The Great Life Tree (An excerpt from Joseph Parker)

(devotional Jan. 2007) (5 Min.'s)

Psalm Chapter 1

1) Happy is the man who does not go in the company of sinners, or take his place in the way of evil-doers, or sit in the seat of those who do not give honour to the Lord.

2) But whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and whose mind is on his law day and night.

3) He will be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, which gives its fruit at the right time, whose leaves will ever be green; and he will do well in all his undertakings.

4) The evil-doers are not so; but are like the dust from the grain, which the wind takes away.

5) For this cause there will be no mercy for sinners when they are judged, and the evil-doers will have no place among the upright.

6) Because the Lord sees the way of the upright, but the end of the sinner is destruction.

We must have positive sustenance. It is not enough to shut up the bad book. We must have the good book in its place. It is not enough to desist from eating bad food. We must have the pure and honest bread to eat. We must be filled with the spirit of God, dispossession followed by inspiration, the outcast devil finding his place occupied when he returns to reconquer his victim. Why have we such incertitude in Christian persuasion and such inconsistency in Christian life? Because we have lost the Bible. We do not read it, we glance at it, we read a verse or a paragraph now and then, but we do not eat it, devour it, consume it. We have Bibles. We ourselves should be Bibles. Let the word of God dwell in you richly. Who really knows the law of the Lord? Who meditates in it day and night? Whoever does this is a blessed man: he eats at the kings table, he listens to the kings music, he lives in the kings light. The Bible is not a text, the Bible is not a chapter, the Bible is not a book of chapters, the Bible is a revelation, is a continual surprise. It brightens upon the mind, charms the fancy. It satisfies all the innermost desires of the spirit, it fills the soul with sweet content, a surprise every morning, a benediction every night. It is impossible for me to convey any sense adequate to the occasion of the manner in which the book of God grows upon me every year of my life. It is my best friend. Would that I could tell you all it tells me. Oh that men would make the law of the Lord their delight, and meditate in it day and night! What preaching we should have then! A word would be a sermon, a sermon would be a library, one hint would start the mind upon infinite ranges of thought and contemplation. You cannot disturb permanently the man who is rooted in Biblical doctrine and Biblical thoughts. Many a man supposes that when he shakes a tree he is shaking the root. Sometimes it appears as if the wind would tear up the deep roots of the great trees. It is not so in all instances. The root is deeper than the strength of which the wind can reach. What is true of many instances in the forest is true in many instances in the Church. If our roots are deep, struck into divine soil, we may be shaken, the branches may creak, a few leaves will be blown off. Aye, a few twigs may be splintered and shivered, but the tree, the great life tree, is safe at the root, because the root is hidden in the wisdom and protected by the eternity of the living God.

Joseph Parker (1830-1902)