Thank you, sir. Good to see everyone here this morning. It's good to be Good to be in church, and that's a blessing to see all the folks here. I consider that you know an indication of your love for the Lord Amen, I think it is I think that's a very good thing excuse me while I take a drink of water just for a moment here Okay I'd like for you to take your Bibles, if you would, with me, and let's go to the book of Proverbs, Chapter 1. Proverbs, Chapter 1. We're going to do a study here for the next four weeks, Lord willing, in Proverbs, and much of the material that we're going to take is not only from Solomon in Proverbs here, but also from Pastor Fred Weiss, who is a pastor in Wisconsin, and also Pastor Chris Huff, pastor over there in in the Chicago area and so we're going to borrow some of that stuff from him but it's very good and you'll see as we go through here it's a very simple approach but if you're like me and you're reading through the Proverbs you see that many times it seems to be a random day in Solomon's house and he just you know says let's talk a little bit about laziness and about gluttony and maybe a little bit about the evil woman and we'll throw in something about lying Because those are all good things to talk about. And I don't know if you're like me, you read that and you think, what in the world is he thinking? Well, keep in mind that he's writing to young men, primarily go through the book of Proverbs. In fact, if you look at chapter 1 there, you'll see verse number 4, chapter 1, verse 4, he says he's going to give subtlety to the simple, and that's a young man if you've ever heard of one, and to the young man, knowledge and discretion. And it's not that, of course, he's speaking to young men and young ladies and old men and old ladies, but primarily it was written from a father's perspective to his son. And so as such, it fits very well with the young man's mindset. If you have young men in your household, or if you ever were a young man, You understand the idea of being random and jumping back and forth from this idea to that idea. And what do I need to do? Well, I think it's written in such a way that it deals with young men in that way. And then also, the truths that we need every day are spread throughout the whole book. And so if you read one every day, like many Christians do, I think it's a good habit. It's like taking Centrum, or the one-a-day vitamin that you need. It's very good for you. It'll hit a little bit of everything in your life. It's laid out so that when you read just one chapter, there's a good possibility it's going to hit several different things, and you may not have a problem with one area, but you'll probably have a problem with something, or you'll need some direction, or you need some counsel, or whatever the case might be, in that particular proverbs. I think it's a very good thing. And not only that, if you read a proverb a day, it continues over and over. You read that every month, you'll find yourself beginning to memorize the things that are here. And there's nothing else that I know people read every month read the entire book through every month. I'm sure some people have, but it's just perfect. 31 chapters, and so no matter how many days we have, we can always have enough Proverbs for the day. So we're going to begin our study, and let me start here by saying the Proverbs were not written so we can read them every day and stay the way we are. Throughout the book of Proverbs, you'll find there are four characters that are likely to be found in the church. And we have them in our church, and I would say every church in America has these four people. Now there are some that are less likely, some characters that are less likely to be found in church. For instance, the evil man, they're less likely to be found. The strange woman, less likely, depends on the church, we understand. But they're less likely to be found in a good church, a church that preaches the Bible. They just can't stick around that much. But we're going to look at four different groups of people, four different types of people, and then we'll jump into the first person and study the first person today. So let's begin in Proverbs chapter 1. We'll read 1 to 5, verse 7, and 20 to 22. We'll find the four there. All right, here we go. Proverbs 1.1. The Proverbs of Solomon, the son of David, king of Israel. to know wisdom and instruction, to perceive the words of understanding, to receive the instruction of wisdom, justice, and judgment, and equity, to give subtlety to the simple, there's our first person, to the young man, knowledge and discretion. A wise man will hear, that's our second person, and will increase learning, and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels. to understand a proverb and the interpretation, the words of the wise and their dark sayings. Verse 7, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction. There's the third group. Now to verse number 20. Wisdom crieth without. She uttereth her voice in the streets. She crieth in the chief place of concourse, in the openings of the gates. In the city she uttereth her words, saying, How long, ye simple ones! There they are again. Well, ye love simplicity, and the scorners, that's the fourth group, delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge. So we see we've got four different folks. And we could pick other ones as well. There's the sluggard. There's the slothful. We could find others as well. But we're going to stick with those main four groups there, the wise, the simple, the scorner, and the fool. And I encourage you, as you go through, to look in your life and see what category best describes you. Now, if you're like me, you might have one area that you could point at and say, maybe I have a little wisdom in that area. And if you're like me, you can take that one little area and use it to kind of spread over your entire life. And I'm pretty wise. But in reality, that wisdom is really only in one area. And in another area, I could be a complete fool. And in other areas, I can be a scorner. And we'll find that there's not a whole lot of help or hope for the scorner in Scripture, unfortunately. And in a lot of areas, I'm just a simple person. I'm just simple. That doesn't mean that I'm stupid. It means that I'm unlearned, that I don't know. And the danger is when we don't know who we are and we don't rightly discern the characteristics of our lives. We don't see the tendencies that we have. And we go through life and we think, this is the kind of person I am. Instead, I encourage you to look at your life as all these plates spinning. You ever seen the Chinese troop that comes through and they spin all the plates? Or they all are balanced, one on top of another, 15 people on top of each other, that type of thing. And it's unbelievable. But I remember watching a guy with the plates one time. And he started spinning. I think he spun 15, 20 plates at a time. And he got one started. Number one, I don't know how he even got the first one started. But he got it started. And then he keeps going down the thing, down the table. And he kept starting these plates and spinning them and spinning them. Now, you know what happened. As soon as he got down here, what did he have to do? to go back and start the other one and keep it going. Wouldn't it be nice if we could just get something started and then it would just keep going. Perpetual motion machine, you know. You've got spirituality started in your life and it just keeps going. Financial decisions, you know, you just make a couple of good ones and then for the rest of your life you're set to go. You know, you discipline your child one time and they just begin to say, oh, I understand. Yes, this is how I should act. Yes, I get it now. Thank you, Mom, for that one time when you instructed me back there. I've never been the same since. right? And your wife says to you, you know, sweetheart, you don't understand me. Okay, let's talk. And you sit down and from then on you understand her. Amen? That's what we call a miracle. Amen? That would be a miracle. It's not going to happen, right? Why? Because you can't just start a thing and then leave it. I mean, you have to you do this and then you jump over here like Proverbs and you jump over here and hit this and you hit that and hit that come back and get this one stopped and come back you know you get finally you know you read your Bible through and your kid you know was rebellious you know and you finally pay all your bills on time and you pay your tithe and you have a fight with your wife you know it's it's never it's never set it and forget it It's going back and going back. And so I encourage you as we go through the book of Proverbs to honestly look at yourselves. And don't look at how others see you. Look at how the Lord sees you. And be willing to say, hey, I may be wise in this area, but I'm a complete fool in this area right here. So if we were to look at the book of Proverbs as a plot of a story of a movie or something, you would find that the hero of the book is the wise man. And he is set apart from the rest. We've got the three stooges, so to speak. They're the other side of it. The scorner, the fool, and the simple. They're the antagonists. They're the villains of the story. They're going to work against the wise. And the wise has to constantly work against the villains, the fool, the simple, and the scorner. And they're really at war. The outcome is, the plot of the book is the outcome of the simple. What's going to happen to the simple? We understand, in any good story, you have a person that's the hero. And you have a person that's the villain. And then you have someone that's neutral that's going to be pulled one way or the other. And by the end of the story, you find out which direction they choose. And I hope that as we look at these things, we'll be able to find ourselves in them and honestly admit who we are, and then recognize that if I'm a simple person, I need to connect with the right people. The simple needs to connect with the wise. The simple can be led about by the knows. It can go with the scorner or the fool. But the simple person really needs to make the right decisions. And there's all kinds of different ways we could look at this, but we're gonna jump right into the first study today, and that is the wise, the wise man, the hero of the book of Proverbs. I'll give you a quick summary, and then we'll begin to look at the different verses. Some of the traits of the wise, he is directed by God, he follows the Bible, he respects authority, he honors his parents, he's not influenced by others, And you can see already they're few and far between, aren't they? And if you're becoming a wise person, that doesn't mean that you necessarily are wise. You're becoming wise. You're moving in that direction. But keep this in mind. A lot of people are just simple, and they follow the crowd. It is possible for you to be a simple person just following a wise person. But when that wise person is removed from your company, or you're no longer with that wise person, you choose whatever the crowd is doing. So you have to be very careful when you look at yourself to say, am I a wise person or am I a simple person that's just following a wise person? What's the difference? The difference is why your kids do things at youth camp that they don't do at home. Amen? You never try to do this at home. The difference is what you will do when you're out on vacation somewhere away from the people that you normally hang around. Or when you take a business trip and you're all by yourself in a hotel room. You might have been a simple person being led by a wise person, and so you're controlled by those around you. But when you're on your own and there are other influences and no wise people around, you have a tendency to go that direction. So you have to really be careful when you look at this. Now, the first thing I want you to see about the wise is that he will listen when wisdom is given. Proverbs chapter 1, verse number 5. A wise man will hear and will increase learning. And a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels. Go with me to Proverbs chapter 9. Proverbs chapter 9, look at verse number 9. Proverbs 9, 9. It says, give instruction to a wise man and he will be yet wiser. teach a just man and he will increase in learning chapter 17 verse number 10 chapter 17 verse 10 a fool forgive me a reproof entereth more into a wise man than in hundred stripes into a fool so a wise man will increase in learning. What does that mean? That means he knows, not just thinks or pretends, he knows that he does not know everything. He is constantly trying to learn new things. A wise person is the kind of person that tries to stay awake in church, not always able to, not always successful, but he tries to. Why? Well, it's simple. It's simple and it's But it's very deceiving. I'll tell you why. When a person has been around church all his life, or her life, you have heard pretty much what people are going to say. Amen? You've heard it. If you've been around it enough, you've heard it. Now, a wise person will say, I have heard everything, but I haven't followed everything. And there's always something that I need to learn. So even when I sit down and a 15-year-old preacher gets up and begins to haltingly open the scripture and tries to give something to me, I'm going to listen. Why? Because he's smarter than I am? No, because he's preaching that book. And it's wiser than I am, and so I'm going to listen. A wise person will increase in learning. A wise person does not rest on the education that he got 25, 30 years ago. Because as we all know, we've probably forgotten most of what we learned, whether or not we ever learned it to begin with. A wise person constantly is asking questions and recording the answers to those questions when he's going through his Bible. You can be a person that reads your Bible and never learn anything. Isn't that sad? And you have simply checked off something that you consider your duty as a Christian. I submit to you, as D.L. Moody said, that some people have bookmarks in their Bible to remind them of where they left off, because otherwise they would never remember where they left off. Now, that can be pretty hard in the day in which we live. It's hard to remember all these things. But you understand the point? The point is that they're not trying to learn anything from the Scripture. They're trying to get through the Scripture. So they put a bookmark there so they don't have to always and read the same verses again. I don't want to do that. I'll tell you that. That's the last thing I want to do is read that passage again. Because I'm not here to learn to read it. I'm here to get through it. I'm not here to learn. I'm here to get through it. Amen? I think it's a pretty good point from a hundred years ago. And we still find people doing it today. I find myself. You read through a passage of Scripture and the Holy Spirit says, that was great. I'm glad you're a speed reader. Man, you're good. Now let's do a little quick pop quiz here and see if there's anything you can remember about what we just read today. Jesus? Like the junior church kids, right? Jesus? No! Read it again, you fool! Amen? But a wise person listens. A wise person listens. You know that's the hardest thing for young people and it's a hard thing for old people is to be told what to do and to be told something that you don't know. Why? Because it's kind of weird if you think about it. A young person thinks they know everything, right? And how is that different from an old person again? Amen? Isn't it weird how we grow up to be the people that we despise? Amen. It's crazy. You know what that is? It's this. Every time I learn something new, it builds up my pride. Knowledge puffeth up. It has to be mixed with humility. It has to be. You have to recognize that if I were to memorize the entire Bible, and there are some that have, very few, if I were to do that, I would not know a fraction of what I should know about the Lord. Amen? Because you can read this book through every month if you want to, for the rest of your life, and you will find something on the last day of your life that you never saw before, if your heart is open. So a wise man will increase in learning. Now I want to ask you to take it beyond this. This is very important, you understand, very important. But when's the last time you learned something new about finances? About fixing your car? When's the last time you learned something new about food preparation? About carpentry? You know what we do in America? We watch other people live lives. That's what we do. I live my life. I'm tired. I'm tired, I'll tell you that. I deserve to sit down. You wonder why we have problems with weight gain and why we have a sedentary lifestyle. We sit and sit and sit and sit. We don't accomplish things. You know, I don't understand why we are to be clapped on the back and given a gold star for going to work. And somehow, because of that, we come home. I understand. Some of you have very physical jobs. But you understand as well that when you do not work hard and you just go and do whatever you have to do, you come home, your mind begins to get flabby. If you don't work hard, your body begins to get flabby. But even if you do work hard and you don't think and use your brain and increase in learning, your mind will begin to get flabby. And now suddenly you find yourself this overweight mentally person that can't think, you're sluggish, and you used to be able to think critically and logically. Now you don't care. You're just whatever. Just flip the channel. Whatever. That's a dangerous place for us to be, I believe. It's a dangerous place. I recently met a young student. I think he was a freshman or a sophomore in high school. He's from South Korea. Exchange student he's here in the states, and he said to me. I said, how do you like living here? He said I like I have some time for myself He said we'll go to school at 6 in the morning Or we go to school by 8 in the morning, and we won't get done till 6 at night Unless we have extra work, and then it'll be 10 o'clock at night. We come home and we wonder why the the Asians are fast overcoming the Americans or they've way surpassed the Americans and much of education and Now, we can say, well, that's just not right. Kids should play. Well, I agree with you. I agree. They need to have physical exercise and all that. But how much? How much is too much? Amen? Bodily exercise profited little, the Bible says. Our brains, we've lost things. You know how the quickest way you know that you've lost something? Go read a book from the 1800s. I dare you. Just go read it. You read one chapter and your brain is so packed, how could they even think like this? How do they know? Every sentence didn't have like in it. I can barely understand it. Why couldn't you put it in easier words for me? I could get it. You know why that is? Because it was largely a culture of their brain. And it helped when they went out and worked. And they went out and they did it. So how could they do the same things over and over again? I'll tell you what helps. When you're doing the same things over and over again that you know, you can think while you're doing that. Right? It's a great thing. Now with our distracted culture, you have no time to think. Because you're constantly updated by these people on Facebook. And people are texting you. And they're calling you. And they're stopping by the house. And you just can't get a break to think. And what's the answer? The answer is not to go live in the woods, to live in a cave somewhere. The answer is to have some self-control. To control those things, have some boundaries. I encourage you to look at yourself. Have you increased in wisdom? If you have not increased in wisdom, then you are not a wise person. Because a wise person is not just one that learned something 30, 40 years ago. A wise person is someone that is learning something today. Today. I hope you have parents that are 80 years old. I hope they're using their brain. I hope they're thinking. Pastor's dad, he does crossword puzzles all the time. And they say that's a very good thing to help prevent Alzheimer's as you continue on in your years. It makes the connections in your brain. It forces you to remember things and put them together. And I think it's a very good thing. You know what? Doing a crossword puzzle sure beats watching television if you have to watch it put the TV on do the crossword puzzle you can accomplish something while you're doing nothing amen they've been amen so let's let's go on now that didn't go over let's go to chapter 9 chapter 9 verse number 8 Now, as a friend of mine said, here's where the road meets the road, right here, Proverbs chapter 9. He was a couple of fries short of a Happy Meal. Chapter 9, verse 8. He says, yeah, this is where the road meets the road. 9, 8, it says, Reprove not a scorner, lest he hate thee. Rebuke a wise man, and he will love thee. The wise man is every pastor's joy, and the scorner is every pastor's grief. What happens when you rebuke or approve a scorner? What does he do? He hates you. What happens when you rebuke a wise man? He loves you. Now, here's the thing. If I'm sitting in the pew, and I agree with everything pastor says, am I being rebuked? Not really. I mean, if I, everything, yeah, that's right, amen, amen. Now, if the pastor says, You know what? I'm sick and tired of people doing this. And I go, well, I'm doing that. Hmm. Where does he get that in scripture? Chapter and verse, please. And he suddenly says a chapter and verse out of nowhere. He invents a verse in the Bible that I haven't seen. And I sit there and I say, well, yeah, but I mean, come on, let's not be ridiculous. Right? See, now he's starting to rebuke me. Because I don't agree with what he's saying. And my lifestyle does not line up with what he's showing me that the Word of God says it should. And so now he is rebuking me. Well, what kind of person are you? Well, a wise person says, you're all that hurts. Man alive. What in the world? Why do I come to this church? And then the Holy Spirit says, you know why you come to this church? Because I'm teaching you to be like my son. I'm teaching you how to get rid of the junk and to live a life that pleases me." And you say, oh, that's right, that's right. Alright, Lord, I'm wrong again. Here we go. I'm wrong. You're right. And what does that make you do to the pastor? Makes you love him. Makes you love him. Because he shows you things in your life that should not be there. Things that you thought were okay and for Pete's sake, can't we... Do I get anything? Am I allowed to do anything? And the Lord says, you're allowed to do what I say. And then you say, thank you, Lord. Thank you for my pastor who's willing to stand up and skin the hide off of me, even when he didn't have to do it. And I'm sure that it doesn't bring jollies to him to do it. Amen. And so it's a helpful thing. A wise man will increase in learning. And one of the ways he increases in learning is by being willing to admit that he is wrong. and accepting the fact that he needs to be corrected and turns things around and corrects them. And then he loves the person. You ever had a kid come to you and hug you after you spanked him? It's a pretty rare occasion. I think if we do it right and with the right attitude, I think it would happen more often than it does. You ever gone to the Lord and said, thank you God for beating me into the mud and showing me who I am? You ought to. You ought to. It's the proper response for correction. And it shows that you have wisdom in your heart. Now, believe me, I wasn't, you know, excited about after getting some kind of a whipping, running back to my dad. But after a while, after the pain goes away, after everything, you begin to realize, you know, that helped me. You ever heard someone say, that kid is begging for a spanking? What do we mean? We mean, you know, nowadays we say, oh, they're tired. I mean really tired. They just woke up, but they're really tired. Right? What is the thing there? The thing that we say, that kid is asking for a spanking. They're cruising for a bruising. Right? And what was the deal? The deal was they couldn't help themselves. This child does not have the capability of correcting his lifestyle. And so as a parent, I have to step in whether I want to or not. And I have to correct that. Why? Because if I do that, my kid will love me. He will love me. If I do not correct him, my child will grow up hating me. Isn't that crazy? Isn't that crazy? I'm not going to correct my child because I want them to like me. Bad idea. Bad idea. Really bad. You know, and that's not to say that, you know, some parents, it seemed like they lived. I always thought my mom loved spanking us. It was, you know, the cherry on top of her day. But, you know, she didn't. What she loved was she loved obedience. And when she didn't get it, it really bothered her. And she took care of business. And now, I love my mom. Amen? And there's nothing between my mom and I. I don't have to say, well, she's a good woman, I'm sure, but no, she's a great woman. I love her. And so a wise man will do that. And it doesn't necessarily mean that you walk out of this church singing the praises of Pastor Sal. It may mean you go home and you're kicking people around, kick the dog and everything. And then by Sunday night, you come back to church and you say, you know what? That's right. That's right. And I may not be prepared right now to get it, I may not be able to just fix it all right now, but I know what he said is right, and I'm heading that direction. Amen? Look at Proverbs chapter 27, verse number 5. We need to keep moving here because we've got several traits of the wise that we need to hit. 27.5. 27.5. It says, open rebuke is better than secret love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. A wise man knows it's good for him to be balled out. He knows it's good for somebody to get in his face and tell him the truth. You know why men love the military? They look back on their days of the military with fondness, not because everything was hunky-dory, not because the food was great, but because somebody got in their drill and said, you will be this kind of man, whether you want to be or not. And they didn't look back on their DI, and they can say, I respect you. I respect that drill sergeant. Because he kept me alive in battle. Because he made me the kind of person that I wanted to be, but couldn't be. You wonder how I know that. I've never been in the military, but I was raised by a very strong military man. And I couldn't tell you that. If I had a dollar for every time, my dad said, you'd never make it in the military. I wouldn't be at this job, I'll tell you that. Amen? My dad, he was raised, you know, everybody that's in the military, they say, well, it was the old military, not like today, not like today. Everybody says that, you know, from the Civil War and the Revolutionary War. In fact, not like today, not like today. New Army today, they can't handle nothing. But that's my dad. He said that. And open rebuke was better than secret love. Now, my dad was not big on saying I love you. Dad was not the kind to walk up and say, you know, just I'm so proud of you. So proud of you. You're doing great. No, dad was more like, you know, what in the world are you doing with your life? What do you do? That kind of thing. And that's what you need. Rather than your dad who's all so happy for you and gives you everything that you want. Rather than the pastor that just strokes your ego and the pastor just says, you know, we just need to fellowship. We need to learn to fellowship. Pastor gets up and says, you know what your problem is? Your biggest problem is the one that you look at in the mirror every day. And so then you go away and say, man, that was harsh. Man, did he have to say it like that? Yes, he did. Because it's better to have that than to have the other. It's better to know that person, where they stand. And so to speak, all their cards are right out there on the table. And you can understand where they're coming from. And if you've got a problem with Pastor Sal, you know what the best way to take care of it? Is to go into that office and talk to Pastor Sal about the problem. Amen. It would be better for you to do that than to just try to, you know, guess what he's thinking. I'll tell you what will get you in trouble more than anything with your authorities. This is from experience. From my vast experience. From the vault. All right? The best thing to do is to not think about what your authority is thinking. It's to talk to your authority about what they're thinking. I bet you they're thinking this. I bet you he doesn't care about this. He's never thought about that. You know why he does that? Because he doesn't love me. He doesn't care about me. He doesn't know. He doesn't understand me. You start asking all these questions. That's what got you in trouble when you were a kid with your parents. That's what gets you in trouble today with your boss. You think your boss is thinking this about you and they did this because of that. You have no idea. You need to go to your boss and you need to talk to them about it. Open rebuke is better than secret love. It'd be better for your boss to say, you know what? You're a lazy bum. You need to get to work. We're paying you more money than you're worth. Out of all the employees of this company, you have the least value to us. You ever heard that? And what does that say to you? You know, it's like you try and you try. Amen? Are you with me this morning? It'd be better for you to say, you are a terrible employee. Get to work. And you say, yes sir. Inside you're saying, I can't stand this guy. I hate him. But on the outside, you control that devil, and you go and get to work. And you work harder than everybody else there that day, and then you do it the next day too. And you keep doing it. Not because he got onto you, but because you should be doing it. Amen, so you don't have to be you know what overall what makes you a better employee? You know somebody just just you're awesome. It's so awesome to have you here, so you're you're such a nice person We all want to hear that, but does that make us better know why because they say whatever level I'm at right now I'm doing great I'm perfect when he says to me my boss or she says to me I I can't believe you're not doing it this way. What does that do? It makes me mad. Doesn't anybody care? But then I say, you know what? Put the emotions aside. Let's take it to the next level. And now you're a better employee than you were. Amen? So open rebuke is better than secret love. And that's a wise person that can handle that. A wise person. I didn't say a wise person enjoys it. I said they can handle it. They can handle it. Bible says in Hebrews 12 11 now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous but grievous nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby a couple words in there I don't really care for righteousness and exercise be a great verse without those two things amen What do I mean? I mean that it takes work on my part. It takes structuring my life according to the principles, not just going through life and then wondering why nobody likes me, everybody's against me. Because I have refused to discipline myself and put boundaries around myself. Now I'll hit this one, Proverbs 13, 1. We'll hit this one and just glance off of it. We'll keep rolling because most everyone here is out of your, from under your parents' authority. We spent about two weeks on this up in the teens class. Proverbs chapter 13, not really. Wise son, it says, Proverbs 13, a wise son heareth his father's instruction, but a scorner heareth not rebuke. So a wise person will honor their parents and hear instruction. He hears his father's instruction. You know, the Bible does say over in Ephesians chapter 6 that we are to honor our father and mother. And that doesn't stop when you get out of the house. Amen? I'll obey you, but when I leave here, forget it. No, you're not going to be blessed because of that. If there is enmity between your parents and yourself because of something that you have done or a character trait that you will not let go, you are not honoring your parents. And you are required to honor your parents. How long? As long as they're your parents. I guess. Amen? How long does someone continue to be your parent? As long as they're alive, right? And that's a hard one. Why? Because we think, finally, I live my own life. They had their own lives to live, and now I live my life. Well, you've got to keep this in mind. No man is an island. You're not living this life for yourself. You say, I want to pass it on to my kids. I'm just here to take care of my family. If you're not careful, you're training your children to act the same way that you act towards your parents. And they're going to grow up. Somebody said, be nice to your kids. They're going to change your diapers one day. Amen? We just returned the favor. That's a scary proposition. But that honoring of our parents is important. It does not stop when you're 18 or when you get married. Now let's go to chapter 13, verse number 20. Chapter 13. We're still in 13. Let's look at verse number 20. A wise person will choose the right friends on his own. 1320, He that walketh with wise men shall be wise, but a companion of fools shall be destroyed. Wise people are a good influence on others. Wise people don't say, what do you want to do? Or, I'll do whatever you want to do. They say, this is what I'm going to do, or this is what I'm not going to do, whether you come along or not. This is the direction that we're going. And I'll be honest with you, I think our generation, my generation, has missed this somewhere. I think that we have missed the concept of this is the direction that I'm going. And everybody else can do whatever else they're going to do. See, we're a very democratic generation. It is, well, what do you guys think? What do you think? What do you think? What do you think? Yeah, you know, it's a classic example, I'll give you, of the singles, working with the singles. It doesn't happen very often, but some of you that were in the singles class before, you'll remember this. Some people will come up to me and they'll say, Pastor John, Are we still going on this activity? Because I've been talking to everybody. Nobody's going. I say, well, I'm sure that your circle of five friends is pretty much influential, but let's ask some of the other people that are in the group as well. And oh, come to find out, we already have 20 people signed up. Apparently, you didn't get the memo. And what is that? That's this thing of, well, if nobody else wants to do it, then why should we even try? Why should we even go there? When's the last time that you have said this is the direction that I'm going? And this is what I'm doing. I'm not rebelling against anybody. I'm not some kind of an anarchist. I'm not a wild-eyed fanatic. I'm just, this is the direction that I'm going. Joshua said, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. You know, we didn't get a poll together of the church and say, well, how many of you agree with this standard? How many of you agree? Because, you know, seriously? Seriously, Pastor? Nobody in this church believes that. No one has that standard. It's like, in our class, it's like no one has that. Why does that matter? Why does that matter? If it's something that God wants you to do, and I'll tell you this too, you know, once somebody gets a standard, it's easy for some people to get something, and they get something, the direction they're going, and then they say, this is what God wants, I don't care what anybody says. And then they make it a test of fellowship, whether or not everybody else has that same standard. And they make that a judge, a ruler for Christianity. How spiritual are you? You don't have to do either one. You say, this is the direction God has for us, and we're going. You say, well, what if everybody doesn't agree with it? Well, did you put it together because everybody agreed with it? No. Then go forward. Do you have to have everybody agree with it after you do it? No. Just go forward and do what God wants you to do. So a wise man is able to choose his own friendships here. Look at 1320. He that walketh with wise men shall be wise. Let me ask you this. If a fool walks with wise men, will he be wise? Yes, he will. If he's willing to lay aside... How do I know? Because a wise man is not going to allow a fool to walk with him and continue to be a fool. So he decides, I'm going to walk with these wise people even though I'm a fool and eventually that foolishness will rub off of him. It'll go away because the wise person will not allow a fool to continue being a fool and walk along. He that walketh with wise men shall be wise. He said shall be. If a simple person walks with a wise man, what's going to happen? He's going to be a wise person. Now I don't believe a scorner will walk along with a wise person. A scorner won't do it. He refuses. Because he knows what he wants, and his pride is the most important motivating factor in his life. He will not walk with a wise person. But you ought to choose some people that are wise. See, what we like to do is this. We like to look at people who are either exactly like we are, and we say, oh, well, I'll hang around them. I'll fellowship with them, because they're just like me. We have a lot in common. Well, there's nothing wrong with that. But why not choose someone that is wiser than you are to hang around with? Why don't you invite a family over, a couple over, that has more experience than you do. That has more discipline, has more self-control, has more grace, more love. Someone that is more spiritual, so to speak, than you are. Hang out with them. Instead of, you know, maybe you need to, you know, I want to reach down to these people. I want to help them out. Well, you know what? You've got to be careful with that. Because you'll find a wise person that always is hanging out with simple people and fools, suddenly some of that wisdom starts to leave them. even with all their good intentions. If the only people you ever hang out with invite over to your house are people that are less spiritual, so to speak, that are more carnal than you are, you've got to be careful. They will pull you down. You say, well, I don't think of myself as any better than anyone. Oh yes, you do. That's why you don't have the other couple over. Amen? You do see yourself as different. What should you do? Some of you young couples, you ought to have prime timers over your house. And you got to say, you know what? We're just getting started on this thing. And maybe you could give us, you know what the primetime is going to say? Oh, we don't know anything. We've had our share of problems. And it's going to take a while to get down to where the real stuff is and get some illustrations. Why? Because they have a lot of humility. They don't look at themselves like you and I do. We got it all figured out. We're not going to do it like our parents did, I'll tell you that much. Amen? By the time we're our parents' age, we're going to be surprised we know anything. Amen. And some of you older folks, you know what you need to do? You need to come alongside these younger ones and you need to say, hey, why don't you guys come over to the house? You don't have to have a big counseling session where you sit down and say, now listen, we've noticed in your family. No. Just being around them and them being around you will be helpful for both. It'll be encouragement. He that walketh with wise men shall be wise. Take an inventory of your friends. Right now, who's on your five circle, whatever they call that? Who's on your most recently texted list? Who's on your Facebook? Who's the person that you stay in contact with on these things? Who's the last person you called? Who's the last person you went out to lunch with? Take an inventory of these friends. If they are not wise people, what makes you think you're wise? If most of the people that you hang around with are not wise, there comes a point when it's not healthy for you. It's just not healthy. And you've got to say, I can't continue. A branch cannot continue to grow out indefinitely. The branch of a tree, it can only grow as long this direction as it's growing this direction. See what I'm saying? So if you say, well, I'm just going to reach out to people. I'm going to reach out. Well, you can only reach out so far before you get top heavy and you fall over. There has to be more of a base and strength here. And as you grow yourself, then you're able to reach out to more people. But it's not continually reaching out. And what happens is this. If you're not strengthened and founded on the word of God, you're going to find yourself dipping your colors because your main goal is not really to help other people. It's to get people to like you and to think that you're really great. You want to be the great asset in the church. And so you reach, reach, reach, reach, reach, reach, reach, reach, reach. But what you're really doing is hanging out with people that are fools. You're spending time with simple people, and it's not healthy for you. So should we reach out to them? Absolutely. How else is the wise of the simple person going to learn? They have to know. They have to be instructed. But there must be a balance there. As you grow here, you spend time with the Lord yourself. As you are spending time with people that are wiser than yourself, You're learning and you're growing. And then it's no trouble at all to reach out and help somebody here. And you'll find that at the end of this branch, you actually have some fruit that can be a help to people. Because you've been growing here, your roots are going down. Your roots are going down. Amen? Now, there has to be the balance. Because what happens? People talk about, well, I want to be deep in the Word. I'm going to be deep. I mean, I'm talking about deep. I mean, way down. Yeah, but where's your branches? You don't have any fruit. There's nothing that's reaching out to anyone. No one's being helped by you. I mean, you're way down there in the dirt, but is the tree really growing? I don't know if it's growing because I can't see any branches. At the other side, you see people that they're like, wait, you know what? This thing of deep, we don't need to be deep. We just need to love people. We need to get, it's not all about just, you know, doctrine. It's loving others. Isn't that what it's all about? And we spend our time reaching, reaching, reaching, reaching, and there's no depth of earth. There's no roots. And so you don't have the strength to reach out to those people. When you have somebody over, you find yourself, you know, you spend some time with someone, you walk away going, well, wait a minute. I hadn't thought of it that way. Maybe they have a good point. And now you're thinking something contrary to Scripture because you don't have the depth that you need. So a wise person will choose the right friends on their own. If the pastor is a follower, he can be in big trouble. What do you all think? Should we paint this? I mean, I'm not sure. How many would say, let's paint it? That's a dangerous way to be. Why? Because he's so smart? No. Because if he is not aware of what's going on, he cannot make wise decisions, why would anyone want to hang around with him or follow him? Why would anyone want to join his church and say, yes, teach me. You're a shepherd. Why would you do that? You wouldn't. Not that the pastor needs me. No, I'll be honest with you. Pastor Sowell downplays his leadership quite a bit. You've got to be careful with that as a member. I need to be careful with that. What do you mean? I mean this. There is something special about the pastor. Not just Pastor Sowell, the pastor in general. There's something special. Now he stands up here and he says, let God be true to every man a liar. And that is the case. But the fact is, if I thought he was going to lie, I wouldn't be here. Amen? I wouldn't sit in this church if I thought every five Sundays he might throw a little half-truth in there. I'm not going to be here. He is a special leader ordained by God. And thank God we have a good pastor. Let me encourage you, in the circles in which we run, sometimes pastoral authority is played down. And I'm not trying to play it up to say it's more than it is, but I will say this. There's coming a point in time where someone else is going to give an account for your spiritual growth. It's not every man for himself with a judgment seat. There comes a point when the pastors are called up and say, how did you do with that church? That's a pretty serious obligation, pretty serious responsibility. And it behooves, because of that, God has given him some say-so in our lives. So we don't have to follow it. We can say, no, I don't want to listen to it. But we ought to be very careful, because it's not going to be us standing up there saying, well, I'm sorry, Brother Jones just never grew, Lord. He never would listen to the scripture. Wouldn't that be a terrible thing? Terrible thing. Thomas Carlyle said, great men taken up in any way are profitable company. Profitable company. Chapter 13, verse 20, we looked at that already. Let's look at chapter 14, verse 16. Chapter 14, verse 16. A wise man will fear God and steer clear of evil. It says 14, 16. A wise man feareth and departeth from evil, but the fool rageth and is confident. A fool gets mad. He says, I can handle this. A wise man is afraid of evil. He's afraid of it. Okay, so what does that mean? It means the things that you watch this week on your television. Are you wise or are you a fool? Well, when you see something, are you afraid of what it will do to you? Or do you say, man, I can't believe they put that on there. I'll keep watching a little bit. I can handle it. It's not gonna, I mean, it's ridiculous. When I was a kid, it used to bother me, but I'm older now. A wise man is afraid of evil. And he departs from it. It's not a mark of maturity how much sin you can handle. Sin is a disease. Sin is a disease. When somebody stands in church and says, you know, I used to be a biker. You know, I used to run and gun. You know, I used to kill people for a living. I got saved. That's not a mark of maturity. What's the best thing about that testimony? That he got saved. Everything else is worthless. Everything else is junk. See, in our cultures, we like to emphasize the grace of God. And where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. But what's the good thing about that sentence? The grace that abounded, not the sin that abounded. See, sin is a disease. I'm grateful and happy when I hear about people getting rid of cancer, getting the victory, so to speak, over cancer. I'm not excited about cancer. I don't walk up to somebody and say, oh, I hear you're in stage four cancer. Awesome. Great stuff. You're a great guy. You're a great man. You say, that's crazy. And just as crazy as we look at people who've been involved in sin, or we look at sin ourselves and think, I can handle it. I can handle it. You can handle disease? How much disease do you want? How much can you handle? It's not something that we... Wonderful, man. You're a soldier, right? I can tell you that right now. You're a Christian soldier. I mean, you can watch movie after movie after movie that dishonors God. You can watch everything on television, and somehow you come shining through. How do you do that? No. A wise person says, man, if I watched that right there, I could tell you've been thinking about that for weeks. I'm not watching that. No way. No way. Well, we already rented it from the movie store. Might as well watch it. Well, I got lymphoma, so you might as well just attack my liver too. I'm going to die anyhow. Same thing, right? If sin is a disease, we want to get away from it. Not show how strong I am by being able to imbibe all the sin that I possibly can handle and somehow get to church. Isn't that a terrible thing? When I think about that, I think about sin as a disease. We don't think of it in that way. Why is that? I'll tell you why. Because sin tastes good. Sin doesn't come in a bottle with XXX on it. Sin comes, you know, with like the cherry flavored syrup you give your kids. Even worse, sin comes in a carton. It's frozen. It's ice cream. It's wonderful. Amen? Oh man, I threw up. Threw a rock in the pack of dogs and I heard one bark. I think we're gonna... Nowhere to direct our attention now. Amen. We've got to get off of this. Alright. A wise man feareth and departeth from evil. Wicked people, they just keep going on in their sin. They have no fear of God. And by the way, you're not gonna get over sin and fear sin by somehow trying to develop in you a hatred for sin. What does that lead to? It leads to Pharisee. It leads to a monk. You can't develop your hatred for sin by beating yourself down. It sounds weird, but a lot of people do. They think that. Well, what's the problem? Television is the problem? Okay, we'll get rid of television. Our kids never watch anything. Ultimately speaking, the television is not the problem. Ultimately speaking, it's your own wicked heart. And how do you get rid of that problem? Not by beating yourself down and saying, I'm just horrible. I'm a terrible person. I'm horrible. In fact, I'm going to wear rough clothing so that I can't have any comfort whatsoever. That's what they used to do, right? That's not the issue. The issue is get close to God. Get close to God. You get closer to God, you recognize what God hates. God hates sin. How do I know how much God hates sin? Because I get closer to God. And what starts to matter to me is what matters to God. And now I care about what God cares about. And so it's not just a pharisaical, I don't do that, I don't do that, I don't do that. No, it's Lord, what will that have me to do? What do you want, Lord? You don't want that in my life? I'll get rid of it. I could have it there. In fact, it's not even a verse of scripture that says I shouldn't have it there. But I just, Lord, something about our relationship says I shouldn't have it there. And so I'm gonna get rid of it. Amen? We'll look at one more and we'll be done this morning. Let's look at Proverbs chapter 29, 11. 29, 11. Wise man, and you could go through this, obviously we've scratched the surface just barely of what a wise person is, what a wise person does. 2911, it says, a fool uttereth all his mind, but a wise man keepeth it in till afterwards. A wise person holds his tongue and waits to formulate an opinion. Until when? Until he's spent some time with the Lord. Or spent some time with a wise person and discussed the issue. A fool uttereth all his mind, but a wise man keepeth it in till afterwards. People say, I just had to say it. I didn't want to say it, but I couldn't help myself. But the wise man knows he should keep his mouth shut. Wise people don't voice themselves all the time. See, it's not just, well, I thought it, and I'm going to be real. I'm going to be real. And so I thought it, I'm going to say it. You're a fool. You're a fool. You don't get a badge for saying hurtful things, even if they are true. Not a good badge, anyhow. A fool uttereth all his mind. Look at chapter 10, verse number 19. Chapter 10, verse 19. Our last one tonight, or this morning. 10, 19. Now here's a verse that gets me every time. If you're a dialectician, someone said, then this will get you. Proverbs 10 19 in the multitude of words there wanteth not sin but he that refraineth his lips is wise you know you think if you're a wise person you'd be the one that has something to say amen you would be the one that should speak but a wise person has a thought and doesn't say anything even a fool is counted wise when he holds his tongue the Bible said You ever see someone for the first time, stranger, and you know nothing about them, and they're standing there, they're not saying anything, they're just standing there, and you're trying to size them up in your mind? You ever see that before? You're trying to determine what kind of person, maybe you go to lunch with someone, this third party is silent, they're not saying anything. You're trying to determine what kind of person is this? You know, you come to a church and you see people, and you see them, how they're dressed, and they don't say anything. You wonder, what kind of person is that? They may be the most foolish person in the world, but you don't know. Why? Because their mouths are closed. Somebody said it's better to be quiet and to be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. Amen? Some people say, well, you just need to vent. Everybody needs to be heard. Everyone needs their voice. You need to find your voice. You need to say what you think. Hey, girlfriend, you need to speak up. You need to say what's on your mind. You need to come out with it. Let's just have a big confab. Let's all get together in the living room. Let's just let ourselves go and say whatever we want. That's a foolish thing to do. Very foolish. If you've ever done that, you'll know how foolish it was. A wise man keepeth it in till afterwards. So the wise man, the first group that we're looking at this morning and this week, next week we're going to look at the simple and we'll continue on there and I hope that it's a blessing to you. What happens to the wise man by the way? A wise man responds properly. and he is congratulated. He is pointed out as a good example. He is the kind of person that we want our kids to hang around with. He's the kind of person that we hope that our children marry. He's the kind of person that we want to sit by in church. He's the kind of person that we're glad is employed by our company. That's the kind of person that I want to be. And I hope that's the kind of person that you want to be. If you're not a wise person, you need to study the Book of Proverbs. And whenever you see that word wise, you need to find out what that wise man is doing, and you need to start doing it. Whatever you see that wise man not doing, you need to stop doing it. And the Bible says, he that walketh with wise men shall be wise. That's our promise from the scripture. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your goodness. Thank you for the opportunity to have a book that tells us the things that we know, that we need to know. Help us, Lord, as we go through this study to make the adjustments necessary. We pray, bless the service to follow in Christ's name. Amen. you.