The Blessing of Reproof

NOTE:

This is a manuscript, and not a transcript of this message. The actual presentation of the message differed from the manuscript through the leading of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, it is possible, and even likely that there is material in this manuscript that was not included in the live presentation and that there was additional material in the live presentation that is not included in this manuscript.

Engagement

This week I came across this quote which was attributed to Gloria Vanderbilt back in 2004.

“Every American has the right to make a fool of himself if he wants to, but too many folks are abusing the privilege.”

In the nearly 20 years since those words were uttered, I’m pretty sure that is even more true now than it was back then. Or maybe it just seems like that because social media has made that foolishness a lot more public.

Tension

As we continue our Fool Proof sermon series in the book of Proverbs this morning, we’re going to get some good insight into why foolishness seems to have proliferated in our culture today.

As most of you know I have officiated volleyball and basketball at various levels over the last 20 plus years. And I always tell people that I’ve never officiated a perfect game or match. I also tell them that if I ever do, which is impossible, I’m going to quit because I’ll have nowhere to go but down from there. In fact, I’ve actually made some pretty big mistakes over the years. In a few cases, it was because I didn’t understand the rules correctly and in other cases, it has just been a result of not being in the right place or even poor judgment. But I learned from those mistakes and so I haven’t consistently made those same mistakes again.

But I’ve also worked with some officials who consistently make the same mistakes over and over. They often refuse to listen to those who point out those errors or some of them just don’t care because they are just in it for the money and they don’t really want to learn from their past mistakes.

From my perspective, that is exactly what is going on in our culture today. There are a lot of foolish people who never learn from their mistakes and so they repeat them over and over. This morning we’re going to see that one of the keys to “fool proofing” our lives is to make sure that we respond appropriately when someone points out our mistakes - especially those mistakes that come from either being ignorant of God’s Word or just choosing not to follow the principles we find in the Bible.

This week I came across a quote that was attributed to someone named Steven Denn. Even though I wasn’t able to even identify who this guy is for sure or verify that the quote originated with him, it accurately expresses the idea we’re going to develop more from our text this morning:

“You can never make the same mistake twice because the second time you make it, it's not a mistake, it's a choice.”

― Steven Denn

Truth

This morning, we’re going to finish up chapter 1 of the book of Proverbs.

Hopefully you’ll remember that two weeks ago we looked at the opening seven verses and focused our attention on verse 7, which is essentially the theme statement for the entire book. We learned that the way to fool proof our lives is to live according to the truth that God is God and I am not. We also defined a “fool” as anyone who rejects God’s ways.

Then last week we looked at the middle part of chapter 1 and developed some principles to help us deal with negative peer pressure.

Go ahead and turn in your Bibles to Proverbs 1 and follow along as I begin in verse 20 and read through the end of the chapter.

Proverbs 1:20–33 ESV

20 Wisdom cries aloud in the street, in the markets she raises her voice; 21 at the head of the noisy streets she cries out; at the entrance of the city gates she speaks: 22 “How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple? How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge? 23 If you turn at my reproof, behold, I will pour out my spirit to you; I will make my words known to you. 24 Because I have called and you refused to listen, have stretched out my hand and no one has heeded, 25 because you have ignored all my counsel and would have none of my reproof, 26 I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when terror strikes you, 27 when terror strikes you like a storm and your calamity comes like a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you. 28 Then they will call upon me, but I will not answer; they will seek me diligently but will not find me. 29 Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord, 30 would have none of my counsel and despised all my reproof, 31 therefore they shall eat the fruit of their way, and have their fill of their own devices. 32 For the simple are killed by their turning away, and the complacency of fools destroys them; 33 but whoever listens to me will dwell secure and will be at ease, without dread of disaster.”

This is the first of many places in Proverbs where we will see wisdom being “personified”. Wisdom is pictured here as a person who is peaking to us. While that might seem kind of weird, we actually do the same thing. We might say something like, “He was overtaken by greed”, or “she was blinded by love”. Like wisdom, greed and love are abstract concepts that can’t literally overtake or blind us, but we use personification as a literary device to express how those ideas work.

In Proverbs wisdom is personified as a woman and she is often contrasted with “woman folly”. I think there are several reasons why wisdom and folly are personified as women in Proverbs:

In English, most nouns don’t have a gender, but in Hebrew and Greek, and many other languages like Spanish, nouns do have a gender. For instance in Spanish the word for house is “casa”, which is feminine regardless of who lives there or how it is decorated. And the word for dog is “perro”, which is masculine, and that same masculine noun is used regardless of whether the dog is male or female. The Hebrew words for “wisdom” and “folly” are both feminine.

In much of the first part of Proverbs we see a father teach wisdom by warning his son not to go after the allurements of evil women. Perhaps that is because men have a tendency to be much more tempted by the things they can see, like the physical beauty of a woman. So Solomon uses the picture of a man pursuing a tempting woman as a way to picture how tempting folly is in our world. In that case it would certainly make sense to personify wisdom as a woman.

Finally, we see here that wisdom raises her voice - so it has to be a woman, right? Just kidding on this!

With that background in mind, here is the main idea we’re going to develop from this passage today:

I develop wisdom when I embrace the blessing of reproof

My guess is that a lot of you are already beginning to be a bit uncomfortable with this idea. Even if you don’t completely understand the meaning of the word “reproof” you probably understand it enough that you know it involves something that is uncomfortable for most of us. And the idea of embracing something that isn’t pleasant isn’t something most of us are going to rush out and do.

But you can’t read this passage without realizing that it revolves around the idea of reproof. In fact, that word appears three times in this passage - in verses 23, 25, and 30. And, along with the related verb, reprove, it continues to appear frequently throughout the entire book.

Since it is so central to this passage, let’s take a moment to define reproof.

The underlying Hebrew word described an ancient legal proceeding that took place at the gate of the city. The elders would judge various claims and disputes and the elders would make a ruling that was intended to set things right. The purpose was never to humiliate any of the parties involved, but to produce repentance and restoration.

With that background, here is my definition of reproof:

Reproof =

exposing sin for the purpose of maintaining God’s truth in a fallen world

This passage, as well as may others throughout the book of Proverbs, reveal that there are two possible reactions to reproof.

Those who embrace reproof are wise and find life;

those who despise reproof are fools and are careening toward disaster.

The wise man is humble and accepts reproof and seeks forgiveness and repents. And that leads to life. But the fool scoffs at repentance and refuses to do anything about the sin that is revealed. Paul summarized these two paths in his second letter to the church in Corinth:

2 Corinthians 7:10 ESV

10 For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.

We could certainly spend a lot more time here, but I think we’ve established the fact that reproof, when responded to appropriately, is a blessing because it leads to life - physically, emotionally and spiritually. So let’s spend the rest of our time making this really practical.

Embracing reproof requires that all of us who are disciples of Jesus pursue reproof from two different directions.

The obvious one is that we are to receive reproof and respond to it appropriately.

But we also see throughout the Bible, and especially in the New Testament, that we are responsible to provide reproof within the body of Christ, the church, when it is needed. And frankly, for many of us, that is even harder than receiving reproof.

Application

HOW TO RECEIVE REPROOF

Listen

Wisdom is actually not as hard to find as we sometimes make it out to be. We see here that wisdom is crying aloud in the streets, it raises its voice. It is not hidden. And yet, as we see in verse 24, the fool rejects reproof mainly because he fails to listen. But there is good news later, in verse 33. There we see that there is hope because those who do listen will “dwell secure”.

The verb translated “listen” here is the same verb that was translated “hear” back in verse 8. when we looked at that word last week, we said that it meant to listen carefully with the intent of obeying.

I’m convinced that one of the biggest reasons we don’t receive reproof like we should is that we really don’t listen like that. We might hear, but in our minds we’re often already developing our defense. We’re thinking about how we can excuse our behavior or explain it away. And when we do that, we’re not likely to hear what we really need to hear.

As I’m going to talk about more in a moment, not everything that we hear is going to be true or accurate or relevant. But we need to make sure that before we decide that is the case, we need to listen to what the other person is saying. Long ago someone gave me a very wise piece of advice. They told me that when someone criticizes me, I need to listen carefully to what they are saying because there is almost always some truth and I can learn even if not all the criticism being leveled is true.

One of the best ways to listen like this is to ask relevant questions. “Let me make sure I understand what you’re saying here. What do you mean when you say...” “Is that something you’ve noticed in my life for a while or did you just notice it recently?”

Once we’ve really listened, then we can take the next step.

Evaluate

It’s important that we don’t get these steps out of order. I don’t want to start evaluating until I finish listening. But once I listen carefully then I need make several evaluations.

The first thing I want to do is pray and ask the Holy Spirit to lead me into truth, which is one of His main functions. This doesn’t have to be some long, elaborate verbal prayer. It can be something that I just pray silently in the moment.

The next thing I need to evaluate is whether or not the facts are true. Perhaps someone said they saw my car in a place that I should not have been. But maybe I know that at that time I was not in that place or maybe I had lent my car to someone else. So it’s always possible the reproof was unwarranted because the other person had the wrong facts.

Finally I need to evaluate the reproof in light of what the Bible teaches. Is the reproof only based on the other person’s opinion or personal convictions or have I done something that violates the standards that God has revealed in the Bible? Now it may very well be that even if I haven’t violated biblical principles, I still might need to take some action based on the reproof, either for the good of the other person or to maintain unity in the body. But if I’ve sinned based on how the Bible defines sin, then I need to take the third step for sure.

Act

Choosing to live based on the fear of the Lord means that when I become aware of sin in my life, I will act immediately. That is true whether I come to that realization on my own or whether it is the result of the reproof of another. While I can’t possibly detail all the possible actions someone might need to take, they generally fall into these categories:

Confess

All sin obviously needs to be confessed to God. And the good news is that when we do that based on our faith in Jesus, God promises to forgive that sin and cleanse us from it.

But if our sin has impacted someone else, I need to also confess my sin to them and ask for their forgiveness.

Repent

We frequently talk about the need for repentance so I won’t spend a lot of time here. The word repent literally means to change one’s mind - in this case to change our mind about our sin and to agree with God that it is sin. But genuine repentance is always accompanied by action. Here is what Jesus said about that:

Luke 3:8 ESV

8 Bear fruits in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham.

The point Jesus is making here is that repentance needs to be manifest in our actions. It is more than just words. Paul confirms this idea while speaking to King Agrippa:

Acts 26:20 ESV

20 but declared first to those in Damascus, then in Jerusalem and throughout all the region of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance.

The goal of these actions is to do as much as we can to prevent our sin from becoming a lifestyle. That could involve anything from finding someone to hold you accountable to giving up some hobby or something you enjoy doing that might put you in tempting situations.

Make restitution

Whenever we have done something to harm someone else, there may be a need for some kind of restitution.

This week, we had a pool service company mistakenly come to our vacation rental and drain and chlorine wash our pool rather than the neighbor’s pool they were supposed to service. But when I contacted the owner of the pool company, he immediately offered to provide all the start up chemicals and restart our equipment once the pool was filled and to reimburse us for the cost of the water to refill the pool. I don’t know if this guy is a Christian, but he certainly responded to reproof the way I hope I would if I caused someone harm in some way.

HOW TO PROVIDE REPROOF

Check my own life and my motives

I’m just going to share a couple of Scriptures that speak for themselves:

Matthew 7:3–5 ESV

3 Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.

Galatians 6:1 ESV

1 Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted.

Once I’ve examined my own life and checked my motives, I can take the second step.

Evaluate

The first thing I need to do is to pray and ask the Holy Spirit to guide me into the truth.

Next I need to make sure I have all the facts right. If I’ve only received the information from someone else, I need to take reasonable steps to verify that the information I have is true.

Then I need to evaluate the situation against the Word of God. I need to make sure that the reproof is because the other person is committing sin based on the Bible and not my own personal convictions or truth. I should be able to point to specific Bible verses that address the situation.

At this point I might come to the conclusion that the other person hasn’t actually committed a sin so there is nothing else to do. But if reproof is still needed, then the next step is to...

Pray for wisdom

This fall, we’ll be teaching through the book of James and we’ll come across this relevant verse:

James 1:5 ESV

5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.

Once I’ve prayed, then I’m finally ready to...

Speak the truth in love

Many of you may be familiar with this verse from Paul’s letter to the church in Ephesus:

Ephesians 4:15 ESV

15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ,

But what does it mean to speak the truth in love? One of my friends that I went to high school with and that I have every reason to believe is a disciple of Jesus has recently posted some things on social media that basically say that loving his neighbor means just accepting their sins.

But there is a serious warning here in the middle of today’s passage beginning in verse 26. Those who fail to heed reproof are going to reap the consequences of their choices. So I would submit to you that just letting that happen in their lives without warning them of those consequences is really not a very loving things to do. If we really love others, we will tell them about the consequences of their sin because we won’t want them to experience that.

There are a couple of caveats here:

The Bible is clear that we are not to judge those outside of the body of Christ. That is up to God. So much of what we’ve learned about reproof today applies mainly to other disciples of Jesus. And the truth is that it’s a lot more effective to love people into the kingdom rather than beat them over the head with the Bible, which they don’t believe in the first place.

That being said, I think there are some gentle, compassionate ways that we can warn outsiders about the consequences of sin, especially when they provide us with an opportunity to do so.

Encourage and exhort

If our goal is restoration, which it should be, then we don’t just leave the other person to fend for himself. At a minimum, we need to pray for the other person. But often we also need to come alongside the other person and provide tangible support. Perhaps there is a need to hold them accountable in some area of their life. We might need to help them develop some new disciplines that will help them overcome their struggle with some particular sin. We might introduce them to others who have been through the same struggles and who can encourage them.

We’ve seen this morning that...

I develop wisdom when I embrace the blessing of reproof

Action

So as we close, let me ask all of us two questions:

Is there some reproof that others have brought into my life that I need to heed and to act on according to what we’ve learned today?

Am I aware of some sin in the life of a Christian brother or sister for which I need to lovingly reprove them?

If the answer to either of those questions is yes, then just go ahead and do what you need to do, applying the principles that we’ve learned today.

Inspiration

Responding appropriately to reproof is not a guarantee that we won’t face difficult circumstances in our lives. But living wisely by embracing the blessing of reproof means that we’re much less likely to bring upon ourselves the kind of calamity described in today’s passage. That’s enough for me and I pray it’s enough for you.