Daily Jewel

by Pastor J.T. Carnell, McAlester, OK
Sept. 29. 2011

“I Told You So!”
“Listen to my instruction and be wise; do not disregard it.” – Proverbs 8:33 (NIV)

“Hear instruction and be wise, and do not refuse or neglect it.” (Amplified Bible)

“Blessed the man, blessed the woman, who listens to me, awake and ready for me each morning, alert and responsive as I start my day's work.” (Verses 32-33, The Message)

“Listen to my instruction and be wise. Don’t ignore it.” (New Living Translation)

“Hear instruction, and be wise, and refuse it not.” (King James Version)

I am always intrigued by the number of “interpretations” that there are and how each puts a unique “spin” on what the text is saying. Of those listed above I would have to say I like what the Amplified Bible does (and says) and that is not only should we be careful to listen (as hopefully we learned yesterday) but that we not ignore what that voice is saying!! There is no such thing as “selective spiritual instruction” you might say! Listen to this description of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster in northern Ukraine: "There were two electrical engineers in the control room that night and the best thing that could be said for what they were doing is they were 'playing around' with the machine. They were performing what the Soviets later described as an unauthorized experiment. They were trying to see how long a turbine would 'free wheel' when they took the power off it. "Now, taking the power off that kind of a nuclear reactor is a difficult, dangerous thing to do, because these reactors are very unstable in their lower ranges. In order to get the reactor down to that kind of power, where they could perform the test they were interested in performing, they had to override manually six separate computer-driven alarm systems. "One by one the computers would come up and say, 'Stop! Dangerous! Go no further!' And one by one, rather than shutting off the experiment, they shut off the alarms and kept going. You know the results: nuclear fallout that was recorded all around the world, from the largest industrial accident ever to occur in the world. This city, which formerly had 55,000 people, is now largely abandoned.”
Here is another I rather like: There was an interesting story some time ago in an issue of Focus on the Family magazine about a man who bought one of those cars that had replaced warning lights with spoken instructions in a female voice. In a soft voice, his "little woman"—as he called her—would say, "Your door isn’t closed properly." "Your key is still in the ignition." "Your seat-belt isn’t fastened properly." On one occasion he recalled how the voice of his "little woman" said, "Your fuel level is getting low." The driver thanked her and figuring he had sufficient fuel to take him a further 50 miles, ignored the voice and kept driving. A few minutes later, his "little woman" repeated, "Your fuel level is low." The further he drove the more often his "little woman" repeated her warning. Getting frustrated, he stopped his car, searched under the dashboard, and found the appropriate wires. One quick jerk and his "little woman" was silenced. Imagine the "grin"; that is "cha-grin" on his face when, a few minutes later his car spluttered and jerked to a standstill—out of fuel. If the “little woman” could have spoken on her own I could well imagine her words would have been: “You should have listened to me…I told you so!”
We all have seen the warning signs and have all probably heard at one time or another that little voice within. It’s called the voice of conscience. It can get very annoying at times, and sometimes we "pull its wires." It is only too late we discover that we cannot stop the reactor or we have run out of fuel. Why is it that we have such an aversion to following instructions? Here (and listen closely) is God’s instruction! You are wise when you listen so don’t ignore it! Don’t wait until it is too late to hear…”I told you so!”
Pastor J. T. Carnell