The Key to Blessed Happiness

Psalm 1 is considered the introduction to the entire book of Psalms. It is a wisdom Psalm because it gives wise instruction and counsel. The wisdom that is shared by the Psalmist, King David, in Psalm 1 is in fact the single greatest nugget of wisdom any person could ever want! As a beginning to the Bible book of prayers and songs to the Lord God Almighty, David describes the key to unlocking blessed happiness.

Happiness

The Psalm begins with the word Blessed which means here, happy. This isn’t the happiness of eating your favorite food or reading your favorite book, but rather the deep satisfaction of knowing that everything that matters is on the right track and will work out for your benefit in the end. It’s the happiness that everyone is searching for whether they know it or not, and it’s the happiness only known and experienced when found yet is found by so few.

No participation in wickedness

According to Psalm 1 verses 1 and 2, there are two things someone must do to achieve the status of blessed happiness. First, we are told “do not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers.” Instead of this verse listing three separate things to avoid, it’s actually just one: the Psalmist is saying that the happy have no participation in wickedness whatsoever. Does this mean we can’t talk to anyone who is sinful or not part of the Christian faith? Some think so but it’s absolutely NOT the case. The Bible is full of passages and stories detailing and instructing godly interaction with those outside the faith. The purpose though, is always to demonstrate and communicate the love of Jesus. While this can be done in many ways, it should never be done by participating in their sin and worldliness. In a way it comes down to influence. The person of God should never be influenced by the sinfulness and wickedness. We must carefully guard ourselves, our families, our businesses, and our social lives against worldly influence.

Application

A question for us then is this: What practices and influences in our lives should we disassociate from? It’s a tough question because if we genuinely consider those things in our lives that make us forget about Jesus or tempt us to live unlike Jesus, we will likely find a good deal of negative influences that we need to reject. All these sinful and worldly influences the Psalmist characterizes as wicked.

Delighting in the word of God

After instructing what NOT to do to gain blessed happiness, the Psalmist now describes in verse 2 the second thing one MUST do to gain blessed happiness. Instead of participating with in wickedness, the righteous (or happy/blessed person) must delight in the word of the Lord. The Psalm says law of the Lord because that’s literally all that the people of Israel had at that point in time; they had what was called the Torah: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. Those five books were known as the Law and were the extent of God’s special written revelation to mankind. However, we now have 66 books of inspired writing of God’s special revelation to us. For us today, we may understand delighting in the law of the Lord to be the same as delighting in the word of the Lord. So, blessing comes from delighting in the word of the Lord. But what does it mean to delight?

To be delighted is to be greatly pleased and pleasured by something. When I think of delight, I think of the first time I saw and held each of my boys. I instantly loved them deeply and was delighted by them and would do anything for them. In the same way, to be blessed, one must delight in the word of the Lord. And just like good parents think of their newborns day and night and spend so much time caring for them and interacting with them, so too does the one who delights in the word of the Lord meditate on it day and night.

To meditate on God’s word is not just to read it upon occasion in your devotional time but rather to interact with it and reflect on its truth in the course of daily activities (The Expositors Bible Commentary, Psalms). This is a truth repeated in the New Testament too. The Apostle Paul instructed Christians in Ephesians 5:18-20 to address one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with the heart. Paul was not giving instruction for Sunday morning worship but for the daily life of the believer… singing while working at the jobsite or driving a car or while cooking dinner and washing dishes. Reflecting on the word of God throughout our daily activities makes God and His word a part of our whole day instead of a few minutes in the morning or evening. This is true meditation and is the activity of one who delights in the word of God and cannot get enough. This is the activity of one who is righteous and will make one happy.

Application

Take a moment and consider what role the Bible plays in your daily life. Do you think about spiritual things throughout the day? Do you recite scripture or sing biblical songs while working? Do you talk with others about Biblical truths you’re learning? If not, it’s likely that you are not meditating on God’s word. When the Christian does not meditate on God’s word, our delight fades and we forget the joy of our salvation. Lack of meditation could also be a sign that we have never delighted in God’s word to begin with.

Here’s a challenge for this week: First of all, examine your heart to see if you have delight for God and His word. If you don’t or if the delight has faded, beg God to help you regain that delight. Then, think of one or two ways you can meditate throughout the day on a passage of scripture like Psalm 1…recite it, sing it, journal about it, talk about it, etc., and commit to meditating on that passage of scripture throughout the week. See what God does in your life and heart when His word remains at the forefront of your mind. I have a feeling it might be something similar to the image given in Psalm 1:3.

In Psalm 1:3, the one who delights in and meditates on the word of God is compared to a tree that is planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in seasons and its leaf does not wither. This image of a tree is a picture of the perfect tree. It’s healthy and green and fruitful and because it’s planted by a stream, it never lacks water and so it prospers. By delighting in the stream of God’s word, the righteous one is provided with an unending supply of nutrients that provide life and blessings of peace, joy, and contentment.

Jesus, the Living Word

King David made a regular practice of meditating on God’s word, as is evidenced by the many psalms he wrote which we have and can read (example, Psalm 119:97 – “Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day.”), and he was known as a man after God’s own heart because of his obedience and dedication to God and His word. But now, over three thousand years later, we have a more complete recording of God’s word, much more than King David ever had! Spiritual blessing still remains for those who delight in God’s word and study it and meditate on it. But for Christians today, the truth of this psalm is expanded to a far greater degree than David ever imagined, for we know a greater truth about delighting in God’s word.

According to the Gospels, we are told that Jesus, God in the flesh, is the incarnate Word of God. for this reason, we may rightly say that the call in Psalm 1 to delight in the word of God is, for us in the 21st century, a call to delight in Jesus, the Living Word of God.

To delight in Jesus is to love Him and desire Him and to meditate upon the truth that He as God in the flesh sacrificed His life so that sinners might be saved from their eternal destruction and be restored back to fellowship with God. The truth of Jesus transforms completely and is powerful enough to changes the hardest of hearts. The more we drink up the living water of Jesus the more we are blessed and transformed to become like Him. Blessed then is the one who delights in Jesus, the word of God made flesh. Jesus is the only way to true happiness for Jesus is the way to life!

But to delight in Jesus is not to reject the rest of the Bible, for Jesus is the fulfillment of the law and the prophets (Matthew 5:17-18). No one can say they love Jesus without also saying they love God’s word in the Bible for to truly love Jesus is to love all of God’s revealed word, both the encouraging and the convicting, the easy to understand and the difficult, and to deny that the Bible is God’s word is to deny Jesus Himself. This is what the wicked do.

No delight = wickedness

The wicked are not like the tree planted by streams of living water. Instead, the Psalmist paints a different picture of the wicked. Because the wicked do not delight in the Word of God made flesh nor the written word of God, they are instead like chaff that the wind blows away.

Chaff is the dried and dead husks of the wheat stalk that was discarded because it could not be eaten. In old days, and in certain places around the world even now, the wheat stalk was cut off near the ground, tied together in bundles, and then beaten or threshed against the ground. The heads of grain would come off along with some chaff. To separate the two, the pile of wheat and chaff would be tossed into the air on a windy day and the wind would blow the chaff away from the grains of wheat while the heavier grains would fall back down together. The chaff then was left to blow away to the ends of the earth or it was burned. The wicked, those who do not delight in God’s Word, are like chaff.

Those who have no love for God and His Son, Jesus, are wicked will be blown away by the wind of God’s judgement and will perish entirely from the earth while the righteous prosper. The Lord knows and approves the way of the righteous, but the wicked and their sinful ways will perish.

With two clear distinct and opposite types of people described in this Psalm, the question for you then is the: Which type of person are you and how would someone else know?

Conclusion:

Psalm 1 instructs that there are two types of people in this world: those who delight in God and in His Son, Jesus, and those who do not. There is no in-between. Yet the Psalm also teaches that there is only one true God in this world: the One who blesses those who delight in His everlasting Word and brings to destruction those who do not. These truths are essential to understanding all of the Psalms as well as all of scripture and it would be good for us to remember them.

The call for all people is to perfect delight in Jesus, God’s word made flesh. We are to have no participation in the wicked and selfish actions of the flesh but must rather deny ourselves, take up our crosses, and follow Jesus (Luke 9:23). Will we ever be like the perfect person described here in Psalm 1, the one who never has anything to do with wickedness and who always delight in Jesus? Will we ever achieve blessed happiness in this life? because of sin, we will never achieve it in its intended fullness. But there is One who was and is the perfect man who lived with the fullness of happiness, and that is Jesus, the word of God made flesh. The call for the Christian is to become like Jesus. The more we drink from the living water of Jesus, the more we will be transformed and moved closer to the person of perfect happiness. That happiness will be made complete when Jesus comes again and we are blessed to dwell with Him forever.

In this first Psalm, we find Jesus to be both the life bringing Word of God and the blessed and righteous man whose ways are blameless and who prospered in all that He did. From Psalms 1, we are introduced to Jesus, the key to perfect happiness.

Blessed is the one who delights in Jesus.

Meditation Questions:

1. What influences in your life should you dissociate from?

2. How can you interact with those who don’t know Jesus without participating in their sinful behavior?

3. What does it mean to delight in the Word of God?

4. Looking back at last week, did your actions and attitudes reflect one who delights in God? Why or why not?

5. What are two ways you will commit to meditating on Jesus and God’s word in the Bible throughout your daily activities this week?

6. Which type of person are you…righteous or wicked? How would others know?