The Beauty of Delighting in God’s Word
Discover the meaning of Psalm 1 and how delighting in God's Word leads to spiritual growth. Learn to meditate like Christ and root your life in God's truth.
Psalm 1
Today's Scripture Passage
A Few Thoughts to Consider
What comes to mind when you think about God?
According to twentieth-century author and preacher A.W. Tozer, this is the most important question any person can answer. Do we think of a taskmaster? Do we envision someone who is disconnected from our ordinary affairs? Do we think of someone who should be eager to fulfill our demands?
The Book of Psalms helps shape our understanding of God like no other book in Scripture. And in Psalm 1, the psalmist writes:
1 How happy is the one who does not
walk in the advice of the wicked
or stand in the pathway with sinners
or sit in the company of mockers!
2 Instead, his delight is in the Lord’s instruction,
and he meditates on it day and night.
3 He is like a tree planted beside flowing streams[a]
that bears its fruit in its season,
and its leaf does not wither.
Whatever he does prospers.
4 The wicked are not like this;
instead, they are like chaff that the wind blows away.
5 Therefore the wicked will not stand up 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 leads to ruin.
Basil the Great said, “Like the foundation in a house, the keel in a ship and the heart in a body, so is [Psalm 1 as a] brief introduction to the whole structure of the Psalms.” And we could add, the whole Bible. As commentator Gerald Wilson notes, “The verb hgh (“meditates”) is onomatopoeic in that it imitates the sound of low voices murmuring or muttering as one reads Scripture in a low undertone.”
So the imagery is that we pick up God’s Word, find our enjoyment in the being of God revealed, and mumble these thoughts aloud. While some are quick to meditate on negativity, the follower of Christ sets her eyes on God.
The words of the Torah were everything to the Jewish people. They revealed what God expected of his people and how he wanted them to live. And the great sin of God’s people throughout history has been their propensity to forget. But by delighting, we are saying our highest fulfillment and enjoyment comes from this relationship. No earthly delight can compare.
