Today's Verse:

⁵ Trust in the Lord with all your heart

and lean not on your own understanding;

⁶ in all your ways acknowledge him,

and he will make your paths straight.^a

^a Or will direct your paths

The Holy Bible : New International Version. electronic ed. Grand Rapids : Zondervan, 1996, c1984, S. Pr 3:5-6.

I think that this passage asks us to depend upon the Lord's wisdom for direction. Without the Lord in our lives, our lives are condemned to unceasing wandering.

Today's Comments: At yesterday's party, in my conversation with the host and another of the attendees, both were talking about their issues with religion, suggesting that religion was designed to give comfort to people so that they would not fear death. I thought quite a bit about this idea, realizing that if death is the end of life, and if there is no life thereafter, what are we doing on earth? We have, under those circumstances, no intrinsic purpose. So, therefore, why live at all? Why not, when we get too old to enjoy ourselves, don't we just check out by taking something that makes death quick, convenient, and final.

My answer comes from the Paul's Epistle to the Romans. There is plenty of evidence that God has left for nonbelievers to show that the cosmos, earth and our lives were not just products of random creation. We are designed and maintained by a creator, God. We do not have purpose on our own, Rather, God has given us purpose. And, as the proverb instructs, to find that purpose, we must appeal not to our own finite wisdom, but to the wisdom and understanding of God, who created us for His purpose. We find that wisdom in the writings of Holy Scripture. Only then, will our paths be set straight.