Proverbs 5 (ESV)
Warning Against Adultery
5 My son, be attentive to my wisdom;
incline your ear to my understanding,
2 that you may keep discretion,
and your lips may guard knowledge.
3 For the lips of a forbidden[a] woman drip honey,
and her speech[b] is smoother than oil,
4 but in the end she is bitter as wormwood,
sharp as a two-edged sword.
5 Her feet go down to death;
her steps follow the path to[c] Sheol;
6 she does not ponder the path of life;
her ways wander, and she does not know it.
7 And now, O sons, listen to me,
and do not depart from the words of my mouth.
8 Keep your way far from her,
and do not go near the door of her house,
9 lest you give your honor to others
and your years to the merciless,
10 lest strangers take their fill of your strength,
and your labors go to the house of a foreigner,
11 and at the end of your life you groan,
when your flesh and body are consumed,
12 and you say, “How I hated discipline,
and my heart despised reproof!
13 I did not listen to the voice of my teachers
or incline my ear to my instructors.
14 I am at the brink of utter ruin
in the assembled congregation.”
15 Drink water from your own cistern,
flowing water from your own well.
16 Should your springs be scattered abroad,
streams of water in the streets?
17 Let them be for yourself alone,
and not for strangers with you.
18 Let your fountain be blessed,
and rejoice in the wife of your youth,
19 a lovely deer, a graceful doe.
Let her breasts fill you at all times with delight;
be intoxicated[d] always in her love.
20 Why should you be intoxicated, my son, with a forbidden woman
and embrace the bosom of an adulteress?[e]
21 For a man’s ways are before the eyes of the Lord,
and he ponders[f] all his paths.
22 The iniquities of the wicked ensnare him,
and he is held fast in the cords of his sin.
23 He dies for lack of discipline,
and because of his great folly he is led astray.
This verse really struck me because it reminded me that nothing that we do, say or think escapes the Lord’s attention. For a Triple Boy Blessed Mama like me, who forgets things like Tooth Fairy visits, signing permission forms, to wash her husband’s work clothes, it is unfathomable that God notices everything.
Everything.
From the often unnoticed and unsung preparation of meals for my family, buying groceries and running errands, cleaning and organizing our home, getting up before the rush of the day to prepare breakfasts and lunches for our boys and send them off to school with a prayer, to the thoughts, prayers and words that are only between God and I…He knows.
And I believe He is pleased by those things.
At at the end of the day, the fact that He knows, He sees is the only acknowledgment that I need.
But the grumbled annoyances I utter, the frustrations that brew right under the surface, the forgiveness I withhold, the many times I choose distraction over prayer, the doubt I entertain, the grace I don’t extend, the times I pick up my phone instead of the Bible…He knows that too.
And although He is not pleased with those choices that I make…He loves me despite them.
And, oh, how thankful I am for that truth.
But today, and hopefully tomorrow, and the next day, and the next day, and the one after that, I am going to think on this, and remember that my ways are always before His eyes. And I am going to ask for His strength to make more and more choices that are pleasing to Him.