Walking Without Stumbling
In the first Psalm laid out in the Bible, the Psalmist (who some believe to be Solomon) lays out something we find in Proverbs 4– a discussion of what happens depending on how we walk:
How happy is the one who does not walk in the advice of the wicked or stand in the pathway of sinners or sit in the company of mockers! Instead, his delight is in the Lord’s instruction, and he meditates on it day and night.
Psalm 1:1-2
We can think of our journey through life like a walk we go on. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end. We don’t necessarily know when the end of the walk will come, but we do know that there are only a couple of destinations at the end of it.
These two paths are outlined for us in Proverbs 4:
The path of the righteous is like of dawn,
Proverbs 4:18-19
shining brighter and brighter until midday.
But the way of the wicked is like the darkest gloom;
they don’t know what makes the stumble.
What way are you choosing to walk? We learn in Proverbs that the way to tell is to be able to read the signs. The Bible is our map, and instruction is our guide to see and be able to know whether we’re on the path that leads to darkness and stumbling, or we’re on the path that leads to light. That doesn’t mean the righteous road will be one that’s free from peril, that’s an easy walk, or that is wide.
Jesus tells that wide is the path that leads to destruction!
No, what it means is that the path that the wicked follow will lead you where you don’t want to go, doing things you know you shouldn’t do, and will lead you further from the truth. Avoid it at all costs.
