Choosing between the two ways

By Rev Kenneth Mtata

10 February 2022

Today’s readings

Psalm 1

Jeremiah 13:12-19

Acts 13:26-34

Today’s verse

“for the LORD knows the way of the righteous,

    but the way of the wicked will perish” (Psalms 1:8)

The tradition of the two ways of life is very strong in the old and new testaments. These are the way of righteous and the way of the wicked. Even though God’s people were called to walk the way of righteousness, there were difficult moments when they were forced to declare once again which way they would choose. One such moment was when the Israelites were to enter the promised land and the potential of falling from the way of righteousness and Joshua declared: “And if you be unwilling to serve the LORD, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell; but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD” (Joshua 24:15).

Sometimes at key moments, God would ask the people to make their choices clear: “See, I have set before you this day life and good, death and evil. If you obey the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you this day, by loving the LORD your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his ordinances, then you shall live and multiply, and the LORD your God will bless you in the land which you are entering to take possession of it. But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you this day, that you shall perish; you shall not live long in the land which you are going over the Jordan to enter and possess” (Deuteronomy 30:15-18).

The choice one makes determines genuine blessedness or wickedness leading to destruction.

If we read this Psalm 1 as the presentation of the two ways, we can see what choices are set before us. If we especially look closely to the verbs in capital letters highlighted below, the two ways are clearly separated. Let's read:

Blessed is the person

who WALKS not in the counsel of the wicked,

nor STANDS in the way of sinners,

    nor SITS in the seat of scoffers;

2 but his DELIGHT is in the law of the Lord,

    and on his law he MEDITATES day and night.

3 He is like a tree

    PLANTED by streams of water,

that PRODUCES its fruit in its season,

    and its leaf does not WITHER.

In all that he does, he PROSPERS.

4 The wicked are not so,

    but are like chaff which the wind DRIVES AWAY.

5 Therefore the wicked will not STAND in the judgment,

    nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous;

6 for the Lord KNOWS the way of the righteous,

    but the way of the wicked will PERISH.

Which verbs to do you identify with? A verb is a word of action. It requires us to go and DO. In DOING, we BECOME a people of the way of righteousness.

Let us Pray:

God, I choose today to walk, stand, sit, delight, meditate, to be planted, to yield fruit, to thrive in the way of righteousness. In Jesus I pray, AMEN.