The Story:How many times have we seen it? Someone sets out to do a foolish, sinful thing at someone else’s expense, and it comes back to bite him big time. Whether or not we actually pay for our foolish ways in this life, damage is done to our souls, and a day of reckoning yet lies ahead. The folly of men – the sin that plagues us all – affects even the world we live in day by day. Damage is done to the systems by which human beings get by in life. Danger lurks even in the workplace – year-in and year-out, the most dangerous career a man can undertake is to be a farmer. Sin takes up lodging in every aspect of life and culture when fools refuse to check their folly at the door, and not even the “innocent” can escape the widespread and far-flung effects of folly run wild.

The Structure:We don’t have to look far to see the evidence of sin’s entrenched position in the systems of our own culture and society. It’s not hard to find examples of people taking advantage of other people by taking a good system and corrupting it with sinful intent. Innocent people are killed by drunk drivers every year, and guilty criminals get off easy because of sinful notions of justice and human perfectibility. It is inevitable, in a fallen world, that the good gifts God distributes among men will be taken captive by the father of lies and made to serve his sinister (Latin: “left”) purposes. Not even the just and righteous can escape the effects of sin and folly unscathed, as we see in the example of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Have you ever been victimized by someone else’s sinful behavior? Were you able to forgive them like Jesus?

Each week’s studies in our Scriptorium column are available in a free PDF form, suitable for personal or group use. For this week’s study, “It’s Common Sense! Ecclesiastes 10,” simply click here.

T. M. Moore

Scripture taken from the New King James Version. © Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.