I heard Brother Aaron's message, Aaron Reisinger, when he was here speaking to you and challenged through the book of Proverbs. I love the book of Proverbs also, but he has challenged me to read more, study more in this area. I am preparing for eye surgery here in about a week and a half, Lord willing, and so I'm going to be off about a week and a half. He said, you won't be able to go to work and drive, do those kind of things. And I said, what about preaching? He said, do you preach from up here? And I said, I can barely preach from notes. And he said, well, you're going to be in trouble. But I'm going to blow the font real big up on my printer and just try to keep going, keep going. Proverbs 1, 20 through 22. We'll read these verses. We'll pick up a few others as we go along. Proverbs 1, verse 20 says, 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? We love simplicity. and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge. Let's pray this morning. Father, again, we thank you for an opportunity to be in your house. Thank you for the blessing of health. Thank you for the wonderful fellowship that we feel here. We have that with every believer, every true believer in you. Thank you so much for that wonderful welcome and that love that we share. We share the same spirit with believers. Thank you so much for that communion we have together. Thank you for those who made a sacrifice to be here, to hear from you. Nobody came to hear from me. They came to hear from you. So I pray that you'd fill me with your Holy Spirit, that you'd protect my lips, that I wouldn't say anything amiss, and that you'd teach us this morning. Yes, please. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Amen. It's hard to think about homecoming service. Sheila and I, and the boys, we hit the door back there, and she said, I smell food. It is hard to think about homecoming without food. And people had a lot of different tastes in food. I have pretty simple tastes. I really do. My favorite type of meal is brown beans. Cornbread. Jiffy cornbread. I don't like homemade. I don't know why. I'm broken. I know that, but I like greens with vinegar. I don't know what kind of greens I like. My wife can tell you, but I like oven roasted potatoes, which has little pepper flakes or something she puts on it. I don't know. Man, I just, I had some beans and cornbread at my grandmother's. I ate lunch at her house every day on the mail wrap. And I had that and I came home that evening and Sheila had my favorite meal, the beans and the cornbread and the potatoes and greens and everything. And I just gobbled it up and got done. And I said, Granny had beans for lunch today too. And she said, why didn't you tell me? She said, I would have fixed you something else. I said, I know, you would have fixed me something else. I wanted it again. But this morning, we are going to focus on three different types of people described in this verse here in verse 22. The simple. the scorner and the fool. We were blessed to be able to go on a cruise for our anniversary, Sheila and I, 25th anniversary. You can eat 24-7 on a cruise. Anybody ever been on a cruise? You know what I'm talking about. They got food everywhere. If you want to go gain 15 pounds or something like that, go on a cruise. That's perfect for you. But they've just got food everywhere and you can get it all hours of the day and night. Some of it is limited, but you can get food somewhere on that boat at some time. But they have everything, just pizza, burgers, hot dogs, Mexican, Chinese. But they have every evening where you could go in and you could have a sit-down meal. Now, the sit-down meal's a little more sophisticated, and you get to order it, you know, and pick what you want. The menu on the boat we were on changed every day. And so you can try some different things, those kind of things. Sheila tried everything, I think. Not all at once, but she tried. They had escargot. which is snails. She had that. I wrote down some of these things that she had. Calamari, which is squid. Mahi-mahi, which is dolphin fish. She had sushi, which is raw fish. She had a salad that was only flowers. You could eat all these different types of flowers. On it goes. She tried something different every night. Me, with my simple tastes, I scorned all of that. We go in there, there's a different menu. I'm looking down through that menu. I want to know which steak it is tonight. I had steak every night. Different kind every night, but that was all I wanted was steak. Give me the steak and A1. A1 is something hard to find on a cruise ship from what I've found. I mean, they came through for me, but it's not like you can just, a restaurant, here's one on this table, you know, but I got that. But I scorned all that other junk to opted for those simple choices I have been called a fool for putting a1 on my steak though. I Love a1. I just do I Did get a chance to eat at a really fancy restaurant one time and and I was warned That I might offend the chef if I asked for a1 I did it anyway I figured when the chef starts buying my meal, he can eat it the way he wants. I'll eat it the way he wants, but I was eating it that way. I love young people. I'm an old person on the outside trapped in a young person's body. My wife says I've just got way more toys than any adult should have. I'm not talking about big kind of toys. I'm talking about hoverboards and I've got a unicycle. I just like to play and I love to act silly. My twin brother has a couple grandbabies right now. I get to see them every week. Every week, they come to a baby day at my grandmother's, which is where I eat lunch on the mail route. And they come, and they both want to sit on my lap at the same time while I'm trying to eat. And my grandmother, every time, she says, don't get up there. Leave Ronnie alone. Let him eat his lunch. And I said, no, Granny, let him come. I don't care. And they're shoving stuff in my face, and I'm trying to do it. They're sticking hands in. But I love them. But as much as we love young people, I'm challenged because it seems like it's harder and harder to get young people in church. And it is. That's really what we're going to focus on this morning and draw our attention to because there are so many things that pull their attention away from God's things. There are sports, and there's music, and there's hobbies, and there's all these kind of things. And you make a stand for God, you're going to suffer in some of those things. They're going to say, well, if you don't show up for this on Wednesday or this on Sunday, your kid's not going to get a play. There's going to be repercussions. for God's people to take a stand. But to me, the greatest deterrent for God's children, young children being in God's house, getting to know God, serving God, is training. You know, sometimes we failed in training them, and so Solomon shares some words of wisdom here, and I believe these are sort of a training manual, if you will. If you look back at Proverbs 1 and verse 8 there, you see he addresses this to his son there, Proverbs 1.8, My son, hear the instruction of thy father, and forsake not the law of thy mother. We are supposed to share the wisdom of God with others. Deuteronomy 6, I'm going to limit everything in Proverbs except for Deuteronomy 6. I do like to share a lot of the Word of God when I preach because I think that's a lot more important than what I have to say. But Deuteronomy 6, 5 and 6 says this, the Lord thy God with all thine heart and with all thy soul and with all thy might. And these words which I command thee this day shall be in thine heart. So the wisdom of the word of God has to be in our hearts. It has to find its lodging there. It can't just be come in one ear and out the other. It has to be the foremost thing. I've heard Tim say this many times. I listen to his sermons all the time. Every week I get them and I tell our people the same thing. The word of God is the most important part of the church service. It really is. That next verse, Deuteronomy 6, 7, he says, And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. Sharing the Word of God, sharing the wisdom of God's Word that comes from our heart because we've taken it in. The first place that we're supposed to share it is from home. It's supposed to be shared there through our children, our grandchildren, our relatives, those type of people. That's a conscious effort to teach them at home, to teach them diligently there. Not just take them to Sunday school. We can take them to Sunday school, and they're going to get a portion of that. I remember running the church van years ago, bringing kids whose parents never came to church. Never came to church. Most of them don't go to church today. They never follow through. You know, they're coming, getting good instruction here at the house of God, and then they're going home and their parents are undoing it. They're teaching them something different or allowing different things there. But here in this verse, he says, talk of them when thou sittest in thy house. Talk about God at home. That's important for us to do. Mealtimes are a wonderful time. If you can sit down with your family and eat, that's a good time to talk about God. He also says, when thou walkest by the way. Now walking was the dominant way of traveling in that time. So what he's saying is when you're traveling, talk about God. In the car, you've got them trapped there anyway. Steal that phone away from them. Steal a video game, whatever they got. I tapped one little boy who was laying here in a pew watching some little video or something. I said, is that good? He was like, who are you? I don't know who you are. But the next one there, when thou liest down, go to bed talking about God. When thou risest up, wake up talking about God. That's important. And so it does extend to other areas of our life. It's not something that we're supposed to hide, that we're supposed to keep secret. Everybody that knows us at all should know we belong to God. They should know that because we're going to be talking about it. We're going to be talking about church. We're going to be talking about God's things. But if we're not practicing those things at home, It will be very difficult when you leave home to talk about God to people that are unsaved, people out in the world there. And so Proverbs 1 verse 20 and 21 again there, he says, this is the proclamation of God's wisdom. 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. So wisdom crieth without, that's out loud. That word is actually ranan, which means to shout for joy, cry for joy, to sing out for joy. Do you notice the common theme in that word? Joy, thank you. It's joy. It really is. We don't just sit and wait for people to figure it out on their own. We should be showing it out loud. We should be doing it. It should be done with joy. You see some Christians out there in the world, and some of them, they'll talk about God once in a while. And my grandfather used to say it looks like they're weaned on green persimmons or something. You know what I'm talking about? You know, that kind of attitude, the joy should show. In the streets, again, that's on the road when we're traveling there, when we're on the move. In the chief place of concourse, that would be the busiest places there where all the people gather. majority of people assemble in the openings of the gates. Everybody has to go in and out through that way. Everybody has to. And so usually magistrates would have judgment in those places. And so that's a public gathering place. That's also where beggars gathered also because everybody's coming in and out. That's your best opportunity to get some type of alms there. But we need to share the wisdom of God in those places. And so we're going to share here in God's house. We're going to do it here. And that's wonderful. We can be disciples and learners together. Anybody know German in here? Nobody? What about Russian? Portuguese? We had a missionary here a while back that spoke Portuguese. His little kid just rambled it off. I may have told you that he bounced back and forth from English to Portuguese back and forth. And we're talking along, everything's going good, and he bounced to Portuguese. And I'm like, what? And his parents would say, English, English. Why don't we know those languages? Tim was talking about the brother. What is it, 43 languages? Oh, praise the Lord for that. Right. Why don't we learn those other languages? Well, to me it's just not very valuable. I've got a limited amount of space up here. I mean, my wife has a lot more up here than I do. I'm not ashamed to admit that. But I'm like a closet. I've got limited space. I'm not even a walk-in closet. I'm just a little pop-open door. And so anything I cram in here extra, something else is probably going to pop out. So I've got to be careful. So things that we don't need, I tend to forget those kind of things. But the same thing's true about the wisdom. from God's Word. If you don't proclaim it, if you don't use it... I remember Pastor Wayne telling me, what was he learning, German or something like that? And he'd tell me, Gutenheimer, you know, Pumpernickel, I don't know what he was saying. He'd say these things, tell me what it meant in two seconds. I thought it was intriguing and then I'd forget it, but it wasn't useful to me. The same thing could be said about God's Word. If you don't see the value in it, if it doesn't actually get into your heart and you say, well, I think I know how to use that, then it'll just be like those other things. They'll just pop out. But you can't do them with joy. It's not going to stay either. Look at verse 22. Proverbs 1, he says, how long you simple ones, will you love simplicity, and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge. Those are turning points for each of us. That's what he's talking about there, especially young people. I want to use the illustration of young people, but these same kind of things will apply to us as well. These are places that a person needs to move away from. All of these are things that we need to move away from there. Nobody is born a fool. Nobody is born a scorner. Now, we're all born simple. We are born that way, but we're supposed to move away from that. What are simple ones? Well, we'd say they're a little bit green maybe, a little bit naive. Young people would definitely fit into that category. Innocent. One other phrase we would say about them is they're probably open-minded. They are open-minded. Some are very impressionable at that time. They're open to suggestion. They're open to instruction. They're even open to correction at that stage there, right? And so that's how we're born. We're impressionable. We're open, right? We're not born with the wisdom of God. We're born in our sin. We are. And we're just simple at first. We're ready for the wisdom of God. We're ready to attach ourselves to it. If somebody trains us properly, somebody teaches us, we get that instruction there. And that's okay at first. It's okay to be simple at first. It's not okay to continue that way, though. We understand that. When babies start out, that's a pretty simple life. They eat, they sleep, and they poo. They get rid of it. That's basically all there is. And then they get just a little bit older and they play along with that. And they start having fun. But it's a simple life. There's just really no responsibility. Nothing's required of them. They're just growing from that. They're enjoying life and that's okay. If that's the same description of your teenager, you're in serious trouble. If they just eat and sleep and poo and play, you've went bad wrong somewhere. But that happens, doesn't it? It does. I've heard parents say, well, they're young. They'll have all their life to have responsibilities and chores and those kind of things. Just let them get good grades and play. They'll be fine later on. They're missing the training part. They're missing that. They just say, well, what's it going to hurt? Just let them be kids. If we don't lead them into godly wisdom by giving them more and more responsibility along the way, they'll become a target. A victim is what they will become. Proverbs 14 verse 15, if you want to look over there, it talks about the simple, some mistakes that they'll make. Proverbs 14 and verse 15, he says, the simple believe at every word, but the prudent man looketh well to his going. The simple are, by nature, trusting. They'll believe everybody's honest, everybody has their best interest in mind. They wouldn't do anything to hurt me. The next thing you know, they're sending a few thousand dollars to a prince in Nigeria, and he's going to send millions back, and they're going to get to keep that. Or they get a letter in the mail from a lawyer and says, this is totally legal. Just put $5 in an envelope. put your name at the top of the list of these 10 people, mail it to 20 people, and then they'll mail it to their 20 people, and they'll keep moving it down. Next thing you know, you'll have $2.187465 million through the mail. That's a scam, right? But people do that all the time. I'm a mailman. I know people that have done that. They do. And you think, well, how in the world could people be that trusting? Training is part of it. Training is part of it. But by giving them responsibilities, young people, we're teaching them to be discerning. Sometimes people aren't going to do what they say they're going to do. They are going to try to do you harm. They are going to prey on you. Sometimes people are going to deal honestly. Other times, they're going to try to deceive, to try to prey. And that's what he's warning about in those verses. The simple believe with every word. They're going to become a victim. They're going to be a prey. to somebody else. By dealing with some of those things early, we put restrictions. What's allowed? What's not allowed? How do we do that? At a very young age, that could be something as simple as a designated bedtime. You think that's a joke. I know families that they have no bedtime for their young children. Well, they don't go to school. They don't have any responsibilities. There's no reason for them to go to bed early. We'll just let them stay up. When they fall down somewhere, I know one that fell asleep and woke up the next morning. It was inside its laundry hamper, you know, one of them things. It had crawled in their play and just collapsed in their bedroom, in the laundry hamper. That's where they found it the next morning. They just went in there, shut the door, and let them go. You know, what's wrong with that? Well, they do that. They will affect the people that do have jobs and responsibilities the next day. And so then you're going to have to deal with that. Toddlers may be bouncing off the walls at 9 o'clock. Put them to bed. Put them to bed. They need more sleep than we do. They'll be ready for church Sunday morning if they're used to that, that training schedule. Older children, responsibilities, that could be things like making their bed, cleaning their room, taking out the garbage, mowing the grass, whatever. Going to bed at a decent hour is also a good thing for an older child. I know kids around here, some of them, they get on the bus at 6 o'clock in the morning. They've got to ride forever. They get up at 5 in the morning. Well, you get up at 5 o'clock in the morning. What time do you need to go to bed? 4, 3, 2, 1, midnight, 11, 10, 9. You say, well, they're teenagers. They can stay up to 11. That's six hours sleep. What are they going to do at school? What are they going to do at church? They're going to be half in, half out, kind of like you all with that meal back there. You just come in, come out, you know, shake yourself away. That's how they'll be, right? So they're simple ones, but we don't want them to grow up to be simple ones. Look over in Proverbs 22, 3. A prudent man foreseeth the evil. He knows it's coming. It said, a prudent man foreseeth the evil and hideth himself, but the simple pass on and are punished. The simple don't recognize evil. They don't see the danger in it. They don't see the harm in it. If they aren't protected from those things, they'll be punished. Now that's not just discipline kind of things. That's not where the parents are punished. They'll be punished by their own consequences. We see that. That's why teenagers argue with their parents about curfews all the time. They don't see the harm in it. They don't see the harm in it. I told this story a while back at our church when Sheila and I were dating. The mall closed at 9 o'clock. The putt-putt golf place closed at 9 o'clock. All these things that we could do closed at 9 o'clock, and so we had to be home between 9 and 9.30. That was when the date ended. It didn't matter if you started at 4 o'clock in the afternoon, but the date had to end at that time. When we were engaged, they upped that to 10 o'clock. And we could be sitting on her mom and dad's couch at that time, but we weren't going to be out. We weren't going to be out there. And so they could foresee the evil that might follow if you give them too much freedom, too much temptation there. And so we set them up to be gullible and naive about the dangers of sin, and then they'll walk into those things, and then they'll be a victim. They'll be punished by them. The next step, simple one, is a scorner. Skorner's someone we might call a know-it-all, smart aleck, a mocker. It isn't someone who's, you know, like somebody who just jokes around and teases with people. That's not what this word's talking about. Skorner's a person who's developed the attitude that they know it all, that they don't need any instruction from anybody else. They don't need godly counsel there. They already have enough information to succeed. That's a dangerous place. Back in Proverbs 21, 22, It's a dangerous place because they will refuse instruction. But it's not hopeless at that point. He says, there, how long ye simple ones will ye love simplicity, and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge? How long will the scorner delight in their scorning? Even a child can progress to this point. Even a young child can become self-willed, stubborn there. You know, this may be a child in school who's rebellious against authority. They don't want to be corrected. They don't want their parents to correct them, don't want teachers to correct them. instead of being challenged to remedy a problem and improve their grades, they're content, some are content to absolutely fail through school, just to show them. I'll show them, I'm not gonna do any of this. I actually know a lady who's talking about her son, and she said, he won't do his homework, and I'm not, I don't know what to do, I'm not gonna make him do it. I told him if he doesn't do it, he's gonna be held back, and he's gonna have to repeat that grade, and if he does it, that's on him. He did, he failed, he had to repeat, guess who it's on? Them, the parents. A child can't expect to make those kind of decisions on their own. They have to be helped in that way there. We don't allow a baby to play around an electrical receptacle with a sharp metal object, do we? You don't say, well, they stick it in there once, they'll know better next time. No, we don't do that. That's foolish. That's scorning appropriate wisdom. We know that. Proverbs 13 verse 1. Proverbs 13 and verse 1. It says, A wise son heareth his father's instruction, but a scorner heareth not rebuke. A scorner doesn't want to listen. Some will actually delight in that ability. If you're there at Proverbs 15 verse 12, it doesn't even matter if it's to their own harm, as long as they think they've won the battle of wills. That's what it's about at that point. It's the battle of wills. Proverbs 15 verse 12, he says, A scorner loveth not one that reprobeth him, neither will he go unto the wise. They don't recognize correction as an act of love. They don't seek counsel from others. When a child steals a simple one, they'll see correction as coming from love, discipline. They may not love it at that moment. I never enjoyed it the very second I got a spanking from my mom or my dad and said, oh, yes, thank you for loving me. I never did. Later on, I recognized that was a good thing. But a scorner won't recognize those kind of things. And they'll see it as a violation of their will. You're trying to force your will on me? Yes, that's exactly what you're trying to do to a young person. You're trying to force your will on them so they'll follow God's will. That's the end goal. That's the end goal. It's not our will. I don't want my kids to be exactly like me. Well, I would, but they're not. But we want them to follow God's will. I remember an incident with Dylan. He remembers this. I shouldn't have told his name, but I already did. But he had a little incident where he was going to scorn us. It was a battle of wills. And Sheila had bought the wrong kind of green beans. They were the French style. They're cut different, but they taste the same. But he said, I don't like those. He was young. I said, they're green beans. You like green beans. Eat them. No, no, no. Finally, we forced him to. He stuck it in his mouth. Right there in the plate. Sheila kind of scorned me a little bit. She said, what do you want me to do now? I said, get him some more. She went back, got him another plate full. I said, you're going to eat them green beans. He put them in. There it went, right out on the plate again. Sheila said, what do you want me to do? Get him another plate. I said, he'll eat them. I said, they're green beans. We're not trying to force liver on him. We're giving him something. The third try, he did it. Now, we weren't trying to make him puke in the dinner plate. It was disgusting for all of us. But it's a battle of the will. That's what it's about. And kids will push us. If we shy away from the battle of wills because they're hard and they try our patience, they really do. But if we don't overcome that attitude of scorn in them, we're training our children then to become rebellious, stubborn, stiff-necked, those type of things. Those things are all contrary to God's will for our lives. If you surrender to the battle of wills to a child that has a scornful attitude, it will lead them to the next step away from God, which is the foolishness. Proverbs 9, verse 7 and 8. Proverbs 9, 7 and 8. says, He that reproveth a scorner getteth to himself shame, and he that rebuketh a wicked man getteth himself a blot. Reprove not a scorner lest he hate thee. Rebuke a wise man, and he will love you. Don't keep arguing with them, is what he's saying. Don't get into a screaming match with them. That works with other people. You're going to share the gospel with some people, and they're just going to say, I don't believe all that foolishness. And you're going to start trying to give them the sound gospel and good godly counsel. And I actually know a man, I wasn't involved in this, but I know a man. who actually got into a screaming match on another man's lawn. This was a Christian trying to witness to a guy who didn't believe the gospel, and they actually got into a screaming match, and the neighbor had to break them up right there on the front lawn. They were getting ready to come to blows, and he said, you guys are going to have to leave, at least get away from my place. You know, that's not what it's about. You know, it's not. We're not trying to get into a screaming match, but sometimes we do have to drive out the foolishness in a child with the rod of correction. That's a biblical principle. Proverbs 22, 15, foolishness is bound in the heart of a child, but the rod of correction shall drive it for him. But don't drive them to hate us by repeating the same things over and over again. I absolutely despise, I hear this once in a while, I'm going to count to three. One, two, I mean it. One, I'm counting to three. When I get to three, you're gonna get it. One, two, they didn't know where three was. I don't know. I just looked for them to go to four because they never got to three. I just wanted to yell out in Walmart one time, three, now give it to them. That's what they need. No, no. Notice this Proverbs 19.25. Proverbs 19.25. There's still some correction available. At this stage, Proverbs 19.25, smite a scorner, and the simple will behave, and reprove one that hath understanding, and he will understand knowledge. You know, if you have an older child that's acting with scorn. It'll help the younger ones if that's corrected properly. I remember my sister one time, she was brazen enough and developed this scorning kind of attitude with my mom, and she defied her to her face. I didn't think my mom was ever going to quit smacking them lips. She just, you're not going to talk to me that way, and she just pip, pip, pip over again. You know, me and my brother, we got into a lot of meanness. I have a twin brother. We got in a lot of meanness. I never did that to my mom, though. Never did that. I said, I saw what she did to my sister. I don't want any part of that. I'll take the paddle or just anything. The greatest danger is, though, that they go from a simple to a scorner to the fool. Proverbs 1 7. Proverbs 1 7. It says this, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. But fools despise wisdom and instruction. Fools despise godly wisdom, instruction from God's Word. They don't have a fear of the Lord. Proverbs 10.18 Here's where it's going to. We don't want it to get to this point. Proverbs 10.18 He that hideth hatred with lying lips, and he that uttereth a slander is a fool." Remember, if you keep reproving a scorner instead of correcting their will, that'll turn to hatred. That's what it'll turn to. If that isn't turned away, the scorner will just try to hide that hatred by lying. They'll become a fool. That's how that'll And so they don't want to hear those words of condemnation over and over again, so they'll lie about that. You know kids will lie about things that don't matter? You've got kids, you already know that. They'll lie about things that don't matter, especially when they're young. It's not maybe something that'll get them into trouble. It's not like they got caught and they broke something and they lied about that. That's not what I'm talking about. They'll just lie about goofy things, things that don't matter at all. And then when they get caught in the lie, Right? Then they'll say, oh, I was just joking, you know, I was just teasing with you, I was just doing all that. Why do they do that? Proverbs 14, 9 says this. Proverbs 14, 9. Fools make a mock at sin, but among the righteous there is favor. It's practice. That's why they do that. They're seeing what works, what doesn't work, when it doesn't matter. And then, when a situation comes up, they'll say, oh, well this one worked before, this is what I'm going to try. This is how I'm going to tell that lie this time. Satan does that with us, does he not? Of course. The devil's not omniscient like God. He doesn't know everything about us. How does he learn our little weak points? How does he know which buttons to push? Practice! He'll try something, right? And if that works, well guess what? Oh, I'm going to keep going back to that one. Same thing with the kid's line. I'm going to do it that way. Over and over again. You know, when we fall into those kind of temptations and sin, expect that to keep coming. Expect Satan to keep pushing that button. That's the weak point. That's the point where we're going to fall. But children, practice lying. They're developing that scorning attitude, and at some point in the future, they'll play us for the fool. That's what they'll do. That's a dangerous game. Proverbs 26, 11. Just a couple more verses before we close there. Proverbs 26, 11. A fool keeps going back to it. A fool keeps going back to it. As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly. I heard a guy say one time, I hate to keep bringing up the throw-up stories after dinner, but you know, I heard a person say one time when a dog eats something that doesn't agree with it, it throws it up and then it just can't resist a good hot meal and so, you know, it goes to it again, you know. Once that foolishness is bound in the heart, It's hard to get rid of at that point. They keep going back to it, whatever age that is. And so if you allow that to set up in a child's life, they'll continue that on into adulthood. Proverbs 17, 10 says this, Proverbs 17, 10. A reproof entereth more into a wise man than a hundred stripes into a fool. A child that's trained from a young age properly will learn to receive instruction properly. They will. Where a fool, it would take a hundred stripes and they still won't receive. Still won't receive. If a child can't be corrected by God's plan for discipline, can't be trained in the way that God wants them to go. Here's the end result, Proverbs 22, 15. Foolishness is bound in the heart of a child, but the rod of correction shall drive it far from him. If they can't be corrected that way, that's God's method of correction. I know that's not popular today. That's God's correction. But if we've dropped that ball in training our young people at some point along the way, We haven't been proclaiming God's wisdom from God's word outside of church, in our house, on the road, before you go to bed, when you wake up in the morning, if we hadn't set proper boundaries for them and enforced those kind of things. If we haven't expected them to assume certain responsibilities along the way and gradually trained them to that, if we've allowed them to talk back, refuse correction, be a scorner, given up on fighting those battles because it's hard, that's a battle of the will. We've allowed them to practice sin and get away with it and go on to that next stage. Don't wait until they've become a fool to try to turn that around. Psalm 53.1, last verse. Psalm 53.1, the fool has said in his heart, there's no God. Corrupt are they, and have done abominable iniquity. There's none that do us good. Nobody wants to get to that point. Nobody wants to get to that point and say, how did it happen? Well, kids grow up fast, don't they? Of course they do. My oldest one's 30. I can remember that green bean incident like it was yesterday. I don't know how old he was. What was he? Five? Five years old. I can remember that. And you look back and I look in the mirror and I thought, where did my barber do with my brown hair? I used to have some. They cut out all the brown and leave that gray for me. How did it happen? That's the same way Satan deceives us, isn't it? Yes. It's not like that, is it? No. It's just a little bit at a time. Yes, it is. Let's pray this one. Father, again, we thank you for an opportunity to be in your house. Thank you for your Word you blessed us with. We're simple. Simple people. Things that we should have learned, we've put off. We haven't grasped some of the wisdom from your Word. Much of that on us as adults is because we haven't studied it like we should have, or as long as we should have. We've scorned some of that instruction. We've taken it in sometimes. We've had good godly people who shared it with us here in your house and other places. And sometimes we took it in, but we didn't feel the need that it was important enough for us to make a part of our heart, part of our life. And then we let it go, and then Satan makes a fool of us. Then we embarrass you. Pray that you'll forgive us of that. Help us to understand that Satan's going to draw us away slowly. That's his plan. So it's unnoticeable, just little bits at a time. Help us to be on guard against that. Help us to know how to train our children, how to instruct our grandchildren, whoever we have influence with, that you'll give us wisdom about that. Ask you to bless in the invitation time. In Jesus' name, we pray. Thank you so much for the wonderful challenge. 514, let's stand together, please. I think this will be one of the answers to the difficulty we face. Obedience. 514. 514. 514. Obedience is the very best thing. So let it be. Living in the sight of the world. ♪ Looking up on a tree ♪ ♪ And I should raise my hand and obediently ♪ ♪ Glory to you we sing ♪ ♪ For he has saved the very best of me ♪ ♪ So let it be ♪ ♪ For he hears me, I hear and see ♪ you. What must now mean more than these? Obedience is the very best way Bill, would you mind holding the curtain for a minute? Heavenly Father, we're really thankful, Lord, for all that we've heard and seen just here today. We just thank you, Lord, for the fellowship that we had. We ask, Lord, that you help us to apply it to our lives. Yes, please. And that you bring us back to the next point in time, grant us safety. Amen. Thank you so much. Don't forget your food next door, please. Do it, please. Don't forget that. Have a wonderful week. We'll see you on Wednesday. No service tonight.