Here are the two verses that really stuck out to me this morning, for whatever reason:

16 How much better to get wisdom than gold!

To get understanding is to be chosen rather than silver.

17 The highway of the upright turns aside from evil;

whoever guards his way preserves his life.

I really like the combination of these two verses.  The first really makes me ask a question I asked a couple weeks back during these readings - do I really value wisdom appropriately?  Do I hold it in high enough regard?  Do I really value it above all else?

And how do I REALLY know the answer to that question?  Well, the second verse, verse 17, says that the highway of the righteous, the person who DOES rightly value wisdom, turns away from evil, from sin, from unwise things...he flees them, he doesn’t play around the edges with them.   It says that whoever GUARDS HIS WAY preserves his life.  That is clearly pointing to a person being away from danger, trying to steer clear of the risk of danger...being wise and not tempting fate.

I think a great thing to consider would be to think about areas of life where I am making small decisions that aren’t wise, and look at the path those decisions may lead down...because we are always in motion down a path; either towards wise living or towards destruction.

It is January 1...perhaps I can take a few minutes today and think these various domains of my life - my spiritual life, my marital life, my parental life, my work life, my physical (fitness) life, and my avocational life and ask, “Am I moving down the path towards righteous living or not?”.  That can be a thought process that is a springboard for moving forward in 2021.