Several times in your Bible, you find the phrase, “Depart from evil”. In the context of four of these references, you can see the reason why we should depart from evil.
Understanding – Job 28:28. To depart from evil is understanding. This verse has a two-pronged application.
First, when you understand your foolishness, Prov 15:21, you’ll turn away from it. I look back now on my days of folly in shock that I could not understand how foolish I was.
Second, if you don’t turn away from your evil, you will never understand the wisdom of God, Rom 1:17-22. You’ll be a fool and eventually you will have a reprobate mind, Rom 1:28. People who don’t have understanding often wrest the scriptures to their own destruction, 2 Pet 3:16.
Good Health – Prov 3:7-8. To depart from evil is health to thy navel, and marrow to thy bones. Not all, but many diseases are related to sin.
When Jesus healed the man with the palsy, Mk 2:12, he first dealt with his sins. He said, “Son, thy sins be forgiven thee”. The woman with the bleeding condition, Mk 5:25-34, couldn’t be healed by physicians. Her health problem was not medical; it was spiritual.
When Asa was diseased in his feet, 2 Chr 16:12, he turned to the physicians instead of the Lord. His health problem was the results of his evil. It was a spiritual condition not a medical condition.
The Lord promised Israel that he would put none of the diseases of Egypt upon them if they would hearken to and keep his commandments, Ex 15:26; Deut 7:15. Their good health was dependent upon their spiritual condition.
Favor with God – Ps 34:12-16. Your favor with God and the length of your days are dependent upon you departing from evil.
If you want to see good and have the eyes of the Lord upon you and his ears open to your prayers, you must depart from evil. Otherwise, the face of the Lord will be against you.
Right now, the Holy Spirit is dealing with you about something evil in you from which he wants you to depart. Get away from it today. And stay away from it.
Eternal life – Ps 37:27-28. These verses about dwelling for evermore, and the Lord preserving his saints for ever, sound much like the eternal life we have in Jesus Christ.
If you haven’t received Jesus Christ because there is something evil in your life that is holding you back, depart from it and come to Christ. There is nothing that you might have to give up that is worth an eternity in hell.