Be careful for what you ask

Yet man is born to trouble as surely as sparks fly upward. Job 5:7.

One of my favourite comedies is ‘Bedazzled’.  Eliot, a geeky man working a dead-end technical support job for a San Francisco computer company had a crush on his colleague, Alison Gardner, but lacked the courage to ask her out.

He said to himself that he would give anything for Alison to be with him. Satan, (played by Elizabeth Hurley) in the form of a beautiful woman, overheard him and offered to give Elliot seven wishes in return for his soul. Each of his wishes ended in disaster.

I too have a story to tell about wishes.

There was once a princess who got rid of a controlling man, and foolishly asked the King for the next man to be the complete opposite.

“Please bring me a man who is the exact opposite of Silver-tongue” she prayed.

The next man was the complete opposite, but still found ways to take advantage.

Even though she had gone to the King with her wish, she asked the for the wrong thing.  The King decided to grant her request because He wanted her to learn.  All a man’s ways seem innocent to him, but motives are weighed by the LORD.  Proverbs 16:2.  She should have asked for wisdom.

Wisdom will save you from the ways of wicked men,
    from men whose words are perverse,
who have left the straight paths
    to walk in dark ways,
who delight in doing wrong
    and rejoice in the perverseness of evil,
whose paths are crooked
    and who are devious in their ways.  Proverbs 2:12-15

Be careful for what you ask.