Proverbs 1 - Wisdom Says Run

Well, welcome this morning to Strength for the Day.

And Pastor Fountain is not able to be here this morning, but he sends his warmest regards to the Strength for the Day family. And looking forward to being back with us soon.

This morning, really just going to kind of hop in in a second once we have a few people that come on. And just a briefer thing for today, but man, I love the Book of Proverbs.

Pastor mentioned it yesterday, just the encouragement that Proverbs has been to so many people of just so many principles, so many different things that we can apply to our lives every day.

And I think about some of the things that it mentions about finances and the help that it's been to so many people in that regard.

There's been so many different things about relationships and the relationship between parents and children, and the relationship between a husband and a wife, all of these different things that you're able to see from the Book of Proverbs.

And my dad for the past, ooh, how old is my dad?

At least for the past 25 years, my dad has been in the Book of Proverbs almost every day, and he has been so greatly helped in his Christian walk and in living for the Lord because of what he's read in this book.

And so I know as Pastor goes through it, as he mentioned, having people like Ms. Hannah on, I'm sure many, many others, there's just so many great perspectives and stuff that we can see in the book. And so look forward to doing that with you.

We've got about eight people on already at the moment. So we're just going to kind of hop in today and dive right into God's Word. So we're in Proverbs, chapter one and we're starting in verse number eight.

Yesterday we left off on verse number seven. Verse number eight says, My son, hear the instruction of thy father and forsake not the law of thy mother. For they shall be an ornament of grace unto thy head and chains about thy neck.

So right here it starts off saying, okay, the instruction that I'm giving you for later generations, the instructions that a parent would give to their child are something that they should follow, that they should do.

Now obviously we know at this time, these are not necessarily for Rehoboam as like a little kid, as we'll see here in just a second.

The command that Solomon gives to Rehoboam, the encouragement that he gives him is not something that you would tell a little kid. This is for an adult.

But really for all of us, maybe for us we don't have a spiritual heritage, father and mother that were saved or something along those lines.

But the same thing of hearing the instruction of the father, not leaving the law of a mother could also be said for spiritual advisors, spiritual parents, if you will. People like Pastor Fountain.

People like, I think of so many in our church with Fountain Sr. who has been such a great spiritual encouragement in their lives.

Proverbs says this, that when you listen to the words, the instructions, the encouragements that these people give and speak into your life, it will be like an ornament of grace unto thy head.

It's kind of like a crown that you're able to wear that people see, man, this person really kind of knows what they're doing in life. And we know it's not because of any inherent smartness or intelligence that we have.

It's because we're listening to people who have listened to God's work. Says that it's like a crown on our head. It's like chains about our neck.

It's like a beautiful necklace that adorns a person. They go, man, that looks really good on that person.

When you follow spiritual advice from godly people, it really does make your life shine to those around you, just like a crown would or like a necklace would. But we come here, really, verses 10 through 19 are the rest of kind of this section.

Now, what Solomon tells Raabohm here is, do not be like the people that go and try and take advantage of others.

Specifically in this time, don't be like those that would go, that would rob houses, that would kill the house owner, and then would just bolt. And no one would have any idea, they didn't have forensic evidence or anything like that back in this day.

And so it was very, it was much easier than it currently is to get away with some of these heinous crimes.

And so he tells him, hey, you know, there's these ways that people are seeking thrills, there's these ways that people are trying to amass wealth, and don't be like these people.

He tells him in verse number 10, my son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not.

He talks about the people saying, hey, you know, come with us, we're going to, you know, it says lurk privily, we're going to hide in secret for the innocent without cause, we're gonna swallow them up alive as the grave, we shall find all precious

substance, we're gonna fill our houses with riches, with spoil, you know, cast in thy lot among us, let us all have one purse or one money thing, like, hey, let's all go in this together. It's a heist, but a terrible, terrible heist.

And he encourages him, my son, walk not thou in the way with them, refrain thy foot from their path. He says, don't go the way that these people are going.

He says, for their feet run to evil and make haste to shed blood, they're doing all of these things in violence and in wrongdoing. He says, surely in vain, the net is spread in the sight of any bird.

He says, if a bird sees you laying out a trap, the bird's not gonna go into the trap. But he says, they lay wait for their own blood. They lurk privately or secretly for their own lives.

So are the ways of everyone that is greedy of gain, which taketh away the life of the owners thereof.

And what he says here is, man, these people don't realize that they are harming themselves, that they are destroying their own lives and their own souls when they go to do these things.

So I think the title that I have on the live for today is Wisdom Says Run. Just like we see in the life of Joseph when Potiphar's wife came after him that he said, no, I'm not going to have anything to do with this. And he ran, he ran away from it.

I think of we're just in the Book of James where it says, resist the devil and he will flee from you. I think of the verse that says, flee also youthful lusts. The Bible over and over again says, hey, don't try and wrestle with sin.

Don't try and go, okay, man, I can just by my self will, I can choose not to say this thing to this person. By my own self will, I can choose to ignore this temptation. No, the Bible says, hey, get out of there.

We still live with, the Bible calls it our old man, our old sinful fleshly nature living in us, and it wants to do wrong.

And so the Bible way to counteract it is to call out to God and to run, to get out of the situations in which we would be tempted to do what's wrong. It's not something that we just go, Oh man, I'm strong enough. I can defeat this temptation.

I can defeat the sin. I can defeat this desire to say these words to this person. I might know run from it.

And that doesn't mean you literally run physically from every situation in which you're tempted to sin.

But sometimes running can look something like if you're tempted to be unkind to a person, that you would run from that temptation and intentionally say something kind about a person, that you would intentionally do something loving for a person, that

you say, man, they're just really grating on me, and I want to be angry and bitter, and I want to be hurtful, that you would run from that and you would do something kind instead. For other situations, it might be literally that you go, okay, man,

I'm not strong enough in this situation, maybe like Joseph with Potiphar's wife, I might say, man, I don't want to try and battle out this whole situation by myself, so I'm going to run and I'm going to literally remove myself from the situation so

that I'm not in that same place of temptation. Just as this mentions here, when we give into our temptations, when we give into our sins, we are literally laying a trap for our own souls. Because the fact of the matter is that sin is poisonous.

It's poisonous to our souls. It destroys us from the inside. It's why God's against it.

It goes against his design. That when we have bitterness in our life, there's been studies done of literally the body decay that happens when we harbor bitterness and hatred in our lives.

When it comes to, you know, maybe immorality and stuff like that, the Bible says that when we partake in immorality, we literally sin against our own selves. We're destroying ourself.

And I'm I know as you read through Proverbs, you can see that mention again and again and again. And all of these things, the the simplest layout is wisdom says run. Don't try and say, Oh, I can reason with sin.

I can overcome sin on my own. No run from it. Maybe that means physically removing yourself from a situation in which there is temptation.

Maybe it means that you do something intentionally. That's the opposite of what your flesh wants to do.

And I was talking about it yesterday with some of the guys, but something incredible that we can do as children of God and really as humans in general is we can choose not to act in accordance with our emotions where maybe our emotions, maybe our sin

nature would want us to do something. But because of the freedom that we have in Christ, we can choose to say, no, I'm not going to do that.

Even though I may not want to do this thing with my emotions, I'm going to choose with my will to follow God, to love, to be pure, to be holy.

I'm going to choose God instead of choosing whatever this other thing is, that we don't have to be ruled by our emotions. I love the line in the song that we sing at our church often, when Christ be magnified. He says, I won't bow to idols.

I'll stand strong for what is true. If it puts me in the fire, I'll rejoice because you're there too. I won't be formed by feelings.

I'll hold fast to what is true. And if the cross brings transformation, then I'll be crucified with you. I love just those lines that we don't have to go by what our old nature would have us do.

We don't have to go by what our feelings would have us do. Instead, we can say with wisdom, hey, I'm gonna choose to not do what my flesh would want me to do and what I would naturally want to do.

So hope that would be an encouragement for you today and that you would let God work maybe in your heart and in your life. I know for myself, there are so many things even just from this little portion.

I don't really struggle with armed robbery as Solomon warns Rehoboam about here. I don't struggle with that. I don't think you do either.

But there are sins in my life that man, wisdom says I need to run. And hope that would be an encouragement for you today. Hopefully pastors should be back tomorrow at 930.

And what is today? Today is Wednesday. So we'll see pastor tomorrow hopefully at 930.

And then tomorrow night, we have our small groups continuing here at MOVC. If you haven't been a part of one of those yet, please come. We've got ones on marriage and ones on Bible study.

And the ones on Bible study with Pastor Michael Bosworth are most of the ones that I've been through since I run the live stream. Have been a huge blessing. And I've heard great things about the marriage sessions with pastor and Ms.

Hannah. And I know that it would be an encouragement to you if you're able to be there. Thank you so much for tuning in to Strength of the Day and see you tomorrow.