April 27, 2025 | Fire Always Burns
Fire Always Burns | Proverbs Part 9
Proverbs 6
My son, if you have put up security for your neighbor,
have given your pledge for a stranger,
if you are snared in the words of your mouth,
caught in the words of your mouth,
then do this, my son, and save yourself,
for you have come into the hand of your neighbor:
go, hasten, and plead urgently with your neighbor.
Give your eyes no sleep
and your eyelids no slumber;
save yourself like a gazelle from the hand of the hunter,
like a bird from the hand of the fowler.
Go to the ant, O sluggard;
consider her ways, and be wise.
Without having any chief,
officer, or ruler,
she prepares her bread in summer
and gathers her food in harvest.
How long will you lie there, O sluggard?
When will you arise from your sleep?
A little sleep, a little slumber,
a little folding of the hands to rest,
and poverty will come upon you like a robber,
and want like an armed man.
A worthless person, a wicked man,
goes about with crooked speech,
winks with his eyes, signals with his feet,
points with his finger,
with perverted heart devises evil,
continually sowing discord;
therefore calamity will come upon him suddenly;
in a moment he will be broken beyond healing.
There are six things that the LORD hates,
seven that are an abomination to him:
haughty eyes, a lying tongue,
and hands that shed innocent blood,
a heart that devises wicked plans,
feet that make haste to run to evil,
a false witness who breathes out lies,
and one who sows discord among brothers.
My son, keep your father’s commandment,
and forsake not your mother’s teaching.
Bind them on your heart always;
tie them around your neck.
When you walk, they will lead you;
when you lie down, they will watch over you;
and when you awake, they will talk with you.
For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light,
and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life,
to preserve you from the evil woman,
from the smooth tongue of the adulteress.
Do not desire her beauty in your heart,
and do not let her capture you with her eyelashes;
for the price of a prostitute is only a loaf of bread,
but a married woman hunts down a precious life.
Can a man carry fire next to his chest
and his clothes not be burned?
Or can one walk on hot coals
and his feet not be scorched?
So is he who goes in to his neighbor’s wife;
none who touches her will go unpunished.
People do not despise a thief if he steals
to satisfy his appetite when he is hungry,
but if he is caught, he will pay sevenfold;
he will give all the goods of his house.
He who commits adultery lacks sense;
he who does it destroys himself.
He will get wounds and dishonor,
and his disgrace will not be wiped away.
For jealousy makes a man furious,
and he will not spare when he takes revenge.
He will accept no compensation;
he will refuse though you multiply gifts. (ESV)
In his sermon Fire Always Burns from Proverbs 6, Jed Gillis shows how God's wisdom trains us to recognize patterns of life that lead to flourishing or destruction. Proverbs 6 teaches that foolishness often looks attractive or understandable, making it deceptively easy to embrace. Gillis walks through four examples: taking on risky financial obligations, embracing laziness, sowing discord, and falling into sexual sin.
In each case, the text warns that while foolish choices may seem reasonable at first, they always carry serious consequences. Wisdom is not just about following a checklist, but about shaping a heart that can rightly assess any situation through God's truth. Gillis explains that God's commands are meant to protect us, shining light on the lies that temptation offers. Even when foolishness seems appealing or excusable, it still leads to ruin. Through it all, believers can trust in God's jealous, passionate love for His people. His love fights for their holiness and ultimate joy.
Transcript of Fire Always Burns | Proverbs Part 9
Before we look at God's word, let's respond in prayer. God, we've just said over and over that you are holy. You are a treasure better than anything else we could possibly find. You are more satisfying than anything we could look to for joy. And you are more necessary for our lives and for our morning this morning than anything else.
So, Lord, we pray that you would use your truth this morning. Whatever is is done this morning in our songs, in our conversations, in the time as we look at your word, none of it it means anything without your power flowing through it.
Lord, please guard us from just making a show of godliness without your power.
Each of us bring our battles against the flesh. We bring our temptations. And we may be in in very different places. Some of us may feel like it's going well. Some of us may know that battle is not going well at all.
Lord, there is nothing, nothing that can help us in that battle other than your power. And your love displayed for us on the cross. So I pray that you would be lifted up and that you would work powerfully for your people this morning.
In Jesus name, amen.
Why Is Following Wisdom Hard?
We're gonna continue in Proverbs chapter six. I think probably children headed out to children's Church already left, but if you didn't, you could go ahead now. We're also glad to have you in here with us.
Several weeks ago, we looked at one of the main themes of this extended introduction in Proverbs, which is that we're told over and over foolishness leads to destruction, ruin, disgrace, and terror. Wisdom leads to honor, protection, peace, life, and hope. And so we face this question if that's true, why is this hard? We're told over and over foolishness leads to all kinds of bad things, and wisdom leads to all kinds of good things.
Because Foolishness is Sometimes Understandable
Why do I still struggle to follow wisdom?
And a few weeks ago, we looked at the first reason, which is that evil is not always ugly. Sometimes it looks really good. This week we're gonna build on that with another reason, and we see it later in this chapter, although he references it throughout. We see it down in verse 30 where he says, people do not despise a thief if he steals to satisfy his appetite when he is hungry. But if he is caught, he will pay sevenfold. He will give all the goods of his house. In other words, sometimes foolishness or evil is understandable. It may make sense to us. Sometimes it looks attractive, sometimes it just seems like, of course, everyone will understand if I respond in this foolish way.
Proverbs Speaks on Two Levels
So as we go through chapter six, we're gonna see, just like in chapter five, he's talking on two different levels. He doesn't just want you to check the box and say, well, Proverbs six tells me some things to do about money. It tells me some things to do about hard work. It tells me some things to do about unity and divisiveness. And as it tells me those things, we can say, okay, good. Now I know how to handle this situation and this situation. That's not really what he's doing here, although it's part of it. He wants you to have wisdom to handle whatever situations come.
He doesn't just want you to say, these principles apply to hard work, but I've got a different problem in my life. He wants you to get used to thinking with biblical wisdom. In some ways it's, it's like a quarterback. Some of you may be followed the NFL draft recently, and you think when someone's going to be a quarterback, they need to just throw the ball a lot of times. Right? You just need repetitions throwing. The ball and the more repetitions you get, the smoother it gets. And the more you get used to seeing different defenses and different routes, the more you're able to process quickly and you become skilled.
Really, Proverbs is trying to give you repetitions of thinking about different situations, not so much so you can say, well, when I think about hard work, these are the solutions, although that he does give you some of those. But it's so you get to be skilled at approaching any situation with biblical wisdom.
So just like in chapter five, he's talking about some specific situations, but he's talking about wisdom overall. We need to know in this chapter what he says about hard work and about responsibility and money and unity and purity. Yes, but we need to know more than that, what he is saying about wisdom and foolishness. It's not about learning a mindless set of rules. It's about learning the patterns of God's world that lets your life flourish the way he wants you to flourish.
Four Examples of Wisdom Patterns
So we're gonna look at four different sections of this chapter, and in each case we will look at just what is the situation he's talking about, and then what should our response be to that situation. We'll also talk about how might we rationalize it so that it seems understandable to us, and then what are the consequences, because that's the pattern he follows. Here's a situation. How should you respond? Why might you rationalize why you shouldn't do what God said? And then what are the consequences? That's the pattern. That's the wisdom pattern. He wants you to learn as you look at these situations so that it applies to other situations in your life.
Example 1: Putting Up Security for Your Neighbor
Let's read beginning of chapter six. He says, my son, if you have put up security for your neighbor, have given your pledge for a stranger if you are snared in the words of your mouth, caught in the words of your mouth, then do this, my son, and save yourself. For you have come into the hand of your neighbor, go hasten and plead urgently with your neighbor. Give your eyes no sleep and your eyelids no slumber. Save yourself like a gazelle from the hand of the hunter, like a bird from the hand of the Fowler.
So we probably don't talk in that language very often. So the first thing is just, what is he talking about? This could apply to a lot of different things. Here's one picture. If you imagine a stranger comes along to you, and the stranger is talking to you and a friend and trying to convince your friend to invest in their business.
Now you don't know this guy. You don't know if his business is a good plan or not. You don't know if he's a hard worker or not. You don't know anything about it, but you and your friend are here talking and he's trying to get your friend to give him, say, I don't know, $50,000 as an investment in his business.
Now, you could sit there and say, all right, my friend really wants to invest in this. It sounds like it could be this wonderful opportunity. If you were to look at your friend and say, go ahead and invest, and if you lose the money, I'll pay it back, most of us probably would know inherently, that's not a great plan. That would be the kind of thing that's going on. This stranger wants an investment, he wants a loan essentially, and you say, well, if he doesn't follow through on that, I'll pay it.
When he says, if you have given your pledge for a stranger, that's what he's talking about. Now, it's not entirely clear the way the Hebrew works here. Does that apply to, for if your friend comes and asks you to invest. That's not entirely clear as to whether he's saying you could invest in that situation or not.
We could at least say, if your friend asks you for an investment, you wanna make sure it's a wise investment. You don't just say, well, sure, I trust you. What's your business in again?
He's warning you against taking on liability, especially in money. Where you don't have good reason to trust it, and the liability is potentially at least too much for you. In a modern context, we use things like co-signing on loans, and that's a conversation which could apply to this as well.
But the reason I gave the first scenario where it's a stranger wanting your friend to invest is because I think that's what he's doing here. He says, if you put up security for your friend, your friend said, I'll give this money.
And you're like, well, I'll make sure you don't lose any of it. Notice when we get down to verse three, he doesn't say, go talk to the stranger. He says, go talk to your neighbor. Right? There's a lot of ways we could take the stranger and the neighbor and say, how exactly do these things relate to each other?
It could be the scenario like I painted. It could be that your friend says, I'll loan money to a stranger, and you say, well, if the stranger doesn't pay it back, then I will. But the point is, you're taking a risk. You're making a promise based on a future you can't control, not making a wise risk based on.
This seems like a good investment and somebody that I trust and know, but a risk that says, sure, why not? I could get rich if this works out. In other words, he's really not warning against generosity. He's not saying don't help somebody. He's warning against gullibility or greed.
To give a real practical example, on Wednesday night, we studied Philemon. The, the men's Bible study studied Philemon this past week. When Paul sends Onesimus back as a former slave or slave currently, and asks for his freedom, he says, whatever he owes you, I will pay it. In other words, I'm going to generously repay that debt.
That's not against what he's saying in Proverbs, but he doesn't say. If Onesiumus ever owes you anything, I'll pay it. See, that would be guaranteeing a future debt that would be taking on a risk that he can't calculate. Should I or should I not take on this debt? He's generous. He obligates himself to say, I'll pay his debt as a gift.
The, the advice here, the wise counsel is don't let greed, potentially, if that's what it is. Either greed for money or maybe I just wanna be seen as a good person. I wanna believe this person is really good and I want them to like me, so I'll guarantee their investment. He says, don't take on that kind of liability, because really it's like modern investment advice, which you'll find over and over. There's a lot of principles and proverbs that people who maybe don't even follow scripture have realized are good advice. When investment investing advisors tell you things like, don't risk what you can't afford to lose, that's basically what he's saying. He's saying you can't afford to lose it and there's a good chance since it's a stranger, you have no reason to trust that you might lose it.
Alright? That's the situation. We're gonna put that into maybe more of our day-to-day life in just a minute. But first, notice the response He says. Urgently save yourself. Do you notice? Over and over he says, go hasten, plead urgently. Give your eyes no sleep. Give your eyelids no slumber like you are trapped in something. Don't stop until you get out.
Now, for us, even if it's not this exact situation, there are times when we're ensnared, we're trapped in something. That was foolish and we never should have gotten into it. And sometimes I think we just go, well, I'm gonna ride it out and hope it works. He's saying, look, don't do that. Get out of the snare. That's our response.
How do we rationalize it? I, I tried to think like, why would someone do this? And I think it probably comes down to either, it seems like generosity to me. And I want to feel like I'm a good, generous person, or I think it's an investment that could give me some significant benefit, and greed drives me.
But do you see how it could be reasonable? When I painted the story a minute ago, you said, well, that's silly. You should never guarantee an investment for somebody you don't know anything about them. That's foolish. It doesn't seem understandable, but the more you know about that person and you say, oh, it's in a, it's in a business that seems like it could really take off. You still don't know his character. You just know it could be really lucrative.
You see, it could become understandable to us, and we need to wrestle through the principles so that we know when the situation comes up, what is the wise response?
And he ends with the consequence. Verse five, save yourself like a gazelle from the hand of the hunter and a bird from the hand of the fowler we're trapped. Some of you know you've been in situations where you pursued debt that was foolish, and that debt is a trap and you get stuck.
His picture is a bird that's supposed to fly. It's supposed to flourish, but it can't. And the same thing is true when we take on these kinds of unwise risks, which could be money, but it could be also when you promise to help someone not knowing how long that's going to take. I'll help you no matter what, and then you realize what that actually entailed.
We should be generous people, but we should not ensnare ourselves by really promising something about a future we can't control.
Now, we could talk about that and apply it the rest of our time, but what I want us to do, like a quarterback, I want us to get. One throw of the football.
Example 2: Go to the Ant, Sluggard
And now let's go to a different situation. Let's keep going. In the, in the chapter verse six, he talks about laziness and work. He says, go to the ant oh sluggard. Consider her ways and be wise without having any chief officer or ruler. She prepares her bread in summer and gathers her food and harvest. How long will you lie there? Oh, sluggard. When will you arise from your sleep? A little sleep, a little slumber. A little folding of the hands to rest, and poverty will come upon you like a robber. And want like an armed man.
Now in our modern world, we can have a hard time understanding this picture, partly because our society recognizes if you dedicate everything about your life to work and productivity, that's not healthy. We say we've seen people do that and it's been a problem. But we know there's a thing as laziness and it's hard to decide, well, how do we figure out which way I should approach this in this situation?
You see, we need wisdom. A, a workaholic who finds their identity in work isn't what he's commending here. Instead, you have a healthy picture or an unhealthy picture that's described for us as the sluggard is indecisive, the lazy person is indecisive. Notice the question in verse nine. How long will you lie there?
And the point is the lazy person goes, I don't know, a little more, little more sleep, little more slumber, little more. The picture is folding of the hands to rest. The point is that little more sleep ends in death, ultimately.
The unhealthy picture is not that a lazy person sleeps. We all need sleep. God made you to need sleep. The problem isn't that he sleeps. The problem isn't that he rests. The problem is that the sluggard wants to escape hard work, so just keeps resting a little bit more and a little bit more, and a little bit more, and a little bit more. You see, God says he gives sleep to his loved ones. That is a gift from God.
But the sluggard isn't recognizing I'm limited. I have to sleep, so I'm going to rest and trust God and then wake up and work hard again. The lazy person in this picture is saying there's difficulties in life. So instead of just saying, well, I know it's hard, so I'm just gonna give up on all of it. The lazy person says life's difficult, so I'm going to escape that difficulty with a million small surrenders.
Now maybe it's not sleep for you. Maybe it's one more episode of binge watching.
Notice, I didn't say sleep was bad, so I'm not saying television's always bad, but that sense of there's something hard I want to avoid. So, well, how long are you gonna sit there and watch that? I don't know. A little bit more.
That's what he's talking about. This situation is, is one who wants to escape little by little by avoiding hard work. And wisdom is about finding the creation patterns in God's world that help you to flourish in your life. That's what Proverbs is all about. So he drives you to creation specifically and says, look at the ant. Here's a creation pattern that you can see. He describes the ant as not having any ruler or leader.
Now, we can all be modern, smart alecks and say, but we know there's a queen and we know it looks like there's hierarchy in ants. Yes. Yes, I know. Number one, they didn't see that in the ancient world. Number two, if you go out and see ants picking up food, you don't see anybody standing around with a cup of coffee telling them what to do.
So I understand there's a sense of hierarchy in ants. He wasn't saying there's not, but what he is saying is the ants have an inner motivation, if you will. They just do their work. You don't look out and see seven ants looking lazy while two of them do the work. You just don't see it. Right? The ant has inner motivation and self-discipline. The ant engages in hard persistent work.
I saw this video, you could look it up if you, if you're interested, where they showed ants with this shape and it was like a T, if you imagine a T, but a little. A little horizontal line at the bottom of the T two, and they had the ants trying to get it through two walls, and of course it doesn't fit directly through the two walls, so you have to kind of move it like this and twist it back and forth.
The interesting thing about this video is that they showed ants doing that and they gave humans something the exact same shape, with the same situation, just larger. So you had it on that scale. And they filmed the ants, you know, looking down from this high and the humans looking down from up there, and it looked so similar. It was funny. I think the humans won, but barely getting it through there.
Because what we see in the ants working actually is the way it works for humans too. And if in that video the group of humans decided, this is too hard, why don't we just talk about what happened last night? Why don't we just enjoy a little bit more rest? While the ants kept working, the ants would've finished first. Because he says, go to the ant. There's inner motivation, if you will, or self-discipline. There's hard persistent work, and then the ant works at the right time.
Notice verse eight, she prepares her bread in summer, gathers her food in harvest. This isn't productivity worship. I wanna make sure I say this clearly. If you come away with this conclusion that says. The most important thing for my life is hard work so that I'm more productive. You, you did not get the right point. Yes, we shouldn't be afraid of hard work, but we don't worship productivity.
The point is, at the right time, the ants by God's creation and instincts, they know the right time to gather food. Nobody thinks a farmer is lazy If in the dead of winter he doesn't go plant crops. That's 'cause it's the wrong time. But the farmer who says, I'll just sleep a little bit more for all of harvest, one will be hungry, and two, we'd say he's lazy. It's work at the right time.
So the response is given really from verse nine through 10. The response is implied. Make up your mind. Stop making excuses and face the hard work. It doesn't say stop sleeping. It says, stop giving into little surrenders. Stop escaping that way.
If you're a believer in Jesus, your debt to God has been paid. You don't have to have productivity to make your life worthwhile. So what are you going to do with it? We as believers in Jesus should be people, we are not afraid that we won't measure up because we already have approval in God. We should be people who are eager to work in a million different ways, but we don't have to have productivity so that we have value.
We look at it and say, God gave me Jesus. I get to do this. We should never be reluctant to work as Christians. That can mean literally like go move heavy objects. Sure, fine, if it's safe and healthy for you to do so. But that can mean the work that we put into our spiritual lives. How many times is it easy to say, I know it's good for me to connect with God through his word, and little by little I go, well, but that's kind of hard sometimes.
By small surrenders, little more sleep, little more slumber, little more mindless scrolling. And I never actually do the hard work of getting to know my Father, which is also a delight.
We should be like the ant in our lives. Working at the right times, working spiritually, building relationships, accomplishing good in a million ways for the glory of Christ, which can mean building a wonderful piece of woodwork that accomplishes something good for the glory of Christ. It can mean sharing the gospel with your neighbor. That's hard. But it's accomplishing something good for the glory of Christ.
God's called us to be like ants, which is great 'cause no one ant does all the work, right? The ants work together, but they're not afraid of hard work. Now again, if we say that's our response, make up your mind. Stop making excuses and pursue the work God puts before you.
Well, why is it sometimes understandable? Well, it, it can look good. In fact, laziness can look like luxury.
But this text drives you again to, this is one of the things that even though it's understandable, it tempts you away from what God has called you and there are consequences. Verse 11, poverty will come upon you like a robber and want like an armed man.
Example 3: Sowing Discord in Your Community
All right, so that's two repetitions. We've got money and responsibility. What's wisdom look like? Okay, now we've got laziness and hard work. Let's go to a third one.
Before we read the text, I want you to notice this phrase that comes twice, once in verse 14 and once in verse 19, the phrase end of verse 14, continually sowing discord or the end of 19, one who sows discord among brothers.
The point. Now, there's a lot of different things here that he talks about, verse 17, haughty eyes, and a lying tongue. And we could talk about pride and we could talk about lies, but what he drives you to, the thing that connects this whole section is one who destroys unity. It's one who's divisive or one who sows discord among the brothers. Even as you see in verse 16, he says, there are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him.
In Proverbs over and over, we have this kind of pattern where he'll say, there's six things. Yay, seven. Or he'll say there's three things, even four. And, and the pattern, it was an ancient way of talking, which draws your attention to the last one as some how significant. It might be saying the last one is the the largest. Sometimes it does that, or the biggest issue, or it might say that's the one that ties all of these together.
So with that in mind. Look back at verse 12, and I want you to think, how do these things destroy unity?
It says a worthless person. A wicked man goes about with crooked speech, I think, well, what kind of crooked speech do you have in mind? Verse 13, he winks with his eyes. He signals with his feet. He points with his finger. We don't talk like that very much, but we still do something like this. If you're trying to maybe play a joke on someone. And you're trying to convince this person of something else. Then you go and you ask a question and you go like this. You can't really trust my words, but he can't see my face, so I'm gonna be like, yeah, it's okay. We say, Hey, roll with it.
It's that kind of thing that says. But not in the practical joke world, in real life, right? That would say, I'm speaking to you in a way that can't really be trusted. Now I'm gonna talk to somebody. I'm gonna kind of wink at them so that they understand we are on the same page, but this person is in the dark. Do you see how it destroys unity by default? It has to because they can't trust what's being said and you split the group.
So he continues. With perverted heart, devises evil, how much community gets destroyed because even if they didn't act on it, somebody in their heart planned evil against someone else? This person is not described as carelessly destroying community, but aggressively destroying community.
They continue. Haughty eyes. So what is it that destroys community? We could say pride even in the way you look. Selfishness in our speech, A lying tongue untrustworthy speech for my gain. Violence in our hands. We know that destroys community. Evil in our hearts. Eagerness to do what's wrong. Notice in verse 18 feet that make haste that are eager to run to evil. Verse 19, hatred of false witness that breathes out lies. All of these things destroy unity.
Now, he doesn't give you a response here. He doesn't say, well, this is what you should do, because in this case, he's not talking to the community destroyer. He's talking to the rest of us and saying, this is what happens. But we could take the implication and say, well flip all of those around and say, instead of being untrust, untrustworthy in your speech, be reliable. Instead of being proud in your look, be humble. Instead of being violent, be peaceable, be kind.
Now all of these things sound really ugly to us, right? I said at the beginning, evil can be understandable. They all sound really ugly to us. But when you are tempted to be proud, it doesn't feel so easy to say no, does it? It's easy to look at somebody else and say, that's not attractive. When you're tempted to devise evil in your heart towards someone else, it's easy to look at someone else and say, that's, that's ugly, but I have all my reasons for why I, I should feel this way. You don't understand what they've done to me, or whatever other reasons we make up.
You see, again, all of these can be understandable when it's first person interaction. But all of these lead to danger, and we have the consequence in verse 15, calamity will come upon him suddenly, in a moment he'll be broken beyond healing, sudden destruction.
So he says, look at people. Who destroy communities, and we've all been around them. We've been around people who destroy groups of friends, coworkers, families, churches in any of these contexts. People who destroy that unity, he says, look at those, and see even when it makes sense to you to go down that path, the result, the consequence is sudden destruction. It's foolish.
Example 4: Temptation and Adultry
So then the teacher returns to his overarching picture. Some texts, some scripture translations refer to it as warnings against adultery, but he warns for purity. Again, he's saying, think about your money and your responsibility. Think about your laziness and work. Think about your unity or division and think about your purity.
In all of these things, learn the patterns of wisdom. His picture here is more like Joseph in Egypt, than it is Samson in Philistia. He's not talking to somebody who's running out trying to just be as immoral as possible. He starts by saying, my son, keep your father's commandment. The son is walking on the wise path at this point, like Joseph, forsake not your mother's teaching. Bind them on your heart. Always tie them around your neck.
Again, there's two parallels here. There's purity, but there's the fact that all these other things like laziness, like selfishness, like pride, they all want to tempt you to go down the wrong path. And so he says, keep these thoughts, keep this teaching in front of you. Keep it on your heart, specifically.
Say why? Well, verse 22, these teachings will help you when you walk. They will lead you. When you lie down, they will watch over you. When you awake, they will talk with you. Because the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light, and there are proofs of discipline are the way of life.
This teaching that he has received benefits him at all times. Because in your life there will be times when evil and foolishness look appealing, and there will be times when they seem understandable, and what you need is to keep the teaching of God's truth bound tightly to your heart, so that even at that point when it makes so much sense to go down this path that God tells you ends in destruction, the commandment, God's word shines light to expose the lies of darkness that would lead you that way.
And specifically it goes to your desires. Notice verse 25. Speaking of the adulterous, do not desire her beauty in your heart. He doesn't say it's okay if you desire the beauty, but don't act on it. And we could put that in any of our temptations. He doesn't say It's okay if you really want to be lazy, but don't act on it now.
He says, take the commandments of God and bind them on your heart, on the, the part of you that desires. Keep them there. Let that light shine because your desires can capture you.
Do not desire her beauty in your heart, and do not let her capture you with her eyelashes.
He goes on and he says, this could seem understandable. It's one of the things that I've been since a couple weeks ago, has been going all over and over through my mind is evil really can look good to us. That's the danger we face. There is beauty. He doesn't say don't desire her beauty, there's not really beauty anyway.
No, he says, don't desire her beauty. It is beautiful. That's why it's dangerous. So don't want it. There is such a thing as beauty. There is desire. There is hunger. He talks about a thief. If a thief steals to satisfy his appetite when he is hungry. And sometimes we have the same thing when it comes to our purity. We say, I have this desire that must be filled, so then it's understandable to us.
Now it works the same way with laziness. I desire rest. I have a desire for rest. True. It's a good desire, but that doesn't mean that we're to be like the sluggard who says, well, I'm just gonna escape hard work. Just a little more rest. Just a little more rest. Just a little more rest.
Just a little bit of impurity. Just a little bit more, just a little bit more.
Just a little bit of gossip and, and unity destruction and division. Just a little bit more.
You see how these patterns work in all of these different situations because he's trying to teach you not just one situation. He's trying to teach you wisdom in a lot of situations, in all the situations you face.
And he goes on to give a picture that says, can a man carry fire next to his chest and his clothes not be burned? Or can one walk on hot coals and his feet not be scorched? In other words, even if it's understandable, evil has consequences. Foolishness leads you the wrong place.
And he then continues to talk about really, you could read it on your own time. The jealous revenge of a husband who's been wronged through adultery. He says, those consequences are severe. Those consequences will never really be satisfied. He won't be satisfied until he takes your life. And by the way, in God's law, if you had committed adultery in the Old Testament, the law would support him taking that kind of revenge.
Consequences are certain. Fire always burns. You can't hold it here and expect to not get burnt.
Doesn't Grace Cover the Consequences of our Sins?
So what do we do with all this? We find patterns of wisdom, but we also, and I hope you think this way, we say, yes, I know sin has consequences even when it's understandable, but the gospel says, I don't get all the consequences of my sin. So how does that work? So I want to say three things quickly as we close.
One: The Patterns of Creation Still Exist, So Your Actions Have Consequences
First, the patterns of creation still exist. Even though the gospel does mean eternally, I do not face the consequences of my sin. Even with that being the case, if I destroy unity and I bring untrustworthiness and lies and pride, I will still find consequences. The patterns are still there, just like the pattern of of aerodynamics exists, and when the Wright brothers flew, they figured out how to make it work. There were many people who tried to fly before that, and it didn't work. Why? Because they didn't fit with the patterns.
If you want your life to flourish, it's not going to flourish just because you checked the boxes and did all the right things. But after you have placed your faith in Jesus Christ so that you have eternal hope and security, there are still patterns in the world where your relationships work better if you follow God's patterns and they work worse if you don't. So even where we say, I don't get all the consequences for my sin, it's still part of wisdom that we say these patterns still exist.
Two: The Gospel Doesn't Guarantee that Foolishness Will Not Result in Pain
Or you could say it this way, you could say. The gospel doesn't guarantee that foolishness will not result in pain.
If your faith is in Jesus, it does guarantee that you will not end in hell, but it does not guarantee that foolishness does not end in pain. So it is good for us to learn these patterns if we are going to soar in the paths of life. We need to know. Evil can be appealing and evil can be understandable.
Three: God is Jealous for His bride
But the last picture, the one I wanna leave you with, we almost always think of ourselves as the person who's battling for purity in this picture. And we are. But think on the picture of the jealous husband at the end of this chapter. It describes him as jealousy makes a man furious and he will not spare. When he takes revenge, he will accept no compensation. He will refuse though you multiply gifts. You're never going to appease this guy. That's what he's saying.
And God is jealous for his bride like that. And when Satan wants to tempt you with whatever temptations it is and wants to seduce you with clever lies that make it seem understandable, and when your flesh tempts you, God has that kind of passionate, jealous love for you. That's how much he fights for you in this battle.
And one day he will crush every tempter. He will break every seduction that tends to pull you away from what truly is good for you.
Jesus loves you like that, so we can trust him. Because he loves us like that. We can trust that when we face evil or foolishness, that seems so understandable, we can say, but my savior loves me so much that I will trust in the Lord with all my heart and lean not to my own understanding.
Let's pray. God we do thank you for your goodness. And we pray that you would shape us in our understanding and that you would give us wisdom in a million situations, not only in the ones you describe here, but make us people who have the patterns of wisdom imprinted on our hearts, so that we love you as we should, and so that our lives flourish the way you want your people to flourish.
Thank you for your jealous love for your bride. And I pray this in your name. Amen.