Take heed to yourself

Only take heed to yourself, and diligently keep yourself, lest you forget the things your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. And teach them to your children and your grandchildren, - Deuteronomy 4v9

Part of my growing as a Christian was reading the Christian scandal sheets. The purpose of some of these things seemed to be to search out the church for anything that might be interpreted as error and make sure that everything, no matter how small, was exposed. These ‘brother watchers’ were everywhere and often their only sourcing was each other.

Don’t get me wrong. The Bible is clear that we need to be on the guard against false teachers. We also must expose error, but I suspect that there is such thing as taking a good thing too far.

Look at what God told Israel – ‘Only take heed to yourself, and diligently keep yourself…’ Remember what Jesus said about the mote and the beam? Remember what we are to do when we observe the Lord’s Table?

Seems like there is a lot more about watching ourselves than watching others, yet that area is far too often neglected.

Guard ourselves against error, of course. But I think we could all do with a little more of ‘taking heed to ourselves.’