The Pulpit Commentary on Psalms 1:1-6

The Pulpit Commentary · Joseph S. Exell and contributors · Public domain

The blessedness of the true.

"God is Love." He must, therefore, seek the happiness of his creatures. Man is the highest of his earthly creatures, and his happiness must be of the highest kind, not only fit for him to receive, but worthy of to bestow. Such is the happiness here depicted. It does not come anyhow, but in accordance with law. It does not depend upon what a man has, but upon what he is. It is inward, not outward. It is of the spirit, not of the flesh. Happiness is blessedness—the blessedness of the true in character.

I. MARK THE FOUNDATION. Sin is self-will. This implies separation from God; and this separation must be final, unless God himself prevent. But the godly man has been brought back into a right relation to God. God's will is his will. To know and to love and to obey God is his delight. His life is centred in God. Thus he is able to receive the blessing in its fulness, which God is ready freely to bestow. His character is founded upon the rock of the eternal, and not upon the shifting sands of time.

II. Mark next THE HARMONIOUS DEVELOPMENT. This is shown under the figure of a tree, fair and flourishing.

1. The situation is choice. It stands, not in the desert, but in a fit place. "Planted." The hand of God is seen in the godly man's life. This is his security. Where God has put him, God can keep him.

2. The environment is favorable. From the heavens above sad the earth beneath nourishment is provided. The supply is rich and sure. Though worldly supplies may cease, and the waters of earth fail (Isaiah 19:5), the river of God will still run free (1 Kings 18:5; Isaiah 55:1-3).

3. The progress is appropriate. There is the power of assimilating. Life develops according to its own order. What the plant does unconsciously, subject to the law of its being, the godly man does freely and consciously, under the benign rule of Christ.

III. Lastly, mark THE CONSUMMATION. God's work always tends to completeness. Every advance is an approach. Every fulfilment is a prophecy of the perfect end. In the life of the godly there is the truest pleasure, the noblest usefulness, the heavenliest beauty. And the charm of all is permanence. There is not only moral freshness, as where there is real soundness of health, but there is enduringness. This is brought out vividly by contrast. "The ungodly are not so." With them there is no reality. Separated from the true life, everything is unstable and uncertain. There may be a kind of prosperity, but it is false and delusive. The pleasures of sin are but for a season; but the love of God is for ever. In the day of trial the just shall stand, accepted and blessed; but the wicked shall be winnowed out of the society of the true Israel, and swept away, as the worthless chaff, by the swift and resistless judgment of God.—W.F.

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