(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Man, Proverbs chapter 19, beginning verse number one, the Bible reads, better is the poor that walketh in his integrity than he that is perverse in his lips and is a fool. First thing I want to point out here is that we should not judge people based on how much money they make because there are a lot of really rotten people out there who are perverse in their lips. They're very foolish, but maybe they make a lot of money so they look successful on the outside. They drive a nice vehicle. They have nice clothing. They live in a nice house, but that is not the measure of success according to God and the life is more than meat. The body is more than Raymond and we brought nothing into this world. It's certain we can carry nothing out and so we don't want to get sucked in by the deceitfulness of riches and then start thinking about other people that way and looking down on poor people and thinking that rich people are automatically good people, smart, successful, whatever. We shouldn't judge people that way. God's not a respecter of persons and the Bible specifically talks about the fact that when we come into the house of God, we shouldn't treat people differently based on how much money they make and say to the poor man, you know, okay, you're going to stand back here or you're going to sit under my footstool. But then the person who comes in dressed nicely, we would say, oh, sit here in a good place and treat people differently. The Bible says that it's a sin to treat people differently based upon how much money they make in that way. But as we're going to see in the next few verses though, that is in many ways how the world works though. Most people in this world, that is how they think. Okay. Because look down if you would at verse number four, it says, wealth maketh many friends, but the poor is separated from his neighbor. So the Bible is saying, look, if you have money, everybody wants to be your friend. Whereas the poor man, even his own neighbor doesn't want anything to do with him. Okay. And then as we go down further, we see the same thing again in verse six, many will entreat the favor of the prince. And every man is a friend to him that giveth gifts, right? The guy who buys, he takes you out to eat and he's buying. Yeah. You like being friends with that guy because he buys dinner, he pays for stuff, he gives gifts. And then it says in verse number seven, all the brethren of the poor do hate him. How much more do his friends go far from him? Even people who are related to him don't necessarily want to be around him. How much less just friends he pursue at them with words yet they are wanting to him. So you know, what's going on here? Why does verse one say, Hey, the person who's poor but walks in integrity is better than he that's perverse as lips as a fool. And then we have all these other verses elsewhere in the Bible that says that if you mock the poor, you're approaching your maker, you're approaching the maker of us all, the poor's maker even. And then also all these verses that say not to respect persons, not to mistreat the poor, treat everyone the same. Well, here's what the Bible is saying here is it's saying that this is the way the world is, right? The guy who gives gifts has a lot of friends. The rich man has lots of friends, the poor man, nobody wants to be around him. That's just a statement about the way the world is. It's not saying that it should be that way. It's just saying it is that way. But we as Christians should be different. So we need to understand how the world works. That's why Proverbs is constantly telling us how the world is, how things are, but that doesn't mean that that's the way we should be. So are people going to judge you based on how much money you make based on your clothing, your car, your house? Yes, they are going to judge you based on those things because that's the way the world works. But then God is telling Christians that he doesn't want us to think that way. He doesn't want us to have that worldly mentality that's just about who we can be friends with because of what we can get from them because they have a lot of money. Rather, we should want to be a friend to those who need help. I mean, what did Jesus say? He said, when you put on a dinner, you know, invite the poor. They can never pay you back. They can never do anything for you, but you'll be blessed by God. You'll be recompensed by God in the resurrection of the just. And so there's a difference between the way the world actually works and the way that things are supposed to be in the way that we're supposed to act. You know, it's sort of like if there's a sign up that says gun free zone, right? And somebody points a gun at me, I'd say, yeah, you can't do that. This is a gun free zone. How dare you point a gun at me? Can't you read the sign? Like people who are criminals, they're going to pull out the gun in the gun free zone, right? Because there's a difference between the way things are supposed to be, what the rules are, what someone says is the law versus reality. And so Proverbs is just explaining both to us. He's explaining, look, we should not look down on the poor because the poor man who has integrity deserves our respect. But the rich man who's perverse in his lips and as a fool, we shouldn't respect him just because he has money. Okay. There are poor people who have integrity, right? And you say, well, yeah, but they're not that smart or they'd be more so, well, maybe they're not that smart, but guess what? Not everybody is as smart as the next person. Like we've all been given different degrees of intelligence in our life. Here's the thing. No matter how hard I study, they're always going to be people that are smarter than me just because just genetically or whatever, they just started out smarter than me. They're just by nature smarter than me, right? And then there are going to be people who no matter how hard they study, they'll never catch up to me. You know, they're going to be people that are more smart than me. They're going to be people that are less smart. You know, God has doled us all out with different talents and gifts and abilities and our abilities aren't all the same. And obviously we should do the best we can with what we have. But you know what? We shouldn't look down on someone because they're not an intellectual. We shouldn't look down on someone because they're just a humble person who works a humble job, maybe just a blue collar guy and just say, oh, well, you know, he's not as smart as this guy over here who's an astrophysicist or whatever. You know what? Different people have different strengths and abilities, but you know what? God really looks down and respects his integrity because you could be an astrophysicist with integrity or you can be a garbage collector with integrity. And in the eyes of God, you know, God's children are both special to him. He loves them. And he's more interested in honesty, goodness, integrity, righteousness than just how smart you are. What is your IQ? How much money do you have? What kind of fancy things can you buy for yourselves and others? So we don't want to get that worldly mentality that just looks down on the common man or the simple man. And, you know, the Bible says that we as servants of God should be able to condescend to men of low estate. So that means that we should be able to go out to some of the most messed up neighborhoods in the city and some of the most messed up areas of the state. And we should be able to knock those doors and talk to those people and relate to those people, even if they're not super smart, even if they're not, you know, from our demographic, even if they're really poor or whatever, you know, we should be able to talk to people like that and not be too high and mighty to talk to the average Joe of this world. So don't ever get, you know, I want you to be as smart as you could possibly be, but don't then get puffed up with knowledge because the Bible says knowledge, puff it up, but charity edified. So make sure that you still love people and don't just look down on everybody who's not as smart as you or, you know, maybe you come into a bunch of money, Hey, I hope that you succeed at your job and that you make good money and that you're able to buy the house and the things that you want, but don't just go around despising people who didn't make it financially. Maybe they have other things going for them. And you know what? I know that there are a lot of people out there that maybe I'm better than them in a certain area, but then they're better than me in these other five areas. It just, that's the way life works. Okay. Everybody's got their strengths and weaknesses. And at the end of the day, the one thing we can all do though is have integrity, right? The one thing we can all do, no matter how much or little intelligence or money or fame or power or prestige we have, you know, we can all be honest people who go to whatever job we have and put in an honest day's work and love people and do right in the side of the Lord. Those are the things that matter in this world though. It's about who you know and how much money you have and whatever, but it should not be so among us. We shouldn't be that shallow and we should have the patience to talk to people that maybe are a little bit dumb or something because you know what? We should condescend to men of low estate and be patient. You know, what if I'm out soul winning and I'm talking to somebody who's not that smart and say, I don't have time for this, this guy, he doesn't understand what I'm saying. You know, hey, sometimes we need to slow down and break it down to them and be patient and be willing to do that. And you know, one of my favorite statements about Jesus and the gospels is when it says the common people heard him gladly. The common people heard him gladly. Jesus didn't just go around and just get all the smartest Pharisees and Sadducees and scribes and just get all the smartest people and just do these super deep Bible studies. Now here's the thing, if anybody could do a super deep Bible study, it's Jesus. I mean Jesus could have always been just preaching at a super high level and he could have said, you know what? I'm just going to let my disciples talk to the fishermen. I'm going to let my disciples do that stuff. I'm only going to preach on this really high level and so we'll get all the intellectuals of Israel and I'm going to teach on this really deep level. No that's not what the Bible says. The Bible says the common people heard him gladly. And you know, the Calvinists of this world, they think of themselves as so intellectual and they're so into theology and they're so deep in their thinking. But you know, it's so funny to listen to these guys talk because they use all this jargon and all of these, you know, giant theological terms that only they know. And it's like they're kind of just preaching to each other in this little club and they've got, you know, 75 views on their video or whatever as they just go down super deep and stay down long and come up dry. And I'm just thinking to myself, like, did these people ever read that verse when it says of Jesus, the common people heard him gladly? You know, it's like they don't get it. It's just like, Hey, look how smart I am. I don't care how smart you are. Your preaching should never be, Hey, look how smart I am. Okay. You know, we shouldn't know how smart you are because you need to be breaking things down for the common man because that's what it means to be a preacher. That's what it means to be a soul winner. You know, the essence of preaching and teaching is taking things that are hard and making them easy. A lot of these bozos, they take something easy and they make it hard, but they sound real smart in the process. But what are they doing? They're puffing themselves up. Hey, look at me. No, no, no. Preaching and teaching and soul winning is about communicating. You know, if I go out soul winning, I'm not trying to impress my soul winning partner with my fancy presentation and all the, you know, a wild versus I can turn to that they've never seen used in a soul winning demonstration. You know, what I want to do is communicate the gospel to that person on their level. And whether it's a 10 year old child or whether it's an elderly person or whether it's someone who's very intellectual or someone who is a little intellectually lacking, guess what? I just want to communicate the gospel on their level. That's what matters. That's what preaching and soul winning and evangelizing, that's what it's all about. And so we don't want to get that worldly mentality that ranks people based on just how much money they have, how smart they are, how successful they are. You know, hey, those are virtues, obviously. Getting smarter is a virtue. Going out and working hard and succeeding is a virtue. But you know what? People that are lame in those areas, you know, maybe they're better in an area that you're lame in because you know what? We all have areas where we're a little bit lame, myself included. That's just the reality of our human condition. None of us is perfect. We all have strengths and weaknesses. And so we need to love people. And yes, the world is like that where wealth makes many friends. But that doesn't mean like, oh, well, God's telling me that life's all about getting smarter so I can have more friends. No, this is descriptive, not prescriptive. Because the Bible is just describing the way things are, okay? But here's what the Bible says in verse 24 of chapter 18, right? The last verse of the previous chapter says, a man that had friends must show himself friendly. And there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. So you know, in reality, friendship in the Bible is about being a friend. It's about who can I reach out to and be a blessing to? Who can I help and be nice to and be good unto? Not just who's going to take me out to eat and always pay for it, okay? That's the wrong mentality. A man that had friends must show himself friendly. It's sort of like when Jesus is talking about loving your neighbor, and the guy says, well, who is my neighbor? And then Jesus goes through that parable about the good Samaritan. And then at the end, he says, who was neighbor unto him that fell among thieves? So for Jesus, it's not about having a neighbor. It's about being a neighbor who was neighbor to the guy who fell among thieves. So with friendship, it's not about having friends that can help you out. It's about being a friend to other people, right? Reaching out and helping others and not being friends with people who can just do something for you, but rather being friends with people for whom you can do something and you can be a blessing to them. And you say, well, I don't have any friends. You know, well, a man that had friends must show himself friendly. You know, sometimes you have to be the one that reaches out and is a blessing to someone else. And you are the one who maybe takes that first step instead of expecting it to just come to you necessarily. And here's the thing. You know, I understand what it's like to go to a church and not really have friends because I remember when I was a teenager, we switched churches and I started going to a church that was a big church. So it had like a couple thousand people in it. And I would show up at the youth group as a teenager and obviously teenagers are shy. And so I would show up at the youth group as a teenager. And I was, uh, how old was I like 15 or something maybe. And I remember going and just sitting there and nobody talked to me and I just kind of sat there and I was afraid to go talk to anybody and nobody talked to me. So I sat there for like a year in this youth group without friends. And I hate, I dreaded going to the youth group. I wished I could just go to my parents Sunday school class because I always just felt awkward sitting in the youth group for like over a year and everybody's talking and having fun and I'm just like, you know, just sitting there and it was just so weird. I just, I just felt awkward. And then, um, then like, then we ended up switching to another church and then like weeks after we left the church, I went to a summer camp and all those same kids were there and I made friends with them all and I was just like, why weren't you guys my friend before? And they're just like, we didn't know you, you know, I was just miserable for that year and a half to sitting there. But, but, but here's the thing about our church. There's a, there's a secret way at our church to get into the in crowd. You know, if you want to crack in to the in crowd, what is it exactly? It's easy because so like if that church would have had a teenage soul winning, I would have made friends because when you go soul winning, you get paired up with people and then you talk to people and you get to know people. So, you know, showing up for soul is a great way to get on the inside, you know, to make friends and to get to know people and get some fellowship in because when you go out soul winning, you have a lot of shared experiences together and so forth. And so later, you know, when I started going to a fundamental Baptist church, when I turned around 17 years old, then it was like I made friends right away cause I just showed up to that teenage soul winning time every week and I was just getting paired up with different teens and you know, fun stuff happens out soul winning too. And then you have like a shared experience, a shared memory and so you can get to know people that way. That's one way to make friends and get to know people. And you know, obviously, you know, you can also just approach people at church services and meet people and say hi to people. And those of you that have been members for a long time, you know, if you see visitors and new people, you know, it's always good to reach out and, and, uh, meet some new people and you know, get out of your circle where you kind of talk to the same three people, every service, you know, branch out a little bit. Right. And, and, and, you know, meet some different people and, and see who's out there. Talk to some people. So anyway, that was a little bit of a rabbit trail on, on friends. But since I'm preaching through the book of Proverbs, everything's a rabbit trail because the whole book of Proverbs is just like switching from one subject to another. So if the sermon gets a little bit all over the place, well, it's not my fault. It's the it's Proverbs folks. So the Bible says in verse two of chapter 19, also that the soul be without knowledge, it's not good. And he that hasteth with his feet sin it because obviously if you're ignorant, you might rush into stupid situations and rush into stupid things. And so that's what the Bible is saying there. And then it says in verse three, the foolishness of man, and this is one of my favorite verses in Proverbs two, the foolishness of man perverted his way and his heart fretted against the Lord. So this is human nature. We'll do something stupid and mess ourselves up. And then we get mad at God, like, God, why are you doing this to me? You'll literally read about people who go out and fornicate and get pregnant out of wedlock. They're they're getting pregnant out of wedlock and then something goes wrong in their pregnancy. They're just like, God, why are you doing this to me? It's like, um, excuse me, I can help with that. You got pregnant out of wedlock, you committed fornication and wow, your life's not going the way you want it to go. Hmm. I wonder why God's doing this to you because you are being a whore. That's what the Bible calls it. Playing the harlot, playing the whore, being a whore, going around and getting knocked up outside of wedlock. The Bible calls this a huge sin. Now you can just sit there and say, how dare you, Pastor Anderson, be so insensitive in our culture? Well, you know what? Take our culture and flush it down the toilet if fornication and having children out of wedlock is normal because guess what? It's sin. It's wrong. And you know what? It isn't right to that child either because children need to grow up with a mother and a father of biological parents in the home. Now obviously if someone passes away, that's a different situation, but you know what? You need to just sit there and to just go out and just have all these kids out of wedlock and then you fret against the Lord. I don't understand why I don't have any money and it's not fair that I have to pay all this child support and you know, God, why are you doing this to me? Right? Or, oh, I'm a single mom with three kids from three different dads. God, why are you doing this to me? You did that to yourself. Okay. So the Bible says here, you know, it's the foolishness of man that perverts his way and then he frets against the Lord, right? So don't fret against the Lord when you ignore God's word, ignore God's way of doing things, commit fornication, adultery, drunkenness, you're taking drugs, you're out gambling and doing all this stuff and then you fret against the Lord and don't fret against me either for getting up and speaking some hard truth to you because you need to hear this and you say, well, why say it like that? I'm saying how the Bible says it. Just get a, there's this thing called a concordance where you can look up every time a word is used in the Bible. Of course, this thing has become totally obsolete now because you can just use a computer to look up every time a word is used in the Bible. So you can go on whatever Bible software and type in the word whore and grab some popcorn and sit down and get comfortable because you're going to be there for a while because it's not going to be one verse or two verse like, like you get in a comfortable chair before you do that search because there's going to be a lot, you're going to have a lot of reading to do, right? Don't fret against the Lord. Don't kill the messenger. Don't fret against the Lord's preacher. Don't fret against the Lord himself. You know, it's, it's the Bible. Okay. And so you could look up the word fornication. You could look up adultery and sit down and read about it and see what God says. And so we, we mess up our own lives when we ignore God's word and then we can't get mad at God when things don't go right because we did something. You know, you know, I mean you go out and just completely abuse the temple of the Holy Ghost here, right? The Bible says there are bodies, the temple of the Holy Ghost, and you just eat just tons of junk food and you're not getting any exercise. And then it's like, you know, you get, you get sick and it's like, why is God doing this to me? But God's not the one who made you eat all that junk food. Now obviously you can do all the right things and be healthy and still get diseases and sickness of course. But if you went out and just trashed your body and just couldn't ever say no to any of the junk that's out there and, and you're just sitting around not getting any exercise, not eating right, you're not eating your fruits and vegetables and you're just pounding, you know, a fast food meal after fast food meal. And then it's like, well, I just don't see how there could be a God that would allow me to get cancer like this. You know, why is God up in heaven hitting me with cancer? I just don't get it. So the, the, the foolishness of man perverts his way and then his heart frets against the Lord. God, why are you doing this to me? And in reality, many times we did it to ourselves. And so it's a, it's a hard truth, but it is the truth. The Bible says in verse eight, he that getteth wisdom loveth his own soul. He that keepeth understanding shall find good. So the Bible is saying, look, you know, if you seek wisdom, if you listen to the word of God, if you go to church and listen to preaching and maybe listen to some of the hard things that come across the pulpit, but maybe think to yourself, you know what, he's got a point. You know, that is what the Bible teaches. And if you open your Bible every morning and read it and you're seeking wisdom, you know, you're doing good unto yourself. You're actually doing yourself a big favor. You know, you're not being this martyr by showing up three times a week to church. Like, you know, I'm, I'm really sacrificing to be at church and I'm, man, I'm sacrificing to read my Bible and look at me, God, I'm, you know, God's looking down and saying, you know what, you're doing yourself a favor by going to church. You're doing yourself a favor by reading about, cause you're getting all this wisdom and knowledge that's going to make your life so much better. And you're going to be so much more successful and you're going to have such a more blessed life and avoid all these pitfalls. If you get wisdom, you say, well, you know, I love my parents, so I'm going to get wisdom. I love my children, so I'm going to get wisdom. I love my wife, so I'm going to get children. I'm going to get wisdom. I'm going to get children cause I love my wife too. I figured that out recently, but you know, I, I, you know, I love my husband, so I'm going to get wisdom for his sake and you know, I really just, I love the Lord. I love the pastor. I love it. You know, so I want to get wisdom for, but, but here's the thing. You're actually, you love yourself if you get wisdom because you're going to be the most blessed. And so you're actually doing yourself a big favor by showing up to church, reading your Bible and seeking the wisdom that comes from God. That's taught in scripture. The Bible says in verse number 10, delight is not seemingly for a fool, much less for a servant to have rule over princes. The discretion of a man defereth his anger and it is his glory to pass over a transgression, right? Don't get mad about every little thing, right? Just let things go. Pass over a transgression. Somebody does something wrong, just let it go. Ignore it. If it's not a big deal, don't make a big deal out of it. The King's wrath is as the roaring of a lion, but his favor is as due upon the grass. Now you say, well, we don't even have a King. So what, you know, what do I do with that verse? Well, you know, you could really just plug in any authority figure there. You could say the boss at work's wrath is as the roaring of a lion, but his favor is as due upon the grass, right? You could, you could plug in dad's wrath is as the roaring of a lion, but his favor is as due upon the grass. I mean, you could plug in whatever authority figure you want and the same thing would apply. Make authority figures happy and you'll be better off, right? Make wives, make your husband happy. Children, make your parents happy. Workers make the boss at work happy and you're doing yourself a favor, okay? Your life's going to be a lot easier. Don't always be bucking against the authority in your life through pride. Verse 13, speaking of that, a foolish son is the calamity of his father. Think about that word calamity. What do you think of when you hear the word calamity? I mean, yeah, it's like a disaster, right? Calamity would be like you drive your car off a cliff. That's a calamity, right? Your entire house is just flooded with water. Everything's destroyed. That's a calamity, right? I mean, you could think about all the different things that would be a calamity. And so that's a pretty strong word. It's like a major disaster that happens. And the Bible is saying a foolish son is the calamity of his father. It's like the house is flooded. It's like, you know, I wrecked the car. It's like, you know, it's a disaster. And the contentions of a wife are a continual dropping. And what does that mean, a continual dropping? This is referring to, this is a very early reference to the Chinese water torture. So before the Chinese had figured this out, God was already talking about it, okay? The continual dropping, because the Bible also says a continual dropping on a very rainy day and the contentions of a wife are alike. So basically, you know, a wife who argues with you is torturing you, okay? So wives, if you argue with your husband, you are torturing your husband. You're like doing the Chinese water torture on him, just bugging him, bugging him. Now here's the thing, like, I don't ever want to be tortured. I hope that I never get tortured. You know, I read that Bible verse that says like, you know, others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. And I'm just like, I like underline like others. And I'm like, that's others, you know, I don't want that to be me. You know, none of us wants to get tortured, okay? But if it was like, if I was given a choice of torture, I'd be like, give me the Chinese water torture. You know, because I don't want to get sawn asunder. I'm thinking of all these other worse, horrible tortures or whatever, because it doesn't really sound that bad, does it? Like dripping water on your head. Like I'm thinking of all these other horrific things and I'm just like, yeah, go ahead and drip water on my forehead or whatever. But it's one of those things that's way worse than it seems. Like you don't think it's a big deal, but it turns out it ends up being a really big deal. It's like that radio host who said, oh, I don't think waterboarding is torture. I don't think it's a big deal. And then he submitted to waterboarding and after like a few seconds, he was like, that's the worst thing I've ever experienced. It's torture. I was wrong. I'm sorry, because it's just worse than it seems. Well, that's how the contentions of a wife are. What does content mean? It means to argue. And so you say, well, I don't think it's a big deal if I argue with my husband every day. But for him, though, he's strapped down and has water dripping on his forehead and is losing his ever loving mind. So you should think about that before you argue with everything that your husband says. And again, this goes back to, you know, submitting to the natural authorities in our life, right? Parents and the Bible does teach that the husband is the head of the wife. And so the husband is the authority of his home. And so that's what the Bible says. Houses and riches, verse 14, are the inheritance of fathers and a prudent wife is from the Lord. So he's saying, look, you know, you get you inherit stuff from your parents, right? And you get a prudent wife from the Lord. So if you're a young single dude, and you want a prudent wife, well, ask the source. You need to be praying and asking God for that prudent wife and doing right by the Lord seeking first the kingdom of God, so that you can receive that prudent wife from the Lord. Jesus casteth into a deep sleep, and an idle soul shall suffer hunger, right? So you can apply this to obviously working so that you can have food. But you know, you could also apply it to the prudent wife. Yes, the prudent wife is from the Lord. But at the same time, if you never talk to any women, God's gonna have a hard time getting you that prudent wife. Okay, so you have to actually get out there and, and not be idle about that either. He that keepeth the commandment keepeth his own soul, but he that despiseth his ways shall die again, verse 16, reiterating the fact that if you're wise, you're doing good unto yourself. And that if you keep God's commandments, you're actually doing good unto your own soul there. He that keepeth the commandment keepeth his own soul, right, you're doing yourself a favor when you obey God, when you follow the commandments, when you do things God's way, you're actually being a blessing to yourself and the people around you, but especially to yourself. He that despiseth his ways shall die. He that hath pity upon the poor, lendeth unto the Lord, and that which he hath given will he pay him again. So this is like what Jesus said, in as much as you've done it under one of the least of these my brethren, you've done it unto me. So if you help the poor, you're lending unto the Lord, you're actually helping God and then God will pay you back what you've given. So if you lend to someone who's well off, you know that they're going to pay you back. Whereas if you lend unto the poor or give unto the poor, because they're probably never going to give it back to you, you just give something to poor. It's like you're giving God a loan and God always repays his loan. So meaning that anything that you do for the poor is going to come back to you. Anything that you give to the poor is going to come back to you because God will repay his loan. And if you give to the poor, you're lending unto the Lord. Bible says in verse 18, chasin thy son while there is hope and let not thy soul spare for his crying. And so the Bible clearly teaches throughout Proverbs that we're supposed to physically discipline our children. The Bible says he that spareth his rod, hated his son, but he that loveth him chaseth him betimes. Right? The Bible says withhold not correction from the child for if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die. Thou shall beat him with the rod and shall deliver his soul from hell. These verses could not be any clearer. When I run into a Christian so-called who says like, Oh, I don't believe in spanking children. I'm a Christian. I'm a saved Christian, but I don't believe in spanking my children. I usually just think like this person is probably not even saved because no one, it could be that stupid to read what the Bible says and believe that. Now maybe they just got saved and never read the Bible, but people who are like, Oh, I've seen all those verses in Proverbs, but I still don't believe in spanking. I'm just like, well, you must not even be saved since you don't even believe the Bible at all. You don't even, you just reject what the word of God clearly plainly says. I mean, can you imagine an actual saved spirit filled Christian reading the Bible where it says thou shall beat him with the rod and just being like, well, I just don't think we should spank our kids. What other parts of the Bible do you just outright reject? This is not an unclear subject. It's not a gray area, is it? The Bible teaches that we are supposed to spank our children. It's clear in the Bible and if we don't do it, it's a sin and we're sinning against our own soul because we're going to have this calamity with that unspanked child. And so we've got to spank our children as Christians. Okay. It's essential to their development and growth and I thank God that my parents spanked me when I was growing up and I'm thankful for every single spanking that I got and I don't have this wicked resentment toward my parents like, oh, my dad spanked me a little too hard that one time. Now here's the thing. No parent is ever going to be perfect. So some spankings are going to be too light and some of them are going to be too hard. It all kind of balances out in the end, but you know what? Even if they always spank too light or if they always spank too hard, you know, your parents are trying to do the best that they can because they love you and they're not perfect. But you know what? I just thank God for the discipline that I got from my parents and I don't sit around and think like, well, I wonder if my parents did it right or I don't sit around judging my parents as an adult, like thinking back like, hmm, were they a little too mean that time? Were they a little too harsh? And I'm just like, man, I'm just grateful that my parents were Christians and that they spanked me, you know, uh, I could, if I wanted to, I could, I could make a case that certain, you know, punishments I got were overboard, but who cares at the end of the day, I'm thankful for every last SWAT, even the ones that were maybe too much good, I, it probably makes up for the times I didn't get caught or the times when they were too lenient, you know, but this generation that's not being spanked, they're a disaster. They're there. One it's, it's, it's the calamity generation. Okay. Uh, there's some weird people out there today. These people probably didn't get disciplined as a kid. Okay. In general, physically disciplining your children is going to make them a better person and deliver their soul from hell in general. And it's a command of God, meaning it's not optional. God says, thou shalt beat him with the rod and shall deliver his soul from hell. And obviously when the Bible used the word beat, it's not like we would use the word beat in 2022 of just like pummeling them or something. Obviously you want to discipline them in a way that makes sense. You don't want to injure them. You just want them to feel the pain, you know, so you, you spank them with some kind of a paddle or some kind of a wooden cooking spoon or a paint stir stick from home Depot is what I recommend. And basically, you know, you just want it to sting, but you don't want to injure them. So when the Bible says thou shall beat him with the rod, you know, it's not saying you just take a big stick and just start just swinging it like a baseball bat or something. Okay. Obviously that's not what it means. That's not what it's saying. You use common sense about the way that you discipline. So the Bible says, but at the same time, it's not for the children to stand in judgment of their parents, how they discipline your parents or the bosses, and it's their job to decide how they're going to punish you. And so, uh, you know, don't you be a child that's standing in judgment of your parents spankings, you know, every once in a while we'll spank our kids and they'll, they'll complain about the way that they were spanked. And so we'll say, okay, you know what? You're right. Come back and let me give you the right kind of spanking now. You know, I'm sorry that I gave you the wrong spanking. You didn't like that. The way that spanking was carried out, I didn't hit you in the right spot. Well, give me another chance. Let me, let me hit the right spot this time. All right. So the Bible says chasing my son while there's hope in verse 18. Why? Because you'd rather fix these problems when they're a kid. Because when they're an adult, it's too late. In many cases when they're an adult, they kind of are who they are at that point. And it's a lot harder for adults to change. It's easier for them to change when they're younger. Also when they get to be a teenager, it can be difficult to mold them. And so you'd rather deal with those problems when they're a little kid than to deal with a monster as a teenager or even worse, a monster as a young adult. So you want to chase in him while there's hope. And don't let your soul spare for his crying. Meaning that you don't want to be one of these people that's, Oh, I just don't have the heart to spank him. He's just so cute that I just can't bring myself to spank little Johnny because he's just such a good boy. But here's the thing, you know, you don't, just cause they're crying and a lot of times they're just trying to manipulate you to get out of that spanking and they need to be disciplined. Don't spare the rod. Let not thy soul spare for his crying, chasing thy son while there's hope. And you know what? You're doing them a favor and you're doing yourself a favor. And people always wonder how we can have 12 kids. It's because our kids are not running our house. I mean, if we were just letting our kids do whatever they wanted, 12 kids would be insane. 12 kids would be a nightmare. And of course there's all these stupid Hollywood movies out there that portray big families as just a circus and a zoo. So then when I tell people, Hey, I have 12 kids, they freak out and they're thinking of some stupid Hollywood movie that they saw. And that's what somebody told me recently. They're like, Oh, it's like such and such a movie or whatever. But it's like, no, it's not like that movie because real life isn't like TV. Okay. And actually if you went over to our house, you wouldn't really even notice that we have 12 kids. Seriously. I mean, Oh, okay. You might notice, but that was my wife laughing. I don't even like, I, to me, I don't feel like I have when, when I'm at home and we only have 10 kids living, our oldest two have moved out. But like when I'm at home, I don't feel like we have 10 kids living in our house. It's just like, it just seems like we got, you know, there's a few kids here. I mean, if you count them, there's 10. But if you're not counting because they're, it's, it's not like they're, they're not making necessarily the noise of 10 people all the time. If they were, we would all be insane by now. And we would have, we would have not continued and, and, and, you know, just pipe down honey. Okay. Because you know what, here's the thing, okay. When the kids really go berserk, that's not our daily life, but you can think of times when they did go berserk, when it felt like 10 kids. But guess what, if that's the way it was all the time, we would, we would, we'd be dead by now or something. You know, I don't know what, you know, the point is that if you chase in your son, he'll give you rest, you'll give rest under your soul. So the way that we're able to have 10 kids living in our house is that our children are well behaved. Now they're not perfect obviously, but in general they're well behaved. And so we can sit down and have a civilized meal or whatever. Yes we can honey. Okay. No, I'm just kidding. So the Bible says in verse 19, a man of great wrath shall suffer punishment for if thou deliver him yet thou must do it again. Never counsel and receive instruction that thou mayest be wise in thy latter end, right? It's good for you to listen and learn. You're doing yourself a favor. There are many devices in man's heart. Nevertheless the counsel of the Lord, that shall stand. The desire of a man is his kindness and a poor man is better than a liar. Isn't that what we talked about earlier in the sermon? The poor that has integrity, a poor man is better than a liar. Say, Oh, this poor person, he's not smart. He's not good at his job. He's not effective. He hasn't made it financially. Yeah. But you know what? He's better than a liar. At least he's honest, at least he has integrity. We should respect that about him. The fear of the Lord tendeth to life and he that hath that shall abide satisfied. He should not be visited with evil. A slothful man hideth his hand and his bosom will not so much as bring it to his mouth again. For lazy people, they're so lazy, even just spooning food into their own mouth is too tiring for them. Smite a scorner and the simple will beware and reprove one that hath understanding and he will understand knowledge. He that wasted this father and chaseth away his mother is a son that causeth shame and bringeth reproach. Cease my son to hear the instruction that cause it to err from the words of knowledge. Stop listening to false doctrine and wrong teaching and wrong advice. An ungodly witness scorneth judgment and the mouth of the wicked devoureth iniquity. Judgments are prepared for scorners and watch this and stripes for the back of fools, right? The Bible says foolishness is bound in the heart of a child, but the rod of correction will drive it far from him. And so again, we've got to discipline our children. The Bible in the next chapter, chapter 20 verse 30 says the blueness of a wound cleanses the way evil. So do stripes the inward parts of the belly. Now this scripture is not necessarily referring to child rearing because obviously these kind of, uh, blueness of the wound and stripes. This is more like talking about beating adults, right? This is talking about like flogging or whipping adults, which you say, well, why would that ever happen? It ought to be happening today in our society. Like what's, this isn't just for children. It's for all fools. Okay. It's to teach your children to grow up and fly, right? But you know, the foolish adult should also be flawed in my opinion, not in my opinion, according to the word of God and, and, and the, and the thing is that, you know, we today punish people by putting them in jail, locking them in a cage. That's pretty detrimental to the human spirit. And yet if I said criminals should be beaten, then people would say like, Oh, that's horrible. But yet if we went down to prison and ask people, would you rather have a beating and be released from jail tomorrow, they would all take the whipping. I guarantee you to empty the jails tomorrow by offering beatings, bloody stripes. I'm talking like caning, right? Like whipping them with a stick, bloody bruises, stripes on their back, even lacerations. They'd still do it to get out of the cage rather than go to prison for years. And you know, I remember when I was a kid, there was a thing on the news about how in South America, people who did graffiti were getting caned in central America. I mean, does anybody remember that? Who's my age or something? Yeah. Remember that? And it was like, it was on the news like, can you believe this backward country is whipping people? Even when we were in Botswana in like 2016, the police carried these sticks that they used to whip people with. And I said like, Hey, what do you use that stick for? And they said like, well, it's for like drunks, like people that are drunk. We just beat them with this and it doesn't, it doesn't injure them, but it just hurts. And so like drunks, they're not cooperative or whatever. We just, cause it wasn't like a, it wasn't like a club. It was like something that you would literally like spank someone with. It was like a plastic, like flexy thing that just stung. And they said, Oh yeah. And I asked the guy like, Hey, how often do you use it? Cause you know, when you get arrested in Botswana, you got to talk to the cops and guards just to pass the time. You know? So I, that's why I was talking to the cops so much. I was in custody. Okay. But they never beat me. They never whipped me because I was cooperative. But I asked them and they said that they do, they said that they're beating people with this plastic stick all the time, that they're just whipping people with it all the time. And you say, Oh man, I can't believe that. But here's the thing. If somebody is drunk, if somebody is out being disorderly and drunk, do you really feel bad for them? If somebody comes up and hits them with a stick and kind of beats them into submission and straightens them out. And here's the thing. Look, if somebody spray paints graffiti in the city, I would love to see them caned. I'm for it. And here's the thing. Jail doesn't really work as far as reforming people. You know, most people are end up, they reoffend and everything. I think that just flogging people would be more effective and they'd be less likely to offend. They'd get the message, they would prefer it. You know, it's just, it's just so much better. And then you could save all this taxpayer money of just feeding them and, and okay, 10 days. Oh, you've been drunk driving 10 days in jail. And then that messes up their job. It messes up their family. And then they end up having to pay all this money and lose their job. And then, and it costs a taxpayer to put them in the drunk tank for 10 days. Why not just say, okay, you're out, you got caught driving drunk, you get a beating. You know, and I'm not saying just like, I'm not saying, you know, you bring in some box or to punch them in the face. I'm saying like, you know, you, although maybe in some cases that might not be a bad idea. But in most cases, you know, you basically would just, you know, tie their hands above their head and you just cane them, whip them, beat them, flog them, scourge them. This is what's been done throughout human history. Oh, it's barbaric. Well, I could say the same thing. I could say it's barbaric to lock someone in a cage, you know, and, and sure. The bill of rights says cruel and unusual punishment shall not be inflicted, but putting someone in solitary confinement is way more cruel or unusual. There's nothing unusual about beating someone with a stick. That's pretty normal. That's been, I mean, I, I would say somewhere in the world right now, someone's being beaten with a stick right now. Right now there's probably like a thousand people being beaten with a stick right now, this second, like ready go. Okay. A thousand more people just got hit with a stick right now. Who thinks I'm right? Of course. Okay. And people are getting beaten with a stick all the time. It's normal. But we think we know better, you know, so we got the prison industrial complex and you know, the United States has more of our citizens in jail than any country in the world. We, you know, here we are the most civilized country supposedly, right? We're number one, uh, in so many ways and we have this great economy and we're such a successful nation. We have the most powerful military in the world. So why do we have more people in prison than per capita than the people's Republic of China? You know, there's something wrong. We have more people in prison than communist China. You know, why don't we just let them out of prison and just beat the crap out of them and then release them back into the population. Lesson learned. Amen. Sounds great. But you know, this one, and what does the Bible say? The Bible says the blueness of a wound cleans it the way evil. Can you really say the same thing for a prison sentence? So do stripes the inward parts of the belly. Does prison have that cleansing factor? Probably not. You know, you get together in prison with a bunch of other messed up people and you talk about how you're going to not get caught next time or something because you know, you can compare notes with all the other thieves and criminals around you. And here's the thing. You know, there are certain crimes that are punishable by death, but most people in prison are not in there for things that are punishable by death. You know, 90% of people that are in prison shouldn't be there. They should get flogged and released, save everybody a bunch of money, and then they can actually learn something and actually live their lives and hopefully become a better person because, you know, and obviously some people are incorrigible, but you know, a lot of people could be reformed, but you know what? I don't want my children as adults to have to get beaten by the police or beaten by the criminal justice system. I'd rather just give them a relatively light duty spanking as a toddler or a child, right? You know, then for them to have to be 25 and getting just flogged by the police or flogged in South America for doing graffiti or something, you know, if they end up in South America. But the point is that it's better to, the spankings that you give a toddler are a lot lighter than the spankings that you give a teenager. And then the floggings that adults get, well, that's the blueness of the wound. I mean, that's the stripes. That's where, I mean, look, when they came these people down in Central America, they're not just, it's not like, now son, this is going to hurt me more than it hurts you. I mean, they're, they're really laying into them. I mean, if somebody does, if somebody is an adult out committing crimes, they need a really serious beating. You know, I mean, if, look, if we're going to, if we're going to let you out of jail and you have a year and a half left on your sentence and we're getting rid of a year and a half, well, you're going to get a year and a half whipping, you know what I mean? It's going to hurt. It's got to be a deterrent. Obviously that's not the way you spank your kids. So do you see how much better it is to deal with these things when they're young, right? Fix the problem when they're young so that they don't have to grow up and get beaten by the police or put in jail or put in prison or, you know, go to the drunk tank. You know, you'd rather just discipline them when they're young and chasing them while there's hope. Right. And so there's a lot of wisdom in the chapter tonight that we need to learn from because if we learn the wisdom of the Bible, we're doing ourself a big favor. We're going to save ourself a lot of pain because we'd rather deal with problems when they're small than when they get huge. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for this chapter, Lord. I pray that these things would sink down into our ears, Lord, and help us to always seek wisdom and read the Bible and go to church and follow your word, Lord, so that we don't ruin our lives. And if we ruin our lives through our own foolishness, Lord, help us not to fret against you. And in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.