Proverbs chapter 2. I'm going
to start reading. I'm going to read these whole
22 verses again tonight. My son, if thou wilt receive
my words and hide my commandments with thee, so that thou incline
thine ear unto wisdom and apply thine heart to understanding.
Yea, if thou criest after knowledge and lift up thy voice for understanding,
if thou seekest her as silver and searchest for her as gold,
searches for hers hid treasures, thou shalt understand the fear
of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord giveth wisdom. Out of his mouth cometh knowledge
and understanding. He layeth up sound wisdom for
the righteous. He is a buckler to them that
walk uprightly. He keeps the path of judgment
and preserves the way of his saints. Then shalt thou understand
righteousness and judgment and equity. yea, every good path. When wisdom entereth into thine
heart, and knowledge is pleasant unto thy soul, discretion shall
preserve thee, understanding shall keep thee, to deliver thee
from the way of the evil, from the man that speaketh froward
things, who leave the paths of uprightness to walk in the ways
of darkness, who rejoice to do evil, and delight in the frowardness
of the wicked, whose ways are crooked, and they froward in
their path, to deliver thee from the strange woman, even from
the stranger which flattereth with her words, which forsaketh
the God of her youth and forgeth the covenant of her God. For
her house inclineth unto death and her paths unto the dead.
None that go unto her return again, neither take they hold
of the paths of life. that thou mayest walk in the
way of good men and keep the paths of the righteous. For the
upright shall dwell in the land and the perfect shall remain
in it. But the wicked shall be cut off from the earth and the
transgressors shall be rooted up, rooted out of it. Back over here in Proverbs chapter
two. I want to start dealing with
verse 10 down to the end of the chapter where it says, Wisdom,
when wisdom entereth into thine heart and knowledge is pleasant
unto thy soul. But you remember when we talked
last week about when you search for wisdom like you'd search
for silver and look for it like it was a hid treasure. then there's
great blessings that come with that, desire and wisdom above
all things. If you sought wisdom like you
did silver and you sought wisdom like you're looking for a hidden
treasure, a treasure chest full of gold somewhere, look what
it does for you. He said in verse five, then thou
shall understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge
of God. Oh my, only wisdom can forgive
you that fear of God and the knowledge of the Lord. Oh my,
what a blessing that is that wisdom brings to us. And the
Lord, He's the one that gives us this wisdom. He's the one
that's got it. The only one who has it. And
He's the only one that can give it. And oh, He gives sound wisdom
to the righteous. He keeps the paths of judgment.
He keeps us in the paths. And He judges what path we take
and preserves the way of His saints. And then He brings us
to understand what righteousness really is. what equity is, and
he makes us to understand the good paths. And now I want us
to see what wisdom that enter into the heart keeps us from. Not only does wisdom do something
special for us, but it also preserves us from some things. He said
here in verse 10, When wisdom entereth into thy
heart, and knowledge is pleasant unto the soul. Oh my, Where's
wisdom to be found? Where do you want it placed to
be? Solomon said, here in the heart. When it enters into your
heart. You know, a lot of people have
a lot of knowledge in their head. You can have this knowledge in
your head. Your head can be full of knowledge. Get the greatest education. Even
get a religious education. But without this wisdom, it's
just nothing but deep, deep ignorance is all it is. And so until God
gives you this wisdom and this wisdom enters into your heart,
into that affections, into the soul. And that's where he says
when that happens, life comes with it. Light comes with it. Power comes with it. That's what
happens when wisdom enters into your heart. Oh, we have the light.
The lights turned on. Life comes into our soul. Power comes with this wisdom. Look what he said over here in
Proverbs 4.23. Look what he said here. Keep thy heart with all diligence,
for out of it, out of the heart, are the issues of life. And all
wisdom enters into your heart. And when it enters their light,
it comes on in the understanding. Then the emotions and the affections,
they get involved in it. And wisdom, oh, wisdom is the
right use of knowledge. And to have this wisdom, then
we know how to understand some things of God, some things of
the scriptures, some things of ourselves. And wisdom turns on
the light for us. It turns on the light. And then
look what else he says, and knowledge is pleasant to the soul. When
wisdom enters into your heart, knowledge is pleasant to the
soul. And how pleasant to the soul is these things of Christ. When you start talking about
Christ being the wisdom of God, you start talking about the treasures
of wisdom hidden in the Lord Jesus Christ. And oh, when you're
talking about pleasant to the soul grace, oh, how pleasant
is that to the soul. The wisdom of God, how pleasant
to that soul. The love of Christ, how pleasant
is that to the soul. And we've handled it. We've tasted
it. We enjoy it. That's what we do. Look over here in Proverbs 24.
Talking about how pleasant it is to the soul. In Proverbs 24. You know, there is things that's
pleasant to the soul. I know this flesh, this flesh
is an awful, awful thing, but we're talking about the soul.
We're talking about the spiritual man. We're talking about that
place where wisdom can dwell in the heart, where wisdom abides
and enters into the heart and it brings pleasant the knowledge
of God. But look what he said in verse
13. Proverbs 24, 13. Eat thou honey, because it is
good, and the honeycomb is as which is sweet to thy taste.
So shall, just like that honey, it's called just good, like that
honeycomb is sweet to your taste, so shall the knowledge of wisdom
be unto your soul. It'll be so sweet. It'll be good
for you, be sweet to your soul, and when you've found it, then
there'll be a reward. What the reward be? You got it!
through rewards in the wisdom itself. And listen to this, and
thy expectation won't be cut off. It won't be cut off. Let
me show you something else in Jeremiah 15. Jeremiah 15. Look over here in Jeremiah 15,
right to your right a little. And look here in Jeremiah 15,
in verse 16. Oh, talking about how things
taste to us and how pleasant they are to our soul. when wisdom
comes. And oh, to taste it, we've handled
it, we've tasted, we've enjoyed this wisdom, this knowledge of
God. Look what he said in verse 16
of Jeremiah 15. Thy words were found. And oh,
that's the wisdom we're talking about. Thy words were found and
I did eat them. I ate them, I tasted them. And
how, how did they taste? Oh, thy word was unto me the
joy and rejoicing of my heart, it was pleasant to my soul. For
I am, why? Because I'm called by thy name,
O Lord of hosts. That's enough to cause you to
be pleasant to your soul and rejoice in that. And look what
it says here now in verse two, back over here in Proverbs two.
Look what it says. And this wisdom that enters in
this knowledge is pleasant to the soul. discretion shall preserve
thee, understanding shall keep thee. This wisdom, this knowledge,
it gives a discreet understanding and discretion and understanding
for our lives. Now some people don't have any
discretion whatsoever, no understanding whatsoever. And I tell you when
the wisdom of God comes into a man's soul, because this knowledge
of God comes into a man's heart, It gives us the ability to live
a discreet and understanding life, that we understand where
we live, we understand who we belong to, we understand the
scriptures, we understand that we are to live to the glory of
God, and we know when to say something and when not to say
it. It is important not to say something, and it is sometimes
to say something. And I tell you, see this wisdom
that he's talking about, this knowledge, it's not just a set
of rules to go by. Not just a set of rules that
we're to go by, laws that we're supposed to quit. Wisdom in the
heart gives discretion. And this word discretion, look
what it says, shall preserve thee. It'll preserve you. It'll keep you. It'll keep you. It's a keeping principle. And
it keeps us from a lot of things, and it keeps us to a lot of things.
You know why we're here tonight? Because wisdom and knowledge
is pleasant to our soul that entered into our heart. It gave
us the discretion and understanding to come here tonight to hear
the Word of God, to delight in the Word. And this discretion
that he's talking about shall preserve you. It'll preserve
you. Look over here at Proverbs 4,
6. I want you to see this. I know, you know, we'll get to
it eventually. But, oh, listen. He said in verse
5 and 6, look what he says. Get wisdom, get understanding,
forget it not, neither decline from the words of my mouth. Forsake
her not, and she shall preserve thee. Love her, and she'll keep
you. She'll keep you. And that's what
this discretion is talking about, being preserved. David said,
Lord, when I consider the works of men's hands, when I considered
everything that everybody was doing, he said, I look to you
to preserve my way and to preserve my steps when I considered what
other people was doing, because I certainly didn't want to go
that way. And I tell you what, this discretion that, I was reading
what that means is, it means like having the best guard watching
over and keeping us. That's what it means. To preserve
you, it's having somebody to watch over you and guard you.
Have you remember when Solomon was after David? And David, one
time, he slipped into this cave where Saul was laying. Saul was
out to kill David, hated David. And David had some men, and David
and one of his mighty men, they slipped into the cave where Saul
was laying. Saul was the king. He had guards. He had royal guards. He had people
watching him all the time. Well, David slipped in there,
got his water, got his spear, and cut off a piece of his clothing.
And then when they got up the next, he got up on the hillside
and started hollering and showed them all that thing. And you
know what he said? He says, them that watch you
and keep you, you ought to slay them, because look what I got
to do. And that's not going to happen to us. Ain't nobody going
to sneak up on us. And ain't nobody going to take
our water. And ain't nobody going to take our spear. And ain't
nobody going to cut the righteousness off of us in any way. We're going
to be preserved and kept by this thing called wisdom and discretion.
And I tell you, beloved, that we search for wisdom. And now
having found it, it's, oh, it's our pleasure. It's our delight.
And I know this. Souls can reform. Men can reform. A man can quit drinking, but
could been a drunk for years. He can quit drinking. Men can
quit certain sins, make promises and pledges. I know that one
great spiritual leader of this day is having great crowds and
he's having people sign pledges that they'll pray for America.
Pray that America will turn back to God. Well, I've got news for
you. If you ain't never heard this
before, America has never, never been for God. And I'll tell you
something about our leaders. There were some principles upon
which our country was founded. But Thomas Jefferson was a deist. He was a God unto himself. John
Adams and John Quincy Adams, they wanted nothing to do with
God. They understood how to write a constitution, a declaration
of independence, but they didn't want anything to do with God.
They didn't do it. So this business, you know, of
turning back to God, do you know how God, you turn to God for
yourself. If he started telling people
instead of turning, getting the nation turned back to God, you
turn back to God. You turn to God. You call on
God. You look to God. And in the more
people that's converted, then the more people that will have
a nation that's worth living in. And it is worth living in.
But what I'm telling you is, and that's what he says, people
can reform and sign pledges and make promises. And it'll make
them no better off. But when the gospel of the wisdom
of God enters into the heart, how pleasant it is. It keeps
us and it preserves us. That's why Paul said, to whom
you yield yourself service to obey, his servants you are. To whom you obey. But God be
thanked that you from the heart have obeyed that form of doctrine
which was delivered unto you. Huh? And that's what we're saying
here. And oh, let me, now he says he's
gonna preserve us and keep us, and understanding will keep us,
keep us like a guard. Well, what's it gonna keep us
from? Now look, there's several things here he's gonna keep us.
What wisdom in the heart will keep us from? It'll deliver thee
from the way of the evil man and the man who speaks froward
things. Oh, you know how many, well,
listen, there was a time that I was very, very evil man. And
he says, to deliver thee from the evil. Deliver thee, ask what
our Lord says, pray that the Father keepeth you from the,
I pray that the Father would keep you from the evil one. And
Lord, lead us not into temptation, but keep us and deliver us from
temptation. And here he says, there's men
and women out there that speak perverse, and that word perverse
means, froward means perverse, Great perversity and fraud. And
they speak great swelling words. They speak against God. They
speak against Christ. They speak against the things
of God. Oh, they got a proud and high look against the Lord.
And we have a lot of snares in this world. We have flesh. And
Solomon describes these principles that wisdom will preserve us
from. First is evil men. You know, The scripture says
that there's men who are ever learning and never able come
to a knowledge of the truth. And then he named certain people
from such turn away, from such turn away. Turn away. I was talking to a fellow the
other day. He got in real estate and then he got into preaching
and he preached for several years and pastored a church for several
years and quit preaching and went back to real estate. But everybody thinks he's a fine
fellow. But he can't, you know, what
he, he speaks, anything he speaks would be perverse. He couldn't
possibly speak anything right and true. When people leave,
leave, leave the religion that they was raised with to go to
get into politics, what do they know? And that's what he's talking
about. God save us from evil wicked
men. They speak great things. They
speak things about God, but it's a perverse thing about God. And then look what else it says
about them. In verse 13, who leaves the paths of uprightness.
Oh, that means that they were one time in the paths of uprightness. If they leave them, they walk
and there's the paths of uprightness. They said, I don't want to walk
in that. I don't like that. I don't like this idea of walking
upright. I like my will. I like my way. I like to do things the way I
like to do them. I like to believe like I want
to believe. And look what it says, and then
when they do that, when they leave the path of rightness,
what do they do? They walk in darkness. Our Lord said it like this, if
the light that's in you is darkness, how great is that darkness. They
walk in the way of darkness. They love darkness rather than
light. Look what Job said over here
in Job 24. Look what Job said over here in Job 24. These people
love darkness rather than light. Now he's talking about people
that they live with and live around. Look in Job 24, 13. They are of those that rebel
against the light. They know not the ways thereof,
nor abide in the paths thereof. They don't know the way of the
light. They don't know the way, the paths of righteousness. They
don't know it. And that's why our Lord Jesus
said this in John 3, 18. He said, he that believeth on
the sun is not condemned. He that believeth not is condemned
already. Why? Because he loved darkness. rather than light and i tell
you light shined in darkness and the darkness didn't the darkness
didn't even comprehend when the light came and these people love
darkness and i and i and i'm going to tell you something what's
light to us is dark to them and what's dark to them is light
to us and then look what else they
do here This is what the wisdom of God delivers us from. This
discretion preserves us and keeps us from. And who rejoice to do
evil? They rejoice in it. They enjoy
it. They enjoy it. They delight in
it. They delight in all the wickedness
that's going on around them, all the meanness that's going
on, all the perverseness that's going on around them. They like
it. You know, and I think people
like this, eventually they were in the right way, in the right
path, and they chose darkness rather than light. I think these
are the kind of people that God gave them up. You know how many
people are sitting in Baptist churches and Methodist churches
and Pentecostal churches? All kinds of churches all across
America that God gave them up. That God, do you know how, listen,
we could, when we talk about people like this, we could be
sitting in a Catholic church listening to a priest and that's
evil. That's a man who loves darkness. We could be in a service
tonight where half of us would be speaking in tongues and the
other half would be running aisles. That's evil. Wicked. And God's
kept us from that. Wisdom has preserved us from
that. Discretion and understanding has preserved us and kept us
from those kind of things. And oh, thank God, thank God
for the Gospel. Thank God for Christ being our
wisdom, being our righteousness. Look what else He delivers us
from and saves us from. delivers from the evil man and
all the things about him, and deliver thee from the strange
woman, even from the stranger which flatters with her words.
Now, you know, false religion is often referred to as a woman.
You know, in Revelation, Mystery, Harlot, Babylon. The Mystery
Harlot. Jezebel, God gave her space to
repent. So you know, when you talk about
this woman here, you don't think of her as just a woman. You think
of her as a religion. Think of her as somebody that's,
she's strange. She's strange to Christ. She's
strange to the gospel. She's strange to the scriptures.
She's strange to anything that's right and true. But yet she comes
along and she flatters with her words. She flatters with her
words. What does she say? Oh, you are
such, you are really, really a good person. You're such a
good person. Oh, you've got such a good, good
heart. Sin isn't really so bad, you
know. If it fits, if you enjoy it,
you know, if you really enjoy it, don't worry about the consequences
of it. And oh, you know, listen, God is a God of love. He could not possibly, possibly
ever do anything to harm you in any way. You're so good, and I'll tell
you what, and if He is just, you know if He is just, then
you surely, surely are going to make it because you're such
a good, fine person. And that's how he flatters you. Bill Sasser's mother used to
tell him all the time, you know, when he started getting under
conviction, well, honey, I knowed you. You was a Boy Scout, you
know. Good Boy Scout. And what's that
got to do with anything? But that's the way people look.
And look what she did. She forsook the God of her youth.
Forsook the God of her youth. So somebody guided her when she
was a young woman, when she was a child. And she forgets the
covenant of her God. And you know, this is what happens. People raised in the church,
they're baptized, taught about God, taught about His covenant,
but they forsake Him. And the only God now that they
have is their own will, their own wisdom, their own light that
they walk in. And that's the only God that's
a house. And look what happens to people that follow her. Follow
her. And this is awful. I mean, you
think about this as being just absolutely false religion out
here. For house inclines unto death. When you start down this path
with this woman that's flattering you, and lying to you, and flattering
you, and making you feel good about yourself, And the scripture
says, a flatter spreadeth a net for your feet. He gonna catch
you. And you know, and she forsook
them. And her house is the house of death. When you start down
her path, she lives in the house of death. There's no life in her house.
There's no light in her house. There's no joy in her death.
cold, lifeless, pale, gray-looking, lifelessness. And look what else
it says here. And her paths unto the dead. They lead to the dead. People
that's dead and twice dead and plucked up by the roots. You know, and listen, I tell
you what, eternal death is her doom. And look what else it says
here in verse 19. This is awful. This is what wisdom
and discretion and understanding keeps us from. None that goeth
unto her return again. When you start down that path
of walking away from the gospel, not following Christ, not believing
the gospel, not taking the wisdom of God and believing the wisdom
of God, And trust in Christ with all your heart, mind, body, and
soul. Trust in Him and Him alone. Finding Christ to be all your
wisdom and all you need for time and eternity. If you go down
that path, you know what it says? They don't come back. They don't
come back. They don't come back. I know
if I could stand here tonight and name three or four preachers
that started down that path. been in meetings with them, and
I mean would preach, oh, they'd preach so good. Then they got
involved in something else. Got involved in this, that, and
the other, got involved in Christian fellowship, got involved in mission
work someplace, and so they end up just raising money, end up
lying, end up anyways, but where the gospel's at? They went down
the path of death, and when they got there, it's nothing but dead.
And when you go down that path, there's no coming back. There's
no returning. Oh, my. And they won't turn back
and get to hold it. I tell you, the only thing that'll
save a man from such a situation is a miracle. It's a miracle. If anybody's saved from this
kind of situation, he would be an absolute miracle. And that's what happened to us.
And oh, listen, only wisdom in the heart and the pleasure of
it preserves us from this. Now, look here at the blessing
of this Word, this wisdom ingrained in our heart and crafted in our
heart. Look what he said in verse 20. Look at the blessing now.
Oh, here's what the blessings of this path deliver us from
this evil man and this strange woman. He says that, oh, listen,
Wisdom will cause you to walk in the way of good. The way of
good. The good way of God. The good
way of the scriptures. The good way of grace. The good
way of wisdom. The good way of Christ. The good
way of His righteousness. And look here, and keep the paths
of righteousness. Keep them. That word keep means
to preserve. It means to guard it. You know,
I've got to protect this thing, preserve this thing. Keep to
the paths of righteousness. Oh my, that's what wisdom will
do for us. And not only does it deliver
us from evil men and evil ways, but leads us and guides us in
the way of good men. And look what else it says. And
it'll keep. We'll keep the paths. We'll keep
them. Job said it like this, the Lord
knows the way that I take, and when he hath tried me, I shall
come forth as gold. He knows the way that I take.
And then look what else he says, and I tell you, you know what
the land where you'll live is and where wisdom will cause you
to dwell? The upright shall dwell in the
land, gonna abide in the land. People that's upright in their
character. Upright, new natures. walking
upright before God, walking upright before the world. The upright
shall dwell in the land, and listen to this, and the perfect
shall remain in it. Oh, perfect people shall remain
in it, in the land of Christ, in the land where the gospel
is. And it was like when Jacob and his family went down into
Egypt, Pharaoh said, take them over there and give them the
best land that there is. that's what Christ does for us
we get to we get to dwell in the best land the land of Goshen
and I tell you that's it that's that place he's talking about
perfection people that's perfect well they're in and one of these
days there's going to be a new heaven and a new earth but the
wicked's not this way the wicked's not this way verse 22 but the
wicked shall be cut off from the earth In this new land, in
this precious land, where the perfect dwell, the upright dwell.
Those that walk in the paths of righteousness, keep the paths
of righteousness. The wicked shall be cut off from
the earth. I wonder how many people left this world today.
I wonder how many people left this world today. And you know, and I'll tell you,
how many of them do you suppose trusted Christ? How many of you suppose trusted
Christ? Two weeks ago, three men died in the same week. Two
within the two I think in one day and one two days later. Note all three of them. How many of the three you reckon
trusted Christ? That's what we're talking about.
The wicked's going to be cut off. Cut off from God. Cut off from
Christ. Cut off from hope. Cut off from light. Cut off from
wisdom. Cut off from any hope of ever
hearing it. And look what else he says. And the transgressors
are going to be rooted up. You know what our Lord said?
Matthew 15, 13. Every tree which my Heavenly
Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up. Rooted up. Oh, for wisdom in the heart.
God give us wisdom, wisdom in the heart. Our Father, oh our Father, Thank you for your word. Thank
you for your word. I know it never returns void.
It accomplished unto wherein you sent it. And oh God, we thank you for
being gracious and kind to us and being merciful to me and
the dear saints. Again, we pray for those we mentioned. Oh God, help them. Lord, strengthen
them, encourage them. We ask these things for Christ's
sake. Amen.