Looking

‘Worthless things’ are things that look good on the outside but are actually empty and of no value. In the end, they are destructive. The Hebrew word translated ‘worthless’, may also mean ‘deceitful’ – they easily lead us astray. In the Garden of Eden, Eve saw that the forbidden fruit was ‘pleasing to the eye’, so she took it (Genesis 3:6).

Sometimes, God’s ways may not look that inviting on the outside, but are always full of life and riches.

What am I looking at? In today’s world we are bombarded with stuff to look at. Everything’s at our fingertips. Sometimes, things, that we wouldn’t choose to look at, appear, unasked, on our television or computer screens. And, sometimes, even though we know it’s wrong, we choose to go on looking at what we know we shouldn’t.

John writes, ‘Everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world’ (1 John 2:16). The lust of the eyes! Remember Achan? God had said that all the plunder taken from Jericho should be devoted to God. But when Achan saw ‘a beautiful robe from Babylon’ and a princely pile of gold and silver, he ‘coveted them and took them’ (Joshua 7:21). And what about David, when he watched Bathsheba bathing (2 Samuel 11:2)? Jesus warns us that ‘anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart’ (Matthew 5:28).

Today’s verse from Psalm 119 offers us the solution to this problem which affects every one of us. Ask God to turn our eyes away from what He doesn’t want us to see. Ask Him to give us new life in His ways.

Worthless – deceitful – things will always be there, open to our eyes. But, as we allow the Spirit of God to touch our consciences, our reflex action will increasingly be to turn our eyes away from them because the ‘eyes of our hearts have been enlightened’ (Ephesians 2:18). Along with our commitment not to go there, we need to decide to go God’s way, to choose the way of life.