“Biblical Spirituality” – Characteristic 5: Morality
December 1, 2013 | by David Ferguson | Psalm 1
Series: Biblical Spirituality
1Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the
way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; 2but his delight is in the law of the
LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. 3He is like a tree planted by
streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all
that he does, he prospers. 4The wicked are not so, but are like chaff that the wind
drives away. 5Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in
the congregation of the righteous; 6for the LORD knows the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked will perish.
Introduction: The Message of the Message
Eugene Peterson, in his contemporary translation of this text put’s it like this: “1How well
God must like you—you don’t hang out at Sin Saloon, you don’t slink along Dead-End Road, you
don’t go to Smart-Mouth College. 2Instead you thrill to GOD’S Word, you chew on Scripture day
and night. 3You’re a tree replanted in Eden, bearing fresh fruit every month, Never dropping a
leaf, always in blossom. 4You’re not at all like the wicked, who are mere windblown dust—
5Without defense in court, unfit company for innocent people. 6GOD charts the road you take.
The road they take is Skid Row.” Psalm 1, The Message
The Key That Unlocks a Moral Life
Until we are gripped with joyful inner impulses of the gospel of grace, we are always
thinking in terms of external duties. External pressures from outside force us to make choices
about the appropriate ways to act. For some of us, everything is a list. Conform to church
expectations. Dress a certain way. Talk a certain way. Act a certain way. Here’s the list of things
to do to please God. Now, work up the will power to do what we’re expected to do. That’s
religion. That’s morality.
C.S. Lewis is incredibly helpful here. Speaking on morality he writes, “A perfect man
would never act from a sense of duty. He’d always want the right thing more the wrong one.
Duty is only a substitute for love of God or others like a crutch, which is a substitute for a leg. Most
of us need the crutch for a time. But of course it’s idiotic to use the crutch when a leg – our own
loves and tastes and habits – can do the journey on their own.”
“Morality or duty – the Law – never yet made a man happy in himself or dear to others.
It’s shocking, but undeniable. We do not wish to be or live among people who are clean, honest
or kind as a matter of duty. We prefer to associate with people who like being clean or honest or
kind. The mere suspicion that what seemed like an act of spontaneous friendliness or generosity
was really done as a duty poisons it.”
So, this is why we need the gospel. God takes sinners staggering on crippled legs and
transforms them into runners who run because God, by his grace, has performed a healing
miracle. Where we once felt obligated to run, we now run for the joy of fellowship with Jesus.
Psalm 1 is an Old Testament song that is surprisingly helpful here. It’s one of the few wisdom
psalms. It teaches the wisdom of a moral life and yet, it says it so clearly. A moral life springs from
a soul delighted by the Word of God!
The Blessedness of a Word-Ruled Soul [1-3]
The psalmist begins by calling the man who walks in righteousness blessed. In Scripture,
“blessed” is much stronger than happy. To be blessed of God is to enjoy God’s special favor and
grace. God loves to bless righteousness. He looks favorably on lives that hate what God hates
and loves what God loves. The reason God does not bless the way described in verses 1-3 is
because he hates it!
Note the downward progression of the three verbs of verses 1-3. The wicked whose way
God hates walk, then stand, then sit. The psalmist wants us to see that a life lived against God,
like a man who doesn’t know he’s sick, is a slow death.
The psalmist gives us three descriptions of the wicked way. First, the wicked way offers us
its “counsel.” What’s the counsel the wicked give? Job says, “14[The wicked] say to God,
‘Depart from us! We do not desire the knowledge of your ways. 15What is the Almighty, that we
should serve him? And what profit do we get if we pray to him.’” In other words, the counsel of
the wicked is forget God. You’ll be happier without him.
Second, the psalmist says the wicked way is the way of sinners. To not “stand in the way
of sinners” is to live an opposite life. The righteous stand for what God stands for. The wicked
stand for the things God won’t stand for. Solomon says of the way of sinners that their the kind of
people who would “set an ambush for the innocent without reason … 17but [Solomon says]
these men lie in wait for their own blood; they set an ambush for their own lives” (Proverbs 1:1018). Translation: sinners live self absorbed lives. Many seem like winners in this life. But all Christrejecting sinners are terrifying losers in the next.
Third, the psalmist says walking in the way of the wicked means you join “scoffers” in
their scoffing. A scoffer is like a person who mocks people with regularity. It’s a person who loves
sarcasm even if it comes at the expense of others feelings. Proverbs 1:22 asks, “How long, O
simple ones, will you love being simple? How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools
hate knowledge?” Proverbs 21:24 says, “Scoffer” is the name of the arrogant, haughty man who
acts with arrogant pride. And Proverbs 3:34 says, “34Toward the scorners he dis scornful, but to
the humble he gives favor.
Against the backdrop of the wicked, the psalmist says in verse 2 that the blessed man’s
“delight is in the law of the LORD.” And because he craves God’s Word “he meditates on it day
and night.” He lingers over the words of God, not because he has to, but because he wants to.
What comes next is so motivating to me. The psalmist says that whatever really shapes a man’s
thinking, shapes his life. A man who desires and lives upon the Word of God is “like a tree
planted by streams of living water that yields it’s fruit in season, and its leaf does not wither. In all
that he does, he prospers.” So, in a nutshell, a life that gets God’s blessing; that feels God’s
blessing and sees its fruit; is a life that loves God’s rule.
The Doom of the Wicked [4-5]
But the wicked hates God’s rule over their lives and the result the psalmist says in verses 45 is that it all goes bad in the end. Unlike the fruitful tree firmly rooted in the ground, well fed, and
consistently healthy (notice, I didn’t say “constantly”), the wicked the psalmist says “are like
chaff that the wind drives away” and like criminals with no excuse before the Judge. “Chaff”
gives us the image of the weightless, useless stuff that is thrown away when grain is harvested.
The courtroom imagery paints a picture for us of sinners with that can’t make a case for their
innocence.
Conclusion: Biblical Spirituality and Morality
In verse 6, the psalmist communicates God’s gracious ultimatum to us this morning. “…
for the LORD knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.” A spiritual
person is a moral person, not because he works hard to be moral, but because he is led by the
Spirit of God. And the Spirit of God lead us to love what God loves.