THE LOOK OF LOVE

"You shall not commit adultery." (Exodus 20:14, ESV)

For more than a little while now, I've been thinking that the problem is my putter.

Forget that I've reached that age where nerves start to get called into question. Never mind that the greens I've been putting aren't the best cared for in the world, and by the time I play them in the later afternoons they have grown quite bumpy. Put aside the fact that I don't exactly practice every day. It's got to be the putter.

So when I joined some colleagues recently for an all-day meeting in the conference room of a PGA Tour Superstore, you know where I spent the lunch hour: on the putting green. And what a putting green it was, surrounded by literally hundreds of new putters, all makes and models.

I tried the brands I'm partial to first, and often I found myself making several putts right off the bat with this model or that. Soon, however, these "babies" were doing what my old putter did—miss on the right, miss on the left, miss well short.

So I'd move on. After all, there was no need to be loyal with so many options before me.

Right about now, knowing the subject of today's study—the Seventh Commandment, "You shall not commit adultery"—you are probably certain that I am making up this little story about the putter in my bag and my straying, longing eyes. It's all a metaphor, right?

Actually, no. I did spend such a lunch hour (and a fair bit more time at the end of our meeting) seeking a new putter. My desire was great. My satisfaction was not. And when I returned the next day to my original putter, the putter I have been using for several years, I found it to be much better than I had remembered. I realized that I had made an error in thinking there was something finer for me.

Adultery is no fanciful matter. It comes at us in a series of small dissatisfactions, so we brush off each sideways glance, each flight of fantasy. We figure we would never actually go there. And yet many do. Because they have not fixed their hearts.

Normally, these tidy little devotions are no time for preaching. We take a passage of Scripture and turn it over in our minds, considering what God would have us do. But today, I feel compelled to give it to you straight: Fix your heart. Don't wait a moment longer. Fix your heart on Christ; fix your heart on your husband or your wife; fix your heart on your children; fix your heart on everyone that God has given to you. Fix your heart.

If we do not first fix our hearts, then our eyes are likely to wander. And this wandering leads to wanderlust, a truly perfect term for the adulterer-to-be. Eyes follow the heart, and actions follow the eyes. Maybe it's only a fling, maybe it's a full-fledged affair. But either grieves God, who has given you those He has for you. Grieve Him not! Grieve them not! Fix your heart.

Fix your heart and you'll find satisfaction right where you are.

--

Jeff Hopper

April 15, 2008

Copyright 2008 Links Players International

The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.