Voices
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Handout
As an intro to our study this evening we will do a short object lesson activity
Do the activity
Now that you have considered the voices that direct us in this life...
What did observe about those speaking?
What did you observe about the one listening?
As the person with the blindfold, what did you feel/experience?
Was it hard to pay attention to the correct voice?
Scripture often gives instruction and warning to keep us from harm...do we hear other voices at times as well? Which voice is most often heeded?
Let’s read the first 11 verses of our passage:
1 My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you,
2 making your ear attentive to wisdom and inclining your heart to understanding;
3 yes, if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding,
4 if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures,
5 then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God.
6 For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding;
7 he stores up sound wisdom for the upright; he is a shield to those who walk in integrity,
8 guarding the paths of justice and watching over the way of his saints.
9 Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good path;
10 for wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul;
11 discretion will watch over you, understanding will guard you,
What is meant by a carrot and a stick?
2. What about the first eleven verses deliver a carrot to the reader?
3. In the book of Deuteronomy there is a specific covenant that encompasses the whole book, how is that covenant similar to the comparison of vs. 1-4 and vs. 5-11?
Let’s be mindful that the covenant in Deuteronomy is an obedience = blessing covenant.
Obedience = Blessing
Let’s look at vs. 1-4
Do you see in vs. 1 & 3 the word “if”
In this text these are the caveat for the blessing.
4. What are requirements for the blessing:
Receive my words
Treasure my commandments
Pay attention & Listen
Call out in prayer
Value the Words
5. What is the promise or carrot? vs. 5-11
Knowledge
Wisdom
Understanding
Guarding
Discretion
We should not that within the text Wisdom = Jesus
12 delivering you from the way of evil, from men of perverted speech,
13 who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in the ways of darkness,
14 who rejoice in doing evil and delight in the perverseness of evil,
15 men whose paths are crooked, and who are devious in their ways.
16 So you will be delivered from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words,
17 who forsakes the companion of her youth and forgets the covenant of her God;
18 for her house sinks down to death, and her paths to the departed;
19 none who go to her come back, nor do they regain the paths of life.
20 So you will walk in the way of the good and keep to the paths of the righteous.
21 For the upright will inhabit the land, and those with integrity will remain in it,
22 but the wicked will be cut off from the land, and the treacherous will be rooted out of it.
Here we return to the concept of the voices and the directions they lead.
There are two sets of voices being warned about: evil men and evil women.
6. What is meant by “perverted speech”?
Perverted speech = speech which calls sin good/right
24 Whoever says to the wicked, “You are in the right,” will be cursed by peoples, abhorred by nations,
20 This is the way of an adulteress: she eats and wipes her mouth and says, “I have done no wrong.”
7. What is the stick?
The Wicked will be cut off from the land.
8. What is the carrot?
Inhabitance
Inheritance
Sustenance
