The Blessing Of God's Word

March 22, 2026

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

I want to jump into this word today. I had done a number of sermons just on the word. Really had two left. I'm gonna do this last one. Today, Rogan was making fun of me and said, What is this? Y'all know what this is, right? I'm gonna get you mad. But this is gonna make sense in a few moments. But I want to talk about that word. And how many of y'all know we need the word? Amen? We really do. And so I want to invite your attention first to our meditation text, Matthew chapter 4, verse 3 through 4. We can compare our hearts and read this together. Matthew 4, verses 3 through 4. Let's read. Here we go. The tempter came to him and said, If you are the Son of God, tell these sons to become bread. Jesus answered, It is written. Man shall not live by bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God. Amen, amen. Amen. That's a good word that we can meditate on. And our primary text for today comes from the first song of the Psalter. The new American Standard, and it reads like this. How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or the ungodly, will stand in the path of sinners, or sit in the seat of scoffers. But his delight is in the law of the Lord. And in his law he meditates day and night. And he will be like a tree firmly planted by the streams of water or the river water, which yields its fruit in its season. And its leaf does not wither, and whatever it does, and whatever he does, he prospers. The wicked are not so. I want to talk about the blessing of God. Seven years ago, several years ago, not seven, several years ago, I had an interesting experience with evangelism and the word of God. Having a conversation with a person who at the time was not a Christian. Raised in a faith that was contrary to the historic faith, though it had elements and language of Christianity. But at its core, it was not Christian. So we were discussing a different subject when the subject of faith emerged in our conversation. And this person asked me straight out, Do you think I'm a Christian? Now I knew in the moment, if I had answered with the emphatic no, I probably would have lost them or any prospect of them coming to Christ. Truth is, it wasn't about what I thought. I wanted them to hear what God had to say. To the contrary, though, if I had said yes, how many of y'all know I'd have been lying to their face? So I said to them, before I answer that question, I need you to read the book of Matthew. And then come back and ask me that same question again. Of course, I had completely forgotten about the conversation, hadn't seen this person in quite some time. Years later, I would get an email from this person, and they stated that they took my challenge, and they began to read the book of Matthew. When they got to about Matthew 26, they said they realized they were not a Christian. And they accepted Christ as their personal savior. They told me not only are they serving the Lord, but they are chasing the call that is on their life. I'm not sharing this to brag about anything I've done. Instead, I want all of us to see how God speaks to us through his word. Want us to experience the blessing of God's word. That it's real. The old preacher was right when he said, When we open our Bibles, God opens his mouth. So that's what I want to do today. I want to raise that issue that we would have a similar experience. That's the sense of this text. Psalm 1, this familiar word. This person is blessed because the word of God speaks to their life. Verse 2 says, He meditates on the law. He meditates on Torah. That's Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy. He meditates on the teaching day and night. And what I notice is he's not reading the word, he's meditating on the word. There's a difference in reading the word and meditating. I think much of our frustration is because we're trying to read it. God says, if you read it, you're not gonna hear me. You gotta meditate on that thing. What do I mean by meditation? Of course, I want to be clear, I'm not talking about meditation practices in Eastern disciplines. Not talking about Zen Buddhism, I'm not talking about age, a new age, I'm not talking about yoga. I have a very good friend, pastor friend of mine. He believes in yoga, so I'm not hating on my yoga Christian folk. Amen. But guard your mind, guard your mind, guard your mind. My point is when we talk about meditation, I'm not talking about emptying ourselves to achieve some sense of self-awareness. I'm not talking about some hidden nirvana that can be found. I'm not talking about oneness with the universe. I'm talking about peace that only comes from the Almighty. Isaiah said it, he said, Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace. Come on, somebody whose mind is stayed on thee. So by meditation, I mean, and I'm very specific here as I define it, I mean baptizing. And I'm using that word baptizing because I'm not talking about dipping your toe in the word. I'm talking about submerging ourselves in the word, submerging our minds, our emotions, our heart, pondering the word as it seeps down in the opening and the crevices of our soul. Last Sunday we talked about worry and how Rick Warren defined worry as negative meditation. You know, if you play over a negative thought in your mind long enough, it'll worry you to the grave. Well, imagine what we what would happen if we conversely do the same thing with the word of God. If negative worry will put us in the grave, how many of y'all know positive worry on God's word will put us on a heel? And so meditation is constantly turning something over in our minds. Turning over again and again the word of God. For God so loved the word, he loves me. When I feel down on myself, I gotta turn it over in my mind. No, he loves me, he loves me until it gets deep down in my soul. Ever get a tune stuck in your mind? I got some music lovers in here, don't you? I had one get stuck in my mind this week. I'm gonna see if it's stuck in your mind. Don't worry. About it, it's stuck in your mind too. Cause every little thing is gonna be see, it's stuck in your mind. I hear you, I hear you, man. See? Tell your neighbor, you already do meditation. You already do it. Heard another song to my wife's cousin. Strumming my pain with his finger. Sing in my life. Come on, somebody. There you go. They already meditate. Y'all do more than meditation. Tell your name. I know what it is now. I know what it is. Learn heel. She's a beast, y'all. Yeah, amen. Meditation is an immersion. Here's my thesis statement. Meditation is an immersion into the word of God to experience the very presence of God. In the same way we immerse ourselves in our song, in our ritual. Come on, y'all. We must be willing to immerse ourselves in the word of God. Don't just dip your toe in. Don't just get wet once a month. No, you gotta deep submerge yourself into the word of God. Don't just do a surface reading. Get into it. Tim Keller may have said it best. He said it like this meditation is building our own burning bush. So when we hear God's voice, we too will kneel and take off our shoes in his presence. That's meditation. It's kind of like, it's kind of like uh, you know, if you try to learn a foreign language. Anybody here know a foreign language well? I ain't talking about, you know, bits and pieces. Whenever we would travel out of the country, I try to do a little duolingo for four or five months. The last time we traveled out the country, we went to, what was it? We went to France. That's what it was. So I'm thinking I can converse a little bit. I got over there as like I was an infant when it came to the French language. Because I learned in that moment that if I'm really gonna learn a language, I can't just do a surface reading of it. I really can't get one little app 10 minutes a day. No, y'all, I got to immerse myself in the language, the culture, the people, the food. I gotta completely devote myself to it if I'm gonna learn it and know it and feel it. And I just believe if you immerse yourself in the word of God, come on, somebody. Won't He give you peace? Won't He give you joy? Won't you hear His voice? Oh folk are right, hush. Someone is calling my name. That's because they have been meditating in God's word. Let me go and hit this thing and get on out of here. Three things very quickly. What are the blessings of God's word? Number one, the word gives you structure. Meditation in God's word builds structure into our lives. To be more specific, it spills moral fortitude and fibers in our soul. It builds moral guidelines. He says, How blessed or blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scornful, of the scornful, the scoffers. In other words, the word of God helps me to distinguish between right and wrong. Helps me to distinguish between light and darkness, good and bad. Because how many of y'all know just because it looked good to you don't mean it's good for you. I got somebody in here, got a grandmother, amen. Listen to Isaiah the prophet. He says this in Isaiah 5 and 20. Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter. And you know we live in a day where folk want to give us a lie for truth and truth for a lie. And the word of God reminds us that right is right and wrong is wrong. The word of God reminds us that this is light and this is darkness. That even in dark times, how many of y'all know we can still shine a bright light? Don't miss the deceptive nature of good and evil. Here, notice the progression in this text. It starts with walking and then it moves from standing, then it moves to sitting. And I raise that because a lot of Christians think they understand how the devil attacks their life. They think the devil comes in shock and awe. No, baby, that's not how it works. Paul says he dresses himself up like an angel of light. He'll make it look good to you, but it's after it's bitten you, you discover it was not good for ya. He'll make her look like Mother Teresa, and you find out over time you're dealing with Jezebel. He'll make him look like Moses or Samuel, and you'll find out later you've been talking to Freddie Krueger. He'll make it look good, but it comes out like something that y'all not hearing me today. And the word of God distinguishes what is good and what is bad, and what is right and what is wrong. And that's why David says, How shall a young man cleanse his ways? And he wasn't just saying a young man, he's talking about a young woman too. And he's talking about an old man too. Talking about an old woman too. How shall people cleanse their way by taking heed according to thy word? Thy word have I hidden, I've meditated on it. I hid it in my heart that I might not sin against thee. The word gives me structure, gives me guidelines, gives me boundaries, and a culture that thrives on boundaryless living. Number two, the word gives me stability. He says, I delight in the law of the Lord. Um, I'm gonna meditate on it day and night. He's gonna be like a tree firmly planted, and the tree is being compared to the stalks of wheat. The tree produces fruit, but the stalk of wheat produces chaff. And the idea is that the word gives you substance on the inside. And without the word, it gives you a shallowness. You know, you can look at a stalk of wheat and you can look at a tree and you can assume that both are stable until they produce something. You can look at somebody on the outside and everything looks fine. But the moment they start producing words, you can you can assume that's fruit coming out their mouth, but that's chaff coming out their mouth. It's a word about substance. It removes artificiality from your life. Anybody can't stand fake folk? I'm just asking the question. Probably the most disturbing thing for me, and I ain't trying to be self-righteous and think I'm better than somebody, but I can't stand a fake Christian. If you don't love the Lord and you don't know him, just admit it. Man up and woman up enough to say, you know what, I don't know him. Because God wants folk who are with him 100%. And what the writer is saying here, the word will give you substance in your life. It keeps that artificiality and that superficiality out of your life. I was watching something on uh Martin Marvels. That's one of my little favorite shows, Martin Marvels, and they just give you all kinds of information about how things are made and stuff and what have you. And when what I discovered, I didn't know this. They were comparing iron to steel and how both metals were being made. And they were talking about iron, that iron for quite some time was a was a staple in in terms of what society would use, but irons corrode and iron's iron becomes brittle over time, particularly if water engages it. And so they discovered that if they turned up the Kelvins on the fire when they made iron, and if they turned it up to 3,000 Kelvins, and if they put it up to 500, 5,400 degrees Fahrenheit, not only would it dry dry uh pull out all the impurities, but it will also pull out all the carbons. And that which was iron is amazingly transformed into steel. And steel doesn't act like iron, it doesn't get brittle, it doesn't corrode, it can handle the toughness of life. And when I saw that, I said, Oh, that's just like the word right there. God knows there's some steel in all of us, and he's trying to remove all the stuff we think we need, that he can bring the steel out of our soul so we can handle the difficulties in life. Ah, it gives us substance on the inside, but then also the word builds rootedness. A tree firmly planted by the river water, planted by the streets. What does that mean? When you got the word in your life, small and insignificant stuff don't bother you like it used to. Small and insignificant people that used to get on your nerve, you just brush them off and keep on going with your life because you realize your purpose is bigger than to waste time with insignificant stuff and insignificant folk. The tree is firmly planted. So it's kind of like whenever you see a hurricane and you see these newscasters that I have great respect for, everybody running from the hurricane. The newscaster is headed to the hurricane because he wants to report or she wants to report on the hurricane. And I don't care what kind of hurricane it is, it can be down in Florida, keep it down in Florida, amen. Down in Florida, it can be in the Caribbean, I don't care what kind of hurricane it is. You'll see cars passing by, you'll see buildings falling apart. You might even see some people going by, you'll see boats, but you will never see a palm tree flying by that screen. The palm tree, you'll see its leaves kind of waving, and it'll be bending, but it ain't gonna break. And seem like the leaves are waving, like it's praising God in the midst of what it's going through. See, when you got the word in you while everybody is fussing and angry about what they're going through, does anybody know? God'll give you a party in the midst of what should have you crying and falling up. Huh. But then it bears fruit. I gotta deal with that. It bears fruit, it's fruitful in a fruitless season. Don't miss what he's saying. It bears fruit in its season. Implication every tree doesn't bear fruit in its season. Why? Because sometimes trees go through brutal winters. The winter is so brutal that the tree did well just to survive the winter. And some trees survive it. But the tree that meditates on the word of God, not only does he survive it, he bears fruit when his season comes. The winter should have killed the season. But because it had roots in the word, and here's what I learned about trees that trees, you know, they they naturally sink their roots deep into the ground, but the colder it gets, the deeper their roots go. Oh God. See, see, some plants, the reason why they die, their roots are not deep enough in the ground. But the reason why some trees make it, because they can test the temperature in the season. And as it gets colder, they have the sense to know I gotta go deeper with my roots. I wish I had a witness in here today. When things get tough, when things get rough, that's not the time to run from God. That's the time to think your roots deeper. Instead of the Lord of God. And God will not only preserve you, but when your season comes, you better food, but everybody else is better. Everybody knows God is doing it. Let me wrap this thing up. We're meditating on the word of God. It'll give you stability. But then lastly, it'll give you success. Because he says, in whatever he does, he prospers. Don't miss what's going on here. He meditates on the law of the Lord day and night. Meditates on the law of the Lord day and night. And in whatever he does, he prospers. The word, and I said this on first Wednesday, the word many times work as a hyperlink. So when you hear certain phrases, it ought to cause you to think back to somebody else. In this case, it calls us to think back to Joshua chapter 1. Because the same instruction was given to Joshua. You shall meditate on the law day and night. And if you do that, you shall be prosperous. And the point is that Joshua was successful as a commander for the Lord because he did it God's way. And that's what the point of the psalmist is trying to say. That whether it is the man of God or the woman of God, when we begin to meditate on God's word and we allow God's word to become a part and fiber of who we are, that's when we begin to do it God's way. We don't question it, we don't sit down and have a committee about it. If God said it, that settles it, I'm gonna do it God's way. I'm gonna trust his way. And therefore, because I trust this way, God is going to prosper me. The wicked is a warning that you want to do it God's way versus your way. Because when I do it my way, how many of y'all know it goes a wicked way? That's all right, that's all right. But when I do it God's way, it has a way of prospering me, it has a way of keeping me well. And so, my word to all of us is that for this year, for our thing, we need to become a people of the word. Which is why, Roby, I brought this Bible up here. Since you were so interested in this Bible, and and and it's gonna make sense in a minute. So many times, most of the time now, when I preach, I preach on my iPad, and I have my scriptures on my iPad. So I do a lot of stuff digitally. But but this, for y'all that don't know, this is a Bible. This is what a Bible looks like. And the reason why I brought it, because it reminded me of a story I came across years ago, and I ain't hating on cowboy fans. God bless you. I ain't hating on you. But I gotta tell this story. So the story goes that legendary coach Vince Lombardi was preparing his players to play a certain season of football. This was before they had won all those championships. And the season before, they had lost horribly to the Philadelphia Eagles. They were winning that game in the fourth quarter, and Green Bay unfortunately had a collapse, and they lost the game. So at the beginning of training camp, he's trying to set the tone. He wants to make sure this becomes a championship team. And so guys show up to camp, they're looking for new drills, they know it's gonna be harder, they're expecting Vince Lombardi to come at them. He sits all the players down. And then he walks over and grabs one of the footballs, and he picks up the football and he says to the men, gentlemen, this is a football. If you play by the game, if you play the game the right way, you will experience victory and success in the game. And then he gave each player their playbook. And they started from page one and they went over the fundamentals of tackling, the very basics of blocking. We're talking about stuff from Pop Warner, y'all. He went through all the fundamentals because he wanted them to understand if you just get the basics, you're gonna be successful. Pastor, where are you going with this? Well, this is a Bible. And if you just follow the basics, you will experience victory and success in your life. It opens in Genesis and talks about the beginning of everything. It closes in revelation, and God's gonna wrap it all up. And I dare you to follow the principles in this book. And then anybody that knows it's gonna bless you, it's gonna keep you, God will keep him in perfect peace. Who's not? It stayed on thee. That's my word today. We gotta be a part of his word. Don't just read it, we gotta meditate on it. So let me wrap it up this way. I want to share, I'm gonna share at least one, one meditation from my own life. I'm my current time with God. Usually I'm reading through the scriptures or reading some complimentary document or a book or what have you. And so now I'm trying to do a bird's eye view of each book. Where I'm going through each book, but I'm just getting a bird's eye view. You can do this by getting what's called a Bible overview or a Bible introduction. And what that book will do, it's not gonna go into every single detail of each book, but it'll give you basically a bird's eye view of the book. It'll give you the summary, it'll give you the basic theme, and it'll give you the highlight. And so I'm going through every single book of the Bible, and I want to just get a highlight. Well, the last one I went through was the book of Esther. And I've been meditating on this thing for three weeks. I can't look, it's like the song stuck in my head. I can't get it out of my head. So the story of Esther, she's an adopted child. She don't know who her mom and dad is, and she becomes a part of the king's court, and she's elevated to the queen of Persia. Present-day, what's that? Present-day Iraq or Iran? One of the two. Maybe no, it's Iran. Be Iran, so it wouldn't be Iraq, Iran. Thank you. Iran, not Iran. Iran. There you go. We need to say it better than that. And so she's a she's the queen. And of course, Haman has this plan. He's uh he's an official and he wants to annihilate the Jews. And so her uncle, Mordecai, who raises her, says, Look, we we need you to step in. And who knows, maybe this the reason why God put you in power. And so she becomes a part of the one that foils the plan, and and and Haman suffers destruction. And to this day, the Jews from that book practice a feast called the Feast of Purim. P-U-R-I-M, based on the story of that book. Now, the overall theme is this of the book, and this is what got me. Throughout the entire book, there's no mention of Yahweh or God, but his hand is all through the book. And here's what I've been meditating on. Just because you can't see him, doesn't mean he's not behind the scenes of your life. I've been chewing on that for three weeks. And like a song stuck in my mind, I can't get it out of my mind. That's been my prayer. So here's my prayer. Lord, help me to trust you when I can't see you, to know you're working in the unseen places in my life. That's enough, y'all. Let's close. Come on, doc. Let's prepare our hearts for the Lord's Supper. What I'm trying to do, this is why we're doing what we're doing on First Wednesday. Um this is why we do the meditation verse. Uh Paul said it like this work out your salvation with fear and trembling. He doesn't say work for your salvation. Because none of us can work for our salvation. For Paul also said, For by grace you've been saved through faith, that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, least anyone should brag about it. That's what boasts mean. And so salvation is something that is purely of God, but we have a responsibility to work it out. And that word work out is energy. It literally speaks exercise it out, put it to work. And so meditation is one way to work out our salvation. Meditating on God's word. There are plenty ways you can work it out. One of the ways is to work it out, to learn the voice of God. That's why we study the word of God, not to show that we're smarter than somebody else, or we more spiritual or better than somebody else, but hopefully and prayerfully to learn the voice of God, the presence of God, so that I understand when God is speaking to me and when he is not. That's my word. Let us be prayerful about that. Let us dedicate ourselves to some type of daily meditation. He meditated day and night. Day and night. You can at least do day. He did day and night. The psalmist said he prayed, he praised the Lord seven times a day. You're gonna get at least one or two in. Come on now. Am I right, Shay? At least one. That's my word.