“Now there was a famine in the land…” This is the setting which precedes one of the most ridiculous decisions ever made by the man of God, Abram. The next few paragraphs describe in agonizing detail him convincing his wife Sarai to tell everyone in Egypt that she was his sister, not his wife. It was because of the famine, Abram moved his entire family down to Egypt in order to survive, but it was his fear of the Egyptians killing him for his beautiful wife, that produced one of the worst ideas in the entire Biblical record.
A famine. Most of our bad decisions in life begin with a desperate situation. “Desperate times call for desperate measures”, or so the saying goes. When life turns up the heat, we tend to make impulsive and foolish decisions. It’s like putting the tea kettle on the stove and turning it on high. Eventually the heat causes the steam to blow out of the top.
Jesus said this in his sermon on the mount…
Luke 6
45 A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.
For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of. It’s so true. My impulsive decisions made under pressure, my foolish words spoken in haste are a revelation of what is going on way down deep in my soul. In that case, maybe pressure situations aren’t to blame for my bad behavior, rather, it’s an indicator for what is happening on the inside of me. If I allow bitterness, fear, jealousy, selfishness, etc. to camp out in my soul, I’m one desperate situation away from a bad decision.
Since I can’t always control what is happening to me, it’s imperative I keep a watch over what is going on inside of me.