- TODAY'S BIBLE TEXT
Text: Proverbs 22:24-29
24 Make no friendship with an angry man; and with a furious man thou shalt not go: 25 Lest thou learn his ways, and get a snare to thy soul. 26 Be not thou one of them that strike hands, or of them that are sureties for debts. 27 If thou hast nothing to pay, why should he take away thy bed from under thee? 28 Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set. 29 Seest thou a man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men.
- MONDAY, 26TH FEBRUARY 2024 DEVOTIONAL
Monday, 26th February 2024
THE SNARE OF FRIENDSHIP WITH VIOLENT MEN
Text: Proverbs 22:24-29
Memory verse: Proverbs 22:24 Make no friendship with an angry man; and with a furious man thou shalt not go: Lest thou learn his ways and get a snare to thy soul.
The Spirit has a wonderful and unaccountable influence upon spirit from the people we associate with. We acquire their habits, learn their ways, imbibe their spirit, show their tempers, and walk in their steps. We must be careful in making choices for our company, for we may soon learn ways that will be a snare to our soul.
A good caution against being intimate with a passionate man. It is the law of friendship that we accommodate ourselves to our friends and be ready to serve them, and therefore we ought to be wise and wary in the choice of a friend, that we come not under sacred ties to anyone whom it would be our foolishness to accommodate ourselves to. Though we must be civil to all, yet we must be careful whom we lay in our bosoms and contract a familiarity with. And, among others, a man who is easily provoked, touchy, and apt to resent insults, who, when he is in a passion, cares not what he says or does, but grows outrageous, such a one is not fit to be made a friend or companion, for he will be ever and soon angry with us and that will be our trouble, and he will expect that we should, like him, be angry with others, and that will be our sin.
The kind of people we go out with, we are apt to grow up like. Our corrupt hearts have so much firewood in them that it is dangerous conversing with those that throw about the sparks of their passion. We shall thereby get a snare to our souls, for a disposition to anger is a great snare to any man, and an occasion of much sin. He does not say, "Lest thou have ill language given thee or get a broken head," but, the worst, "Lest thou imitate him, and so contract an ill habit."
- TODAY'S HYMNAL
CGDS Hymn 15; SS&S 607
I AM THINE, O LORD, I HAVE HEARD THY VOICE
1. I am Thine, O Lord, I have heard Thy voice,
And it told Thy love to me;
But I long to rise in the arms of faith,
And be closer drawn to Thee.Refrain
Draw me nearer, nearer, blessed Lord,
To the cross where Thou hast died;
Draw me nearer, nearer, nearer, blessed Lord,
To Thy precious, bleeding side.2. Consecrate me now to Thy service, Lord,
By the power of grace divine;
Let my soul look up with a steadfast hope,
And my will be lost in Thine.3. O the pure delight of a single hour
That before Thy throne I spend,
When I kneel in prayer, and with Thee, my God,
I commune as friend with friend!4. There are depths of love that I may not know
Till I cross the narrow sea;
There are heights of joy that I may not reach
Till I rest in peace with Thee. - TODAY'S PRAYERS
Prayers:
1. Lord Jesus, bring the right people around me and remove the wrong people from me.
2. LORD God Almighty, connect me only with people that will build the fruits of the Spirit in me and not violence, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
3. Pray for others in this regard.
