Rooted & Unwithered

In 1968, Paul Ehrlich published his bestselling book, The Population Bomb, which predicted the apocalyptic death of millions in the 70s and 80s as the result of over-population. Surely you have heard the nutshell of his argument before: the earth and its resources simply cannot sustain humanity’s ever-growing population. Sixty years later, the fact that nearly all of his predictions have failed to come true did not stop the now ninety-year-old from doubling-down on the disaster of over-population on 60 Minutes just last month. And many people are still in agreement with his assessment.

Darrell Bricker and John Ibbitson make a case that the global population is actually looking at the very opposite problem: a population bust rather than a bomb. In their book, Empty Planet: The Shock of Global Population Decline, they aim to dismantle several common population myths. 

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Blessed are those who avoid the way of sinners, who turn away from the path of evil and pursue the wisdom and righteousness of the LORD.

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This is my discussion of the first chapter of Thomas Watson's book, Heaven Taken by Storm, from 2020. 

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The only way not to walk in the counsel of the wicked is to walk according to the counsel of the Scriptures.

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Here is a brief introduction to the book Heaven Taken by Storm, its author Thomas Watson, and the Puritans in general. 

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Wise men and women somberly, but boldly, look death in the face, praying for God’s grace to keep them from wasting their limited time here on earth.

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Indeed, the blessed man is the focal point of the psalm, and he is described by action (meditating on God’s law), by comparison (like a tree), and in contrast to the wicked. Biblically, to be blessed is to be favored by God. Conversely, the wicked are disconnected from God, still “alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds” (Colossians 1:21). To belong to God means being blessed, wise, and alive, while rejecting God is wickedness, foolishness, and death. And each and every person must walk down one of these two paths. There is no third option.

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The first Sunday of each month I will be recording sermons from church history for a series called Dead Men Preaching. I recorded a reading of this sermon by Thomas Watson back in 2020 whenever our church read through Heaven Taken by Storm together. Titled “Parting Counsels”, Watson delivered this message to his church after the Act of Uniformity ejected him from the pastorate. The best place to read this and other sermons from this time is Sermons of the Great Ejection from the Puritan Paperback series.

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From Israel’s enslavement in Egypt to their wondrous crossing of the Red Sea, the first fourteen chapters of Exodus are some of the most well-known stories in all of Scripture, which added a degree of gravity to preaching through them last year. Yet, as is almost always the case, well-known is a bit of a misnomer. It would probably be more accurate to say that we think that we know exodus story. The reality is that most of us remember the broad story beats: slavery, Moses in a basket, burning bush, plagues, Red Sea. And we allow our imaginations, films, or a combination of both to fill in some of the details.

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My goal is not to say all that could be said about Psalm 1; instead, I simply hope to present enough thought on each phrase of this psalm to provoke further meditation in you, the reader. I pray that you take these nuggets of Scripture, easily memorized, and ponder them in your heart and mind throughout the day and week.

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