Proverbs 13 -- When We REFUSE Healing

I read once that we will never know until we reach heaven the total amount of evil God has protected us from.  The truth in His word is to be used by us as part of that protection.  Verse 3 says, "Those who are careful about what they say PROTECT THEIR LIVES."  While we could certainly see that happening when we don't, for instance, mouth off to a bully, I think we should go to the other extreme to realize that persons who, say, willfully gossip to the point of even inventing stories in order to watch with glee the resulting havoc their words cause are endangering themselves with God.

I noticed there was a lot about rejecting or accepting good teaching and obeying what we know is right.  Verse 13 says, "Those who reject what they are taught will pay for it, but those who obey what they are told will be rewarded."  Any part of God's truth that we refuse to accept - that we think might not apply to us - will become light denied.  Perhaps we don't want to hear that we are doing something that God considers a sin, and we either don't quit doing it, or we allow ourselves to, say, think about it rather than doing it.  Either way, willfully going against God's truth only serves to build up our reserves against stopping it.  This action may even cauterize the moral wound that God has opened up as the Great Physician, exposing it to His healing light.  Without agreeing with His healing, we refuse it and thus allow spiritual gangrene to set in.  I saw that reinforced in verse 18:  "A person who refuses correction will end of poor and disgraced, but the one who accepts correction will be honored."  The last part of verse 19 really rubbed it in:  "Fools hate to stop doing evil."  The operative word there is fools, for that is what God is calling us when we hate to give up what He does not want us to hold next to our hearts.

Father, continue to examine my heart.  Show me those areas where my stubborn, foolish refusal to give up sinful ways is impeding the healing You so want to bring to me.  With Your Word - Your sword - open up those wounds, expose them to me, and shine Your truth upon them.  Show me the utter foolishness of refusing Your treatment.  I need Your protection over all my life.

Your Brother In Christ,

Gary Ford