Devotional: Beware of flattery
Cape Flattery Lighthouse on Tatoosh Island on the very northwest corner of Washington State
DAILY MANNA
THURSDAY 12TH NOVEMBER, 2020
BEWARE OF FLATTERY
📜📜TEXT:JOB 32:11-22📜📜
🔑📖KEY VERSE:”Let me not, I pray you, accept any man’s person, neither let me give flattering titles unto man. For I know not to give flattering titles; in so doing my maker would soon take me away” (JOB 32:21, 22).
A story is told of a crow, a scavenger bird, which snatched a piece of meat from a farmer’s child and flew to a tree near a very hungry fox. The fox seeing the meat on the crow’s beak thought of a plan. He praised the crow for its sweet songs. He prayed to him to sing a song. The crow felt proud. As the crow opened its mouth to sing, its own piece of meat fell down. The fox took it away and ate it.
Today’s reading is an account of Elihu, one of Job’s acquaintances, who took his turn to rebuke Job’s friends for accusing Job wrongly. Though a younger man than Job and his three friends, Elihu tried to give a fiery defence of God’s ways of dealing with His creatures. While presenting his position, he was quick to point out what was motivating his opinion. He was not going to join the friends of Job to condemn him, nor was he also going to flatter Job because God hates flatterers.
Today’s world is unfortunately laden with speakers, preachers, politicians, business people, who hold men in admiration instead of holding God in reverence. Some people take flattering as a career; they are paid to speak or sing the praises of men even when these men are corrupt and odious in the sight of God and society. God abhors sin and corruption of any kind; His word is strongly against any kind of sin. And those who praise corrupt and sinful people are helping to promote their evil and ungodly practices.
We are to obey God, seek and speak to please Him always, if we are to continue to enjoy His pleasure. Like the crow, we will lose everything including our souls if we continue to massage the ego of sinful men, rather than tell them the gospel truth. We must steer clear of sugar-coated appeals that only help to caress the pride of men. We must speak the truth, even when it is obviously a bitter pill.
✍THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: We can never please God if our intention is to please men.
📜📜THE BIBLE IN ONE YEAR:EZEKIEL 3-5📜📜
