“Do not answer a fool according to his folly, or you will be like him yourself” (26:4). I have been addressing the ways in which we might respond to those who attack us with their words or actions. Our natural inclination is to fight back. We have a sense of justice within us that makes us want to repay evil with evil. The problem with that sense of justice is that it often forgets who the judge is. We are not to act as the judges of other people, and we are certainly not permitted to carry out a sentence against them. Whenever we repay evil with evil, we join in with the very injustice that was being perpetrated against us. Evil is like a highly infectious disease. It’s like rabies. A dog with rabies bites another dog who then contracts the disease and goes about attacking other dogs and on and on it goes. Unfortunately, this is how world history has unfolded. As people perpetrate evil against others, they infect them with bitterness and an insatiable desire for vengeance. This then perpetuates and intensifies the evil which grows and compounds like a storm. If you strike back at someone who strikes at you then you forfeit your claim to be any different to that person. You have no right to come away feeling justified that ‘they started it’. If you answer a foolish act or word with another foolish act or word, then you only fill the world with more folly.
Reflect on who you may be holding something against and ask God to help you be gracious.
Read Proverbs 26:1-10
