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Post by Deleted on Sept 18, 2019 6:50:46 GMT -6
“Through desire a man, having separated himself, seeketh and intermeddleth with all wisdom” (Proverbs 18:1 KJV).
“Through desire,” what a man wants.
“. . . having separated himself,” but this isn’t a “godly” separation like a Christian would separate himself from the world and separates himself for God’s use—that is sanctification. This is something else. Well, you take people that want to be successful and make a lot of money, for a time they have to get an education, so they separate themselves from, in essence, from mainstream society, in order to get an education. Some even have to go across the sea to get the education they want—to fulfill their desires. A lot of this has to do with religious things, notice he says:
“. . . seeketh and intermeddleth with all wisdom.” Well, all wisdom is God, and the wisdom that God has given. Christ is said to be “our wisdom” in 1 Corinthians 1:30-31. And he begins to “intermeddle,” that is “to interfere,” “to meddle in the affairs of others” or “to treat something improperly.” Here you got this business of the monk, or the monastery-type thing, where men separate themselves from society to be religious and they are seeking some personal justification—that is the “desire.” What do they desire? These kind of people separate themselves in their manner of dress, in their pious actions, and they have all this religious garb. But, what do they desire? They “love the uppermost rooms at feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues, And greetings in the markets, and to be called of men, Rabbi, Rabbi” (Mat 23:6-7 KJV).
“But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in [They intermeddle with all wisdom, they mess it up for themselves and everybody else—the wisdom of salvation]. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows' houses [Now we see what they want, they want—they are looking for a religious buck], and for a pretence make long prayer: therefore ye shall receive the greater damnation” (Matthew 23:13-14 KJV).
We understand now why some of these men separate themselves in their prayer closets and their prayer towers for hours. There is a dollar behind it.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 19, 2019 7:17:10 GMT -6
“A false witness shall not be unpunished, and he that speaketh lies shall not escape” (Proverbs 19:5).
Verse six and seven go with verse 4, so I’m not sure why Solomon stuck verse 5 in here as it just seems out of place. The first part of verse 4 is spoken about in verse 6, and the last part of verse 4 (about the poor man) is spoken of in verse 7. And then in between them is this business on the false witness.
This deals with judgment cases, or court cases, where a person gives false testimony wrongly: “And set up false witnesses, which said, This man ceaseth not to speak blasphemous words against this holy place, and the law: For we have heard him say, that this Jesus of Nazareth shall destroy this place, and shall change the customs which Moses delivered us” (Acts 6:13-14). Scripture does not inform us what the end was for those that lied against Stephen, but we can bet that they did not go unpunished by God.
“. . . and he that speaketh lies shall not escape,” this was already established under the Law: “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour” (Exodus 20:16). What is amazing is how many people will tell you, “Well, I’ve never killed anybody, and I’ve never stolen anything,” as they talk about how they have kept the ten commandments but they never really get around to talking about how they have never lied. John said that “all liars shall have their part in the lake of fire” (Revelation 21:8). A man can keep nine of the ten faithfully all their life, but James said: “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all” (James 2:10).
The Law of Moses is completely incapable of saving any one’s soul. It has to be kept one hundred percent or not at all. The payoff for lying is just as bad as murder.
There are certainly some false witnesses in the area of religion. We usually think of Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons, but any group that tries to substitute church membership, or good works, or their baptism for the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ are lying witnesses as well. They “shall not be unpunished.” Paul said: “I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel: Which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed. For do I now persuade men, or God? or do I seek to please men? for if I yet pleased men, I should not be the servant of Christ” (Galatians 1:6-10).
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Post by Deleted on Sept 20, 2019 8:00:46 GMT -6
“A king that sitteth in the throne of judgment scattereth away all evil with his eyes” (Proverbs 20:8).
Like the Great White Throne Judgment of Revelation 20:11-15, or the Battle of Armageddon, or Gog and Magog, God doesn’t have to call out an army to scatter away all evil, all He has to do is look upon them and there are all wiped out in an instant. One angel, of course, did this with 185,000 of Sennacherib’s fighting men as they encamped against Israel.
Likely, what is being referred to here is the destruction of the heaven and the earth: “And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away” (Revelation 20:11). The present heavens and the earth are evil—they’ve been tainted by sin, in the sense that they are unclean. Job says, “Behold, he putteth no trust in his saints; yea, the heavens are not clean in his sight” (Job 15:15).
The heavens are unclean, even the galaxies are the abode of unclean spirits. Satan has had access to them in the past, and he will have access to them during the Tribulation. God is going to destroy all of that and start all over again. That destruction is also found in Second Peter: “But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up. Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness, Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness” (II Peter 3:10-13).
“A king that sitteth in the throne of judgment scattereth away all evil with his eyes.” When you study that passage in Revelation 20, we need to understand that that resurrection of the unsaved dead is different from that of the saints of God, both New and Old Testament. The Christian’s comes at the rapture of the Church when the Lord blows the trumpet. If we are dead, our bodies will come up out of the ground. This is not so with the unsaved dead. God reveals His glory as the heaven and the earth flees away from His sight, and the dead are left standing there on nothing. Millions and millions of disembodies spirits standing out in space by the power of Almighty God.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 22, 2019 7:25:34 GMT -6
“That thy trust may be in the LORD, I have made known to thee this day, even to thee” (Proverbs 22:19).
“That thy trust may be in the LORD,” because they are the Lord’s wisdom, they are the Lord’s words.
Now, here is a real interesting thing. If you don’t have the words of the Lord, how can you trust fully in the Lord? This passage says to bow down your ears, hear the words of the wise, keep them within you, that your trust may be in the Lord. Well, if you don’t have the words of the Lord, you just have someone’s opinion on the matter. If we do not have a Bible that men have faithfully translated, no man can truthfully and honestly say that they trust in the Lord one hundred percent.
God has had to provide us, and there again, it was God that did it (in verse 22:12 it is the eyes of the Lord that preserve knowledge), He did it that man could trust in Him. Paul said: “And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power” (I Corinthians 2:4-5). What Paul preached were the words of God’s wisdom. Why? “That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God” (I Corinthians 2:4-5).
If a man isn’t preaching the words of God’s wisdom, people have no basis to trust in God. They will be lacking in any kind of real faith. What we see in American Christianity today is a faithless, powerless bunch of people. And it is because they really don’t have the words of God’s wisdom. They are taught that the Bible for the most part is a “good” translation, but not the best, and as a result their faith is shattered.
When Christians have nothing but a faithless Christianity, they reach out to other things such as psychiatry, psychology, education, and philosophy for truths—since it has been destroyed here—so what we see in America is a striving for a so-called “Christian education.” These are purely the result of people that cannot find faith in their Bible. So, they are looking for it somewhere else.
“. . . I have made known to thee this day, even to thee,” we can rest assured that God has made known His Word to us, he has purified it, and He has preserved it.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 23, 2019 7:25:55 GMT -6
“Speak not in the ears of a fool: for he will despise the wisdom of thy words” (Proverbs 23:9).
Jesus’ commentary on this verse is most striking, and goes directly to the heart of the matter: “Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you” (Matthew 7:6).
“Dogs” in the Bible usually refer to unsaved people. What is the only thing that you can give to an unsaved person? The Gospel. Of course, we are speaking of spiritual things here. If a man is hungry, feed him, and pray that that will make him receptive to hear the Gospel, but the only thing of any real importance that one can give to the unsaved is the old, old story of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The plain fact of sin and salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ. Heaven, hell, and judgment.
Don’t try to explain to them the rapture, the beast, the left eye, the Antichrist, or any of those things. He won’t have any idea what you are talking about. You are talking into the ear of a fool when you are speaking to an unsaved person, they know nothing of the things of the Spirit of God. You are wasting your breath and squandering valuable time which needs to be spent on the Gospel. Get him saved, and somewhere down the road those subjects will be desirable to the new Christian, but not now.
“Speak not in the ears of a fool: for he will despise the wisdom of thy words,” he won’t understand it. The Lord Jesus Christ practiced this truth: “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now” (John 16:12). He realized that there were some things that His disciples could not understand. Now, later on, after the Resurrection, and after He had breathed on them and they had received the Holy Ghost in Acts 1; then he told them those things. “Until the day in which he was taken up, after that he through the Holy Ghost had given commandments unto the apostles whom he had chosen” (Acts 1:2).
Jesus could not tell them things in John 16, but after John 20 He was able to because then they could understand them. And so is it true with unsaved people and carnal Christians. Can fleshly, worldly believers understand spiritual truths? Paul answered this: “And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ” (I Corinthians 3:1).
You can’t talk to a carnal Christian about the pure Word of God in the King James Version, and biblical separation; they look at you like an alien from another planed—they just don’t get it. The best thing you can do for them is be a friend to them and get them into a Bible-believing church. It is not some nice dialogue that will reach them, but good old hard-nosed preaching. It is not counseling and debating but preaching. Let God take care of them, put them under conviction, they get right with God and the light of understanding will shine on them.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 24, 2019 8:06:41 GMT -6
“My son, eat thou honey, because it is good; and the honeycomb, which is sweet to thy taste: So shall the knowledge of wisdom be unto thy soul: when thou hast found it, then there shall be a reward, and thy expectation shall not be cut off” (Proverbs 24:13-14).
God’s judgments are sweeter than honey to the believer: “The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb” (Psalms 19:9-10). The Word of God is likened to honey.
“My son, eat thou honey, because it is good,” is an illustration of the best kind of honey. The best honey is that which is produced in your own neighborhood, because the bees reflect the environment, and your vicinity is the best for you.
Spiritually, the best honey you’ll ever find is what you get from reading your own Bible. You mark it up just the way you want and is best for you. You can get good honey from great preachers like Dr. Ruckman, or from the illustrations of Walter B. Knight, but the best honey is what you glean from your own personal Bible study.
“. . . and the honeycomb, which is sweet to thy taste,” I believe some people could eat their weight in honey if it were available in abundance. There’s nothing like honey on an English muffin.
So, we have the illustration in verse 13, and then we get the application in verse 14, where it is likened to wisdom and knowledge.
“So shall the knowledge of wisdom be unto thy soul: when thou hast found it, then there shall be a reward, and thy expectation shall not be cut off,” the Word of God promises you hopes and expectations and they will not be cut off when you get in there when you get in there and eat them up.
Someone might say, “My family is not saved.” Well, claim it! Claim Acts 16:31: “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.” Then thy expectation will not be cut off. Some might say, “Well, that’s not for this dispensation.” You’d be surprised how many times God steps over dispensational lines to accomplish His purpose, and to honor the prayer and faith of a saint.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 25, 2019 8:36:47 GMT -6
“Go not forth hastily to strive, lest thou know not what to do in the end thereof, when thy neighbour hath put thee to shame. Debate thy cause with thy neighbour himself; and discover not a secret to another” (Proverbs 25:8-9).
“Go not forth hastily,” don't be in a big hurry “to strive.” This verse deals with handling people problems. I mean, you’ve got problems with people. And we will, as long as we're around people, and long as we are the way that we are, we are going to have problems with people. That's the way you handle it -- cautiously.
“Go not forth hastily to strive, lest thou know not what to do in the end thereof, when thy neighbour hath put thee to shame.” In other words, get the story from the horse’s mouth before you go accusing somebody, or you go out for revenge against somebody that you think has done something that somebody else has told you about. Now, the way you are to take care of this is found in verse 9.
“Debate thy cause with thy neighbor himself; and discover not a secret to another.” If there is a problem between you and your neighbor, it is between you and him. Go to him: “Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother” (Matthew 18:15). Especially your friend and your brother in Christ. You are to go to him and not anyone else. Now, if he will not receive you, or if he will not listen to you then take it before the church; but your first obligation is to go to him.
You are not to go out and just say, “Hey man what did you do? And start trouble. You go to him and ask, “Did you do this? I've heard, or somebody said, or I have been told such and such, and I'm trying to get the truth.” Go to the person and find out, lest “in the end thereof, thy neighbour put thee to shame.”
In other words, when he tells you the truth that he didn't have anything to do with it, or it isn't like you were told; and you are all out of sorts about it—then you will be the one that is brought to shame.
That's just how to handle the problems of life. Before we go accusing somebody or judging somebody or condemning somebody, get the story straight from the horse’s mouth. Go to it, “debate thy cause.”
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Post by Deleted on Sept 26, 2019 7:11:44 GMT -6
“The slothful man saith, There is a lion in the way; a lion is in the streets. As the door turneth upon his hinges, so doth the slothful upon his bed. The slothful hideth his hand in his bosom; it grieveth him to bring it again to his mouth. The sluggard is wiser in his own conceit than seven men that can render a reason” (Proverbs 26:13-16).
Now we come to a series of verses about the sluggard, the slothful man.
These are the excuses of the slothful man.
- It's too hard. - I can't. - There’s no way. (There’s a lion in the streets). Just anything to get out of responsibility and get out of work.
You know, a lot of Christians won't witness because of the devil. The devil is like a lion (I Peter 5:8) and they're afraid of the devil. The say, “I can't do it.” The devil has them cornered; they use him for an excuse.
Notice how the lazy man is a coward. He said, “There's a lion in the way.” Well, that won't stop a man that's really got determination and got a need, and if somebody else has a need, he will go. He will take the message.
“As the door turneth upon his hinges, so doth the slothful upon his bed.”
That is descriptive. Do you know why he tosses and turns like this? Number one, he doesn't do any work, so he doesn't sleep well. A man does a lot of good hard labor and he hits that sack, and he won’t hardly move. Seven hours and he is just flat out gone, and he’ll wake up like he went to sleep and be refreshed. But there is very little work in his life, he’ll have trouble sleeping. He'll be tossing and turning all night. And then he just stays in bed longer than he should. He is just like a door on hinges.
“The slothful hideth his hand in his bosom; it grieveth him to bring it again to his mouth.”
Something similar is found here: “A slothful man hideth his hand in his bosom, and will not so much as bring it to his mouth again” (Proverbs 19:24).
“The sluggard is wiser in his own conceit than seven men that can render a reason.”
“The sluggard is wiser in his own conceit,” he just thinks he's so smart. He’s got the whole thing figured out. He's wiser in his own conceit “than seven men that can render a reason.” In other words, no amount of truth will straighten this fellow out. You can send him seven men that can render a good reason why he shouldn’t be doing what he’s doing, but he’s wiser than these men in his own conceit. He is so self-sure, so self-righteous. Lazy people justify their laziness. “Oh, I’ve got this problem, and I’ve got that problem. And I was dealt a dirty deal, and I have a bad back . . . and on ad nauseum. You could say, “I know ten people that have bad backs and they are working just fine.” Of course, he’ll answer, “Well, they are not like me. I must have a dislocated fibia, tibia, or bibia, or something like that.”
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Post by Deleted on Sept 27, 2019 5:59:20 GMT -6
“Take his garment that is surety for a stranger, and take a pledge of him for a strange woman” (Proverbs 27:13).
Solomon also addressed this in 6:1-4 and 11:15. Other passages on it are 20:16, 22:26-27. That 11:15, that’s five times this thing about surety, or being surety for somebody. You know, backing somebody up, and cosigning notes for somebody. But, notice what he says here. This is the last time it's mentioned in the book. It really gives you the key to it. “Take his garment that is surety for a stranger,” in other words, if another guy that owes you money has stood good for somebody else's debts, before you stand good for his you better get collateral. Because the Bible implies that that guy is a fool, and that that stranger is not going to pay, and the fellow that owes you money is not going to pay you; you better get collateral before you loan him anything.
“Take his garment,” see, there's your collateral for you. I mean, if he's been surety for a stranger he's about to get ripped off. I told you the reason they want collateral for a loan is that the bankers really don't feel that that guy can pay, and when they want a cosigner, what they are saying is we don’t think he can't pay, and we need somebody who will. Ask any banker, to be honest about it, that's what a cosigner is for. If you cosign, you are a surety for a stranger. That’s really all you can say about it.
I'd just be careful about loaning money. Even to a best Christian friend, just be careful about loaning money. You want to make enemies fast? Loan Christians money. Just do the best you can. Just tell him you haven’t got it to loan, that you don't want to lose him as a friend. Do you know what you are better to do? Just give it to him, free and clear, give it to God and walk away from it. That's the best thing to do.
Perhaps that is why this verse was written: “He that hath pity upon the poor lendeth unto the LORD; and that which he hath given will he pay him again” (Proverbs 19:17).
You'll be the last guy on the face of the earth that they'll pay off. I mean, you're their friend. Just give it to him. Don't let the devil sit on your shoulder.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 28, 2019 7:47:55 GMT -6
“The wicked flee when no man pursueth: but the righteous are bold as a lion” (Proverbs 28:1 KJV).
Do you want to know why some people don’t witness? Right there is the whole problem. Their life really isn’t right with God, “the righteous are bold as a lion,” the more in fellowship a man gets with God, the bolder and the braver he gets, and the more assurance he has, the less fear he has.
What about the wicked? They “flee when no man pursueth.” We say, “That guy is afraid of his shadow.” There are some examples in the Bible of people that fled though no man was after them. Just scared of nothing, because of their sin.
1. Joseph’s brethren (Genesis 50:15).
2. The Assyrians (2 Kings 7:6-7). God scared them to death from the noise in the trees. They said, “Uh oh, the Jews have hired somebody to fight against them. They were not pursued, yet they fled. They were so wicked. And when that thing happened, their guilty conscience convicted them of that wickedness—and they imagined God’s judgment—which they deserved.
3. The Jews in dispersion will do this. God basically told them that when He sends them out of the land, they will be scared to death at anything (Leviticus 26:36). Even after World War II was over, in Europe, if someone knocked on the door of a Jew at night—they would be terrified. Because of their rebellion against God, He told them that they would stay scared. There was the time of the Inquisition, as retold in Larkin’s book, The History of the Jew, from the late 19th century and since. He has no God, he has no hope, he has no protection, he has no comfort.
4. The lost hide from the presence of God, as did Adam and Even in the garden as they attempted to hide their nakedness through the use of fig leaves, a picture of human effort to cover sin. The lost are separated from a holy God through their sins.
Paul put it even more plainly in Ephesians:
“Wherefore remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ" (Ephesians 2:11-13).
“. . . but the righteous are bold as a lion,” like Jesus. In Revelation, we read that He is the Lion of the tribe of Judah (Rev 5:5). They said about the disciples that they were bold, because they had been with Jesus (Ac 4:13). The thing we need to see here is that wickedness produces cowardness, and righteousness produces bravery. The one thing that limits Christians from witnessing is sin in their life.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 29, 2019 8:17:30 GMT -6
“In the transgression of an evil man there is a snare: but the righteous doth sing and rejoice” (Proverbs 29:6).
“In the transgression of an evil man,” now this is a spiritual law. “In the transgression of an evil man,” when an evil man commits a transgression; there is a snare. There is something that grabs a hold of him.
“. . . but the righteous doth sing and rejoice,” why? They have liberty. There is no snare in doing right. There is no trap in doing right, no hook in doing right. There is rejoicing in doing right.
Now, the snare of sin is thrills and pleasures for a season. Then it is a habit. Then total bondage. Then inevitable reaping. Other verses that show this are:
“His own iniquities shall take the wicked himself, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sins” (Proverbs 5:22).
“The righteousness of the perfect shall direct his way: but the wicked shall fall by his own wickedness. The righteousness of the upright shall deliver them: but transgressors shall be taken in their own naughtiness” (Proverbs 11:5-6).
Other passages of note are Job 18:5-14 and I Timothy 6:9. There are snares, traps to those that would be rich; usually by illegal means. Riches will just get you nothing but trouble.
“Yea, the light of the wicked shall be put out, and the spark of his fire shall not shine. The light shall be dark in his tabernacle, and his candle shall be put out with him. The steps of his strength shall be straitened, and his own counsel shall cast him down. For he is cast into a net by his own feet, and he walketh upon a snare. The gin shall take him by the heel, and the robber shall prevail against him. The snare is laid for him in the ground, and a trap for him in the way. Terrors shall make him afraid on every side, and shall drive him to his feet. His strength shall be hungerbitten, and destruction shall be ready at his side. It shall devour the strength of his skin: even the firstborn of death shall devour his strength. His confidence shall be rooted out of his tabernacle, and it shall bring him to the king of terrors" (Job 18:5-14).
“But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition" (1 Timothy 6:9).
“In the transgression of an evil man there is a snare,” now, they never see that. Well, you don't show the fish the hook. Isn’t one of the tricks to fishing is to hide that hook from the fish? I mean fish are dumb, but they ain't that dumb. Go back to chapter one, where one of those great verses in Proverbs is found in verse 17, “Surely in vain the net is spread in the sight of any bird.”
Now, there's that net from flattery. If that bird knows what flattery does, you are spreading the net in vain. He's not going to take it.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 30, 2019 6:22:11 GMT -6
“Surely I am more brutish than any man, and have not the understanding of a man. I neither learned wisdom, nor have the knowledge of the holy” (Proverbs 30:2-3 KJV).
Now, you will find in First Corinthians chapter 2 that the natural man does not understand supernatural things, and Agur says that he is even one step below that. The natural man does understand natural phenomenon, and natural principles to some extent, but Agur he says, “I am more brutish than any man.” A brute is like an animal, and you will find references on the root in Romans 1:31, Second Peter 2:12 and Jude 10 and some other places; and this is true of the last days.
Notice in First Corinthians 2:14 that “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
You must be Spiritually alive to understand Spiritual truths. That's why I wonder about some people that profess to be Christians. You can teach them spiritual truths, yet it just seems like it goes right over the top of their head and they don't catch it and received it at all. I really have a hard time believing that some folks are really saved. I mean, they say they are, but yet when they are reproved, and when they are exhorted; there's no response from them. It is as if they didn't receive it. It is as if it just kind of bounced off of a wall. Well, it says the natural man doesn't receive it, now verse 15 says, “But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.”
Now back up in verse 7, Paul says, “But we speak the wisdom of God,” these are the things that God teaches, teachers these are the wise things of God like Salvation, sanctification, the Saviour and sin and all those things that God reveals in the Bible. “But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory,” and he goes on to say in verse 10, “But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.”
This is important, because in 30:3 Agur writes: “I neither learned wisdom, nor have the knowledge of the holy.”
You don't learn spiritual principles. Let me say that right now, you don't study the Bible like you study math or business or science or computers. The Bible is revealed. It's not learned, it's revealed. Now, if you'll set yourself down in a learning situation, like a Bible college you can learn some things, historical facts and other things. But the spiritual meat of the Word, you’ll only receive through the Holy Spirit’s teaching.
You don't learn it. Bible truth is a supernatural revelation. You understand it because of the spirit that is within you; not because you have a brain. You receive it because you have a Spirit, the Spirit of God, and the Spirit of God shows you that, and He witnesses to it, and reveals it to you. So, he said, “I neither learned wisdom.”
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Post by Deleted on Oct 1, 2019 6:06:05 GMT -6
“My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not” (Proverbs 1:10).
“My son,” notice and consider that verses 1 through 6 are introductory to what the purpose of proverbs is; then, it tells you that the fear of the Lord the is beginning knowledge in verse 7. He is saying, “Make sure you listen, and make sure you hear because if you do, they will be an ornament to you.”
Verse 10 is the first bit of genuine advice the father gives to his son. In a book of wisdom, the first thing that the father says that is instructive to his son is at verse 10. We've gained other instruction reading before, but this is the first piece of clear instruction, and that instruction is, “My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not.” The first real genuine open advice stated as such in the Book of Proverbs is, “You better be careful about who you consent to.”
It seems like everybody in this world is looking for your consent nowadays. People call you up on the phone and they're going to sell you something and they already have so much of your personal information already, that all they want you to say is, “Yes, I will take it,” and it's a done deal. I hate it when they do that. They pretty much say to you, “Now, Sir you know we see that you've done this that and the other and we're going to send you totally free, and all we need is for you to . . ..”
“Stop it right there! You aren't sending me anything ‘totally free’ that I have to return within 10 days if I don't like it or else, I get charged for it and enrolled in some sort of program.’” This is illustrating in effect that it is so easy just to consent to something.
The Bible says of Saul, that’s the guy that became Paul, that he was consenting unto the death of Steven. He didn’t do anything to Steven. All he did was stand there and they threw their coats and their overcoats and stuff at his feet and he guarded them. He never threw a rock, but he was consenting unto Steven’s death. He was all for what they were doing.
“If any man teach otherwise, and consent not to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which is according to godliness” (1 Timothy 6:3).
We are asked to not consent to the world, and what the Lord is asking is for us to consent to the Bible. On one hand, we are not to go along with the world, and on the other hand all you have to do is go along with the Bible. All you have to do to consent is to go along. Say yes. That's it! Say that’s right! Yell Amen once in a while. Consent to the things of God, but “if sinners entice thee, consent thou not.”
This is really the wisdom of God through Solomon, for we'd have to argue that Solomon’s wisdom was corrupted by the time we get to Ecclesiastes because his meddling with false gods and strange women and so on and so forth. It’s too bad that Solomon didn’t heed the advice of verses 7-9 where it tells us that we had better fear the Lord and to heed the instruction of your father and your mother; and that's our earthly as well as heavenly Father, of course. These are the right things to do.
So, as far as admonitions are concerned, we had better watch who we consent to. We had better watch who we walk with and who our friends are. Now, there's a trick in there, and the trick with this is that it is easy at times to blame our friends as being the problem, but our friends are not the primary problem. You are the primary problem and friends are just an ill-effect sometimes, if they are bad friends.
“Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man” (James 1:13)
James doesn't say that the Lord won’t try you, the context is “tempted with evil.” It's not going to be God that sends a floozy your way. That's not what it is talking about. Now, he will try you in other manners, but as far as God enticing you with sin; that's not what he's going to do. Verse 14 is the key, “. . . but every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.”
Now, this word, “enticed” is the word that we were just looking at in verse 10 of Proverbs 1, “My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not.” See, it's not just that that the sinners are so enticing that you just can't resist them, the problem is that you have a corrupt nature and those sinners appeal to your carnal nature. That's the problem. That's why you have to be careful in picking your friends because what more people do then not is, they pick friends with basically the same weaknesses that they have, and they fall off into sin together. We need to strive to make friends with somebody better than us, and if he’s not altogether better than you, then maybe you'll be better than him in one way and he's better than you in another. We both need to be looking at what the other is better at because if you start looking at what he is worse at, his old nature is going to appeal to your old nature.
This is important, because in 30:3 Agur writes: “I neither learned wisdom, nor have the knowledge of the holy.”
You don't learn spiritual principles. Let me say that right now, you don't study the Bible like you study math or business or science or computers. The Bible is revealed. It's not learned, it's revealed. Now, if you'll set yourself down in a learning situation, like a Bible college you can learn some things, historical facts and other things. But the spiritual meat of the Word, you’ll only receive through the Holy Spirit’s teaching.
You don't learn it. Bible truth is a supernatural revelation. You understand it because of the spirit that is within you; not because you have a brain. You receive it because you have a Spirit; the Spirit of God, and the Spirit of God shows you that, and He witnesses to it, and reveals it to you. So, he said, “I neither learned wisdom.”
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Post by Deleted on Oct 3, 2019 6:05:36 GMT -6
“The LORD by wisdom hath founded the earth; by understanding hath he established the heavens" (Proverbs 3:19).
“The LORD by wisdom hath founded the earth; by understanding hath he established the heavens,” and you can’t get any of this anywhere else but by the Bible, and the King James Bible at that. All the rest of the Bibles mess it up—they won’t give you the truth on it.
“. . . by wisdom,” look at John 1. Let’s see the connection here to this “by wisdom hath founded the earth; by understanding hath he established the heavens.” Notice it says, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1 KJV). So, it is possible to be with God and to be God. You say, “I don’t understand that,” that’s because you don’t have a mind like God. If you had a mind like God’s, you would understand it the way that He understands it. He wrote it the way He understands it. It takes the Holy Spirit to interpret it, to discern it, and you can’t understand it because His ways are not like our ways. But you can believe it! “And the same was in the beginning with God, All things were made by Him . . .” by Who? By the Word, “and without him was not any thing made that was made, In him was life: and the life was the light of men.” Notice verse 14: “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.”
“And the Word was made flesh,” there is what did the creating. “. . . by wisdom hath founded the earth,” it was created by Jesus Christ.
“But of him [God] are ye in Christ Jesus [because of God you are in Christ through the work of the Holy Spirit and conviction, and the new birth], who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption” (I Corinthians 1:30 KJV). Christ is our wisdom, and by wisdom he founded the earth. It is Jesus Christ that does the creating.
“Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: For by him were all things created [He founded it, He created it all], that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him: And he is before all things, and by him all things consist” (Colossians 1:15-17 KJV).
Jesus Christ is wisdom. He is the very embodiment of wisdom, and Proverbs chapter 8 will display even more that wisdom personified is Jesus Christ.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 4, 2019 6:11:15 GMT -6
“But the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day” (Proverbs 4:18 KJV).
If we walk in the right path it gets better and better, it gets brighter and brighter. It gets more joyful. It has something to do with the Second Coming: “We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts” (II Peter 1:19 KJV).
One of these days Jesus Christ is going to come back and the light in the darkness is going to get brighter. What will happen then is that we are going to get into the perfect day—the Millennial day—and the darkness will be dispelled.
So, he says to the righteous that “the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day,” but then notice the contrast.
“The way of the wicked is as darkness: they know not at what they stumble” (Proverbs 4:19 KJV).
We have the light of the Word of God: “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path” (Psalms 119:105 KJV). They stumble in the darkness of sin.
They don’t know why they lost their children; they don’t know why they lost their job; they don’t know why they lost their spouse; they just don’t know why? The answer is sin—but they refuse to see because they can’t see through the darkness. There isn’t a man or a woman in this world that is a Bible-believing Christian, that knows a few principles about life and marriage and happiness and success in the Christian life—there isn’t a person in the world that you couldn’t sit down with and in five minutes diagnose how they got into the mess they are in. Why? Because “the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day,” they know the path. They know what is right. They know what is wrong. And they know that the wrong leads to disaster. You can’t put a home together based on the standards for a marriage in America, it won’t last. It can’t last. The principles of the world are in darkness.
A Christian knows what is going to happen if he walks in darkness, and he knows why it will happen, but “the way of the wicked is as darkness: they know not at what they stumble.” That is the condition of the lost. Their way is darkness, they like dark places. The young ones sleep all day and they roam around during the night hours, wearing their sunglasses at all hours of night.
“The way of the wicked is as darkness: they know not at what they stumble.”
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Post by Deleted on Oct 5, 2019 8:25:27 GMT -6
“Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house: Lest thou give thine honour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel: Lest strangers be filled with thy wealth; and thy labours be in the house of a stranger” (Proverbs 5:8-10 KJV).
Stay away, don’t even come near the thing. The Bible takes it for granted that if you get near it, it’ll get you. It’s like a trap. It always looks good, always looks inviting. How many times do we hear a Christian say, “Well, I just don’t see what’s wrong with it?” The best answer for them is, “What’s right with it?” How does it help you to win people to Jesus Christ? What does it do to make you a better Christian? You get involved with it, does it make you feel like going to prayer meeting, or does it encourage you to support missions? What’s right with it? “Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house.”
“Lest thou give thine honour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel,” that’s the best years of your life, your honor and your labor.
“Lest strangers be filled with thy wealth; and thy labours be in the house of a stranger,” there went your honor, and your life, and your wealth, and your labor—like a slave.
Do we know of a character in the Bible that had quite a bit and decided to just have his fling in the world, and before it was all over with his honor was gone, he wasted time, somebody else had his wealth, and he was laboring in the house of a stranger? The Prodigal Son. That is the picture of the Prodigal right there. One sermon title about this was, “He Gave Him What He Wanted, but He Lost What He Had.” “And he gave them their request; but sent leanness into their soul” (Psalms 106:15 KJV). You could go through every person in the Bible, and you know what you will find in every case where there is a failure or a fall in that individual? They wanted something that they didn’t need, they wanted something that was wrong, and God gave it to them, and they lost what they had. Take heed!
Eve certainly wanted what she didn’t need, and when she got it—she lost everything that she had. She lost her fellowship with God, she lost her life, she lost her home in the garden, she raised a murderer as a son, and you can bet that wasn’t what she bargained for.
Lot had a family before he lusted over the plains of Mamre. He lost his family. He had riches and cattle. When he came out of Sodom, he didn’t have anything but the skin of his teeth. If that don’t scare you all, you ought to hit the altar and fall on your knees before God.
I wonder if Proverbs 5:8-10 was well known to the Prodigal, and I wonder if he wasn’t thinking about that very passage when he woke up to find himself in the pig pen, eating the same food as the pigs. I wonder if God didn’t speak to his heart and say, “Remember when?” I wonder if that wasn’t possibly the moment that he came back to his senses and decided to repent and go home to his father? Surely the father trained him up in the Word as a child, and now that he was older, he returned.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 6, 2019 9:49:29 GMT -6
“A naughty person, a wicked man, walketh with a froward mouth” (Proverbs 6:12 KJV).
Verses 12-15 describes a wicked man, obviously; but more spiritually, or more prophetically, they describe THE wicked man in the Bible, the Antichrist. Notice how it starts out.
“A naughty person, a wicked man.” What he is doing is giving two descriptions for the same man. It’s not two different people. He didn’t say, “a naughty person AND a wicked man,” he said “a naughty person COMMA, and then some additional information, a wicked man.” What does that tell you about the word, naughty? It’s not so good. And in this case, the definition of naughty follows immediately—a wicked person—the Bible interprets itself!
Sometimes when we are speaking about our kids we’ll say, “Well, he’s just a boy, he’s a little naughty,” but the Bible means something entirely different than you think it means. Don’t use “naughty” to describe your children! This is how we destroy the strength and the power of the English language; the word means someone that is extremely wicked.
“A naughty person, a wicked man, walketh with a froward mouth,” or a crooked and perverse mouth. He is crooked. You can’t get a hold of what he is saying, he doesn’t speak straight, but rather he throws those big looping curves. His speech is filled with doublespeak and double entendres. A perverse mouth. They make really good salesmen, as long as we remember, “let the buyer beware.” A salesman often knows his product isn’t worth what it is being sold for, but he works for the company and has to use their words, and not his own.
How will the Antichrist deceive the whole world? He will speak of “peace and safety,” he’ll be selling a concept. He will be using “great swelling words,” and he will do it without a weapon in his hand. I do not see any place where the Antichrist picks up a weapon, and his bow has no arrows.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 7, 2019 6:09:03 GMT -6
“For she hath cast down many wounded: yea, many strong men have been slain by her. Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death” (Proverbs 7:26-27 KJV).
This boy wasn’t her first victim. She is a professional and she has been at it for a very long time. We could ask, “Why doesn’t God kill her?” Because God is using her. God used the Devil. God uses her to deceive and destroy those that reject His truth. She has been around for a long, long time. Those that reject God, they come and go.
One day God will be through with her also, thank God for that. One day Satan will be thrown into the Lake of Fire and that will be the end of it. One day God will create a new heaven and a new earth, and the curse will be gone—and that will be the end of that.
But boy, until then, sin is going to run rampant.
“For she hath cast down many wounded: yea, many strong men have been slain by her,” so who do you think that you are? Who do I think that I am that I can defeat her?
How about Adam? He lost. How about Noah? He was defeated by alcohol. How about David? He got caught looking out his casement window.
Many mighty men have been suckered by the strange woman, or by the enticements of sin in general.
“Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death,”
This is the sad result of hating instruction. It is the result of self-love and self-indulgence. “Her house is the way to hell,” you go in, but you don’t come out the way you went in.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 8, 2019 6:01:28 GMT -6
“All the words of my mouth are in righteousness; there is nothing froward or perverse in them” (Proverbs 8:8 KJV).
“All the words of my mouth are in righteousness,” They are right. They are from the right motive. “there is nothing froward or perverse in them,” Note that the self-interpreting Bible defines the word “forward” for us as “perverse.” We don’t need a Greek lexicon at all. We are speaking of something which is perverted, or crooked. So, when you see that word, it is described right here in the verse.
Peter, speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ, said: “Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth” (I Peter 2:22 KJV). Now, the old Devil was subtle and full of guile and he tricked Eve by telling her that she would not surely die, when he knew that she would die spiritually. Even Eve knew that she would die because God said, “in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die” (Genesis 2:17). And yet, what happened? She believed the Devil, and not God.
When God speaks to us, and we are willing and open to listen, and we want the truth—we will always, always, always get the truth. We do not always get the truth, in fact, we very seldom ever get the truth from the media of this world. The media hates God; hates His Word, hates Jesus Christ, hates salvation by grace through faith and it hates the Christian that takes a stand for Jesus Christ. There are some Christians that the world tolerates. It loves those Christians that are willing to compromise with it. As long as a Christian is willing to get along with the world and play its games, the world will hardly notice them.
But the world seriously hates Jesus Christ because He told it like it is, and His Word continues to do the same. And that is exactly why that crowd crucified Him, and it will crucify you if it ever gets the chance if you take a stand for Jesus and preach the Gospel and call out the world’s sins. It is so much preaching that upsets the world, as it is preaching it and living it. That’s what got them mad at Noah. The Bible says that Noah condemned the world by building the ark. He condemned it not by what he said alone, but by what he said and did.
“All the words of my mouth are in righteousness; there is nothing froward or perverse in them.”
This verse can only be speaking about Jesus Christ. There is absolutely no man that could ever make such a statement. Now, there is a way to speak truth—if you are a Christian. As much as possible, the Bible says, “If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God” (I Peter 4:11 KJV). Study this Book, rightly divide this Book, believe this Book, apply it properly and you will speak the truth. Of course, we cannot speak this Book every time we open our mouths, we really don’t know it that well. But Jesus does. So, verse 8 is a picture of Jesus Christ under the picture of wisdom, because He is infinite wisdom.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 9, 2019 6:02:50 GMT -6
“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding. For by me thy days shall be multiplied, and the years of thy life shall be increased” (Proverbs 9:10-11 KJV).
“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.” This is where it all starts.
“. . . and the knowledge of the holy is understanding,” begin to learn what God thinks about life. The important thing—the knowledge of the holy. In the Old Testament the Law was holy and just, the Tabernacle, the Priesthood—those were holy things. The priests ministered about the holy things, the shewbread, the Holy Place, the Most Holy Place.
In the New Testament we have a Holy Bible “. . . and the knowledge of the holy is understanding,” in other words, this Book right here will give you understanding, but you have to read it. The Holy Spirit is Holy. Knowledge of Him and by Him will give you an understanding of the New Testament. “And unto man he said, Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil is understanding” (Job 28:28 KJV).
So, we get understanding from two places. Number one, stay away from what’s wrong, and number two, learn all you can about what is right.
“For by me thy days shall be multiplied, and the years of thy life shall be increased,” again, wisdom is talking. The years of a man’s life in the Old Testament were how long? “The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away” (Psalms 90:10 KJV). If a fellow were to make it past 70, there would be troubles.
Verse 11 is an Old Testament promise of longevity.
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