Corona Devo 1247

When you make a promise to God, don’t delay in following through, for God takes no pleasure in fools. Keep all the promises you make to him. (5) It is better to say nothing than to make a promise and not keep it. (6) Don’t let your mouth make you sin.  ~Ecclesiastes 5:4-6

You can't get more point blank than these verses: we don't wonder what they mean...we get it.  

And yet...we break our promises to God, don't we?

We know His feelings about things like marriage, lying, gossip, and loving others.  And when we accepted Jesus into our hearts, we made a spiritual promise to God to follow His ways, and to seek to be more like Him.

And yet...we fall short too often.  We have promised God our hearts, but in large and small ways each day, we delay in following through.

There may be a major area of our lives (marriage/finances/integrity/a calling on our life) that we have made a promise to God about, and yet, we delay in following through.  

Don’t delay in following through, for God takes no pleasure in fools.  ~Ecclesiastes 5:4

Does it seem harsh for the Bible to call us a fool if we are not keeping our promises to God?  Not if you are God. He is holy and He will not sugar-coat sin or our titles when we are in association with it. 

Do the wise delay in following through on a promise to God?  No, but fools do.  And it should alarm us (spiritually) that God takes no pleasure in fools.  We want God to take pleasure in us, and He desires to take pleasure in us. (He led me to a place of safety; he rescued me because he delights in me.  ~Psalm 18:19).

So...don't delay in following through when we make a promise to Him.

~~~

I have a girlfriend whom I love to connect with, and we often say that we are going to pin down a day to connect, but months (years?) have sifted through life's hourglass and we find ourselves having the same conversation all over again about meeting up.  

When we shared in an impromptu phone call last week and she said (again), what both of our hearts feel, "We really have to get a date on the calendar", the truth of these verses stung my heart.  

Sometimes we want to do something/say something/be something, and we mean to, but we refrain from applying full-investment in making it happen.  

Sometimes, we just plain lie and tell people what we think they want to hear or we say whatever nicety is necessary.  

Both are wrong, but especially (as in the case with my friend) if we feel led by the Lord, or if we have made a "promise" to Him about completing a promise to Him (or one of His people), then we should not delay in following through, for God takes no pleasure in fools. 

So, when my buddy wrapped up the call and she said (as we have said before), "We should meet", I knew that she wasn't expecting me to whip out my calendar, because even though we always mean to, we never do.

But I did.

"How about the day after tomorrow at 8 A.M.?"

Keep all the promises you make to him. (5) It is better to say nothing than to make a promise and not keep it. (6) Don’t let your mouth make you sin.  ~Ecclesiastes 5:4-6

I was tired of my mouth making me sin because I never followed through.

Are you?

~~~

These verses helped me to "realize" (this is putting it euphemistically) that I should stop saying things and making promises to people, to God, and to God's people...unless I intend to keep them.  It is better to say nothing than to make a promise and not keep it.

We need to say nothing more often.  And we need to stop letting our mouth make us sin.

~~~

There was a pause on the other end of the phone line when I threw out an option only 36 hours away, and then came an excited blurt of "Yes!  Where?"...

Coffee was not all that we ingested that morning.  My friend and I drank deeply from the fellowship, collaboration, brainstorming, parenting-tips, God-praising, inspiration, and laughter that we poured into each other's souls during that sacred hour.  

Putting each other off (while understandable), had become a breach in a promise I had made to God, and I knew it.  

Finally, I didn't delay in following through, and what a blessing (to me) it was to fulfill that promise.

~~~  

Is there a promise to God (or in service to God) that we need to "make good on" today?

Is there a promise to God that we have not kept?  

Start to "make it right" today.  Take the first step and initiate action.  Apologize/pick up the phone/make a move/set a date/do the right thing...and don’t delay in following through.  

When you make a promise to God, don’t delay in following through, for God takes no pleasure in fools. Keep all the promises you make to him. (5) It is better to say nothing than to make a promise and not keep it. (6) Don’t let your mouth make you sin.  ~Ecclesiastes 5:4-6

Blessings, 

sarah

https://sarahsundy04.blogspot.com