Your trajectory can quickly become your destiny. In Psalm 1, David makes the timetested observation that where you walk rapidly becomes where you live:“ Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers”( emphasis added). Repeated passing interactions with an unwise person can quickly turn into regularly hanging out, and eventually you are doing life together. Charles Spurgeon wrote,
When men are living in sin they go from bad to worse. At first, they merely walk in the counsel of the careless and ungodly, who forget God— the evil is rather practical than habitual— but after that, they become habituated to evil, and they stand in the way of open sinners who willfully violate God’ s commandments; and if let alone, they go one step further, and become themselves pestilent teachers and tempters of others, and thus they sit in the seat of the scornful. They have taken their degree in vice, and as true Doctors of Damnation they are installed.
He is not overstating the point. When you link your life to men who are foolish, evil, and stupid, you become an expert in all the wrong things. Their viewpoint becomes the way you see life. It happens fast, and the sad truth is that once you have decided to sit, it’ s hard to get back up and walk away. Why? You have camped out with“ mockers.” The meaning of the Hebrew word includes the idea of a big- talking, sarcastic rebel who delights in mocking what’ s right, and when that becomes your world, cynicism is the air you breathe.
And it all starts with walking down the path of the wrong people. As Solomon warns his son,“ Whoever walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of fools will suffer harm.” Pay attention to the path you take.
The best clue to the right path is the men who are on it. If you are worried that you might be on the wrong road, all you have to do is look at the men on your right and on your left. Are they swimming upstream or downstream? Are they content to simply go with the flow of culture or are they men of commitment with clear convictions? Are they easily unsettled or are they deeply rooted in biblical truth?
The Path of Least Resistance
You can graduate college, have a job, volunteer at your church, and still be on the path of least resistance. That’ s the deceptive thing about the path of least resistance. You are technically doing“ good” things, but you aren’ t building anything of substance or going anywhere. You may even object and say,“ I am not on that path,” because you have some resistance. However, you forget it’ s not the“ path of no resistance,” it’ s the“ path of least resistance.”
It plays out this way. Your boss finds out you lied about a sick day and wants you to come in for a meeting. So you just bail and find a different job. You overextend your finances by purchasing a new car to impress people you don’ t even know, and now you are living off credit cards instead of living within your means. Your wife wants to get counseling because she doesn’ t feel connected to you,
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