I'm in Awe!

Let me start out by asking you a few questions.

(Q) Have you ever heard the phrase, the natural consequences of your actions?
(Q) Have you ever done something you shouldn’t have and gotten away with it but still feel badly or experience some other negative consequence because of it?

Asking yourselves questions like these will lead you to one place, growth. Growth in the area of wisdom. One one of the greatest places to find a huge amount of wisdom is found in the Psalms.

Many of the psalms make use of proverbs, numerical series, acrostics, and comparisons. These psalms also use direct instruction to teach and often do so by declaring the importance of godliness in speech, work, use of wealth, etc.. This is were we will find and grow the wisdom that we need.

Psalm 1 is a good example of gaining wisdom.

Psalm 1 (NIV)
1 Blessed is the man
who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked
or stand in the way of sinners
or sit in the seat of mockers.
2 But his delight is in the law of the LORD,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
3 He is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither.
Whatever he does 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 will perish.

This psalm serves as a prologue for the entire Psalter and vividly portrays the type of person who will pray the spasm and be instructed by them. This person is a person of faith who is a believer in and a follower of the one true God. This person finds his joy in God’s Law. The word translated as blessed comes from the Hebrew word רשׁאָ is the Hebrew verb that means to go straight, go forward, or advance. When it takes the form of a noun(only in the plural construct form) אשרי it means happiness or blessedness.

In verse three we find that righteousness is described by way of a comparison to trees planted by streams of water. By reminding us that trees flourish when they are planted next to the source of their greatest need (water) the psalmist teaches us that the state of happiness or blessedness is not a reward but just the result, or natural consequence, of being close to our greatest need (God). Verses five and six describe the wicked and the result of their lifestyles. The final verse sums up the psalmist’s lesson: there are basically two types of people, those who follow God, are fed by his instruction and are happy (blessed) and those who are wicked and doomed, not as a punishment but as a natural consequence of their behavior.

Grow in Wisdom today.

David