Proverbs Shifts From Big Picture

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All right, welcome back. Alright, so I want you get a feel of what we're doing here. As we walk through Proverbs, let's keep the bigger picture in the back of our minds. Up to this point, chapters one through nine, Solomon's been painting with a really big brush. It's been pretty black and white, know God or don't know God. Choose wisdom or choose death. Real broad strokes. So as we go through these next scriptures, see if you can follow the same theme. Maybe in each one about choose God and live or don't choose God that equals death or separation from hearing his voice and walking with them. Now we hit chapter ten, things start to narrow. Now we're getting into real life consequences, everyday stuff, cause and effect. You get the idea. As we go through these, let's see if we can see how the first nine correlate with each specific verse as we go deeper into it.

A Wise Child And A Mother’s Grief

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So starting in chapter ten verse one, it starts off by saying the Proverbs of Solomon A wise son maketh a glad father, but a foolish son is a heaviness of his mother. And every time I read that, something jumped out at me. Why does it say the foolish son is a grief to his mother? Why not the father? That got me thinking back to a conversation I once had with Richard Wombrand. He said nothing can hurt a mother more than a son or daughter. Now at that time I was younger and I didn't really understand what that meant. But now I have a better idea. Women feel things deeper. Men a lot of times, we take it like a punch in the chin and we move on. We're still sad, but mothers, mothers carry it, they replay it. They wonder what they could have said differently, what they could have done that might have changed the outcome. And a father may think, hey, they made their choice, they have to live with it. But a mother feels that grief deep down in her soul. So what Solomon is saying here is powerful. If you're a young man or woman and you're out on your own, making your own decisions and you're not walking with the Lord, not listening to his voice, you think you're in control. You think you're doing things right. You think you're living that I did it my way kind of life. But what you don't see is what you're leaving behind. In your wake, that's grief, that's stress. There are fractures in your relationships, your choices are creating divisions, not just in your own life, but in your family, especially in the hearts of your parents. And when that fraction happens, Scripture doesn't treat it lightly. Divisions, fractions, strife, those things aren't neutral. They're not just personality differences. They come from living outside God's wisdom. So when someone insists on living their way, rejecting God's direction, the Bible actually calls that an ungodly, even an evil path. Not because God is cruel, but because of what it produces, broken homes, broken hearts, and especially a mother's grief.

Ill Gotten Gain Versus Rescue

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Alright, let's move now into verse two. It says ill gotten treasures profit nothing, but righteousness delivers from death. Now on the surface that sounds pretty straightforward. Stolen money doesn't last long. Doing right is better. Fine, but if you slow down for just a second, this verse has a little more weight to it than we might notice at first. Because the last line should stop you. Righteousness delivers from death. And you think, hold on a second, righteous people still die, godly people die. Good people die all the time. So what is Solomon actually saying here? Well first, let's deal with the obvious, the practical side of it. When Solomon spends when someone spends their life chasing ill gotten gain, shortcuts, deception, cutting corners, doing whatever it takes to get ahead, that road usually goes somewhere. It might look good at first, it might feel like progress, but it carries consequences with it, and eventually it catches up with you. Trust gets broken, relationships fall apart, and you put yourself in a bad situation. You create enemies you didn't need to have. You start living with pressures and fears because everything you built is shaky. So, on a very real, everyday level, righteousness does protect you, living clean, living honestly, living with integrity. It keeps you off the road that end badly. In that sense alone, righteousness really does deliver you from death. But Solomon isn't done yet, because that's not the deepest level of the verse. Scripture is always pointing us beyond just this life. And when the Bible talks about death, a lot of times, and not only talking that was my uh pool cleaner. When the Bible talks about death, a lot of times it's not talking only about physical death, it's talking about separation from God, a deeper kind of death. Now this verse opens up because righteousness here isn't just about being a decent person or following some rules. It's about being right with God. It's about alignment. It's about who are you walking with? And that kind of righteousness is the only thing that actually delivers. Everything else, everything built the wrong way, it doesn't last. You can pile it up, you can chase it your whole life, you can build your identity on it, but it stops at the grave. Righteousness doesn't. That's why Solomon uses the word delivers. That's rescue language. That sounds like someone was headed somewhere final and something or someone stepped in and pulled them out. So if you want to hear this verse in real, everyday terms, it's like this. You can spend your whole life building something the wrong way, and it won't carry you through. Or you can build your life with God, align with Him, and that's the only thing that goes through death, not just up to it.

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That's the difference.

Seeking God First Eases Pressure

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You know, uh the thing about being live and getting a little ADD is the other day I was sitting on my patio overlooking the water, and I was looking at all the rich, expensive homes, and this scripture came to my mind, and the Lord's like, you see everything around you, it's all at the end time's gonna burn up, and there's gonna be nothing left. And the reason for that, well, I'll get into that, but the reason for it is because the Lord was saying, Everything is for his glory, and everything is by him. That's really the bottom goal here. So you got the scripture, like we will be judged, and the wood and hay will burn up, but the things that are like gold and precious jewels, they'll survive. That's referring to like, did you do it in Christ or let Christ do it through you, or did you do it on your own? And the Lord kind of made it clear to me, is like when the new kingdom is here, there's gonna be nothing where any man can say, Remember when we built that, remember when we did this, because we're gonna realize everything is from and for God. And that kind of made me think about, okay, I get it. Because I have this podcast I'm doing, and this is the will of the Lord, but I also have a large insurance company. And so, making a long story short, doing this, I realized, oh, I can apply a lot I've learned here in the insurance world, and as far as marketing and growing the business. And so I started doing both. And then it got to the point where I had so much going on with this and so much going on with that, that the pressure was just getting I was getting wiped out every day, just wiped out and getting frustrated. And then I was sitting with the Lord, and the Lord's like, you know, give me the scripture that has told you about everything's for him, and like, what did he ask me to do? And I'm like, Well, you asked me to do teach people on Proverbs. He goes, Well, okay, good. Did I tell you to do that for your business also? I'm like, no, but Lord, I gotta run the company, I gotta grow the business. And then he gently put me back to the scripture, like, yeah, but what did I say? Seek first the kingdom of God and my righteousness, and these things will be added to you. And then another scripture that we'll run into quickly here is that you know, the Lord will prosper you and you'll have no sorrow trouble with it. So in small talking with me, he made it pretty clear, like, look at you just work on the proverb podcast. Leave your business to me, just leave that alone, I'll take care of that. And that really released a lot of pressure in me where I'm like, oh, I can do that. And so being honest, that's where I'm at today. I'm just focusing on this and I've given the Lord the cares of the business and the growing in it. And it took a lot of stress off, you know, so it's great knowing God. He really just walks you through this life. Okay, Proverbs ten three.

Hunger Of The Body And Soul

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It says the Lord will not suffer the righteous to hunger, but he casts away the substance of the wicked. Now on the surface that sounds like a straight promise of physical provision, but if we're being honest, real life pushes back on that, and it pushes back hard. You can be working sixty hours a week, doing what's right, and still barely getting by. That's not theory, that's real life. So what do we do with a verse like this? Well, first thing let's look at some other scriptures and see how it might correlate with this. David says in Psalms thirty seven, I have been young and now am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread. And that sounds even stronger than Proverbs. But David isn't saying that no righteous person ever struggles. David himself ran for his life, hidden caves, and depended on other people to eat. There were moments when he absolutely could have said, Lord, I am hungry. So what is Solomon talking about here? And I can correlate with this as a personally, I remember when I first moved out to Florida with my wife and two young children, I was doing everything I could in the flesh to live perfectly, no drinking, going to church a couple, three times a week, working sixty, seventy hours a week, and if it wasn't for me humbling myself to call my parents to borrow some money every three months just to pay rent, we would have starved. And I went to these verses and had a what I call coming to Jesus before the Lord. I'm like, look, Lord, what's the deal? You promise this, and look how this ends up. And I wasn't really hearing them too clearly back then. I was trying to do everything perfect. And that's once again, I get off on these sidetracks where like I gotta behave a certain way, and then he'll bless me. And he always brings me down to like nobody, I bless you because I love you. Just hang with me, quit putting so much stress on you. So the good thing is I made it through.

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We'll learn about that here in a minute. But we made it through.

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And uh he led me into the insurance build. I was doing real estate at the time, and then it turned to be the blessing. So once again, praise God. All right, so what are we talking about in this verse? He's talking about the pattern of a life under God's care, not a moment by moment guarantee of comfort. Now here's where Proverbs 103 really opens up, and this is important. The foot there's a footnote, and it says it's the soul of the righteous. Proverbs is often less about outward circumstances and more about the inner life. Jesus said, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. Later he says, I am the bread of life. So we're talking about two kinds of hunger here. There's physical hunger, and that's real. You felt it, I felt it, there's no denying that. But there's also soul hunger, hunger for peace, for purpose, for meaning, for connection with God. And Proverbs ten three leans heavily into the second one. God may allow seasons of physical lack, but he does not abandon the soul of the righteous to emptiness. Now on the other side of this verse it says God cast away the craving of the wicked, and that can mess with your head because you look around and think they don't look too cast away. They look like they're doing just fine. But the Bible actually addresses that frustration straight on. In Psalm seventy three it says, I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. And then it ends up by saying, But until I went into the sanctuary of God, then I understood their end. That's the key. Proverbs isn't giving you a daily snapshot. It's giving you the trajectory of a life. The righteous sustain, rooted, ultimately provided for, the wicked, cravings that are never satisfied, even if they look successful on the outside. Because here's the truth, you can have money, success, status, and still be starving inside. So let's bring this back to real life. You can be doing right, working hard, but still coming up short financially for a season. And that does not mean Proverbs fell. That was a season, not a verdict. Proverb provision still came sometimes through parents, sometimes through others, and that's still God's hand. And more importantly, your soul didn't collapse. You're still walking with him, you're still listening, still growing. That's Proverbs ten three playing out, just not in the way we expected. Proverbs isn't promising the righteous will never feel hunger in their body. It's promising God will never abandon the soul to emptiness. There may be seasons when your table looks light and your bank account thin, but your life is still being sustained. On the other side, the wicked may look full, but inside there's a craving that never gets satisfied, and in time God lets that collapse under its own weight. Now Proverbs ten

Craving Without Commitment Stays Empty

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four. Let's move to Proverbs ten four, where it says The soul of the sluggard craves against nothing, but the soul of the diligent is made fat. Now when we first hear that, the question comes up pretty quickly. Is this talking about what's going on the inside of a person, like their feelings and thoughts? Or is it talking about real world results? Because when I look at life, it feels like Proverbs is describing something I've watched played out over and over again. And I've noticed this especially among men. A lot of guys want to be the CEO. They want to be the general manager, they want the big position, the big life, the recognition. And look, wanting those things isn't the problem. The problem is how quickly they expect it to happen. They'll work somewhere for a couple weeks, and yeah, I might be exaggerating, but not by much. And then they're gone. New idea, new job, new direction, jumping from ship to ship, always chasing the next thing, but never staying long enough for anything to actually take root. And that's exactly what this verse is talking about. It says the soul of the slugger craves. Notice that. He has a desire. He wants something. He's not empty of ambition, he's full of it. But the verse says he craves and gets nothing, because craving without commitment never produces fruit. Now that word soul matters here. In Hebrew it's not just talking about your thoughts or emotions. It's talking about your whole inner drive, your appetite, your desire, and your life force. In other words, this isn't just a guy who thinks lazy thoughts, this is someone whose whole life runs on craving but not committing. He wants the outcome, but not the staying power. He doesn't stay it long enough to build skill, he doesn't push through the boredom, he doesn't endure the small beginning stage. So even though he wants it badly, nothing ever comes of it. And Proverbs is honestly enough to say that clearly. There's substance there. And again, notice where it starts. It starts in the soul. The diligent person learns how to show up when it's boring. He stays when it's slow, he keeps putting in effort when nobody's clapping. And that inner consistency, that steady pressure over time eventually produces outward results. This is why success rarely happens overnight, even though it looks like it does from the outside. When you really look closer, you find deep roots underneath, years of showing up, years of staying put, years of just getting better quietly. That ties right into something else we've seen in Proverbs, the word prudence. Prudence is the ability to see the future and adjust your presence accordingly. So the diligent man, this feels small right now, but I see where this leads, and that's what he says. The sluggard says, This feels small, I'm out. And then he resets everything back to zero again and again and again. And this verse answers the last question clearly. Is this spiritual or physical? Well, it's both. It starts spiritually in the soul, and it ends up physical, in real results. Proverbs works from the inside out. Inner life produces your outer life. The sluggard has a restless soul, scattered effort, and no results. The diligent has a steady soul, consistent effort and a full life. Now this isn't saying every diligent person becomes rich, but that every lazy person is a broke overnight. Proverbs isn't talking about instant outcome, remember, it's talking about the trajectory of your life. Over time, diligence compounds. Over time laziness fragments. Here's what I've seen in real life. The sluggard isn't lacking desire. He's full of it. He wants the big job, the big life, the big payoff. But he won't stay anywhere long enough for roots to grow. So a soul is always craving, but never full. But the diligent man learns how to stay. He shows up when it's boring and when it's slow, and when he feels like nothing's happening. And over time something starts to build, his soul gets steady, and his life gets full. That's Proverbs ten four.

Don’t Sleep Through Your Harvest

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Now let's roll into Proverbs ten five and hear a little more about kind of the same thing but different. It says he that gathereth in summer is a wise son, but he that sleepeth in the harvest is a son that causes shame. Now at first glance, this is one of those sounds obvious like yeah, of course. When it's time to work, work. Don't sleep when it's time to gather. But Proverbs does that on purpose. It gives you something simple on the surface, and then the longer you sit with it, the more layers start to open up underneath. Because this verse really isn't about work ethic. It's about timing. Summer and harvest represent an opportunity, a window, a season when things are lined up, when effort actually pays off. And sleeping through the harvest isn't about being incapable or untalented, it's about being unaware, missing the moment. This is why this verse isn't framed as lazy versus hard working. It's awake versus asleep. And that ties directly like into Ecclesiastic, where it says to everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven. Wisdom isn't just knowing how to work, it's knowing when to work. A wise person recognizes the season they're in. This is where the word we've already seen early in Proverbs comes back again prudence. Prudence is foresight, it's the ability to look ahead, see what's coming, and adjust your present behavior accordingly. And Scripture gives us great pictures of that with the ant Proverbs six. No boss, no manager, nobody standing over her. She just sees what's coming and gathers while she can. That's wisdom. Now here's where this verse gets sharp. Sleeping der V sleeping during the harvest isn't just unproductive, it's called shameful. Why? Because deep down the person knows that was my window and I let it pass. This is something you see all the time in real life. Earlier we talked about the guy who jumps from job to job, leaving too soon. That was Proverbs ten four. But Proverbs ten five shows the flip side of that. These are people who stick around long enough to plant, but then check out right when it's time to collect. They start things but don't finish. They build but don't capitalize. They invest, but don't follow through. And that's just as costly. Jesus touches on this exact idea in John four when he tells his disciples, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, for they are white already to harvest. In other words, pay attention, this is the moment. Paul says the same thing in Galatians six. He says, Let us not grow weary in doing good, for in due season we will reap if we do not give up. There it is again, due season, harvest comes, but only if you stay awake long enough to gather. There's also a bigger life rhythm here. There is a time to plant, a time to build, a time to wait, and a time to gather. The wise son adjusts to each season. The foolish one treats each season the same. Either always grinding with no awareness or always coasting with no urgency. And this one really hit home in the real world. I was listening to a tape by Jim Roan and he was talking about seasons, and I check out, you know, because as I mentioned, I'm sixty four now and since I've been twenty, it's you work. You don't really gather, you don't really put the sickle in. This is just me. You work, you work and work, and then you take a little bit off the top to make sure everybody's fed and they get to go to schools and stuff, but you really don't bring in the harvest. You just keep working and working and working. And I don't know, maybe this will correlate with some of you around this age, but there comes a part or a time in your life where you realize you don't need to work that hard. So you slow down, but then your mind and your body's like screams at you like you're being lazy. You gotta keep producing, you gotta keep producing. Then it brings that scripture apart to me where uh the Lord says that a man dies in his pursuit of gain, like just sitting at his desk working and he just dies there. Like, that's not a wise way to be. There is a time to collect your gatherings. And I can open up a little more, I think, here on personal things. It's like I remember I had an investment and it was worth probably about two and a half million, and the Lord told me to sell it on a certain date, but it was a soft word to me. So when that date came, he also promised me something else, which I won't bring up right now, but I was like short by 20 million, make a long story short. And so I have the scripture also that there I will heal uh hear a voice behind me and I'll know which way to walk in it. So that morning when I woke up and the investment didn't grow to what I needed, I went to the verse, like, well, I'll hear correctly. The anxiety was really high. You know, I've learned when the anxiety side, that's why God says don't be anxious about anything, because when your anxiety is side, you just can't hear from them. But when he told me like the day October 6th, it was it was just like a soft nudge per se. So on the day the loud screaming voice was, I'll hear a voice. Well, I didn't hear anything, so I didn't sell. I didn't gather like I thought I heard him say. Long story short, within a couple months at two and a half went down to about 800. It just totally collapsed. So I'm totally kicking myself. I'm like, man, why don't I listen to him? Well, around that same time, he gave me another investment idea, same soft little nudge, and told me about doing this Proverbs podcast. So my flesh kind of tried to jump back up and saying, you don't have the authority to teach people on Proverbs. But after losing basically a couple million dollars, I said, I could care less. I know the voice of the Lord and I'm going all in. So talking about shameful, yeah, I'm extremely shameful about that. But the good thing is, is the Lord picked me up and directed me in a new area to go to. And so I'm walking in that and I'm pretty happy about it because I know, I know the goodness of God will come around and and I try to teach you, do the best you can with what you hear. And if you fail, no biggie, says the righteous man, will get up seven times. So I'll know I'll get up, and I'll still accomplish what he has for me on this earth. And I hope that helps you out where you might be at. So back to Jim Rowan, he's talking about all the seasons. I mean, I'll just tuning them out. I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah. But you know, it's true. There is a time to gather. So if it's your time to gather, it's time to gather because life isn't going to continue forever. Listen to the voice of the Lord and bring in your sheaves and relax and figure out what to do next with your life. So back to the verse, it's not just about money at work, it's about stewardship. Do you honor the opportunity God put in front of you? Because harvest is both a gift and a test, as I kind of just explained. It reveals whether you recognize the moment you're living in. Now, this verse sounds like a no-brainer first, didn't it? Of course you gather and harvest, but here's the deeper part. Wisdom isn't just about working hard, it's about recognizing when it's time to move. There are moments in your life when everything you've been building up finally lines up. And if you're not paying attention, you can sleep right through it. That's why wiz that's why Solomon calls it shameful. Not because you couldn't do it, but because you missed your moment. The wise son sees the season and steps into it. The foolish one treats every season the same and wonders why nothing ever comes together. And that with Proverbs ten five. Well, it was great hanging out with you again.

Learning From A Costly Miss

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I haven't learned how to attach my ending about getting the book about how to hear the voice of the Lord, so I'll just say it here because it'll save you a ton of time. It's called God Why Won't You Talk to Me by Edward L. Carpenter, and it's on Amazon. God bless. Love you all. Until next time, listen to the voice of the Lord and walk in faith. Bye bye.