Which Way Shall It Be #3

This is the Truth Pulpit with Don Green, teaching God's people God's Word. From God's perspective, the wicked are just like chaff. Those who do not love God's Word are useless debris, fit only to be gathered and burned.

A disposable byproduct of the greater goal of gathering together good grain. What distinguishes a believer from a non-believer? If it's a matter of the heart, can anyone but God discern which is which?

Well, as Pastor Don Green points out today on the Truth Pulpit, there are definitely some outward characteristics, like their relationship to scripture. Hi, I'm Bill Wright, and we're wrapping up the message, Which Way Shall It Be? Don will focus on the way of the wicked, what they resemble, and what they receive. Finally, he'll consider the way of the Lord, how He provides for the righteous. Once more, we'll turn to Psalm 1 and join our teacher now in the Truth Pulpit. What comes next is a jarring and a sharp contrast.

Beloved, listen to me. There are times where you just despair of trying to do justice to the Word of God, and that's how I feel right now. In the first three verses, we saw a negative and a positive contrast of the righteous man, what he rejects, what he receives. In the brilliance of the mind of God, which inspired the writer of this Psalm, you have another contrast going on. The righteous man is defined by contrast, what he receives, what he rejects. Then there's this bigger contrast that we're about to step into in the last three verses, the next two verses, I should say, that contrasts that righteous man that we've just seen with a wicked man. And so there are all of these clear contrasts that are going on throughout the Psalm, and what we have now is a jarring, sharp contrast. We have just seen a description of the way of the righteous, and we say this is a path of blessing. He comes out like a tree flourishing.

This is so good! And then you move into verse four, and when you read it in the original, it says this, not so the wicked. Not so, not them. Look at verses four and five. The wicked are not so, but they are like chaff which the wind drives away. Therefore, the wicked will not stand in the judgment nor centers in the assembly of the righteous. Who are the wicked? They're the reverse of what I just described. They are the contrasting image. They are defined by the opposite of what we just saw in the first three verses.

So as we look at the way of the wicked, let's look at what he resembles. The wicked are not so, and so when he says the wicked are not so, he's saying they do walk in the counsel of the wicked. They do stand in the path of sinners.

They do sit in the seat of scoffers. They do not delight in God's Word. See, I'm always grateful there's so many faithful people that come to Truth Community week after week, and I know that for most of you, you come because you love God's Word, and you're the object of the blessing of the first three verses.

And I just thank God that he's been good and is pouring that blessing on you, but not everyone in this room is like that. Some of you are in this second path. You're here because you have to be. Somebody made you come, or it just seemed like the right thing to do, but at heart you do not love God's Word. It is a burdensome yoke on your neck, and so you dismiss it.

Outwardly you go through the motions, but inwardly you dismiss it. You don't love it. You don't delight in it.

Well, here's what I want you to see. The second half of Psalm 1 is talking about you, and here's what it says. The way of the wicked, what he resembles is what we want to see. Verse 4, the wicked are not so, but they are like chaff which the wind drives away. There's a tree, and there's chaff. Now chaff is a word that we don't use a whole lot here, but it was something very common, something well known, a part of daily life when this was written. Let me give you just a little bit of a picture, a little bit of an explanation of chaff because it's describing what the wicked are like, and so it matters.

These people who reject God's Word. Chaff was a byproduct of harvest time. They would pull their grain together, and the grain would be mixed with dust and dirt and husks and debris, and they had to separate the good grain that they could eat from all of that dirty byproduct, and they had a means by which they did that. They had a pitchfork-like instrument called a winnowing fan.

What they would do, they'd stand up on the hill where their threshing floor was, and there'd be a good firm wind blowing through, and what they would do is they would shovel up this mixture of grain and straw and chaff, and they'd throw it up in the air, and the wind would blow the chaff away, and the good grain would fall back down to the floor, and so they would just do this repeatedly, the wind blowing the chaff away into a pile away from the grain, separating it, and then they would eventually burn the chaff. The chaff was useless. It was a hindrance. It was a waste. It was a byproduct that had no value, that needed to be destroyed.

It had to be separated from the debris, and eventually it was gathered, and it was burned. Do you realize what a horrific picture this paints of wicked people, what this says about those who love the world, and those who reject or dismiss in whatever form the Word of God, those that are actively hostile to it, that scoff at it, those that simply say, not my cup of tea, I don't care about the Bible. They're in the same camp.

They're grouped together. They don't delight in the Word of God, whatever way they manifest that, in open sin or quiet rebellion. They're all lumped together in this one group called the wicked, and Scripture says that they're like chaff. What God's Word is saying to us from God's perspective, the wicked are just like chaff. Those who do not love God's Word are useless debris, fit only to be gathered and burned. A byproduct of a disposable byproduct of the greater goal of gathering together good grain. This is an arresting phrase.

This brings you up short, because we're too used to, we're too used to as human beings, especially in this day and age, we're too used to patting each other on the back and congratulating each other on how important we are. I'm talking in the most broadest sense, and that there are multiple paths to God. You have your truth, I have my truth. Look, the Word of God rejects all of that and says, those who don't delight in the Word of God are debris. Verse 5, look at verse 5 with me, which describes what this wicked person receives.

Therefore, the wicked will not stand in the judgment nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous. John the Baptist, turn to Matthew chapter 3, John the Baptist used this exact same phrase. He talked about it in the exact same way as he talked about the coming ministry of Christ. Matthew chapter 3 in verse 11. He says, as for me, Matthew 3 verse 11, as for me, I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I. He's talking about the Lord Jesus Christ there. He says, I am not fit to remove his sandal, he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. Watch what he says in verse 12.

His winnowing fork is in his hand and he will thoroughly clear his threshing floor and he will gather his wheat into the barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire. The choice to ignore, the choice to spurn Scripture leads to that outcome. If you are indifferent to God's Word, the man who rejects God's Word and substitutes human wisdom, his own opinion over what Scripture says, is a man who is choosing his own destruction. A man who is manifesting his own worthlessness, useless debris to be cast out, separated from the good grain. And Scripture makes this point with a number of metaphors. The wheat will be separated from the tares. The goats will be separated from the sheep.

There will be a separation coming in the judgment. One path leads to heaven. One path leads to hell.

You're on one or the other. It's that severe. It's that serious. It's that consequential. And you can't avoid this. You can't avoid it. The blessing that we who know the Lord have is certain. We can't be avoided. The judgment that awaits those who continue to spurn God's Word is unavoidable.

Why is that? How can you say that with such a definitive dogmatic certainty? Verse 6. We've seen the way of the righteous, the way of the wicked. Now in verse 6, we're going to see the way of the Lord. Look at this. This is cool.

Four. There's a lot that hangs on that word for at the beginning of verse 6. Why is it that the man of God's Word is blessed? Why is it that the wicked are driven off into judgment?

It's not because there is some kind of self-fulfilling power in our choices. Behind all of this is the power and the omnipotence and the righteous judgment of God. We can know for certain that the man of righteousness is blessed. We can know for certain that the man of wickedness will be cursed. Four.

Because. Verse 6. The Lord knows the way of the righteous.

The Lord, His most holy name, the covenant-keeping God. The Lord knows the way of the righteous. How can I guarantee the ultimate blessing of God on your life if you're the man of the righteousness? It's because the Lord knows your way. The Lord understands. The Lord cares. The Lord provides.

The Lord directs the man who loves His Word. And this frees us up from all manner of anxiety about what the future holds. You don't have to know the outcome of any of the circumstances. You just have to know, okay, the Lord knows the way of the righteous and I have set my heart on His Word. Therefore, somehow, the outcome for me is good. And I am confident.

I am strong. I am courageous, you say to yourself, because this is the path of blessing that God Himself has ordained and I trust Him to be true to His Word. He knows the way of the righteous. The Lord knows my heart.

Peter said in John 21, Lord, you know all things. You know that I love you. If you can say that, Lord, you know my failures. You know my sins of this past week.

You know how many times I've fallen short. But, Lord, you know that at the bottom of it all, I'm a man. I'm a woman who delights in your Word. Then you have every prerogative, every reason, every hope to look at verse six and say, this applies to me. The Lord knows my way.

I will be that blessed man in the end, no matter the sorrows that intervene between now and the outcome. But friends, if you're indifferent to God's Word, you young people, I can't help but talk to you. My ears are going to go by pretty quick and you're going to outlive me. And I'm going to lose the opportunity one day to keep saying things to you. So I'm going to say it because I care about your souls. If you're indifferent to the Word, the Lord knows your way too. If in light of Psalm 1 you still stubbornly go your own way, resisting, resenting God's Word, you are choosing your own destruction. And it won't be anyone's fault but yours.

God will not accept the blame because the way of life and the way of death was set before you and you said, I don't care about this Word. You say, I will drive on the wrong side of the road. I'm sick of this Department of Transportation. I want to drive on that side of the road. Really?

Really? The outcome of that foolishness is unavoidable. You will be.

You will have a collision with a Mack truck known as the judgment of God. And I ask you, why would you do that? Why would you do that? Why?

On what possible basis of self-interest even could you justify that attitude? It's laid out before you. Look at the end of verse 6. Every one of you, look at the end of verse 6. The way of the wicked will perish. It's unavoidable. Here's the thing.

I realize these kinds of themes are really stark and there's a certain weightiness to them. That's as it should be. God didn't give us eternal souls so that we could trifle with them, right? Why would he do that? That would be foolish. I realize it's weighty, but even in the name of your own self-interest, why would you turn away from this? Why would you spruun God's Word knowing that it brings certain destruction?

Knowing that. Think about it this way. Picture, as it were, all of the people in this room being gathered up and tossed up into the air, like the threshing example, the threshing simile that is used in this Psalm, and that most of us will come back down in the hand of God to be gathered up into heaven, into his kingdom of safety. And yet, there are some of you, rather than coming down into that, will be blown away, separated from the rest of us, falling into a pile where you will simply be waiting to be gathered up and burned. Why would you do that?

Please don't do that. Please resolve in your heart right now. I've got to pursue this Word. I will seek out this Word. I don't understand everything about Christ and salvation, but I know that I must become a person of this Word, and I will start today. God, unveil yourself. God, make yourself known to me through your Word, and take the path of blessing.

But know for certain that if you harden your heart once again, and you walk out and say, I will not be that man, I will not be that person, know that you're just grabbing the keys and saying, I'm gonna be on the left side of the road going home. Those of you that know Christ, that love his Word, take heart. This is, you are a tree planted by water, nourished by the goodness and providence and protection of God. Blessings on you. Our lives are good, and they come out good in the end.

Better than we think. The dividing line is God's Word. If you won't embrace it, you will collide against it, and the outcome will be that you will perish. It's that clear. It's that simple. It's that direct.

Which path will it be for you? Let's pray. Our Father, we thank you for the blessing that you promise to those who love your Word. And we've seen it, Lord. We've experienced it in our own lives. You've given fruit to our lives. We've prospered in what we've done. We've experienced the joy of the Spirit and a clear conscience that comes from the forgiveness of our sins. Your blessing just rains down on us, and the tree grows deeper and broader by the day.

Thank you for your goodness to us. And may those who are truly in Christ, who have heard this message, Father, take great nourishing encouragement from the fact that you know the way of the righteous, and you will bless them. May it sustain them through the sorrow and the discouragement that they've felt over these past many days. May this be water that revives the plant of grace in their hearts. Father, for those that are not so, who push away Christ, who don't care about your Word, Father, I beg you to work in their hearts so that they would take your Word seriously. That when you describe them like chaff, as those that will not stand in the judgment, as those who will perish, as those who will be gathered up and burned, that you're not bluffing, that you're not kidding. Father, may there be a holy fear that takes root in their heart, that persuades them to humble themselves under your Word and to receive your Word, the written Word and the incarnate Word, our Lord Jesus Christ, as the defining affection and the defining authority in their hearts.

There's too much at stake, Father, and we've said all that we can say. Now we look to your Spirit to do that hidden work, which only He can do. We commit all of this to you in Christ's name. Amen. Two paths, two entirely different outcomes.

One leads to eternal life in Christ, the other to judgment. We hope you'll be motivated to share this truth with others you meet in the course of your day. Pastor Don Green will have more from the Word of God next time here on The Truth Pulpit, so do plan now to be with us.

Right now, though, Don's back in studio to offer some pastoral encouragement. Well, my Christian friend, in light of this wonderful psalm that we've just concluded our study of, I would ask you this question with a lot of sympathy in my heart. Are you walking with Christ and yet you find that the way is full of sorrow?

I want to encourage you to take heart, my friend, and not give up and not despair. Remember this about our Lord Jesus. He himself was a man of sorrows, and he was acquainted with grief.

And what was the outcome of his life? His death, his resurrection, God raised him to glory. And take heart from that. The Lord knows the way of the righteous. He will not abandon you to your sorrow and your tears forever, but just as he raised Christ to glory, if your faith is in Christ for your salvation, so also he will raise you in glory as well. The outcome for you will be like it was for Christ. So keep looking to your Savior, my friend. He will comfort you in time, and he will bless you in the end.

And one day, you and I who believe in Christ, we will see him in glory, the tears of this life forgotten, and the wonder and bliss of heaven, ours for all of eternity. Thanks, Don. And friend, we hope you'll visit TheTruthPulpit.com to learn more about our ministry. That's TheTruthPulpit.com. For Don Green, I'm Bill Wright, inviting you to join us again next time as Don continues in his ministry of teaching God's people God's Word.