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The sermon expounds Psalm 1 by contrasting the righteous, who are planted by God and sustained by His spiritual provision, with the ungodly, who are fruitless and unstable like chaff. Spurgeon emphasizes that respectable or outward religion is not the same as genuine godliness, and that neglected obedience is itself serious sin. The ungodly face separation, judgment, and eternal punishment. Yet the sermon’s warning serves a gospel purpose: sinners are urged to repent, look to the crucified and risen Christ, and trust His promise to save all who come to Him.
Theological center: God sovereignly nourishes and preserves the righteous, while the ungodly remain under sin’s judgment unless they repent and find salvation in Christ.
Applications: Repent before judgment · Come to Christ · Believe in Jesus · Examine your standing
Primary texts: Psalm 1:4 · Psalm 1:6 · John 3:14
“The ungodly are not so: but are like the chaff which the wind driveth away.” Psalm 1:4 AND who are the ungodly? Are they open and willful sinners—men who take God’s name in vain, and curse, and blaspheme—men who break the laws of man, the laws of the State—men who are scarcely to be trusted with liberty? Certainly these are included, but these are not mainly intended. While such men come under the category of “sinners” and “scorners,” there is another class expressly aimed at by the term “ungodly.” And who are the ungodly? Are they the men who deny God’s existence, who neglect the outward forms of religion, who scoff at everything that is sacred, and make a ribald jest of things at which angels tremble? These are included, most certainly, but neither are these the men specially aimed at. They are the scornful, the pestilent, these are the men whose iniquities have gone beforehand to judgment against them, and whose sins are clamoring before the throne for justice. Another class of men is intended under the term “ungodly.” And who are they? Surely, my brethren, the answer may well strike you with awe. I do trust there are not many in this hall who may be called scorners, and perhaps, not very many who would come under the denomination of open profligates and rebels, but how large a proportion of all those who attend our places of worship may justly be ranked under the character of the ungodly! What does this exactly mean? Let me just show its differences once again, and then more precisely define it. We sometimes call men irreligious, and surely, to be irreligious is bad enough, but to be religious is not good enough. A man may be religious, but yet he may not be godly. There are many who are religious, as touching the law outwardly they are blameless, Hebrews of the Hebrews, Pharisees of the straightest sect. They neglect no rubric, they break no law of their church, they are exceedingly precise in their religion, yet notwithstanding this, they may rank under the class of the ungodly, for to be religious is one thing, and to be godly is quite another. To be godly, then—to come at once to the mark—to be godly is to have a constant eye to God, to recognize Him in all things, to trust Him, to love Him, to serve Him. And the ungodly man is one who does not have an eye to God in his daily business, who lives in this world as if there were no God, while he attends to all the outward ceremonies of religion, he never goes to their core, never enters into their secret heart and their deep mysteries. He sees the sacraments, but he sees not God therein, he hears…