Proverbs 16.27, an ungodly man
diggeth up evil. And in his lips there is a burning
fire. Now this use of the word dig is the same as in Job 3.20. where it says, wherefore is light
given to him that is in misery and life unto the bitter in soul,
which longeth for death, but it cometh not, and dig for it
more than for hid treasures. So when it says he diggeth up
evil, it's talking about this ungodly man exerts energy, he
spends what energy he has and time he has pursuing evil. He pursues it, he desires it,
he searches for it. And it's interesting this, when
compared to what David wrote in Psalm 23, you'll remember,
while the ungodly man pursues evil, David said, God's goodness
is pursuing me. Surely his goodness and mercy
shall pursue me all the days of my life. That's the difference
that grace makes. One sinner pursuing evil and
one sinner being pursued by good. When applied to the ungodly man's
treatment of the scriptures, he diggeth for evil. It's so appropriate and true. You have to strive and strain
to make the scriptures say what you want them to. To make them
say what they do not, you've got to dig. You have to do some
digging, not in the form of real study. The man of God digs too, but
not this way. Not in the form of real study,
but in the form of twisting and perverting the word of God. You
have to strain, to strain at it and change it and make it
mean what it doesn't. To get man's false religion out
of this book, they use the same book in many cases. The false religion is not there,
but if they dig enough, they can twist a part of this passage
into a part of that passage and fool people who have no spiritual
understanding. You can't fool a believer like
that, but you can another ungodly man. A man who knows God by his grace,
as I said, will also search and dig in the scriptures. But he's
not digging for evil. He's digging for the hid treasure
of the truth of Christ. And by God's grace, he finds
it on every page. And you don't have to strain
the word of God. When God reveals it, it's clear
as it can be. And when he don't, it's not.
But as Paul said in 1 Corinthians 2, the Lord reveals the hidden
things of the spirit to his sheep. The ungodly man, what he's digging
for is a way And this is why it becomes an effort, a digging.
It becomes labor. It's not complicated when somebody
just preaches the simple truth that God is God. That's not complicated. That's not hard to understand.
God does as he pleases. That's what David, that's how
David characterized, there's a lot of different ways he could
have characterized his God. When the heathen asked him, where's
your God? But the way he characterized God is he's in the heavens, He's
done as he pleased. He does what he wants. That's
what it means to be God. He does what he wants to. So
when religion, they talk about God wanting to and trying to
and can't do it and hoping for the best, but falling short,
people going to hell anyway, in spite of all of God's efforts.
They've got to dig, they've got to strain at the scriptures.
They've got to take one out of context here. and put together
this monstrosity of a puzzle in order to deceive themselves
and the souls of men. And what they're doing is they're
digging for a way that even from this book that glorifies Christ
alone with every word, they can get some glory for themselves.
That's what they're digging for. And that's evil. Getting some glory for the flesh. That is the ungodly man's hid
treasure. You mark it down. Glory for self. And you're not
gonna find that in the word of God. You're gonna have to dig
up some evil. And it's not gonna come from
the scriptures. It's gonna come from your own wicked ungodly
heart. But you're gonna twist and use the scriptures to do
that. And the same applies to the last part of our verse. When
a man digs up evil rather than believe in the truth, he can't
shut up about it. When he thinks he's figured out
a way for man to get some glory, oh, he loves to tell everybody
about that. And they love to hear it. If they're also ungodly,
if they're without Christ, without the grace of God, they love to
hear it. But his lips are a destroying
fire. They have in them a destroying
fire. That's what it amounts to. The
destroying fire of false doctrine. Man-centered doctrine. There's
a reason we call it what we do. Man-centered, free will, works,
religion. That's not just a bunch of adjectives
thrown together to sound good. It's man-centered. In other words,
if you will, God will. Everything starts with you. Everything
depends on you. Here's the thing, maybe we should
operate on the assumption that God Almighty may just want to
do some things without you. You reckon? He may just want
to save somebody whether you do anything or not. You think? If you read this book, I think
you might agree with that. Man-centered religion. What we
mean when we say that is it's all about what you need to do
to get saved. Instead of what Christ did when
he saved sinners. Man gets the glory and salvation
when this evil is excavated. Free will, we call it free will
religion. Salvation is up to you. the most
important thing in the universe hinges upon your will. That's not just wrong. It's evil,
according to God. It's evil. It's not just a mistake. It's satanic. It's a destroying
fire. It makes God weak and man to
be the decider of everything vital. It's a horrible, satanic
lie, and we need to recognize it as such. Don't be fooled by the nice,
sentimental face that religion puts on their evil. It's the working of Satan in
this world. It's not the things that people think of when they
think of evil. It's the false doctrine that
sounds so good to the flesh. That's the evil. We call it works religion for
obvious reasons. If the Philippian jailer, you
remember when he asked Paul and Silas, what must I do to be saved? I can tell you this with authority
now. I've been in false religion for
many years as a young man. And I know it hadn't changed
because I see it on the television. I see it from people that I knew
back then. that are now some of them preaching. It hadn't changed. If the Philippian
jailer had asked one of these ungodly men in our text that
digs up evil, what must I do to be saved? They would have
given him the five easy steps to salvation. They would have
taken him down the Roman road. Have you ever heard of that one?
The Roman road. They would have said, walk this
aisle and repeat after me. They would have said, you must
live the Christian life. You must tithe and pray many
times a day. You've got to read your Bible
this many times a day. You must make a decision for
Jesus. Anything except just believe God. Believe on his son. Believe the
record that God has given concerning his son. And this is the record
that God has given unto us eternal life. And this life is in his
son. Sinners are still digging. They're
still working, striving, laboring, and are heavy laden. And what they have when they've
dug all they can dig is just more evil than they had already. And the Lord Jesus Christ is
still saying, come unto me all you that labor and are heavy
laden, all of you that are digging. All you're gonna get is more
evil. Come unto me and rest. Come unto me and rest. Lay down
your shotgun, surrender to King Jesus and lay down your shovel
too. Lay down your shovel. The Lord
Jesus does not need for you to do anything. He doesn't need
you to do anything. Put the shovel down and just
look what he's done for sinners and believe with all your heart,
he did that for me. He laid down his life for me.
He accomplished salvation for me. I get it now when the scripture
says this, This is the record that God has given unto us eternal
life. We haven't earned it. We didn't
merit it. We didn't distinguish ourselves
from others so as to attain it. We didn't make a decision for
it. We didn't choose it. We didn't want it. It wasn't up to us. He's given
it to us by His grace, by free and sovereign grace. And what
that looks like is Christ. This life, it's not giving us,
you know, some kind of life full of, you know, the prosperity
of earthly things like religion talks about. This life is in
His Son. He gave us life when he put us
in his Son. Cease from your own works and
rest in the Savior. Rest in salvation finished, salvation
perfected. That's the message of our text.
The evil man, the ungodly, notice it's the ungodly man. that digs
for evil. And not just a man, the evil person digs for evil. The more he digs, the more evil
he is. The more he works, the more he
sins. And everything he says is a lie,
everything. By God's grace, those who know him have ceased
from their labors and rested in him alone. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your grace
and thank you for the plain message of Christ, the simplicity that's
in him, the all-inclusiveness of our Savior, He is our salvation,
our righteousness, our sin offering, our all and in all. And may we
come to know that more and more, more this very day than we've
ever known it. Lean on Him harder than we ever
have. Praise Him with more, with more
zeal and enthusiasm than we ever have. And look ever, ever more away
from this wretched flesh. Bless us in Christ, in his precious
name, amen. Amen. I think we'll just stay
in here and fellowship a little bit again this morning. And keep a check on the the water back here, make sure
it's not freezing or...