My 119:11 Project, Pt. 1

I mentioned in a post last week my plan to memorize the book of Psalms, in their entirety, over the next three years (fifty psalms a year), as one of my spiritual goals for 2012 and beyond (I set goals each year in five categories--professional, spiritual, physical, financial, and marriage/family--as well as in increments of one-year, two-year, five-year, and lifetime periods). Anyway, as I said in that earlier post, I also plan to update the readers of this blog every so often on how I'm doing, and how God is using the psalms in my life. So I thought I'd start right away.

The following is my typed-from-memory recitation of Psalm 1, from the New Living Translation, the first of my fifty psalms to memorize this year:

Oh, the joys of those who do not follow the advice of the wicked,
or stand around with sinners,
or join in with mockers.
But they delight in the Law of the Lord,
meditating on it day and night.

They are like trees planted by the riverbank,
bearing fruit each season.
Their leaves never wither
and they prosper in all they do.

But not the wicked.
They are like worthless chaff,
scattered by the wind.
They will be condemned at the time of judgment.
Sinners will have no place among the godly.
For the Lord watches over the path of the godly,
but the path of the wicked leads to destruction.

I know it's a bare beginning, but it has been a joy--not ironically at all--to steep my mind in that psalm in recent days, reciting it in the car and in my prayer chair, meditating on it day and night, so to speak! I'm thoroughly looking forward to more and more blessings and benefits as I hide God's Word in my heart (Psalm 119:11) with a new memorized psalm each week over the course of the next three years.