Two Ways to Live (Psalm 1)
This is an excerpt from, God Is Our Refuge and Strength: 150 Devotionals Through the Psalms, by Bill Boekestein and Rob Ventura, published by The Banner of Truth, October 2026. Enjoy!
The story of redemption starts with a curse (Gen. 3:14-19). Sin spoiled and shattered the blessed life that man once enjoyed with God. However, in his grace, the Lord offers sinners a choice: perpetuate your failure or be truly happy. God warns that some will perish for choosing poorly—even some within God’s congregation, to whom this psalm is written. But that’s not what God wants. That’s why he leads with the way of life in this first psalm, the doorway to the rest of the sacred Psalter.
The godly person treasures God’s law and orders his life according to it. ‘His delight is in the law of the Lord’ (2). He meditates upon it, not as a burden, but as a well-spring of life. It reminds him of God’s love and justice, wisdom and power. In response, the godly person trusts God, believing that his ways are best. He loves the Lord for showing him the way of joy and peace. He knows that ‘bad company ruins good morals’ (1 Cor. 15:33). So even if sinners entice him, he does not consent (Prov. 1:10). He ‘walks not in the counsel of the wicked’ (1).Instead, he gives his attention to godly instruction (Deut. 6:7). And, growing in God’s grace, he will always prosper—like ‘a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season’ (3).
But ‘The wicked are not so’ (4). Those who reject God’s wisdom and embrace sin will become as worthless as chaff swept away by the scorching desert wind. John the Baptist used this same image when he spoke of Jesus: ‘His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire’ (Matt. 3:12). Devotion to sin makes us unfit for any noble use and leads to an eternal hell (Rom. 6:23).
The first psalm echoes Jesus’ call to ‘Enter by the narrow gate’ (Matt. 7:13). There is a wider gate that many pass through. Its way is easy. But it leads to destruction. Those who choose it ‘will not stand in the judgment’ (5); tested against God’s perfect righteousness, they will be found wanting and be thrown into the fiery furnace (Matt. 13:50). The narrow gate, however, leads to a harder life; godliness guarantees tribulation (Acts 14:22). Yet its end is eternal life secured for believers by the truly blessed Man, Jesus Christ the Righteous (Matt. 7:13, 14; 1 John 2:1). God’s promise of happiness and his threat of judgment must be considered in the balance of eternity. Today, God sets before us life and death, blessing and curse—there is no third gate or middle way. And in grace, he gives us every reason to choose life in his Son (Deut. 30:19). Which way will you choose?
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—Ian Hamilton, Professor of Historical Theology, Westminster Seminary UK
