Be Careful What You Wish For

When Moses came down from Mount Sinai, he had two tablets that contained the Ten Commandments. The first four commandments have to do with our relationship with God, and the next six commandments have to do with our relationship with people.

Unrighteousness is the result of sinning against each other, and ungodliness is the result of sinning against God. And when you’re out of fellowship with God, you will have conflict with others, too.

If you want to run from God, He won’t stop you from exercising your free will. The prodigal son went to his father and basically said (loosely paraphrased), “Dad, I’m sick of waiting for you to die. I want my inheritance now. So give it to me.”

We would have understood if the father had said, “No, son, I love you too much. You will make bad decisions and hurt yourself. I won’t give it to you.” But that isn’t what happened. The father gave his son what he asked for.

The boy skipped out of town with his inheritance, and then he blew it all. He messed up his life. And he regretted it, of course. But his father allowed him to exercise his free will.

Be careful what you ask for, because you might get it.

The Bible describes what happens when you push God out of your life: “Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done. Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, quarreling, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip” (Romans 1:28–29 NLT).

God will allow you to pursue what you want to pursue and do what you want to do. But be careful. Because when you reject God, ruin follows.