2/18/24 – Psalms 1-2
Many times, the Bible calls us to walk in righteousness. After hearing our call, it is only natural for us as Christians to fall into a frantic search. What is righteousness? What must we do to achieve it? Can we truly achieve it? The synchronization of these two chapters happens to point us to the answer. Psalms 1 points us to the law, and Psalms 2 eludes to the perfect fulfillment of that law that came to save us from our inability to execute it.
Psalms 1 starts by defining what a blessed man is, he “walks not in the counsel of the wicked” and “his delight is in the law of the Lord”. The author says the blessed man “is like a tree planted by streams of water”. The law nurtures him, replenishes him, and gives him all that he needs to grow and prosper. The wicked however don’t adhere to these ways, and the author declares they are instead like “chaff in the wind.” The Psalm concludes, “for the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.”
It is clear that the law is good. We are to delight in the law. In the case of the Israelites, the law was given to them to set them apart as God’s chosen people and guide them toward the Lord. It is sacred to them, when they follow it the Kingdom prospers and it falters when they stray away. We must follow it to be righteous before the Lord.
But the problem since the beginning of time has been that people don’t fulfill the law. We have all failed to practice the law perfectly, we are all wicked in the eyes of the Lord. This is partly what Psalm 2 highlights. “Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the Lord and against his anointed.” The world is full of wickedness, the rulers do not delight in the law, and they plot against those who do. But something (or someone) is coming. “As for me, I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill.” The Lord has a plan.
In summary, Psalms 1 recognizes a beloved standard to keep, while Chapter 2 acknowledges how the world has fallen desperately short. However, that is not the end, the Lord has prepared a king. We are lucky to know this king. He shall enter into a broken world to live a perfect life. He shall commit the ultimate act of love, dying on a tree on our behalf. The author says of him, “Blessed are all who take refuge in him.”
The psalmists unknowingly speak of the antidote to our unrighteousness. Though we cannot fulfill the law spoken of in chapter 1, Jesus can and did. If we wish to walk in righteousness, we should plant ourselves close to him like a tree by a stream of water. Only while being in him and accepting his gift of grace can we be in righteousness, in no other way could we come before the Father than through him. He is the law fulfilled, we must look to him and his example in everything we do. Only by doing this may we walk in righteousness!