Proverbs chapter 10 is the beginning
of Solomon's individual proverbs, individual impossible things
to understand unless the Lord be our teacher. Every verse is
a different proverb. None of them necessarily correlate
with the other one. And yet, if the Lord be our teacher
tonight, I believe he showed me that the first 11 verses,
they do coincide one with another. There's parallels in each of
those verses. There's the foolish and there's the wise. There's
the, um, well, there's 10 of them total. Um, there's the poor
and there's the rich and who, who make us to differ. That's
the question tonight, but If we're going to understand this,
we have to look at this particular chapter in the light of everything
else that we've learned up until this point, all nine chapters.
That's how we're gonna have to understand that. But in order
for us to understand it, the Lord's gonna have to be a teacher,
just as he had to be the one, give me the message, he has to
be the one to give you ears to hear, and he has to give me the
ability to preach the message, and he gets all the glory for
that. Here in chapter 10, it starts the parables, as I mentioned,
and I know all of Proverbs is parables, parables that Solomon
is saying go from chapter one to chapter nine, you'll have
a whole chapter. Remember the strange woman? Remember the,
there were several different ones, but it'd be almost a whole
chapter of one parable or one thought. Now it's just individual
thoughts for each verse. And so you can break Proverbs
down into three parts. You have chapters one through
nine, chapters 10 through 25. That's how long these are going
to be. And then chapter 26 through 31. And so I don't know exactly
how we're going to take this. If there's one verse that has
just the message in it, and there's no more, then we'll just go one
verse at a time. If there's several, like tonight,
that's how we're going to take it. This is what the Lord gave. That's
what we do. That's all we can do, right? If we have the ability to see
the truth, to know the truth, and to speak the truth, God's
the doer of that. To be able to believe the truth,
to be able to know the truth, and to be able to speak the truth,
God's the doer of that. He is the truth. He is the truth. So
here in our text, we have 10 contrasts, distinct differences. We must always ask who make it
thee to differ. We know the answer. It's the Lord that does that.
So let's read this together. The first 11 verses of Proverbs
chapter 10. The Proverbs of Solomon. Now I'd remind us right there
that verse one starts the same exact way. So it's somehow, you
know, he doesn't say that in any other place. He says, hear
the instruction of my words, my son, or hearken unto me, my
son. Well, now he's saying the Proverbs
of Solomon. So as he has individual thoughts,
I don't know how often he's writing this. It's by inspiration of
the Holy Spirit, but it could be one a day, maybe multiples a
day, but you get what I'm saying. It's a little different than
before. The Proverbs of Solomon, a wise son maketh a glad father,
but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother. Treasures of wickedness
profit nothing, but righteousness delivereth from death. The Lord
will not suffer the soul of the righteous to famish, but he casteth
away the substance of the wicked. He becometh poor that dealeth
with a slack hand, but the hand of the diligent maketh rich. He that gathereth in summer is
a wise son, but he that sleepeth in harvest is a son that causeth
shame. Blessings are upon the head of
the just, but violence covereth the mouth of the wicked. The
memory of the just is blessed, but the name of the wicked shall
rot. The wise in heart will receive
commandments, but a prating fool shall fall. He that walketh uprightly walketh
surely, but he that perverteth his ways shall be known. He that
winketh with the eye call the sorrow, but a prating fool shall
fall. The mouth of the righteous, the
mouth of a righteous man is a well of life, but violence covereth
the mouth of the wicked. We'll stop there. We have 10
contrasts in this. And I'm going to give each of
them to us, but I'm going to read them to us. So just bear with me. You
first first verse, you have the wise son and the foolish son.
Second is the is wickedness and righteousness. Third is the righteous
and the wicked. Fourth is the poor and the rich.
Five is the wise son and the son that causes shame. Six is
the head of the just and the mouth of the wicked. Seven, the
just is blessed and the wicked shall rot. Eight, the wise in
heart and the pratting fool. And I will tell you what that
word pratting means, literally means speaking foolishness with
the lips, foolish talker, speaking foolishness. Number nine, he
that walketh uprightly and he that perverted his ways. Number
10 is actually not a contrast. So you go to verse 11 and it
tells us that you have the mouth of a righteous man and the mouth
of the wicked. But what do these have in common?
As I was studying this, I was trying to find the Lord's face. I said, as I'm praying, I said,
Lord, I can't, I don't know what, what you're saying here, what
I'm supposed to understand. You're going to have to teach
me. And he calls me to realize the contrast that was here. And
he calls me to realize that this isn't 10 different contrasts.
This is just one contrast in 10 different ways. This isn't
10 different types of people. This is two types of people.
This is the wise and the fool. The wise and the fool. That's
what I've titled this message. The wise and the fool. And it
is the Lord that must make the difference. He must be our wisdom
or we have no wisdom. We're not wise. We're the fool.
Fool hath said in his heart, there is no God. The fool doesn't
believe God and can't believe God. But the wise, they are they
which have seen the Lord, that believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
by his doing. And therefore they're wise, because
the Lord made them to be thus. You remember Rebecca when she
was expecting Jacob and Esau. And the Lord told her she's going
to have children. She said, well, if it be so, why am I thus? She
was having trouble. She was travailing. And the Lord
told her, he said, because two nations are within you. Two nations
are within you. Two types of people. And there's
only always been two types of people. The Lord's elect and
those left to themselves. Those not chosen by the Lord's
grace. There's only two types of people.
That's why he said in Romans chapter nine, Jacob, if I loved
Esau, have I hated. This is the fool and this is
the wise man. The Lord is the one that makes
us to differ in this. So, I pray that he be our teacher
this hour and calls us to see him, him in all this, because
he's here. He's here, but he has to choose
to reveal himself. So that's my hope. So the question is, and I'll
ask this several times, who maketh thee to differ? Who maketh thee to differ? Am
I wise because I did something? Am I wise because I don't do
something? Or am I wise by the hand of God,
by the doing of the Lord, by His finished work? Has He made
Christ unto me all of my wisdom? Or am I wise because I have done
something? If I'm wise because I have done
something, learned something, people, they, Love to learn theology. They love to learn different
doctrines. They love to learn many things
in the scripture, but you can know the entire Bible and not
know the person of the Bible, which is the Lord Jesus Christ.
You could know a lot of doctrine, and you still, that doesn't mean
that you know the Lord Jesus Christ. See, being wise means
you know him. Paul said, I know whom I have
believed. And I'm persuaded that he is
able to keep that which I've committed unto him against that
day. What day was that? That was the
day on the cross of Calvary where he took our sin to himself and
put it away. We didn't commit it to him necessarily.
We didn't say, here, take it. But he took it, didn't he? He
took it of his own will, for his own purpose and glory. And
now by grace through faith, we commit everything to him, don't
we? Everything. Is salvation, is God's salvation
of the Lord or is it of man? Is it of the will of the flesh
or is it of the will of God? This is the difference between
the fool and the wise. This is the difference between
the wise and the fool. The wise man will say salvation is of the
Lord, but he won't just say that with his mouth. Wise woman won't
just say that with her mouth. They'll say it from the heart
by faith that's been freely given by God's grace. The fool, on
the other hand, will say, yeah, salvation's by grace, and there's
a but, or there's a yet, or there's a well and. There's always an
interjection, always something where the flesh wants to but
in on it. That's the fool. That's who's
being described here. Now, there can be no doubt that
everyone, without exception, Everyone, without exception,
are born dead in trespasses and in sin. Therefore, we're born
fools. We're born sinners. We're born,
our nature is against God in every way. We are completely
depraved, completely and totally sinful, from the top of our head
to the bottom of our feet. And if we try to do anything
to fix it, that makes us a bigger fool than when we started. That's
just how it works, but that's what men try to do. Can't be
any doubt, though, we're born into sin, we're shapen into iniquity. The nature that we have, you
hear me say this often because you don't hear this in preaching
much, our flesh hates God. Our flesh hates God. Do you ever feel like you're,
do you feel the warfare that happens between your new man
and your old man? Do you ever feel sick of yourself? Do you ever,
I'll tell you this, there's not a bigger hypocrite in this room
besides me standing up here. If you want to feel like a hypocrite,
stand in a pulpit. I'm just telling you, you think
about, But we don't think of, we can't look to ourself. We
can't look at our inadequacies or inadequacies. We have to look
to Christ. We have to say, Lord, you're going to bless this. You're
going to have to have mercy. Take my eyes off of me and put them
on you. Do you ever feel like a hypocrite? Paul said it best. He said, that which I would do,
I do not. But the things that I would do, or he said, the things
that I would not, that's what I do. Every time, that's what
it seems like I do. It says, oh, wretched man that
I am, who shall deliver me from this body of death. That's not
the words of a fool. That's the words of a wise man,
because the Lord gave him that plea, that cry. I'm depraved. I'm a sinner. You're gonna have
to save me. I can't save myself. I can't
get wisdom. People talk about getting saved.
I mentioned that on Sunday. No, I can't get saved. I can't get wisdom. I need Christ.
Give me Christ or I'm gonna die. Our nature cannot and will not
come to God. That's what the Lord said in
John chapter five, you will not come to me that you might have
life, but I have good news. I have good news. Salvation is
of the Lord. It's not by the will of the flesh,
nor the will of man, but of God. It's not the will of blood. It's
of the will of God. It was his doing that saved his
people from their sin. It's his choosing to elect a
people. It's his choosing to redeem a
people. It's him choosing to regenerate those people in the
fullness of time. This is our hope. This is our
hope. Otherwise, we'll remain like
these individuals in chapter 10, which would be the foolish,
wicked, poor, shameful creatures that they are at birth. At birth. With our abundantly deceitful
heart, brethren, we'll pervert our ways. What does that mean?
Well, that means that we don't go the way of the Lord. You remember,
I believe Peter was talking and he said they've gone the way
of Cain, followed after the order of Balaam, going after the gainsaying
of Korah. Those are three examples of men
that went after what they wanted to go after, and all of them
died because of it. All of them ended up dying because
of their unbelief, their inability to believe. They were fools.
They were fools. They weren't of the Lord. Our
deceitful heart will pervert our ways as well, and we'll try
to pervert God's ways. Did you know that? We'll try.
We can't, but we think. We're not even thinking that
we're doing it, but that's what our flesh will do. Change the
truth of God into the lie. That's what he was talking about
in Romans chapter one. He said, they changed the truth of God
into a lie and worship and serve the creature more than the creator.
Well, what's the creature? I'm the creature, and you're
the creature. That's the fool, isn't it? That's the fool, the
creature. So what's our hope? The promise of God found in verse
two is our hope. Look at that with me. Treasures
of wickedness profit nothing, but righteousness delivereth
from death. The translator should have capitalized
righteousness there. That's a person. That's a person. That's the Lord Jesus Christ.
He is righteousness. We read Psalm chapter 85 in that
last verse said righteousness will cause us to go in his way.
That's the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the Lord Jesus Christ.
So what is our hope? Our hope is that righteousness
delivers us from this wretched man that we are, from this death,
this walking corpse that we have, the death that we would have
to face, eternal death without God, that's what our hope is. What's he saying? Well, Is he
saying, now we contrast this, because he's talking about wicked,
treasure of the wicked, but righteousness delivereth from death. So is
he saying should I work righteousness? Should I try to become more righteous?
Because if I become more righteous, that means I'll deliver myself
from death. Not at all, he's saying Christ has to deliver
you. Christ is the deliverer, Christ is the redeemer, Christ
is the savior, and without him doing it all, none can be saved. Listen to Psalm 85, 10 and 11.
We read this earlier. Mercy and truth are met together.
Righteousness and peace have kissed each other. Truth shall
spring out of the earth and righteousness shall look down from heaven.
This is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. This is Jehovah's,
sit can you, the Lord, our righteousness. That's his name. That's his name. When did righteousness and peace
meet together? That was on the cross of Calvary,
wasn't it? When did the Lord, when did truth spring up in the
earth? That's when the Lord Jesus Christ became a man. When did
all these things happen? This was done in the eternity
past, but this was done in time when the Lord Jesus Christ condescended
and put on a robe of flesh. And he died in our room and in
our stead. This is when righteousness and
peace met together and kissed each other. This is when mercy
This is when mercy and truth were met together. This is the
place, this was the time. It's with the Lord Jesus Christ.
He's the only one we can get the truth from. He's the only
one that we can get mercy from. He's the only one that we can
get righteousness from. That's the message here tonight. Righteousness,
our Lord Jesus Christ delivers from death. And either we're
wise or we're the fool. And it's his, he gets all the
glory. If I'm the fool, I'm to blame. But if I have the wisdom
of Christ, he gets all the glory. He gets all the glory. I like what it said. It said
righteousness look down from heaven. Righteousness look down
from heaven. Why did righteousness look down
from heaven? Because we were sinners dead and trespasses and
in sin. The Lord's seen us. through time,
before time even existed, he saw a people. Now, Todd, I can't
explain this to you, but this is what the scripture is clear
about. The Lord's people were elect before time ever began,
given to Christ, given to Christ to redeem. Then the world was
created for the purpose of Christ redeeming his people, saving
them from their sin all by himself. And that's exactly what he did.
Therefore, righteousness delivereth. from death. Righteousness looked
down and had mercy upon a people. The only way you and I could
ever be righteous is if we are the righteousness of God in Christ. That's it. I can't work righteousness. I can't merit righteousness.
I can't earn righteousness. Righteousness is a person and
righteousness is what he makes his people according to his will. He delivered all of God's chosen
people, didn't he? From the sting of death. by his
own death. No wonder Paul said, O death,
where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?
And he said, delivereth from death. He did more than that.
He took away the sting of death because the sting of death was
sin. The sin's been taken away, been put out of the way. For
he hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin that we might
be made the righteousness of God in him. Christ took our sin,
nailed them to his cross. When he had by himself purged
our sin, he sat down on the right hand of God. The sting Took away
the sting, the sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin
is the law, but Christ is the end of the law for righteousness,
and Christ is the end of death for his people, for his people,
for all God's chosen people. Notice also it says the treasures
of wickedness. I don't wanna miss that. Treasures
of wickedness profiteth nothing. What's the treasures of wickedness?
There is no treasures in wickedness, is there? Yet men proudly proclaim
that they've done something to obligate God to save them. They've
gotten their treasure because of what they have done. The flesh
profiteth nothing, the scripture says. Did you know that? It's
profiteth nothing. We can't please God. In our flesh,
by saying I've decided to follow Jesus, I've obligated him to
do something now. I can constrain him, I can restrain.
He's God, he's sovereign, he's holy. What'd the Lord say? You
did not choose me, I chose you. Somebody messaged me the other
day and said, well, he was talking to his disciples when he said that. I said, yeah,
but it's very clear in scripture that he chose his people as well,
we didn't choose him. I mean, that's abundantly obvious.
This individual doesn't believe the gospel, and I pray for him,
but. Even though he was speaking to
his disciples, you can apply that to the Lord's people. There's
no doubt. Every person that's ever been saved was saved for
one reason and one reason only, because God chose to save them. That's it. That's it. He chose
to elect them. Christ agreed to redeem them. The Spirit agreed to regenerate
them. If that doesn't happen, nobody's gonna be saved. Nobody's
gonna be saved. So there is no treasure in wickedness.
There is no treasure. What is this wickedness, though,
that he's talking about? Is he talking about horrible living? Is he talking about... The wickedness of the flesh is
the unbelief towards God. It's saying, we will not have
this man to reign over us. I am my own God. I don't need
his blood. I don't need his work. My work's
good enough. My work made the blood of Christ
effectual. That's wicked. That's wicked. Okay. Notice verse three, we're
not going to go completely verse by verse. I'm gonna run out of
time, but, um, be pretty close. Verse three, the Lord will not
suffer the soul of the righteous to famish, but he casts it the
way of the substance. of the wicked because we were
given to Christ before time ever began, because we were given
Christ before time ever began, he lived a perfect life. Therefore we were in him and
we lived a perfect life because we were given to Christ before
time ever began, because we were in Christ when he died, we died. Because we were given to Christ
and we were in Christ, when he was resurrected, we were gloriously
resurrected in him, his people, his chosen people. He told his
followers, I am the bread that came down. I am the manna that
came down. He said, you can't see me. You
don't know me. He said, you won't come to me, that you might have
eternal life. But he says, I am that bread that came down from
heaven. And because we were in him, because we're his, he continually
gives that bread down each day. He gives new manna. What is that
manna? That's his body broken for us.
That's his precious blood that was shed for the remission of
his people's sin. Men talk about treasures. You
ever heard people talking about rewards in heaven? Christ is
our reward. Christ is our reward and he's
sufficient. He's sufficient. He's exceedingly sufficient.
He's our portion. Our portion is the broken body
of the Lord Jesus Christ and the precious blood that was shed.
Our portion is the fountain of living water. Our portion is
grace and peace and mercy. This is what he feeds his people
with daily. This is what he's saying here
in verse three, the Lord will not suffer the soul of the righteous
to famish. He's not going to leave you to
yourself if you're his. If you're his, he will not leave
you to yourself because you know why? He said the Lord, even if
we deny him, the Lord remaineth faithful. He cannot, cannot,
cannot deny himself. See, the union that we have with
the Lord Jesus Christ is a perfect union. It's not kind of in union. It's more in union than husband
and wife on this physical earth. We're literally in him in the
heavenlies. You follow what I'm saying? It's a perfect union
with him. Well, look at the opposite here.
He cast it the way the substance of the wicked. What does that
mean? Those that's left themselves,
their substance is cast away along with them. They're cast
away as well. Let's read verse four. He becometh
poor that dealeth with a slack hand, but the hand of the diligent
maketh rich. Now that's true in life. You
could just say that if your hand works hard, you're going to have
more money as if your hand didn't work hard. But what is riches
in the scripture? Is it monetary? Is it wealth? Is it health? Prosperity? The
riches of the Lord is the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the riches
that we're talking about here. And how is it that we receive
the riches of the Lord? Because the hand of the diligent
one, the Lord Jesus Christ, makes his people rich in him. Do you see that? It's not that
we're earning anything because our hands are moving when it
comes to salvation. It's that the Lord earned salvation
for us. He was the man with the diligent hands. No, we were the
fool, remember? We were the foolish ones. We
were poor and needy. Our hand was slack. But the scripture
says, Lord is not slack concerning his promise towards us, not willing
that any of his elect should perish, but that all should come
to repentance. Lord's not slack like we were. And yet, even in
that sin that we are and that we do, he saved us. He saved
his people from that sin. Was it not by the mighty hand
of our Savior, the victory was won, salvation's complete, redemption's
accomplished, righteousness has been bestowed. God saved his
people. God finished the work. The Lord
Jesus Christ finished the work. Now verse five says, he that
gathereth in summer is a wise son, but he that sleepeth and
harvests is a son that causes shame. That would remind us that
we're born dead, so you could say that we're sleeping. And
the Lord said one time, the fields are white and ready to be harvested,
but the laborers are few. This labor that he's talking
about here, it can't mean Gathering it can't mean something that
we do as part of our salvation because we know that that's not
true Christ finished the work So what is he talking about here?
Was it not the Lord that said unto us live? Was it not Lord
that said the same words Lazarus come forth to each of his people
each one of his into each one of his elect Here come forth
and then we come forth and is it what we gather or is it what
he gathered? Well, what did he gather? righteousness
justice satisfied, the law fulfilled. This is what he gathered. This
is what he gathered. And this is what we find ourself
with in the Lord Jesus Christ is his righteousness, his sanctification,
his redemption. Notice that he says, he that
gathereth in summer is a wise son. Well, that also does apply
to us. What does it mean gather? What
work is he talking about? We labor to enter into the rest
of the Lord Jesus Christ. We labor to enter in to the Lord's
Sabbath. What does the word labor mean
there? It means flee. It means flee. It means hurry
to rest. That's what it means. Hurry to
rest. Go as fast as you can to rest.
And when you're there, rest. Rest in Christ. And by definition,
resting is not working. No, we just get to feast upon
everything that the Lord Jesus Christ has gathered for his people
by his finished work. All right, verses six through
eight we'll take together. It says, blessings are upon the
head of the just, but violence covereth the mouth of the wicked.
The memory of the just is blessed, but the name of the wicked shall
rot. The wise in heart will receive commandments, but a pratting
fool shall fall. That's already told us that pratting
literally means a fool of lips. a foolish person speaking. Well,
who are the just here? Let's start there in verse number
six. Blessings are upon the head of
the just. Who are the just? Those who God chose by his infinite
grace to justify freely by those grace. First of all, Christ is
the just one and justified his people. And if his people have
been justified, they are considered just in his sight. So the Lord's
people are the just here. The Lord's people are the just. They're blessed with Christ.
They're blessed with life eternal. That's why it says here that
in the next part, the wise in heart will receive the commandments,
but no, that's not the one I wanted to read, I'm sorry. The memory of the just is blessed.
Why is the memory of the just blessed? Because we think upon
the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ. How blessed is
that? That's the blessing, isn't it? The finished work of the
Lord Jesus Christ. The memory that we have. How that God saved
his people from their sin. That's our hope. That's our hope. How the Lord's saving us now.
We remember the Lord promised. His promises are why our memories
are glorious. It's all about him. It's all
about him. We remember this, the Lord has
given us the ability to obey him by faith, to obey his command. That was the, you see verse eight,
that's what I was gonna say a second ago, but I was getting ahead
of myself. The wise in heart will receive commandments. What
commandments is he talking about? Are we talking about the 10 commandments?
Are we talking about the law? Get to receive the law, but there's
no rest in the law. What's he talking about? Believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. That's a
command to the Lord's people. Come unto me. That's a command. I love, you remember Blind Bartimaeus
on the side of the road. It was said, Jesus, thou son
of David, have mercy on me. And all the disciples and everybody
was shushing him. Be quiet. You're bothering the master.
And he cried louder. He had a need, didn't he? And the Lord said
unto him, go, go fetch him. Go get him. Just like King David
said about Mephibosheth, go fetch him. Go get him. And that blind
beggar was brought to the Lord. He was brought to the Lord. Do
we not see the picture of us being brought unto the Lord?
And the Lord said, what would you have me do for you? He said,
my sight. And what'd the Lord say? Receive your sight. It wasn't an offer. It was a
command to receive your sight. This is what the Lord gives His
people, the command to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, look
to Him as all your righteousness, all your sanctification, all
your wisdom, and all your redemption. And He gives you the faith to
believe and obey. The faith to believe and obey. Let's look at verse nine and
10. He that walketh uprightly walketh surely, but he that perverted
his way shall be known. He that winketh with the eye
causes sorrow, but a pratting fool shall fall. What is it to walk uprightly? I heard that in false religion
a lot. You need to walk uprightly. Your walk should be better. You
should live in this way and doing this and doing that. What does
it mean to walk uprightly? I'll tell you, the scripture's
clear on this. In Him, we live, we move, and we have our being. In Him, we live, we move, and
we have our being. That is what it is to walk uprightly. It's that simple. If it doesn't
bring us back to Christ every single time, there may be an
exception to that, but I don't believe there is. If it doesn't
cause us to look to Him as the end result, then it's not of
the Lord. If it's about our work giving
us something, causing Him to do something for us, if I can
examine myself and see my walk is good and I'm walking uprightly
because I'm doing this, that's not of the Lord. to walk uprightly,
to be in Him, living and moving and having our being in Him,
in Him alone. Because of our substitute surety's
finished work, we walk by faith, not by sight, not by what we
see any longer. Now here, we have the opposite
of that also. You'll notice it says, that walk,
verse nine, he that walketh uprightly walketh surely or truly, but
he that perverted his ways shall be known. That means found out. It's going to be found out. Nothing
can be hid from the Lord. Nothing can be hid from the Lord.
We see that the winking eye in verse 10, and that he that winketh
with the eye causes sorrow, but a prating fool shall fall. The
one that perverteth his ways, the one that winketh with the
eyes, and the one that, the prating fool, that's all the same. It's
all the same individual, just doing different things. What
it means is they're believing and speaking the lie. I can do
something in my own hand to make God accept me. That's not true. I can't do that. I don't have
the physical ability to do that and I certainly don't have the
spiritual ability. The Lord is pleased with one, the Lord Jesus
Christ. We don't pervert our ways or
try to pervert the ways of God. We believe on him and we rest
all of our hope in the finished work of Christ, that's it. I
have no other righteousness, I have no other plea, it is enough
that Jesus died and that he died for me, the songwriter said. God only accepts the person and
work of the Lord Jesus Christ, and because he did, God has made
his people speak what he speaks now. We don't speak foolishly,
we're not a pratting fool. We speak what he speaks. What
does he speak? Well, this is my beloved son
on whom I'm well pleased to hear you hymn. We speak that, don't
we? That's our heavenly father. We
believe that. We believe that. What do we speak?
Christ is all. It is finished. These are the
things that God says that we speak. In closing, let's look
at this last verse quickly. The mouth of a righteous man
is a well of life, but violence covereth the mouth of the wicked. What is it that we speak? The
mouth It's going along with what he's saying just above that about speaking. Like how the fool speaks, we
don't talk the way that they talk because of grace. But what
does the mouth of righteous speak? How is it a well of life? Do
we not speak of the fountain of living water as all of our
hope? Is that not a well of life? Do we not speak of the bread
of life as being the only sustenance that's gonna keep us, that's
gonna save us? Do we not speak of righteousness
only obtained through and by the Lord Jesus Christ? These are wells of life. This
is the wells of eternal life. We speak of Christ and Christ
alone never, Paul said it best, never glorying in the flesh.
I have nowhere to glory in my flesh. We speak of the righteousness
accomplished by the Lord Jesus Christ without our help, without
our aid, without our input, without our contribution, without our
knowledge. We didn't even know about it,
did we? We were born, and eventually, somewhere along the line, a gospel
preacher told us about the finished work of Christ. That's when we
came to the knowledge of it, not before. We didn't know. We didn't have a clue. So God
did all of that without our knowledge. Isn't that glorious? Without
our input, without our contribution, without our help or aid in any
way. What else do we speak? Well, we speak of justice being
satisfied by God. God pleased God. Scripture says,
Abraham pleased God and it was accounted unto him for righteousness.
And you heard me talking about this a lot. That word accounted
means reckoned. It was tallied more or less to
be true because the Lord had made him righteous. He gave him
faith to believe. Therefore Abraham believed God.
But the reason, the reason that, uh, lost my train of thought. We are blessed with faithful
Abraham because we've been given the same faith to believe God.
We believe him the same way he believed him. We don't cover
our mouth with the violence that's mentioned here. And that violence
is just falseness. It's falseness. I'm going to
get to that in a minute. But violence literally means injustice. injustice. Now we speak that
God is the reason we have faith to believe God because he gave
it to us freely by his grace. Therefore, we speak on things
that glorify him, not glorify the flesh, not glorify the flesh. But the wicked, on the other
hand, they say they have violence in their mouth. They speak wrong
about God and about Christ, about the justice that was satisfied
on the cross of Calvary. They look to themselves to do
something to make Christ's work effectual. That's the fool. I've
told you the difference this hour in the wise man and the
fool. And I want to be very clear that one that makes the difference,
the one that determines it, the one that secured it, the one
that rolled it, the one that made it to be the one that willed
it is God and God alone. It's not by the will of flesh,
not by the will of man, not by the will of blood, but of God.
That's how we're born according to John chapter 1. God has made us to believe, to
know, and to speak the truth. I actually said that when we
started. God made us to know, to believe, and to speak the
truth. Therefore, God's people have
been made the wisdom of God in Christ. We've been made his wisdom
as well because we're one with him. He's the difference between
the wise and the foolish. He gets all the glory for this,
all the glory for this, and his people love it that way. Let's
pray. Father, we ask that you would
bless this to our understanding for your glory calls us to rest
and you calls us to see and seek your face. In Christ's name,
amen.