Psalms 1

Wesley: Blessed—O the blessedness of that man! Counsel—that doth not lead his life according to their counsel or manner of living. Standeth—a more settled abode; seat—constant and resolved perseverance in wicked courses. Scornful—those who make a mock of sin and scoff at goodness. Divers observe a gradation: standing more than walking, sitting more than standing; sinners worse than the ungodly, and the scornful the worst of sinners.

Blessedness is authentic for the one who refuses the slide into wicked company. The verse names choices that deepen—walk, stand, sit—so the warning is pastoral, not theatrical. Grace enables separation; the hearer must still refuse the counsel, the way, and the seat.

Calvin: the righteous should be confirmed by knowing that all without God’s blessing are miserable, and that God is favorable to none but those who zealously devote themselves to divine truth. It is impossible to apply the mind to God’s laws without first withdrawing from the ungodly. Walking, standing, sitting mark how Satan leads step by step from evil counsel to open transgression and obstinate sitting.

The world is fraught with deadly corruption; the first step to living well is to renounce ungodly company. Separation is not optional hygiene around a neutral path—it is how God keeps a people for the study of his law.

Wesley: Day and night—not seldom and slightly, but diligently and constantly. The positive half of blessedness is delight and meditation in the LORD’s law, not merely avoiding bad company.

Delight is grace-worked affection that still must be practiced. Meditation is a lived diligence—day and night—not a momentary spark. The law is to be loved and kept; forced or empty religion is not the blessed life this verse describes.

Calvin: godliness is designated by the study of the law; God is only rightly served when his law is obeyed. The standard is taken from the Word, not framed by private judgment. Under “law” as head is comprehended the whole of Scripture. Forced or servile obedience is not acceptable; those only are worthy students who come with a cheerful mind. From love of the law proceeds constant meditation.

Delight is not inventing religion; it is cheerful submission to God’s speech. The blessed are those God favors in the pursuit of heavenly wisdom—watered for meditation, not left to invent a law of their own.

Wesley: his happiness is not short and transitory, but like trees continually green and flourishing. Fruit in season and an unwithered leaf picture lasting blessedness tied to delight in the law.

Planted near water, the righteous bear fruit that lasts. Prosperity here is the flourishing of a life rooted in the law, not a blank check for every scheme. Stay by the streams—keep meditating—and expect fruit in its season.

Calvin: those who fear God are happy not with empty gladness but because they are in a desirable condition—like a tree well watered, not one that soon withers in barren soil. The children of God constantly flourish, watered with the secret influences of divine grace, so that whatever befalls them is conducive to their salvation. Fruit in season means full maturity, not precocious show without perfection.

The blessing of God alone preserves any in a prosperous condition. The tree’s life is secret grace, not bare human grit beside a dry ditch.

Wesley: Ungodly—their condition is far different. Chaff—they are restless and unquiet; their seeming felicity has no firm foundation, but quickly vanishes and flees away as chaff before the wind.

Prosperity without delight in the law is weightless. The contrast is moral and practical—rooted obedience versus driven emptiness—not a puzzle about genres. Flee the seat of scoffers before you become chaff.

Calvin: not reckoning a withering tree strong enough, he debases the ungodly as chaff. He does not keep his eye on their short boast but ponders the destruction that awaits. Although they live prosperously now, by and by the Lord shall drive them with the blast of his wrath. Contemplate with the eye of faith what seems incredible: the high ungodly man will be refuse when God casts him down.

Present height does not rewrite the end. Providence, not chance wind, drives the chaff when God chooses.

Wesley: Not stand—not endure the trial. Judgment—in the great and general judgment of the world. Sinners will not hold a place in the congregation of the righteous when that trial comes.

Judgment is serious, public, and moral. The wicked’s present swagger does not survive the trial. The congregation of the righteous is a company one must belong to by a righteous way—not a club the unrepentant can crash at the end.

Calvin: a happy life depends on a good conscience; the ungodly fall from the happiness they fancied. They may revel while disorder reigns, as robbers in caves beyond justice—but when order is restored they are deprived of their pleasures. The Lord distinguishes righteous and wicked even now only partially; we must look higher to the assembly of the righteous and wait for the day when Christ separates sheep from goats.

Judgment is God’s settling of the world. Present confusion does not annul the congregation of the righteous or the verdict that the wicked shall not stand.

Wesley: Knoweth—he approves, loves, and delights in them, and therefore will recompence them. Perish—all their designs and courses shall come to nothing, and they shall perish with them.

The LORD’s knowing is approving love tied to the righteous way they walk. Recompense answers that way; the wicked’s way perishes with them. The fork of two ways remains live until judgment—delight and meditation are not stage scenery.

Calvin: God is the Judge of the world; therefore it cannot but be well with the upright, while terrible destruction impends over the ungodly. Outwardly the servants of God may derive no advantage from uprightness, but it is God’s peculiar office to defend them under his protection. He is the certain avenger of wickedness though he seem to take no notice for a time. Have before your eyes the providence of God, who settles the affairs of the world and brings order out of confusion.

“knows” is covenant care and judicial certainty. The righteous way is safe because God defends it; the wicked way perishes because God avenges—not because history randomly balances.