Do not let your hearts envy sinners, but always be zealous for the fear of the Lord. There is surely a future hope for you, and your hope will not be cut off.
When sharing her testimony, one of my friends always says „Life became more difficult since becoming a Christian.“ Sometimes we can find ourselves looking at the lives of our friends or relatives outside of the church and think „Look how easy they have it – their standard of living is much lower than mine / they have no obligation to respect the system / they have more ‘fun’ than me etc.“ But when we start thinking like this, we have lost perspective – Jesus never promised us life would be easy following Him, in fact He called us to follow Him, He who suffered loneliness, disparity, mocking, being misunderstood as well as death on a cross.
Rather than envying those around us we are called to be envious for the fear of the Lord! Jealousy is a strong emotion, one that causes us to act passionately and possessively. What would it look like for me, for you to be in passionate and possessive pursuit of pure reverence of God today?
The wisdom of this proverb assures that we need to shift our perspective to the hope that we have – in Christ, the inheritance we have in Him. Maybe we do not have much to hold onto in this life, but the eternal hope we have will not disappoint us (Romans 5:5).
Father thank you that we have an abundant in heritance in you, and that the hope we have in you will never put us to shame (however much others might try!). Thank you that you are jealous for our hearts and help us today strive to follow you, emmulating your passion for us.