Today’s reading was Psalm 1:
Blessed is the one
who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
or sit in the company of mockers,
2 but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
and who meditates on his law day and night.
3 That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
whatever they do prospers.
4 Not so the wicked!
They are like chaff
that the wind blows away.
5 Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.
6 For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked leads to destruction.
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So, bit by bit…
v1 Blessed is the one
who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
or sit in the company of mockers,
Did you notice the progression of verse 1. The person starts with walking in step with the wicked, then stands in the way that sinners take, then sits in the company of mockers.
This suggests to me a desensitization is taking place. To be sure, you can accidentally be on the same road as a wicked person, but then you choose to stand in the place where you know sinners congregate, and finally you are comfortable enough to sit down with them, and become one of the mockers.
Walk, stand, sit. Wicked, sinners, mockers.
This is the old story of the frog being boiled in the kettle. The temperature increase is so incremental that, allegedly, the frog does not notice that he is slowly being boiled alive, and so does not jump out.
What is our version of this slowly boiling kettle? Are there thought patterns or speech patterns that we are slowly adopting because they are commonplace among our colleagues or social circle? And are these thought patterns or speech patterns honoring to God?
I am always saddened when I hear Christians using coarse language. In some circles, it has almost become fashionable to be Christian and crude, to show how “free under grace” you are. It’s almost as if the person is saying, “Look how close to the edge I can come. Am I not hip and liberated from the shackles of confining, legalistic Christianity?”
Hmmm. Are you also liberated from the biblical command in Ephesians 4:29
Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.
When the Bible talks about freedom, it is freedom FROM sin, not freedom TO sin. We are freed up to be holy, to be the person God always intended us to be. Coarse language does not make us cool, or hip, or liberated. It makes us ape the world, being “of” the world, rather than just “in” the world. Being different should not cause embarrassment for the Christian. Rather it is our calling.
And in terms of thought patterns, and being in the seat of mockers… it has become fashionable to maintain a façade of detached irony, as though everything is amusing, and nothing deserves to be taken seriously. We are above it all, detached observers, amused by the antics of our fellow humans. I thank God that he was not above it all. If the incarnation is anything it is a rebuke to detached irony.
God attached himself, in the form of Jesus, to the womb of one of these fellow humans, and there was nothing funny about the cross.
Mockery, and cynicism have no place in the thought life of Christians. When we mock, we usually mock another person. Would we do that so freely if we thought to ourselves, “This is a person that Jesus loves and died for.”
2 but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
and who meditates on his law day and night.
This is the corrective. The law is like the bumpers on a bowling lane. It provides an edge, a boundary to push us back towards the center of God’s will. As we refresh our minds with Scripture, we are aligning our thoughts with the way God thinks. We are reminding ourselves of what’s important to Him. We are washing our minds with truth and revelation, and we are the better for it.
3 That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
whatever they do prospers.
What a wonderful promise. Like this tree we are connected to the source, and we will be fruitful. Fruit for the Christian is two-fold: character, and good deeds. As we are connected with God, he refines our character, and moves us to make this world a better place, one deed at a time. As I moved through this week, there have been some “accidental meetings” that were actually anything but. As I seek to be God’s instrument, his hands will guide me to the conversations and interactions that I need to have.
As a pastor, I tend to think that my major contributions to a person’s life will come through my sermons, but experience shows that it’s the 5 and 10 minute “serendipitous” conversations that more often make the difference.
4 Not so the wicked!
They are like chaff
that the wind blows away.
5 Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.
6 For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked leads to destruction.
In contrast, the wicked will not prosper. Although they may appear to do so between the brief boundaries of birth and death, in eternal terms, they will not. They will crumple at the judgment, even as we run into the arms of our loving Lord.
What a contrast. What a sobering thought as we evaluate ourselves. So, just to make the pain a little more pressing, some diagnostic questions for us today:
• is my language honoring to God, or do I engage in course or unwholesome speech?
• am I being influenced negatively by who I am around? What can I do about that? Can I remove myself from the situation or challenge the nature of the conversations, or just set the bar higher by the way I speak?
• am I cynical, or am I optimistic and hopeful as I consider God’s power to redeem situations and people?
• am I regularly washing my mind in God’s word, so that he can refine my character and move me to good deeds?
May we be like the trees, fruitful and beautiful in his eyes.