Opening remarks and formalities
“Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, 2 but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night. 3 That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither—whatever they do 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 leads to destruction.”
Over two and a half thousand years ago, before Jesus came to earth, these words greeted the people of God when they opened the Book of Psalms. Psalm 1 stands at the front of the Book of Psalms as an introduction to the whole book; a message to anyone who would open this book of prayers and songs belonging to the people of God. It encourages the hearer of this psalm to delight in God’s law, that is, in God’s word as revealed in scripture. Today, graduates, as you graduate with your Certificate in Christian Ministry, this psalm belongs to you. I would like to use its message to encourage you about your future, now that you have completed this program.
First of all, know that you are blessed! Psalm 1 tells us that God does not bless the wicked, the sinner, or the mocker. Who does he bless? The one whose delight is in God’s word, who meditates on it day and night. As graduates of the Certificate in Christian Ministry, you have meditated on God’s word. That means you have read the word. You have reflected on the word. You have wrestled with the word. You have taken the word and applied it in your minds to areas of personal life, spiritual life, and church life.
And so as graduates of the Certificate in Christian Ministry, as those who have been blessed by God, let me encourage you: continue to delight in the law of the Lord! There is a difference between reading the word and delighting in the word. It is the same difference between eating food and enjoying food. We all must eat, but we do not always enjoy. Let the Bible be your favourite food for your minds and your hearts, so that you want to come back to it and have it again, so that you choose it over any other spiritual food, because it will bring you joy that you don’t find anywhere else. Continue to meditate on God’s word day and night.
You have finished your Certificate in Christian Ministry, but you have not finished with the Bible. Continue to seek God's instruction from the Bible. Search for books that discuss the Bible. Listen to sermons that explain the Bible, sing songs that rephrase the Bible. Watch people whose lives are shaped by the Bible. God's message, his instruction, exists in all those things. When you read scripture, or hear scripture, or sing scripture, or talk about scripture, or even remember scripture, enjoy the fact that it is God's very own teaching for your life. Recognise its value. Think about it all the time - not just in a studying way, but in a real world practical way, thinking, "How does what God has told me fit into this bit of my life right now?" When you hear other people say different things about how you should live, hold up God's instruction and measure their message against God’s message.
It's not how much of Bible you read, or how often that matters. Reading the Bible more will certainly help more. But there are very, very few people who get to spend all day and night reading the Bible. We have to work, to look after our families, to eat and to sleep. What matters is delighting in God's teaching whatever you are doing. Value God’s instruction, let it sink in, think it over, deliberate on it, and hold it up as the truth against which all other teachings get compared.
If you do this, Psalm 1 says not only will you be blessed; you will also be fruitful! Like a tree planted by a stream of water, you will yield God’s fruit in season, and you leaves will not wither – whatever you do will prosper. This is the picture Psalm 1 paints of the person who delights in the law of the Lord. I have no doubt that many of you have already seen the fruit of God’s word growing in your own lives, and in the lives of others studying this course. That is the power of our God through the Lord Jesus Christ and by his Holy Spirit – he changes us for the better! He saves us, and he changes us into the people he wants us to be: people who are not wicked, but who delight in his word. That is the fruit that God loves to grow.
So my encouragement to you is this: value the fruit that God grows. Don’t go chasing after the prosperity of this world – phones, cars, houses, children and cattle. To quote our Lord Jesus, “[T]he pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.” Psalm 1 tells us that the wicked, who seek these things, are like chaff that the wind blows away. They cannot stand in the judgment! They cannot stand before the assembly of the righteous! Instead, as members of the assembly of the righteous, stand like a strong tree planted beside water whose fruit is the prosperity of God; the fruit that he grows through his spirit - love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control – and the fruit that he grows through his word – a family for God 30, 60, 100 times what he has sown.
Let these fruits be what you seek, because Psalm 1 says that way of the righteous is the way of life that God watches over. As you have studied God’s word and let its power change who you are, God has watched over your path like a father watching his child’s first steps, because the path of the righteous is the same path that Jesus walked in his life – and because Jesus is God, that means the path of the righteous is God’s path! You have been walking along God’s path, in the footsteps of Jesus Christ.
And so my final encouragement to you today is to keep walking on that path; keep living God’s way of life. So often we see situations and hear stories of people who are not living righteously but seem to be doing really well, while those who are living righteously suffer for doing it! Big companies profit from child labour while paying no tax, and their shareholders cheer; people in positions of power become corrupt and take money away from the needy, yet their power increases; people campaign for God to be removed from schools and public speech, and their voices spread across the media. Meanwhile those who release evidence of corruption and blow the whistle on wrongdoing get forced into exile; those who pray for the release of prisoners are arrested; those who spend their lives healing the poor are kidnapped by terrorists. Where is the blessing? Where is the prosperity?
Psalm 1 lets us look further forward, to see the end result of a righteous life and a wicked life. God watches over the way of the righteous. It is a way of life that lasts forever - not because by being righteous we earn our place in eternity with God, but because a righteous life is the life we will live in that eternity. The righteous life is the way of life of the eternal God, and that eternal way of life starts now.
But the wicked way of life? It will be destroyed. There is no room in God's eternal kingdom for wickedness. And thank God for that! Greed, lust, murder, theft, corruption, violence, rebellion against God - all of these things are temporary! They don't last! God doesn't just punish those who live that way; he destroys that way of life entirely! We are reminded of these truths every time we see the wicked get brought down, every time their schemes go wrong, every time they are exposed; we're reminded every time we do the right thing and we see God's plans furthered in people's lives. That's the way it's meant to be, and that's the way it's going to stay.
My prayer for all of you graduating today is this: that in the blessing of your graduation you will keep on meditating on God’s word; that in the fruit of salvation and change God has worked in your life, you will pursue God’s prosperity; and that as you stand up as members of the assembly of the righteous, you will remain on the path of the righteous watched over by God, that remains forever. Let me finish with the prayer of Paul for the Ephesians: “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen."
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