October 1, 2008

Today's Reading - Proverbs 1
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Following Scripture Verses

1. The proverbs of Solomon the son of David, king of Israel;
2. To know wisdom and instruction; to perceive the words of understanding;
3. To receive the instruction of wisdom, justice, and judgment, and equity;
4. To give subtilty to the simple, to the young man knowledge and discretion.
5. A wise man will hear, and will increase learning; and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels:
6. To understand a proverb, and the interpretation; the words of the wise, and their dark sayings.
7. The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction.
8. My son, hear the instruction of thy father, and forsake not the law of thy mother:
9. For they shall be an ornament of grace unto thy head, and chains about thy neck.
10. My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not.
11. If they say, Come with us, let us lay wait for blood, let us lurk privily for the innocent without cause:
12. Let us swallow them up alive as the grave; and whole, as those that go down into the pit:
13. We shall find all precious substance, we shall fill our houses with spoil:
14. Cast in thy lot among us; let us all have one purse:
15. My son, walk not thou in the way with them; refrain thy foot from their path:
16. For their feet run to evil, and make haste to shed blood.
17. Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird.
18. And they lay wait for their own blood; they lurk privily for their own lives.
19. So are the ways of every one that is greedy of gain; which taketh away the life of the owners thereof.
20. Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets:
21. She crieth in the chief place of concourse, in the openings of the gates: in the city she uttereth her words, saying,
22. How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?
23. Turn you at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you.
24. Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded;
25. But ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof:
26. I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh;
27. When your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you.
28. Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me:
29. For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the LORD:
30. They would none of my counsel: they despised all my reproof.
31. Therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own devices.
32. For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them.
33. But whoso hearkeneth unto me shall dwell safely, and shall be quiet from fear of evil.

Today's Pathway:
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"Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded; But ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof:" - Proverbs 1: 24-25

No one is ever going to be able to honestly blame God for the mess that he has made of his own life. Unfortunately, people don't seem to understand that. They blame the circumstances that God has allowed them to have, or the family members that God has given them, or the church that God has placed them in, or the government that God has put over them. In so many words, they are saying that if God had treated them better, they wouldn't have wound up where they did.

The problem with this thinking is that it is designed to blame someone else, specifically God, for my problems. Today's verses tell us that God is not to blame, but that He has offered solutions. He has called to men, begging them to return to Him and listen to Him, but they have refused to respond. He has stretched out His hand, both to stop the individual's wayward progress and to assist him in heading in the right direction, but most men have pushed his arm away. He has offered correct advice through the pages of the Bible, yet men have ignored it as being old fashioned, irrelevant, or simply wrong. Finally, He has sent men, including prophets in the Old Testament and pastors in the New Testament, to preach messages of reproof and judgment, but men have ignored, rejected, and ridiculed them. He has even gone so far as to send the Holy Spirit to convict the world, but men will not listen to Him either.

With this all being true, it is God's fault if a man goes astray? Is it God's fault if a man ruin's his life? Is it God's fault if a man goes to Hell? Absolutely not. God has offered a way of escape but it is up to men to choose to follow it.

Pastor Mark J Montgomery