Monday April 17, 2018

 

One day you will wake up and ask yourself; how did I get here? How did my family come to this? How did my finances turn out this way? Whether you realize it or not, the currents of this world will slowly carry you away. The truth is that we are all prone to being carried away. What makes this dynamic so dangerous is that it does not happen from one day to another, it is a gradual process, just a small step in the wrong direction and we are slowly carried away.

 

King Solomon was one of the wealthiest, most famous, and most powerful men of all times. He was also one of the wisest men of all times second only to Jesus. However, all of his wisdom, power, and wealth, were not enough to keep him from slowly drifting away. Looking at Solomon’s first misstep, we can see that in and of itself, it appears to be small and insignificant. However, one small step in the wrong direction caused him to drift so far that God eventually took everything away from him including the kingdom.

 

Disobeying God was Solomon’s first misstep. Solomon feared going to war with the Egyptians so he decided to enter into a peace treaty with them. Egypt’s Pharaoh gave Solomon one of his daughters to serve as his wife as part of the deal. The problem is, God had already instructed Solomon to not marry any foreign women because he said: “they will surely turn your heart away from me”. In Solomon’s mind, it was just a one- time deal and it was for a good cause, so he took that one step in the wrong direction and the next thing that we see is that he began to slowly drift in the wrong direction. Over time, Solomon allowed his wife to set up altars to worship her Gods. I imagine that one day Solomon woke up, and asked of himself the same question we have asked ourselves, how did I get here?

 

The Lord became angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice. Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods, Solomon did not keep the Lord’s command. So the Lord said to Solomon, “Since this is your attitude and you have not kept my covenant and my decrees, which I commanded you, I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates. – 1 Kings 11:9-11 NIV

 

We are all prone to being slowly carried away by the currents of this world. For some of us, just like Solomon, we are drifting in our relationships, for others it is in their finances, and for others it is in the area of morality or ethics. The areas might be different for each of us, but the mistake is always the same, disobedience to God. It is the tendency to think that because of our circumstances, it is ok to do it; after all it is just a one-time deal and God understands.

 

The anchor that will prevent you from being carried away by the currents is always obedience to God, whether you agree or disagree and when you like and dislike God’s commands, when you understand and when you do not understand, when it is convenient and when it is inconvenient. Just like Solomon, knowledge, position, or power will never be enough to prevent us from being slowly carried away.

 

Walk in obedience to all that the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may live and prosper and prolong your days in the land that you will possess. – Deuteronomy 5:33 NIV