Sunday Service 9-6-20 - Proverbs 12:4-7 - A Wise House of Blessing Stands Forever

Proverbs 12 Sermon B (4-7) - A Wise House Of Blessing Stands Forever. 1 Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is stupid. 2 A good man obtains favor from the Lord, but a man of evil devices he condemns. 3 No one is established by wickedness, but the root of the righteous will never be moved. 4 An excellent wife is the crown of her husband, but she who brings shame is like rottenness in his bones. It is possible to be an excellent wife - and God, the Lord of the universe is interested in this, he takes note of the one who is an excellent wife. Who is an excellent wife? This comes from the context of what has already been written here in Ch 12. V1: One who is not only able to deal with discipline and reproof/correction, but invites it, seeks to improve her character without pride getting in the way - and in this she obtains knowledge. V2: One who is good - this adjective refers to how this person is with others - that this person is a blessing to others around her - and in this she obtains favor from the Lord. V3: She is righteous and holds her integrity above her desires - she doesn't justify evil in the name of some good - and in this she drinks from the fountain of God, she has His resources of love, mercy, grace, and wisdom at her disposal, and she is established eternally in His kingdom. She is the crown - she brings him honor, she establishes his authority as a man and head of his family - she gives him the confidence, the mindset he needs to succeed in what he is called to be and do. Conversely, it is also possible to be a shameful wife. How? V1: To hate reproof and discipline, to have too much pride to change or to be corrected 0 and in this she never learns, she remains stupid. V2: To be a woman of evil devices who takes from those around her, who expects them to serve her rather than to be of a servant-heart who blesses others. She's distracted by her evil devices, always into drama, or status, or facebook, or drunkenness, or other things that cause laziness in her. V3: She justifies evil in the name of good. She will sacrifice her family, her husband, her God, and her own morals for the sake of establishing whatever it is that she deems ultimate. Her source is not in God, and so she continues to chase after her peace and fulfillment and affirmation from whatever worldly endeavor the devil is able to lure her with. And, so nothing truly worthy of honor is ever built, and there is no lasting legacy from this marriage/family. She is like rottenness in his bones - she is a cancer to her husband/family, taking away his zeal and energy to accomplish or to lead or to be the head. He is not able to stand, and he crumbles in his life, his character, his soul. We are challenged here in both sexes to apply this verse: Wives, what kind of wife would you be? Men - what kind of wife would you seek? This hearkens back to the two women in the prologue who epitomize wisdom or folly and call out for our attention, and again at the end of the book of Proverbs in Proverbs 31 where the Godly wife is thoroughly described. This is to say that an excellent wife is both a primary contributor and also a primary result of wisdom - as one commentator puts it - For the wise husband, she is the pinnacle of wisdom. Contrarily, a foolish wife prevents the enjoyment of a wise life. Again, it's almost like the wife here serves as a picture of a wise life versus a foolish life - which will you choose. So, we see in the NT Paul forbidding an unequal yoking - a marriage of a believer to an unbeliever, which to his mind pits ultimate wisdom against ultimate folly. Another NT insight to take here is that when both are believers, both should be instances of verse 1, inviting correction and growth into their own lives and into their marriage - and so Paul instructs a husband to give himself up for his wife, to love his wife as his own body, to wash her in the word - and in this wisdom is found. We should also think about excellent/shameful wife as we look at the proceeding verses. 5 The thoughts of the righteous are just; the counsels of the wicked are deceitful. Again, this goes to the fact that the heart of a person is connected with the well-being or oppression of those around them. For a righteous person, the thoughts you have (ie the plans you make) are for justice, for fair treatment, for people to get a fair shake, for there to be righteous judgment in the land and in their household - and also that the evildoers would not get away with evil; that evil would be dealt with. So, their thoughts flow to the grand story, and include others. A wicked person however, is only looking out for themself - they don't care about justice unless it somehow serves their own purposes. They may very well tell people what they want to hear, but it's not right, it's not for justice's sake, it's for their own sake. For the evil person to orchestrate things for his own benefit, he must be deceitful. And, so we have this inner counsel leading to this outer counsel ... And, so we are to assess ourselves as to our thoughts/plans and as to the counsel we give to others - are we truly seeking justice even if it costs us something or are we more concerned about our own gain - do we counsel people according to what's right or do we tell them what they want to hear so that we might gain something from them? And, we are also to be wise in assessing others to determine what kind of person we're dealing with - what drives/motivates this person? Am I to trust their counsels? 6 The words of the wicked lie in wait for blood, but the mouth of the upright delivers them. We certainly think of Satan here - the father of lies - who lures us away by our own evil desires, As Cain was told that sin was crouching at his door and that is desire is to have him, that Satan is a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour ... And, then once Satan has a person, that person then becomes like his father Satan. He too will lie to get what he wants. The power of words: they have the power to kill and to save. Again, the words employed by the wicked person seek their own desire and will sacrifice others if it will get them what they want. We get this notion also of a person who is out to get you and just waiting for the moment when they can pounce. But, in the second half of this verse, we meet salvation. It is the mouth of a righteous person that can bring deliverance from the destruction of the words of the wicked. We get this picture - almost like a courtroom, where there is an accuser who is falsely accusing a righteous person and piling up the case against them with devious and carefully planned manipulation ... and then the advocate, another righteous person comes to the defense and gives testimony that totally upends the case of the accuser. Think of Christ and the religious rulers of his day, how they falsely accused him, how they manipulated the crowds to have him crucified, how they paid false witnesses to come against him ... And, then think of Jesus - there are things he COULD have said to deliver himself, but he didn't deliver himself ... instead he used his words to deliver others - "Father forgive them, for they know not what they do" "Mother behold your son, son behold your mother" "Into thy hands I commit my spirit" "It is finished". And, we too have ultimate words of deliverance to share with others - we have the truth of the Gospel to defeat every lie of this world that Satan uses to hold them in his power. His lies have no power over the truth of the Gospel - that... Our words of righteousness and wisdom serve us well and serve our neighbors. 7 The wicked are overthrown and are no more, but the house of the righteous will stand. V5-7 - Thoughts give rise to plans, plans give rise to words, words give rise to the path of your life, and the path of your life gives rise to your ultimate eternal destiny. As we've already seen, and here the sage and the Spirit see that it bears repeating ... Righteousness wins, wickedness doesn't. Rob Bell's book "love wins" - universalism. It doesn't matter that it goes against the clear and repeated message of Scripture. Righteousness wins, and Rob Bell joins the category of the false teachers, the wicked, who are in it for themselves. Notice that it brings our attention unexpectedly to two things: 1. the ultimate insignificance of the wicked - the thing they sought most is the thing that they will have least. 2. Not only do the righteous stand, but their HOUSE stands - it carries over to their family, their business, their lives. What we saw with Herod and Jesus stands again as an illustration of this. (V3) The root of the righteous will never be moved - (V7) the house of the righteous will stand ... (Eph 3) "Rooted and grounded in the love of Christ". Overall we see in 5-7 that the righteous are concerned with justice (ie the law of God and the fair-treatment of others), and the beauty is that in God's wisdom not only is a community blessed by them but they themselves are delivered through this wisdom, and delivered in such a profound way that their house will stand firm forever. Meanwhile the wicked are seeking their own glory, use their words to scheme for themselves and to tear down anyone else who doesn't serve their purpose, and in the end they get nothing and are nothing. 5The thoughts of the righteous are just; the counsels of the wicked are deceitful. 6The words of the wicked lie in wait for blood, but the mouth of the upright delivers them. 7The wicked are overthrown and are no more, but the house of the righteous will stand. Who will you partner with in this life? Are you growing together in wisdom? Are you concerned with more than just yourselves? Are you a blessing to each other and to those around you? And, in these callings to our hearts, we hear the call of Christ to enter into a relationship with Him - for Him to be our wisdom teacher greater even than Solomon - that He is the righteous one, the one whose words deliver you in the courtroom with the accuser, the one who didn't use his wisdom to deliver himself though he could have because he is not just wise, he is wisdom, he didn't just gain wisdom, wisdom came from him, his life wasn't a product of wisdom, wisdom was a product of him ... His counsel is true and loving, and you can trust Him - He will lead you in the path of righteousness and joy. He builds his house to stand forever ... and His house is US! Because of His righteousness, we who trust in Him can know that we will stand with Him. He has called us to be His bride, and HE WILL MAKE US CLEAN, he will make us beautiful, somehow even fit to be His bride on that great wedding day and he will call us His crown, His prize, His beloved whom He will love with an immeasurable love forever ... we think he would be ashamed of us, but he will not be ashamed of us (He is not ashamed to call us brothers). Though our sin is like scarlet, he will make us white as snow. And He even begins this process now in this life, calling us to wisdom, graciously giving us of His Spirit to bear its fruit of wisdom, so that we may be like Him, that He may call us to His mission in this world - that our words would deliver others, that our marriages would bring Him honor, that we would seek justice rather than sordid gain, that we would be blessed to bless others by the power of the Gospel and the Spirit in us! 8 A man is commended according to his good sense, but one of twisted mind is despised. 9 Better to be lowly and have a servant than to play the great man and lack bread. 10 Whoever is righteous has regard for the life of his beast, but the mercy of the wicked is cruel. 11 Whoever works his land will have plenty of bread, but he who follows worthless pursuits lacks sense. 12 Whoever is wicked covets the spoil of evildoers, but the root of the righteous bears fruit. 13 An evil man is ensnared by the transgression of his lips, but the righteous escapes from trouble. 14 From the fruit of his mouth a man is satisfied with good, and the work of a man's hand comes back to him.