Self-Evident

Daily Reading: Proverbs 28

Scripture Focus:  Evil men do not understand justice, but those who seek the Lord understand it completely. (Proverbs 28.5)

Devotional Thought:  In "The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America," are the celebrated words: "We hold these truths to be self-evident."  Those revolutionaries of the 1700's wrote about such things as equality and unalienable rights.  Yet, those truths were not so self-evident in the world of their day, and in today's world, they are still greeted with skepticism.

In the days of Ancient Israel, there were also self-evident truths that found their way into the Proverbs of King Solomon.  These principles were greeted with skepticism then as well as today.  Proverbs 28.5 contains four self-evident truths that fit in that category:

• Evil men: There are evil people in the world.  The Bible explains that evil came into the perfect world when Adam and Eve rebelled against God (Genesis 3).  As people continued to reject God, they became increasingly evil (Genesis 6).  Pop psychology may assert that no person is evil - only deeds are - but the Bible is clear that people are evil and do evil to others.

• Do not understand justice: Evil is not universally accepted.  Evil minds are clouded and deluded.  What is evil is called good, and what is good is called evil.

• Those who seek the Lord: This phrase is placed in juxtaposition to the phrase "evil men."  It is self-evident that to escape the mastery of evil one must turn to the Lord.  Experience teaches us that this is a process as well as a crisis.  There is a turning to - then a growing in - righteousness.

• Understand it completely: Understanding, like character, comes as a process, too.  What begins as a morning light is destined to become the noon-day sun.

Do you see these self-evident truths?

Prayer: Help me, O Lord, to seek you and to understand justice.  May I be kind and merciful and patient as you are.  Amen.

Psalm of the Day: Psalm 17.1-5

1 Hear a just cause, O LORD; attend to my cry! Give ear to my prayer from lips free of deceit!

2 From your presence let my vindication come! Let your eyes behold the right!

3 You have tried my heart, you have visited me by night, you have tested me, and you will find nothing; I have purposed that my mouth will not transgress.

4 With regard to the works of man, by the word of your lips I have avoided the ways of the violent.

5 My steps have held fast to your paths; my feet have not slipped.