Proverbs 24 - Do It Right

We're going to jump right into the passage for a couple of reasons.

One, that's what we do on these lives on this podcast. We go into God's word. Number two, it's very warm in here and I can't turn on any ACs.

Otherwise, there's going to be a bunch of audio interference. So, we're going to go quick today, but I know that this is going to be an encouragement to you this morning, even as it was to me. So, we're in Proverbs 24.

And we want to start off in verse number three. It says, Through wisdom is a house built, and by understanding, it is established. And by knowledge shall the chambers be filled with all precious and pleasant riches or beautiful riches.

The point of these verses is the fact that if you want to have a house that lasts, if you want to have a family with a legacy that matters, how you build it is through wisdom, through understanding, through knowledge.

And not just, okay, if you want to have a good house, you have to have a master's degree. That's not the kind of wisdom or knowledge that it's talking about.

Instead, as we've been talking all throughout the study in Proverbs, the kind of wisdom that God wants us to have is his wisdom, his wisdom on what we do with our finances, his wisdom on how we interact with people.

So if you want to have a good house, if you want to have a solid family, the way to do it is to build that family and that house in your life on the Word of God. It makes all the difference in the world. Verse number five and six.

A wise man is strong, yea, a man of knowledge increase its strength. For by wise counsel thou shalt make thy war, and in multitude of counselors, there is safety or victory.

Here you have just this kind of common theme that you can look at, that a wise man is strong and a man of knowledge increase its strength. So when you're smart, you're going to realize, okay, I have things that I need to grow in in my life.

Even a person here that is wise says, man, I need to be strong. I need to constantly be adding to my life. Why would that be?

Well, the simple answer is that none of us are perfect. If any one of us would go, hey, I look at myself in the mirror each morning and I go, wow, I'm really intelligent. I'm really strong.

I am literally perfect in every way. We would go, man, that person is just being narcissistic. They're not being realistic.

They don't realize what some of their own faults might be. But as we look in God's Word and we can go, man, there might be some areas in my life that I need to grow in. As we grow in those areas, it's a great thing.

And I think verse number six even kind of bolsters this thought of how would you know what areas you would need to work on in your life? Well, you would know by wise council. And it says in the multitude of counselors.

When you ask true friends, hey, what are some areas I could grow in? A true friend or maybe a spouse or a sibling will be the one that will say, well, Brian, you talk too much. You know, you've gotten slovenly.

You know, you're eating too much. You're being gluttonous. You need to fix some of these areas in your life.

I'm going to put this down a little bit. There's a bit of a glare. When you have counselors, when you have those people that can speak truth into your life, it helps you to know, OK, what are some areas of my life that I need to grow in?

We're going to skip down to verse number 13. My son, eat thou honey because it is good in the honeycomb, which is sweet to thy taste. So shall the knowledge of wisdom be unto thy soul when thou has found it.

Then there shall be a reward, and thy expectation shall not be cut off.

Man, there's some comfort in this verse, that just as sweet as honey is to a person that is hungry, or just as tasty as the honeycomb is, as sweets are, you know, maybe today we might say candy is, or, you know, we're in Moses Lake, we've got the

frozen yogurt place, blue palms, I believe it is, just as sweet as candy or a milkshake or frozen yogurt might be to us. That's what wisdom is to our soul.

When we read God's word and when we begin applying it to our lives, man, it makes life so much better than it would have been without the word of God. So the obvious admonition to us is be in the word of God every day.

Verse number 15 and 16, many of us would be familiar with verse 16, but it is connected to verse 15. If you're looking at your Bible, even though it's different verses, you can see at the end of verse number 15 that there's a colon there.

There's not a period. So it's a continued thought from verse number 15. Lay not weight, oh wicked man, against the dwelling of the righteous.

Spoil not his resting place. For a just man falleth seven times and riseth up again. But the wicked shall fall into mischief.

A lot of times, I've heard the said, you know, maybe if you fall down, you can get up again. A just man will fall seven times.

It's not if you fall down, if you stay down, which, you know, there could be thoughts of endurance and patience and, you know, long suffering and some of those things that you could read about elsewhere in scripture, but the specific direct context

of this verse would tell us that it's talking to the wicked and saying, hey, don't attack the righteous because God will cause them to come back again, that they will stand back up again. And so what you're trying to do in taking down these good

people, God will see and He will assist them. And man, for us, that's a comfort. The point of this verse is not, hey, pull yourself up by your own bootstraps seven times and don't give up.

The comfort of this verse is that God, the help of the righteous, will help us even in times of trouble when other people might come against us, when circumstances might come against us.

The point of this verse isn't how great the just man is, but in the fact that he has a great God who will help him. And I just, I found some comfort in that this morning going, oh man, it's not about me, it's about him.

Verse number 17, rejoice not when thine enemy falleth, and let not thine heart be glad when he stumbleth, lest the Lord see it and it displease him and he turn away his wrath from him.

Here you have something that's mentioned several times in the Minor Prophets, that God's not looking for his people to be those that would be really happy when others undergo hardship and specifically hear punishment from the Lord.

That when we see God's punishment on someone else, maybe on a country, maybe on a person, maybe on a state, when we see God's punishment happen, it isn't something that we rejoice and go, ha, told you so, you should have listened to me.

Instead, what God says here is rejoice not when thy enemy falleth, and don't even be glad in your heart when he stumbles.

Instead, have that recognize, I was gonna say reconnaissance, I'm not even sure if that's a word, have that reconnaissance that it could be you that except for the grace of God might be in that particular situation.

I think of the first couple of verses in Galatians 6. Here we go, brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, you which are spiritual, restore such in one in the spirit of meekness, considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted.

Man, any of us, except for the grace of God, could be in any situation. So when we see God's punishment come on people, it's not something that we are boastful or glad about.

Instead, we realize, man, God is holy, and there is a just punishment for sin. So I need to be relying on the Lord and not just going my own way. And that's very, very important for us.

Verse number 21 and 22 is a connected thought as well. My son, fear thou the Lord and the King, and meddle not with them that are given to change. For their calamity shall rise suddenly, and who knoweth the ruin of them both?

Here you have Solomon giving this advice, maybe not necessarily to his son who would be the future king, but really in just kind of general revelation for God's people of hey, fear thou the Lord and the King.

You can even read about that in 1 Peter 2 and in Romans 13 and in several other places that we are supposed to respect and honor those that God's put in authority over us, specifically on a governmental level.

And it says, and meddle not with them that are given to change. Now, I have occasionally heard the latter part of this verse, meddle not with them that are given to change. You know, maybe someone will say, oh, we are only to use horses and buggies.

And that's the only kind of transportation we should use because horses are in the Bible. And so these new fangled cars, I've really read sermons from the early 1900s that said stuff like this. But that's not what this verse is talking about.

You know, there can be a lot said about using, you know, maybe tried and true methods for things.

But specifically in this verse, meddle not with them that are given to change is specifically talking about, you know, the very previous words in the verse, fear thou the Lord and the king and meddle not with them that are given to change.

That those that would be rebels, that would fight against those that God has put in authority, man, that wisdom would say, don't do that because there is a punishment. There is a downside for this occurring.

It says calamity and ruin comes to those that are given to change. And so I don't think any of us are actively plotting to overthrow our local or federal governments. So hopefully none of us need that.

But if you're reading through that and you go, man, why does it say Meddle not with them that are given to change? Well, look at the sentence previous and there's a great truth for us there. I'm gonna end today.

There's tons of other great verses in here that we could go through, but I wanna go down specifically to verses 30 through 34.

Here you have this whole section where Solomon says, I went by the field of the slothful and by the vineyard of the man void of understanding. So the person that is lazy and that has no biblical intelligence.

And lo, or look, behold, it was all grown over with thorns, and nettles had covered the face of it, and the stone wall of it was broken down.

So here you have, he goes to this vineyard, this place where crops would be grown, and everything's broken down, there's weeds everywhere. Says, then I saw and I considered it well. I looked upon it and received instruction.

I looked at it and I went, oh. Verse number 33 says the instruction that he received.

Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep, so shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man, a person that is constantly in their life going, oh, I guess I'll just sleep a few more

minutes, I guess I'll just relax here a little longer, I won't go into work today, just these little decisions, little sleep, little slumber, little folding of the hands to sleep, all of these little choices resulted in this big problem in this

vineyard. And he says, so shall thy poverty come as one that traveleth. Maybe today we might even think of those that would be homeless and are traveling around trying to find maybe people that would assist them financially.

Maybe they're even looking for a job, but that would just be traveling, wandering. The older word for it maybe from back in the day would be a hobo.

I think instantly when I hear that word of people that might jump on a train to go out to California or something to try and pan for gold and things like that. But it says, your poverty will come like a hobo that you will have great need.

You will be poor. You'll have poverty because of little choices that add up to big circumstances. And here in this last part, and I want your need, your necessities.

You're gonna have, you're gonna be in need just like an armed man. And here when it says armed man, it's not necessarily talking about someone in the military.

It would be talking about someone that would be a robber and that would take advantage of people along the way of maybe roads or things like that.

You can think of the story of the good Samaritan, those that would lay in wait and ambush travelers and take all of their money. And so oftentimes those people would be those that didn't have other means of income that they were relying on.

So a person that can't grow crops, can't sell the crops, can't eat the crops because of this little sleep, little somber, little folding of the hands to sleep, then they have this great need.

And he says, hey, you're gonna be just as poor as a person that has to travel around to try and find money and to try and survive, or a person that has turned really to a life of crime in order to get money.

So application for us, I don't think many of us are on this end of thing. I think verse 34 of being one that travels or a hobo or an armed man or a robber. But man, we should be diligent in all the work that we do.

And when we do that, it is, it's wisdom, it's understanding, it's biblical work ethic when we would do something like that. Hope this morning would be an encouragement to you.

And I know there were just several little things as I was reading through this morning that I went, wow, I hadn't thought of that before, and I need that in my everyday life.

Looking forward to being with you all tomorrow, and I'm fairly certain Pastor Dennis will be back with us and then having our evening service tomorrow night. Do be in prayer for our junior campers as they're at camp that they would have a great time.

Thank you and have a great day.