Commentary - Psalm 1:1-3

Bird's-eye view

Psalm 1 serves as the great gateway into the rest of the Psalter. It is the front porch of the whole book, and it sets the stage for everything that follows by presenting the fundamental choice that confronts every man: the way of the righteous or the way of the wicked. There is no third way. This psalm is a wisdom psalm, laying out the stark contrast between two paths, two destinies, and two kinds of people. The blessed man is defined by what he rejects and what he embraces. He is separated from the world's counsel, and he is saturated with God's Word. The result of this is a life of deep-rooted stability, fruitfulness, and genuine prosperity. The wicked, in stark contrast, are rootless, weightless, and ultimately blown away by the judgment of God. This is not just poetry; it is a foundational statement about the nature of reality as God has constituted it. To be blessed is to be aligned with God's created order, which is revealed in His law. To be cursed is to set oneself against it.

The entire psalm is a commentary on the first and great commandment, to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. The blessed man is the one who does this, and the practical outworking of that love is a delight in the instruction of God. This psalm is therefore intensely Christological. The only man who has ever perfectly embodied this description is the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the truly blessed man. We, in turn, become blessed only as we are found in Him. Our righteousness is a derived righteousness, and our stability is a result of being grafted into Him, the true and living tree.

Outline

Context In The Psalter

Psalm 1, along with Psalm 2, forms a deliberate introduction to the entire book of Psalms. While Psalm 1 focuses on the law of God and the character of the righteous individual, Psalm 2 focuses on the Son of God and the rebellion of the nations. The two psalms are inextricably linked. The blessed man of Psalm 1 finds his ultimate expression in the anointed King of Psalm 2. The law that the righteous man meditates on is the law of the King. The choice presented in Psalm 1, blessing through submission to God's law or perishing as chaff, is the same choice presented in Psalm 2, blessing through kissing the Son or perishing under His iron rod. Together, they establish the foundational themes of the Psalter: God's righteous rule through His Word and His Messiah, and the necessity for men and nations to submit to both.

Key Issues

The Great Bifurcation

The Bible is a book of choices, and this psalm sets the most basic choice before us in the starkest possible terms. From the two trees in the garden, to Cain and Abel, to the two ways in Deuteronomy, to the wise and foolish builders in Matthew, Scripture consistently divides humanity into two camps. There are those who serve God and those who do not. There is the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent. There is the wheat and the chaff. Modern sensibilities chafe at this kind of binary distinction. Our relativistic age wants a hundred shades of gray, a spectrum of options, a third way. But God does not give us that option. He says there is a way that leads to life and a way that leads to destruction, and we are on one or the other.

This psalm is the great bifurcation. It is the fork in the road at the very beginning of the path. The word "blessed" that begins the psalm could be translated as "Oh, the happinesses..." It is an exclamation of the deep, abiding joy and stability that comes from being rightly oriented to God. This is not a superficial, circumstantial happiness, but a profound state of well-being that is rooted in the character of God Himself. And the path to that blessedness begins with a decisive break from the world's way of thinking.

Verse by Verse Commentary

1 How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, Nor stand in the way of sinners, Nor sit in the seat of scoffers!

The psalm opens by defining the righteous man negatively, by what he avoids. Notice the progression here. It is a downward path, a de-evolution. First, he does not walk in the counsel of the wicked. This is the initial step, the casual stroll. It refers to the internal life, the acceptance of the ungodly's advice, their worldview, their philosophy of life. The "counsel of the wicked" is the whole godless system of thought that permeates a fallen world. The blessed man refuses to entertain it or be guided by it. Second, he does not stand in the way of sinners. The walk has now become a halt. He is not just listening to bad advice; he is now loitering in the place where sinners conduct their business. This refers to a pattern of behavior, a lifestyle. He doesn't adopt their practices. Third, he does not sit in the seat of scoffers. The walk and the stand have now settled into a permanent, seated posture. He has become comfortable. He has joined the club. The "scoffer" is the most hardened form of the ungodly; he is not just a sinner, but one who actively mocks righteousness and the things of God. The blessed man refuses this entire trajectory. He is a separatist, not in the sense of withdrawing into a monastery, but in the sense of a principled, ethical, and intellectual disengagement from the world's rebellion against God.

2 But his delight is in the law of Yahweh, And in His law he meditates day and night.

Having been defined by what he rejects, the blessed man is now defined by what he embraces. The "but" is a strong adversative. In contrast to the entire system of the wicked, the righteous man has a completely different source of joy and guidance. His delight is in the law of Yahweh. The "law" here is not just the Mosaic code, but the whole of God's revealed will, His instruction, His Torah. For the ungodly, God's law is a burden, a set of arbitrary rules that restrict their fun. For the righteous man, it is a delight. He loves it. It is sweet to him, like honey. Why? Because he loves the Lawgiver. This delight is the mark of a regenerate heart. And this delight is not a passive feeling; it leads to action. He meditates on it day and night. This is not some kind of empty-your-mind Eastern meditation. This is the Hebrew idea of muttering, chewing on, thinking deeply about the text. He fills his mind with Scripture. It is the constant background music to his life, the lens through which he sees the world. It is his first thought in the morning and his last thought at night. This saturation in God's Word is the positive secret to his separation from the world's counsel.

3 And he will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, Which yields its fruit in its season And its leaf does not wither; And in whatever he does, he prospers.

This verse describes the consequences, the results of the first two verses. Because he is separated from the world and saturated in the Word, he is stable and fruitful. He is like a tree firmly planted. He is not a tumbleweed. He has roots. His life is not accidental; it is intentional, "planted." And he is planted by "streams of water," plural. He has an abundant, constant source of nourishment, which is the law of God he meditates on. This rootedness produces two things. First, fruitfulness: he "yields its fruit in its season." This is not a frantic, constant activity, but a timely, appropriate, seasonal fruitfulness. His life produces the character and works that God desires. Second, endurance: "its leaf does not wither." Even when the season is not for fruit-bearing, there is life. His vitality is not dependent on external circumstances because his roots go down to a source the world knows nothing of. The final clause summarizes this blessed state: "in whatever he does, he prospers." This is not a promise of a new car and a fat bank account. The prosperity gospel wrenches this verse out of context. Biblical prosperity means succeeding in the things God has called you to do. It means accomplishing the purposes for which you were created. The righteous man, aligned with God's will and nourished by God's Word, will succeed in the enterprise of living a godly life. His life works. It is a successful human life in the deepest sense of the word.

Application

This psalm confronts us with a fundamental audit of our lives. We must begin where the psalm begins, with the question of blessedness. Do we want to be truly happy, truly stable? If so, we must examine our inputs. What counsel are we walking in? Whose voices are shaping our thoughts, our ambitions, our understanding of the world? Is it the talking heads on the news, the influencers on social media, the secular assumptions of our workplace? Or is it the timeless Word of God? We cannot serve two masters, and we cannot walk in two counsels.

The great application is the call to delight and meditation. Many Christians treat Bible reading as a grim duty, another box to check. This psalm calls us to find our joy in it. We must pray for God to give us a supernatural delight in His instruction. And out of that delight, we must cultivate the discipline of meditation. We live in an age of distraction, with our minds constantly pulled in a thousand directions. To meditate on Scripture "day and night" requires a radical counter-cultural commitment. It means turning off the noise and chewing on the truth. It means memorizing Scripture so that it is with us in the car, at our desk, and in the middle of the night.

Ultimately, our only hope of being this blessed man is to be united by faith to the Blessed Man, Jesus Christ. He alone perfectly rejected the counsel of the wicked, perfectly delighted in His Father's will, and is the true tree of life. When we are in Him, His righteousness becomes ours. He plants us by the life-giving streams of His Spirit. He causes us to bear fruit for His glory. And He guarantees our ultimate prosperity, an inheritance that will never wither, reserved in heaven for us.