[0:00] Let's go to Psalm 1, Psalm 1. You know, I don't know if I've ever preached on Psalm 1 since I've been here.
[0:19] Psalm 1, very familiar Psalm, a lot of people know, Psalm 1. You all know the Bible is a book about God.
[0:33] And it tells us the revelation of himself, who he is, what he has done, what he is going to do. And there's probably no book that helps us to get closer relationship with God than the book of Psalms.
[0:47] The difference between the book of Psalms and a lot of other books is the fact that it is not about Israel's history. It's not about things that they went through. It is about man's relationship with God.
[1:02] It talks about matters of the heart. It talks about how we should relate to him. Some have said that the key verse of Psalms is Psalm 29, verse 2, which says, Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name.
[1:20] Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. Give glory and give worship. That's what we're here for, is to give glory and to give worship to God.
[1:32] It's the most quoted book in the New Testament. It's quoted more times than any other book of the Old Testament. It's, some have said, the foundation.
[1:45] Psalm 1 is the foundation of all the other Psalms. So we're going to look at that this morning. Look at Psalm 1. Follow along with me as we look at Psalm 1. Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
[2:01] But his delight is in the law of the Lord. And in his law doth he meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season.
[2:12] His leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff, which the wind driveth away.
[2:23] Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish.
[2:37] Let's pray. Father, open our hearts and minds to the things you have for us today. Lord, I pray that you would take this word this morning. You would touch our hearts.
[2:50] You would help us to see our responsibilities as we live for you. Lord, you want to bless. You want to take care of us. You say we will be blessed if we follow you.
[3:04] Lord, help us this morning to see your hand in these verses. May we see your hand at work in our lives. And Lord, not everything that's going to happen in our life is going to be positive.
[3:17] But Lord, even the negative things can help us. Lord, help us to learn this morning. In Jesus' name, amen. Blessed is the man.
[3:30] The first three verses of this psalm talks about what it means to be a blessed man. Blessed. Happy. Blessed. One who sees God's honor and blessing on his life.
[3:41] We all want to see God's hand of blessing upon us. We all want to see God working in us. He says, here's how you get to be a blessed man. Here's how you get to do things.
[3:52] See, Satan wants to throw all kinds of distractions in our way. He wants to give us all kinds of things that are going to take us off the track of being what God wants us to be. The Bible tells us we need to have our heart fixed.
[4:03] We're to set our eyes on Christ and stay there. But the devil's always trying to do things. When I was in college, one of the things we had to do, I went to an unusual college. One of the things we had to do every year was an opera.
[4:16] They put on an opera and we had to go to it. Oh, an opera? Really? Oh. Don't say that around my wife. She used to do it. So, quiet. But the opera, the very first one I went to was the best thing I could have gone to.
[4:30] If I had to learn opera, this was a great one. And you probably, most of you probably never heard of it. It's called Mephistopheles. It's the story of Faust. And you know the story of Faust.
[4:41] He's praying. The devil's trying to distract him. The devil's trying to get his attention and stuff. And so, here I am, kid from central Maine, watching an opera. But they did such a great job.
[4:54] Because they had Faust. He's down on his knees. He's praying. And the devil's over here on a turntable on the stage. And he's whistling. And he's jumping. And he's doing all kinds of things to distract Faust from what he's, from the prayers that he's putting up.
[5:11] And he's just doing all kinds of things. And then, all of a sudden, you see him going down. And you see flames coming up around. I mean, this is a cool opera. You have flames coming up around this guy and stuff. It was just amazing.
[5:22] And while he's praying and the devil's going down, there's a spotlight that comes down on Faust. And they somehow did glitter type things and stuff. So, it's coming down and on. It was the coolest thing ever.
[5:33] For a kid from central Maine, they're like, ooh, these aren't so bad after all. Hmm. The devil's always trying to distract us. He's always trying to get us off on different things. God says, don't get sidetracked.
[5:48] Don't follow the devil's distractions. I want to bless you. Follow me, and I will bless you. And as I prayed, sometimes that means negative things in our life.
[6:01] So, the sermon today is going to come from the negative side. You know, a lot of today, people want prosperity gospel. They want health and wealth gospel. They want all those kind of things. And you're just going to, everything that happens in your life is going to be just the greatest thing ever.
[6:15] Well, if you've been a Christian for any time, you know that's not always true. There are times you go through times that are not good. So, first thing this morning, I'm going to give you the negative standards.
[6:26] The negative standards. God says in that first verse, he says, blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.
[6:45] All negatives. He says, don't do these things if you want to be blessed by God. Don't follow after those things.
[6:57] He says, God wants to bless you, but in order for him to bless you, you're going to have to avoid some things. There's going to have to be some things you don't go after. You say, I thought the Bible was all positive about things.
[7:08] Can I remind you of one section of scripture? You don't have to turn there. You'll recognize it as soon as I start quoting things from it. Exodus 20. Exodus 20, beginning at around verse 3, it says things like, thou shalt have no other gods before me.
[7:27] Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.
[7:37] Honor thy father and thy mother. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness. Thou shalt not covet.
[7:48] Ten commandments. A whole lot of negative in there. Don't do this. If you want to be blessed by God, don't do these things.
[7:59] See, we need to understand that this is from God's word. And God is sometimes negative about some things. He says there's some things you don't want to do. There's some things we cannot do if we're going to be blessed by God.
[8:14] There are some things I cannot read if I'm going to be blessed by God. There are some things that I cannot look upon. There are some places I cannot go. There are some things that I should never say if I want God's blessing upon my life.
[8:29] I have to follow his standards. And some of those are negative. He says, blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly.
[8:42] That's a negative. Don't walk in the counsel of the ungodly. Then he goes on and says, nor standeth in the way of sinners. See, the way of sinners are heading toward hell.
[8:54] How can I be blessed if I'm walking that direction? I need to be walking toward Christ and what he has for me. Then he goes on and he says, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. Think about it.
[9:05] I'm walking along and I see Cully and Judy down here. And they're doing something and I stop. I'm like, I'm watching what they're doing.
[9:17] And I go, oh, this is fascinating. I'm going to. Wow. He goes, whoo. And we stop.
[9:28] And did you notice something there? If I was to be down there on the front pew, I'm not Mike Schrock, so I don't move around quite that much. If I was down there in the front pew and I sat down, you can tell me from anybody else out there, could you?
[9:44] I'm just one of the people in the crowd. He says, don't do that. Don't just be one of the crowd that goes along. Don't be someone who walks around and then all of a sudden gets caught up in something and you stand there and you stare at it for a while and then you're like, man, this is really fascinating.
[10:00] I'm going to sit down for a while and watch this. He says, don't do that. It's not. Usually you think of something like that. He walked.
[10:11] He stood. He sat. That's a progression toward things. And it is, but it's really a digression. I'm really going backwards. I'm not walking with the Lord like I should be. I'm actually going backwards from doing what I should be doing.
[10:24] You know, when I'm sitting down there, like I said, you can't really tell. I'm just part of the crowd. And he says, don't do that.
[10:37] Don't stand in the way. Don't sit. Don't sit. Now, how do we apply this to us? The way we live, the way we work, the things that we do.
[10:50] You know, maybe wherever you work. Do you distinguish yourself as a Christian? Do you distinguish yourself as someone who's different?
[11:02] You know, we're not to be the same as everybody else. Do we go into the lunchroom? And as we're there, do we just hang out with everybody and just laugh at their jokes and follow along and, you know, even contribute and stuff?
[11:22] Or do they know that we are Christians, that we are different? We don't talk the same. We don't do things the same. And you don't have to be obnoxious about it and stuff.
[11:34] Just don't do what they're doing and people will notice. Like, you don't swear. You don't say these things. You don't tell dirty jokes. You don't do. Why? People will notice when you do that.
[11:50] He says, you should not walk, stand, or sit or be identified. He says, look, have compassion on them. Witness to them.
[12:01] Seek to bring them to Christ. But don't lose your Christian testimony while you're there. We're supposed to be witnesses, so we have to talk to them.
[12:12] We're supposed to show them Christ, so we have to be around. We can't do that if we just hide off somewhere. But he says, don't lose your testimony. Follow Christ.
[12:23] If you begin walking with them and standing with them and then finally sitting with them, you're going to talk like them. You're going to behave like them. You're going to do what they do. And the testimony for Christ is gone.
[12:35] He says, be so very careful. He says, there are certain negatives that you have to have in your life if you're going to serve the Lord Jesus Christ. Then he continues on, verse 2 and 3.
[12:48] But let his delight be in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night, and he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water that bringeth forth his fruit in the season.
[13:00] His leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. This one I call nonconformist saints. See, we're not supposed to walk or stand or sit, which means we're not going to conform to what they have.
[13:19] We're going to be saints of God who stand and show a difference in the things that we do. See, a blessed man is not like the ungodly man. The blessed man is going to have a difference in his life.
[13:34] The blessed man is going to show things to people that says, look, I know the Lord Jesus Christ. I have him in my life. What's the first thing he's going to do? Well, did you notice it said there, the first thing he's going to do is he's going to delight in the law of the Lord.
[13:50] Unsaved people are not going to delight in the word of God. Unsaved people don't care about the word of God. Unsaved people do not follow the word of God, but you delight in it.
[14:03] You take it in and you make it a part of you. See, what I said about not being obnoxious, we can be sweet and kind and compassionate and Christ-like to the people that are around us, but we can still stand up and speak up for the word of God.
[14:22] Show them what it means to us. Show them how important it is to us. People should know that we're Christians by the things that we say and do.
[14:36] And the things that we say and do, if they're backed up by scripture, are going to make a whole world of difference in what people see in us and how they look at us. People need to know you're a Christian.
[14:48] Every sphere of your life. We like to go to governors from time to time. We know most of the waitresses and waiters in there.
[15:04] You go in and you ask them, what about that couple over there? Oh, yeah, he's the pastor of the church up there. He'll leave you a track. He'll do that. They know that there's something different.
[15:19] Do people where you go to eat know that there's something different? When people go where you work, do they know something's different? Maybe some of you carpool. Do the people in your carpool know that there's something different about you?
[15:31] Our life should be like Psalm 37. Psalm 37, beginning at verse 1, it says, Fret not thyself of evildoers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity.
[15:46] For they shall soon be cut down like the grass and wither as the green herb. Trust in the Lord and do good, so that thou shalt dwell in the land and verily thou shalt be fed.
[15:59] Delight thyself also in the Lord and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. He will give you the desires of your heart if you delight yourself in the Lord.
[16:13] Oh, man, have I got a list of some things I would like. Let me give you a little hint. If you delight yourself in the Lord, your delights are going to become, his delights are going to become your delights.
[16:28] I don't need the Lamborghini I keep talking about. I don't need all those different things. My desires are going to be what God's desires are.
[16:39] I'm going to do what he wants me to do. Paul wrote to the church at Philippi. He said in chapter 2, verse 13, he said, It is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.
[16:57] God's going to work in you both to will, to desire, and to do his good pleasure. He wants you to desire what he desires. And if he's working in your life and you're in the word of God and you're doing those, that's what you want too.
[17:12] You want to see God at work in your life. You want to see him exalted. You want to see him uplifted. Someone said, The wonder of what I am doing is not that I am serving God.
[17:28] The wonder is that I desire to serve God. Think about that. It's not that I'm serving God. A lot of people will try to serve God. A lot of people will do things that they think are serving God.
[17:40] But the fact that I desire to serve God, that's the telling point. That's what I want. Do you want to serve God? Do you delight in him?
[17:52] He says, Blessed is the man who does that. Blessed is the man who wants to do what God wants him to do. He says, And in his law, there in verse 1, or verse 2.
[18:11] Wait a minute. It will delight in the law of the Lord. And in his law doth he meditate day and night. He says, We're going to meditate day and night in his word.
[18:25] Remember Joshua? Joshua chapter 1, verse 8. The book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth, but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein.
[18:38] For then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success. He says, The man who meditates on the word of God, the man who loves the word of God, the one who delights in the word of God, he says, His heart, His calling, His thing will line up with the word of God.
[18:59] You know, did you realize you can be busy for God and not necessarily be blessed? Did you know that you can be in church every Sunday and not necessarily be blessed? Do we delight in the Lord?
[19:11] I mean, it's one thing to come to church and say, It's Sunday morning, I get to go to church because that's the right thing to do. Or do you delight in the law of the Lord? Do you delight in what he has for you?
[19:24] And then it says, You'll be like a tree planted. You'll be like a tree planted in the rivers of water. Think about that.
[19:37] Some trees, out here in our side thing here where all the rocks are. Every once in a while we'll find trees growing in there. Nobody planted them there. Believe me.
[19:48] We don't want them there. But sometimes, you know, seeds will fall and they'll go in and they'll, you know, start to grow and stuff and things. But he says, No, you're going to be like a tree planted by the river of water.
[20:01] I'm going to go way out of my comfort zone today. I'm going to give you an object lesson. And I'm going to use some of you. Debbie, Judy, Cully, can you guys come over here for a second?
[20:13] I know you don't want to be singled out, but come on over. Fred and Sue, can you come up here too? I have a wireless mic so I can move around. You don't have to face them.
[20:28] You can face that way if you want. It doesn't matter. I teach. I'm not worried. You teach. That's right. You teach. All right. So Debbie, stand right there. Okay. Judy, about a foot away. Right there. About a foot away.
[20:41] About a foot away. I didn't forget you, Cully. Come over here. Right there. Okay. I just planted them where I want them.
[20:56] I saw you moving around. I want you where I had. No. I planted them. They're in a place. I put them in a place. God says, you'll be like a tree planted by the rivers of water.
[21:11] Rivers of water. Okay. So I've got them planted. There has to be water. Where does water come from? Yeah. Jesus is the water of life.
[21:22] So they're planted, the blessed man, planted by the rivers of water. If they're planted, and they're getting the water, what's going to happen? They're going to grow.
[21:34] Okay, you guys? Put your hands up like this. It's okay if you touch one another and stuff too. Come on, Cully. There you go. All right. We're planting. Now, think about this for a second.
[21:46] As a church, planted, growing, watered, growing. What does that do? You know, the Bible talks about praying for a hedge about us.
[21:59] And we usually think angels. And angels, it's true. God put a hedge about us, angels. But what happens if our church members, God has you here for a reason.
[22:13] He has you planted here. He's watering you through his word and through him. And you're starting to grow. What does that make? Put your hands up, Fred. Okay.
[22:24] What does that do? It starts to make a hedge. And so, we, praying for one another, we, trying to be an encouragement to one another, we, trying to be a church member that we should be, praying for each other, form a hedge about the people in this church.
[22:44] You can go sit down now. Thank you. I want to tell you fabulous actors, give them a hand. Keep your hands up. No, you can put them down now. He says, look, that man, who's blessed, is going to be like a man that's planted.
[23:06] And he's going to be watered. And he's going to grow. He says, look, not only that, he's going to bring forth fruit. If we're growing, we're going to bring forth fruit.
[23:19] In John chapter 15, verses 1 and 2, it says, I am the true vine, and my father is the husbandman. Every branch in me, that beareth not fruit, is taken away.
[23:30] And every branch that beareth fruit, he purges that, that it may bring forth more fruit. Purging, is painful sometimes. But he says, look, God wants us to bear fruit.
[23:43] And purging sometimes can help bear fruit. He goes on. Look at verse 3. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivets of water, to bring forth his fruit in his season. His leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
[23:58] The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. Therefore, the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.
[24:11] We're going to have fruit. Actually, the Bible talks about fruit, more fruit, and much fruit. We can have fruit, but sometimes that takes some purging. There's some things that have to go out of our life.
[24:22] Another negative. Some things have to go out of our life in order for us to be used by God. But he says, His leaf shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
[24:36] If you study the word prosper in the Bible, it doesn't always mean wealth. It doesn't always mean material gain. It could mean God's blessings on your life. You'll be blessed with God's blessings on your life.
[24:49] And he's talking about, blessed is the man that walketh not. Blessed is the man that does what God asks him to do. I'm running out of time already.
[25:01] Look at verse 4. The ungodly are not so, but like the chaff, which the wind driveth away. Third point.
[25:15] An unchanging statute. An unchanging statute. A promise from God. He says, Look, the ungodly are not like you. The ungodly are not like the blessed man.
[25:26] He says, They're like the chaff that the wind bloweth away. You ever watch when they do the wheat and stuff? They throw it up in the air.
[25:38] The kernels will land. The chaff is blown away. He says, Look, the ungodly are like the chaff. They don't realize it. But he says, The chaff don't understand what is going to happen.
[25:52] They don't understand what is about to take place. There's a lot of people who think, Oh, if we could just get these Christians out of here, this place would be so much better. They don't realize if Christians were not here, God's judgment would already be falling on the earth.
[26:10] As long as we're here, there's hope. Once we're gone, there is no more hope. Who's going to tell them the gospel?
[26:22] Who's going to tell them about Jesus Christ when Christians are gone? He says, They're going to be like the chaff. Blown away. No hope whatsoever.
[26:34] Verse 5, Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, and the sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous, and the way of the ungodly shall perish.
[26:49] Ungodly are on their way to hell. The only joy that they have is whatever they find on this earth. And we can have joy, and we can have good times on this earth, but do we really want that to be all that there is?
[27:03] No. There is so much more. The Bible tells us, I've pointed out numerous times in Ephesians, that God will do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think.
[27:16] Picture heaven in your mind. Right? Everybody got a picture of heaven in your mind right now? He says God's going to do abundantly above all that we can ask or think.
[27:30] Whatever you're thinking of right now doesn't even come close. To what heaven's going to be like. You ever had times in your life, as a Christian even, when you're like, I just don't get it.
[27:47] I don't understand what God is doing. I don't know why God did this, or why God allowed this to happen. I don't understand what God is doing, and what he's trying to teach me. I just do not know. Do you notice what it said there in verse 6?
[28:00] The Lord knoweth the way of the righteous. He knows your way. You know, there are times when we go through things, and we're just like, I don't get it.
[28:12] There was a song 25 years ago or more, they used to say, when you can't trace his hand, trust his heart.
[28:24] We don't always see what God is doing. We don't always see where he's leading. But he says, trust his heart. Notice it said there, the Lord knoweth the way.
[28:37] God, where are you? I don't see you. I don't know what you're doing. God says, I know where you are. I know what you're going through.
[28:48] You remember that? Job. You all remember Job and all the things that Job went through? I mean, he lost everything. And he got to a point in Job 23 where he's like, I don't know what God is doing.
[29:02] I don't see God at work. I don't know where he is. I don't know. And then he says in verse 10, Job 23, 10, he says, but he knoweth the way that I take. When he has tried me, I shall come forth as gold.
[29:17] I don't know where he is. I don't know what he's doing. But he knows the way that I take. He knows exactly where I am. On this path that I'm going through, he knows exactly where I am on that path.
[29:29] He is watching over me. He is taking care of me. He is setting up something for me ahead in the path so that I get out of all of this. He is taking care of me. I just have to, oh, there it is again.
[29:42] Trust him. Trust him. How many times have I said that lately? Trust him. There are times in my life when I'm going, God, I don't understand.
[29:53] God, why is this happening? God, why is that happening? God says, don't worry about it. I know exactly where you are. I know exactly what you're going through.
[30:04] I know exactly what I'm going to do about it. He's there watching us all the time. There are times you get to, how can I go on?
[30:14] How can I continue? You remember that God knows exactly where you are. Don't fret. Don't worry about what's going on. God says, everything is still under his control.
[30:28] Everything is still within his reach. It's under his control. God says, look, I'm going to give you some negative things to think about.
[30:41] Some negative standards. Things you should not do if you want to be a blessed man. And I'm going to give you some things that you're not going to conform to this world. You're going to be a non-conformist saint.
[30:51] You're not going to conform to the things of this world. You're not going to follow this world. You're not going to walk in their ways. But I will give you this never changing statute.
[31:02] I will give you this promise. I will always be with you and know where you are. And I will take care of you. This psalm sets the foundation, like I said, for everything else that is going to come.
[31:17] As we look at psalms and you read psalms and you follow the psalms, he says, remember, I've got you. I'm taking care of you.
[31:28] I'm going to meet your need. Some of you here know the story of Ron Hamilton. He recently passed away. But when he was a younger man in his 20s, he had cancer of the eye.
[31:40] And he had to have an eye removed. And because of that, he started wearing a patch over it. And the people at his church, the kids at his church in particular, started calling him Patch.
[31:50] And then they called him Patch the Pirate. And most of you have heard of Patch the Pirate and the songs that come from there and the different plays and things.
[32:02] He took what was a negative. God, where are you? Why would I do that? I'm only in my 20s. Why would I have this happen to me? And he just took it and ran with it. And God has used it tremendously over the years.
[32:14] And one of the first songs he wrote when all that happened was 475 in your hymn book. Turn to page 475. Thank you.
[32:39] Thank you.