Latest / Reformed Thinking / Two Ways, Two Ends: The LORD’s Verdict (Psalm 1:4–6)

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Two Ways, Two Ends: The LORD’s Verdict (Psalm 1:4–6) · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome back to the show. You are listening to the
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Reformed Thinking edition of the Deep Dive.
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Glad to be here. This is where we take a stack of
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theological documents, old commentaries, historical
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confessions, and we we really try to find the signal and all
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the noise. We're looking for the root
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systems of our faith. We certainly are.
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We're not interested in just skimming the surface.
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We want to understand the bedrock of what we believe.
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Today, the documents we have in front of us are, well, let's
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just say they are not designed to make you feel good about
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yourself in a superficial way. No, not at all.
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We are tackling the second-half of Psalm 1, specifically verses
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4 through 6. It is a heavy text, It confronts
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us. It really does.
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And before we even open the text, I feel like we have to
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address the elephant in the room.
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We live in a culture that absolutely loves the myth of
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neutrality. You know what I'm talking about.
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Right. Absolutely.
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It's. That vibe you get maybe at a
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dinner party or just scrolling through social media, where the
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base assumption is that spiritual truth is like a big
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buffet. Right.
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You take a little of this, a little of that, a bit of
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Buddhism, some Christianity, maybe some Stoic philosophy, and
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as long as you're a generally nice person, it's all equally
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valid. It's the idea that there are
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infinite paths up the same mountain.
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And they all lead to the same peaceful destination.
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That's the core belief. That is the spirit of the age.
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You have your truth. I have my truth.
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It's pluralism. It's this notion that we can all
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exist in this kind of comfortable Gray middle ground
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where we're not fully for God, but you know, we're not really
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against him either. We're just.
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Existing we're. Just chilling, yeah.
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Floating in the middle somewhere.
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And that is precisely the illusion that Psalm 1 is
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designed to completely destroy. Violently, it seems.
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Yes, the source material we're looking at today, which includes
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some heavy lifting from Hebrew scholars and some classic
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Reformed theologians, identifies this text as the gateway to the
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entire book. Of Psalms, the gateway.
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I like that. It acts like a security guard at
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Thor of a concert. It stops you before you go in
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and says hold on. Before you start singing these
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songs, before you complain to God or praise Him, you need to
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know what you are. And according to this text,
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there are only two options. 2 not 3, not 100, just two.
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You are either a tree or you are chaff.
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That's it. It's a binary reality.
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No third way. And just to Orient everyone
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listening, we are unpacking this through the lens of historic
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Protestant Christianity. Specifically, we're working
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within the framework of the Westminster Confession of Faith.
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So this isn't just generic moral advice we're handing.
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Out. Not at all.
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This is about covenantal boundaries.
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It's about where you stand in relation to the God of the
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universe. It's a question your fundamental
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identity. OK, so let's get into the text
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itself. In our last discussion, we spent
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a lot of time on verses one through 3.
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The blessed man that was the tree.
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The picture of flourishing life, right?
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Planted by streams of water, yielding fruit in its season.
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Its least does not wither. I mean, it's a picture of
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stability, of life, of permanence.
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It's beautiful imagery gives you a sense of heaviness, of being
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established and rooted. But then we hit verse 4 and all
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the sources point out that the original Hebrew does something
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violent. Here the text reads the wicked
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are not so. Not so.
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The Hebrew phrase is lukong. Lukong just hearing it, it
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sounds sharp. It sounds like a clap.
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It is sharp, and it's not just a casual transition.
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This isn't the writer saying. On the other hand, the scholars
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we've been reading describe this as a violent, antithetical
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connector. It is a hard slam on the brakes.
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It feels like a door slamming shut right in your face.
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It is. Think about everything we just
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said about the righteous man in those first 3 verses.
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He is planted. He has a source of life from
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outside himself. He produces fruit.
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He has a future. He has stability.
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Everything is positive. And then the psalmist turns to
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the wicked and says Lucon. Not so.
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It is a complete and total negation of everything that came
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before. So we have to be clear here.
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It's not that the wicked are just, say, wobbly trees, or
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maybe trees that just need a little bit more fertilizer.
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No, and that is the key insight we have to grab onto.
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They are not a lesser version of the tree.
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They are the opposite of the tree.
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They are the negation of everything that implies life and
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substance. If the righteous man is a living
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Organism, the wicked are. Well, there's something else
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entirely. Anti life.
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In a way, yes. And to drive that point home,
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the psalmist uses this metaphor that honestly, I think most of
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us modern people kind of miss because we don't work on farms
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anymore, for sure, He says. They're like chaff, which the
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wind drives away. Now when I hear chaff, I just
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think of, I don't know, dust maybe, or some bits of dry
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grass. But the materials we're using go
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deep into the agricultural mechanics of this and it's
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fascinating. It's critical to understand the
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ancient Near Eastern threshing floor to really get this image.
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In the ancient world, threshing floors were usually built up on
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a hill somewhere flat and hard, where the wind would blow
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consistently. OK, so location is key.
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Location is everything. You'd take your harvested grain,
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the whole stock, and you would crush it on the floor.
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Maybe with animals or a sled. You're trying to loosen the
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actual grain, which is the edible valuable part, from its
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outer casing, the husk. And the husk is the chaff.
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Right, the husk is the chaff, and then comes the process
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called winnowing. You take a big fork, a winnowing
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fork, and you toss the whole crushed up mess into the air.
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You just throw it up. You throw it up, and this is
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where the physics of it all comes into play.
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The grain, the kernel has weight, it has density, it has
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substance. So what does it do?
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Gravity takes over. It falls straight back down.
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It falls back down to the floor where you can gather it up.
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It has value, so it's collected. With the chaff.
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The chaff is weightless. It's a dry, hollow husk.
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It's got nothing inside, so when you toss it up, the wind catches
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it and just drives it away. It's gone.
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It doesn't land back on the floor.
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It scatters. It becomes debris.
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It's blown off the hill and forgotten.
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That is a terrifying image when you realize he's talking about
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human beings. That is a destiny.
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The sources we have list 4 specific attributes of chaff
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based on this process. Let's maybe run through them,
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because this feels like the diagnostic test for that myth of
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neutrality we were talking. About good idea.
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First, it's rootless. The chaff has been severed from
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the stalk, which was severed from the ground.
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It has no connection to the earth or water source anymore.
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It's completely detached from any source of life.
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It's just floating free, but not in a good way.
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Not in a good way at all. And the second one is connected
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to that which is second. It is dead.
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There is no life in a husk. It's just a shell.
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It is the casing where life used to be, but now it is totally
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empty. There's no potential for growth.
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And the third one, this is the one that really stood out to me.
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The third one is maybe the most significant concept for us to
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grasp weightlessness. OK, talk to us about weight,
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because in the Bible, weight is not just about pounds or
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kilograms, is it? No, not at all.
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In Hebrew, the word for glory is kabad, and the literal root
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meaning of kabad is heavy or weighty.
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To have glory, to have significance in God's economy is
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to have substance, to have weight.
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So God himself is the heaviest being in existence.
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Because he is the most real, He is the most substantial.
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All other reality is derived from him.
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So when the psalmist says the wicked are like chaff, he's
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making a statement about their substance.
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He's saying they lack kebab, they lack glory, they lack
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weight. Correct.
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They are flimsy. They are insubstantial.
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And this is where the irony really hits us in our modern
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context. Because if you look at the
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people the world considers wicked from a biblical
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standpoint. And we should clarify, Wicked
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here doesn't necessarily mean a cartoon villain tying someone to
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the train tracks. Not at all.
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It just means someone living their life without reference to
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God, someone who's operating system doesn't include.
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Him, right? The person who ignores God could
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be nice guy. He could be a philanthropist, a
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family man. He could be.
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He could be a tech CEO, a celebrity and influencer with
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millions of followers. A powerful politician in our
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eyes. From a worldly perspective,
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those people look like they have the most weight.
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They take up space. They influence the culture.
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They look solid. They look like big, strong oak
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trees. But the text is saying that's an
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optical illusion. It is a mirage, biblically.
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If you are not rooted in God, if you do not have that connection
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to the source of life, you are chaff.
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It doesn't matter what your bank account says or how many
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followers you have. You are all surface, no
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substance. You are a hollow husk.
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And because you're weightless, that leads to the 4th attribute.
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Because you're weightless, you are driven.
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Which the wind drives away. They do not move themselves.
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This is the deep tragedy of the Sinner.
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They think they are the captains of their own soul, to quote that
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famous poem Invictus. Self-directed.
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Autonomous. They think so, but biblically
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they're just being pushed around.
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They are slaves to the cultural wind of the moment, slaves to
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their own passions and appetites, slaves to the
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approval of others. They are blowing in the wind and
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they call it freedom. This really connects back to the
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Reformed doctrine of total depravity, doesn't it?
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It's a perfect picture of it. Total depravity doesn't mean
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you're as evil as you could possibly be at every moment.
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It means that sin has affected every part of you, your mind,
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your will, your affections. It's a total infection.
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It is. And without the regenerating
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grace of God, without being planted like that tree in verse
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three, you are by nature spiritual debris.
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You have no root in yourself. You cannot anchor yourself.
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So you can be successful, fit, wealthy and admired by everyone,
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but if you are not in that covenant relationship with God.
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You are chaff, and the terrifying part of the metaphor
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is that the wind will blow. A test is coming.
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It is inevitable. And that's the perfect
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transition to the next segment. The text itself moves us from
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the farm, from the threshing floor into a completely
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different setting. A courtroom, A radical scene
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change. Verse 5 starts with a word that
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implies A logical result. Therefore.
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Alcone. It connects the condition to the
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consequence. It's a word of logical
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progression. So because they are chaff,
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because they have no substance, no weight, therefore the wicked
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will not stand in the judgement. It's cause and effect.
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The inward emptiness leads directly to the outward judicial
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collapse. The language here really does
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shift into a kind of legal drama.
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The Hebrew verb for stand is yakumu.
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Now the sources are clear. This is not talking about
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physical posture. It's not about whether you have
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strong knees or can physically get up from a chair.
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No, it's a legal term. It is.
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It refers to standing in a divine assembly or a tribunal.
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Think of it like a defense attorney in a modern courtroom
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trying to make a case. To stand means you have a valid
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defense. It means you have a reason why
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you should be acquitted. You have an advocate.
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You have quite literally ground to stand on.
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So the psalmist is saying that when the wicked face the
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judgement of God, they have no defense, they have no case.
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They simply collapse. They fall apart under scrutiny.
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When the light of a holy God is shined on a life that is chaff.
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There's no substance there to withstand the verdict.
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The wind of judgement blows and they are gone.
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They cannot present a case. They have nothing to say.
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Now, the sources mentioned that this has an eschatological
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context for those listening who might not have a theology
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degree. That just means it refers to the
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end times, right? Yeah.
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The final chapter of history, yes.
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That's the primary reference. While we certainly see many
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judgments throughout history, empires falling, corrupt leaders
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being exposed and brought to justice, this verse points to
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the Great White Throne judgement described in the Book of
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Revelation, the Final day. The day when all accounts are
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settled. The day when every secret is
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laid bare. And on that day the chaff will
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not be able to argue its case. There will be no filibustering.
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The verse goes on to say they will not stand in the
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congregation of the righteous. Let's unpack that word
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congregation. The Hebrew is ODA.
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That sounds specific. ODA is a very specific word.
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It's not just a random crowd or a mob you'd find at a market.
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It refers to a formal covenantal assembly.
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It's the official gathering of God's people.
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OK. And this brings up a really
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helpful distinction in Reformed theology that you hear a lot
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about the difference between the visible church and the invisible
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church. It's a vital distinction to
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make. OK, so explain that, because
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when I look around my church on a Sunday morning, it definitely
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looks like a mixed bag of people.
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It is, and it's supposed to be. That is the visible church.
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It contains everyone who professes faith in Christ,
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everyone who gets baptized, everyone who shows up on Sunday.
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And Jesus himself told us in the parables that it would have
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wheat and it would have tares or chaff.
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So there are people in the pews who are genuinely rooted in
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Christ, and there are people who are just there for social
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reasons or out of habit, or maybe they're even hiding from
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something. All of the above.
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That's the messy reality of the church in this age.
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But Psalm One is talking about something else.
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It's talking about the invisible church.
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It's talking about the congregation of the righteous.
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This is the true assembly of the elect, the actual body of Christ
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as God sees it. And the text is absolutely
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explicit. The wicked, the chaff, will not
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be a part of this final assembly.
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It is a divine separation, a final sorting.
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It is God himself draws the line, and this creates a huge
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problem for some popular modern ideas like universalism, the
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belief that everyone gets saved in the end, that all paths lead
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to God. This text says no, that is not
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true. There is a separation.
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The chaff does not stay with the wheat, they are removed.
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Oh wait, we have to be super careful here.
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I can hear someone listening and thinking, OK, so the righteous
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get to stand because they're just better people, right?
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They worked harder. They water themselves better.
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They tried more. And that is the trap of
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moralism. It's the default setting of the
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human heart. And if you read the text that
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way, you miss the gospel completely.
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So how should we read it? The righteous do not stand
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because they are naturally sturdy or morally superior.
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Remember the metaphor from verse three?
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They are a tree that was planted.
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It's a passive verb. Someone else did the planting.
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Someone else did the work. They are righteous because they
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have a different route, not because they have better
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willpower. They stand because they have
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been given a standing that they did not and could not earn for
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themselves. This leads us perfectly to the
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climax of the Psalm, to verse 6. The source material we're
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working with calls this the theological summit of the whole
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Psalm. It is.
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It gives us the ultimate why behind the verdict.
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For the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of
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the wicked will perish. This is the bedrock, This is the
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foundation for everything that has come before.
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Why do the righteous stand? Why do the wicked fall?
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It's not, at the end of the day, about them.
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It's about the Lord. OK, let's drill down on that.
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Word knows the Hebrew is yada. Now if I'm just reading this
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casually in my English Bible, I might think we'll hold on.
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God is omniscient. He knows everything.
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He knows the way of the wicked too, doesn't He?
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He knows what they had for breakfast this morning.
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So why does the text say he only knows the way of the righteous?
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That is the crucial question to ask.
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And you're right, if yada here just meant cognitive awareness
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or the simple gathering of data, the verse would be nonsense.
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God knows every thought and every molecule in the universe.
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So it has to mean more. It means something much, much
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deeper in this context. And honestly, in most of the Old
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Testament, when it refers to God's relationship with his
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people, yada means covenantal, intimate, electing affection.
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It's a knowledge of relationship, not just
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information. The sources compare it to a
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verse in Amos chapter 3. Yes, Amos 3.2 it's a striking
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verse. God is speaking to the nation of
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Israel and he says you only have I known of all the families of
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the earth. Now obviously God knew about the
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Egyptians. He knew about the Babylonians.
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He knew their geography, their kings, their sins.
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He knew all the data points, but he did not know them in this
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special way. He did not set his particular
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saving love upon them. It's the difference between me
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knowing of the president and me knowing my own child.
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I know facts about the president.
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I know my son. I'm committed to my son's
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well-being. It's relational, it's personal.
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It is electing love and Jesus uses the exact same language in
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Matthew 7.23, which has to be one of the scariest verses in
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the New Testament. I agree.
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He looks at these people who were workers of lawlessness,
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people who did miracles in testness.
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His name, by the way, they cast out demons and he says to them,
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I never knew you depart from me. He knew who they were, he knew
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what they did, he just had no saving relationship with them.
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Spot on. So when Psalm 1.6 says the Lord
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knows the way of the righteous, it's teaching the doctrine of
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Providence and the preservation of the Saints, it means he
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guards their way. He watches over it, he approves
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of it. He is committed to it.
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So the righteous stand not because they are holding on to
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God with their own strength. But because God is holding on to
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them with His Sovereign in knowing gaze, their security is
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in His knowledge of them, not their knowledge of Him.
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That is a huge comfort. But then we get the contrast,
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the other side of the coin. But the way of the wicked will
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perish. The verb there is ibad.
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Ibn Bad, it means to be ruined, to be lost, to be destroyed.
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And notice the active nature of this.
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The text says the way itself perishes.
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The road there on leads to ruin. OK, we need to address a
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theological controversy here that the sources bring up.
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There's a view called violationism.
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It suggests that when the wicked die or face judgement, they just
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they just cease to exist. Like a light bulb burning out,
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poof, gone. No suffering, just non
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existence. Does this word perish here?
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Support that idea. The source material argues
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strongly against that interpretation, and I think
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they're right. In the broader context of the
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Old Testament and the whole Bible, perish implies a ruinous
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loss in being under active wrath, not a simple cessation of
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existence. Have you given analogy?
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Think of a beautiful car perishing in a fiery crash.
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The matter is still there. The metal, the glass, it all
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exists, but it's ruined. It's destroyed as a functional
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vehicle. It exists in a state of
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destruction. That's closer to the biblical
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idea of perishing. So it's the tragedy of a path
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that leads directly off a Cliff. Right.
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The wicked fall off the Cliff. They don't just vanish into thin
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air before they hit the bottom, they crash.
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It is a state of active, conscious destruction.
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So the deep tragedy is that the wicked past might look
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successful for 70 or 80 years. It might look like a paved 6
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lane highway with great scenery. You're driving a Ferrari.
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Everyone's cheering you on. But the destination is a bridge
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that is out absolute loss. That is the destination.
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OK. So we've laid out the text, We
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have the chaff versus the tree, We have the judgement where the
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chaff cannot stand, and we have the Lord's knowing versus the
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way that perishes. Now we have to talk about how to
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apply this, because if we just stop here, the message sounds an
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awful lot like, hey listener, try really really hard to be a
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tree and not be chaff. Which is a crushing message.
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It's a message of despair. Because naturally, apart from
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grace, we are all chaff. That's the function of the law,
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right? Theologians talk about the uses
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of the law. That's the first use of the law
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in reformed theology. It functions as a mirror When we
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read Psalm one honestly, we shouldn't immediately puff out
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our chest and say oh, I'm the tree.
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Look at my beautiful fruit. That's our first instinct
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though. It is, but we should look at the
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standard delighting in the law of the Lord day and night, never
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walking in the counsel of the wicked, never standing in the
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way of sinners. And we should say, I do not do
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that. I fail at that every single day.
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So the text exposes the reality that no son of Adam can stand in
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the judgement on his own merit. We are all naturally rootless
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and weightless. Right.
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If you try to stand before God on your own record, you will be
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blown away like chaff. This is where we must bring in
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the gospel. We have to look for the
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Christological fulfillment of this song.
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The great exchange. I love how the sources lay this
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out. Who is the true blessed man of
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Psalm, One who actually lived this out?
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It's Jesus Christ. He is the only one who never
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once walked in the counsel of the wicked.
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He's the only one who perfectly delighted in the law of the Lord
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every second of his life. He is the true green tree.
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But here's the twist. The winnowing fork.
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Yes, John the Baptist introduces Jesus in Matthew 3.12 with this
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exact imagery. He says his winnowing fork is in
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his hand and he will clear his threshing floor.
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Christ is the judge. He holds the fork.
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But before he acts as the final judge, he does something
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completely unthinkable. He becomes the substitute.
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This is the part that should just floor us every time we
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think about it. On the cross, Jesus, the tree of
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life, was treated as the chaff. That's the heart of the gospel
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right there. He was driven away.
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He was taken outside the camp, outside the city walls, which
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was a place of curse. He faced the full force of the
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wind of God's wrath. He cried out, My God and my God,
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why have you forsaken me? He endured the perishing so that
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we would not have to. He took the weightlessness of
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our sin, the rootlessness of our nature, and He absorbed the full
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blast of the destruction we deserved.
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So that we the guilty, could be known by the Father.
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So that when we say we stand in the judgement, verse 5, it's not
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because we are standing on our own 2 feet, it's because we are
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standing in Him. We are clothed in His perfect
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righteousness. This changes the metaphor of the
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tree for us, doesn't it? As believers, we aren't just
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plastic trees that we stuck in the ground trying to look real.
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No, the key theological concept is union with Christ.
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We are branches that have been grafted into the true vine.
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Our weight, our substance, our life.
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It comes from His substance. We draw our life from Him.
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Without that vital connection, we revert to being what we are
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by nature. Chaff.
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So, having established that we are saved by grace alone through
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faith alone, not by being good little trees on our own, what do
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we do with this text now? How does it apply to a
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Christian's life? The source material talks about
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the third use of the law. Right.
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The third use of the law is the law as a guide for the believer.
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Because we are united to Christ, we now have a new nature.
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So we don't avoid the counsel of the wicked in order to get
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saved. We avoid it because we are
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saved. It's a rule of gratitude.
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It's how a tree is supposed to live.
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I like that framing. It's the head, heart, and hands
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application. Let's break that down for the
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listener. First, the head.
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What does this Psalm call us to believe?
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We need to believe in the absolute sovereignty of God's
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decree. We need to truly believe that He
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knows our way. This is a complete rejection of
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chance, of karma, of blind luck. We must believe that God is the
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primary actor in our preservation.
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Our security rests in His mind, not in our performance.
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And the heart. This isn't just an intellectual
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exercise. What should we feel?
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No, it's deeply effective. The text should cultivate 2
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specific emotions in us, a holy fear and a profound gratitude.
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We should feel a holy fear of the judgement, not a cowering
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terror that God will abandoned us, but a trembling awe at the
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reality of His Holiness and justice.
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And that should lead to an overwhelming gratitude that we
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are secure in Christ. We should feel the weight of
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eternity. And finally, the hands.
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What do we actually do differently on a Tuesday
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afternoon because we believe Psalm 1?
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We separate. Now, I know that's a dirty word
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in our culture, but the song calls for a kind of separation.
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We separate from the world's methods and values.
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We reject pragmatism, you know, the idea of doing whatever works
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to get ahead. We reject secular ethics that
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ignore God is the standard. And interestingly, the sources
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say this should actually drive our evangelism.
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How does that work? Well, if we really believe that
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our neighbors, our Co workers, our family members who are
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without Christ, our chaff who will be driven away into ruin,
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how can we possibly stay silent? The terrifying reality of the
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chaff should compel us to share the good news of the gospel.
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It's not just that they're missing out on a better life or
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a purpose driven life. They are facing absolute eternal
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ruin. The stakes couldn't be higher.
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They couldn't. The sources also touch on how
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this Psalm integrates into our corporate worship, specifically
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with the sacraments. This is very practical for
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church life. Think about baptism.
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What is it a sign of? It is the sign of being planted
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into Christ's death and resurrection.
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It's the sign of being washed. It marks the boundary line
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between the world and the visible covenant community.
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In the Lord's Supper. The Lord's Supper in Reformed
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circles is often talked about in terms of fencing the table.
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It is food for the congregation of the righteous.
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It's for the family. When we take communion, we are
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visibly acting out this separation.
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We are eating the bread of life, distinguishing ourselves from
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the way of the chaff. And it's not about being elitist
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or better than anyone else. Not at all.
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It's about recognizing who are only source of life is and
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confessing our dependence on him.
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The sources mentioned Charles Spurgeon here.
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I always love a good Spurgeon reference.
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They talk about his earnestness when preaching a text like this.
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Spurgeon was famous for pleading with his congregation.
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He wouldn't just lecture them with theological abstractions,
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he would look them in the eye. The pastor has a duty to warn
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the successful Sinner. He has to have the courage to
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say you might have money and health and the world's approval,
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but you are dangling over the fire.
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You are chaff and the wind is about to blow.
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But he also has to comfort the struggling St.
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Yes, that's the other side. There are people in the pews
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every Sunday who feel weak. They feel like their leaves are
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withering. They've had a bad week, a bad
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year, a bad diagnosis. The pastor needs to look at them
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and say your stability is not your grip on God, it is his
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knowing of you. That is the deep comfort of
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Psalm 1.6. It brings us right back to where
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we started the two ways, the summary of the whole thing.
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It's the great biblical framework.
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You see it everywhere. Deuteronomy 30.
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I have set before you life and death.
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Jeremiah 17. The cursed shrub in the desert
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versus the blessed tree by the water.
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Matthew 7 The broad Rd. that leads to destruction and the
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narrow Rd. that leads to life. So history isn't just wandering
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aimlessly. No.
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It's moving toward a binary outcome, a great sorting
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congregation or destruction. It is stark.
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It is very uncomfortable for our pluralistic age, but it is
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clear. It is the clarity of love.
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It is more loving to warn someone about the Cliff ahead
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than to let them drive off it while telling them to follow
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their heart. So the call to you, the
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listener, is clear. If you're listening to this and
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you realize I think I'm chaff, I have no root, I'm just being
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driven by the winds of culture, the call is to flee.
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Flee the coming winnowing, repent and believe in the one
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who was treated as chaff for you.
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And if you are a believer, if you are in Christ, the call is
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to rest. Rest in the glorious fact that
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your way is known by the Father. I want to leave everyone with
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one final thought from the source material and it's on this
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idea of wait, we live in a culture that is absolutely
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obsessed with visibility. Everyone wants to be seen,
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everyone's there post to go viral.
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Everyone wants to be an influencer.
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But God is obsessed with weight, substance, kabad, glory.
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So the question to chew on this week is this.
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When the wind blows, and it will blow in your personal life, in
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our culture, and most certainly at the final judgement,
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visibility will not matter. Being viral will not matter.
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Your follower count will mean nothing.
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Only wait will matter. What will be left standing?
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Only that which is rooted in Christ.
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That's the question, are you building a life of visibility or
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are you receiving a life of weight?
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Thanks for joining us on this deep dive into reformed
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thinking. We will see you next time.