Pin It Now! Today's reading: Proverbs 23 Click here to read online (NIV)

Verse of the day: "Do not let your heart 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." 23:17,18

It is only human nature to envy others but not a godly one. As we grow spiritually we need to get rid of envy from our heart. We can not be believers and also envy others. If we envy others we are not truly believers. As long as we fear the Lord and shun from envy and other sinful ways, our hope is not in vain.

I love the explanation for this verse in the Gill's Exposition and wish to share it with you:

Let not thine heart envy sinners,.... Their present prosperity and happiness, the pleasure, profit, and honour, they seem to enjoy; all which is but a shadow, fading and temporary; and yet good men are upto envy it in their hearts, if they do not express it with their lips; and are ready to murmur and think it hard that they should be in straitened circumstances while the wicked are in flourishing ones; and inwardly fret and are uneasy at it, which they should not; or do not "emulate" or "imitate" them, or do as they do, thinking thereby to enjoy the same prosperity and happiness; choose not their ways, nor desire to be with them, to have their company, or be ranked among them...  

... but be thou in the fear of the Lord all the day long; let the fear of God be always before thine eyes and in thine heart; be continually in the exercise of fear, which is attended with faith and trust in the Lord; with love and affection to him, and joy and delight in him; be constantly employed in the duties of religion, private and public, which the fear of God includes; and this will be a preservative from envying, murmuring, and fretting at the outward happiness of wicked men; and from joining with them in their evil ways...

For surely there is an end,.... Both of the prosperity of the wicked, which is but for a short time; and of the afflictions of the righteous, which are but as it were for a moment; and therefore there is no reason to envy the one, nor to be fretful under the other; the end to a good man will be peace and prosperity for ever: there is a "reward", as some render it here, for the righteous, though not of debt, but of grace; upon which account they have ground to expect much here and hereafter...

So, points taken: Let's not envy others; Let us be zealous with the fear of the Lord; Our hope will not be cut off! Amen!