When a man’s folly brings his way to ruin

“When a man’s folly brings his way to ruin, his heart rages against the Lord.” (Prov. 19:3, RSV) There is no book on psychology like the Bible. It gives insights on human behavior that you cannot find in any other place. Here, for instance, it describes a man whose own waywardness wrecks his life, yet rather than shoulder the blame himself, he turns around and vents his spleen on the Lord. How true to life! We have known people who made a profession of being Christians but who then became involved in vile forms of sexual immorality. This brought them to shame, disgrace and financial ruin. But would they repent? No, they turned against Christ, renounced the faith, and became militant atheists. More often than we probably realize, apostasy has its roots in moral failure. A. J. Pollock told of meeting a young man who began to spew out all kinds of doubts and denials concerning the Scriptures. When Pollock asked him, “What sin have you been indulging in?” the young man broke down and poured out a lurid story of sin and indecency. The gross injustice lies in man’s perverse way of raging against the Lord for the consequences of his own sins. W. F. Adeney said, “It is monstrous to charge the providence of God with the consequences of actions which He has forbidden.” How true it is that “everyone that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved,”(John 3:20)! The Apostle Peter reminds us that scoffers “walking after their own lusts” are “willingly ignorant”. Pollock comments, “This brings out a most important truth that the inability and reluctance to receive the truth of God is very largely because of what is moral. Often a man wants to go on with his sin, or the flesh has a natural dislike to God. Maybe the searching character of the light, and the restraining influence of the Bible are resented. It is not the head that is so much at fault as the heart.”