Key Topics – Page 84 – Three Minute Bible

Blessed is the one
    who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
    or sit in the company of mockers,
but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
    and who meditates on his law day and night.

Today’s meditation begins another new feature at Three Minute Bible, Psalm Sunday. Each Sunday we will look into the Psalms for inspiration. I don’t know if we will jump around the book of Psalms or go straight through. Either way, there is a lot of material here so I’m not worried about running out of things to talk about.

Two Paths

In today’s verse, King David points to two different paths. One path is described as the place where the wicked are. Sinners are there as are mockers. Is this information helpful? How do we discern what is sin or what the wicked do? Mocking is easy to recognize, but is the mocker bad?

…because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.

The word, “test” is one of those words with many connotations and meanings. In today’s verse James explains what he means by suggesting we should consider “trials of many kinds” as “pure joy.” Testing, he says, produces perseverance.

He is not talking about the kind of testing that an engineer might use to determine how strong something is. That kind of test requires pushing a material or design to the breaking point. When testing a material that way, we measure where the failure is. That information is used to design something that will not fail when it undergoes a different kind of test.

Category: Key Topics

Psalm Sunday – Psalm 1: 1-2

Testing – James 1: 3