Topic: Beauty Of Self-Restraint [Tuesday July 25, 2017]
Text: Job 32:13-23
Key Verse: “I said, I will answer also my part, I also will shew mine opinion” (Job 32:17).
When there is an argument or intense discussion and there is someone who considers he has more valid contribution to make, or that others are simply missing the point, the discreet one must restrain himself with difficulty from interrupting. Yet, if he must wade in, he must do so with careful study and observation.
The text deals with a situation in which Elihu, who had held his peace while the others were talking, now had to come in strongly in putting across his own views and feelings. His youthfulness had precluded him from speaking all the while, but he reasoned that God had given him special understanding, regardless of his age. Elihu considered that Job had not been clever in his responses to his friend’s arguments, hence, his stepping forward to speak.
It is often considered that one who keeps quiet while others are talking, does so more intelligently and reasonably when he chooses to speak, having been studying the trend of the arguments of the others. Despite his youthfulness, he boldly made his contribution, thus making himself an arbitrator and a fourth party. Self-restraint, in the face of provocation and temptation is a virtue that every believer must prayerfully cultivate.
The scriptural credo of “swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath” should undergird the comportment of heaven-bound saints. A believer who has no rule over his spirit but speaks impulsively, acts irrationally, has needless leakages to his spiritual life. He cannot go far with Christ.
Thought for the day: Wisdom discretion sets the believer apart from others.
Bible Reading in one Year: Exodus 30-32
DCLM Daily Manna was written by Pastor William Folorunso Kumuyi; is the founder and General Superintendent of the Deeper Life Bible Church situated at KM 42 on the busy Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, Nigeria.
