Psalm 1

Blessed is the man
    who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stands in the way of sinners,
    nor sits in the seat of scoffers;
but his delight is in the law of the Lord,
    and on his law he meditates day and night.

He is like a tree
    planted by streams of water
that yields its fruit in its season,
    and its leaf does not wither.
In all that he does, he prospers.
The wicked are not so,
    but are like chaff that the wind drives away.

Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
    nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous;
for the Lord knows the way of the righteous,
    but the way of the wicked will perish.

I generally use the ESV version but use whichever you prefer. Don’t switch between translations when memorising a particular passage as it becomes confusing.

Here is a way of hanging this psalm on a walk along the Prom at Felixstowe in Suffolk. You could do a similar thing with a journey you know well. The key verbs at the beginning are WALK, STAND and SIT.

As you can see I often use rhyming words to capture the text word so ‘whatever he does’ becomes a ‘water duck’ and ‘judgement’ becomes ‘fudge’! This may appear sacrilegious but I would encourage you not to worry about that because the images in the end disappear. They are just a means to an end.

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