The Purpose and Power of Worship: A Song of Instruction

Hey everybody, I’m KJ Scriven and welcome to Strengthen Your Walk™. We’re going to be continuing, and over the next few sessions, we’re going to be actually referring to psalms. We’re just going to hang out in the songs for the next few days. And again, all of these psalms are songs that were written to string, which is psaltery, but as I described before, the psalms cover all different types of subject matters. And so, these are different songs and prayers that different people, probably the most famous is David, but he’s not the only one that wrote Psalms.

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But we’re going to start with the very first, from the beginning. Psalm chapter 1 and we’re going to read verses 1 through 3. Notice this, I’m going to read it in CSB. In some of your Bibles it’ll say “Blessed is the one,” but in CSB it describes what this word blessed actually means. It actually says, “How happy is the one who does not walk in the advice of the wicked or stand in the pathway with sinners or sit in the company of mockers! Instead, his delight is in the Lord’s instruction.”

Some of your Bibles may say, “in the Lord’s law,” in the law of the Lord, but when he’s saying law, it’s actually saying instruction. That word law is the word Torah, which just means the word of God, the first five books of the Bible. This is Old Testament. So, he’s saying, “Happy is the” If you’re looking for happiness and joy in your life, that word blessed literally means happy, fortunate, or joyful. Happy. “How happy is the person” watch this, “who does not walk, stand, or sit?” Basically, it says walk in the advice of the wicked, stand in the pathway of sinners or sit. So you notice that? Walk, stand, sit.

Basically, it doesn’t have a lifestyle of soaking in or living a life with those who are wicked or scornful. In essence, it means people who don’t live by the advice of the world, but a happy person, a joyful person, delights in the Lord’s instruction in the word of God. Watch this and it says, “and he meditates on it day and night. He is like a tree planted beside flowing streams that bears its fruit in its season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers.”

Now notice that imagery. He is like a tree, the person who meditates on God’s word day and night is like a tree planted beside a flowing stream. So imagine that. What does that tell you? It tells you that the roots of that tree is constantly being nourished. The soil is always being nourished because it’s right next to a stream. And it says and says “it bears fruit in its season and its leaf never withers.”

And I want you to notice this word meditate there is actually the word murmur. You notice if you ever want to remember a phone number and you don’t have a paper or a pen, you murmur it. You say it over, “8-6-7-5-3-0-9, 8-6-7-5-3-0-9.” You keep murmuring it until you can get to a pen or a paper. So, he’s saying, the person that is happy or joyful constantly meditates, recites the truth of God’s word. And that person is like a tree whose roots are constantly being nourished by streams of water. This is a psalm that gives us instruction and tells us this is the power of worship, of meditating on God’s word. Thank you for joining us for Strengthen Your Walk™.

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