Intro & Overview of Gospel

Let me first say a word about our event this afternoon at ACU doctor Robert Osborne, who has already lectured at ACU during our Christian Scholars This is the week when we bring in scholars who are of the highest academic quality, who share our biblical worldview and our view of education. He is the head of the Wilberforce Academy where they train students to be redemptive change agents around the world. His PhD is in international education and he has lectured in the Department of Organizational Leadership, Policy and Development. He has had the opportunity to speak in numerous countries around the world. His tour that has brought him here also included stops in West Africa, in Zimbabwe, in the Congo, and in a number of other places where he has been lecturing on some of these same issues. And essentially he's talking about how God uses biblical worldview to transform cultures. So, if you have the time, if you are available, if you are at all interested, I recommend it highly to you. You will not be disappointed. And there is a free launch. Amen. If you have your Bibles with you, open them to the Book of Proverbs. Proverbs I'll be starting a new series this year, and in the mornings we will be looking at the first three chapters of the Book of Proverbs, the first three chapters of the Book of Proverbs. The title of the series will be the Gospel according to Proverbs. And oftentimes we miss the Gospel. As I've talked on a number of occasions, we not only missed the Gospel in the Old Testament, but in particular we miss the Gospel in the wisdom literature, and the Proverbs. The Book of Proverbs is part of the wisdom literature. We have the Books of Moses, the Books of Law, we have books of History, we have the books of Prophecy in the Old Testament, but we also have the books of Wisdom. We have job Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon, and these are wisdom books. And we do not interpret wisdom books the same way we interpret the Books of the Law, or the same way we interpret the books of Prophecy. We do not look at them the same way. We do not read them the same way, or we should not read them the same way, and we should not interpret them the same way. But unfortunately that's exactly what we do. Will find a word right in our you know, strong exhaustive concordance, and the word is used in Genesis, and then it's used in Job, and then it's used in you know, Ezekiel, and we will interpret the word the exact same way in all three books, even though one of those books is Law, one of them is Prophecy, and the other is Wisdom. For example, if you found correspondence of mine and I used a particular phrase about my passion, well, you would probably want to know is that a letter that I was writing in my official capacity as Dean of the Seminary at African Christian Universe, because then it would mean one thing? Or have you happened upon a note that I wrote to bridget because then it would mean something else. Amen, I hope we get that right. A letter that I'm writing or a note that I'm writing to my wife using the same word that happens to be in a letter that I write and my official capacity will probably not have the exact same meaning, and you'll look at it differently depending upon the context of what it is that I've written. The exact same thing is true when we talk about the Old Testament. If you are in the Book of Exodus, and in the evenings during my series, in the evenings, we're going to be in the Book of Exodus, we're going to be in law. So if you're in the Book of Exodus and you find a word or a phrase or a concept there that is all so present in Proverbs or the Psalms, or in job or in the profits, the first thing we have to understand is what is the context, What is the genre? What is the type of literature? One last example that I'll give. If someone is speaking to you and they're telling you something. You're at an event, and let's say you go this afternoon and our speaker begins his presentation and he begins with the words once upon a time, Well, we know that we're probably about to hear a fairy tale. And in a fairy tale, different rules apply. Amen, little girls drink things and get smaller or bigger. But we know that it's a fairy tale, so different rules apply because it's a different type of literature. I know I'm belaboring this point, but it is important because the Book of Proverbs is often abused because we do not treat it like wisdom literature. It is wisdom literature. It is not law, it is not prophecy. It is wisdom literature, and there is a way that we have to interpret wisdom literature. This is important, especially because the two great dangers that we face in Christianity. The one danger is legalism and the other danger is moralism. I love it when we have our baptismal services and we hear the testimony of people more often than not who were raised in Christian homes. Did you notice that more often than not raised in Christian homes? And we praise God for that. Amen. We praise God for that. That is our desire. The desire of Christian parents is that our children have the most boring testimonies imaginable. Amen. If you don't understand that, you're not a parent, but if you are a Christian parent, you want your child to have a boring testimony. Amen. That's what we want. Come to know the Lord at an early age, Come to place your faith in Him at an early age. Do not spend a lot of your life wasted out there chasing sin. That's what we desire, but we know that often that is not the case, and usually what ends up happening is people grow up around the godsel around the Bible, around Christianity, and they migrate to one of these two camps that are very attractive. The one camp is the legalism camp. What is the law? What is the rule? The legalism camp believes that we are right with God by keeping the law. You find the rule, you find the law, You keep the law, or at least the laws that you choose, because legalists always have laws that they don't even want to think about. If you can't say amen, you ought to say out right. But my righteousness is determined by me keeping the law. I look at other people who don't keep the laws that I do, and I feel better about myself because of my law keeping. God owes me something because I keep the law. I have a list of things that I don't do, and I have a list of things that I do, and I'm right with God because of my list. Well, in this series, we're going to look at another danger, and it's the danger of moralism, this idea that Christianity is not necessarily about you being saved from your sin, but it is primarily about you becoming a moral person. Jesus goes from being the god man who died on the cross to pay the penalty that we owed because of our sin before a holy and righteous God, and instead he becomes a holy man who was merely a moral example of how to live, principles to follow. And so we read the narratives in even the New Testament looking for supposed to follow. And we love moralism because moralism allows me to believe that I'm a good person without having to wrestle with my sin. Moralism is incredibly popular, especially in a country like this one, a constitutionally Christian republic, amen filled with moralists who do not know God. The great doctor Barnhouse was asked a question and he answered it, and I'll paraphrase him, and the question was about what it would look like if Satan took over a town. Think about that for a moment. What would it look like if Satan took over a town, if the great Deceiver himself took over a town. And most people when they think about that, they say, oh, man, if Satan took over a town. If Satan took over a city, I mean, you know, the bars would be going NonStop, and there'd be drunkenness in the streets, and there would be, you know, all sort of debauchery and no order, and no it would just look horrible if Satan took over a town. Doctor Barnhouse said this, if Satan was able to completely take over a town, here's what it would look like. All the bars would be closed, all the children would be neat, tidy, orderly, and obedient. Everyone would be mannerable, and churches would be filled every Sunday where the gospel was never preached. Because the greatest way to deceive people is to make them moral and cause them to believe that they don't need God. Allow them to look out on others and look down on others who are not as moral as they are, and continue to deceive themselves into believing that they do not need God, that they are in fact righteous simply because they follow some rules of morality. That's the danger we face, because most of us in this room, if we came upon that town where it was obvious this is what Satan, don't you know, don't worry about. Don't worry about a man in a red soup with a pitchfork. That's not how he shows up. The Bible says he shows up as what the angel of light. You see. If we saw that first town where there was violence and debauchery and drunkenness and everything. All of us would know this is not a place I want to be. I need to get out of here. This place needs to change. But if we saw that second town, we would assume everybody's fine, because this is exactly what we would all want order, decency, morality. And the fact of the matter is in both instances, the Gospel is lost. And so the danger for us, and listen to me, Christian parents, the danger for our children is that they are brought up as much moralists that they learn to do the right thing, but they don't learn the reason that they learn to be good, upstanding moral people and believe that they can do it apart from the Gospel. That they come to believe that their greatest need is just to amend their behavior and not be radically saved, because they are sinners to the core. And one of the ways we do a disservice to our children is by misusing wisdom literature. And so that's why today what I want to do is give us an introduction. Let's read these first seven chapters and will go into our introduction. At first seven verses, sorry that the proverbs of Solomon son of David, King of Israel, to know wisdom and instruction, to understand words of insight, to receive instruction and wise dealing in righteousness, justice and equity, to give prudence to the simple, knowledge and discretion to the youth. Let the wise hear and increase in learning. And the one who understands obtain guidance to understand a proverb and a saying, the words of the wise and their riddles. And then here it is the crux of the matter in verse seven, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Fools despise wisdom and instruction. Amen. Several things about this book, and bear with me. This is incredibly important if we're going to understand the work of Proverbs. First, it is attributed to Solomon, but what it is is a collection of wise sayings. Solomon collected thousands of wise sayings. And what we find is this these sayings collected in a very orderly way. It's interesting some people have actually used that to argue that the Bible is not authentically the Word of God, because they'll say, well, you know this proverb exists in other places. Well, of course it does. The King collected proverbs from many many places. It was written for sons or for disciples. That's why I made the emphasis about parents and our children. The book is divided really into two parts. In chapters one through nine have extended sayings. It lays out the theological foundation, and it explains the source of wisdom, which is the fear of God, or we might say a right relationship with God, a right relationship with God. From chapter ten on we have shorter sayings or pithy sayings. It builds on the foundation of those first nine chapters, and it explains the way and the fruit of wisdom. So you have to understand the theology of the first part of Proverbs in order to understand the applications of the sayings in the second part of Proverbs. Can you already see a problem with the way we handle the book. We'll take a short saying from the second half of Proverbs, rip it out of its context. Quote the saying without any reference to the theology of the first half of Proverbs. Turn it into a rule to defollow. It's important to understand the structure of the book, the outline. You have the preamble that we just read chapter one, verses one through seven, then you have extended sayings on wisdom one eight through nine eighteen. Then you have the Solomonic proverbs. These are proverbs specifically from Solomon chapter ten to one through twenty two sixteen, and then again in chapter twenty five to one through twenty nine seven. In twenty two seventeen through twenty four to thirty four, you have the sayings of the Wys. In chapter thirty you have the sayings of Aiger, and then in chapter thirty one you have the sayings of King Lemuel. Famously, the poem of the virtuous Woman comes in the sayings of King Lemuel in chapter thirty one, verses ten through thirty one. We've looked at the introduction to the book and that one verse in verse seven, which really is the thesis of the entire Book of Proverbs. If we want to understand this book, we've got to understand chapter one, verse seven. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. Fools, despise, wisdom, and instruction. That terminology there, the fear of the Lord, and we use this right. We talk about being a god fearing person, and unfortunately, for the most part, when people use that phrase of being a god fearing person. All they mean is you're a moral person that goes right back to where we started. That is not what the Book of Proverbs is referring to. It's not referring to someone who doesn't know God, to someone who does not have a saving, covenantal relationship with God, someone who lives their life outside of God and yet acknowledges or recognizes that there is a God out there somewhere. That's what we mean when we say a God fearing person. That is not what the Book of Proverbs means. When we read this, we come to understand that this fear of the Lord, this reverence for God, is actually the evidence of a covenantal relationship with God. We understand who God is, and we fear and revere God and serve God because we know who God is. It is not just an outward acknowledgment that God perhaps exists out there somewhere, and what he says is this is the beginning of knowledge. This is incredibly important because there are a lot of people who use the Book of Proverbs. There are Christians who who have taken the Book of Proverbs, taken principles from the Book of Proverbs and written for example, books on business right successful business principles from the Book of Proverbs, and they write them intentionally so that people who are not Christian won't be bothered at all, because they don't mention anything about God, they don't mention anything about Christianity, they don't mention anything about righteousness. They just pull the principles out and say, here are business principles. They may even say these are business principles from Proverbs. But what they have done is denied the very essence of the Book of Proverbs, because what does Proverbs say. Proverbs says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. These people writing these books say, no, actually, you can have this without the fear of the Lord. You can just grab the principles, grab the sayings, apply the sayings, and it's enough. Here's the danger. You can do that and be successful in business. Amen, you can. You take the principles of Proverbs and you apply the principles of Proverbs, and you more than likely will be successful. The problem is you will now be living in the second city that we talked about. Why I'm using the Bible, I'm following biblical principles and God is blessing me because I'm following biblical principles. I am right with God. Do you know this person? Are you this person? I'm certain that we know them well. When we look at the Book of Proverbs, the Book of Proverbs is really it's two main stories. One is a tale of two sons, the wise son and the fool. Over and over and over again we hear about these two sons. And it is also the story of two women, Lady Wisdom and Dame Folly. Dame Folly is also the harlot. These are the personifications of what the author is talking about. This is the fool. The fool is this, The fool does that, The fool thinks this, the fool believes that. But this is the why son. The wise son is not like the fool. Here is Lady Wisdom crying in the streets. And here is Dame Folly, who's the harlot, who says, come aside to me. These are literary tools meant to help us understand the story. Listen to this from Dinard and Lungmen. In this light, the alternative between wisdom and Folly is more than how to get along and advance in the world. It is a matter of life and death. Proverbs three eighteen. After all tells us that those who embrace wisdom embrace life. Moreover, the horrible truth about Dame Folly is that she is a murderess. She invites people in for a fine dinner, but they never come out. Her guests are in the depths of the grave Proverbs nine eighteen. This is not just a fairy tale. This is not just a story about good little boys and bad little boys, and good little girls and bad little girls. This is not just a story about successful businessmen and unsuccessful businessmen. This is a matter of life and death. This is a matter of knowing God versus not knowing God. This is a matter of being right with God versus being an enemy of God. This is a matter of being saved or being lost. This is about everything. And so there are four principles that I want us to gather in this introduction. Four things I want you to understand. I'm going to give these to you and then we'll walk through them. Four things when you read Proverbs, four things to help guide you Proverbs. And these have been incredibly helpful to us as a family as we've worked through this in our own time. It's also been extremely helpful to me, helpful to me as a pastor, as a counselor. There is amazing usefulness in the Book of Proverbs for biblical counseling. But we have to understand these four principles. There are amazing truths here for discipleship, regardless of whether it's our children or not. But we have to hold onto these four principles. Number one, Remember, wisdom is not law. Wisdom, sorry, is not law. That's the first principle when we're looking at the Book of Proverbs. Wisdom is not law. Again, I'll explain all of these. Number two, we have to understand the difference between indicatives and imperatives. The difference between indicatives and imperatives. And it's interesting so me you're probably thinking, well, wait a minute, I thought I heard you teaching about that in the New Testament. Yes, absolutely, it's also true in the Old Testament. We have to understand the difference between indicatives and imperatives. You don't know what those are. Don't worry, I'm going to explain. Number three. Remember that Christ is the wise son of Proverbs. Christ is the wise son of Proverbs. And listen all of these principles are important. But if you don't get any of the others, but you just grab this one, it will transform the way you read the Book of Proverbs. Christ is the wise son of Proverbs. Here's the way we read the Book of and the way we use it with our children. Son, here's the fool, and here's the wise son. Be the wise son, my daughter, here's the fool. Here's the wise one. Be the wise one. Folks, Christ is the wise son of Proverbs. If my child or my person that I'm discipling can be the wise son of Proverbs by just trying harder, that means Jesus died for nothing. Do you hear me? This alone will transform the way we read the Book of Proverbs. Christ is the wise son of Proverbs. Not you, not me? Amen. Fourthly, the New Testament interprets the Old Testament. My dispensational friends hate this, but it's true. Testiment interprets the Old Testament doesn't mean that the Old Testament is invalid or not useful. It just means that when we are looking at it, we have to look at it with the benefit of all of the revelation that God has now given us let's look at these in turn. First, wisdom is not law. Again, from dinner to longmen. The individual proverbs must be interpreted and applied within the context of the whole book and indeed the teaching of the whole Bible. They are not divine promises for the here and now, but true observations that time will bear out. The Book of Proverbs is not a book of divine promises. It's wisdom literature. It's wisdom literature, and I know you hear it anyway. Wait, what it's not. Yeah, let me give you an example. I'll give you an example in general, but then we'll look at some in proverbs. If you eat healthy, you will live longer. If you eat healthy, you will live longer. Now, in general, that's true, Amen, In general, that's true. You have a healthier diet. Thank you. You have a healthier diet. You will live a longer life. But does that automatically mean that anybody who does not live long did not eat healthy. You and I both know that healthy people die young. Every day. You can eat healthy, exercise and run in front of a bus. The fact that you eat healthy will not save you from the bus. Amen, So it's a principle, not a promise. It's a principle, not a promise. Remember that first thing we need to understand is don't read wisdom literature as law. Proverbs is not law, it's wisdom literature. Wisdom literature is a collection of why saying sayings. It is a picture of the way that the world works in general. Listen to this Proverbs fourteen twenty six. He who fears the Lord has a secure fortress, and for his children it will be a refuge. Amen, Hallelujah, praise the Lord. Is that true? Yes, it's true. But does that mean that if things are going badly for a particular family, that they must not be fearing the Lord? Why do I pick this one because there is a book in the Bible designed to refute the idea that this is law, And that book in the Bible is Joe. When Job's friends come to him, they are basically quoting Proverbs to him, and essentially they're saying this, you must have sinned, because we know that when you live righteously, this kind of stuff doesn't happen to you. Confess. Confess. The entire book of Job exists to obliterate this kind of thinking. Job was a righteous man, righteous man, and his children died. But when you read proverbs or wisdom literature as law, if you live like this, you will get that. Then the reverse has to also be true. You did not get that. Therefore you must not have lived like this. Now you're one of Job's friends, Job, what did you do wrong? And the beginning of the Book of Job tells us Job is not suffering because he did wrong. To follow this is the danger of reading wisdom as law. Proverbs three one and two. And my son did not forget my teaching. But let your heart keep my commandments for length of days and years of life and peace they will add to you. Is this a law, No, it's wisdom. Generally speaking, this is the way things work. This is the way things work. One of the great Christian biographies, and we usually sign it to our children when they get a little older. But it's the biography of David Brainerd. And how many of you familiar with that name? David Brainerd, godly young man contemporary with Jonathan Edwards. The long and the short of it is this, this young man was an incredibly godly young man, a picture of godliness and the pursuit of righteousness, and his life was filled with pain and heartache and sickness and even early death. Why because this is a proverb, not a law. It's a proverb and not a law. And if you want this to be proved to you, you don't have to look at Job and you don't even have to look at David Brainerd. If you want it to be proven to you that righteousness is not a guarantee that you escape from suffering, all you have to do is look at Jesus Hello. Because his life in many ways is a violation of a number of proverbs if they are meant to be law, but they are not meant to be law. He was the only righteous man ever to live, and he was cut off at a young age. Are you following? Wisdom is not law? This brings us to train up a child and the way you should go, and even when he is old, he will not depart from men. Is that a law or is it a proverb? Is it a law or is it a proverb? Because we don't know how to read proverbs, we often treat it as a law. If you train your child correctly, they will end up godly. Therefore, if your child ends up godly, you get the credit, and if they do not, you get the blame. How many times do Christian parents have a child who goes through a season or an extended period of their life where they're living, as my grandmother would say, on fools Hill, and immediately we come and go, I just don't know what we did wrong? Ah, this one? The others are this and now the other? Where did we go wrong with that one? When people come to me with that as a pastor, I immediately say, stop and repent, because if you believe that the other ones went right because you did a good job, and this one went wrong because you made a mistake, you are robbing God of his glory. Your children do not end up right just because of you. It is always because of the grace of God. Always, always. Here's the other thing you didn't do right with the other ones? Hey man, somebody, if you're honest, on your best day, you were an inferior parent on your best day. You left many eyes undotted and many tease uncrossed on your best day. So you want godly children, get on your face and beg God for them. You have godly children, get on your face and thank God for them. And in the meantime we do everything we know to do. Why because we trust the Lord, because he is sovereign over the ends as well as the means. But he is indeed sovereign. A proverb is not a law, it is a principle. Let's move to the second. First, wisdom is not law. Second, understand the difference between indicatives and imperatives. Indicatives tell us what something is. Imperatives tell us what to do, and indicative from a theological perspective, think about it this way. What God has done or produced in us and for us through christ redemptive work on the Cross. Who we are because of Christ's work. Imperatives what God enables and requires us to do as a direct result of Christ's work. That last phrase is important. It's a direct result of Christ's work. I can do the imperatives because of the indicatives. I can act righteously because Christ, the Righteous One has been formed in me. But first, Christ the Righteous One has to be formed in me. Remember, in order for an act to be righteous, it has to be the right thing, done the right way for the right reason, and the only right reason is the glory of God. I can do a right thing, and I can do that right thing the right way. And if my motivation was anything other than the glory of God, that right thing that I did the right way was unrighteous because it came from a selfish and sinful motive. This is why indicatives and imperatives are important. Proverbs twelve, fifteen and sixteen. The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man listens to advice. The vexation of a fool is known at once, but the prudent ignores an insult. Was that an indicative or an imperative? It was an indicative. There are no instructions in that verse. You are not told to do anything in that verse. Let me read it again. The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but a wise man listens to advice. The vexation of a fool is known at once, but the prudent ignores an insult. One thing were you told to do in that verse? Nothing? Nothing. You were just shown the difference between the wise man and the fool. This is an indicative. Proverbs twenty eight to one. The wicked flee when no one pursues, but the righteous are bold as a lion. What were you told to do in that proverb? Now, I'm not asking you how do we use that proverb? How we use that proverb as we say something like, son, you have to be bold as a lion. That would be an imperative if I tell you to be bold as a lion. But the text says the wicked flee when no one pursues, but the righteous are bold as a lion. What have you been told to do? Nothing, You've just been told what righteousness looks like. These are indicatives and not imperatives. And if we are going to read proverbs rightly, if we're going to interpret proverbs rightly, we have to know the difference between an indicative that just shows us something and an imperative that tells us something to do. That doesn't mean that there's no instructions that come from indicatives, but we'll talk about that in a moment. First, get these principles. Sometimes we have both proverbs three eleven and twelve. My son, do not despise the Lord's discipline or be weary of his reproof. For the Lord reproves him whom he loves as a father, the son in whom he delights. That's bert, that's both of them in one. Using indicatives like imperatives means demanding of our hearers something that can only be produced by God, and that's dangerous. So how would we use that proverb The wicked flee when no one's chasing them, but the righteous are bode as a lion. When we were living in wickedness and unrighteousness, there's an irrational fear that comes upon us. Son, you experienced that rational fear because of your wickedness. You want to not walk in that irrational fear. There is an answer to that. The antidote to that is walking in righteousness. When you walk in righteousness, you don't have to walk in that irrational fear. How do you walk in righteousness by being found in the wise son of Proverbs who is Christ? You see if I tell my son, be bold like a line and by the way, we can do that. That's the danger of moralism. The military does this. The military takes scared young boys and through a process of breaking them down, building them up and training them, teaches them to do irrational things like run toward gunfire, not because they're righteous, but because their behavior has been modified. So you can modify your child's behavior, but behavior modification and righteousness are two different things. See One approach to this book takes it indicative, turns it into an imperative, and impresses it so that we get a forced behavior. The other approach to this book takes an indicative shows what foolishness and unrighteousness looks like, points to Christ as the only answer, and constantly calls for faith and belief through the proclamation of the Gospel. Which one do we as Christian parents want to do? Are you beginning to hear me? I hope you're beginning to get this. I hope you're beginning to understand why this is important. Thirdly, Christ is the wise son of Proverbs Colossians two, verses one to three. For the second time, I'll just read it for you, for I want you to know how great a struggle I have for you, and for those at Leia to sea, and for all who have not seen me face to face, that their hearts may be encouraged being knit together in love to reach all the riches of full assurance and understanding and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ. Listen to this in whom are hidden in Christ, are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge? How many of the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden in Christ? How many all of them? Which means every treasure of wisdom and knowledge and Proverbs is hidden in Christ, found in Christ. If there's wisdom in Proverbs that is not found in Christ, then it's not wisdom. Amen. Don't teach wisdom as law. Always point back to Christ as the fulfillment of the proverb, and always point to Christ as the source of true wisdom Proverbs twelve eighteen. Another example, there is one whose rash words are like sword thrust, but the tongue of the wise brings healing. So what does this mean? This means that we need to be more wise with our tongues, Yes, it does, But how do we become more wise with our tongues by being found in the wise son of Proverbs who is Christ? Proverbs thirteen to five. The righteous hates falsehood, but the wicked brings shame and disgrace. Again, this is an indicative and it is a picture of righteousness. But how do we get here by working harder at it? Or by Christ? The righteous son of Proverbs being formed in us so that we become in Him the righteousness of God. It is the latter and not the former. And fourthly, the New Testament interpreting the Old Testament. Christ is the interpretive key of the entire Bible. We've talked about this on many occasions. Genesis three fifteen is really the thesis statement of redemptive history. Right. He says to the serpent, I'm gonna put enmity between you and the woman, between your seed and her seed. Your bruises heal, he will bruise your head. This is a promise of the redeemer who is going to come. The rest of the story of the Bible is about this redeemer coming and destroying the serpent and delivering us Amen. That's the story of the Bible. The story of the Bible is about our redemption in Christ. And the last idea is this, The furniture has not moved. The furniture has not moved. Now I say that, and you have a picture in your mind, what do you mean. Here's what I mean when you come into the New Testament in terms of righteousness, and you look at this beautiful, lavishly furnished room, and righteousness is the furnishing in this lavishly furnished room. Here's what you need to not think about the Old Testament. Don't think that somehow there was different furniture there before. Now in the New Testament we have new furniture. No, in the Old Testament that furniture was still there. What's the difference Now the lights are on, The furniture hasn't moved. It's just that the lights are on. And the Old Testament we have these laws in this sacrificial system. What does that mean? In the New Testament the lights are on. Christ is the lamb of God slain before the foundation of the world. You follow, the lights are on. And so when we were reading Proverbs, we're looking at righteousness. Not a righteousness that is something different than the righteousness today, but a righteousness that we can now understand better because the lights are on. The furniture hasn't moved. So why would I limit myself to the dimly lit expressions that we find there and not take full advantage of the illumination that we have when we look at the New Testament. Then give an example of this before we come to close. Proverbs twenty eight thirteen. Whoever conceals his transgression will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy. Whoever conceals his transgression will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy. And there are even stories, you know, there are stories in different cultures that bring out this principle, right, that the cover up is worse than the crime. But are you familiar with this one? Right, the cover up is worse than the crime. Just come clean. You start lying, and you have to tell more lies and more life and moral lies. Just come clean. Now, all of these are based on the same kind of principle. Are those good ideas? Yes, there are good ideas, But I think there's a better way to understand this in terms of actual righteousness Luke eighteen ten through fourteen. Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a pharisee, the other a tax collector. The pharisee, standing by himself, prayed, Thus, God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week, I give tithes of all I get by moralism. But the tax collector standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to Heaven, but beat his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner. I tell you this man went down to his house justified rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted. How about this one John one eight through ten. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and declines us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. That's more light. So do I just want to take Proverbs twenty eight thirteen. Whoever conceals his transgression will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy. And do I just want to press that as law and say son? And I keep saying son, because Proverb has written, my son, you'll find all the time right, son, tell the truth, Son, don't cover it up. Son, don't be that kind of man. Is that all I want from my son? No? No, I want him to know that his desire to cover up is rooted in his sinful nature and his desire to cover his sin not only from men, but from God. And I want him to know that that desire is keeping him from the only one who can actually save him, and that confession and acknowledgment of sin is the only way to find that salvation, and that, yes, that principle also applies horizontally man to man, but it is much more significantly significant vertically between man and God. Do you see the difference between moralism and a moralistic approach to the Book of Proverbs and the approach that we are going to take, which is a gospel centered Christ's centered approach to the Book of Proverbs. Hear me when I say, I think it is absolutely crucial that we teach this to our children, that we teach this to those whom we are discipling, and that we learn this ourselves. But if you are anything like me, your view of the Book of Proverbs is broken, because if you're anything like me, you learn how to read proverbs as law. If you're anything like me, you learn how to take the indicatives of proverbs, turn them into imperatives, and force feed moralism, which means, if you're anything like me, you spend a long time missing the glory of this book because it is all about the wisdom and righteousness that can only be found in Christ. That is Solomon's righteous son, who got this right. That is Solomon's wise son, who got this right. Well, if Christ is the wise son of Proverbs, then who's the fool? You? Me too, but mainly you. It's very important that we take this approach. It's very important that we take this approach because here's what this approach does. This approach saves me from the moralistic reading that puffs me up. I read about the fool, right, the fool despises wisdom and instruction. But I don't. I love wisdom. That's why I'm reading Proverbs. I'm getting puffed up. Right. But if I come to Proverbs and I say, the wise son of Proverbs and is Christ, and the fool is me? The fool despises wisdom and instruction, Now I'm going You know what, even though I'm sitting here reading the Book of Proverbs, deep down in the places you don't talk about in church, I do despise wisdom and instruction. That is the truth of my flesh and anything in me that does not despise wisdom and instruction is a byproduct of Christ being formed in me. Because of Christ being formed in me, I am apart from Christ being formed in me, I am the food of Proverbs. This will change the way you read the book. This will change the way you interpret the book. This will change the way you teach the book. This will change the way you use the book. And it will also change the way you experience the book. Chris, Truth be told. You get past those first few chapters and proverbs, and you get to those short sayings that somehow don't even say to have anything to do with each other. Sometimes they'll seem to contradict each other, and you just start going, Yeah, Okay, let's read something else. But if we get this, if we get this, it will point us to Christ. It will highlight the Gospel. And for those of us who are here mired in moralism, it will remind you again and again of what I've already said. Your desperate need is not to be a moral person, but your desperate need is to be found in Christ. Christ died for sin, once for all the just, for the unjust, in order that he might bring us to God. God made him who knew no sin, to be sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. Righteousness is not found in the law. Righteousness is not found in wisdom literature. Righteousness is found through the person and work of Christ only. And it is only when we find Him that we have the very beginning of knowledge and begin to do the right things the right way for the right reason the glory of God through the person of Christ, our Savior. Let's pray. Father, we thank you, and we praise you for your goodness and mercy and kindness toward us. We thank you for your word, for the wisdom that we find in Proverbs, which is ultimately the wisdom we find in Christ. Grant by your grace that as we embark on this journey, Christ the Wise Son might be formed in us. And Father, for those under the side of my voice who have not come to know You in the pardon of theirs, in grant them repentance and faith, that they might flee to Christ as their only hope. For we ask this in His name. Amen.