TODAY’S DEVOTIONAL PASSAGE

DEVOTIONAL

by Sandra Chua

As parents, we want the best for our children. We teach them. We guide them, correct them, and discipline them. We also try to shield them from pain and sometimes choose their friends. But we can only do so much. We are not able to watch them 24 by 7, and sadly, they are not always willing to listen. We just pray that they make the correct choices, and the times when our children choose to do wrong, we do not always get angry. Knowing the consequences, sometimes our reaction is pain. This goes for decisions they make, which we know will harm them. 

God felt much the same way, seeing how evil “man” has turned out and that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart was only evil all the time his heart ached. NIV84 translates the verse, “The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain.” 

The storyline moved fast. Five chapters ago, it was a perfect world. Everything was good. God walked with Adam and Eve in the garden. But a poor decision,  a choice to believe that God is not truthful, that He is withholding something good from us, led to disobedience, and sin entered the world. A chapter later, there was not one murder but two. We are only in chapter 6, and it says the human heart has nothing but evil in it. How could things have gone so badly, so quickly? Grief and pain filled God’s heart.

REFLECTION

What should we do when we cause someone pain and grief? How do you feel knowing that you have caused God pain? In what ways have you grieved the Lord? How does knowing that our disobedience causes Him pain make us choose wisely? 

PRAYER