I should have probably looked
and seen which chapter we were going to fall on in Proverbs
prior to saying, well, we're just going to preach the Wednesdays,
whatever it falls on, because I struggled a little bit trying
to find the Lord's face. He's in every chapter. He's in
every part of His precious Word. The volume of the book is written
of Him. Sometimes he humbles his preachers by making us beg
Lord. I I really need the message from
this particular passage. I can't see you and so the Lord
I believe is giving me a message for us tonight. It's found in
Proverbs 7. Proverbs 7. This is Solomon's experience
of the harlots behavior. He's observing this from a window
and we're going to. Attempt to go through the for
the most part, the entire chapter, at least look at it as an oversight
or go over each particular portion, whether we read it aloud or not.
But let's begin in verse one. Of Chapter 7 of Proverbs, it
says my son, keep my words and lay up my commandments with thee.
Keep my commandments and live in my law as the apple of thine
eye. Bind them upon thy fingers, write
them upon the table of thine heart. Say unto wisdom thou art
my sister, and call understanding thy kin's woman, that they may
keep thee from the strange woman. That's what I've titled this
message tonight, the strange woman. That they may keep thee
from the strange woman, from the stranger which flattereth
with her words. I love the way that the Lord's
direct wording in the very first two words of verse one, how he's
clear in ownership of his people from the very beginning. My son,
I couldn't get past that for the longest time. He's saying
you're mine. It's a possession. It's a purchased people that
the Lord is speaking to here. This is not a warning in this
chapter for the entire world. The Bible was not written to
the entire world. Did you know that? The Bible
was only written to the Lord's people. An example I can give
us to make that more clear would be if I wrote a letter to my
wife, a love letter, I would write it specifically addressed
to her with what I was feeling for her. But if I gave it to
every woman present, it wouldn't mean much to my wife, first of
all. But second of all, it wouldn't mean the same thing to you that
it would mean to my wife because it's to her. This Bible, this
blessed book, the word of God was written for his people. It
was a love letter to his people by divine inspiration in order
for us to see his face. And it is what he uses. by the
preaching of his gospel to bring his people to the knowledge that
they are his bride, that he hath purchased them. That is our hope,
that he does that for us. This totally null and voids the
idea that Jesus loves everybody. He doesn't. He doesn't love everybody.
He died for his people and he successfully saved his people. If he loved everybody, then what
does his love have to do with salvation? If he shed his blood
for everybody, what does his blood have to do for salvation?
What does it have to do with it? He died for his people, loving
his people unto death, shedding his precious blood on purpose
for his people and successfully redeemed his people back to God.
And we know that in order for this passage to be said of us
in order for this passage to be written to us, the qualification
is to be a son. of the Lord himself, my son."
This is Solomon writing, certainly. But understand, we're talking
about a physical side of something and a spiritual side of something.
The word of God can be seen as just being parables and passages
of physical things that you can do. And certainly if we took
the word of God and tried to apply it to our physical life, I'm
sure we'd be better off, if you want to put it that way, but
certainly not for righteousness. We wouldn't do that as the Lord's
people, we know better. That being said, we seek the Lord
spiritually, don't we? We want to know what he has to
say to our soul to the eternal part, not the carnal part. What
is the Lord speaking on here? Well, he's saying my son, keep
my words. So the qualification is is being
a son of the Lord. He tells us that you didn't choose
me. He's talking to his disciples, but it's also likened into his
his elect bride and John 1560 said you didn't choose me. I
chose you. And what did he do when he chose us? Well, John
put it this way, behold what manner of love the Father hath
bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God. So we qualify because of his
righteousness. We qualify for his merits on
behalf of his merits. We qualify because of his faith.
And that is our only qualification before the Lord. Otherwise, we're
disqualified. We're discredited, we're devalued,
but he valued his people in so much that he shed his blood and
he saved his people. My son. That's the address that
the Lord mentions specifically to us tonight. We know that this
was between the father and the son only. In order for us to
be the benefactors of this grace, it had to be something other
than what we merit, or it would no longer be of grace. Isn't
that what Paul said? If it's of works, it's no longer
grace. If it's grace, then it no longer can be of works. And
that's exactly what the Lord did. By his determinant counsel
and foreknowledge in the covenant of grace, according to his own
will, hath he saved us by mercy and by grace alone. He did that
for his son. He did that for His people. Now,
I wanted to preface everything I was about to tell us with those
two words because if we don't get that as our foundation, then
the rest of it could be considered legalism to some degree. And
that's what men do with the Word of God is they take it and they
try to bring it into a legal manner of something they could
keep, something that they can please God with, or something
where they can sit a little bit higher than their peers and maybe
God will recognize them as being better. I'm not as bad as so-and-so. I don't do this. Somebody mentioned
to me recently. I don't go here. I don't drink
that I don't watch this and I said, well, that's all well and good,
but if that's your righteousness before God, it's going to burn
up with a fervent heat. We need one that spoke perfectly
in every every word that he spoke. Everything that he saw was under
his father. Everything that he did was perfect
under his father. That's what you and I need. So
what is the instruction that the Lord's giving us here in
this precious chapter? My son, keep my words and lay
up my commandments with thee. Keep my commandments and live. Keep my commandments. Now, what
is the commandments of the Lord? The Pharisees came unto the Lord
many times trying to deceive him or trick him or to get him
to fumble, to get him to falter, to get him to catch him, if you
will. That's what men try to do in false religion, truly,
just today as they did then. But in Luke chapter 10, verse
27, he told them, they came to him and said, what is the greatest
commandment? Tell us what the greatest commandment is. And
they were only doing it in a deceptive manner, trying to get him to
fumble and falter. He's the one that wrote the commandments,
wasn't he? Men can't trick God. Men can't fool God or play with
God. He's not a, He's not an object, a toy that men can meddle
with. He's sovereign, he's holy, and
we love him being that way, don't we? Jesus answered them and said,
thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with
all thy mind, with all thy soul, with all thy strength. And the
second commandment is likened to the first, love your neighbor
as yourself. Now, have you ever loved your
neighbor as yourself? No, certainly not. And have you ever loved
the Lord with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength? certainly
not in and of yourself, but if you're in Christ, if you're in
Christ, you love your neighbor as yourself and you love the
Lord thy God with all thy heart, mind, soul, and strength. He's
the only one that did it and we need the substitute, the Lord
Jesus Christ. These are the commandments. His
love was perfect under his father at all times. Notice it goes
on and tells us, keep my commandments and live in my law as the apple
of thine eye. What is he referring to there?
Well, the Lord Jesus Christ is the only one that continually
looked unto his father in everything. Now we know that the apple of
our eye is the pupil. Have you ever had a scratch on
your eye before? Or have you ever had something in your eye? I know every one of us has probably
at least had something in our eye. I've had a scratch on my
cornea before and it hurts. It's one of the, every time you
blink, it's just more pain over and over and it wears you down.
So what do we do? Well, if you're smart like I'm
not, you'll put safety glasses on. You'll try to put goggles
on to protect your eye, right? And that's what he's talking.
Keeping your eye, keeping the apple of your eye, the precious
part, because if you lose that apple, if you lose the center,
then you've lost sight. You've lost sight, so we keep
it. But you and I know that this commandment is something that
we cannot, but yet Christ did for us. He kept his eye on the
father at all times in his life. Not one time that he deviate.
Not one time that he swayed. Not one time that he was. He
removed from looking unto his father. That's what I need in
a substitute. I need one that did not waiver
that did not falter that did not fail that did not try. And
that's the Lord Jesus Christ. Because I'm prone to wonder.
I'm prone to wonder and leave the God I love. I'm prone to
take my eye off of him And that's why we come here, isn't it? Is
to be reminded, to be told, keep it as the apple of thine eye,
look to Christ. That's what he's telling us.
Look to Christ, look to Christ. That's what we hear over and
over. And yet we sit here and I, even as I stand here and I
say, look to Christ, we know we can't do that, don't we? Not
in and of ourself, unless he says, seek ye my face. And then
we look unto him. In verse four, he says, say unto
wisdom, thou art my sister, and call understanding thy kin's
woman. Say unto wisdom. I've enjoyed,
as I mentioned earlier, I've enjoyed going through the book
of Proverbs thus far, looking at all the chapters. If you take
the word wisdom as you're reading, a lot of times you can change
that word wisdom to Christ as you're reading it. If you change
it to Christ, it gives more of a depth to it. We know that in
the New Testament, Paul said that Christ is by God. God hath
made into him Christ unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification
and redemption. So there's nothing wrong with
us using the word wisdom and changing it to Christ sometimes.
Now, if you'll turn back to chapter two, I'll show you that. Proverbs two. My son, There it
is again, isn't it? My son. Who is he addressing?
He's addressing my son. He's addressing those that are
in the Lord Jesus Christ. If thou wilt receive my words
and hide my commandments with thee, so that thou incline thine
ear unto Christ and apply thine heart to understanding, yea,
if thou cryest after knowledge and lifted up thy voice for understanding,
If thou seekest her as silver and searchest for her as for
hid treasure, then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord.
Now, what did the Lord say about that in another passage? The
fear of the Lord is the beginning of what? Wisdom. Wisdom. Thou shalt understand the fear
of the Lord and find the knowledge of God, for the Lord giveth Christ
out of his mouth. The word of God is the Lord Jesus
Christ, isn't it? It comes out of his mouth. It
cometh knowledge, and understanding. What a glorious picture of the
Lord Jesus Christ being everything unto the elect. All knowledge,
all understanding, all wisdom. That's what he is unto us, and
that's what he's telling us back. If you go back to Chapter 7,
that's exactly what he's saying here. Say into wisdom, thou art
my sister. Say unto Christ, thou art my
sister. Now I want to explain what he's
meaning by that. You remember in Song of Solomon Chapter 4,
Solomon says how fair is now this is the Lord speaking. This
is the Lord speaking unto. unto the Shulamite, the Shulamite
girl that was his betrothed, that was his to be wed to, and
they're in a courting phase, if you would. They're going to
be espoused, and here's what he says unto her. How fair is
thy love, my sister, my spouse. My sister, my spouse. How much better is thy love than
wine, and the smell of thy ointments than all spices. Now, don't miss
that part about smell, because we're gonna come back to that
later in this chapter, because it's mentioned here. But the Lord
speaking and says, how fair is thy love, my sister and my spouse. This is the title. This is the
title, brethren, that the Lord has given unto his people. He said that he might be a faithful
high priest unto his brethren. So he's calling us his sister
here. He's calling us. This is the way that a pet name,
if you will, and it's a back and forth. type saying. It's not just one-sided. So as
he's saying, saying to wisdom, thou art my sister, this is not
a derogatory term or degrading of the Lord. This is talking
about oneness and unity and talking about the kinswoman being the
wife. This is what we are married unto
the Lord Jesus Christ. Do we see that? That's what he's
saying here. You're married unto wisdom. You're bone of his bone
and flesh of his flesh. That's what he's speaking of
here. Why do we say this unto wisdom?
That they may keep thee from the strange woman. They may keep
thee from the strange woman. We approach the Lord Jesus Christ.
With the title that he has given us, we did not give ourself the
title son. We did not give ourself the title
beloved of the Lord. We did not give ourself the title
The elect of God. He's the one that did that. He
is the one that chose to call us that, and if he's done that,
he will keep us from the strange woman. Now. I meant to tell you
this to begin with, but I'll tell you now my intention tonight
is to show you that the strange woman is false religion. Mentioned
in this chapter, the harlot is false religion at its worst. I was going to say finest, but
if there's nothing fine or good about it, it's the worst, isn't
it? The Lord Jesus Christ has given us These titles. Can we approach him? We approach
him with these with these adorations with these words we call him.
We we. We call him the Prince of Peace. We call him wonderful. We call
him counselor. We call him the mighty God, the
Everlasting Father, the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords.
These are the titles that we see that we call into him. He
calls us friend. He calls us beloved. He calls
us elect. He calls us loved of the Lord.
He calls us sister. He calls us spouse. He calls
us his lover, the one that he loves beyond measure. This is
how we come into him and everyone that he has given these titles
to will be kept from the strange woman. Now, I'm reminded that
the title that he says at the very beginning of this in verse
one is my son, my son. And I'm reminded of a son that
was the prodigal son found in Luke, the gospel of Luke. We're not going to turn there.
You remember the account probably well. There was a man, it says
a certain man, and I love the way that the Lord never makes
an accident in the way that he words things. He either give
us a name or said it's a certain man, it's a particular man. That's
another title that we have. We are a chosen generation, a
royal priesthood, a peculiar people, particular. This is God's
particular redemption we're talking about here. This certain man
had two sons and one son went into his father and he said,
give me my inheritance. Give me my inheritance. And the
father parted the inheritance and gave half unto his son. And
the son leaves, doesn't he, and goes off into a far country.
And the scripture says that the son wasted his life with riotous
living. He wasted his inheritance with
riotous living. That word riotous means wasteful.
Immoral now understand we're talking about a harlot in Proverbs
Chapter 7, something that's immoral, and that's exactly what's like
into this prodigal son being in an immoral stint. A sense
of lifestyle wasting away that which was given to him by his
father. This. Man, after losing everything
because of a famine in the land. He finds himself feeding swine.
Now understand under Jewish law, we've mentioned this before,
but the swine was an unclean animal. It was impure. It was
unclean. It was repulsive to the children
of Israel. And here he is feeding the swine. This is where he found himself.
This is what his decisions, if you will, found him at. This is where he found himself.
So this man, was a deacon at the First Free Will Baptist Church
on Main Street is what happened. He left the gospel. Do we see
that? That's what I'm trying to get across to us. He left
his father's word. He left the gospel. Just as this
harlot is going to try to lead away this young man, and we're
going to see that in a minute, that's exactly what happened to the
prodigal. He left his father And after losing everything that
he had, there was a famine. Are we not in a land of famine,
brethren? And this place, this is where we come for bread. This
is the only place of manna that we can come to. We can't go to
the first Baptist church on the corner and expect to hear the
gospel of God's free grace. It doesn't exist there. This
is the swine's husks that I'm talking about. And he said he
would have felled his belly with the swine's husk, but yet he
came to himself. Now this, this, By definition,
him coming to himself is not a decision that he made. Men
say, well, you need to make a decision for Jesus. You need to try a
little harder. You need to do this and that. No, understand,
a man will never live until God says live. He said, Lazarus,
come forth, didn't he? A man will never live until God
says live. He came to himself because the
same thing we pray, brethren. Turn us again, oh Lord, and we
shall be turned. The only way we're gonna be turned, the only
way we're gonna seek his face is if he causes us to. And he said,
I will meet with you here. This is where you'll see my face.
And this is where he says, seek my face. And we say unto him,
thy face, O Lord, will I seek. He leaves. He leaves his works. He leaves his husks behind. He remembers that his father
has servants in his house that are eating better than he is.
He has servants in the house that are clothed better than
he is. Father has everything. So he goes back to his father,
doesn't he? And he says, I'm gonna tell my father that I have
sinned. I'm going to tell my father that
I was wrong and maybe he'll let me be one of his servants. Maybe
he'll let me be one of his servants. Don't you love the mercy of our
Lord still seeing us in Christ no matter what we do? That does
not motivate me to go out and live a frivolous lifestyle. That
makes me want to cleave unto him even more to see that even
though I am the prodigal that left, perhaps for a brief moment,
as I return and say, Lord, just let me be a beggar, let me be
a servant unto you. The Lord says, you're a son,
just as this father comes running to the son. And he says, bring
the very best robe that we have and put it on his back. bring
my ring and put it on his finger, my signet, my name, put my name
upon his finger. He is my son, my son. He has returned unto me. This
is the same son that we're reading about in chapter seven of Proverbs.
That's exactly what the Lord did for his people, wasn't it?
He put the robe of Christ upon us, Christ's righteousness. He
put the ring, his signet, his name upon us. What should her
name be called? The scripture asks. The Lord
our righteousness, Jehovah, sit in you. The Lord is called the
Lord our righteousness, Jehovah, sit in you. But you flip over
a few pages, you'll find that it says her name, her name, the
bride of Christ shall be called the Lord our righteousness. He's
given us his name. Just as we give our name whenever
we've become married to our spouses, my wife's last name, even when
the preacher announces it, it was now presented to you, Mr. and Mrs. Caleb Hickman. That's
what the Lord did for His people. He's given us His name. He's given us His robe. He said,
kill the best. He said, kill the best, the fatted
calf, the one that's prepared the best for my son. He's returned.
What is that a picture of? What does the Lord feed His people?
Christ. He feeds us the very best, does He not? So in this
chapter of Proverbs, we have an instruction We have a warning
the same as this prodigal, a warning against what this prodigal did,
so to speak. But we have to understand the
spiritual aspect of all of this, because it's not just a physical
warning of fornication. Now, certainly the scripture
is clear on these matters, even in the New Testament, flea fornication
and different things like that. But in order for us to understand
the spiritual aspect of this, we have to see that it's a warning
against free will worship. It's a warning against going
and eating the husks that people do in religion. And that's what
I hope for us to see this hour. The only way we can understand
this is Christ causes us to. Now let's look in, we're in chapter
seven, so let's look at verse six. This is Solomon speaking. He
said, for at the window of my house, I looked through my casement
and beheld amongst the simple ones. I discerned amongst the
youths, a young man void of understanding, passing through the street near
her corner. He went the way to her house in the twilight, in
the evening, in the black and the dark night. And behold, there
met him a woman with the attire of an harlot, a subtle of heart
and subtle of heart. Now. In religion, men talk about
people being Creatures of the night and they use I even heard
old quote Benjamin Franklin acting like it was a Bible burst early
to bed early to why early to rise makes a man healthy wealthy
and wise That's not the Bible. That was Benjamin Franklin What
a man does in the daytime or the night time is not relevant
until what the Lord is trying to this is showing us here What's
to be understood by this is this was a young man void of understanding
Now you and I are not void of understanding. Do we see that?
I The Lord has given us some light to his gospel. So we're
not void of knowing who God is and what he demands in salvation
is perfection. We're not void of understanding
like this young man was. Second thing we can notice is, is this
woman had an attire of a harlot. She didn't have a robe of righteousness
as the prodigal son coming back to his father had. She had her
own righteousness, which is a righteousness of the law, which is not of the
Lord. Now, I'm reminded that this young man, first of all,
we have a viewpoint of Solomon being in the house. And I love
the fact that the Lord's people are in the house in Christ. The
Lord's people are in the house in Christ. So we're in Christ,
seated in the heavenlies right now. And we are looking through
a glass darkly unto our Lord, but we are looking at this world
through the lens of the gospel. And I think you can relate to
what I'm talking about in that. Everything that you do throughout
your daily activities, You see things different than other people
see. Whenever the Lord reveals unto you his glorious gospel,
he shows you you're a sinner. And we grieve over that sin.
This is the place, though, where we're meeting right now. This
gospel that I'm speaking about is the only thing that tells
us that your sins have been forgiven. This is the place where you're
relieved of your grief, so to speak. This is the right place
to be. This is the house, inside this house. in Christ Jesus. Now, I'm not talking about the
brick and the wood and all that. This is the place where the Lord
said he would meet because his people's here, but I'm talking
about being in Christ. Now, Solomon's looking out through
this window and he sees this young man. This is the best place
that we can be, physically speaking, right here. We're looking out
through this glass under the sound of the gospel. This young
man was not at the right place, was he? He wasn't in the house
with Solomon. He was wandering along the street, and he found
his way into the presence of this woman, this harlot. I'm
reminded of David and Bathsheba. David wasn't in the place he
was supposed to be, was he? When the kings went off to war,
David was tarried in Jerusalem. Why did he do that? We can look
back and say it was the providence of God that did this and this
and this, but it was all the Lord getting the glory, getting
good out of the evil that took place because David, he committed
adultery. He committed murder, didn't he?
He was at the wrong place at the wrong time. He should have
never been there. Furthermore, he should never went up on the
roof and looked out. It was customary for the women
to bathe at a certain time. He knew what he was doing. So
what do we see? Is this all just stories? No,
certainly not. This is a declaration, a good
example of you and I needing to be here. This is where we
should be. Anytime the gospel goes forth,
this is where the Lord said, I'll meet with you. This is where
he reveals himself. You're not coming here for me. I'm not coming
here for you, so to speak. We're coming here to worship
God. We're coming here to see his face, aren't we? It doesn't
matter who stands in the pulpit. If they're declaring, if it's
a God called man declaring the gospel, we are to be here. I'm
certainly not browbeating anybody. I'm just simply saying that that's
the desire we have, isn't it? We see that right here in this
picture. Solomon was in the house. Solomon was in the house. There's
no harm going to come to Solomon as long as he's in the house.
As long as he doesn't leave and walk down that street where the harlots are,
there's no harm going to come to him. We don't go to the other
churches to associate with them or to try to to fit a round peg
in a square hole, so to speak. We have the gospel of God's free
grace, and there is no compromise. We have a robe of righteousness.
We're not looking for the harlot's robe, are we? We're looking to
be found in Christ, not having our own righteousness, which
is of the law, the righteousness of Christ, the righteousness
of Christ. That's our hope. That's our heart's desire. We go back and forth in this
chapter with the physical and with the spiritual, as I mentioned
before, and it's constantly back and forth, because if we are
led away, we're led away by our own lusts. And I mentioned that
to a Sunday. But no man can say that God's tempted him, for God
cannot be tempted, neither tempt he any man of sin. He doesn't.
So this is not a temptation that the Lord puts before us to test
us. Well, let's see how Steve stacks
up if I put a test right before him. No, certainly not. Satan's
the one that comes and tries to tempt the brethren, the accuser
of the brethren. He's the one that does these things. We're
led away by our own lust, aren't we? We're led away by what's
in our own heart. And it's the Lord that keeps
us. And it's the Lord that gets the glory in it. If left to myself
for a brief moment, I will leave the house. but the Lord is the
keeper of the house. Do we see that? He is the strong
man of the house that hath put us in the house. We didn't even
put ourself in the house. He's the one that did it. Certainly,
I'm not talking about this building. I'm talking about the Lord Jesus
Christ, but he's the one that keeps us from this false religion.
He's the one that keeps our minds and our hearts from lusting after
these things and going after them. We know, we've been made
to know that if we are left to ourself for a moment, We would
be left to destruction because that's what we produce, isn't
it? This woman, this strange woman.
Is false religion. All false religion without exception.
False religion is more appealing to the flesh than the Gospel.
Did you know that? Why is that? Well, because. It glorifies the
flesh, doesn't it? It glorifies the flesh. False
religion allows you to see physical evidences of a false spiritual
life. So what I mean by that is, is
you do things what you think, what we think is spiritual, when
actually in reality, it's not spiritual at all. It's just physical
things that we're doing. We're trying, men try to fix
a physical, a spiritual problem, spiritually dead and trespassing
and sin. Men try to fix a spiritual problem with a physical application
of some kind, and it can't be done. It can't be done. A man
has to be regenerated, doesn't it? Man has to be made alive.
False religion glorifies the flesh. And the Scripture says,
so then they. That are in the flesh cannot
please God. There's an article in your bulletin
this Sunday. that says, they that bear fruit
are they that cannot see that they bear fruit. Our brother
Donnie Bell in Crossville, Tennessee wrote that. I love that. They
that bear fruit are they that cannot see that they bear fruit.
You and I will not have physical evidences in ourself that we're
a believer. We will not be able to look in
the mirror and say, okay, now I'm certain that I'm a believer
because I've done this and I've done that. If that is our thought,
perish the thought. We look to Christ through the
eyes of faith, don't we? That's what's commanded of us. That's
what's required of us. We look to Christ through the
eyes of faith, not by works of righteousness, which we have
done on our goodness, not our merits, but according to his
mercy. And look at verse 11. This woman,
this strange woman. She is loud and stubborn. Her
feet abide not in her house. Now is she without now in the
streets and lieth and waited every corner. So she caught him
and kissed him, and with an impudent face said unto him, I have peace
offerings with me this day. This day have I paid my vows.
Therefore, come up. Came I forth to meet thee diligently
to seek thy face, and I have found thee and abdic my bed with
coverings, tapestry, with carved works, with fine linen of Egypt.
Here we have the religionists. The men and women that are in
religion, in their wickedness, in their iniquity, they're loud. Have you ever been to a Southern
Baptist revival? If you have, you know that they're
loud. Pentecostals, they're loud. Most religions, loud. It draws
attention to themselves. As a matter of fact, you remember
Baal, the men, the prophets of Baal that went to worship Baal,
and Elijah said, call from heaven, pray unto your God, if he answers
by fire, he's God. The one God that answers by fire,
he's God. And what'd they do? They cried aloud, didn't they?
And as the day got longer, they begin to cut themselves, and
they cried louder. And he started making fun of them. He said,
well, maybe he's on a journey. Maybe he's sleeping. Maybe he's using
the bathroom. He was obviously making fun of them because he
knew that the God that they were serving was not the true God.
Well, this is the picture here. Men lie and wait. Men lie and
wait to spread the lie, the lie. They cry aloud, and the more
that they cry, they have a stirring of emotion when all the time
it's just the lie. Thou shalt not surely die. Isn't
that the lie? Isn't that what Satan said from
the very beginning? What is this woman saying into this man right
here in this chapter? She said, I've made peace offerings.
Everything we're about to do is just fine. I've made peace
offerings. I've made a covenant with death. We're good. We've
let Jesus into our heart. We took the step. We knew that
if we took the first step, God would take the rest. We knew
that if we prayed the prayer and we shook the preacher's hand,
we knew that if we tithed and we did this, we knew that all
these things would be okay. We've already, we've already
made our sacrifices. Isn't that what she just said? I made a
peace offering, literally saying, I'm going to commit this trespass,
but I've already committed, I've already gave a peace offering.
Well, that's just an equity, isn't it? And that's exactly
what we produce by nature, brethren. If we try to approach the Lord
on any other merits besides that of the Lord Jesus Christ, it's
just iniquity. And that is exactly what's happening here. That's
the lie men are saying, thou shalt not surely die. I've made
peace offerings. Jeremiah put it this way, they're
saying peace, peace when there is no peace. I like the way that
she tries to entice him. She doesn't try, she succeeds,
but I appreciate the wording that our Lord gave us here at
the very last part of verse 16. He says, she says, with fine
linen of Egypt. Now you understand what Egypt
represents, right? We went over that several weeks
ago. I believe we're going through
Exodus. Egypt is bondage, is it not? Egypt is the law. Egypt's
works. Egypt's false gods. Egypt's a
place of no worship. And she's saying, well, I've
adorned it with fine things from Egypt. The most interesting part
about the children of Israel, being delivered from the Red
Sea, and something that you and I can relate to, no doubt, is
as soon as they saw the hand of God destroy the Egyptians,
as soon as they saw the Red Sea part, as soon as they got to
Mount Sinai, they worshipped a golden calf named Jehovah.
Is that not us by nature, if the Lord leaves us to ourselves?
What did they do after that? Well, they complained the entire
time in the wilderness. Well, we were better off in Egypt.
We were better off in Egypt. We had garlic. We had onions.
We had all kinds of better things. We had water. We had food. They
said we loathed this light bread. Well, that was Christ the manna
coming down from heaven, isn't it? This is what she's saying. All
you have to do is keep the law. All you have to do is return
into Egypt. Brethren, do you take great comfort in knowing
that the Lord keeps his people. Boy, that's my hope. If not,
I'm gonna return right back to Egypt. I'm gonna find this enticing. I'm gonna be led away by my lust,
according to my flesh, and I'm gonna find myself in Egypt, in
bondage, trying to keep the law again. And if the law is being
kept, it's iniquity before the Lord, because no man can keep
the law but one, Jesus Christ the righteous. And it says she made everything
smell good, didn't she? I made it smell good. It smells
really good to the flesh. False religion smells really
good to the flesh. It doesn't stink. But once you've
smelt of the Lord Jesus Christ, you remember the Shulamite girl
that came to the Lord, or that was in the room, as I mentioned
earlier? She said, I heard him outside
the door talking about, this is a picture of the church and
the Lord Jesus Christ coming to the door. And she said, I
went, but he was no longer there, but I still smelt his smell.
I knew it was him that was at the door just previously. Then
she goes into the city. She says, have you seen my beloved?
Have you seen the one that I'm betrothed to? Have you seen the
one that I love the most? And they said, what makes your
man any different than the rest of the men? She said, well, let
me tell you about it. And she gives a verse after verse of
describing him, the Lord Jesus Christ and his beauty. How do
we describe him? Wonderful. precious, glorious, magnificent.
There is no words that we can adequately describe the beauty
of our Lord. Yet we see that in religion,
men try to make something smell good unto the flesh. But once
we have smelt of the Lord, once we have tasted of the Lord, no
other fount will do, will it brethren? There is no other smell
that will satisfy like the smell that went up before the Lord
as a sweet smelling Savior. There is no other taste that
will satisfy like the bread of life. Like the wine that gives
life eternal, there is no other sight to be seen that is appealing
unto us any more other than the Lord Jesus Christ and His righteousness. We have the conclusion of this
could read it for the sake of time, I'm just going to skip
down to verse 24 and it says this is the warning going forth.
This is the warning going forth. Harkening to me now, therefore,
O ye children. Who's he speaking to? He just told us, children.
O ye children. And attend to the words of my
mouth. Let not thine heart decline to her ways. Go not astray in
her paths. For she hath cast down many wounded.
Yea, many strong men have been slain by her. Her house is in
the way to hell. Her house is the way to hell. Going down to the chambers of
death. Now, is this a physical aspect? Well, certainly I would
imagine so, but I believe this is a spiritual picture that we
have here of this false religion. The scripture refers to it in
Revelation as Babylon, the great whore. And it's literally all
of the false religions of the world that are spreading the
lie in one way, shape, form or another, telling men that they're
good enough. They're good enough in their
Egyptian cotton. They're good enough in the smells
that they've put forth. They're good enough unto the
Lord to have the pleasures of works religion. Brethren, we
know that not to be true, don't we? There's only one thing that
satisfies, and it is the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the exhortation
that we have by Paul in 2 Thessalonians 2.15. Therefore, brethren, stand
fast. Stand fast. And that's exactly
what he told us when he said, take unto thee the armor of God.
First thing he says is, stand therefore. Having your loins
girded about with the truth, having your feet shod with the
preparation of the gospel of peace, the shield of faith, the
helmet of salvation, the sword of the spirit. What is he saying? Well, all these things that he
just described, we didn't produce. We didn't get the shield of faith. The Lord Jesus Christ bestowed
that. We don't have our feet shod with the preparation of
the gospel of peace because we chose to. The Lord gave us our
feet shod, our covering, did he not? That's what he's saying. Stand fast and hold the traditions
which he had been taught, whether by word or our pistol. Look to
Christ as all his blood had put away the sin of his people. He
is. He is sweeter than honey out of the honeycomb. He satisfied
the satisfies the longing soul. He said, I am the Lord. I change
not. Therefore, you sons of Jacob are not consumed. We're not looking
for something new. We're looking for just what I've
mentioned. The same honey every time we come here. That's what
we're looking for. The same the same taste, the same smell, the
same satisfying savor that the Lord Jesus Christ is. Certainly
doesn't satisfy the flesh, but we're not looking for satisfaction
of the flesh, are we? This is the only place that you
can. I mean, there's other churches that preach the Gospel, so I
don't want to misspeak on that, but this is the only place that
you can come to. and somebody can look at you and say that
you're a dead dog maggot and you say, amen, amen. Why? Because that's the way the Lord's
made you be. Isn't that the, you go tell somebody that in
free will works religion and see what you get. They'll get
angry. Men used to come and talk to me after I heard the truth
of the gospel, they would argue with me and say, I used to be
a sinner. Now I'm a saint. Well, According
to the declaration of God, that is true. But you see, that was
a self-righteous piety about it. It was a false piety that
they were a pompous attitude. I'm a saint now because I have
done this and I have done that. It's the harlot. Something to
mention about a harlot is she's a hireling, isn't she? She's
bought. You and I can't be bought because
we've been bought with the price, the price of blood. Nobody can
come to you. I know this is true about the
Lord's people. Nobody could come to you and
offer you money to say, I need you to renounce God's gospel. I need you to renounce who the
Lord Jesus Christ is. Can't do it. Can't do it. I have
to have him. I have to go to hear more about
him. I cannot. Lord, I don't say that
cannot as in of myself. The Lord must keep us, but he
does keep his people. There is a perseverance that
he gives unto his people, and it's not because of what we do.
It's because of what he done. If he loses one, he's a failure.
That's our hope. He's not going to lose one. He's
going to keep us to the very end. In that light, we cannot
leave the gospel for that reason. Isn't that glorious? He's going
to keep his people. He's going to keep his people. Some men will hear this and they'll
rebuttal. They think they're contradicting the gospel. They'll
hear the gospel and they'll just kick against it. Well, that's
exactly what Paul did, wasn't it? The Lord said, it's hard for
you to kick against the pricks, isn't it? What is he talking
about? Every time Paul thought about
the message he heard from Stephen, it would prick his heart a little
bit more and a little bit more until the time came where the
Lord revealed himself. Take heart, brethren, and hope
in the Lord Jesus Christ, because those whom are the Lord's, he
will get in time. and our loved ones that we care
for so much that are lost. They've heard the good news of
the gospel. That's the most important thing in the step of salvation,
because without the preaching of the gospel, there is no salvation.
It has to come through and by the preaching. Look to Christ
for their salvation, because if they're going to be saved,
He's going to do all the saving, isn't He? And rest in His finished
work, looking unto Him. Rest in Him. Last thing I'll tell us is that
God's not fretting over the strange woman. God's not shaken. Our Lord is not shaken over this
strange woman, this false religion. The Lord's not upset with the
situation, if you can put it that way. He's angry with the
wicked daily, certainly. But it doesn't trick Him. It doesn't contradict anything
He does. No matter what Satan tries to
do, he cannot alter He cannot change. He cannot frustrate the
grace of God. It's forever settled. The salvation
of the Lord's people is forever settled in heaven. He is going
to give grace upon grace upon grace unto His people, never
to be exhausted, because it's of Christ's grace. The Lord is not intimidated by
this strange woman. He hath saved His people and
made us sons. Made us His son. My son. Says
verse one, my son, keep my words and lay up my commandments with
thee. What is he saying? Look to Christ, nothing wavering,
nothing wavering. Look to Christ. Aren't you thankful
that the Lord continually delivers us from the strange woman? Aren't
you thankful Lord continually delivers us from ourself and
he keeps us where I am? Father, thank you. For causing
us to be able to look Through the lens of the Gospel, seeing
your son as all that we need in salvation. Thank you for thus
far not leaving us to ourself utterly. Calls us to not take
that for granted, thinking that we see evidences of our salvation,
but calls us to be mercy beggars. Every breath of our life that
we take. Bring us safely and present us
in Christ. May we be found in him. in his
righteousness. For it's in his name we pray.
Amen.