Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

An angry person stirs up conflict,
    and a hot-tempered person commits many sins.
Pride brings a person low,
    but the lowly in spirit gain honor.
The accomplices of thieves are their own enemies;
    they are put under oath and dare not testify.
Fear of man will prove to be a snare,
    but whoever trusts in the Lord is kept safe.
Many seek an audience with a ruler,
    but it is from the Lord that one gets justice.
The righteous detest the dishonest;
    the wicked detest the upright.

• Proverbs 29:22-27

Proverbs 29:25 ”We have two ancient proverbs here. Each of them is true as a separate proverb, but they are equally true when linked together. The independent proposition, that the fear of man brings a snare, is a truth of God which experience has taught to many. The other proposition, that he that trusts in the Lord shall be safe, has been found most blessedly true by all those who have tested it. Then put the two propositions together-that the fear of man brings a snare, but trust in the Lord is the safe and certain way to avoid that snare-and this also is true.”

• Charles H. Spurgeon, from his sermon notes

The Message

Solomon is making a few last statements here for proverbs that have been recurring themes.

Anger is counterproductive.  Besides committing a lot of sins while angry, it stirs up greater conflict.  I commented on a television advertisement, a public service announcement.  They have people from all walks of life, including athletes, looking into the camera and almost shouting that anger has to stop.  Two points need to be made.  When the other person will not quit until they get what they want, backing down may be the wrong thing if that leads to sin, but when you are angry, telling someone else to not be angry simply does not work.

Then the next repeated theme is pride.  There is a big push amongst people who are acting outside of God’s will to be proud of that.  This only compounds the problem.  God will lift up the humble and He will lay low the proud.  We can be confident in our abilities.  We can be proud of a job well done.  But puffing our self up is a problem.  I have heard public service announcements about how we need to praise children more.  They need to build self-esteem, but I never had any praise in my life growing up.  When I did a great job, I was always told I could have done even better.  But one of my big impediments in accepting Christ was my pride.  When you are never praised, you invent the praise within yourself for yourself. Rejecting the rejection.  But someone who is always praised for mediocre work will never see that there is room for improvement.  Will they ever here God calling, saying that they have sinned, when all they have been told is how wonderful they are?

Helping a thief puts you in a bind from both sides.  If you testify against the thief, they might kill you.  If you do not testify, you will find yourself in prison with the thief.

The next overlaps the last.  Fearing man, including the thief, can get you in trouble.  Fear the Lord and trust Him.  Only God can always fulfill His promises.

Proverbs 29:26 ramps up the previous proverb, in a way.  We might greatly wish the audience of the king, but only God can give true justice.  The king is simply a more powerful person who is flawed with sin like the rest of us.  God is our rock.

And the last first is the problem we have today.  We see the other person as being wicked.  Some of it is that whichever side we are on in a disagreement, the other side is portrayed as being evil.  Thus, if we think we are right, we will hate the other side.  Some of this is an Isaiah 5:20 problem in that many call good evil and evil good.  But sometimes, the one person simply tells one false statement after another.  Hitler said that if you tell people loudly and often enough, they will believe anything.  And oddly, the people saying that the other guy is like Hitler are the most accomplished liars.  I remember when political correctness was not calling people names, but now it is you cannot call me names, but I can call your racist, bigot, fill-in-the-black-aphobe, because I define who is good and bad.  We are a victim of this proverb, hating those that disagree because people are telling us that they are bad and we are good.  And this proverb backs us up.

No, it does not.  You have been told a lie if you think so.  Truth is not relative.  God’s truth is absolute.  We cannot establish who is righteous until we realize that we are not righteous and they are not righteous either, but in Christ we can be made righteous.  And that crosses all the battlelines.

There are two chapters of Proverbs left.  This study will continue next week, but this concludes the wisdom of Solomon.  Proverbs 30 contains the wisdom of Agur.  Proverbs 31 contains the wisdom of King Lemuel, which is mostly the description of a wife of noble character.

And now let us sing.

The following song is Even if.  This is sung by Mercy Me.  Let us cling to Jesus, and even if something still goes wrong, my hope is still only found in Him.

Closing Prayer

Dear Lord,
We need Your wisdom.  Help us to value wisdom.  Lord, we live in a world of angry and proud people.  If they were not so proud, they would not get that angry.  I just want to quit at times, Lord.  I feel so overcome, but You, Lord, are the great overcomer.  You can make things right.  Your justice is pure and our justice is puny at best.  And Lord, if we do not turn to Your Holy Word, how can we know what righteous is.  And Lord, once we see that righteousness, we will love even our worst enemy.  Teach us Lord.  Open us and pour Your wisdom into us, so that we can see through the lies but love them anyway.  In thy Name we pray.
Amen

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.