Friday, June 27 || DO NOT BECOME A VICTIM OF ENVY!

Honey Drops for Every Soul
Jun 27
2 min read

Read : I Samuel 16:21,22, 18:6-11

“Do not envy wicked men, do not desire their company for their hearts plot violence. ...” - Proverbs 24:1

Besides disobedience, unbelief, impatience, lying and other sins, Saul’s heart was filled with hatred and jealousy too. After David’s stunning defeat of Goliath, when the army of Israel was returning home, the women came out from all towns of Israel singing joyfully, “Saul had slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands.” “It is a dangerous crisis when a proud heart meets with flattering lips,” said John Flavel. What the women sang did not seem to affect David, but their song enraged Saul and made him envious of David. Envy is otherwise called as the “evil eye.” “Envy is a dangerous and an insidious enemy, a cancer that slowly eats into our inner life and leads us to say and do terrible things,” writes Warren Wiersbe. Proverbs 14:30 rightly calls it, “the rottenness of the bone.” Envy is the pain we feel within us when somebody achieves or receives what we think belongs to us. Dr. Bob Cook said, “Every one wears a sign that reads, “Please make me important.” How true it is! People who envy others would somehow try to take revenge by going to the extreme of even trying to murder them. Even in Saul’s case, we read that he became violent and attempted to kill David by hurling a spear towards him! But the Lord was with David and rescued him from his enemy’s hands.

Dear friends, by nature all of us are proud and like to be recognized and appreciated.  When we see others reach the heights, we are unable to stand it and become envious of them. But let us remember that envy harms us both spiritually and physically.  James 3:16 says, “Where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.” So, as children of God, let us resolve not to envy others, but to love them with the love of Jesus.

PRAYER: Almighty God, whenever I see my friend or my colleague rise up in the ladder of success or when I see somebody enjoying the benefits which would rightfully belong to me, let me not become envious of them, but make every attempt to love them with the love of Christ. Amen.

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