June 5, 2024

Proverbs 4.26 (NIV)
Make level paths for your feet and take only ways that are firm.

Our duty as Christians is always to keep heaven in our eye and the earth under our feet.*

One year, as Christmas was approaching, my co-workers were all a-twitter about how much they had to do before the holiday. Baking and shopping and wrapping and decorating and Christmas cards. “Who said you had to do all that?” I asked them. My point was that they were doing all those things because they chose to. If they weren’t getting joy from it, they needed to stop it. If they were enjoying it, they needed to quit stressing about it!

Are we supposed to look for the easy road - the one that doesn’t go uphill and is smoothly paved all the way? Ways that are firm – as opposed to muddy and swampy?What can we do to make level paths and firm ways for ourselves? The literal translation sheds some light on this proverb: “ponder the path.” Indeed! That might make things easier!  Think about where you’re going and perhaps you will choose better. We’re not promised an easy road but occasionally we choose the rough road when we don’t have to.

 

Solomon and I are not suggesting that we become people who are always looking for the easy way out. But what kind of statement do we make to the world if we continually choose poorly? And while it is wise to ponder our path, asking God to direct our choices is the ultimate in good sense (read Proverbs 3.5).

A wise course results from wise forethought.*