June 28, 2020 | Books of the Bible | Proverbs by Daniel Brooker
Proverbs 14:1-3
The wisest of women builds her house, but folly with her own hands tears it down. Whoever walks in uprightness fears the LORD, but he who is devious in his ways despises him. By the mouth of a fool comes a rod for his back, but the lips of the wise will preserve them. (ESV)
Imagine you’re given the option to walk down one of two cereal aisles. Aisle one looks like the one you encounter every time you go shopping, with all its choices available to you. Aisle two, however, is stocked top to bottom with only one option. You’re not told which brand it is, but you must choose which aisle to go down. Which aisle would you choose? When we get right down to it, humans love choice, and the grocery store cereal aisle is a testament to that fact. God’s Word reminds us that we make choices every day that mean much more than the cereal we eat.
We must decide what to do with our actions. Every day, we choose to be someone who uses our hands and efforts to build up or tear down.
Another choice we get to make each day are the words we say. We can choose to be kind, gentle, and loving with our speech or to be harsh, prideful, and rash. Both our actions and our words flow from the seat of our hearts. That’s why Solomon reminds us that we have a choice to walk upright with the Lord or to despise Him.
Christian obedience can’t be manufactured. If we are trusting in our abilities (instead of what Christ has done to make us new) to do and say what is right, we will fail every time.
Consider
- Look at the remaining verses in Proverbs 14. Are a majority of the pieces of evidence of your life found in the verses about wisdom or in verses about folly?
Pray
- Pray for God to show you how you can best build your life around Him and not this world with the decisions you will make today, this week, and this month.
