It's a pleasure and a privilege
to be with you for the first time. As Marvin said, we've been friends
for years, and I'm grateful to the Lord and His good providence
that He did give me some good friends, and Marvin's one of
them. A great blessing to me, has been
for a long time. In Proverbs chapter 12, tonight
I just want to Bring a few thoughts from Proverbs
twelve thirteen. You know, the Lord is pleased
to teach us. He doesn't teach the way most
men do. With long theological discourses and. He teaches us. in simple pictures
and types, examples, parables. I'm glad he teaches us like we're
little children because that's what we are spiritually at best. And this is an example of that.
The wicked is snared by the transgression of his lips, but the just shall
come out of trouble This is a very interesting and
instructive picture because a snare is a trap with a very nasty and
unique characteristic about it. There's nothing else like a snare.
The more you pull, the more you struggle, the more you strive,
the more you work, the more caught you are. And this is a picture
now, the tighter the noose draws itself around you, the harder
it is to get out, the more you do about it. And this is a picture
of us in our wickedness, spiritually before God, doing all the wrong
things to get out. We're caught. We're trapped. We strive and we work. We think
the only way to get out is to run away from the trap, to fight,
to do something. Adam and Eve made aprons for
themselves. Cain was a tiller of the ground. These are pictures
of man trusting his own works, his own labors, his own efforts
to cover his shame before God, to manufacture a covering of
his own devising, to get him out of trouble with God. That
word trouble in the text is key. Trouble. You're snared. You're
in trouble. Adam would have been better off
naked before God than to be caught. with a covering that he made
himself. God hates nothing more, he declares, than self-righteous
pride. Adam's efforts just got him deeper
in trouble, and then he began to speak. You notice the word
lips in the verse. He began to speak, and it just
got worse and worse, didn't it? He blamed Satan, he blamed his
wife, and he ultimately blamed God for his trouble. I wouldn't
be in this snare if it wasn't for you. And it just got tighter
and tighter and tighter. The woman with the issue of blood,
spending all that she had and growing worse is a picture of
this same thing. The more she spent, the sicker
she got. The more we try to do to please
God in this flesh, the more we sin. The more we insult God. and trample under our vile feet
the precious blood of his Son. Man gets religious and goes to
church and God says, your solemn meetings and assemblies make
me sick. Your prayers I will not hear,
your religious activities my soul hateth, they are an abomination
to me. Isaiah chapter 1. This is what
they said in Matthew seven twenty two to our Lord. Now you think
about this. Here's some people. Facing God. Facing God's son. Having died. Come to the end,
this is it, and they're standing there before the one that made
them for the one without whom was not anything made that was
made. They're standing before their creator. And the Lord said
what they'll say to me in that day, when access to them is barred,
they'll say, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name?
The snare of your own lips. And in thy name cast out devils,
and in thy name done many wonderful works. And then will I profess
unto them, I never knew you, depart from me. You that work
iniquity. I think about that text as we
consider the passage in Proverbs 12. With their own lips, they
put themselves on a footing of works before the Son of God,
who taught everywhere he went, look unto me and be ye saved.
I am the door, I am the bread, I am the life, I am the truth,
I am the way. And they will stand there in
his very presence. This is the wicked now with the
snare of their own lips. They're in trouble, deep trouble.
By their own confession, they desire to be judged by the judge
of all the earth based on what they have done. And that's the very thing that
has them by the throat. The snare of their own lips.
What they did got them into the snare. And notice in the language
of the text in Proverbs, it says it's a snare of their own lips,
their own making, their own devising. And all that they do while in
that snare has only tightened it around them. And in the end,
when all is said and done, they're still trusting themselves. They're
still trusting the one They got him in the snare, the one that
was stupid enough to fall into the snare to begin with. They
still refuse, even then, to beg for mercy. They refuse to see themselves
as sinners, as God declares them to be, even then. They refuse to recognize the
authority, the righteous claims and truth of Christ that He preached
to them. that they heard from his lips
even as they stand before him. Let me ask you a question tonight
in myself. He said in that text there, many
will say to me in that day. Do you suppose that's literal?
Do you think people will actually say that? That they'll actually
refer our Lord to their works and their preaching and their
gifts as their hope for access to God,
as their hope for communion and fellowship with God, access into
his presence. Do you think that's literal?
What will you say to him in that day? The record shows I took the blows
and did it my way. People think, what a wonderful
commentary on a man's life. Does that sound pretty good? I did my best. Will you tell
him that? I did the best I could with what you gave me. That's
right back to the garden. You're blaming God for your sin.
Will you bring your best to God? What an insult. Well, there's one thing that
someone in a snare can do. The more you struggle, the tighter
the snare is going to get now. But there's one thing you can
do. But as the scripture clearly reveals, we will never do this
unless God is merciful to us first. No beggar ever cried for
mercy until he had it. But here's one thing, if God
is gracious, a snared sinner can cry. You can cry. God, be merciful to me, the sinner. Lord, if you will,
you can make me clean. Jesus, now Son of David, have
mercy on me. In Exodus 2, 23, it says, It
came to pass in the process of time that the king of Egypt died,
and the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage They
were in a trap too, weren't they? And it says, and they cried.
And their cry came up unto God by reason of the bondage. Even
somebody caught in a trap that they can't get out of can cry
by the grace of God. And listen to Exodus chapter
3 verse 7. And the Lord said to Moses, I
have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt
They've heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters, for I know
their sorrows, and I am come down to save them." Isn't that
beautiful? I've heard their cry, and I came
to save them. Is that your testimony? I cried. I lifted up my voice unto the
Lord, and He heard me. From His holy temple, He heard
me. He heard the cry of a worm. This is the simple gospel message
tonight. We have a God who hears the cry
of worms like us. He said, I've come down to save
them. And notice in our text now, this is talking about the
wicked and the righteous. And throughout the book of Proverbs,
we see that contrast. By nature, there's nothing but
wicked now. You notice that the righteous, too, they're in the
same trap. They just get out of it. That's
the only difference now. They're still in the same trap.
We're also in trouble. The just, and the just are just
simply those in Christ, of God, or you in Christ Jesus, who has
made unto you righteousness. Wisdom righteousness sanctification
and redemption the just are those in Christ and of God are you
in Christ? We're in trouble too. There's
no difference by nature. We're by nature the children
of wrath even as others But we go forth out of the snare we
escape how? There's only one way out of a
snare You can cry, but that won't get
you out of the snare One thing you can do is stop struggling.
That'd be a pretty good start, wouldn't it? You're just making
it tighter. Stop struggling. Quit. That's
a pretty good start, but that won't get you out either. Nothing
you do or don't do will get you out of trouble. But you're in
by nature before God, and you're sinfulness before Him. How then?
Somebody's got to come get you out of it. That's how you get
out of it. And it ain't the preacher. If you're snared by your own
works, your own lips, what comes out of your lips, by the way,
where does it come from? Our sin, our evil is the heart
problem. The expression of our lips comes
from the heart. How are we going to get out of
that snare? How will you get out? If it's your works, your sins
that got you in the trap, how are you going to get out? By
somebody else's works. Yours ain't, you're just going
to tighten it. That's all it's going to do. Somebody who is
not snared. It's a work done all together
for you by somebody else. It's a work done by someone who's
not in the same snare you're in. They can't help you. And because of the justice of
the holy God of heaven and earth, the Lord Jesus Christ must put
your snare upon himself. in order to get you out. He got
to put himself in that snare. He puts it around his own neck.
And whereas I would have fought and suffered for all eternity
and never could have broken that snare, my Savior took it and
broke it. He broke it. He took it upon
himself. Not without cost. Not without
suffering. Not without shame. But at infinite
cost, with unthinkable suffering, is there any sorrow like unto
his sorrow? And yet he broke it. And I can never be snared again.
The snare is broken. The sting of death is sin, and
the strength of sin is the law, 1 Corinthians 15, 56. But Acts
2, 23, him! being delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God, you have taken, and by wicked
hands have crucified and slain." He's talking to the Jews there.
He's talking to you. He's talking to me. But God raised him up. And when
He did, He raised him up having loosed the pains of death. That word loose means to loose
one bound, to unbind, to release from bonds, to set free. And that's how, by us, by means
of us taking him by wicked hands and crucifying him, this is how
he breaks the snare, by the power of his precious sin-cleansing
blood. When he was loosed, from the
pains of death, God raised him up because the offering that
he brought was satisfactory. The blood that he shed was sufficient
to redeem all those for whom he shed it and set them free
from the bondage, the snare of sin. And Christ as my representative
and my sin offering, if he can't beholden of it, neither can I. So without doing anything at
all, I'm free from the snare that
held me captive. Are you in the snare? Are you
weary of trying to pull free, only to find yourself tighter
and tighter bound? Cry unto the Lord Jesus Christ
for mercy. He's plenteous in mercy. He delights
to show mercy. And if the Son shall make you
free, You'll be free indeed. Amen. Lord bless you.