Listen to Instruction

Proverbs 19:27
Stop listening to instruction, my son, and you will stray from the words of knowledge.


Have you ever met someone who thinks they have it all figured out? I’m afraid I may have been that person, if you’ve ever met me. It’s easy to think we’ve read it all, and we know the answer to every malady and every problem. Of course, Christ is the ultimate answer to each and every problem we have - real or imagined. However, it’s also very easy to think "I know Him, so everything else is taken care of." Why bother with church? Or Bible study? Or Christian living books? Christ is in me, and that’s that.

Well, as we can see from this passage, "that’s" not entirely "that." You see, salvation is 3-fold - past salvation is the moment we chose to live under Christ’s Lordship; present salvation is the process through which God refines us, teaches us, molds us to be more like Him, and uses us for His great purposes (this is known as sanctification); and future salvation is the moment we are saved from eternal damnation - the fate we all deserve. This verse is speaking to us regarding our present and on-going salvation - our sanctification.

When we bow our knee to Christ and open the door for Him to enter our lives, we have simply taken the first step in our Christian journey. I know women who think that once Christ is in their lives, they simply have to trust Him to "do His thing" and everything else will be taken care of. I also know women (and I would tend to fall into this category) that after being under His teaching for a brief time, we’ve heard it all and know it all, and have "arrived." These are two extremes of the same problem - not listening to instruction. Whether we have been Christians for a day or 100 years, we all need to listen to instruction - we all need to be under a person who is teaching us, and then take that teaching and apply it to our lives. We need to be in the Word, allowing Christ to teach us, and then take that teaching and apply it to our lives. We cannot do this alone. We cannot walk in the Spirit, living in truth, and make an impact in this world without being taught.

Who is teaching you? What are you learning? How are you applying what you’re learning and living it out? If these questions are stumping you, perhaps you should look at your life and see what needs to change. Perhaps you think I’m in the wrong here. If so, look at your life - the choices you’re making, the way you’re living, the impact you’re making. Now, hold it up to the light of truth - compare it to what God has to say (not what you think God has to say) about all of these things. Look in the Word and see if your life is lining up with a true, radical disciple of Christ. I would be willing to bet that if you are not listening to instruction, your life will not line up very nicely. Oh, you might have a nice veneer - a beautiful shiny outside - but your life through-and-through will be in the shadow that the world’s teaching is casting onto your life.

Here’s the thing - we’re all learning something, we’re all under someone’s teaching - the question is, are we learning the truth? Is that someone a person who is under the truth of Christ? Or are we learning life’s lessons from the TV or from magazines or secular books? We must listen to Christian instruction, and apply it to our lives, or salvation from the snags of life will be long and painful. Oh, God will finish us - He always finishes what He starts. But it is so much more fun, delightful, and amazing when we are willing parties to His great plan.