Good morning, how are you's? It's nice to be with you's. Thank you's very much for having me back. It's nice to be asked back, so it is. If you's have a Bible with you's, would you's mind turning to Psalm 1 please? The first Psalm we'll be reading from today. Psalm 1 please. So Psalm 1, and we'll take time to read the whole Psalm. Psalm 1, and starting in verse 1. Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night, and he shall be like a tree planted by rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season. His leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away. Therefore, the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. For the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish. Amen. God bless the reading of his word. But in Psalm 1, I think that you can maybe break up this wee psalm into three different wee sections. In verse 1 to 3 we see the blessed man. Notice there at verse 1 it says blessed is the man. So we can see the blessed man and verses 1 to 3 shows us the blessed man. Then in verse 4 and 5 we see the ungodly man. at the start of verse 4 it says the ungodly. So we can see the ungodly man through these verses. And then verse 6, the last verse, it gives us a wee conclusion on both men. It says the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous. There again that's talking about the blessed man, the Lord knows his way. But then it says at the end that the way of the ungodly shall perish. And again we can see the ungodly man, the conclusion that the psalmist gives on the ungodly man in verse 6. But today we'll just be looking at the first three sections, the blessed man. That's what we'll be looking at today. just the blessed man in verses one to three. We're going to be looking at three different things. We'll be looking at what the blessed man avoids, what he stays away from, what he stays clear of. Then we'll be looking at the blessed man's delight. There's no point just looking at what the blessed man stays away from. You need to see what thrills his heart, what brings him joy, what thrills his soul. We'll have to look at that there. And then we'll look at the picture of the blessed man. In verse three, we see the psalmist gives us a picture of what the blessed man looks like. He gives us this wonderful picture, and we can learn different things from it. So we'll be looking at that there. But first of all, What is the blessed man? I remember back in my Sunday school days, there's one year, the Sunday school teacher, he sat us the challenge of learning Psalm 1. And I wasn't actually able to do it, so I wasn't able to learn Psalm 1. I could have a stab at it, but I don't think I could do it. But I never really understood what the blessed man meant. I could never understood what the word blessed meant. But when you look at it, it just simply means happy. It just means happy, so it does. That's what the dictionary says. Blessed means happy. And we'll be looking at the blessed man. What makes you happy according to the psalmist? Well, the world teaches that to be happy, to be blessed, to be satisfied, you've got to live for the moment. That's what the world teaches. Live for the moment. Do whatever makes you happy now. Don't worry about the consequences. Don't worry about the future. Live for now. That's what the world teaches. Just be reckless. Do whatever you want now. The world teaches live for self. You're number one. Don't worry about anyone else. You're the main person. Number one. Look out for yourself. Do whatever you want. Do whatever you think is right. Don't worry about what anyone else thinks. It's your opinion that matters and no one else counts. That's what the world teaches. The world teaches go out and live for the drink. Live for the drugs. Live for the parties. Get as much material stuff as you can. That's what the world teaches. That's what the world teaches. That's how the world sees how the best way to be happy, how to be satisfied is. But we're not here to look at what the world teaches. What does Psalm 1 teach? And we'll see in Psalm 1 verse 1, it says, blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. It says there, if you want to be blessed, If you want to be happy, don't walk in the council. Don't live in the vice of the ungodly. Don't live in the vice or the ways of the world. No, avoid it. Don't go after the ways of the world, because the ways of the world and the ungodly doesn't really satisfy. You know, it might give you a bit of pleasure and it might give you a bit of enjoyment for a short space of time, but ultimately, It'll not last, so it'll not. It'll not truly make you satisfied. It'll not satisfy your heart. It'll not really thrill you. It'll not last, so it'll not. And it says, don't walk in the counsel of the ungodly. Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly. Don't be taking advice from the world. Don't be going the way of the world. It doesn't truly make you happy. If you want to have good counsel, have good advice, There's no better place to go than this book, because this book is inspired by God. God told the men who wrote the Bible what to write, so this is straight from God. It's inspired by God and God created you, didn't he? He created me and he knows what thrills our heart. He knows what we need and He knows what will satisfy us. And He knows what is best because He's all-knowing and He created us and surely the creator of us knows what is best for us. So get into His word, let Him speak to you and live out this book and that's when you'll be truly satisfied and truly blessed in the Lord. And maybe you actually, you really do need a bit of advice about a problem. You need a wee bit of counsel, you need a bit of advice. What I'll do is, the first one says, don't be going to the ungodly. Don't be walking in the council of the ungodly. Don't be going to an ungodly person for advice. Because they'll give you advice from the world's perspective. You need to go to someone who fears the Lord. You need to go to a person who fears the Lord, because Proverbs 9, verse 10 says, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. If you want wise counsel, if you want wise advice, go to a person who fears the Lord, because they are a wise person if they fear the Lord. And they'll give you advice, godly advice, and they'll give you good advice. That's where you get good counsel from. We'll look at the next wee bit. Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners. And of course, we've got to be careful about who we stand with. There's a lot of different organisations and there's lots of different groups that we can associate ourselves with, but we don't want to stand and associate ourselves with sinners. We don't want to stand with them. We don't want to be associated with them. We don't want people saying, well, he's linked with that, their group. No, they're a bunch of, that's a group of sinners. Of course, we're all sinners, but this is talking about the ungodly, unsaved people, so it is. We are saved by grace, sinners saved by grace, but we don't want to be standing with and associating ourselves with people who haven't put their trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. We don't want to be associated with those groups. Don't associate yourselves with them. It goes on to say, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. Now, we don't want to be sitting and having close fellowship, spending time with and having close fellowship with the scornful. Scornful, those are the people who laugh and mock the things of God. I'm sure you know people who laugh and mock the things of God, mock the word of God, mock God. We know plenty of people who are scornful of God, who laugh and mock at Him. Well, why would you want to sit and have close fellowship with them? Why would you want to spend all your time with those types of people? Because we are the people of God, so we are. If you've put your trust in Jesus Christ, he is your Lord and your, well, he should be your Lord, he's your Savior, but have you made him the Lord of your life? You should have. And you don't want to be spending time with people who laugh and mock and scorn the Lord Jesus Christ. You don't want to spend time with them. I wonder, does this describe you? Are you like the blessed man? You're not taking counsel from the ungodly, you're taking counsel from the Word of God and from godly people. Are you not associated with unbelievers? You stand with believers, sweetie, and you associate yourselves with them, and you're not fellowshiping with mockers and scoffers. Instead, you're having fellowship with God's people. Is that like you? See, to be truly blessed, to be truly happy, We have to practice this separation. We need this wee bit of separation. See I'm not saying we'll have to practice isolation. We don't practice isolation, because the fact is we live in the world. We don't live in a wee Christian bubble. The Lord's Day Sunday, it's almost you could say it's an easier day because we have the church and we can come together and we can meet with our Christian brothers and sisters in the Lord and we spend the day and we're almost like, maybe it's wrong to say it, but you know what I mean and what I'm trying to say. We're in like a Christian bubble. But then the rest of the week, we don't have that. Some of us have to go out to work. They're not all believers that people will work with through the night. We have to work with ungodly people, and there's nothing wrong with that. But we shouldn't be sitting and having fellowship with them and spending all our time with them and associating ourselves with them. We need to practice this wee bit of separation. Not isolation, but separation, and I think you know what I mean. And of course, this is what the Lord Jesus Christ taught himself. Because remember when he is praying to his heavenly father in John chapter 17, he prayed in John chapter 17 verses 15 and 16, I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world. See the Lord Jesus Christ was praying to his father, look keep them in the world. Don't take them out of the world, keep them in the world and of course to reach the world We've got to be in the world. If the Lord had to take us out of the world, we couldn't reach them, we couldn't tell always about the Lord Jesus Christ and how you can save them. He told us how we leave them in the world. But then he went on to say, but thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. See, the Lord prayed to keep them in the world. But keep them from the evil. Keep them from the ways of the world. Keep them from the evil, from sin. Because they're not of the world. Although they're in the world, they're not of the world. Because the Lord Jesus Christ wasn't of the world, sure he wasn't. He was in the world, but he wasn't of it. People, when they watched him, knew that he was different. They knew he was different. And when people look at us, do they see the difference of us? Do they say, that person's different. He's not like the rest of the world. There's something different about them. Is that what people see when they look at you? There's something different about you. But notice in verse one, the different positions. As you go down the verse, first of all it's walking, then it goes to standing, and then sitting. It's gradually getting worse, isn't it? It's gradually getting worse. See, it's easy to walk with someone. Just walk along with them, just have a wee chat and a wee natter with them. It's easy just to walk along with them. And you might think there's no hurt in it. But before you know it, when your legs get tired, what do you do? You'll just stand and have a talk with them. You'll be standing with them. And then after a while, you'll be sitting with them and having close fellowship with them. You might think, what's the hurt? But don't give the world an inch because it'll take a mile. It'll go further than what you think. Do you know what a fisherman does to catch a fish? I'm not really a fisherman so I'm not like that. I was never keen on it so I always thought there was something fishy about it. But you know, a fisherman, what does he do? He gets a worm and he puts the worm on the hook and then he casts it out. And then the wee fish, it sees the worm so it does. And the worm It's attractive to him, isn't it? He sees it and thinks, there's a wee bit of food for me out there, it'd do well in my belly, so to speak. And it's attractive to the fish, and they might think, what's the hurt in it? And of course, when we see the sin, and when we see the world, there's things that are in it that are attractive, aren't there? There's no point in it. The world sometimes can be attractive to us. Sometimes sin does look appealing to us, and we might think, you know, what's the harm in it? What's the harm in it? But of course there is harmony. When the fish sees the worm, he then goes for the worm. What does he do? He eats it. And I'm sure it's tasty in his mouth. And you know it's good to him. But before he knows it, there's a hook in the side of his mouth. And before he knows it, the fisherman has him reeled in and he's on the fisherman's plate. It's done. He's gone. He's dead. Before you know it, you may think there's no harm in sin, but before you know it, it will have destroyed you so well. Now don't give an inch to sin. Hebrews chapter 11, verse 25 says, the pleasures of sin, there's pleasure in it, but it says, for a season. The pleasures of sin for a season doesn't last. It doesn't truly satisfy and it'll do you harm. Avoid the world and avoid sin. So we've seen what the blessed man avoids, but there's no point just telling you what you should avoid if you want to be truly blessed. You've got to know what to do that will thrill your heart. So what thrills the psalmist's heart? What makes him truly joyful? What puts a song in his heart? We see this in verse 2, and it's the law of the Lord. Verse 2 says, but his delight, the thing that thrills him, the thing that makes him happy, the thing that gives him joy, is in the law of the Lord. It's the law of the Lord. This is what thrilled the psalmist's heart. And when I was trying to look into this and tried to do a wee bit of looking into it and research. I think, I believe the Psalmist probably only had the first five books of the Bible. He probably only had Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Deuteronomy and Numbers. Now if you disagree with me, I do apologise, we will not fall out over it. Maybe he had one or two more books, I don't know, but I believe he only had the first five books. What we can definitely agree on is he didn't have all of the Old Testament and he certainly didn't have the New Testament. But why was it that he got such a thrill? Why did he get such a kick out of the first five books in the Bible? Why did it thrill his heart? Well, when he got into reading these books, he learned a lot about God. When he read the commandments, when he read God's precepts and his testimonies, he saw God's standards and he saw, wow, God is holy. That is the ways of God. He is so holy. And he also saw how just God is. He saw how just he is. And as he read through Genesis, the first couple of chapters of Genesis, and he read through other, that's like an exodus, and he saw how almighty God was. He saw how he was able to create everything by just saying. Like in Genesis 1, he just said, let there be and there was. How powerful is God? He saw how God was able to send the plagues, in Egypt and he saw, wow, how powerful is God that he's able just to destroy Egypt with the 10 plagues. He was able to see how almighty God is. When you read God's word, you see how almighty he is. But then the blessed man, he also saw how sinful he was. He saw where he stood before God. Again, when he was reading the commandments, he saw how holy God is, but he also saw, yeah, I'm a sinner. I'm sinful. I don't measure up to God's standards. And he saw that he deserved to be punished, and when he saw how just God was, he knew he deserved to be punished. And of course, you might think, well, how does that thrill this man's heart? How does that bring him delight? Because as he was reading, he also went on to see God's mercy. He saw God's grace, and he saw how God forgets. And he sees all God's promises to him and he sees all the blessings that he has for him. And that's what thrilled his heart. When he saw God's mercy and grace and forgiveness and all the promises and blessings that he had to him. And you know how wonderful those things are. How wonderful those things are. But the psalmist, he only had probably the first five books of the Bible. He didn't have the full canon of scripture. We have the full canon scripture though, don't we? We have the whole Bible. God has revealed everything that he's going to reveal to us. We have the full canon scripture. You know, the psalmist, he couldn't read about the Lord Jesus Christ. There's wee things in the first five books of the Bible where it points to the Lord Jesus Christ, and he tells how he will send the Lord Jesus Christ, but it's not, he can't actually read about the Lord Jesus Christ, sure he can't. But we can, we can read about how the Son of God left heaven and came to earth and became a little baby. He left the splendors of heaven where the angels worshipped him, where there was a street of gold to lie in a manger and animals feed themselves. Why would the Son of God do that? It was to die for me and to die for you. To die and take the punishment for our sin. But see, it was perfect that he died to save us. And we can read all about this, how the Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross, but then came back to life three days later. How amazing is that, to come back to life. He defeated death. He used to know how to do a wee bit of undertaking. If someone was to come back to life, I'd know what I'd do. I'd probably be in the grave a couple of days later myself. But that's what the Lord Jesus Christ done. He came back to life. He rose again. And he ascended back to heaven. He went back to heaven. And today he's at the right hand of God. And we can read about why he's coming back again. He could come back at any moment to take us to spend eternity with him. Does that not fill your heart? Does that not bring you joy? Does that not delight your heart? Isn't this book wonderful? You know, the question is though, do you delight in it? Do you read in it? Do you delight in it? I've got to ask myself out there, does this book really bring me delight? See, God has so much that he wants to teach us in this book. He wants to teach us, but to learn of him, to learn these things, you have to get into it and read it. You know, the psalmist, he delights so much in the word of God that it just goes on to say, and in his law does he meditate day and night. Does he meditate day and night? You know, when I was younger, I used to think, when someone said the word meditate, I used to think of like a Hindu person going like that, they're going, mmm. That's what I used to think. But it's not the case. And this, it just means to think about it. The psalmist just all day, day and night, he's just meditating, just thinking about the word of God. Maybe he's just got a wee verse in his head, just one verse. And maybe just as he's going about his work, when he has a wee moment to have a wee think, He's just thinking about that verse. What does that verse mean? What does that word mean? How does that apply to me? How does that affect my life? Am I living out that verse? And he's just thinking about it, just moment over in his head, just thinking about it, just like a cow that chews her pud. Just getting all the goodness out of the grass and how we should get all the goodness out of a verse. And you know, as we meditate on God's word, the Holy Spirit, who God has sent to dwell within us, will help us to open it up to us. He'll help us to understand it, because he guides us in all truth. And you know how wonderful this will be. The psalmist wrote in Psalm 104, verse 34, my meditation of him shall be sweet, I will be glad in the Lord. Now the psalmist, when he meditated on the Lord, he said it's sweet. It's sweet to him, it's wonderful. And he was glad in the Lord when he done it. You know, is it any wonder the hymn writer wrote, turn your eyes upon Jesus and the things of earth will go strangely dim? You know, sometimes the problems of the world and problems of life and circumstances and just different things that can never get us down. And it's so easy to get so busy and caught up with different things, proper and legitimate things. can maybe get us down a wee bit. But how wonderful it is if we're able to set those things aside just for a bit and think upon the Lord. How it will make us glad. So we've seen what the blessed man avoids, we've seen what the blessed man delights in. Now we're going to look at the picture of the blessed man. What's he like? Well, we see this in verse three. And he shall be like a tree, planted by rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season. His leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. Now, if you ever try to picture that there in your head, just get the wee picture, you know, that's what it is. It's a picture. If you ever try to visualize it and just see it. And this verse is telling us, you know, the blessed man is like a tree. And how's the blessed man like a tree? Well, what's a tree like? It's not easy moved. Have you ever tried to move a tree? It's not easy shifted, so it's not like. And why is it not easy to shift? Because the tree's well rooted. It's got good, strong roots and it's not gonna budge easy, so it's not. And see, if you're like the blessed man who delights in the law of God day and night, then you'll be strong in your faith. You'll be well rooted in your faith. See, the Bible says in Romans chapter 10 verse 17, faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. See, faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. That's how you build up your faith. It's through the word of God. You know, it's good to sing praises to the Lord. And it's good to pray. But if you want to build up your faith, become strong in your faith, it's by the Word of God. That's how you get strong in your faith. And you need to get into the book to read it. See, when you read the Bible, when you get into it, you'll see all the different things God created. You'll see how almighty he is. We touched on that earlier. And you'll see how he's able to do wonderful things. and how he brought his people out of problems. Remember, he brought the Israelites out of Egypt, and he led them to the Red Sea. And the Israelites, the Hebrews, they thought they were in trouble, because the Red Sea was before them, and the Egyptians had come chasing after them, and they were behind. There was mountains around them. They had nowhere to go. The game was up for them. And they thought they had nowhere to go. They had nowhere to turn. And maybe that's a bit like you sometimes. Do you think you have nowhere to turn? You have no moves left, and you think, what am I going to do? Well, what did the Lord do for the Israelites? When they had no moves left, what did he do? He put a wall of fire between the Egyptians and them, and then he opened up the Red Sea. And they were able to walk through on dry ground. You know, I've always amazed at that wee bit where it says dry ground. They didn't even get a bit of mud on their feet because it was dry. How amazing that is. How the Lord can deal with their problems. And then we can see how the Lord keeps all his promises. Sometimes we look at the promises of God and think, how's the Lord going to keep that? That's impossible. But remember, some of the promises that he gave to the people in the Bible, remember the promises he gave to Abraham? He said he'd have a child with Sarah, his wife. Abraham was well past it, so he was. He was past his peak, so he was. He was over the hill. Sarah, his wife, was well past the age of childbirth. And it was impossible, humanly speaking, for them to have a child. But did Abraham and Sarah have a child together? Of course they did. God kept his promise. And sometimes the promise is God, you might think to yourself, how's he gonna keep that? But the Lord is faithful to his word. He keeps his word, and when we see that there, our faith will build in the Lord. We'll just depend on him, because we've seen he's done it in the past, and he'll do it again, because the Lord changes not. And we'll realise how much he loves us. You'll see how much he loves us. Because he sent us a new begotten son to die for us, didn't he? And no matter what anyone else says about us, or no matter what anyone thinks about us, we'll know he loves us. He cares for us. He wants us to speak to Him. He wants us to spend time with Him, no matter what anyone else thinks of us. And we'll increase in our love for Him when we get into this Word, when we see all the things that He has done for us. Why is Santa's only be gotten some today for us? Because of course we only really love Him because He first loved us. Isn't that what 1 John 4, verse 19 says? We love Him because He first loved us. See, naturally, we don't really have any affections for God in ourselves because we're sinners. We rebelled against God, we went astray and wanted nothing to do with God. The only reason we love Him is because He sent His Son to die for us on the cross. And it's because of that there that we love Him. And when we see how much He loves us, we'll increase in love. And then this should lead to an obedience to God. Because if you love Him, you'll want to obey Him. Because that's the only way that you can prove that you love God. We know that God loves us because of what he has done, first in sentencing Christ to die on the cross for us. We know that Christ loves us because he was willing to go through all that for us. But the only way that we can prove that we love God is by obedience. Christ said this himself in John 14 verse 15. If ye love me, keep my commandments. There's no other way for you or me to prove that we love God to prove that we love Christ, the one who died for us, unless we obey his commandments. If ye love me, keep my commandments. So we've seen how the blessed man is like a big strong tree. And of course it's important to become like a strong tree as a believer. Because what happens with trees? They will fall over. They'll fall over eventually in the winds. Earlier on there, before the meeting, people were talking about the storms over in America and how they'd wreaked havoc and trees had fallen down and houses had fallen and people lost everything because of the winds. You know, when the winds come, the weak trees fall over, but the strong trees will stand. And how you've got to be like a strong tree for when the winds come. Ephesians chapter 4 verse 14 says, that we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by sleight of men and cunning craftiness whereby they lie in wait to deceive." See, what is it that the men of the world want to do? They want to see us tripped up. They want to deceive us. They want to trick us. They want to see us fall. And how do they do this? They come up with cunningly crafted doctrines. They're cunningly crafted and it's easy to fall for them because they're so cunningly and craftily made up. And these doctrines can easily make a weak believer who's not rooted in the faith fall over. And how careful they've got to be to be strong in the faith, strong in the word of God, so that we don't fall for these cunningly crafted doctrines that are described as wind in Ephesians chapter four. And of course there's storms of life, isn't there? There's storms of life and at times the troubles of life and the storms of life can become like strong winds. And sometimes it could be easy to almost give up in the faith. But we need to be strong, well-rooted to stand in the storms of life. But notice the position of the tree. And he shall be like a tree planted by rivers of water. The position is beside rivers of water. It's just not a river, it's rivers, it's plural. So there's at least two rivers that he's near beside. And of course in Northern Ireland we see lovely trees all the time because we'll have that much rain and the grass is always green and there's always green trees, but the psalmist lived in Israel here. and it maybe just wasn't so common to see a nice big strong good tree all the time because there is wilderness it's warm out there they don't maybe just get as much rain as we do here but maybe just wasn't as common to see this tree and this is maybe why this tree stands out because of where he lived maybe just wasn't so common to see a tree and this tree why is it Why is it different? Why is it able to survive in this environment? It's because of its position. It's beside rivers of water. See, the tree has plenty of nutrients. It has plenty of substance to keep it going. That's the only reason why it's able to keep going. And what is our nutrients? What's our substance that keeps us going, that keeps us strong? Again, it's the word of God, isn't it? It's the word of God. This is our spiritual food. Physically, we need food to keep going. If we don't eat, we get weak. And eventually, if you don't eat for long enough, you'll die. And spiritually, to stay strong, we need spiritual food. And how important it is, Job said in Job 23, verse 12, I have esteemed the words of his mouth more than my necessary food. See Job thought the word of God was much more important to him than our physical food. I wonder, do you believe the same yourself? Do I believe the same myself? That this word, the word of God is more important than our physical food? You know a while ago there, there's a Sunday night My mum and dad had gone to bed early, so they hadn't. And my daddy had made the lunch, his lunch, put it in the lunchbox and all for Monday, so he could have his lunch at lunchtime on Monday. But my brother, as we were talking away, my brother came up with this idea, so he did. And my brother decided he went down to the kitchen and got my dad's lunchbox and he took out the sandwiches, so he did. He took the sandwiches out and he hid them. And then in the lunchbox he just put a wee Bible, so he did. And he put a wee post-it on the inside of the lunchbox and just said, 4 verse 4. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. And you know, my dad, when he opened up the lunchbox, he saw the verse, but he couldn't really argue with it. He got a bit hungry, so he had to go down to town and get something to eat. But how true that is. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. And you know, when we don't have physical food, Sometimes we can get a wee bit grumpy, can't we? We can get a wee bit grumpy. And when we don't have the word of God, sometimes, spiritually speaking, we can get a bit grumpy. We need the spiritual food to satisfy us spiritually and to help us grow. See, we desire it. We need it. 1 Peter 2, verse 2 says, as newborn babes to desire the sincere milk of the word. See, naturally when we become new, when we become born again, when we're babes in Christ, we desire the word of God. And we desire it, we need it, we want it. And if we're not eating on it, feasting on it, we are starving spiritually. But notice it goes on to say that bringeth forth his fruit in his season. See this is a fruitful tree. It's fruitful, it produces fruit. And a Christian, a believer in the Lord should produce fruit. We should produce fruit. And what type of fruit should we produce? Well, the answer is seen in Galatians 5, verse 22 and 23. You all know what it is, of course. It's the fruit of the spirit. The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance. That's the fruit that we should be producing. And notice, it's fruit. It's not fruits. You've got to have them all. So you have. You can't pick and choose. You can't have love and joy and peace, but not have gentleness. You have to have them all. When people look at your life, they should be able to see the fruit of the Spirit. They should be able to see in your life, is there love? Is there joy? Is there peace? What about long suffering? Do you have a bit of gentleness in your life too? Is there goodness? Do people say you're a person of faith, you're a man and woman of faith? Do you have meekness? and do you have temperance, do you have self-control? Or do you fly off the handle easy? See, people should notice these things in your life. Massey chapter seven, verse 16 says, you know, sorry, you know, sorry, you shall know them by their fruits. You shall know them by their fruits. When you look at another believer's life, you should know if they're a fruitful Christian by the fruits they produce. And likewise, when people look at you, They should know weller you are a believer by the fruit you produce. Are you producing the fruit of the spirit? Am I producing the fruit of the spirit? Then we'll go on in verse three and it says, we're near the end, we're near concluding. It says, his leaf also shall not wither. His leaf shall not wither. And as D.L. Moody said, all the Lord's trees are evergreen. All the Lord's trees are evergreen. In other words, they stay green all the time. It's not like the leaves on the trees at the minute. They're starting to fall down, aren't they? And they're starting to see those nice, different colours of the leaves that are falling to the ground, but we shouldn't be like that as believers. Our leaf shouldn't wither, it shouldn't fall off, it shouldn't start to decay. It should stay on the tree and it should not wither. And of course that speaks to us of how there should be a consistency in our Christian life and our Christian walk. Sometimes as a believer, sometimes we can be up top spiritually and then we can be down low and then we can be high and down low again. We can be in peaks and valleys, but it shouldn't really be the case. Spiritually speaking, we should just be constant. There should be a really steady consistency there. We should be evergreen all the time, consistently. Consistent. And then it goes on to say, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. See, the Lord will bless us if we do the things that we have learned from these verses. God will bless us. I'm not saying some prosperity gospel teachers will say, you know, the Lord will probably turn that in and say that God will make you a millionaire and I would love that to be the case. But it's not the case. It's not health and wealth, but the Lord will bless you in everything if you do these things. If you're like the blessed man, avoiding the ways of the world and the counsel of the world and not having close fellowship, if you're avoiding that, and if you're delighting yourself in the law of God and meditating on it day and night, you'll be like this tree that's producing fruit. There should be a consistency there and the Lord will bless you. So, thank you very much and we'll just conclude. Maybe Bert will close the wee meeting in a wee word of prayer if that's okay with this. Amen. I have the power to thank the Lord indeed for this good construction of my presence here tonight. This morning, Lord, praise thy name, God, Lord. Yes. We thank the Lord indeed for the opportunities here. To accept me in the word of the Lord, meditating day and night in the word of God. Our own brother, he told us, our faith will not fade, Lord. The consistency and the bond for our lives, Lord, will reduce the burden of the spirit, Lord. We thank the Lord for that. The people will take note to us, that we've been with the Lord Jesus Christ. The Pharisees can say that Peter and John were ignorant along the way, but they can see that they've been with the Lord Jesus Christ, because their lives were different. We spend time with them at work, in our own broad houses. We're praying this meeting this morning, that if you can see the redeeming of the Lord Jesus Christ, that you can pass on these thoughts that you received from me, Lord, in a quiet place. We thank you, Lord, for that. Yes, we have to practice what we preach. And we praise thy name and thank to see young men like us coming along who are growing up, growing in grace and knowledge of our Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ. Our prayer is, us older people here, our prayer is to see young men advancing with the presence of the Lord. Yes, we see so many young ones disobeyed to God, living an awful life in sinfully. We pray for them to be saved Lord, but we thank the ones who are saved for going so well with thee Lord, taking part in the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ. We praise thy name and thank that these gifts come from our blessed, blessed and glorified Lord Jesus Christ. He's given gifts unto men. He gave some to apostles, some to prophets. They are traditional gifts, evangelists, apostles and teachers for us. We thank the young men at this hour who are exercised by the Holy Spirit to spend time with the Lord and to be a blessing to others. We pray to bless Simon and it's a ministry for thee, Lord. We know what's God's intent to do, to go and pray in the gate and lay by thyself, Lord. And now we open the door. You already mentioned this morning, and it's a ministry. If anything else fails, there is a light. We've blocked off everything. The Red Sea opened up now, by God. And now, if I pray now, open the doors of opportunity for him and his life to thee, Lord. Bless him as he walks with thy speed, Lord. That he will prosper under the mighty hand of our God. And we thank you for this challenge thy working, and we bless you and thank you for our soul's Lord's support. We can say amen to all these wonderful challenges and God's support. Because we love the Word of God. Yes, Lord, indeed. And everybody in this assembly here, and the young preacher this morning, we do meditate day and night on Thy Word. And we love the Word of God. Because it has inspired in myself, Thy Word tells us, Genesis to Revelation, all Scripture is given by inspiration of God. And it's a problem for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction of righteousness. That the man of God may be perfect, authority, punishments, and all good works. And we praise Thy Name, God. And we love thee, Lord, for anything said, because you first loved us. And yes indeed, our precious Saviour has told us, if you love me, then keep my commandment, be obedient to my word. And we pray we'll take this little message home with us, Lord, and meditate yesterday on this, Lord. And we pray for a joyful message, Lord. And we pray, Lord, for Simon tonight in the Gospel, that we'll undertake again as he preaches himself to the riches of our precious Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that for the last time in all his family, his father and mother, we owe his father and mother both an honest and true love to his mother and her brother too, Lord. We commend them all to thyself. I commend ourselves to thee, Lord, for a blessing, Lord. We thank you, Lord, for all your blessings. Blessed are the God and Father, our Lord and Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ, who have blessed us with all the spirit of blessing from the heavenly and Christ Jesus. Let us pray, Lord, to share and thank one another for the precious blood of God. We give Thee praise and honour and glory for everything, Lord and our Saviour, our Lord Jesus Christ, blessed, blessed unto the name of the Lord. Amen. Amen. Thanks a lot.