Living Life by Design

Success of the worldly – power, fame, making money and so on – and the success of a true follower of Jesus in living a holy life is like the difference between grass, which only lasts a few days, and a palm tree that stands throughout the ages.

In Psalm 92:1-15, the psalmist sees the world divided between ‘evildoers’ (v.7) and the ‘righteous’ (v.12). Evildoers are senseless ‘fools’ who ‘do not understand’ (v.6). They are ‘enemies’ of God (v.9). One day, not only will they be divided from the righteous, but they will also be divided among themselves – they will be ‘scattered’ (v.9), and they will ‘perish’ (v.9). The ‘righteous’, on the other hand, have a secure future (vv.12–15).

Both ‘evildoers’ (v.7) and the ‘righteous… flourish’ (vv.12–13), but in different ways. For the ‘evildoers’ (v.7) it is passing and temporal. They will soon be ‘destroyed’ (v.7). They are like the grass. But for the ‘righteous’ (v.12) it is a lasting and eternal flourishing. It is ‘like a palm tree’ or ‘a cedar of Lebanon’ (v.12). They ‘will still bear fruit in old age, they will stay fresh and green’ (v.14).

God allows us to choose the life we want to lead…a righteous one, or an evil one. There’s no in between. It’s one or the other. Which will you choose…