Again, we want to read this for it to teach us, to expose ourselves to us. I'm thankful for this text today as it's worked on me to help us see what we might I hope I can convey what was taught to me today, and that I think it's pretty good timing as we get to Proverbs 18 to bring these things up. And so I'll read through Proverbs 18 again, see what strikes you, and then we'll take some time to talk about it, and we'll bring it back together here at the end. So Proverbs 18. Through desire a man, having separated himself, seeketh an inner medalleth with all wisdom. A fool hath no delight in understanding, but that his heart might discover itself. then cometh also content, and with ignominy reproach. The words of a man's mouth are as deep waters, and the wellspring of wisdom is the flowing brook. It is not good to accept the person of the wicked, to overthrow the righteous in judgment. A fool's lips enter into contention, and his mouth calleth for strokes. are his as wounds and they go down into the innermost parts of the belly. He also that a slothful and his work is brother to him and is a great minister. The name of the Lord is a strong tower. The righteous runneth into it and is safe. The rich man's wealth is his strong city and has a high wall in his own conceit. Before destruction, the heart of a man is haughty. and before honor is humility. He that answereth the matter before he hearth it, it is folly and a shame unto him. The spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity, but a wounded spirit can bear. The heart of the prudent giveth knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeketh knowledge. A man's gift maketh room for him and bringeth him before great men. A lot causes contentions to cease and parteth between the mighty. A brother offended is harder to be won than a strong city, and their contentions are like the bars of a castle. A man's belly shall be satisfied with the fruit of his mouth, and with the increase of his lips he shall be filled. Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and they that love shall eat the fruit thereof. Whoso findeth a wife findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favor of the Lord. The poor, sorry, useth entreaties, but the rich answereth roughly. A man that hath friends must show himself friendly, and there's a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. All right, so this one's got some familiar ones to us in it, but anybody wanna say what struck out then? Stands out to them. Verse 10. Verse 10. Collaboration, just accept it. Amen. Thank you. I also have to comment on verse 10. We used to sing a song years ago. And every time I read that verse, I hear this song, and it just reminds me that we are safe when we run to Him. Amen. I like that. Tim started a trend. If we're going to quote a verse that's a song, you have to sing it. It'd be a very long church sermon. I always put little musical notes by the lines that always remind me. Yeah, Angel? I just think verse 10, or verse, I'm sorry, I can't see my pen authority like that. Yeah. 19, if brother offended, it's harder to be one than the opposite. That's why it's so important to monitor our tongues. Because once you're offended, even when you forgive somebody, it damages them. So it's hard to win them back. My dad taught us gun safety because we had guns in the home office. We shot a lot and he had them. And one of the things he instilled in us that I instilled in my boys, and they brought them around, he would say, he'd hand us the gun and he'd say, all the wishing in the world won't put that bullet back in that gun. So you make sure you're aiming what you want to shoot. So you mind the end of that barrel. All those in the room, can you take those words back? What's going on there? Yeah, Tom. Verse 24, I just, I've got, I just feel blessed. I've got a couple of friends I know that would be there and tell me this. Amen. My brother would be here and tell me this as well. Amen. Yeah, amen. Good friend he is. With all his weight in gold, sure. Mother? 14, the spirit of man will sustain him in his sickness, but who can bear it without the spirit? And I think most all have ones that you admire, how they handle things that are rough on their lives. I mean, Robbie is just, he's up there, praying for him every night. But then when you need somebody that doesn't have Jesus, and see them suffering twice as much or more because they don't have the confidence and faith in Christ. And it's a real challenge that nurses to be wise in sharing the gospel and reaching out to those that are broken. And it's hard because they don't hear it. Joe told me about his boss that has a young man who has prostate cancer, didn't believe in God, but he's softening up because So even in the bad things that happen to us, as a Christian, we can understand how to turn that around and that something good is going to happen from it. And that's why I pray for that young man, Mr. Harrison. No, 22. He who finds a wife finds a good thing. And he obtains favor from the Lord. OK. Yeah. She was elbowing him. I know. Of course, it's another experience. It's something about that. Contentious woman. Yeah. I'm hearing her mind as well. I have a tendency to say, be very blunt when I'm talking to you. I see this a lot, like I just do a lot of testing and I start to ask questions. And I think they know all the answers to the answer. I'm like, yep, you didn't listen to the question. The answer is totally wrong, so why don't you listen before? But like, just a practical reminder from the Lord, like, yeah, that's what you look like, too, when you don't take time to hear someone out or listen before you're speaking. Right. Yeah, that's right. A lot of times the Archdiocese has a goal. The person here seems like he's going to get his goal. So, if he is, then why doesn't he just come that way? You know, I think there's a clear belief in something like this. Amen, amen. I'm going to elaborate on that, because yeah, I've got to hear you say it. All right, yeah, so I think you can kind of pick up a tread as you're going through. I was waiting for Jay to do his normal. Hey, I counted how many words, so I'll do that for you. This talks about your speech reveals your character, right? You kind of see this throughout the theme of the proverb. Words is used three times, mouth is five times, lips are two times, tongues once, or speech and talking a couple is destructive. It can burn down a town, you know. And so, like the one the angel brought up with a friend, or how Robbie's saying, here we go. Listen to both sides of the story. Speech and words can harm and destroy and mislead. And look at verse seven. It says, a fool's mouth is his destruction, and his lips are the snare of his soul. So not only is he going around and maybe saying something against others, but it comes back on him to the point where him going around being this person who's saying these things, it destroys his own soul. You know, as he's trying to destroy or put down others, it ends up being the weight that pulls him down. Gossip in verse eight says, the words of the tail bearer are his wounds, and they go down into the innermost parts of the belly. In the ESV, another version says, you know, that this tail bearer is gossip. It says it's like choice food in one version of it says it's like delicious morsels It's like when we hear some kind of tale on somebody our sin nature is like who I can't wait to hear this It's gonna be like a morsel. It's gonna be this little thing. I can't wait to hear something bad on somebody I think the way the King James kind of puts it out points it out It's kind of like a fish hook that when you take it in you swallow that gossip Hooked in your belly it's gonna be the thing that snares you You know, it takes two to gossip. There's the here, and then the person's tell two, and then there's also the victim of it. And that's always a sad thing. They all get wounded. There's a joke that I heard early on when I became pastor, and I keep it close, and I put down here a big question, do I tell them or not? But I'll tell them. And so these three pastors went out fishing, They're out in the middle of the lake, and they're out there, and they're like, you know, while we're out here, the Bible says we should confess our sins to one another. You know, we're three pastors, and you know, we're in the community. And so I think it'd be good for us to do that. So the one goes, you know, I really have trouble with lust, you know, and so I really watch myself during the church service, and the people coming in and out, you know, and so I just wanted to confess that and ask you guys to pray for me. And the next guy's like, well, I have to, we're doing this, I have trouble with stealing, you know, I like to try to slip a little bit out of the plate as it comes around, you know, and just, I don't know why, you know, it's just something that is there, something I really battle with. They get to the third guy, they look at him, and he's just like, oh, like this, and they're like, what is it? He goes, I love to gossip, and I came out way too weak at the short. It's like, I think, in my mind, they're like, they drown the guy, because they're like, you're going to wound us, you know, with your thing. And so I think that just always stays fresh in my mind. They're like, be careful who you are, mister. You know, all these different things, and we're all sinners saved by grace. and gossip. Verse 13 says, he that answereth the matter before he hearth it is a folly and a shame to him. This is why I have a special note off to the side for me. And it's under the context of something that can keep you from learning anything. When I read it on the surface, immediately I think of me. As Angel was talking about, do I hear someone presenting their trouble or their question, and I think, oh, I know exactly what they're going through, I know what's going on, I think I got the answer for this, I'm gonna get to a good one, let's hurry up, I can jump to a conclusion. Instead of listening to the whole thing, find out what's going on, as Angel was mentioning, see what it, I don't wanna be that kid that jumps to the end, I'm reminded of one time in eighth grade, we had this test that was passed out, and the teacher's like, read the instructions first, and then fill out this question, and the kids are going through, and they answer it all, and I'm reading this, and I'm like, man, it's asking all kinds of weird stuff on here, Directions were to do every other question, you know, and the kids were filling out like how often they smoked pot, you know, until they take down the principles. He's like, you didn't read the instructions first. It's like, so make sure that you do those things, you know, that you listen and take it all in. And so I get that, you know, and I hear that end point on me, but there's a bigger thing about bias going on here. And it's a cautionary note, like I said, written in my margin. And it is, beware of condemnation before investigation. You can really limit anything that you can learn by saying, well, stop that. It's like, how many UFOs? You're like, no, there's no UFOs. You're a moron. And then you don't investigate. You don't know. Bigfoot? I don't know about Bigfoot. But if you don't look at it, if you don't have that, did you question, did you examine, did you look and see? With science, it's like, there's no God. So all of our answers have to be naturalistic, because they put a bar on their understanding. Well, it can't be God. And so they look at all those things and try to find an answer, anything but God, which gives you a huge blank spot, because it is God. And so they're never going to see it, because they're never looking, because they've already written that off. And here you say, make sure you don't allow for that, that you are allowing to search and find, you know. God's not afraid of questions. Not seek, ask, you know, and he will answer it. So I write this verse to help me. And I add that note up to the side to make sure that it helps me understand. To weigh all sides. Because it's easy to be in the, oh, this is my camp, and not think about that camp. If I can be honest with you, it's like, God has schooled me on this all this afternoon. I came here, I wrote my lessons, Is there something on the way? And it was point by point, word for word, everything that I thought about and thought over throughout the day so far. And I was just like, there's one of them where God answers your prayer right then and there and you're like, I don't think so. It's like, I'm gonna write it down, but before it's, I forget and put it on my accent moment back there where God answers your prayer, where he intercedes to the point on the very details on something. You don't get those, I mean, I get them, and I get them pretty often, but man, no. It's just good to know when God hears your prayers, when God answers, and God is using this text and He's trying to show you a deeper understanding because you're asking. Well, if you want to know, I'll show you. So verse 17. Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I think once, and I think because we try to acknowledge Acts' hidden moments, we are aware that these things happen. God is answering. God is moving. We might just say, oh, it's a circumstance of life. Who knows? But it's God answering your prayer, interceding on behalf of your life. I just was super confident about this. Preparing for the Lord to please us on Sunday. You know, we're studying the bulls up in that retirement home. We're talking about the wanderings too. Mm hmm. And you know, you look at them and you're like, how did they not want to go in the promised land? They thought people were too big. They just had God do you know, 500 amazing things and god said, yeah, I'm I'm also feel the same way about you. When you question if something's going to work out because I just showed you an accent moment like very clear accent moment and then the next moment, you're too afraid to do that or you won't, you know, and and the fact, you know, god's like, I and not kill them because so he was pulling back on fulfilling his promise and it was offensive to him. It was offensive to him that they did not believe what he had shown, and we do that every day. But it's easy to sit back and look at the tripwrites and be like, I don't know why I thought they could do that. But it does the same for me, because it acts like I'm always asking that question the next day. It's offensive to him for who he is and what he does. Yeah. I think it's very comforting when you're street witnessing and people say, I don't know what he's got on. He's like, what's your name? I don't believe that. He does all these things that are offensive to them. Where do you live now? deny someone that's telling you the truth. He's like, you're you're doing to god. You're denying him. He was telling you the truth. You're not believing the very things he puts in front of you. But but I think that verse is like in verse seventeen go together like Robbie would point out. He is first in his own cause seeming just but he that but his neighbor cometh and search them out. As as Robbie put it, it's like a courtroom scene. I would say that in B version, right? It's like it's a court. You know, the first guy goes, you're like, oh, that's a They yell at Ewell. He beat her, visibly bruised her on the right side of the face. Her father saw it happen, testified in court. Well, this was the 1960s, and Tom Robinson was a colored man, and she was white. Those were the very prejudiced parts of the country. It seemed cut and dried. It seemed like it was done and over with. The answer was obvious, he's guilty. And then they were cross-examined, and they asked the sheriff, and he said, the sheriff was called first, and they didn't call a doctor. Hmm, that's interesting. And that was also a different time when it's not like, we would call 911 and you'd get everything, right? You know, back then, we had a Mr. Young sticker, we had a fire department thing, we had a police, we had all these, remember that on the side of your phone? You had all those things, all these written down so close, where you could get it, you know, so, like, oh, that's interesting. You would call a sheriff before you'd call, you know, a doctor, you know, if you cared about these things. The right side was injured. That suggested it was a left-handed attacker, you know, to be able to hit on the right side of the face. Mayo's dad was left-handed. kind of a mean man that the people knew. They never called the doctor at all. Tom Robinson, at the big point of this trial, it's revealed that his left arm was maimed in a cotton gin accident. He can't even use it. And it was clear that he could not inflict these injuries. And it became clearly obvious by the tensions in the room and the things that they couldn't say and the inconsistencies in the story that the father had done it and not Tom Robinson. That is called To Kill a Mockingbird. If you've never read To Kill a Mockingbird or watched that movie, I highly put it on your list of Christmas watching. Well, it's not a Christmas story, but a good, good, good book. But we'll have a more familiar one as we read through the book of Job. Here, this is a thick book. And it seems overwhelming with the evidence that is there. It says, you and I are in the 18th chapter of the book of Proverbs. It is a very black and white world. You do this, you get that. You know, if you're righteous, good things happen. If you're wicked, bad things happen. It spells it out for us in that way. It's called Deuteronomical or something like, you know, if you were a Jew, how these things work. That's kind of how the world did work, you know, but we live in a different time, a different age. That's a lot how it worked back then. So you get the book of Job, you get Elphaz who comes over, you know, because we have Job, Job, Job, I'm not even reading it, I said Job. And Job has all these horrible things happen to him, right? And so Elphaz comes and says, well, good people prosper. You're not prospering. Bad people suffer, you're suffering. Conclusion is you're a bad person. You know, that's how it is. You must have secretly sinned. You're doing something on this lie, and God is now punishing you. It's obvious. That's how the Proverbs teach. That's what all the wisdom literature, that's what Ecclesiastes, Solomon, you know, even part of the Psalms, you know, it's clear, it's obvious. He's using this kind of logic. Elphaz and Bildad joined in together. Tragedy means divine judgment. You're having bad things. God's judging you and your family. Your kids died. It must be part of it. Your property, your wealth, your health is lost. It's a cause and effect. It's obvious. You are now giving. You did these things. Now this is the effect that's coming upon you. It's sin and it's judgment, Job. Zophar says, you're hiding sin. You are surely guilty. We can see it. It's obvious for everybody in our community. We know it. Elphaz, you lose a good one. A buddy comes back by and says, you are arrogant, trying to defend yourself, saying that you haven't. Undermining God's justice is who you are. So confess, admit, repent. Get over this, Job. Bildad comes back in, he says, only the wicked suffer like this. It's clear, it's obvious, we watch it, the Bible tells us. Terror has been upon you, financial ruin, you've lost some of your family, you have a disease, you're covered in boils, you have death upon your family, and your wife's even saying, you should probably curse God and die. Sounds like that to you, Job, that you're this evil, wicked person. He uses all these patterns that are seen in the Proverbs to try to apply them to them. Elphaz, that old buddy of his, comes back around and concludes, you must be mistreating the poor, you must be exploiting the widows, you must be abusing your power in the community, and you're refusing to help the needy. You're just like the worst of the worst. These are all charges. The charges against him are secret sin, hypocrisy, pride, rebellion, oppressing of the poor, that he had wicked children, that's why they were taken, and that you deserve all that you've gotten. That is a good conclusion by all the worldly evidence in the book of Job. until you get to where God speaks. God says you're all wrong. That's not how it works at all. You judge God wrong, you judge me wrong, you judge how I work and how I do these things. Now again, they say that's why the book of Job is in the Bible. It's to run as a contrasting theme to the book of Proverbs. These things aren't like formula, X plus Y equals Z. This is principles that we are to have to guide us by, things to course correct us, to help us to adjust our aim to be more God-like and to be more righteous and to live that way. So God says, no, you're wrong. You're wrong on who I am, you're wrong on what I do, you're wrong on all these things. Job is generous. He's known for his generosity. God says, I know this. He is kind. He's a pursuer of righteousness in the things he does. If you remember the opening of the book, he sacrificed his kids just in case they did something wrong and they forgot. You know, maybe in their celebration they did something. The devil entered into the picture. Nobody considered him, right? We have this agent of chaos who comes in and says, I'm gonna destroy all these things and then show them that Job will curse God and die. He doesn't. The devil brings it. They attack God's people. There's outside circumstances, just because things are going on. It's easy, and the world likes that too, to think that, oh, you're wicked, so wicked things are happening, or you're good, so good things are happening. There's a lot of well-to-do wicked people, and a lot of super-righteous poor people, and yet we're not to judge them, because that's not right. That's what, Job is there to help teach us how to do life right, and God brings it to that point, and turns around and doubly blesses Job, for us to make sure we don't get And to this mindset that we don't hear all the evidence, and God's like, make sure you hear all the evidence. Take it all in, be slow, listen to everything I'm telling you, this proverb. Watch your mouth, be slow to listen. You wanna be Christ-like? Then we're slow to listen, and we're quieter more. We listen more, we take it all in before we give that answer. And show ourselves to be fools, you know, we've had that one before. Verse 17 goes on, it says, he that first in his own cause seemed unjust, uh gossip you know there's another side you've heard it go find out a lot of times it's all invented somebody just thought something perceived and looked at the circumstance and came with a whole scenario on their head and told it and spread to somebody else and none of that even went on it's all perceptions most of the proverbs to help us stop rumors and gossip and narrow, vicious behavior from growing. Verse 24, a man that hath friends must show himself friendly, and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. Be friendly. I know some other versions put it a little bit different, but be friendly. Different backgrounds and diversity of friends makes you a better person. A congregation like ours, from different parts of the, not even the same county, different parts of the state, as we all come together, different areas of expertise, oh, it makes us better, well-rounded individuals, because we know one another, and we see things differently, we know how to pray differently, know how to intercede differently, we see how God's moving and working in different lives and different ways, and we're astounded that God's moving and working in our midst, We talk about life, we talk about God, we have our life, we learn, we watch people suffer in a gracious way, we watch people be good in a gracious way, we watch people go through all kinds of stages of things, you know, and face hard things, and then help us face hard things, because we've seen others do it right in front of us. We're not to be isolated, no Christian is to be an island unto themselves, at all. That's why the trend I've been doing is look at the bookends of the Proverbs, I'll jump to the end, let's look at the verse first. Through desire, a man, having separated himself, seeketh and intermitteth with all wisdom. That's basically talking about isolation. A man will separate himself, a man will stay isolated, a man will stay by himself and only see his perspective, only see things from his point of view, never have an ironing, chopping iron moment, never have a debate on a topic. I heard it said that this verse is actually pointing to Satan. He was like, how? He said, because a serpent is an individual, lone creature, usually out in the wild, and it's coiled up. And think of someone who's isolated, coiled up, and withdrawn. When you try to help them, it strikes out against you, and it scares you, and it seems scared, and it makes you wanna stay away, and just smash them, and get, you know what? This is serpent-like behavior. God's like, my people come together. We fellowship. We talk, and we sing, and we praise. We worship in the church. That's my people. Not an isolationist who stays by himself. Verse 22. It's one of our helps, as Carl brought up. Whoso findeth a wife, findeth a good thing, and obtaineth favor of the Lord. Why? Because a good wife grows you, challenges you in your perspectives, challenges you in all things, right Carl? Right, 37 years back there? That's one of those things, that's what, two different perspectives, male versus female. Husband versus wife, kids, family, money, fight, all that. It all comes together and you as a team are working together to do this. Mine keeps me on my toes. Lest I decline to my own understanding, as the scriptures will warn us again. Well, remind me, I know that we all know all. She'll help me see two sides to the subject. She'll push me out of my complacency. drives me to do better, to be better, to think of others, to be more thoughtful, to be more compassionate. I might be pastor, but you get us. We're a team, and we're better because of it. She's a good treasure. Verse 14, the spirit of man will You can recover from a sickness. It might not seem like it. Sometimes when you're so sick, you're like, I don't remember what it was like to ever feel good. Did I ever feel good? You ever have one of those? You're like, was I ever not dizzy? Was I ever not dizzy? Yeah, you're just like, man, what was that like? Are you having an injury? I kicked a stump one day, and that thing bit me for a couple of years. I think I split my heel, and it bit me. Everything I did in a long thought, I'm never going to walk right again. I finally did, sort of. This is like a betrayal. Angel's bringing out about a brother offended here, verse 19. A brother offended, it's harder to be one than a strong city. Their contentions are like the bars of a castle. You gotta break into the castle? Try to break past that hurt and put on a friend. Except for a miracle of God, usually, right? Prayer and intercession and open and confession and tears and crying and seeking the Lord, then maybe. watching what we say, having some kindness and compassion for one another. As the Indians would say, walk a mile in your friend's moccasins, right? You'll see what their life is like, see what they are going through. To try to put that, you know, that's one of the things that makes humanity so different than anything else that God has created. We can have empathy. We can sit, we don't just have to experience, we can mentally put ourselves in someone else's scenario, see all that there, And that's why God gives us the scriptures. Dogs don't have a Bible, as much as my wife sees those Instagram. Dogs don't, they don't read something to instruct them and make them better. If you all go outside and look at the lights, he's gonna eat the turkey, right? Yeah, that's going to happen. We went to the candy kitchen, bought me some caramels that my grandma used to make and some divinity. Ate all the caramels, I didn't get one of them. But rapper and all. You know, am I going to do that? What does God want me to do? We can do that with every scenario. We're not animals. The world wants to tell us that we are and that we should cave into those needs and desires and feelings and just whatever your emotions are and need it. The Bible runs contrary to all that. No, come on mom, they're be separate. Think about these things. Ponder these things. Have that examined life. Look and see and what would Christ do? What am I going to do? What does God say we should do? How am I supposed to behave this way? And Lord, give me the right answer. Help me not to answer when I shouldn't. Help me to answer rightly when I should. And all those things. And so, yeah, I'm gonna have a short time on this one. Watch your mouth. Your speech reveals who you really are. And I think Proverbs 18 is one that Probably not too long to read over just to kind of keep us in the checks and balances. So I'm thankful the Lord gives it to us and to remind us, especially here in chapter 18, to say, this is not black and white. This is not, because we tend to get into the mindset of Job's friends, but we got to remember there's two sides in all this. And God's like, and I'm moving and working in his mysterious ways. And there are a lot of different things going on. There's a lot of moving pieces and you don't get it all. So trust me. Remember those accidents moment? Trust me, I'm moving, I'm working, I'll work on things for you. Seek me, read the scriptures, try to apply it, do your best, trust me. Yeah, for sure. If you're gonna put, and that's usually if you have a portion of the scripture and you don't know what to do with it, stick Jesus in the middle of it. He is a friend that stays closer to the brother. Isn't that a song, have you seen that? No other friend than Jesus. That is kind of goes with their spinning the wheel that we're going to from the last one that God is the one who's in the lot and you're having contentions and you're just going to turn it over and say, well, whatever this lot is, it's going to decide it. It's trusting God. He'll, he'll help build the contention to cease. At least then you have a decision like, oh, the short straw, I guess you're right. Or whatever it might be. So the lot causes contention to cease. So it settles the matter. part between the night and so it'll help. Again, that was how they went to more often. We had the Holy Spirit we could pray to. They would use a lot system to answer those confusing questions where they couldn't come to an end or where they heard both sides of the story because that's not a way to put, you know, if you took Solomon, the mom's like, hey, her baby died, now she's trying to take mine. And Solomon's like, all right, go get me a knife. We'll cut that baby in half and we'll have it, you know. It seems like I don't have a real good answer here. You know, until the mom's like, oh, let that baby live. He's like, there's your real mom. And on the world side, they didn't get it. It wasn't cast in the lot, but I guess in a sense he took a gamble there that the real mom's gonna be like, no, let that baby live. I don't care if it's my house or not. And so I think it's just the same with the Lord's in charge and it's all subtle. Oh, the hooman, the hooman, yeah. Yeah, in my mind, the breastplate all lit up when I did some things. But that's why I lost special effects by then. Yeah, because that's what they carried, like a black and white stone kind of in there, and that's what they would trust. They would do the same thing where they selected a goat and other things that, like, it would show which one was the lord, which one was that. We don't have that, but