September 5, 2017

Blessed is the Man

“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.”  Ps. 1:3

Psalm 1 is practical and useful; in many ways similar to Proverbs.  It begins by describing ways a person is blessed by God.  That person doesn’t hang out with bad company and take advice from those who want to bring the person down.  Instead our approach is to delight and meditate on the law of the Lord.  We find the law of the Lord in the word of God, Scripture.  As we delight in reading our Bibles and we take time to chew it over (meditate on what it is saying to us), the Psalmist tells us we are blessed.

Such a person is then depicted as a tree.  Not just any tree, but a tree that has planted by streams of water.  Streams are important because that tells us the waters are running and living.  Such trees will bear fruit in the right season.  Such trees will have leaves that are healthy and vibrant. 

If you would engage in a picturing exercise for a moment, go back to a recent Scripture that has had an impact on you.  Maybe you read it in a devotional and it really spoke to your heart.  Perhaps you ran across several times recently, as if God was getting your attention with it.  Or it is one that just keeps coming to you, even when you are driving the car, doing laundry and don’t have a Bible close at hand.  Your spirit brings it to you.  Once you have the verse, now see it being planted in you as you imagine yourself as a tree.  Picture that word beginning to work in your life as it takes root in the base of the tree and slowly over time grows and spreads and reaches other parts of the tree.  See it spreading to the branches and those leaves.  See fruit developing and growing and being strengthened by that word working in you.

Friends this is the power of God’s life giving word.  When we encounter it, it gets in us and it changes us.  Get in God’s word and it will get in you, transforming you and shaping you into the person God created you to be.