Blessings From Heaven

[Editor's Note: This sermon was originally delivered as a New Year sermon in 2007. It, of course, is fitting for any time but especially at the end of a year or the beginning of another.]

Introduction

I have begun to realize more and more, The longer I serve the Lord and the longer I preach His Word, that He does not want His children to be depressed; He wants them to be blessed. God literally and liberally wants us to receive "Blessings From Heaven."

The First Psalm tells us exactly how to do that. The first four words say, "Blessed Is The Man." We know that this Psalm is God's blueprint for blessings. It is God's hallway to happiness.

The word "blessed" is actually in the Hebrew language a plural word. It refers to the intensity and multiplicity of the blessings that await anyone who will do what this Psalm tells them to do. In the old testament, blessings would be synonymous with what we would call "Success" today.

Now in the right way get it in your heart and mind that God wants you to be successful. Psalm 35:27 says, "Let the Lord be magnified, which hath pleasure in the prosperity of His servant." The apostle John even said to some of his friends, "Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth. (3 John 1:2)

Every parent has the desire that his children be successful. I am no different from any other parent. Let me share with you one of the greatest fears I have for my two daughters. It is not that they will not succeed; my greatest fear is that they will succeed in things that really don't matter.

If you want to be successful in the right way, God's way, which is really the only way; and if you want to make this year your best year, and literally receive blessings from heaven, then there are three  pieces of advice the Psalmist gives us.

I. Avoid Bad Company

Verse 1 Begins By Saying, "Blessed Is The Man That Walketh Not In The Counsel Of The Ungodly, Nor Standeth In The Way Of Sinners, Nor Sitteth In The Seat Of the Scornful." (Psalm 1:1) The Psalmist Describes Three Groups Of People That You Could Call "The Skeptic," "The Sinner," And "The Scornful." These Are People With "D.D." Degrees. They Are Doctors Of Damnation. They Are Professors Who Teach In The School Of Sin, And Their Only Lecture Is "How To Go To Hell In Three Easy Lessons."

A. Skeptic

They Are All Very Different. The First Person We Call "The Skeptic". He Is Referred To Here As "The Ungodly." The Prefix "Un" Means "Not." If You Are Unafraid That Means You Are Not Afraid. If You Are Ungodly, It Simply Means There Is No Room For God In Your Life. Very Few People Are "Anti-Godly." They're Just Ungodly." In Other Words, They Just Don't Have Any Room For God In Their Life.

We Are So Proud Of The Statistic That 96 Percent Of All Americans Believe In God. That Is, Only 4 Percent Of Americans Do Not Believe In A Supreme Being. Yet, I Want To Tell You that 80 Percent Of Americans Live As If There Were No God. America May Not Have Many Intellectual Atheists, But It Is Full Of Practical Atheists.

In Fact, The Word "Ungodly" Literally Means "Wicked." We Oftentimes Think Of Wicked People As People Who Murder And Lie And Steal. But Wicked People Can Wear Tailor-Made Suits, Go To Church Every Week, And Give Money To Charity.

B. Sinner

Then We Move From The Skeptic To "The Sinner." What Is The Difference? The Skeptic Is Ungodly, But The Sinner Is Unholy. The Sinner Is Someone Who Not Only Lives As If There Is No God, He Knows He Lives That Way and It Doesn't Bother Him. As You Know, Hollywood Not Only Flaunts Fornication And Pre-Martial Sex Both In Its Lifestyle And In Its Movies; It Actually Brags About It. The Hollywood Mentalilty Is Described Perfectly In Proverbs 30:20, "Such Is The Way Of An Adulterous Woman; She Eateth, And Wipeth Her Mouth, And Saith, I Have Done No Wickness."

C. Scornful

Finally, we come to "The Scornful". This is a person who is unruly. The Word refers to a "Dog's Snarl" and it literally means "To Make A Face At." This is a man who is not only a sinner and wicked, but laughs about it. He mocks God. He mocks sin. He makes fun of the whole concept. Proverbs 14:9 speaks of "Fools" (Who) make a mock at sin."

If you want to be successful, you've got to avoid the bad company represented by these kinds of people. First of all, you cannot listen to their counsel. You have got to turn a deaf ear to the counsel of the world. The world is the devil's psychiatrist, and you don't need to be lying on her couch.

I read one-time about a man who was having severe marital difficulties, who went to a well-known pastor. He was trying to bring his marriage back together. He and this pastor talked and the pastor asked him how he could pray for him and his wife. Do you know what the man said? He said, "Would you please pray that she would reject ungodly counsel? He then told the pastor that she was getting counsel from a woman who had been divorced several times and was advising her to also get a divorce. You would be better off getting advice on brain surgery from an automobile mechanic than you would to listen to the world's advice.

Think about it. Why would you listen to a world full of sin advise you on how to deal with sin? It is like a man who had a sick mule and he went to his next door neighbor and said, "Sam, my mule is sick. When your mule got sick what did you do for it?" He said, "I gave his a quart of kerosene.

The man went home and gave his mule a quart of kerosene, and the mule died. He came back and said, "Sam, didn't you tell me to give my mule a quart of kerosene?" He said, "Yes I did." He said, I did and my mule died." The man said, "Don't feel bad, mine did too!"

There are people who are dead today, in prison today, people who are eaten up with sexual disease today, because they listened to the wrong crowd.

Then we are told not only to not to listen to bad company, but we are told not even to hang around them. Verse 1 says, "(Do Not) standeth in the way of sinners." Do you see the progression here? Once you begin to believe to behave like bad company. Action follows advice. What will get into your head will always get down into your heart. What you believe will determine your behavior.

That's why if you feed your mind mental junk food, you will live a junkyard life. If you listen to the wrong crowd, then you will start acting like the wrong crowd.

Then you pass into the third phase where you "Join in with the scoffers" (Psalm 1 - New Living Translation). This is the worst stage of all. This is when you are fully trapped with the wrong crowd. First you accept their advice. Then, you imitate their action and then you adopt their attitude. This is exactly how the wrong crowd gets into a person's life. First they entice you, then they embrace you.

All the psalmist is doing is simply telling us what we already know. The best way to deal with a potential problem is to avoid it. The best way to deal with alcohol (In My Opinion) is simply not to drink it. The best way to deal with drugs is not to take them. the best way to deal with pornography is not to read it. The best way to deal with profanity is don't use it. The old saying is true, "Bad Company Corrups Good Morals," so avoid bad company.

II. Apply God's Word

There are alot of people who think their success is tied to the Wall Stree Journal or to Money Magazine or to Forbes Magazine or some other publication, but I don't mind telling you that the only type of success that will outlive you is the success you will find in the Word of God. In fact, the bible clearly teaches that God blesses a person directly and in proportion to their relationship to God's Word.

Here is the person who God blesses with a type of success that outlives them. "But his delight is in the law of the Lord.." (Psalm 1:2) The word "Delight" literally means "Pleasure." I really believe when you are close to God and right with God, nothing will give you more pleasure than reading the Word of God. One of the things I try to pray for everyday in my own life and for my family is that we would have a hunger for God's Word.

King David, who wrote many of the psalms, had a literal love affair with God's Word. Listen to these words, "I have rejoiced in the way of thy testimonies, as much as in all riches" (Psalm 119:14). He said again, "The law of thy mouth is better unto me than thousands of gold and silver" (Psalm 119:72). Listen to this statement: "O how love I thy law! It is my meditation all the day" (Psalm 119:97). I love this one. "How sweet are thy words unto my taste! Yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!" (Pslam 119:103) Finally, he said, "I opened my mouth, and panted: for I longed for thy commandments" (Psalm 119:31).

Let's All be honest. Do we have the same delight? That same desire? That same dedication? That same devotion to the Word of God? I just want to make a statement and move on. I think sometimes we delight too much in the preacher of God's Word, rather than in God's Word that the preacher preaches.

It is not enough just to read the Word of God, We also are told, "And in his law doth he meditate day and night" (Psalm 1:2). There is more to the bible than just reading it or even studying it; we are to meditate on it. That word "Meditate" literally means "To speak to yourself."

It has the overtones of "Humming." Have you ever listened to a tune and the tune stuck in your mind and you caught yourself humming that tune? That is the picture that is painted here. We should constantly be humming the tune of God's Word to ourselves; meditating on it day and night. It is like a song you can't get out of your mind.

Let me tell you why so many of us read our bibles almost in a grinding sort of way, but then we will say to each other when no one is listening, "You know, I read my bible, but I don't get anything out of it." May I tell you why that is true for alot of us? You read it and then you forget about it. For some of us, reading our bible is just another thing we check off of our to do list and we walk away from it and never really think about what we just read.

Let me give you a very easy example - take John 3:16. Have you ever really thought about John 3:16? Took time to work through it? "For God so loved the world." Wait a minute - that means God loves me! It not only means God loves me, but it means God loves everyone else, regardless of who they are. Regardless of whether they accept Him or not. That means I am to love other people just like that.

"That He gave His only begotten Son." Love gives. If God loved me so much that He gave His Son for me, then if I really love Him, shouldn't I give things like my money and my time and my talents back to Him?

"Whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting (eternal) life." All that is necessary to receive eternal life is to believe in Jesus Christ and commit your life to Him. I believe in Jesus Christ and I've committed my life to Him and God says I have eternal life." If I have eternal life I can know for sure when I die that I am going to heaven. If I can know for sure that when I die I am going to heaven and know that because God loved me so much that He gave His Son for me that ought to fill my life with joy no matter what else is going on. Do you see the awesome power of meditation? That is why success is tied to God's Word and it is not enough just to avoid bad company; we must apply God's Word.

III. Affirm What Is Right

When you do these two things here, this is what you will be like: "And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. (Psalm 1:3) Why did the Psalmist compare successful people to trees?

A. Standing Firm

Think about it. A healthy tree stands firm. Look at the words again. "He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water. (Psalm 1:3) When you are planted by God and He plants you beside the river of His truth, you will be unshakable in what you believe and therefore unwavering in how you behave. Jesus made a statement that really makes sense in this context. He said, "Every plant, which my Heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up."

What does that mean? That means when a person is planted in the truth of God's Word and has chosen to abide by what God says, he will not have to read the latest public opinion poll or put his finger to the wind to know what he believes. When you stand on and affirm the Word of God, it doesnt't matter what anybody else says or what everybody else believes. Righteous people are not guided by polls, by pundits, or by the public. They are guided by principles based on the Word of God.

If you study history, you will find that the people who have truly moved this world have been men that the world could not move. Where on God's earth would we be today in America, in our racial relations, were it not for Martin Luther King? How could one african-american man move the entire nation in a way that civil war could not? The reason he could move this nation is because this nation could not move him. That is the mark of a tree; it stands firm.

B. Bearing Fruit

A tree also bears fruit. Verse 3 goes on to say, "That bringeth forth his fruit in his season." (Psalm 1:3) Every life is a fruit bearing tree, but there are only two kinds of fruit bearing trees in this world; trees that bear ripe fruit and trees that bear rotten fruit. That is why we go on to read in verse 4, "The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away." (Psalms 1:4) That verse is hard to understand unless you understand the agricultural life of Palestine back in bible days.

Threshing floors were located on hills that would catch the best breezes. Grain would be brought, crushed by animals or by the threshing instruments that they had and then it would be pitched where the wind would blow the chaff away. The wheat, which was the heavier grain, would fall back to the threshing floor to be collected. The chaff would be scattered and then it would be burned, because chaff is worthless waste.

The truly successful person bears fruit that lasts. Jesus said in John 15:16, "Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain..." (John 15:16)

C. Remaining Fresh

Finally, the truly successful person will bear fruit that remains fresh, because this tree has a - "Leaf (That) shall not wither." (Psalm 1:3) Here is a tree that is always green. It's leaves are always fertile. It's roots are always fruitful. That is the way God want us to be; fruitful in season and fresh in all seasons.

Conclusion

There is a Christian College in the mid-west where there was once a large lovely tree that was a central part of the landscape. It was one of the places that students would love to come and meet and talk. For decades, that giant oak brought beauty to the campus and shade to thousands of students. One day a loud crack echoed across the campus and that tree, under which so many conversations had taken place and so many memories had been built, crashed to the ground.

When they examined it, they noticed that disease had been growing within that massive tree to the point where all that was left was the outer trunk. Inside was nothing more than an empty shell, so when the harsh wind blew that day, the hollow tree fell over.

I just described to you the vast majority of people that live in this world. On the outside they look happy, and many of them are happy. They look healthy and many of them are healthy, but spiritually they are as dry as dust and as dead as a graveyard. If there is anyone like that here today who maybe has everything money can buy, but doesn't have the one and most important thing money cannot buy - which is a relationship to God, a home in heaven, and a purpose to live that will outlast you - then I encourage you to give your heart and life to Jesus Christ so that you will not only receive blessings from heaven in 2007, but will receive blessings from heaven throughout all eternity.