Turn with me in your Bibles to Proverbs chapter 21. I have great comfort for the Lord's people tonight. Message of comfort, a message of hope. If you find yourself a sinner, you find yourself as broken, or you find yourself as needy, you find yourself as a mercy beggar, I have good news for you tonight.

And our text is, it not only tells us what's done, it tells us how it's done. And the Lord himself is the one that is the doer of it. It's the hope of every believer that God would take a sinner and make him the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ. It's the hope of every sinner, God's made into a sinner, to be, to find himself no longer looking at self-righteousness, but just looking to the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ.

What a miracle that is. This is all by grace alone. It's the hope that we have because he saves the weak and the powerless. He doesn't save the strong and the powerful by man's standard. He says not many mighty, many. There's an M in there, so you could be a strong man still yet, or a woman, and you're still, he may call you. But the point I'm trying to make is, He saves the afflicted. He saves the sick. He saves the lame. He saves the blind. He saves the one that cannot save themselves. He saves sinners.

This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation. Christ Jesus came in the world to save sinners of whom I am chief. So if you're finding relatability to those words, I have comfort for us tonight. Let's read Proverbs 21, and we'll read the first 12 verses.

The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord. As the rivers of water, he turneth it with it so ever he will. Every way of man is right in his own eyes, but the Lord pondered the hearts. To do justice and judgment is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice.

And high look and a proud heart, and the plowing of the wicked is sin. The thoughts of the diligent tend only to plentifulness, but of every one that is hasty only to want. The getting of treasure by a lying tongue is a vanity tossed to and fro of them that seek death. The robbery of the wicked shall destroy them because they refuse to do judgment.

The way of man is forward and strange, but as for the pure, his work is right. It is better to dwell in a corner of the housetop than with a brawling woman in a wide house. The soul of the wicked desireth evil, His neighbor findeth no favor in his eyes.

When the scorner is punished, the simple is made wise. And when the wise is instructed, he receives knowledge. The righteous man wisely considered the house of the wicked, but God overthroweth the wicked for their wickedness." Titled this message, The Simple Made Wise. That's what he just said in verse 11. Look at this. When the scorner is punished, The simple is made wise. The simple is made wise. How simple man's ways truly are, how simple we are as creatures. We're the most intelligent creatures on the planet, but how simple are we really compared to God?

He is omnipotent. He's omnipresent. He's all powerful. We can't say anything. We don't have any of those attributes. We don't have any of those qualities whatsoever. We're simple people. We're born simple. As we're born, we had to have somebody taking care of us all the time, didn't we? And you end up leaving the world the same way you come into it, don't you? That's how simple we are as human beings.

We're frail. And as you get older, you learn that frailty more and more. You see things that happen more and more. You start bruising easier. You have to be more careful doing this. You know, I can't do that anymore. And I'm speaking to several of you that know what I'm talking about. I'm not all the way there yet, so I'm not saying it's me, but you get what I'm saying. We're frail creatures. We're frail. And we are simple. Simple. David said we're fearfully and wonderfully made.

We know that that's true because we're made in the image of God, but no man thinks like God thinks. Every man wants to be his own God. So simply put, we're born in sin and we're shaping in iniquity and we can't do anything about it. Whenever we fell in Adam, when we fell in Adam, we were ruined by the fall. It wasn't just a little bit bad. No, we were ruined by the fall. And because one man sin entered a world and death by sin, so death passed upon all men, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.

So that's what we are by nature. That's simple. That's very simple. But tonight's message is about the simple being made wise. I love the word made. Don't you love that word? He says, the righteous man, wise, no, that's the wrong one. Verse 12, when the squirter is punished, the simple is made wise, is made wise. Don't, don't overlook that word because that means he didn't do it himself. The simple individual did not do it themselves.

And you and I in no way could we fix our sin problem. No way can you and I hope to correct what Adam corrupted. There's nothing we can do to fix it. Nothing we can do to change, we can add to it, but we can't do anything good to it. We're born in sin, shape it in iniquity. Scripture says this, can an Ethiopian change his skin or a leopard his spots? Can't do it.

Job said, how can that which is born of a woman be made clean? Well, I'm going to show you how, look in verse one, even the King's heart is in the hand of the Lord as the rivers of water, he turneth it whether so ever he will. There's your answer. That's how the simple, that's how the simple, um, are made wise is by the Lord himself. That's our hope. That's our hope. Our sovereign God, He is faithful. He said, I'll do something and none can hinder me. I'm going to elect a people. I'm going to save those people. I'm going to regenerate those people.

So we're all born simple, and yet when the Lord reveals Christ to us. We are no longer simple any longer. We are now wise. Why? Because Christ is our wisdom. So we have no wisdom to boast in of ourself. All we have is our simplicity. But when we are given Christ, then we boast in our Lord. We boast in our Savior. We boast in his wisdom. Christ is then made unto us all wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.

That's how the simple are made wise. God chose to make the simple wise by predestinating them, conforming them to his image. that they might be conformed to the end of his son. And he elected them. He chose to save them in spite, despite what they were. It's all by grace that we are saved. It's not by us.

Lord chose to take some vessels and set them to the side for his glory and for his honor. It's the best, one of the best examples we could use found over in the book of Romans. He said, does the Lord not have power? Does the potter not have power over the clay to make one vessel of honor and one lump dishonor?

So that's all we are is just a bunch of lumps of clay. Do we see that? That's how simple we are. We're made of dust. And yet the Lord chooses in his sovereign right as God by his grace, by his mercy to take that pile of dust that we are and set it aside and say, I'm going to save that. I'm going to, I'm going to make that righteous. Give the righteousness of God in Christ to that.

That vessel, that's what the Lord did not. When that happens, we're no longer simple anymore. We're made in the likeness of his son. That's how he sees his people. See in this great gospel, God does it all. In God's salvation, it's God's salvation. And that's something that you don't hear very much. David said in Psalm 51, restoring to me the joy of thy. salvation, not my salvation, thy salvation. He's the one that did it. He's the one that wrote it. He's the one that accomplishes it or accomplished it. And he's the one that gives it freely by his grace. Turn with me over to Isaiah chapter 45. I want to read the first nine verses. Now this is, it obviously, it tells you the very first verse, this is God speaking, this is the Lord talking.

Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I have holden to subdue nations before him, and will loose the loins of kings to open before him the two levied gates and the gates shall not be shut. I will go before thee and make the crooked places straight. I will break in pieces the gates of brass. I will cut and sunder the bars of iron.

I will give thee the treasures of darkness and the hidden riches of secret places that thou mayest know that I, the Lord which called thee by thy name, am the God of Israel. For Jacob, my servant's sake, and Israel, mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name. I have surnamed thee.

Though thou hast not known me, I am the Lord, and there is none else. There is no God beside me. I girded thee. Though thou hast not known me, that they may know from the rising of the sun and from the west that there is none beside me. I am the Lord, and there is none else. I form light and create darkness. I make peace and create evil.

I, the Lord, do all these things. Drop down, you heavens, from above, and let the skies pour down righteousness. Let the earth open, and let them bring forth salvation. And let righteousness spring up together. I, the Lord, have created it. What did he create? Salvation and righteousness, right there. Woe unto him that striveth with his maker. Let the pot sherds strive with the pot sherds of the earth. Shall the clay say to him that fashioned it, what makest thou or thy work? He hath no hands.

Brethren, this is how the simple are made wise. This is how he's doing it. It's different wording right here, but he tells him, I'm gonna go before you and I'm gonna make the crooked places straight. So not only are we simple, but we're crooked. Crooked in the way we think, crooked in the way we do. And we're all about self from nature. But he says, I'm gonna fix that. I'm gonna make the crooked places Straight.

You ever heard somebody maybe said, maybe they said, well, you better straighten up. You ever heard that before? I got that as a kid a lot. You better straighten up, boy. I knew what that meant. That means I better change whatever action I was doing that my parents were displeased with or there was going to be an action that they were going to do that I didn't like. I didn't want that.

But what I'm trying to say is, have you ever heard somebody tell you, I'm going to straighten you out? I'm going to straighten you out on a few things. I had somebody tell me that one time. I'm going to straighten you out on a few things. the thing no matter what our parents tried to do or no matter what other people try to do you can't the crooked is going to remain crooked unless God is the one doing straightening.

See the difference? The Lord has to be the one. We saw a picture of him here he says, I am the Lord there is none else. He's the one that's got to do this. He's got the one to take our dead corpses of where we are born in sin. He's got to save us by His grace alone. He's got to give us His righteousness. He's got to give us His understanding. And that's what He does. He takes us just as we are in the simple situation that we are in and He gives us wisdom. He gives us Christ. Causes us to believe Him. He straightens out the crooked places. Listen to what Isaiah 42 says. Or just turn back there to Isaiah 42 it's only two pages. Just one word, one verse, verse 16, Isaiah 42, 16.

And I will bring the blind by a way that they know not. Now, that's interesting to me because they're blind. Is that not right? I'm gonna bring them by a way that they know not. We don't know hardly, if we're blind, we don't know anyway, do we? I mean, think about that. He says, I'm gonna bring them by a way they know not. I will lead them in paths that they have not known. I will make darkness light before them and crooked things straight.

These things will I do unto them and not forsake them. This is the Lord's doing and it's marvelous in our eyes. This is how he takes a dead dog sinner and makes them the righteousness of Christ. All by his self, all by his finished work on Calvary's cross.

What hope did Nicodemus have of living again? And I'm going to say a couple of things that may sound silly, but, uh, if our Lord would have said, Nicodemus, if you take the first step, I'll take the rest. Then Nicodemus wouldn't have been able to do anything.

He's dead. What if the Lord would have said, well, I've did my part. Now you need to do your part. No, he's dead. And that's what men don't understand is we're completely depraved. The Lord has to come to where we are and say, Lazarus. I said, Nicodemus, I meant Lazarus, Lazarus come forth. Lazarus, come forth. And as he does that, you and I will stay dead. This is our Lord. This is what he does for his people.

What hope did blind Bartimaeus have of obtaining sight? They didn't have laser eye surgery back then. I don't know if that would help give sight or not, really, to somebody completely blind. I don't know. But what hope did he have? None. Not none of his self.

So Lazarus and blind Bartimaeus has one thing in common. They are dependent upon one and it's out of them. It's not each other and it's not themselves. So they were dependent upon another because I can't help myself in my current position. I can't help myself in my sin. I see my poverty. I see my, I see my leprosy and I can't fix my leprosy. I can't fix what I am.

The Lord says, fear not. I've put away your sin. You shall not die. Fear not, I put away your sin, you shall not die. I'm gonna make the simple wise. I'm gonna make the crooked places straight. This is what our Lord does for his people. The Lord told Moses, Moses was kind of, getting mouthy with the Lord. The Lord told him he wanted to go down to Egypt. He said, go down to Egypt and tell them, let my people go. And he's like, well, Lord, I can't go. I'm slow with speech. I can't talk. There's no way I can do this.

Send my brother with me, Aaron. He can talk for me. And the Lord tells him, who taught the dumb to speak, the lame to walk? Who taught the deaf to hear? Did not I? Now go, and I will be with you, Moses. That's what he told him. And it's the same today. The only one that has that power, that ability is our sovereign, holy Lord and savior. He has the right. He has the ability. We don't have the ability. We don't have the right. God is the author and finisher of faith. He has to be because man, go back to our text. I'll show you the state of man by their nature. Man self justifies themselves over everything. You ever get into an argument and we just justify ourselves, don't we? We want to be right. We want to be right. That's pride, but we want to be right. Look at verse two. We're going to bounce around a little bit here.

Every way of a man is right in his own eyes, but the Lord pondereth the hearts. Now that's what the Lord said. I didn't say that. Every way of man is right in his own eyes. That means everything that man does in his fallen nature, he justifies it before men and before God. Every man on the face of the planet, every woman on the face of the planet. I'm right in my own eyes. I know I'm right.

Look at verse four. And high look and a proud heart and the plowing of the wicked is sin. Now that second verse goes with that verse because now you see that when man believes he's right in his own eyes, he has a high look and a proud heart and he's plowing the wicked. That's what he's doing. Look at verse seven and eight.

The robber of the wicked shall destroy them because they refuse to do judgment. The way of man is forward and strange. You ever seen that before? The way of man is strange. But as for the pure, his work is right. Look at verse 10, last one. The soul of the wicked desireth evil, his neighbor findeth no favor in his eyes.

So you have all these descriptions of these man, these person, these people that see themselves as justified in their own eyes. Maybe it's religious justification, maybe it's just physical. Everybody is somewhat religious to some degree about something usually. But most of the people I meet, what their righteousness is, is that they're a good person. I'm a good moral person. So God will understand and He'll let me into heaven. He's a just and holy God. Our goodness is nothing compared to His goodness.

See, we're crooked. That's the crooked way of thinking. That's the simple way of thinking that we're talking about this evening. The Lord has to straighten us out. The Lord has to fix what we cannot fix. Because all of these things, all this description, gives us no hope of what we are by nature. But look at our hope in verse one. heart is in the Lord, the hand of the Lord.

As the river of water He turneth it, whithersoever He will." The next time, a little side note I guess I'll say, the next time that we get upset over something, whether it be something that we see that's happening in the world that we might not like or disagree with or something like that.

Just remember this the King's heart is in the Lord's hands. He's turning it how He sees fit. He's still seated on the throne. He don't make mistakes. He's God. But if we look at this from another point, we also see that everyone's heart is in the Lord's hand. He turns it whether so he will. That's the point, isn't it? If it's all the way at the top at the king, you better believe it's down in the peasants. It is. He turns the heart according to his will and his purpose.

This is how he makes the simple wise. Look at verse 11. When the scorner is punished, the simple is made wise. And when the wise is instructed, he receiveth knowledge. What he's saying here is the only people who are going to have wisdom are simple people.

They're made sinners. They're made to be sinners. Not by our choices, not by ourself, but they're made to be sinners. Christ said, I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. He said, they that are whole need not a position, but they that are sick.

So we might say in our heart, I'm simple. I see it clear as day. But the Lord had to be the one to give us that ability to see that, didn't he? Someone said, I don't understand everything about the gospel. Well, it's not meant to be understood, actually. It's meant to be believed. The only way it can be believed, this is an unbelievable Gospel. Mankind cannot believe it. The Lord has to give faith to believe it. Once He gives faith, you know, the interesting part is you can't help but believe it. You know what I mean? You just, you cannot not believe it. You have to. It's everything. He gives, He makes everything. He becomes everything on every page. He becomes everything to you. It's a complete renouncement of yourself, who you are. Self-entitlement and the pride that we're talking about.

Problem is, we don't have the power or the capacity to believe, but God says, I'm going to make the simple wise. I'm going to cause you to believe. I'm going to cause you to believe by my power, by my work. Salvation is of the Lord. It's his work. Scripture says, this is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation. Christ Jesus came into the world to save centers. It's the second time I've quoted that. I know, but it's so important. We understand that's only who he saves. Somebody says I'm just a center. You're qualified. That's the qualification.

He didn't come to call the righteous. He come to call centers. The Lord Jesus Christ was chosen in the covenant of grace to be our propitiation. He's called monolect by the father. To be our atonement, to be our surety, to be the substitute of each chosen child of God. Each one of the elect, he was chosen.

He was purposed in the covenant of grace before time ever began, that he would go with the cross and that he would die the death that we couldn't die. Well, we could have died it, but it wouldn't done us any good. It wouldn't have fixed anything. Died the death that we deserve. carry our guilt, carry our shame, hang naked before the world like we should have done, had to be done, had his soul made an offering for sin that God would be satisfied so that you and I could have the wisdom of Christ. so that you and I could have the righteousness of God, so that you and I would not be seen as broken vessels of dishonor any longer, but we were now seen as perfect, precious vessels in His eyes because He hath formed it, He hath made it, He hath done it.

He made the crooked things straight again. He's now made unto us all our wisdom, all our righteousness, all of our sanctification, and all our redemption. This is how the simple are made wise, brethren. This is how. We're given Christ our wisdom. He, by his spirit, straightens us out, if I can put it that way. He does. Gives us a new way of thinking, a new nature that looks to him by faith alone. We're made to see that it's not my life that I'm living, but it's his perfect life.

It's not my sacrificing. Right now is close time to Easter. So a lot of people are doing a lot of sacrificing in different ways. They're abstaining from certain things, or they're making sure to eat more of some things, or they're doing this and that. You know what the Lord calls that? Iniquity. That's what he calls that. And he says, I hate the workers of iniquity.

Psalm chapter five, verse five. It's not my sacrifice in any way, shape, or form, but it is the perfect sacrifice of the Lamb of God, the chosen Lamb, slain from the foundation of the world. It's not my death. My death wouldn't have accomplished anything, but because I died in Christ when He died on the tree, His death is what I hope to, because that means I'll never have to die again. Our hope is that in His death, He died in our place.

He took the full wrath of God. took justice of God, satisfied the law's demands for every one of the elect of God. Look at verse three, to do justice and judgment is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice. To do just, here's the problem. We can't do justice and judgment, but that's exactly what the Lord did on the cross of Calvary. You had the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ and you had the father pouring out his eternal justice and judgment upon his darling son.

If he hadn't have done that, what does the scripture say? He laid upon him the iniquity of us all. He took our sin and nailed it to his cross. Understand this, I owed a debt and you owed a debt that we could not pay. We could not pay it. He paid a debt he did not owe. I owed a debt I could not pay. He paid a debt he did not owe.

He took all my ugly, all my wretched vileness and gave me his perfect righteousness all by his grace. That's why we rejoice. That's why we worship because he finished the work. Scripture says, blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that were against us or contrary to us, He took them out of the way, nailing them to His cross. Took our sin out of the way, nailing them to His cross.

You know what that record says now? The handwriting of ordinances, perfectly righteous, perfectly holy. The Lord looks at His people and He sees the Lord Jesus Christ, He says, justified. You're justified. No longer crooked, but made straight by the blood.

No longer blind, but now we see. No longer deaf, but we hear his voice. He said, my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me. We hear him. We no longer are looking at the physical for our hope or our satisfaction in this life or to obtain salvation. We're looking by faith. We have sight now. We're not blind anymore.

So we can hear him. We can see him. One day we'll get to touch him. I'm excited for that day. But just for now, we get to get to experience the sweet odor that he leaves whenever he's in our midst. And we've had a good meeting and we just had sensed his presence.

You know what I'm talking about? This is all spiritual metaphors. He makes us alive. We're no longer dead. We're alive in him. He's changed our mind about who he is and about who we are. He's given us repentance towards God and faith for the Lord Jesus Christ. He's made us to have no hope in what we wear, no hope in what we say, no hope in what we do. Give me Christ lest I die. I've got to have him. It's not about me. As soon as I start looking at me or drawing attention to me, I'm missing the whole point. That's going back to being crooked. That's going back to be simple. But how he makes the simple, his simple people wise is by his amazing grace.

They're given Christ. They're given Christ. We're given the Lord Jesus Christ and we're given that was given to him by the father. Let's read verse 11 in closing one more time. When the scorner is punished, the simple is made wise. When the wise is instructed, he receives knowledge. If the Lord be our instructor, if the Lord be our teacher, we'll receive knowledge. But I've heard it said before, if a man talks you into something, another man can talk you out of it. But if you're instructed of God, he's given you the wisdom of Christ. He's given you Christ as your wisdom. You're no longer simple minded. If he'd done that, he no longer sees us as simple, he sees us as infinitely wise in Christ, doesn't he?

Listen to what our hope is in John six, and they shall all be taught of God. Every man, therefore, that hath heard and hath learned of the Father comes to me. This is how the simple are made wise. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we pray that you would take this and you'd bless it to our understanding for your glory. In Christ's name, amen.