If you'd like to turn to our
text tonight, you'll find it in Proverbs chapter four. That
song said, prone to wonder, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the
one I love. And that is so true. And that's what we were praying
for just a moment ago. Our wondering minds to be stopped.
How soon our frail minds wonder how quickly our Our thoughts,
well, they betray us, don't they? They think of things that our
deceitful hearts run towards mischief. I mean, that's just
us by nature, isn't it? That's just us. We need to be
reminded. We need to be reminded how often our love towards God
grows cold. And yet, he never allows us to
be left to ourself utterly. He comes back to where we are
and says, seek ye my face. He reveals his truth once more
and our hearts ravished again by our loving Savior. We need
to be reminded so often of his grace, of his mercy, of his love,
that his compassion felleth not, that his mercy is everlasting,
that his grace is all sufficient. No matter the need, His grace
is all sufficient. We need to be reminded that it
is finished, don't we? It's finished. All things. For the salvation of the Lord's
people, it's truly finished. All things are ordered by His
hand. Now tonight, here in our text, I've titled the message,
Forget Not. Forget not, because it's something
that he says in our text here. Let's read it. Proverbs four,
verses four through six says this. He taught me also and said
unto me, let thine heart retain my words, keep my commandments
and live, 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 shall keep thee. You'll notice that
word it in between forget and not is in italics. It was added
by the translators. That's why I titled the message
Forget Not, because it's not a it. What is he talking about
here? He's talking about wisdom. I
understand wisdom is a thing. Wisdom's a person. Wisdom's a
person. Forget him not would have been
a better translation. First thing he says is get wisdom
and get understanding. What does wisdom teach us? God
is God, and I am not. God is God, and I am not. Now,
I might think I am sometimes whenever I don't get my way. And you know children, they want
to be in charge of the house. And today, more than ever, we
see children who are unruly, but they'll throw a temper tantrum.
They'll begin to I saw a kid just recently at a place of business
rolling around on the floor, and I thought, that's interesting.
Glad it wasn't my child. But that's what we do when we
don't get our way. Did you know that? We don't roll around on
the floor, but oh, our flesh is so ready just to rear its
ugly head up and shake our fist at the Lord if the Lord leaves
us to ourself. It's him that keeps us. It's
him that keeps our minds. It's him that keeps us from murmuring
and complaining. Wisdom teaches us that. He's
God and I am not. He's God and I am not. What else
does wisdom teach us? Christ is all. Christ is all. Yeah, but that's too simple of
a gospel. But that's the gospel. Christ
is all. Christ is all in salvation. Salvation's of the Lord and it's
finished, that's it, Christ is all, it's not complicated. And
men hear that and the religious will stumble upon it because
it's too simple and then the educated will call it foolishness.
That's just how men are by nature, isn't it? But oh, to us who believe
the truth, it is the power of God and the wisdom of God, that's
what the scripture says. Now what Solomon's saying here,
what the Holy Spirit's saying to us through Solomon, is do
not ignore the truth. The word that he said there,
forget not, is the word ignore. The word ignore. And that's what
he's telling us. Don't ignore. The truth. The second thing he says is,
decline not. You'll notice in the next verse,
or at the end of that verse, so it says, get wisdom, get understanding,
forget it not, neither decline from the words of my mouth. Then
it says, forsake her not. So that's the three, forget it
not, decline, neither decline from the words of my mouth, and
forsake her not, forsake wisdom not. And that's the three things
here in this text. To forget not means to ignore.
To decline not, and this one I found interesting, decline
not means pervert. Decline not means pervert. Don't
pervert the truth. Don't pervert it. And the third
one, forsake not, which means to leave or to depart. He's saying to begin with, get
wisdom, get understanding, forget it not, don't ignore it. Don't
ignore it, because if me and you can, we will. We will. Do you remember when you were
younger and your parents would tell you to do something or tell
you that you were wrong about something and you didn't believe
that you were wrong? And perhaps you decided to challenge
that. Perhaps that didn't work out too good. But no matter what
we think about God and the things of God, he is truth. He cannot
lie. He is right. Therefore, the scripture
says, let God be true and every man a liar. You and I, that's
what we are by nature. We can't challenge God and say,
no, I think you're wrong. No. No, we can't do that. We hear. The Lord said, my sheep
hear my voice. and I know them and they follow
me. The Lord's people hear the Lord. And yes, it is true sometimes
in our flesh we do get frustrated at life and different things.
I had some things happen this week that were frustrating. The
Lord always brings us back to our feet being on the solid rock,
always grounds us again. And you know, when you hear the
gospel being declared, you know what that does? I was talking
to Steve about this last night. It makes our flesh shut up. I
love that. I love that. If you're hearing,
if the Lord allows you to hear, everything else just fades away
for just a moment. And now here we are resting at
the feet of Christ. We're like Mary sitting at his
feet. Lord, tell me, tell me all about it. That's what we're
doing. And Mary wasn't worried at all. Martha was going all
over the house, cleaning everything. She was overcome with burdens.
I have to clean this and do this. Went up to her and said, Lord,
don't you care? I'm working so hard, and Mary's
sitting here doing nothing. And she said, no, she's doing
the one thing needful. She's worshiping. She's hearing
the words of the Lord, and that's why we come. No, we don't ignore
the truth. We've got to have it, don't we?
We don't ignore it. We've got to have it. He says, get wisdom, get understanding,
don't ignore it. Forget it not. Now how does one
get wisdom? We have to get wisdom. How do
we get wisdom? It's not something that's on the shelf somewhere
that you can buy, is it? How do we get wisdom? Well, is
it by our merits? Do we earn wisdom? Is that how
we get wisdom? Or is it the gift of God, freely
by his grace? If I am required to have wisdom
in order to please God, and we are, and we are, that means it
has to come from him. Because if I produce it, it's
sin. The Lord is the one that must
give wisdom, give his darling son the revelation of Christ
to his people by his choice, all by his grace. Wisdom is the
person, the Lord Jesus Christ. The scripture says wisdom founded
the worlds. It also says the word of God
created everything. That's the Lord Jesus Christ,
isn't it? Wisdom knows all things. Wisdom is his name, but wisdom
is his attribute and his character as well. It's just, you can't...
None of the attributes of God contradict themselves. In this
infinite wisdom, he not only knows all, he purposed all because
of what he knows, because of who he is. We're like David when
we hear those kind of things. Such things are too wonderful
for me. They're too high. I can't attain to that. But we
believe it. We heard in Psalm 100 whenever
we were reading the call to worship, it said, we are his. Know ye
that the Lord he is God. It is he that hath made us. and
not we ourselves. We didn't make ourselves, he
made us. How did he do it? By his wisdom. By his wisdom,
he made us, he chose us, he saved us, he keeps his people. Forget
that not. Forget that not. In his infinite
wisdom, He knew you by name before the world was created. His people.
He knew you by name and purpose to create you to save you. I love that. He purpose to create
you in order to redeem you for his glory. That's that's wisdom. That's what our that's what our
Savior. That's who he is. That's what he's done. time he knew the only way he
was going to be able to redeem the ones that he loved was to
become a man, born of a woman, born under the law to redeem
them that were under the law. He knew he would have to come
to this sin-cursed earth. He purposed it that way. He gets
all the glory. Think of the condescension of
infinite wisdom becoming robed in the likeness of sinful flesh
and poor sin condemning sin in the flesh, putting away the sin
of his people. which you and I could not have done. We don't
have wisdom in and of ourself, but he does. Therefore, he had
the knowledge, the understanding, and the wisdom to put away sin. He knew. He knew exactly how
to do it. He purposed it, and he did it.
He did it. Forget not that his choice to
redeem was entirely based upon the merits of the Lord Jesus
Christ. His choice to redeem was not
based upon your and I's merit. It was not based upon your and
I's choice. It was not based upon your and
I's heart. He chose to love out of one word, grace. Grace, for
by grace are you saved through faith, in that not of yourselves,
it is the gift of God, not of works. Less any man should boast. He didn't look through the eons
of time before he created it and say, well, I know this person
right here, they're gonna choose me, so I'm gonna elect them to
eternal life. No, he looked through and loved
whenever we were polluted in our blood, when we were dead
in trespasses and sin. That's what he said, you ethiquicken
together. When did he do that? When we were dead without God
in trespasses and sin. That's grace. And what a God
of wisdom to know how to do all that. To know how, and it's,
well, forget not. Salvation is entirely
based, and I wrote this, three words to describe this, entirely,
completely, and totally based. I'm sure if I had thought of
another one, I'd have put another one there, but that was all I could come
up with. Entirely, completely, and totally based on the merits
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Salvation is entirely, totally,
and completely based on the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Salvation
is entirely, totally, and completely, entirely, totally, and completely
based on the finished work of Christ alone. Not our work, not
our merits, not our blood, not our lives, certainly not our
deaths. but his, his life, his work,
his death. If you and I are to have righteousness
before God other than these filthy rags that we are born with, the
Lord Jesus Christ is gonna have to be the one to give it. He's
gonna have to be the one to bestow it. It must be imputed. It must be given freely by his
grace. Don't we see that we would never
choose it because by nature we want to be our own gods, he must
do the entire work and then tell us, this is what I've done for
you. And then he lets us see that it's Christ's righteousness
that we're bearing. And it's too wonderful for us.
I didn't have any part of that. If the Lord doesn't give it freely
by grace, then we're adding to what he accomplished. That's
what that means. But no, the Lord's people want salvation
by grace alone, don't we? We don't want it by grace plus
works. We don't want it by grace plus
merits. We don't want it by grace plus ceremonies. Grace. We just want God's amazing grace. Everyone that he died for, by
his wisdom, he imputes his righteousness for our justification before
God. He imparts his righteousness to his people as their sanctification
before God. Forget not. Forget not. Do not ignore the truth. It's
the only thing that can set us free. Don't ignore it. Forget
not what the Lord's done. The second thing he says is,
neither decline from the words of my mouth. Now, The Klein here
means to pervert, pervert the words of his mouth. Now, if he's
speaking, the word of God is speaking, then that means that
it's the truth. He's saying, don't pervert the truth. Don't
pervert the truth. Well, how does one pervert the
truth? I'll show you in 1 Samuel 2, if you'd like to turn there. Look in verse 12 through 16 with
me. First Samuel chapter two. Verse 12. Now the sons of Eli
were the sons of Belial. They knew not the Lord. And the
priest's custom with the people was that when any man offered
sacrifice, the priest's servants came while the flesh was in the
sea with a flesh hook of three teeth in his hand, and he struck
it into the pan or kettle or cauldron or pot. All that the
flesh hook brought up, the priest took for himself. So they did
in shallow unto all the Israelites that came thither. Also before
they burnt the fat, The pre-servants came and said to the man that
sacrificed, give the flesh to roast for the priest, for he
will not have sodden flesh of thee, but raw. And if any man
said unto him, let them not fail to burn the fat presently, and
then take as much as thy soul desireth, then he would answer
him, nay, but thou shalt give it me now, and if not, I will
take it by force. Let's read verse 17, too. I didn't
write that down, but it's necessary. Wherefore, the sin of the young
men, Hophni and Phinehas, was very great before the Lord, for
the men abhorred the offering of the Lord. The sin was very
great. Well, what's happening here is
they're having sacrifice. And as you all know, the Levites
did not work outside of doing priestly duties. They didn't
have land that they owned. They didn't have food that they
would go glean. They were completely dependent
upon the people's sacrifice that was brought to the temple. And
what was happening was, is as they would bring it, the pattern
that the Lord had given the children of Israel was it was supposed
to be roasted with fire. And why it was roasted with fire,
when it was seething, When it was cooked, they would take a
flesh hook and they would hit it with the flesh hook. And whatever
that flesh hook got, that would be for the priest to eat. That
would be their food. What's happening now though,
Hophni and Phinehas, they're taking the raw meat. They want
the fat. Now the fat's the first thing
to cook whenever you cook over a fire. That's the first thing
to cook off. But that fat represents the Lord's glory. It's the best
part. It's the most coveted part, so
to speak. They didn't want it the way that
God said, you're going to eat it this way. They wanted it the
way they wanted it. They didn't want, they wanted it raw. They
didn't want it, uh, cooked. They wanted it raw. And they,
and he says to us here, it was, uh, the sin of the young men
that was very great before the Lord for the men aboard the offering
of the Lord men, they started despising the Lord's offering
because of this, that they took, took out the, the meat before
it was cooked, then they'd broken the ordinance. They weren't worshiping
at that point. This is how they worshiped. This
is what the picture is here. This is the lamb, the sacrifice,
the Lord Jesus Christ upon the altar, and the wrath of God being
poured out upon him just as it was on the cross of Calvary by
fire. The fires of God's wrath. That's
what this is a picture of. And that lamb, he had to die
order for their sin to be put away in order for the, uh, for
that year, for that year to be covered up for that year. Now,
our lamb is a little, there's a lot different. That was just
typical and symbolic. Our lamb, Lord Jesus Christ,
when he died, he put away the sin of the Lord's people forever.
Once and for all, when this man had by himself purged our sins,
he sat down and Why was this such an insult to God that Hophni
and Phinehas were not doing the ordinance the way that the Lord
had commanded them to? I'll show you why if you want
to turn back to Exodus chapter 12. You remember this is where the
children of Israel, it's the 10th plague of Egypt, it's about
to come to pass, and the Lord's given them this ordinance to
observe in order to save them. Exodus chapter 12. Verse six, oh, verse five, I'm
sorry. Your lamb shall be without blemish,
a male of the first year, and you shall take it out from the
sheep or from the goats, and you shall keep it up until the
14th day of the same month, and the whole assembly of the congregation
of Israel shall kill it in the evening. And they shall take
of the blood and strike it on the two side posts and on the
upper door posts of the house, wherein they shall eat it. And they shall eat the flesh
of that night, roast with fire and unleavened bread, and with
bitter herbs they shall eat it. Eat it not raw, here it is, eat
not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with
fire his head with his legs and with the pertinence thereof. And ye shall let nothing of it
remain until the morning, and that which remaineth of it until
the morning ye shall burn with fire. And what is the Lord saying
here with Hophni and Phinehas and with this and the perversion
of the Lord's gospel? It's simple. If you eat it raw,
it's a disobedience unto the Lord. The sacrifice has not been
complete at that point. And if you sodden it, what are
you doing? You're watering it down. It's when men take the
gospel and they don't preach the gospel fully. They take it
and they add to or they take away from it. They smooth it
over so it's not as offensive as it might be. They make it
watered down. He's saying, don't do that. Don't
eat it sodden and don't eat it raw. It has to be burned with
fire. If they take it and they, if
they take it and they were Eating it raw, it's a picture of the
sacrifice, the Lord not finishing the work. They didn't want the
Lord that way. They wanted him this way. I wanna
take him that way. This is the perversion. This
is what we're being warned from in Proverbs. Don't pervert the
truth. Take the lamb, you have to eat
it all. Every bit of the lamb. Everything that he accomplished,
everything that he did, you have to have every bit of it. You
can't just take pieces and parts and say, I believe this and I
don't believe that. Now we must say, what does thus sayeth the
Lord? And we believe the full truth. Don't eat it raw, don't discredit
what God accomplished, the salvation for his people. We have to eat
every bit of it the way God said to eat it. God's not looking
for anything that's going on inside that house to save the
children of Israel. He's looking at the blood on
the outside of that house, and that was their salvation. But
isn't it true we love to feast upon the lamb, the water and
the bread of life? It's true, isn't it? We want
all of him, all of him, not just part, not picking and choosing. No, that's how men take and pervert
the gospel. They take glory. for themselves. They want the fat for themselves.
They want the fat for themselves. I'll remind you that when the
lamb died, the scripture says the first sacrifice this happened
was whenever Noah came off the ark, he sacrificed under the
Lord and the smell went up to heaven, a sweet smelling savor. Then we read also when Christ
died, the smell went up to heaven under the Father as a sweet smelling
savor. And that's the point, the sacrifice that is made with
the fat goes up and the Lord was reminded, not that he forgot,
but he was reminded of his darling son and how his son was gonna
have to die and he was gonna be stripped of everything in
order to be able to redeem his people. He was gonna have to
die the horrible death, make his soul an offering for sin.
That's why it's an insult to water it down. We tell the truth
in love and trust that the Lord will do the work according to
his will. God's people, we don't forget
and we don't pervert it. Now go back to our text in Proverbs
chapter four. We don't forget, we don't pervert
it, for we know it is the blood alone that causes the Lord to
pass by. He said, when I see the blood,
I'll pass by you. The last thing that's mentioned
here is beginning of verse six, it says, forsake her not. Forsake her not. That means do
not leave. Do not leave. You know, if you
and I can leave, we will. I've seen it several times. People
come for a while and they'll leave. If we can leave, that
means we've been left to ourself. It's not us that keeps us, it's
God that keeps us. In every aspect of this salvation,
we're mercy beggars from the time that we believe to the time
we die. were mercy beggars. Lord, keep me. Judas kissed the
face of the Lord. That's how close he was. He kissed
the face of the Lord and he died and went to hell. He got to walk
with the Lord, do the miracles of the Lord. He's warning us
here. He says, no, don't leave. This
is life eternal. This is salvation. Christ is
all. Flee to him, forget not that the work is finished. Don't
pervert the gospel by watering it down. And don't leave it,
it's all of our hope. It's all of our salvation, the
Lord's gospel. His finished works, all of our
salvation, don't leave. Thanks be to God. He keeps his
people. He keeps his people. Isaiah 43
says, but now thus saith the Lord that created thee, O Jacob,
and he that formed thee, O Israel, fear not, for I have redeemed
thee. I have redeemed thee. I have
called thee by thy name. Thou art mine. If you heard the
Lord say to you, thou art mine, there wouldn't be anything to
be afraid of, would there? There'd be rest. If I'm his, oh, I have called thee by thy name,
thou art mine. When thou passest through the
waters, I will be with thee. And through the rivers, the rivers
won't overflow thee, death won't touch you. That's what the river
is, the Jordan River. When thou walkest through the
fire, thou shalt not be burned. Why? Why will the flame not kindle
upon you? Because he took all the flame
of God's wrath when he was on the cross for his people. He
absorbed every bit of it, extinguished it. There's no more flame. There's
no more flame. For I am the Lord thy God, the
Holy One of Israel, thy Savior. What can harm a child of God? Nothing that doesn't pass through
our Father's hand first. What harmed Job? Lord had to
allow it, didn't he? Lord had to give permission.
We'll find out one day the devil's on a short leash and he doesn't
have any teeth. He just growls and roars a bunch
and it's frightening to us, but the Lord has him on a leash.
He's God's devil. He's God's devil. You and I are
no match for him, but our savior is. And he conquered him on Calvary. He conquered him. What can harm
the child of God? Nothing that doesn't pass through
his hands. Well, if I am his, who shall separate us from Christ? What shall separate us from the
love of God that's in Christ Jesus? Paul said, for I am persuaded
that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities,
nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height,
nor depth, nor any other creature shall be able to separate us
from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. He didn't leave
anything open-ended there, did he? There's nothing gonna separate
you from the love of God. It's an everlasting love. It's
not that we chose to love Him and then He loved us. It's an
everlasting love. It never had a beginning and
it never had an end. Our love for Him, because He gave it,
there was a time we didn't love Him, but He gave us the love
towards Him. Now we love Him. He causes all of his children
to have the same confession. Lord, save me. Lord, keep me. Don't let me forsake you. Don't
let me forget you. Don't let me depart from you. Keep me. We know we're Judas
if left to ourself. Don't let us, don't let me forsake
your wisdom, your Christ, your gospel. Your gospel, it's all,
it's all we have. It's our only hope, our only
rest. Therefore his commandment is, forsake her not. Lord, I
will if you cause me to. And then we begged, Lord, cause
me not to forsake. Cause me not to forsake. And
for those whom he keeps, our dying confession will be the
same as our living confession. David said this on his deathbed.
David said, though it be not so with my house. Now it could
have been talking about his physical house. Absalom and him were at
war. They had all kinds of problems
at one point. And David's on his deathbed now, so Absalom's
been dead for a while. But he said, even though it be
not so with my house, I believe he's talking about this. Because
we read in the scripture, this earth and house of this tabernacle
be dissolved, this house. We have a place in heaven, a
place that Christ prepared, not made with hands. Even though
it be not so with this house, my flesh, yet, and I love the
yets of the gospel, the buts of the Lord, the interjections
of when the Lord says, but God, yet the Lord hath made with me
an everlasting covenant, an everlasting covenant. This is all my hope,
this is all my salvation, that we make it not to grow. It's
the same confession as right now, isn't it? Even though I
see myself having the ability to forsake, even though I see
myself having the ability to leave, I see myself, if the Lord
leads me into myself, I'll be Judas. The Lord hath made with
me an everlasting covenant. Oh, that's my hope. Covenant
of grace, the salvation of God's people. You know what our confession is?
God is God, salvation is of the Lord, Christ is all, and it is
finished. Don't forsake this covenant.
Don't run to the covenant of works. That's what that forsaking
is. Don't go back to the covenant
of works. You won't find anything but death there. No, this is the
covenant of grace. Look to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. We say
with the man, Lord I believe. Help thou my unbelief. I am full of it. I believe, help
thou my unbelief. May the Lord enable us to believe
in him. By doing so, get wisdom and get understanding freely
by grace. May he keep us from forgetting, ignoring the truth. May he keep us from perverting,
declining from it. And may he keep us from forsaking
it, leaving or departing it. Here's the most glorious part.
If you're his, he promised he would. I'll never leave you. I'll never forsake you. I'm going
to keep you to the end. Let's pray. Father, we thank
you that you do keep your people. Thank you for grace. Take these
words and apply it to our heart according to your will to our
understanding. In Christ's name, amen.