Proverbs 19 New Living Translation
Proverbs 19New Living Translation
19 Better to be poor and honest
than to be dishonest and a fool.
2 Enthusiasm without knowledge is no good;
haste makes mistakes.
3 People ruin their lives by their own foolishness
and then are angry at the Lord.
4 Wealth makes many “friends”;
poverty drives them all away.
5 A false witness will not go unpunished,
nor will a liar escape.
6 Many seek favors from a ruler;
everyone is the friend of a person who gives gifts!
7 The relatives of the poor despise them;
how much more will their friends avoid them!
Though the poor plead with them,
their friends are gone.
8 To acquire wisdom is to love yourself;
people who cherish understanding will prosper.
9 A false witness will not go unpunished,
and a liar will be destroyed.
10 It isn’t right for a fool to live in luxury
or for a slave to rule over princes!
11 Sensible people control their temper;
they earn respect by overlooking wrongs.
12 The king’s anger is like a lion’s roar,
but his favor is like dew on the grass.
13 A foolish child[a] is a calamity to a father;
a quarrelsome wife is as annoying as constant dripping.
14 Fathers can give their sons an inheritance of houses and wealth,
but only the Lord can give an understanding wife.
15 Lazy people sleep soundly,
but idleness leaves them hungry.
16 Keep the commandments and keep your life;
despising them leads to death.
17 If you help the poor, you are lending to the Lord—
and he will repay you!
18 Discipline your children while there is hope.
Otherwise you will ruin their lives.
19 Hot-tempered people must pay the penalty.
If you rescue them once, you will have to do it again.
20 Get all the advice and instruction you can,
so you will be wise the rest of your life.
21 You can make many plans,
but the Lord’s purpose will prevail.
22 Loyalty makes a person attractive.
It is better to be poor than dishonest.
23 Fear of the Lord leads to life,
bringing security and protection from harm.
24 Lazy people take food in their hand
but don’t even lift it to their mouth.
25 If you punish a mocker, the simpleminded will learn a lesson;
if you correct the wise, they will be all the wiser.
26 Children who mistreat their father or chase away their mother
are an embarrassment and a public disgrace.
27 If you stop listening to instruction, my child,
you will turn your back on knowledge.
28 A corrupt witness makes a mockery of justice;
the mouth of the wicked gulps down evil.
29 Punishment is made for mockers,
and the backs of fools are made to be beaten.
Proverbs 19
FINISHING WELL
December 19, 2014
“”Cease listening, my son, to discipline, and you will stray from the words of knowledge.”” (Proverbs 19:27)
No man, save Christ, is perfect. But what makes men and women great is a teachable spirit over a lifetime. A man who decides he knows it all or knows enough and ceases to pursue the Lord and His truth, to listen to the discipline and training of God, to learn from the lives of others, is in an incredibly precarious position and will not end well.
LEARNING FROM LIDDELL
Yesterday at my 97-year-old Dad’s memorial service, my brother, Tom, shared about Eric Liddell, the famous Scottish runner who is immortalized in the film, “”Chariots of Fire.”” Liddell is known for his uncompromising faith that caused him to back out of his signature 100-meter race for the 1925 Paris Olympics because he refused to run on the Lord’s Day.
But his most famous race in Scotland happened in 1923 at a Triangular meet between England, Scotland, and Ireland. He got his legs tangled and fell a few yards into a 400-meter competition. The 400 meters takes less than a minute and when he stood up, he was over 20 yards behind the last man.
What happened next is astounding. He got up and with fire in his eyes began to run again. He ran so fast that he beat his competitors by several yards at the finish—arguable the fastest 300 yards that has ever been run in history.
He fell, but he rose again, keeping his eyes on the tape, and finishing well.
This was not his best race, though, for Liddell left an almost certain career of athletic fame for the mission field in China the same year he won the Olympic gold medal. He served there until 1943 and died in a prison camp, having served the people of China for 17 selfless years.
MY PRAYER
I carry some cinder chat in my left elbow from falling in a track meet in my early years. We all have a lot of the chat of the world on us from such falls. No doubt I will make thousands of mistakes between here and the finish line. I will need to listen to the Coach to correct my trajectory over and over and over again.
But I hope I keep listening, and rising. I pray that I will never think—in any area of my life—that I have arrived and no longer need the wisdom of God and the counsel of godly men. I pray I will maintain a wise, teachable heart that trusts and obeys with rugged determination.
And I pray that I will listen to the cries of the great cloud of witnesses who have run the race before us—which now includes my Dad—and end my race well.
Sermon Overview
Scripture Passage: Proverbs 19:11-12
It’s been said that unjustified anger is like an acid that brings harm to anything it is poured on, including the very container it inhabits. If we can’t control our temper, we risk wrecking our lives and destroying our testimonies.
Proverbs 19:11 reveals God’s answer to anger. “The discretion of a man makes him slow to anger, and his glory is to overlook a transgression.”
Scripture says sudden anger is to be controlled. When we feel it coming, we must confess it to God and keep it contained until we have a chance to consider it.
Sinful anger is to be condemned; it is not a weakness, it is wickedness. It is anger without a cause rooted within us. It is centered on a person rather than on an offense. It refuses to forgive and let go.
Stubborn anger is to be conquered. Bitterness and wrath take over when we let the sun go down on our anger. We allow the devil access in our lives when we let anger rule over us.
We must recognize and repent of our anger and refuse the devil’s schemes to use our emotions against us. If we don’t control, condemn, and conquer anger, it will control, condemn, and conquer us.
But there’s a sanctified anger we are instructed to channel. It is not destructive to the soul, and it does not result in sin. We see it in Jesus in Mark 3, when He cleared the temple of malicious Pharisees and self-seeking merchants who were taking advantage of the poor.
It is not only possible to possess righteous anger, but it is also expected. In fact, injustice ought to stir us and move us to act. Never once did Jesus retaliate when he was personally attacked and abused, even when He was crucified. Yet, Jesus was moved with righteous anger to act when He saw other people being attacked and abused.
Adrian Rogers said, “Sometimes anger is love’s clearest expression, but we need to be careful with it.”
If we want to follow the example of Jesus, we are instructed to get angry at the right time, for the right reason, against the right thing, in the right way.
Apply it to your life
Is there a sudden, sinful, stubborn anger in your life that is controlling you? Recognize it, repent of it and rebuke the enemy, so that you may live righteously and protect your testimony.
The Daily Hatch 