8 January ~ Epiphany ~ Companions matter

With whom are you traveling?  With whom are you associating?  With whom are you spending your time?  It matters.  Happy are they who have not walked in the counsel of the wicked.  Happy are they who do not walk with those who do nothing but gripe and complain.  Happy are they who do not linger with "energy vampires"(hat-tip to Jon Gordon for that term).  Keep your positive energy, keep your spirits high.  The journey is long, the pilgrimage to see the Lord is also best spent if you allow God to be with you along the way.  Happy are we if we keep counsel with the good, if we plant ourselves by streams of living water, if we allow good fruit to be produced in our lives.  Prosperity and happiness, true prosperity and true happiness will be with us if we stick to the good.

Psalm 1

1Happy are they who have not walked in the counsel of

the wicked, *

nor lingered in the way of sinners,

nor sat in the seats of the scornful!

2Their delight is in the law of the LORD, *

and they meditate on his law day and night.

3They are like trees planted by streams of water,

bearing fruit in due season, with leaves that do not wither; *

everything they do shall prosper.

Read the Psalms!

From the Daily Office this morning, Psalm 1.  The book of Begins with "Happy are they,"...I would say that "Happy are they who read the Psalms."  And the long monastic tradition seems to have agreed with this sentiment.  Monks and nuns prayed through the psalms in corporate worship very very quickly - within a few days.  If you visit a monastery or convent today even for a few days, you will get a fair dose of the Psalms.  A bishop I know said over and over that "the Psalms were Jesus's prayer book."  And they were on his lips often.

So, Read the Psalms!

Start with Psalm 1, which we read today in Morning Prayer.

~The Rev. Peter M. Carey

• Psalm 1
• Beatus vir qui non abiit

¹ Happy are they who have not walked in the counsel of the wicked, *

nor lingered in the way of sinners,

nor sat in the seats of the scornful!

² Their delight is in the law of the LORD, *

and they meditate on his law day and night.

³ They are like trees planted by streams of water,

bearing fruit in due season, with leaves that do not wither; *

everything they do shall prosper.

⁴ It is not so with the wicked; *

they are like chaff which the wind blows away.

⁵ Therefore the wicked shall not stand upright when judgment comes, *

nor the sinner in the council of the righteous.

⁶ For the LORD knows the way of the righteous, *

but the way of the wicked is doomed.