If you would, now go back to
the first psalm, the very first psalm. The Jews say that this
is a psalm written by David. There are a few who believe that
Ezra wrote this psalm, in which case that would have been about
450 years before our Lord came. But the vast majority of commentators
and Jewish writers believe that David is the inspired author
of the very first psalm. And that would make this psalm
to have been written over a thousand years before our Lord Jesus came
into the world. It is notable that believing
David to be the author that he begins the psalm with the word
blessed, which puts me in mind of, and should put you in mind
of, David's son and David's Lord, whose first recorded sermon was
that one that I just read to you a few moments ago, the Beatitudes. And as David began this psalm
with blessed, all the blessednesses of the people of God. So our
Lord begins his public ministry in his first, not his first sermon,
but the first one recorded has to do with the blessings that
he pronounces upon the people of God. The Psalm, Psalm 1, really is
divided into two parts. The first three verses are about
the blessed man. The second three verses are about
the blessed man settling in contrast with the wicked. Mr. Spurgeon made an interesting
comment upon this first psalm, he said, this is like a summary
psalm. That is, this is a summary of
all of the rest of the psalms. The 149 psalms that follow this,
this is like a summary psalm. Because here in this first psalm,
we have the blessed man set forth, the people of God, the righteous.
Those who are made the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ. Those
who are forgiven. Those who are the true people
of God. And then, toward the end, toward
the last three verses of the Psalm, we're told about the wicked,
about unbelievers. And then the following 149 Psalms
kind of enlarge upon the righteous, and the wicked. So this is, and
I think Mr. Spurgeon was correct, this could
be considered a summary psalm. It's like this is the foundation
and the rest of the house is built upon this. This is the
keel of the ship as it were. And the rest of the ship rests
upon this first psalm. is indeed a blessed psalm. Two weeks ago, I gave you a bit
of an introduction to this psalm. The message was, who is the blessed
man? And just to kind of refresh your
memory, we went through the psalms, seeing that the blessed man is
one chosen unto salvation. What a blessing. Multitudes were
not chosen unto salvation. They were bypassed with the mercy
of God. But you who believe the gospel,
you who embrace the Lord Jesus, you who see the glory of God
shining in the face of the Son of God, you who are made to rejoice
in the full and free forgiveness of sins, and the imputation of
righteousness through the obedience and death of the Lord Jesus Christ. The reason is because you were
chosen of God. He ordained you unto everlasting
life. He ordained you not to wrath,
not to wrath, but unto everlasting life. also considered blessed is the
man who trusts in the Lord, whose only trust for salvation is in
Christ, who has no other foundation, who has no other basis for believing
that all is well between him or her and a holy God except
Jesus Christ the Savior. Blessed is the person who trusts
the Lord. Oh, God, give us a greater faith. Deepen our trust in the Lord
Jesus. The more we're enabled to trust
Him, the more joyful we will be. The more we're brought to
believe Him and rest in Him, for salvation certainly, but
for all things, the happier we will be and the more contented
we will be. And then blessed is the man who
fears the Lord, who has a reverential respect and awe of God. People who don't use the name
of God as some kind of byword, or in speaking in slang, who
don't use the name of the Lord flippantly, but people who realize
His name is holy and reverent and speak of the Lord with great
respect and worship Him. Blessed is the person who fears
the Lord. Blessed is the man whose sins
have been forgiven and pardoned. We're told in the scriptures
by our Lord in Hebrews chapter 10, as he inspired the apostle
to write, your sins and iniquities, God says, will I remember no
more. And we confess we remember many
of our sins. Most of them we don't remember.
Because many of them we're not even aware that we've committed
them. But there are some sins, and maybe I'm speaking to somebody
tonight who has some glaring sins that still trouble you and
still cause your heart to ache. Know this, the blood of the Lord
Jesus has washed them all away. And it's so powerful that God
says, your sins and iniquities will I remember no more. I will never remember them against
you. Blessed is the person who is
forgiven and who enters into the joy of being forgiven. And then blessed is the person
who is not offended by Christ, or the doctrine of salvation
by grace, by the blood and righteousness of Christ. The word here blessed
is really in the plural. And literally it would be all
the blessednesses of the man. And notice this, and I'll get
back to this in a little bit, the word man is singular. Blessedness,
blessed or blessednesses, that's plural. All the tremendous heap
of blessednesses is upon the one, because we're each individuals. Upon the one that walketh not
in the counsel and the advice according to the principles of
the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth
in the seat of the scornful. Oh, the blessednesses of that
person who is led to cast themselves fully, fully upon the Lord Jesus
Christ, and know the sweetness of the Savior and his great salvation. Do you remember in the book of
Numbers there was a king by the name of Balak of Moab? And he hired actually kind of
a soothsayer by the name of Balaam. And people had a lot of confidence
in Balaam. He was a false prophet. And yet, he said a lot of good
things, as false prophets tend to do. In fact, I may preach
something about that fellow this coming Lord's Day morning. But
anyway, when King Balak went to Balaam, he said, I'll give
you riches. I want you to curse Israel. And the Lord said to Balaam,
thou shalt not curse the people. And here's the reason, for they
are blessed. And you and I, who've been blessed
of God with all spiritual blessings from old eternity, we can never
be cursed because we're blessed. We're blessed in Christ Jesus.
There is therefore now no condemnation. May I just put the word curse
there? There's no curse to them who
are in Christ Jesus, who walk not according to the flesh, but
after the spirit. We have been blessed and we cannot
be cursed. We cannot be cursed. I want you
to hold your place here and go to the book of Galatians chapter
three. The book of Galatians chapter
3. We will never know the curse
of God because that curse which was due to our sins was born
by our Savior. He was cursed in our stead. Look here in Galatians chapter
3 and verse 10. Galatians 3.10, For as many as are of the works
of the law are under the curse. For it is written, Cursed is
every one that continueth not in all things which are written
in the book of the law to do them. But that no man is justified
or made righteous in the sight of God, it is evident, it is
obvious to those who know something about the Scriptures and know
something about the grace of God in Christ Jesus. For the justified, the righteous,
shall live by faith. And the law is not a faith, but
the man that doeth them, shall live in them. Now look at verse
13. Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made
a curse for us. For it is written, cursed is
everyone that hangeth on a tree. Know this, eternal life can only come to
us if the law of God has been satisfied by an eternal death. Do you remember that? Eternal
life. Eternal life can only come to
us when and upon the if eternal death, the law of God and eternal
death has been satisfied. And it has been satisfied in
the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. He was cursed for us. He had no sins of His own, but
He took upon Himself all the sins of all of His elect of all
ages. And the curse of God fell upon
Him. And therefore there can be no
curse to us, only everlasting blessednesses. come to the people
of God. Our Lord settled the issue when
He bore the sins of His people away and answered what the law
fully demanded, death for sin. The law of God will be satisfied
not with the death of a sinner, because a sinner cannot satisfy
divine justice even by suffering in the hell. Sinners are sent
to hell not to pay for their sins. That can never be. No man, no woman can pay for
their sins in hell. Hell was not made as a place
to where people are punished for sin and they finally pay
their indebtedness. That's impossible. The infinite
debt we owe to the justice of God can only be paid by an infinite
being. That's the Lord Jesus Christ. So know this, eternal life comes
only when the issue of eternal death has been settled and answered
by our Lord Jesus Christ. He was what we would call the
penal substitute. He suffered the penalty for our
sins and he died the death that the law of God demanded. And
he brought immortality to light in his resurrection from the
dead. So remember this, the curse of the law is death. And anybody who runs to the law
of God, anybody who runs to their works for salvation or sanctification,
as far as that goes, anybody who runs to the law of God for
life, justification, or sanctification is actually running not to a
blessed place to be, but a cursed place. Because you see in 2 Corinthians
3, we find that the law of God is the ministration of death.
And then Paul says, it's the ministration of condemnation.
That's all the law can do for you. If you run to the law of
God, it will kill you, and it will condemn you, and that's
all it can do. There is no life, there is no
salvation in the law of God. God's law was given to pronounce
us guilty without a hope before God. And then the gospel was given
to give us all hope in Christ Jesus and in his substitutionary
death. So with that being said, go back
to Psalm 1. Back to the text. Blessed is the man. Oh, the blessednesses
of the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. What is a man's walk? That's
the tenor of his life. That's the general way that he's
going. Somebody used this illustration
a long time before I ever came to be in this world. They said a man's tenor of life
would be likened to the Mississippi River. If you flew, and I've
flown over the Mississippi River, it generally goes south. But
there's sometimes it goes to the west, sometimes it goes to
the east, and you know, sometimes it even takes a curve and goes
back to the north a little bit. But the tenor of the river, the
general flow of the river is toward the south. And this is
typical of a child of God. The tenor of our life is walking
with God, walking in a manner that is pleasing to the Lord,
that is, we seek to honor Him and please Him, and we walk according
to the truth of the Gospel. Do we always do that? No. No. But the Bible says of Enoch,
Enoch, what'd it say? Walked with God. He walked with
God. Well, does that mean that Enoch
was perfect in his conduct, in all of his actions? Well, of
course not. He was a sinner saved by grace. I'll tell you another
man that the scripture says was a man who walked with God, Noah.
Noah walked with God. Was Noah sinless in himself? Of course not. He was a sinner
saved by grace. Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. It's all about grace. Grace from
the first man who's ever saved all the way to the last person
who'll ever be saved. But the tenor of their life,
the general direction of a believer's life is, I love the gospel. I love the message of grace.
I love the message of Jesus Christ and Him crucified. And that's
the tenor of our life. And you see, blessed is the man
that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. And the word
counsel not only means advice, though it does mean that. It
also means the aims, the aims of the ungodly, the principles
of the ungodly, the goals of the ungodly. Blessed is the man
who doesn't walk, whose tenor of life is not according to those
who are ungodly, who are wicked. The people of God are certainly
in Christ, we're perfect in Christ, we're righteous. Then in our
activities, in our thoughts, in our motives, we're still sinners
saved by grace. But the longing of our heart
is to be perfect in Christ Jesus someday in glory. And the greatest
burden to a child of God is his or her own sinfulness. It still
plagues us. It still bothers us. And that's
a good thing. It's a good thing that your sin
troubles you. It's a good thing that you're
bothered by the fact that I don't always think upon my Lord. My mind's not always on Him. Sometimes we can go hours and
not even think of Him. And we're embarrassed about that.
But thankfully, He never forgets us. And we're always on His mind. Oh, the blessedness is of the
man that walketh not in the council according to the principles of,
the aims of, the goals of the ungodly. We have different goals. Don't you have a different goal
than the ungodly? Our goal, and keep your eye on
the goal. Our goal is to be with Christ
in eternity. That's our goal. Keep your eye
on the prize. I used to run track. Rob was
really good in track and maybe some of the rest of you as well
too, but especially running the relays, how many times I saw
somebody's got the baton and it's the final leg and they're
running and they do this and hear steps behind them and they
take their eye off the goal, off the final mark. crossing
the finish line. Keep your eyes on the goal. The
goal is to be with Christ. The goal is to be with Him and
enjoy Him and worship Him forever. And that is our aim, is it not?
That's our aim. We don't have the aims of the
ungodly. The ungodly, all they ever think about is getting more,
gaining more, enjoying the pleasures of the world. But we have a higher
goal. We want to know Him, as Paul
says in Philippians, in the power of His resurrection. That's a
more worthy goal. We want to know more fully what
it means to trust the Lord with all of our hearts, as Solomon
says in Proverbs 3. He says, Trust in the Lord with
all thine heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding.
In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.
And that's what we want. And then he says, O the blessednesses,
Not only of the man that walketh not in the counsel and the advice
according to the principles or the goals or the aim of the ungodly,
nor standeth in the way of sinners. The way of sinners is the wrong
way. The way of sinners is the way
of works. It's the way of free willism. I don't want to stand in the
way of sinners who give credit to works and to man's free will
for their salvation. I don't want to stand in the
way of sinners. They're on the broad way that
leads to everlasting destruction. I don't want to stand in that
way. And you'll notice the progress
of this. First, all the blessednesses
of the man that doesn't walk in the counsel and the advice
according to the aims and goals of the ungodly. And then, standing. That's a further progress. Nor standeth in the way of sinners.
I don't want to stand with sinners in the broad way that leads to
destruction. I don't want to stand with them. I associate with them, I preach
to sinners, but I'm not going to stand with them in their opposition
to the gospel. I'm not going to stand with false
religion as they oppose the way of grace and the way of Christ,
the way of sovereign grace. nor standeth in the way of sinners,
nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful." The scornful are those
who mock the things of God. I'm not going to sit with them. But I can tell you, sometimes
you can get into a position when you do sit with them. Simon Peter comes to mind. He sat with them. And I'll tell you, he went out
and wept when the Lord just looked at him. Our Lord looked at that
man and it just melted him. But he didn't stay in the seat
of the scornful. He didn't stay with the mockers. So here's what David does in
verse one. He approaches this subject in
a negative way. all the blessednesses of the
man, the individual, that doesn't walk in the counsel, the advice,
the principle, the aim, the goal of the ungodly, and he doesn't
stand in the way of sinners. We stand in the narrow way. We
stand in Christ, who is the way. And we don't sit in the seat
of the scornful. I don't mock the things of God.
I hope you don't. I said we may get in a position
to where we do in a time of weakness. I love the truth of God. And
may the Lord ever give me boldness and courage to never deny the
truth. But even believers can do that
for a little while. So then in the second verse,
he gets to the positive. Here's what the blessedness,
here's the blessedness of a man who believes the Lord. His delight
is in the law of the Lord. And I think that's not only in
the 10 commandments, it's in all of the word of God. This
is our delight. This is sheep food. It's milk
for the young and meat for the older. We delight in the law
of God. And almost all the commentators
say, by this is meant not only the Ten Commandments or the Torah,
that is the law that was given from Mount Sinai, but the entirety
of the Word of God. We delight in the Word of God.
We find pleasure and joy in the Word of God. It's sheep food. And in his law doth he meditate
day and night. And here's another positive that
is given in the third verse. This person, this man, this woman,
this boy, this girl, who's blessed of God, he shall be like a tree
planted by the rivers of water. He doesn't grow in the garden
of God naturally. Has to be planted. You see, by nature, we're like
weeds. And you don't have to plant weeds.
They just grow on their own. But we're trees of righteousness
that our Lord plants. He puts us in his garden of grace. He plants us by the rivers of
water, the waters of life. That bringeth forth his fruit
in his season. And I think of Galatians chapter
five, the fruit of the spirit. His leaf also shall not wither. We're not gonna die. And whatsoever he doeth shall
prosper. Now, let me give you one more
thing, and that's as far as I'm gonna go on these verses tonight. I wanna give you one more thing,
and this'll kinda set the stage for the message next Wednesday. When I read this, let me read
The first verse again. Blessed is the man that walketh
not in the counsel of the ungodly, but I have. I have. Nor standeth in the way of sinners,
and I have. Nor sitteth in the seat of the
scornful, and I've done that. There was a time when I mocked
the things of God. I thought I was honoring God,
but I was actually mocking the things of God because I didn't
know the truth. You see what this psalm really
is about. It's about one perfect man. And I'll repeat what I said earlier. Oh, the blessedness is of the
man, literally of the only man, the only man that never walked
in the council of the ungodly. He never stood in the way of
sinners and he never sat in the seat of the scornful or the mockers. Who is that perfect man? That's the Lord Jesus Christ. You remember in, and I'll give
you this and I'll quit. You remember in Revelation, our
Lord said, I'm alpha and omega. Remember that? Well, that's the
first letter of the Greek alphabet. And the last letter of the Greek
alphabet, he's the whole alphabet. Well, let me tell you something
about this psalm. This psalm begins with the first
letter of the Hebrew alphabet and ends with the last letter
of the Hebrew alphabet. You see, our Lord Jesus, he is
the entirety of the word of God. Old Testament and New Testament.
It's all about Him. And next week, I'll get more
fully into that subject. Because really, these first three
verses can only truly and fully be applied to our Lord Jesus
Christ. And the last few words of the
third verse are very notable. Whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. Whatever you do doesn't prosper.
Whatever I do doesn't prosper. But what he did and what he's
doing now, this is, as somebody said, this is the only prosperity
gospel. worth preaching and believing.
Whatever Christ does, He always prospers. Okay, let's sing the
closing song. Let me see what it is.