Posted on 06/21/2021 11:18:25 PM PDT by Pilgrim's Progress
“A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches, and loving favour rather than silver and gold” (Proverbs 22:1).
“A good name is rather to be chosen,” I take a good name to be a good testimony. The only other place you find a good name is in Ecclesiastes, chapter 7. It is the only other place where these two words are placed together like this, and I take them to mean a solid, sound testimony, having a good name; but not necessarily a reputation, but a good name.
“A good name is better than precious ointment; and the day of death than the day of one's birth” (Ecclesiastes 7:1).
So, “a good name is rather to be chosen,” first of all, it is worthwhile to say that if somebody has a good testimony, it is a choice that we make. You can choose to have a bad testimony or a good testimony, and you do control that. It is a choice, right? In a day when it seems like this kind of stuff is going to the wayside, everybody wants to be known as honest, and that sort of thing. But as far as having a testimony of real upstanding godliness, servanthood, humility, forthrightness, and all those things; it seems like more and more Christians just don't care about that stuff. The new catchphrase is, “Well, we’re only human. We’re doing the best that we can do.” As if that excuses them from truly being their best and having a good name. That's not right. We should have a good name, and that good name is to be chosen.
It says a good name is rather to be chosen than great riches. Well, a good name has to do not so much with reputation as your testimony. When we hear that a man has a reputation, that can be rather ominous, right? Because that can be a bad thing. Our testimony is what we have; not only before God, but before men.
The thing about that is, that we're called not to the over-occupied with what men think about you. In other words, there is going to be a time when you have to do something, and it's not popular, and you can't think about necessarily what other people think about it, right? There is a time for that. On the other hand, the other way around that; kind of a two-edged sword, is that all too often folks think nothing whatsoever about what other people think. Now, this is not to make people slaves to somebody else’s opinions, or that sort of thing; but you need a good name. You need a good testimony. In order to do that, you need to live right and do right.
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FMCDH(BITS)
Great advice - until the rent is due.
Bump.
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