More from Pastor John Piper’s sermon, “Songs That Shape the Heart and Mind”
Two Questions on Psalm 1
As we turn now to Psalm 1, we will see confirmation for much of what we just saw. This psalm is worthy of three sermons at least. I will only make two observations that come from two questions.
Question #1: Why does the psalmist begin the way he does?
Why does the psalmist begin, “Blessed 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”? Why not just say, “Don’t be wicked, don’t sin, and don’t scoff.” Why draw attention to the wicked, the sinner, the scoffer? Why focus on where we look for influence? “Don’t be influenced by the wicked. Don’t be influenced by the sinner. Don’t be influenced by the scoffer.”
The reason is that the contrast he wants to draw is notwickedness versus righteousness. The contrast he wants to draw is being influenced from one place versus being influenced from another place. Being shaped in one way versus being shaped in another way. Being shaped in our thinking and feeling by the wicked, the sinner, and the scoffer versus being shaped by the law of the Lord—the instruction of the Lord found in the Psalms.
So he sets up verse 1 the way he does to prepare for the contrast in verse 2. Don’t give your attention to the world (the wicked, the sinner, the scoffer) so that you start to delight in their ways. Verse 2: “. . . but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.”
Nobody walks in the way of the wicked out of duty. Nobody stands in the way of sinners out of duty. Nobody sits in the seat of scoffers out of duty. We walk and stand and sit there because we want to. And we want to because we have been watching them so intently that what they do is now attractive. We have meditated on them (without calling it that). And we now delight in them. That is how worldliness happens.
You just start by looking at the stuff that the world produces. And you look at it and think about it so much that you want it. And so you walk and stand and sit in their counsel and their way and their seat.
That’s why the contrast in verse 2 refers not to duty and obedience, but to delight and meditation. The point is that the only hope against the pleasures of the world is the pleasures of the word. And just like the pleasures of the world are awakened by looking at them long enough, so the pleasures of the word are awakened in the regenerate soul by looking at them long enough—day and night.
Meditate day and night on the instruction of God in the Psalms and delight will be awakened. That is what the Psalms are designed to do: inform your thinking in a way that delights your heart. Meditating day and night leads to delighting which frees us from the pleasures of the wicked, the sinner, and the scoffer.
So the very first two verses in the book of Psalms confirm what we have seen: This whole book is designed to shape our thinking through meditation and to shape our feeling by becoming our delight.
Question #2: Why does verse 3 read like it does?
Now here’s the second question for Psalm 1 that turns up our second observation about this psalm. Why doesn’t verse 3 say: “And when you meditate on God’s instruction in the Psalms and delight in what you see, then you will not act wickedly and you will not act sinfully, and you will not scoff”? That would have rounded things out nicely with verse 1, wouldn’t it?
The answer is that the psalmist wants us to see that the life of the godly is like a tree bearing fruit, not like a laborer picking fruit. To use Paul’s language, the Christian life is the fruit of the Spirit, not works of the law. Verse 3: “He 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.”
Knowing God through His Word ... Day by Day 