(Psalm 1:1-3)
1 “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful;
2 But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he meditates day and night.
3 He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth its fruit in its season, whose leaf also shall not wither; and whatever he does shall prosper.â€
In this article I’m going to speak from just three verses in the bible. These three verses are the first three verses which open up the book of Psalms to us, and they are very powerful because they tell an amazing story for those who have eyes to see!
Three, as many of you know, is an important number in God’s numerology and in Hebrew thought. God expressed His own person as three in one, one in three. God chose to create us in his image and likeness, also being three in one and one in three. We are a spirit, that has a soul, and that lives in a body. The story of creation, the fall, and the redemption can be told in threes as well. The first man Adam was created in the image and likeness of God, but He fell due to sin and disobedience to God’s word. The 2nd man Adam came as the only begotten of the Father, the Lord Jesus Christ (1 Cor.15:45), and died for the sins of mankind thus reversing the curse and purchasing the redemption for not only mankind but creation itself (Rom.8:20-21). This made way for the third man (The New Creation in Christ, the Church) to rise with Christ on the third day. The story of redemption can also be told in three parts. First, the era of the patriarchs, the prophets, and Israel. Second the era of Christ, his church, the church age, and the gospel, and third the era of full redemption, resurrection, and the earthly kingdom of Christ, which is yet to come. These three eras are depicted in the three days that Jesus was dead before He rose again on the third day.
This amazing story of the fall, redemption, and glorification is actually found, believe it or not, in the first three verses of Psalms as well. The story of creation and mankind’s downfall in the garden is found here, as well as Christ’s redemption and the restoration of the sons of God, all in these first three verses. God really is amazing like that! Let’s get into it!
PSALM 1:1 / ADAM’S FALL
(Psalm 1:1)
“Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful;
Verse one shows how Adam abandoned the blessing of God because He chose to walk in the counsel of the ungodly, which came from Satan in the garden. Adam was created to delight himself in the Lord, in his law, in his light, and in his precepts day and night, but instead He was tempted by Eve to partake of the forbidden fruit which she offered him, which ultimately represented “hidden knowledge”. Satan convinced them that God was hiding things from them, not sharing everything with them, and that they somehow needed to know those things by partaking of the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen.3:4). To this day, every occultic order is built the same way. They offer greater power and position through giving access to esoteric hidden knowledge. This is what the famous pyramid with the all seeing eye at the top represents, a person’s ascent into power through hidden knowledge. Movements in the church come under the same spirit if they’re not careful. Setting up conferences and writing books that promise to give people greater power through the hidden knowledge that “the angel only brought to them and them alone” is dangerous, especially when it’s for “a limited time only” if you just “pay $89.99 today” (eyes roll).
But the Hebrew word used here for “counsel” in (Ps.1:1) is ʿēṣâ (ay-tsaw'), which can be translated as: counsel, advice, or purpose. This same Hebrew word is used in (Ezra 4:5) when the people of the land weakened the hands of the people of Judah and troubled them in building the temple. The bible says in this verse that the people “hired counselors against them, to frustrate their purpose (esa) all the days of Cyrus king of Persia, even until the reign of Darius king of Persia” (Ezra 4:5). Where you get your counsel from determines whether or not your purpose will be fulfilled or frustrated. The counsel that Adam and Eve received was bad therefore therefore their purpose was not fulfilled.
WALKING IN THE COUNSEL OF THE UNGODLY
Notice how in (Ps.1:1) David writes “the man who walks in the counsel” and “stands in the path of sinners”. This is speaking of the life of a man or woman, the path they take, and even greater the path that the human race has taken because of the actions of the first man Adam. Adam walked in the counsel of the ungodly. He walked in the counsel of the most ungodly nasty perverse creature that has ever lived (Satan), when He should have been walking in the cool of the day with the Lord.
(Gen.3:8)
“And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.”
When you choose to walk in the counsel of the ungodly (which is to say, you chose to let the power of sin influence you more than the Word and Spirit of God), then your plans become frustrated and shame overtakes you for the life you’ve chosen. When God draws near you run from his presence instead of embracing it with all of its life and blessings, and many people don’t even know why they run, but they do. Ungodly counsel forms a path within us that leads away from God. Thanks be to God that the Father sent His only begotten Son who is the Way (Jn.14:6)! The Son of God, received by faith into one’s heart, makes a way back to the Father, back to the presence of God in the cool of his day, the New Day in Christ! Jesus makes a way for your heart to come back into the glory and back into peace! Isn’t that good news!
STANDING IN THE PATH OF SINNERS
When David speaks here in Psalm 1 of “standing in the path of sinners” and “sitting in the seat of the scornful”, I believe He’s poetically and prophetically speaking of the condition and end of the man (or the human race in the bigger picture) that goes down the path that ungodly counsel triggers. When we think of “standing” in the biblical sense we think of defending ourselves and our beliefs; we think of making a “stand” when we’re challenged. Paul wrote, “having done all to stand, stand therefore” (Eph.6:13). When I see spiritually David writing about one who has chosen the wrong path through ungodly counsel and “standing” in the path of sinners, I see someone whose heart has grown so hard that now they’re defending that path and that way of life. I see someone who is grounded in their deception, firm in it, and not easily moved from it. I think of my nation America, and how we started out in large part on a path of righteousness. A big part of our foundation was created by a group of quakers seeking freedom to worship God in the new world, as they “quaked” under the power of God in their communities. But oh how we have strayed from that path, and now even what most would deem as good people defend a way of life in this land that is not godly, that is not pleasing to God, and that is not pleasant in his sight. We’ve come to stand in the path we’ve chosen, to defend the path, and to defend the choices and decisions that have led us this way, even if it is the path of sinners; even if it is ultimately a path that God rejects because it does not lead to Christ. This is human nature. We defend our path even if it’s the wrong one because sin breeds pride, and pride defends one’s actions even if they’re wrong.
Just look at the conservative movement in the west. Conservatives are supposed to be made up of people that believe in God and stand for good family values. More and more the conservative movement is inviting homsexuals in. I even heard of a drag queen named “Lady Maga” being invited to CPAC last year (which is the biggest conservative event in the U.S.). How is this moral and God-centered? This is what I’m talking about. As a nation, even in the conservative community, we’ve moved more and more away from God and true conservatism, and we have the audacity to defend this slide from godliness. We’ve taken a firm stand in the path of sinners!
SITTING IN THE SEAT OF THE SCORNFUL
For the climax of humanity's sin story we see Adam (and all of mankind in his loins) “sitting down in the seat of the scornful '' in (Psalm 1:1). The equivalent in my colloquial expression would be: “we see Adam making his bed and laying in it”. Sitting down in biblical language means, “it is finished”. It represents resting from one’s work once the job is done. Jesus after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God (Heb.10:12). When He sat down He was finished, and when we see Adam sitting down in the seat of the scornful in (Ps.1:1), it represents that mankind’s fate was sealed; that it was finished, and that mankind was lost for forever. This is why we needed a savior, and not just any savior. We needed the impossible. We needed perfection. We needed the only begotten of the Father, a miracle which Satan had never seen and could never foresee as possible. We needed God himself, the Self-Existent One, the one who was never born and could never die to both be born and die for our sins. We needed Yeshua!
The “seat of the scornful” speaks of authority as well. It’s a “seat of authority and power”. When Adam sat down in his sin He was fully given over to its power and authority over him. This is known as the law of sin and death that had fully taken over, which only the law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus could defeat (Rom.8:2). The word for “scornful” here is the Hebrew word lûṣ (loots). It’s translated: to scorn, make mouths at, talk arrogantly, to boast, to mock, and to deride. The words of one’s mouth reflects the ultimate condition of the heart. Jesus said, “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks “(Matt.12:24; Lk.6:45), and the bible tells us that Jesus was a man that had no guile, no deceit in his mouth (1 Pet.2:22). Jesus is the Word of God (John 1:1-5), the ultimate expression of the condition of the heart of the Father! As mankind has settled into the authority that the law of sin and death is exercising over him, it comes out in his speech. It comes out in our cursing, our hatred, our contempt that we have for one another, and how we give voice and expression to that contempt and hatred. But this was not the ultimate destiny for mankind, for when Christ came He made a way through His own flesh. He made a way for us to escape the clutches of sin. He made a way for the power of sin and death to be broken in us, and for us to be delivered from that seat of the scornful, from the authority of Satan and darkness!. He made a way for us to stand in righteousness instead in the path of the sinner, and Christ made a way for us to return to the counsel of God, for us to return to God through the Word and Light of God in Christ and His Spirit!
In the next article we will pick up this study of (Psalm 1) in verse two where we will see the entrance of Christ and the restoration of man!
In His Service,
Stephen Powell
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