Daily Devotions – Be slow to make promises

Daily Devotions – Be slow to make promises

 

 

Click this link to hear an audio version of the below text narrated by SOTH member Jerry Rhinehart:

Deuteronomy 23:21-23 (NIV)

21 If you make a vow to the Lord your God, do not be slow to pay it, for the Lord your God will certainly demand it of you and you will be guilty of sin. 22 But if you refrain from making a vow, you will not be guilty. 23 Whatever your lips utter you must be sure to do, because you made your vow freely to the Lord your God with your own mouth.

By the time we get to Deuteronomy, God has already made adjustments to his instructions in Leviticus, urging his people to avoid sin by being slow to make a promise, and quickly keeping the vows they make to God. The modern slang for this is “keeping short accounts”. As an incentive to following this instruction, keep in mind how much it simplifies our lives and lowers our stress when we have only a small number of uncompleted promises hanging over us.