**Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle? Who shall dwell in thy holy hill? He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart ** Psalm 15:1,2
**But the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day. ** Proverbs 4:18
**But in every nation he that heareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him. **Acts 10:35
I love to find thoughts and principles in the Bible that have been handed down from generation to generation. Psalm 15 was written by King David and Proverbs 4 was written by his son Solomon. In the Book of the Acts of the Apostles, we see the same principle of walking in righteousness. The story of Solomon tells us that God gave Solomon great wisdom but we also see that many times when Solomon writes, he is repeating something he heard from his father. Don’t we all wish that our children would find value in something that we teach them and those teachings would be passed on to our grandchildren?
Righteousness, light, holiness and truth are highlighted in these three verses. If we want to have an impact on those that are dearest to us, these verses tell us that we have to do some inner searching. We need to be real with ourselves and speak the truth in our own hearts and take a hard look at who we are, what we say and think and how we act. Because our loved ones are watching us and looking for something to imitate.
One of the great things we can admit and teach our children and grandchildren is that we are still a work in progress. Let’s take the pressure off of the next generation and let them know that we have NOT arrived and we are still working out our new life in Christ. We do NOT have all the answers but we trust God to keep showing us how to walk closer to Him every day. Hanging out at church just isn’t enough for the next generation to know that God is ALIVE and is interested in all that we do and love.
If we see some weak spots in OURSELVES that need some cleaning up, it is our responsibility to face that reality and make some changes in us first before we go pointing out what’s wrong with someone else. Motes and beams come to mind 🙂
Yielding to the truth from God’s point of view helps us to correct the areas that are not surrendered to God, areas where we might be hanging on to our old life and old habits. It will also impact others when they see our sincerity about our realization that we need to keep growing. If we want to make a positive impact on our children and our grandchildren, the time to start is today, don’t you agree?