Morning & Evening Devotional Reading–

July 28– Morning

 by C. H. Spurgeon, revised and edited by W. C. Neff

“I was so foolish and ignorant; I was acting like a stupid animal before you.” 

—Psalm 73:22

This is the confession of the man after God’s own heart. The word “foolish” here means more than it signifies in ordinary language. Earlier in the Psalm he wrote, “I was envious of the foolish when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.” Since he envied the same evil within his own heart, he had to confess that he himself was intensely foolish, or as he says, “so foolish.” How foolish he could not tell. It was a sinful folly— one that shouldn’t be excused by frailty but should be condemned because of its perverseness and willful ignorance. He envied the present prosperity of the ungodly but forgot about the dreadful end that will come to them.

And are we better than the Psalmist that we should call ourselves wise? Do we profess to have attained perfection or to have rid all willful disobedience from our lives? Now that would be prideful foolishness, indeed!

Look back, believer! Think of how you doubted God when he has been so faithful to you. Think of how you foolishly rejected his afflictions when he only intended to give you a greater blessing. Think of the many times when you have questioned his leading in the dark and groaned out, “All these things are against me,” when they were, in fact, all working together for your good! Think of how often you have chosen sin because of its pleasure only to find that it brought great bitterness!

Surely, if we know our own heart, we must plead guilty to the charge of sinful folly, and, conscious of this foolishness, we must make the Psalmist’s consequent resolve our own: “Lord, guide me with your counsel.” [M&E]