MAY 27

Ecclesiastes 7:26
Memorise Proverbs 7:4-5
“Let not thine heart decline to her ways, go not astray in her paths”

And so in Solomon’s quest to seek to better understand the things of this world, and the mysterious ways of God, he stumbled and fell deeply into sin. And what was the cause of Solomon’s fall? It was because of his weakness for women (1 Kings 11). Because he married many women from the heathen nations, he went after other gods, and thus fell away from the Lord. He thus acknowledges here that despite all his wisdom, he was not able to withstand the snares of the women, and so he fell into sin. In Proverbs 7, Solomon gives a good treatise of these manifold snares and temptations of the strange women. She is the temptress whom he describes here as one whose heart is snares and nets. She is depicted as one who is full of traps, and a foolish man can so easily be snared in, and be trapped and fall into sin. This is probably what happened to Solomon time and time again. In fact, he so loathed this weakness of his that caused his downfall, that he says he finds it more bitter than death!

And so more than just wisdom, we need a desire to please God in all that we do, and only then can we escape from the snares of sin. Not just this weakness for women, but all sins in our life. More than anything, we need God, and have a sincere desire to please God in all that we do.

May the Lord grant us such a conviction and hatred for sin as well, to regard our falling into the snares and temptations of the devil as being more bitter than even death. Often times our problem is that we take sin too lightly. We fall into sin and temptation, and then without batting an eyelid, we just carry on with life as if nothing wrong had happened. We fail to remember that we had just offended the Almighty God, and caused great injury and grief to Him. We do not see the seriousness of sin, and how it is like falling into a trap set by the Devil. Instead, we see sin not as being more bitter than death, but regard it as an enjoyable part of our lives! We need to ask the Lord for forgiveness and help to be strongly convicted of our sin.

Thought: Is sin bitter to you? Or is it a sweet enjoyment?
Prayer: O Lord, may You convict my heart to help me realise the seriousness of sin, and the need to flee every temptation.