Contemptible Wickedness
According to King Solomon's book of Proverbs, wickedness and contempt come together hand in hand. Be it a wicked person or wickedness done by an individual or an organized group of people, say a government, when wickedness comes, contempt will surely follow very close behind.
Wickedness or to be wicked is to express evil and immorality. Wickedness is evident in a culture with an established moral code and laws governing the actions of those within the culture. It becomes more obscure when wickedness is acted out in a culture without these governing principles.
We must raise up a standard. We must resist wickedness in our lives. There is something you can do.
Contempt has a few definitions, including "the feeling that someone or something is beneath consideration" or "disregard for something that should be taken into account." Plainly stated, to show contempt is to ignore important things. Showing contempt is the action that allows bad things to happen, even when they could have been prevented. For example, showing contempt toward adopting false gods and ritualistic worship of idols led to the Jewish exile in Assyria and Babylon. With only the prophets speaking out against the idolatry and those same prophets ridiculed by the political and religious elites, Israel's culture degraded and eventually fell prey to conquering armies.
Solomon's proverb on wickedness and contempt helps us understand why citizens of a culture with growing wickedness ignore that wickedness, even to the point of their own ruin. The king's writing was intended to give warning of such an event. The people must take note of wickedness, battle it and overcome it so the eventual consequence of the wickedness does not come to pass.
In the last few years, reasonable people have said, "There is nothing I can do," while watching our culture go through wave upon wave of ever-increasing wickedness. These reasonable people may be right on a grand scale. However, there is something we can do when it comes to our families, homes, and even our communities. There is undoubtedly a standard to be raised. There is a place of influence we can secure from the wickedness our society tries to press upon us.
When we resist wickedness in our own lives, in our own homes and communities, we have a promise from God to hope in: "If My people, which are called by My name, will humble themselves, and pray, and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways; then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land." (2 Chronicles 7:14) Let us set the standard against wickedness, starting at home, and remove contemptible wickedness from our nation.