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Every Day Bible

Don’t Make It Worse!

Government officials in Delhi, India, were concerned about the deadly Cobras in the area, so they came up with a simple solution: they put a bounty on them. Citizens could turn in dead snakes for money.

Initially, that’s exactly what happened, but before long, some people saw an opportunity. They began to breed cobras to turn in for the bounty! The government was frustrated by this turn of events, so they cancelled the program.

Now that the program was over, cobra breeders were out of business. What did they do? They released their inventory into the wild. By the time the program was over, there were more Cobras than ever!

What’s the moral of the story? There’s no problem that government can’t make worse? Maybe!

Many times when I try to solve a problem, I make it worse.

Do you remember Abram and Sarai? They had a problem. God had promised them children, but they didn’t have any. So they decided to solve the problem themselves. Abram had a child by Sarai’s servant, Hagar. Not only did this not solve the problem—God had told Abram and Sarai that they together would have a son—but it made it worse. Now there is a woman scorned, a boy raised in a broken home, and ultimately a new conflict that lasts throughout the duration of history.

David’s sin with Bathsheba was bad enough, but it got even worse when he tried to solve it at the expense of Uriah’s life.

Here’s some simple advice: when you mess up, do whatever you can not to make things worse!