My son, keep my words
and treasure up my commandments with you;
2 keep my commandments and live;
keep my teaching as the apple of your eye;
3 bind them on your fingers;
write them on the tablet of your heart.
4 Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,”
and call insight your intimate friend,
5 to keep you from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words.
(Proverbs 9:1-5)
God has taught us so much - about right and wrong, true and false, the eternal and the transitory. But what are we going to do with what we've got? If we are wise, we will hold them in front of us like a delicious apple - wanting to do His will. We will put them on like a ring on our finger, representing a commitment to be faithful to Him. We will plant them deep within so when we filter desires through the filter of our feelings we will not pursue evil. And we will choose to go into relationships as if we always have a chaperon with us - like our sister, or our best friend - a real friend who is willing and allowed to speak truth to us, to tell us to "stay away from her!" To be sure the writer here is speaking in both literal and figurative terms: young men must avoid immoral women! But we all must avoid the alluring temptations of foolishly living for passing pleasure. We need to live life to please God, and not as if our actions affect nobody else.
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