Please sign the GuestMap at The Burning Bush website. You can plant your country's flag on the map and leave a message. You can find it on the front page at http://www.theburningbush.org The Burning Bush Devotional (Over 13,000 subscribers in 75 countries) 09.21.04 The Best Laid Plans... My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent. If they say, ‘Come with us, let us lie in wait to shed blood; let us lurk secretly for the innocent without cause; let us swallow them alive like Sheol, and whole, like those who go down to the Pit; we shall find all kinds of precious possessions, we shall fill our houses with spoil; cast in your lot among us, let us all have one purse’ - My son, do not walk in the way with them, keep your foot from their path; for their feet run to evil, and they make hast to shed blood. Surely, in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird; but they lie in wait for their own blood, they lurk secretly for their own lives. so are the ways of everyone who is greedy for gain; it takes away the life of its owners. - Proverbs 1:10-19. He did not intend for everything to work out the way it did. Everything had gone well for the burglar. He had broke into the house undetected even with the residents at home. He was able to do his work and only when he was fleeing did the residents know a burglar had been in their home. This Malaysian burglar had thought of everything except he left the keys to his car in the house he had just burglarized! He then went back to the house and asked the residents to give him his keys and pleaded that they not call the police. Of course, they refused and the burglar left behind his car, car keys, and his burglar tools. He smashed the windshield of his own car and removed the tag trying to hide his identity but officials believe they will be able to identify him through the car’s serial number. What the burglar did not know was that he, as the writer of proverbs notes, was “lying (lie) in wait for his (their) own blood.” The fact of life is that when we prey on other people, when we steal, kill and destroy, we are actually attacking ourselves. When we prey on others we are yielding to the temptation of and following the devil (John 10:10a). We can avoid and we can resist laying a trap for ourselves by heeding God’s wisdom. “For scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge. Turn at my rebuke; surely I will pour out my spirit on you; I will make my words known to you (Proverbs 1:22b-23).” Have sinners been enticing you? Have you been thinking about doing something you know is wrong? Don’t do it! Heed God’s wisdom! Copyright © 2004. Ed Wrather. 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