Are you following your friends or are you following God?. Maybe your friends are following God but are they? Have you ever really asked yourself this question? This isn’t really for the person who looks at their vocally nonchristian friends but more so for the person who is sitting next to their friends in church. So many times I looked down the row at my group of friends and never did I once question how they were truly changing me. For good or for bad the people around us change us. Proverbs 27:17 clearly states “as iron sharpens iron so one man sharpens another” How many times have you heard this? How many times have you actually thought about it? Back in ancient times iron was one of the best metals one could have. It was great for war with swords, which also it made beautiful work when used as a tool. Iron sharpens iron, have you ever actually tried to sharpen a knife, or really sharpen much of anything for that matter? In today’s society we have technology to make all these things easy for us. Back when I worked construction one of the tasks I had was to sharpen the chisels that we were using for various concrete work. The sharper they are the easier the work. A metal cutting blade is what is used for the task of sharpening. Something that can mutilate the blades is used in the right way to make them perfect. From experience it is extremely easy to mess up and put the slightest of chips into what you are trying to sharpen. So easy to damage but so useful when flawless. You may be asking yourself how I’m looking to connect this with Proverbs 27:17 I mean isn’t it obvious. The verse could easily read “As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another. So quickly can one man dull another” Now I’m not looking to change scripture but what I’m looking for is conviction in your heart. When is the last time you’ve looked at your friends and asked yourself what they’re doing for you? It is wildly easy to chip the blade you wish to sharpen; it’s also just as easy to sharpen it at a bad angle to which it will not be useful for the task of which it is meant for. I’ve been sitting on this idea of a blog about my new pocket bible that I got and it kind of falls in line with what I’m saying here so I’ll shorten it up and add it. When I started hanging around more Christians I started to notice something, something that other notice as well but something that you are likely not thinking about. Most all of the guys in their back left pocket carried a bible. A small pocket bible. When I first started seeing these people more and more I almost longed to have a relationship with God that all of these awesome men of God had. So what did I do? I imitated them I went out to my local bookstore and bought a pocket bible. I say this now after having it for a couple months. “I got it just to get it, but when I got it, I GOT IT” I’ll be honest with you, I originally bought it to appear like them to follow suit in the good example they made. What I didn’t expect was how much it would change my life. After getting the pocket bible my time spent in the word dramatically increased. I would open it at sporadic times and just read. It didn’t matter where I was I would just crack it open and read. I guess what I’m trying to say is that when you have truly Christian examples in your life it makes easy work for God to sharpen us. After a reexamination of Proverbs 27:17 I KNOW that the choice is mine. Am I going to fill my life with people that will dull me, or will I fill my life with the people that are going to sharpen me, not even with their words but with their actions. I don’t use a question mark their because it’s not really even a question that needs an answer, you know the answer as well as I do.
