“Behold, they who flatter and
snipe are nothing; they will pass away with the sound of their words, but the
truth of the Lord remains forever.”
— Thomas á Kempis (1380–1471)
There is a strange coherence
between those who are given to flattery and sniping. Those who engage in the
one usually engage in the other. There is a stark disingenuousness about them.
They are mendacious and flexible upon their questionable morality. Anything for
a price.
We, however, are called to integrity. We all are.
Alignment to the code of truth—to
the Lord—is our divine imperative here and now, always. We’re tempted to be
sickened by the duplicitous intent of those who engage in vulgarities, just
because they can. But, in this world, there will always be those who shall be
quickly passing away; not missed by any allegiance of legacy to the next
generation.
The only thing the treacherous one
leaves is a bane for the sad unfortunates that follow as their sons and
daughters. That is, apart from the many fragments of damage they leave strewn
through others’ lives they blew through.
Leaving Behind Temptations to Anxiety
God is good and we know it. The
Lord is seeing to it that we are not trapped by those given headlong to their
disloyalty. We are, and will be, blessed. Our faith says so, and so does God.
We are not left marooned.
It can appear that the flatterer
and the sniper have control.
Well, of course they don’t.
Faith’s needed to see beyond
sight. They seem popular, happy, even glib—and they seem to get away with it.
We best not envy them by wondering why we’re ‘not so blessed’. We probably know
the Word of God tells us these truths, but living it is another thing entirely.
But that negatively-poised
thinking’s not getting us anywhere—and certainly not to the blessing we were
destined for. Leaving behind the typical anxieties of these situations is about
becoming God-poised, God-positioned, and God-focused, toward becoming
God-blessed.
Leaving behind the common and
petty temptations to envy and anger and retribution is about knowing the wonder
of God’s enduring truth that surpasses the world and all things physical and
material.
***
People who flatter and snipe are
commonly the same; here today, gone tomorrow. It’s up to us to choose a better
bread to feed upon. The truth of God endures eternally; it leaves every false
thing in its wake. Where will we go today?
© 2013 S. J.
Wickham.
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