“Happy is the man that feareth alway: but he that hardeneth his heart shall fall into mischief.” KJV
“Blessed is the man who always fears the Lord; but he who hardens his heart falls into trouble.” NIV The Bible used masculine nouns for man, but I think that we can understand this to ultimately mean “happy is the person…” The text is certainly relevant to both men and women. The point of the verse is that it is not wise to harden our hearts against God. The verse begins by reminding us that a person is “blessed” or “happy” when he or she fears the Lord, or reverences the Lord. I can think of no circumstance in life when we should not take God seriously, and give Him reverence. The Jews take the name of God/Yahweh so seriously that they will not even say or print His name. We do not go that far, but we should certainly learn the lesson that the Jews are trying to teach us, i.e., that God alone is worthy of our reverence and praise. The verse says that the happy person is he or she who fears, or reverences, God “always.” This means that we should not let our guard down at any time in our lives. God is holy and worthy of our worship all of the time, whether we feel like worshiping Him or not. As we go through life, we change the way we look at life and our opinions change, but this should never be true of God. The only thing that should change in our view of God as we progress in life is that we have a deeper understanding of Him and of His love for us. Those of us who believe that “the word became flesh and dwelt among us,” should certainly feel this way. The verse gives a warning about ceasing to fear God: “But he that hardens his heart shall fall into mischief.” (The NIV translates it “fall into trouble.”) Whichever translation you prefer, it means that when we fail to worship and reverence God, we have hardened our hearts toward Him and that means trouble for us. I like the word “mischief” because my parents often used this word referring to the trouble that I was in. It was: “You have gotten into mischief,” and unfortunately, that was often. Since it is out of our hearts that the “issues of life” proceed, our hearts should always be right with God. The fact is that how we regard God in our hearts will determine how we live our lives. If we fear God, we will be careful how we live our lives. Let me give some examples: When we think that God does not care how we live, we will do things that will certainly be displeasing to Him. There is nothing in our lives that God is not interested in, and we get into mischief when we forget this. I think, perhaps, that David forgot this when he committed adultery with Bathsheba. That moral lapse certainly caused him a lot of trouble. We can probably remember times in our lives when we have forgotten this, and could testify that it got us into trouble. (I’m using “mischief” and “trouble” interchangeably.) When we think that God will not judge us, we will do things that will be displeasing to Him. Often, we care more about how people judge us than how God judges us. When we fear the opinion of the world more than the opinion of God, we have hardened our hearts against Him are headed for mischief. Worse, still, when we think that God does not love us, we will do things that are displeasing to Him. I know that when I got into mischief as a youngster, I felt that I had betrayed mama’s love. (I wish that she had known that her tears were more effective than the switch.) In the same way, if we know that God loves us, we will find it much more difficult to displease Him. None of us will please Him perfectly, but even knowing that, we should want to please the God who loved us enough to send His Son to die for our sins. When we wander from the love of God, we get into mischief. Anyway, if you want to be blessed and happy in your life, do not harden your heart against God. If you feel that you have, seek His forgiveness and, if you are sincere, He will forgive you. Bro. Joe
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AuthorDr. Joe Beauchamp is the author of this blog and website. Categories
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