WHATEVER YOU DO, DON'T DO THIS
PROVERBS 19:3 NKJV
3 The foolishness of a man twists his way,
And his heart frets against the Lord.
As a pastor, I get to hear all kinds of things. I get the good and the bad. And most of the time, I am not going to comment on the things people say. I don’t feel as if I have to weigh in on everything.
But allow me to use this devotional platform to encourage you to not do what our verse for today is talking about. I cringe when I hear people fret against the Lord. They are, in effect, blaming God for the situations they find themselves. The problem is that blaming and getting offended at God is wrong on so many levels. This error is especially egregious when it involves things we have gotten ourselves into. Things and situations that the Lord had nothing to do with.
Whenever we blame the Lord for something that we are responsible for, a couple of things happen. The first thing is that we make God the source of the problems in our lives. God has never been our problem and never will be. He is the answer out of the problems that are troubling us.
The second thing that happens when our heart frets against the Lord and we blame God is our relationship with Him is hindered. It's just plain hard to have great fellowship with someone who is the source of hurt for your life. We need confidence with God. And that confidence is a function of our spending time with Him and having a deep respect for Him. He is the One who loves us and can help us. He is the One we owe our very existence to. And He is the One who saved us and promised us an eternity with Him. We love Him; we don’t blame Him.
APPLICATION
One of the signs of maturity is the ability to take responsibility for our own stuff. When we tried to start a church in my hometown years before we started The Ark, it was a disaster. Well, we didn’t keep it going long enough to qualify as a disaster, but it was an epic failed attempt. I had to come to the place where I owned the fact that the move to North Carolina was my fault. Owning the mistake due to my foolishness was the first big step in recovery.
So now, when something goes wrong, I start looking for my part. Even asking the Lord where I missed it is an important part of getting back on track or at least not repeating the same mistake. But what I refuse to do is fret against the Lord. I need His help way too much to blame Him.
PRAYER
Lord, help me recognize when the foolishness of my way has created a problem. And thank You for Your mercy in helping me out of what I caused.