“The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is safe” (Proverbs 29:25, ESV).

Ben walked in on the basketball team by surprise, and found them smoking marijuana. With startling swiftness they surrounded him making their demand. He stretched out his hand and took the smoldering joint.

Ranged round him like a wolf pack were his teammates, every eye locked on to him. The pressure was more intense than a Vick’s Vapor rub, clogging his chest. He couldn’t refuse the marijuana because he had seen all the others inhaling the drug.

They wanted him – needed him — to be similarly compromised. The only way to ensure that he did not tell Coach was to have him inhale the pungent smoke.

There was a light in their eyes, shining with the fierceness of the predator. “Come on, take it Ben! Be one of the guys,” one said, but it sounded more like a threat than an invitation.

Peer pressure is not the sole preserve of the teenager, of course. Consider the preacher who compromises God’s message for the sake of popularity, or the businessman who deceives his clients because his competitors are “way ahead” of him.

So what’s the cure to peer pressure? Solomon tells us it’s the willingness to “trust in the Lord.” You will fear men a little less if you fear God a little more!

–by Stan Mitchell