Skip to playerSkip to main content
American Torah
  • 1 week ago
It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out.
Proverbs 25:2 ESV

In this conversation about Proverbs 25, the Common Sense Bible Study crew discuss relationships with powerful people and themes of humility, kindness, and the power of speech in everyday life: family, traffic, the workplace, etc.

From Jay Carper at Common Sense Bible Study (https://CommonSenseBibleStudy.com) and American Torah (https://www.AmericanTorah.com).

This content is free, but I accept contributions via Paypal at https://jaycarper.com/paypal.

Follow me on X: https://jaycarper.com/twitter
Follow me on Facebook: https://jaycarper.com/fbat
Transcript
00:00:00All right, like the previous chapter or two, a lot of these Proverbs are connected together.
00:00:10So for example, verse, I think, four and five are a set, and six and seven go together,
00:00:19eight through 10.
00:00:21There are several other sets of individual verses that are actually paired with another
00:00:26one for a single Proverb.
00:00:30So let's just start at the beginning of the chapter and work our way down.
00:00:35Let's see, in verse one, it says, these are the Proverbs of Solomon, which the men of Hezekiah,
00:00:40king of Judah, copied.
00:00:42There's actually a surprising lot we can learn from that.
00:00:45And it's not a proverb, of course, it's an introduction to this set of Proverbs.
00:00:49But I don't know if you, I think that everyone here, except maybe Scott, was here when we
00:00:55did the first, first part, first episode, whatever you want to call it for Proverbs.
00:01:01And I talked about how Proverbs is divided up into seven books.
00:01:05And I think four of them are written by Solomon.
00:01:10One is possibly adapted by Solomon from an Egyptian sage.
00:01:16And then there's King Lemuel, who might actually also be another name for Solomon.
00:01:20But this is the beginning of the third book of Solomon's Proverbs.
00:01:27The first two are, well, the first one is in chapters one through nine.
00:01:31And then the second book of Solomon's Proverbs is chapter 10 through chapter 22, verse 16.
00:01:37And then you've got the section with Aminah, whatever his name was, the Egyptian guy.
00:01:43And now we're back into Proverbs of Solomon.
00:01:47So this is the third book of Solomon.
00:01:49But one thing we can learn from this is that, you know, Solomon didn't just write all his
00:01:54Proverbs down in a book and hand them over.
00:01:57He might have written down maybe the first book, maybe even the second book.
00:02:01And he probably wrote that book from Aminah Moppy because he adapted it or Aminah Moppy adapted
00:02:10it from him, whichever way it was.
00:02:12It's something that he wrote down in other kings who lived at about the same time were
00:02:16able to read it and use it.
00:02:19But this piece of Solomon's Proverbs coming after that is and being copied by Hezekiah means
00:02:27that all of the last from here on out was not compiled, at least by Solomon and was compiled
00:02:33at a much later date and then added to what Solomon had already written.
00:02:38Now, these are Solomon's Proverbs.
00:02:40I'm not saying that they're not weren't created by Solomon, but he spoke them in court and a
00:02:45scribe wrote them down in the court records or, you know, he wrote them in a letter or something
00:02:49like that.
00:02:50And then Hezekiah commissioned a group of men to go and find them all and compile them.
00:02:56First Kings mentions that, you know, Solomon wrote 3000 Proverbs or something like that.
00:03:02And it's probably a round number.
00:03:03He probably didn't actually write 3000.
00:03:05It might have been more or less.
00:03:06But we certainly don't have anywhere near that many in the book of Proverbs.
00:03:10So there are other Proverbs of Solomon out there somewhere that we don't have, and maybe
00:03:16they don't exist anymore.
00:03:18But at least in the time of Hezekiah, there were still things of Solomon or writings of
00:03:24Solomon that were kind of scattered around, maybe in royal records or something like that.
00:03:29And in the later parts, you know, the book of King Lemuel, the stuff that he heard from
00:03:37his mother in Proverbs 31 and the Proverbs of Agar or whatever his name is right before
00:03:44that.
00:03:45I can't remember those names right now.
00:03:46Sorry.
00:03:47Those were either written or at least compiled at a later date.
00:03:51So that just tells us the whole book of Proverbs wasn't a single thing written all out
00:03:55at once.
00:03:56It was something that people compiled over a long period of time, over many centuries.
00:04:02And that doesn't make it not inspired.
00:04:04It just means that that's the way these kinds of books are compiled.
00:04:08The Psalms are the same way.
00:04:10It's probable that Isaiah's prophecies were written in lots of separate scrolls and then
00:04:17later compiled by his disciples or their disciples or their disciples somewhere down the road.
00:04:23Anyways, I thought it was just interesting that how much you can gain.
00:04:26About the history of a book just by a little line stuck in the middle of it like that.
00:04:33So anyways, on to verse two, the glory of a king of God to conceal things, but the glory
00:04:38of a king is to search it out.
00:04:41And this is linked somewhat with verse three, but they're not exactly saying the same thing.
00:04:47I think verse three is actually kind of a mirror of verse two, where verse two is saying, on
00:04:54the first part, it's saying that it's the glory of God to conceal things.
00:04:58God has created this amazing universe and he knows everything.
00:05:04There is nothing that happens anywhere that he doesn't know.
00:05:07So it's not like he has to search anything out.
00:05:12You know, elsewhere, I think Solomon said that, you know, God searches the hearts of all
00:05:15men.
00:05:16And of course he does in a manner of speaking, but he knows the hearts of all men.
00:05:20He doesn't have to like rummage through them to find out what he needs to know.
00:05:25Instead, God conceals things from us.
00:05:27And scripture says that God dwells in deep darkness.
00:05:33And partly that's a metaphor because he is mysterious.
00:05:36We can never understand him.
00:05:37And so he, he holds himself back partly because we can't understand him anyways, but partly
00:05:44also for our own protection.
00:05:46And this goes back to Deuteronomy 29, 29.
00:05:50Let me, it had my other Bible app already ready.
00:05:54Deuteronomy 29, 29, which says the secret things belong to Yahweh, our God, but the things
00:06:01revealed belong to us and to our children forever that we may follow all the words of
00:06:05this law.
00:06:07So God has chosen to reveal some things to us, but not everything.
00:06:11And the things that he has revealed are things that are to help us manuals for life, how we
00:06:20can live according to his standards, what our purpose are, things like that.
00:06:24Purpose is, but the things he's hidden are things that are dangerous or forbidden.
00:06:34You know, one of the definitions of the Hebrew word for witchcraft, which I can't remember
00:06:37the name right now, but it's, has a common, it shares a root with a word that means secret
00:06:43or hidden.
00:06:45And which is where we get the word for a cult, which also means hidden.
00:06:48And so the idea of witchcraft might be referring to things, delving into things that God has
00:06:54hidden and forbidden for us to go.
00:06:57So it is possible to go and speak to the dead, but God said, don't do that.
00:07:03That's something that God has hidden.
00:07:06It's, it may be possible to use divination, you know, to throw chicken bones or read the
00:07:12stars, things like that.
00:07:13But God has said, don't do that.
00:07:16I mean, we can watch the stars in the sky for signs, but we're not to read them like,
00:07:21you know, like horoscopes do.
00:07:22We're not to use them to tell the future or to learn messages from spirits or anything
00:07:27like that.
00:07:28But on the other hand, the glory of a king is to search things out.
00:07:32In part, this is talking about things that God has concealed.
00:07:35Not things that he has forbidden, but things that he hasn't revealed necessarily.
00:07:39There's a lot that God has chosen not to tell us.
00:07:44In part, that's so that we have the work of figuring it out.
00:07:48And where this really applies to a king, in part, you know, Solomon was also known as a
00:07:55naturalist.
00:07:56So there are lots of things that Solomon spent his time researching and discovering, searching
00:08:00out God's secrets in the world that he created.
00:08:04And those things aren't necessarily revealed in scripture, but Solomon had the wealth, the
00:08:10resources, and the time to search those things out where most people, you know, they were
00:08:16just barely getting by.
00:08:18Not where I was going.
00:08:19I was actually talking about the law.
00:08:21You know, God has given us laws, instructions on how to live, but a lot of those laws are
00:08:25ambiguous so that we have to work together to try to figure them out.
00:08:29And so that we have to think about our circumstances and extrapolate from what God has told us into
00:08:35what he hasn't told us.
00:08:37And that is particularly important for someone like a king who is judging other people's
00:08:42crimes.
00:08:43If people come to him with a dispute about the law, he has to be able to reason through
00:08:48it and extrapolate from the things that God has revealed into those things which are still
00:08:53hidden so that he can apply the law in situations that the law doesn't directly address.
00:08:58And I'm off to us to a loquious start.
00:09:03I just made up that word, though.
00:09:07So don't look it up in a dictionary.
00:09:09Yeah, that always says that was my sermon for the night.
00:09:12Take it away, Carlos.
00:09:14Yeah.
00:09:16So verse three.
00:09:18I mean, if anybody has thoughts on verse two, feel free to speak up.
00:09:21But I'm curious if anybody has some thoughts on verse three and how that relates back to
00:09:26verse two.
00:09:26I do.
00:09:29Verse two about concealing himself.
00:09:34I mean, with Moses in the wilderness.
00:09:39He had Moses hide himself in the cleft of the rock and he only showed his backside to
00:09:46Moses.
00:09:47So he concealed it.
00:09:49He concealed himself.
00:09:52And but he had Moses seek him out despite despite concealing himself.
00:10:00But the glory of God was still upon Moses when he came back from that visitation because
00:10:08they couldn't even look upon his face.
00:10:09He had to put a veil over his face.
00:10:12So another principle to that God veils himself not not to.
00:10:18To try to hide himself from us.
00:10:23But because if we were to look upon God, we would die.
00:10:27He is that holy.
00:10:29And we're living in a profane world, a common world where everything is.
00:10:34It's just full of sin.
00:10:39It's full of the curse.
00:10:41The ground was cursed because of Adam.
00:10:45Not you.
00:10:46Mankind was not cursed.
00:10:48It was the curse of sin that came upon the land also as well.
00:10:55I mean, Adam filling the sin, the curse of sin, of course, you know, is having to die, having
00:11:01to sacrifice animals for atonement, Moses and them and in the Levitical priesthood.
00:11:10But anyway, the heart of kings is unsearchable because even though God is, see, God, we can
00:11:21search him out.
00:11:22We can search him out.
00:11:24But the thing is about searching your own heart as a king is you're around pleasures all
00:11:30the time as a king, as a leader.
00:11:34You're around a comfort life.
00:11:37You're living in a comfort zone.
00:11:39And God does not operate in a comfort zone.
00:11:43So the heart of kings is unsearchable because it's like you're in that comfort zone, like
00:11:56I was saying.
00:11:58And you're used to having the luxuries and everything's in your way of distraction.
00:12:05Everything's distraction with being a leader.
00:12:08You're distracted by the world, the affairs of the world and everything in it.
00:12:14And you cannot search your heart if you're distracted.
00:12:19Interesting.
00:12:21That's my take on it.
00:12:23Yeah.
00:12:23So you're saying that as the king being his heart being unsearchable to himself.
00:12:28Okay.
00:12:31Not to God.
00:12:32God knows his heart.
00:12:33Yeah.
00:12:35And it's continually wicked according to scripture.
00:12:39Yeah.
00:12:39And you know that, you know, you're saying about how when Moses came down from the mountain,
00:12:44he had to veil his own face.
00:12:46In a way, that was because some of God had rubbed off on him.
00:12:51You know, God concealed himself for Moses' protection.
00:12:54That's right.
00:12:55But Moses had absorbed so much of that power, even, you know, just briefly seeing God's backside,
00:13:02so to speak.
00:13:03That when he came down from the mountain, he had to hide part of himself for the protection
00:13:08of the people.
00:13:09Yes.
00:13:10Yes.
00:13:11Makes me think that, you know, there are, you know, people who live extremely holy lives
00:13:17are very close to God.
00:13:19I'm not really sure I've ever met somebody like that.
00:13:22But I think that the closer to God's ways you are living, the harder it is for the world
00:13:27to understand you.
00:13:29And that's true for everybody.
00:13:31Eventually, you get to the point where you and the world have very little ground for communication.
00:13:37Nothing makes sense.
00:13:38Like, you don't understand them.
00:13:40They don't understand you.
00:13:42And I wonder, you know, people use that phrase, too heavenly minded to be of any earthly good.
00:13:48I don't really think that's what they mean by it.
00:13:50They mean people who are just, who are, you know, holier than thou.
00:13:54But I think there is a point where somebody who is that close to God isn't really suited
00:14:00anymore for the mundane tasks of life.
00:14:03I mean, would Moses have made a good arm hand at that point?
00:14:09Probably not.
00:14:10His time was better used as a national judge.
00:14:14Yeah.
00:14:14And then there was Aaron.
00:14:16Aaron became that kind of figure as well after Moses refused to do it.
00:14:21And then Aaron gets anointed as a high priest.
00:14:26And, of course, you know, they have the curtain constructed to conceal the Ark of the Covenant
00:14:31from the high priest and everybody until a certain time, of course, where they had to put the blood
00:14:42on the mercy seat.
00:14:44But the curtain was always there until Yeshua came.
00:14:48Praise God.
00:14:50I go with the concept of Yeshua spoke in parables.
00:14:56There was a reason that he spoke in parables.
00:15:01It somewhat winnowed people out.
00:15:04You had to have a desire and a commitment to try and understand what he was saying.
00:15:16So, basically, you had to do a leap of faith, so to speak, that his parables warranted pondering,
00:15:29consideration.
00:15:29And you didn't just slough them off as to, Yeshua was just talking again and, okay, if you were
00:15:39going to get close or closer to God, you had to effort to dive in and understand the secrets
00:15:50that he was revealing.
00:15:51So, like, the whole Bible, I mean, they say there are four levels, the Ramez, the Shah,
00:16:02I don't remember them all, but, and you can take it at face value, you can dig in deeper
00:16:11and try to apply it to yourself or apply it to the nation or, you know, you can get mysterious
00:16:16with it.
00:16:16But, you know, that's how I look at it with regards to searching things out.
00:16:22Yeah, that's good.
00:16:23I like the connection with the parables there.
00:16:26He was definitely hiding things from people who weren't ready for it or who didn't want
00:16:30it.
00:16:31Right.
00:16:32There is something I did learn about the, you're talking about parties, the acronym,
00:16:38Pashat, then there's Soad, and Ramez, and then, yeah, I got what you're saying there.
00:16:46Um, the parables are, we're really deep, and that Yeshua taught about, I do agree there.
00:16:54But there's things that sometimes we're not supposed to dig into on the Soad level, because
00:17:02we're not either ready for it or God has not revealed it yet.
00:17:06So, that's my take.
00:17:10Yeah, I suspect that after the resurrection, we'll have a lot more access to that kind of
00:17:14thing.
00:17:15But there will still be things that God will hide from us for our own protection.
00:17:21But I think Daniel's observation about the king being unable to search his own heart is
00:17:25valid and certainly true.
00:17:27I read that a little bit differently, though.
00:17:31In verse two, it's the king who is searching things out, including the hearts of his people.
00:17:37So, it's his job to know people's motivations and, you know, to try to understand people's
00:17:43character when they're coming to him with a dispute.
00:17:46The character of the people bringing the dispute is almost as important as the evidence itself,
00:17:51the tangible evidence, I mean.
00:17:54But from the other way around, the king's heart is unsearchable for the people who are
00:18:00bringing their case before him, or at least it should be.
00:18:04Because if they understand his heart too much, if he reveals too much, then he'll be easier
00:18:11to manipulate.
00:18:12They'll be able to bribe, present themselves, you know, customize their presentation so that
00:18:18they'll like him better.
00:18:19You know, if they know that his favorite color is yellow, then, you know, showing up in a
00:18:25yellow robe, maybe the king will be a little more disposed towards you or something.
00:18:30I mean, that's a little trivial, but just to illustrate the point.
00:18:34I think that's a good point.
00:18:36I think that, like, the other side of it is also that, like, the more people know that
00:18:42the king, like, if people know him well, the tendency to treat him casually would be there.
00:18:51So there's that kind of thing too, which, like, you know, we see that kind of stuff in
00:18:55our modern day happen a lot.
00:18:58And just like with, you know, the king of heaven, we're not supposed to treat him casually.
00:19:04Like, he's set apart.
00:19:06And it's the same kind of thing.
00:19:08Like, he has to be, things have to be set apart.
00:19:11They have to be less accessible.
00:19:14It's just the way it is.
00:19:17Well, Paula, you've heard, you've gone to enough churches that I'm sure you've heard
00:19:22Abba God or Papa God.
00:19:24You've heard people refer to God in that fashion.
00:19:27Do you think that's appropriate?
00:19:31I think that, I think it really depends on how they look at their relationship with
00:19:41her.
00:19:42And so I think, I don't think that it's necessarily wrong.
00:19:45I just think, you know, for me, that's not necessarily, like, how I would, you know,
00:19:52pray or whatever, address God.
00:19:54But, you know, I can't judge how close somebody is to God.
00:19:59Yeah, I've taken that tact before.
00:20:01I've taken that tact before.
00:20:03But I'm, I have reconsidered and I still am reconsidering it.
00:20:09I reconsider it because even a, even Solomon had to have reverence for David.
00:20:16There was a certain protocol that, that was put upon him.
00:20:23And I'm not, I'm not sure how that, that looks.
00:20:25When I tend to think of God as, you know, Abba, you know, Papa God, that, that type
00:20:32of an attitude, I take him out of that area of, of reverence.
00:20:38I think that I need to keep him in.
00:20:41I haven't noodled it all the way through, but it's, it's something that, that certainly
00:20:45I need to ponder.
00:20:47Yeah.
00:20:47I, I, I mean, I think that there's probably, you know, something to those things.
00:20:51It's like, you know, as we grow up, we don't always call our parents by the same terms that
00:20:58we call them when we were, you know, younger.
00:21:00So there's stuff like that too.
00:21:02Like how we see them and how we address them and how we interact with them changes.
00:21:06So, so are we, are you guys saying that the way we called out to him can change our attitude
00:21:17towards him?
00:21:19You're saying that if, if, if I use father or Abba, I can take him subconsciously or eventually
00:21:29and take away the fact that he is the creator and the king and bring him a level lower than,
00:21:40than that, is what you're saying?
00:21:42I'm not saying that.
00:21:43That's not what I'm saying.
00:21:45Okay.
00:21:46I don't know.
00:21:46I can't speak.
00:21:47I'm saying that's something to consider.
00:21:50I don't know.
00:21:51Okay.
00:21:52Yeah.
00:21:52I think there is a limit to it.
00:21:54You know, like there is that tendency for people to interpret the term Abba as daddy.
00:22:01I think, you know, primarily it was more like what we would use as, as dad or something
00:22:08like that.
00:22:09I mean, it's in Aramaic, it didn't necessarily mean daddy, but it could.
00:22:14But if people use that too casually and they start thinking of God, the ultimate power in
00:22:21the universe is just daddy who can give him an allowance and, you know, buy him some ice
00:22:27cream.
00:22:28That's when you're in danger.
00:22:30And especially when you do take him casually, no matter what name you use, people do think
00:22:35that they know God and they start, well, they start justifying their behavior saying, well,
00:22:41God wouldn't really object to that.
00:22:43I had a, an atheist reply to one of my tweets lately, sometime this week in his comment was
00:22:51surely God wouldn't send, you know, Muslim children and atheist children and these, whatever
00:22:59Hindu children to eternal torment.
00:23:03And it's like, you don't really know God.
00:23:07So it's not up to me what God's going to do.
00:23:10I mean, I may have my opinions, but really God is the one who calls the shots, his universe,
00:23:16his rules.
00:23:17And when people think that they know him and start treating him too casually, I think they
00:23:23forget that.
00:23:25No, I can agree with being too casual and things like that.
00:23:30But I think also what, if you call him like God or the way people, not talking about us,
00:23:39talking about like other people, if you, if they see God, it may see him like in this
00:23:44old man in the sky, that it's not, but if you say father, my heavenly father, and I do
00:23:54call him Abba occasionally, but when I pray, I do say father because Yeshua called him father.
00:24:00And Abba, yeah, exactly.
00:24:05I think that to me justifies it that you can.
00:24:10I think before I used to say, I used to say just God before when I wasn't too close to
00:24:15him when I prayed, but now that I'm closer to him, I call him father.
00:24:20I'm not, again, this is not an argument of whether this, that, or the other, right?
00:24:26I mean, we're just having a discussion, right?
00:24:29But if you guys heard me before in the past, I like to use the father-son analogy a lot.
00:24:36Now, if you have, if you, if the ones of us who've had a good father in their lives, it's
00:24:43easier to understand God, in my opinion, because your father, earthly father, being a good father,
00:24:52he has loved you, and he has instructed you, and he has disciplined you.
00:24:58The scriptures are very clear on that same thing, that God loves you, he gives you instructions,
00:25:05and sometimes he disciplines you, and he disciplines you because he loves you.
00:25:10So, to me, calling him father is that sense, too, but I think it relates a lot to my relationship
00:25:17between me and my earthly father, like, yes, I'm, I'm older, and he's older, but to this
00:25:22day, I don't want to embarrass or disappoint my dad, my father, so in the same way, when
00:25:29I think about my heavenly father, I also don't want to disappoint him and embarrass him either.
00:25:36To me, that kind of makes sense, just a thought, but I'll leave it there before we get off course.
00:25:43My take, I'm sorry.
00:25:46No, go ahead, Daniel.
00:25:48My take is, I'll say Hashem in public, but I won't say Hashem in private.
00:25:54I say Abba in private, because, you know, when you talk to God, when you're having a personal
00:26:01prayer life with, and even Yeshua taught the Lord's prayer typically, which was actually
00:26:08a form of the Amidah, but a prayer, but he said, Father, my Father who art in heaven,
00:26:17hallowed be thy name, and, and he, it goes on, but he says, my Father, in all his prayers,
00:26:25he's talking to the Father, and, and I look at it like it's a personal thing, because, I
00:26:34mean, even Yeshua did it in public, but he was the Father in the flesh, so he had that, he
00:26:43had that, he had that glory about him, that he could do such things, but I think, you look
00:26:52at the disciples after Yeshua died, and was resurrected, and, and ascended, they didn't
00:27:00go around saying the Father this, and the Father that, they didn't say that, they said
00:27:05Yeshua, or Hashem, or something along that lines, they wouldn't say my Father, so and
00:27:14so, I mean, you look, look at Acts, and beyond, and after Yeshua had ascended, you'll see what
00:27:21I'm talking about, but, I say Hashem, because, you know, of course, the name Yud-Hev has so
00:27:29many different renderings to it, and I don't want to drag it under, that's my conviction,
00:27:36I don't want to drag the name.
00:27:37I've been in churches that, I've, I've heard people praying in churches, uh, uh, Papa, they'll
00:27:43call him Papa, or Daddy God, or, you know, and it's.
00:27:47Yeah, that's a no-no there.
00:27:49Yeah, it's, it's a little too nicknamic.
00:27:52That's why I wanted to keep it in private.
00:27:55Yeah, yeah, I think, you know, what Paolo was saying about how it's not really so much
00:28:00the name that you're using, you know, or the label title, I mean, all of these things we're
00:28:04talking about are titles, rather than a name like we normally think of it.
00:28:09It's not so much that the title that you're choosing to use, but the attitude behind it.
00:28:14Yeah.
00:28:15So, if somebody is calling God Daddy, in the sense that they're appealing to an authority
00:28:22figure who loves them, and they're trying to humble themselves in, in that kind of attitude,
00:28:27I don't think that's a problem.
00:28:29It's a problem in a church setting, though, Jay, because it's appropriating a personal
00:28:36relationship in a public form.
00:28:40Yeah, there's a chance that, that that's some kind of, a bit of showmanship, saying, look,
00:28:46look how, look at this special relationship I have with God.
00:28:49Yeah, there's certainly that kind of danger.
00:28:52Okay, so, have we exhausted God being concealed or concealing things?
00:28:57Probably not, but we should move.
00:29:00Okay, all right, so, verses four and five, the silver and the dross.
00:29:08Yeah, when I, when I spread that one, what came to mind, first thing that came to mind was
00:29:15King Josiah, and how he removed all the wickedness from the kingdom, he's considered the most righteous
00:29:26king, correct?
00:29:29In 2 Kings chapter 23, verses 11 through 14, I think, I'm not going to read it, but it goes
00:29:36down on, on everything that, all the things that he removed, and so on.
00:29:41And then in chapter, in verse 25, it says, and like unto him, there was no king before him
00:29:48that turned to the Lord, to Yahweh, with all his heart, with all his soul, and with all
00:29:54his might, according to all the law of Moses, neither after him arose there any like him.
00:30:00So that's kind of what it reminded me, when I saw that, and it's kind of the same thing
00:30:06in our lives, whenever we remove that stuff from us, then there's no room for that, so we have
00:30:15righteousness in our lives, but it reminded me that of King Josiah, and his wife, removing all the bad
00:30:22stuff from the kingdom.
00:30:25Yeah, and that is the, the, you know, the immediate context of what Solomon is saying
00:30:31here, is in the court of the king, and yeah, not just his court, but the whole nation.
00:30:37If he wants to have a peaceful and prosperous kingdom, then, you know, get rid of the dross,
00:30:43and the dross is the, the idolatry, the, the corruption in, in the courts.
00:30:48Yeah, and other kings tried to do it.
00:30:50Even Josiah didn't, didn't really finish the job.
00:30:53He still left some of the high places.
00:30:57But that, to me, when I, when I read that, too, it kind of takes, and I don't want to
00:31:02get complacent, but it does take the pressure off, because I think, I think you, you mentioned
00:31:09this, Jay, in one of your, you know, YouTube videos, where, you know, God doesn't
00:31:18expect you to be perfect.
00:31:20He just wants you to try to be perfect, but he knows you can't be perfect, in that sense,
00:31:27right?
00:31:28And that, you know, things that some people, and I know, because I'm around them, they
00:31:33stress themselves out to get everything so right, sometimes, on, on the little things,
00:31:42as they read the scriptures.
00:31:45For those of us who are new to unleavened bread, you know, we, we may take that a little bit
00:31:50too extreme, on throwing away certain things that may not be thrown away, or things like
00:31:55that, you know, or freak out if you just touch something leavened, but you don't eat it, or
00:32:01things like that.
00:32:02And, and when those things happen, I just remind them, it's like, look, you know, we're
00:32:09still, for some of us, we're still babies and little children, walking into faith, we're
00:32:15not going to get it overnight.
00:32:17Like, you know, don't stress yourself out, like a good father, earthly father, looks after
00:32:22his children, and is just happy that they're trying to be obedient, even if they don't get
00:32:27it right, you know, so it's, so it's, so it's God the same way, and King Josiah, he didn't
00:32:34get it all, everything right, but he was still seen as righteous, which tells you that you
00:32:40don't have to be perfect, but seeing that you're consistently trying to seek after his
00:32:49ways, and that's what happens when you are in love with someone, like truly enough, is
00:32:56you, regardless of how many times that person fails you, you keep encouraging that person
00:33:04to do better the next time, and here King Josiah did a lot of good things, and yes, he didn't
00:33:13get it all right, but he was still considered as righteous, and I think that gives, that shows
00:33:19how graceful and merciful the father is, and hopefully, and I think we need to talk about
00:33:25that some more, understanding and always pointing out, that doesn't give you a get out of jail
00:33:31free card to be a scoffer at his ways, but understand that, look, whatever you did in the
00:33:39past, it's in the past, yes, are there ramifications from that, you know, absolutely, but, you know,
00:33:48you can rest in him, knowing that those things are in the past, and that you can start walking
00:33:54with him in righteousness, and you may stumble a little bit, but that's okay, the whole point
00:34:01of it is to keep moving forward, walking side by side with him, knowing that he's slightly
00:34:07walking in front of you, not leaving you behind, and removing that frost from your heart.
00:34:15Yeah, and it is a, it can be a long process, I mean, it's definitely a lifelong process.
00:34:20Sure.
00:34:21Yeah, even if you, if you talk about literal silver, it doesn't matter how long you keep
00:34:27the silver in the furnace, it will never be totally 100% pure.
00:34:31As long as the silver is on this earth, and not in a, you know, a sealed vacuum, it's
00:34:38going to keep getting impurities, even as you remove impurities, it's going to get some
00:34:42more, you know, it's just going to absorb things from the air, and from the fuel you're
00:34:47using to heat it, or from the container that it's in, there's always going to be
00:34:50something, and yeah, there's a goal, God has given us a target to aim for, and, you know,
00:34:58like Romans, what is it, Romans 10, 4, that talks about how Yeshua is the end of the law.
00:35:03It's not talking about the termination of the law, but the focus, the main point, but
00:35:09also the target, or the aim of the law, and part of what we can take from that is that
00:35:15keeping the law is moving us closer to him, closer to becoming like him, so that Yeshua is
00:35:22the goal of keeping God's commandments, not the Yeshua, the person, but Yeshua in us, or
00:35:28us becoming more like him, if that makes sense.
00:35:32Yeah, I was thinking the same thing, the whole aim, what you're aiming for matters, it matters
00:35:40to God, and I think that's why we see kings like Josiah, who didn't get it all right, and
00:35:50so many other, there's so many other examples, I was reading some of the stories just in the
00:35:55last week thinking, so many examples of people not getting it right, and God says, God either
00:36:02chooses them, or says something good about them, and it's just, it's a blessing to know
00:36:09that, but it's also about where their heart was, and the direction they were headed, and
00:36:15trying to go, and their intent of continuing to pursue that, versus that straddling the
00:36:24fence kind of thing, that we know is not acceptable to him.
00:36:29Yeah, I think this proverb also still applies in the public sphere today.
00:36:34You know, in our culture, it's not generally considered acceptable when a new leader comes in
00:36:43to purge all the, all of the old people from the old regime.
00:36:49That's just generally not something that, that we do in America, or in the United States
00:36:54of America, I should say, but historically, that's how most countries operate.
00:36:58When you get a new ruler, he kicks out all the old guy's people, in part because he needs
00:37:03his own people to be loyal, and they're going to be loyal if he appoints them, and he knows
00:37:08that he can trust them, but there is, even in, in a so-called democracy, there is a call
00:37:17for that kind of thing sometimes, you know, when, when all of your courts, and all of your
00:37:22appointed officials are corrupt, if you've got the opportunity, get rid of them.
00:37:28Might have some chaos for a while, but I think it'll be worth it.
00:37:32You know, we've had presidents who have tried to get rid of, or to, to clean house over
00:37:39a period of time, you know, one in just recent memory.
00:37:42You mean draining the swamp?
00:37:44Yeah, something like that.
00:37:46Right, with a flag.
00:37:48If, yeah, if, if you've got a swamp to drain, and all you do is pull a bathtub plug, you're
00:37:53not going to get anywhere.
00:37:54You, you're, you're going to need bulldozers, and some demolition equipment, and some industrial
00:38:00pumps, because there's, there's a lot of effluvia in that swamp.
00:38:07You can look that one up.
00:38:08That one's in the dictionary.
00:38:09What's it say?
00:38:10Is that a word?
00:38:11Yeah, it's not a polite word.
00:38:12I noticed something, too.
00:38:15The draws from the silver, we come with the heart.
00:38:17There's a scripture, it says, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.
00:38:21So, whatever's in our heart comes out of our mouths.
00:38:26So, our mouths can be a vessel for good or evil, depending on how much dross we've got
00:38:32in our hearts.
00:38:34Yeah, and it is important to let God clean all that dross out.
00:38:38Yeah.
00:38:38And we complain about the hard things that come in life, but God sends them for a reason.
00:38:44Yeah.
00:38:44You know, not everything bad that happens to you is God trying to help, trying to build
00:38:49your character.
00:38:49A lot of bad things that happen are just, you know, other people being evil.
00:38:54But God does use that, use all the bad stuff in life to help develop you into who he needs
00:39:00you to be.
00:39:01He can use all that bad stuff if you trust him.
00:39:04And it can be painful, but, you know, that's where trust comes in.
00:39:09Amen.
00:39:09There's a passage from Isaiah that I wanted to reference here, from Isaiah chapter 1, and
00:39:16he's talking about Judah and how Judah has become corrupt.
00:39:21He says, see how the faithful city has become a prostitute.
00:39:25She once was full of justice, righteousness used to dwell in her, but now murderers.
00:39:31Your silver has become dross.
00:39:32Your choice wine is diluted with water.
00:39:34Your rulers are rebels, partners with thieves.
00:39:37They all love bribes and chase after gifts.
00:39:39They do not defend the cause of the fatherless.
00:39:41The widow's case does not come before them.
00:39:44Therefore, Yahweh, therefore, Adonai, Yahweh Almighty, the mighty one of Israel declares,
00:39:50Ah, I will vent my wrath on my foes and avenge myself on my enemies.
00:39:55I will turn my hand against you.
00:39:57I will thoroughly purge away your dross and remove all your impurities.
00:40:01I will restore your leaders as in days of old, your rulers at the beginning.
00:40:05Afterward, you will be called the city of righteousness, the faithful city.
00:40:10And God was promising that he was going to send some very hard times on Israel, or on
00:40:15Judah in this case.
00:40:17That there would be war, there would be famine, all kinds of terrible things were going to
00:40:22happen because Jerusalem, the people and the rulers had abandoned God.
00:40:28And so he wasn't going to abandon them, but he was going to turn away from them for a while.
00:40:33In effect, he was going to hide himself so that he could burn away some of their dross.
00:40:40And God will always preserve a remnant of his people.
00:40:43He will never completely destroy Jacob.
00:40:47But he will put a fire under them and burn a whole lot of them away until he's got a faithful
00:40:53remnant again.
00:40:55Sort of like the 40 years in the desert.
00:40:57Yeah.
00:40:58Yeah.
00:40:58All the time in Egypt, really.
00:40:59I mean, I think that all that time of slavery was God burning away some dross.
00:41:04He was building Israel into a people that he could have a relationship with.
00:41:09In the wilderness was teaching them about that relationship after he had, you know, purified
00:41:15them somewhat.
00:41:16Of course, then they go into Canaan and, you know, they're dumped into the trash heap again.
00:41:21That makes me think all the stories we read about them and the time in the wilderness.
00:41:28What the heck were they like before?
00:41:33Like for him to be like saying, okay, now I can use now I can like make these people my
00:41:39people.
00:41:40I'm like, if he was using slavery, their slave enslavement to like try to burn off some
00:41:46dross, I'm like, how corrupted have they gotten?
00:41:52Not suggesting that we don't live with the same kind of problems.
00:41:55We're living in the same world, but it's just kind of interesting to kind of see it that
00:42:01way.
00:42:02Yeah.
00:42:03Yeah.
00:42:03That's, I think that's true of everybody that God uses, you know, all of anybody that
00:42:09God sends on a mission, whether it's, you know, a people or an individual or an organization
00:42:14or whatever it is, don't look too closely because you're not going to like what you
00:42:20find if you look too closely, but God can still use them despite all of those flaws.
00:42:25Yeah, absolutely.
00:42:28I think that's another good reason like to really think about like a lot of the things
00:42:33that Yeshua said, but also the standard that God has for us.
00:42:38And because when we start to like judge other people by those standards, we also have to
00:42:47judge ourselves by those standards.
00:42:49So if we, you know, if we're watching other people too closely and judging them by God's
00:42:55standards, and we're forgetting to do that to ourselves, and then it can, it can be a real
00:43:00hot mess of not wanting to see them as people who are doing God's work.
00:43:08Yep.
00:43:09Yeah, I have, I have a real hard time with some, some Christian, Sunday Christian pastors.
00:43:15And I, I don't use the term Sunday Christian derogatorily.
00:43:19I just mean it as pastors who have not completely embraced God's law the way that I think they
00:43:25should.
00:43:27I need some label to refer to them.
00:43:31There are a lot of them that I really respect.
00:43:32And, you know, obviously I don't agree with them all, or they would be Saturday Christians
00:43:37instead of Sunday Christians.
00:43:40And of course I'm, I'm always right.
00:43:42Yes, you are dear.
00:43:44Yes.
00:43:45But yeah, we haven't gotten to that verse yet, Paula.
00:43:48Hey, where was I going with that?
00:43:50Not, but there are some that really rubbed me the wrong way and I don't want to name
00:43:55any names or anything, but I don't understand how they come to the conclusions.
00:44:00They do reading the same Bible.
00:44:01Like, how do you read this and then come up with this as a strategy for evangelizing, you
00:44:10know, pastors who will embrace or never openly condemn transgenderism or homosexuality, not
00:44:19because they don't think it's a sin, but because they want to bring those people into their church
00:44:23to minister to them.
00:44:24And so they will not defend those behaviors so much as attack people who are condemning
00:44:32those behaviors.
00:44:34And so it appears like they're on the opposite side.
00:44:37And I don't know their hearts.
00:44:39I mean, I can't say whether these people are saved or not saved or whatever.
00:44:43And maybe this is really something that God has told them to do.
00:44:46And it's just a matter of a different emphasis on God's word, but I can't, I mean, every
00:44:54time I interact with them, I feel like these are the enemy.
00:44:57These are, these are not God's people and they're masquerading as God's people, but I can't
00:45:03really know that.
00:45:04So it's really hard to give those people the benefit of the doubt.
00:45:08And now I don't remember what you said, Paula, that made me go down that path, but.
00:45:14I have no idea.
00:45:16So we're not going to be able to get to the whole chapter.
00:45:18I mean, we never, we never managed to talk about anything in one of these, in one of
00:45:22the Proverbs chapters, but we're going to get to even less than usual tonight, I think.
00:45:28Can I bring up two, two verses that I, I just scratched my head at.
00:45:33Sure.
00:45:35The verse about, I'm trying to find it, not going into a person's house.
00:45:40Oh, where is it?
00:45:43Yeah, I know.
00:45:44It strikes me as odd.
00:45:46I think that just means don't become too familiar.
00:45:49Yeah.
00:45:49Yeah.
00:45:50Yeah.
00:45:50But don't you want to be familiar to your, your neighbor?
00:45:54Yes and no.
00:45:56Yeah.
00:45:56I think that there, I think that there are boundaries.
00:45:59I think that being too familiar can be a problem.
00:46:06It can lead to problems.
00:46:08Yeah.
00:46:09Being too present.
00:46:11It's verse 16 and 17 are a proverb together.
00:46:16So if you find honey, eat just enough, too much of it and you will vomit.
00:46:19Seldom set foot in your neighbor's house, too much of you and they will hate you.
00:46:23And it's saying that no matter how charming you are, people don't want to see you every
00:46:28day, all day long.
00:46:29They don't want to hear you.
00:46:31They need a break.
00:46:32Yeah.
00:46:33Doesn't matter how much you like somebody, you need time away from them sometimes.
00:46:36Yeah.
00:46:37Okay.
00:46:38The other one that I had a question on is whoever sings songs to a heavy heart is like
00:46:45one who takes off a garment on a cold day and like vinegar on soda.
00:46:51I thought that would be a good thing, you know, to, to try.
00:46:56David did it to Saul.
00:46:58You were, I'm interpreting singing a song to a heavy heart as you're trying to encourage
00:47:04them.
00:47:04And yet it seems to not be a, a, a, um, a positive thing in this verse.
00:47:10Yeah.
00:47:11I'm not sure.
00:47:12There is certainly a time when, I mean, songs can definitely be encouraging and music is
00:47:18a powerful tool in it.
00:47:20It can energize you.
00:47:23It can make you sad.
00:47:24It can make you happy.
00:47:25So I don't think it's so much about just, you know, trying to encourage somebody with songs.
00:47:31I think maybe it's about being too cheerful.
00:47:35I'm trying to think of an example.
00:47:37So you're not reading it.
00:47:38You're not reading your audience is what it's saying.
00:47:41That's what you think.
00:47:42You know, if, if somebody's somebody just died in, you know, a good, a good friend, his
00:47:49wife or her husband or whatever, just died.
00:47:51And you go over to the house and you start singing carpenter songs that might just really
00:47:56irritate them.
00:47:57Can't you see that I'm in mourning here?
00:47:59Why are you singing about rainbows and butterflies?
00:48:03Yeah.
00:48:03You just have to know the person I think in the situation and what, what kind of cheer
00:48:09or if you waltz into their house and you say, wow, what a beautiful day it is.
00:48:13Have some cookies.
00:48:14It's like, don't you know that, you know, my spouse just died.
00:48:18I think that's really what it's getting at.
00:48:21Yeah.
00:48:21And I don't think it's, yeah, I don't think, I don't think it's saying encouraging someone
00:48:25is not, is wrong.
00:48:28It's definitely more like, you know, the reading the room thing.
00:48:32It's, it's much more about like, know who you are.
00:48:35I hadn't thought of it that way.
00:48:36That's a good way of, of couching it.
00:48:39So thank you.
00:48:40And Carlos, were there any particular proverbs in here that you wanted to talk about?
00:48:45Yeah.
00:48:45I mean, back up top there, just going on pace with it is six and seven.
00:48:52Do not put yourself forward in the King's presence or stand in the place of the great.
00:48:58Where it's better to be told, come up here than to be put lower in the presence of the
00:49:03noble.
00:49:04Now I, I try to, in the workplace in corporate America, it's not always the easiest to be
00:49:14living in, trying to live in righteousness and trying to live in that world.
00:49:21Very worldly, right?
00:49:22Especially if you have to go into the office and all these, you deal with a lot of different
00:49:27characters and personalities and cultures and things like that.
00:49:30And we've all heard the phrase like, you know, moving up the corporate ladder.
00:49:35And if anybody's been in corporate America for a certain period of time, it's not just about
00:49:42doing good work.
00:49:43Like you can be the best at your job and still not move up the corporate ladder.
00:49:51It requires much more than just being good at your job.
00:49:55It's going above and beyond, which is a famous phrase, but it's also, you have to be part of
00:50:02that inner circle.
00:50:04You have to.
00:50:05Um, and I always keep forgetting, I think, because I dislike this so much and I always
00:50:10forget my bosses used to tell me this all the time.
00:50:14Um, I know if, if Danielle was here, she'll remember what it is, but they will always tell
00:50:21me like, you have to be seen something like that.
00:50:25You have to be, people have to see you.
00:50:28And I'm like, well, what else do they need to see me as?
00:50:32I mean, I do the job, you know, like really well.
00:50:36I'm, I'm always on time.
00:50:38I come below budget, all, all these things.
00:50:41Right.
00:50:41But they still, you still need more, right?
00:50:44So you have to do all these extra projects and you have to do all these social projects
00:50:49as well.
00:50:51Um, all these employee resource groups and all these things in order for people to constantly
00:50:55see you in order to do that.
00:50:57So it's different.
00:50:58You have to put yourself in front of the King consistently in order for, for them to see
00:51:05you, which is just the total opposite of what this is.
00:51:09And when I've read this, I've, you know, I've taken it to heart.
00:51:14So I'm, I, I don't do that at work.
00:51:17I don't put myself in front of the King and all these other things.
00:51:21So because of that, you can argue that my career probably hasn't gone as forth as,
00:51:27others, but you know, we've had multiple layoffs at work in the last few years and I'm still
00:51:34there.
00:51:35Right.
00:51:35And I'm still just, you know, got a new role or whatever.
00:51:40And, and even if I may not understand, even if I see the world go in a certain way, I still
00:51:51try to stick to the scriptures.
00:51:52Because if it says that not to put yourself in front of the King instead, instead it's
00:51:57better to be called to me.
00:51:59That's, that's better.
00:52:00Now it doesn't mean that you don't have to open your mouth and say, Hey, I'm interested
00:52:05in another role or anything like that.
00:52:07But it's, you shouldn't be like, Hey, look at me, you know, like constantly trying to
00:52:13do that.
00:52:14And I think, I think there, one of the things that you said is that I can't remember the
00:52:22exact word you used, Jake, but ambiguous probably you said that we have to work through things.
00:52:27And I've thought about Esther when I read these verses, how she actually, part of the law was
00:52:37not to put yourself in front of the King is to wait, but she didn't do that.
00:52:42Right.
00:52:43You know, she had and did it anyway.
00:52:45And through that engagement, she ended up saving her people.
00:52:51Right.
00:52:52So that came from a little push from her uncle, was it all Mordecai saying, Hey, look, if you
00:53:00don't do this, you may not even be able to make it either out of this way for the King
00:53:08to allow her to approach him.
00:53:12She did have to wait for him to extend his, his, his hand or rod or something like that.
00:53:17But she, but to my understanding, she wasn't even, it was supposed to be seen, but she
00:53:23at least made her presence known.
00:53:25And then the King called her over, but she wasn't even supposed to do that.
00:53:29So I guess what I'm saying is that there's this discernment and that there's a certain
00:53:34type of action that you need to take on these things.
00:53:39So that's what I thought when I read those two faces, like that she came up to the mind
00:53:45quickly.
00:53:46Yeah.
00:53:47Yeah.
00:53:47Yeah.
00:53:48That's a good connection.
00:53:49I don't think there's anything necessarily wrong with ambition or, you know, wanting to
00:53:54get ahead.
00:53:55And part of the key here is, you know, just being humble.
00:53:59And I don't think that humility necessarily means thinking less of yourself or always pretending
00:54:06to be less than who you are, but knowing who you are and what your position is.
00:54:11And in the case with Esther, she knew it was not her place to go barge into the King's
00:54:16throne room, but she also knew that God had put her in a position where if she didn't
00:54:21do that, people were going to suffer.
00:54:23So she had to humble herself to, you know, get over her fears, which, you know, it's a
00:54:29different kind of humility.
00:54:30It might look like pride in the eyes of some people, but it actually is humility because
00:54:35she, she put her own, her own life below that of others.
00:54:40You know, one thing I was thinking, you know, in the workplace, I know for a long time, my
00:54:47name got in front of a lot of people at work, not because I wanted it to, but because of the
00:54:53thing that, you know, my area of expertise was just very high visibility.
00:54:58And so all the directors, all the managers, they all know, knew who I was and, you know,
00:55:03they would contact me directly.
00:55:06And, you know, I've moved into a role where I'm a little more removed from the end users.
00:55:10So I don't, I don't have that direct contact anymore, but they all still know me.
00:55:16They all still know my name.
00:55:17And, you know, I get, I get assigned these, you know, are in the ticketing system, you
00:55:22know, when you've got a problem, you call the help desk, they, they create a ticket in
00:55:26the software and they assign it to a work ticket, if you know what I mean.
00:55:31And so I get assigned a lot of those things to do some work on it.
00:55:35And, you know, in the notes, I'll, you know, I'll put in whatever I think the solution is
00:55:41or what I think they need to do to fix it.
00:55:43And at the bottom, I'll, I'll put my name and my job title in.
00:55:47So not only do people know who added these notes, but also the people who matter further
00:55:53down the line, when they need to know who solved the problem, my name will be there.
00:55:58They'll be able to find it if they're looking for it, but I'm not going to go around in
00:56:03saying, send an email to the vice chancellor at the university and say, Hey, you know what
00:56:08I did this week?
00:56:10Because I don't, I don't think he would care.
00:56:13That would also never happen.
00:56:14And that's, I think that's the word that I was looking for that they told me so, you
00:56:23know, visibility, that's the word.
00:56:25And so we'll say, Hey man, here's a project.
00:56:28It'll be good for you.
00:56:29It'll be high visibility.
00:56:30Now they weren't the Kings, but they were the Kings men and they came, would come to
00:56:36me and say, Hey, do this.
00:56:38So it'll give you good visibility.
00:56:40That's different because the King may not be calling you, but the Kings men are the one
00:56:44calling you.
00:56:44And eventually the King ends up seeing you or your boss, right?
00:56:47Your manager, whatever the director, because of those things.
00:56:51So maybe I didn't make myself clear is that, and you said it, Jay, it doesn't mean you don't
00:56:58have to be ambitious in all these things.
00:57:00I guess what I'm saying is, you know, you don't have to put in, because some people at
00:57:04work will, you can literally see that they're trying really hard to put themselves in front
00:57:09of the King.
00:57:10Right.
00:57:11You know, look at me while others, it may be a slower progression, but I think a more
00:57:17stable progression as the scriptures, I think, you know, allude to that, where it's just better
00:57:22to be called and then you execute and you perform to that duty.
00:57:27And then that's better than trying to insert yourself where you shouldn't be just to be seen.
00:57:36Yep.
00:57:37Yeah.
00:57:38I used to, I've, I've been telling a lot of
00:57:41work stories the last few weeks, but I used to work with another systems administrator
00:57:45in, not in my department, in another department where we, we actually had to work together
00:57:50on, on a number of projects.
00:57:52And this person had lots of certifications, a degree, I think a master's degree in information
00:58:00technology had been working for the university for 15, 20 years and was always telling people
00:58:09how much they knew.
00:58:10I've been here this long.
00:58:12I know all these systems.
00:58:13I know all these people.
00:58:14And in that department, this person was everybody, everybody was afraid of them.
00:58:21Like this person knows everything and they will shut you down if you say something stupid.
00:58:28And the director of that department, any IT questions that he had, he would go to this
00:58:35person, would not listen to anybody else because this person was constantly telling the director
00:58:41how much they knew compared to everybody else.
00:58:45Nobody else knows what they're doing.
00:58:48Everybody else is incompetent.
00:58:50And that got them a long ways.
00:58:53They kept that job for a long time.
00:58:56But then when that director retired and somebody else who knew what this person was doing from
00:59:02the outside was observing this for years, when that person took over the department,
00:59:07that person was the first one to go.
00:59:11That kind of behavior, even if you fool some people, you're not going to fool everybody
00:59:16by making yourself, you know, putting yourself in front of the king and making yourself look
00:59:20bigger than you really are.
00:59:22Other people are going to see it and it's going to come back to you.
00:59:25I took that verse a little bit differently.
00:59:28Um, I know that advice is sometimes appreciated, but unasked advice usually isn't appreciated.
00:59:42So if the king is seeking input and it talks about, let's see, when he says, come here,
00:59:50well, then he's looking for your input.
00:59:56He may not use it, but at least it shows that he'll ponder it.
01:00:01Whereas unasked for advice is a, um, well, it's going to be frustrating you because you,
01:00:08you know, it all.
01:00:09And I was like, Hey, I, all you need to do is this, but it could also be very embarrassing
01:00:16to have your advice be on, uh, not followed outlines where exactly you stand, you know?
01:00:27Yeah, that's good.
01:00:27I hadn't thought of it that way, but that's true.
01:00:30Anyone got another one they want to talk about before we wrap it up?
01:00:33I'm not in a rush to get out.
01:00:35So I just don't want to keep everybody longer than you want to be here.
01:00:38Last one for me and kind of a, one that I've been trying to practice for a while and it's
01:00:48verse 15 and it says with patience, the ruler may be persuaded and a soft tongue will break
01:00:54a bone, but through Proverbs, it does speak about being gentle on the way you speak, regardless
01:01:03of how you're being spoken to and I've been working on that for many years.
01:01:10Not that I'm hard to talk to, or that I'm rough when I try to express myself or anything like that.
01:01:18At least I didn't think so, but maybe because my tone or sternness or my directness, or maybe
01:01:27even lack of empathy or something like that, that it may come out too strong, maybe.
01:01:32But I've been working on just being a lot palmer and gentler with my, the way I speak, especially
01:01:41at work and learning not to say more than I should, even if my flesh feels like saying
01:01:52more.
01:01:53And I do the same thing even in my own household.
01:01:57I try to do that when I speak to the wife, the kids, my parents, and just being really
01:02:03gentle in the way I speak and not showing my frustration, but not, not like an act.
01:02:10I've been like, I've been praying for that as well, that he may make my heart, you know,
01:02:18a little bit more gentle and calm because I thought, you know, I think because of my
01:02:25life experiences and my past, I think that I've just came to the point where I was always
01:02:32like wired all the time.
01:02:34And I think that feeling of being wired all the time, like always had to be like full blown
01:02:41energy sometimes, and it just would come out the wrong way.
01:02:46And of course, the one who knows you better is your, your wife.
01:02:50So she will point those things out.
01:02:52And I'm like, yeah, I can totally see that, but I will get upset because I don't mean it
01:02:59that way.
01:03:00That's not, it's not, it's not my heart to be that way.
01:03:03But like I always say, it's, it's, it's what people perceive like perception is so important.
01:03:12So that when I read that in the Proverbs verses, just like that, I've come into proof in the
01:03:22last probably year, like I've been working for a year, but the last year I've been seeing
01:03:28the results of me being calm and patient and not raising my voice and not looking frustrated
01:03:36and being gentle and picking my words correctly.
01:03:39And I'm seeing how the other person, it happened today, like somebody just thanked me for getting
01:03:47back to them.
01:03:49And I was just baffled by this person doing that.
01:03:54Right.
01:03:55And I've been twice today, actually.
01:03:58And then, which, you know, how corporate America is, they're cut dry.
01:04:01But this lady, she emailed me and she's like, thank you for being so nice to me.
01:04:05And I wasn't trying to be nice to her, like, in a sense of, because I'm trying to get something
01:04:13out of her or anything like that work related, right?
01:04:16But I told her, I said, well, it's easy to be nice to you, because you're a nice person
01:04:22yourself.
01:04:23But I hope that and I was speaking to myself in this, in a sense, but telling her that I
01:04:29hope that I'm nice to others, even when they're not nice to me.
01:04:33And I've worked on that the last few years, when I get back service in a restaurant, when
01:04:38somebody cuts me on the road.
01:04:41And it shows people, I think, because it doesn't matter.
01:04:47Look, you know, one thing about this community is that everybody is so well read and versed
01:04:53and compared to everybody else.
01:04:55Like, we can talk about scriptures left and right, up and down, all day long.
01:05:00And most people are not like that in other communities.
01:05:04But who cares?
01:05:08Everybody else around us, we can know the scriptures left and right.
01:05:11It doesn't matter.
01:05:12I'm telling you right now, guys.
01:05:14It doesn't matter unless we speak with gentleness, with steadfast love, with kindness, being
01:05:22merciful, forgiving people.
01:05:25Like, those things are so much more valuable.
01:05:30And it touches the heart more of people.
01:05:32And it really shows Yeshua more than me telling you all the other things that us in this community
01:05:40hold tight to, and some of them hold tight to the point that it squeezes out everything
01:05:47else, right?
01:05:49And I mean this word, there's this beautiful balance of the letter of the law, but spirit
01:05:57of the law as well.
01:05:59And being able to merge both of them together in that manner.
01:06:05And that is a very conscious action that we all have to, like, pursue every day.
01:06:14Because I think it's great that we're all here together.
01:06:18I mean, it's so important that even if we know the scriptures as well as we do in comparison
01:06:26to what we may think other people do.
01:06:28Like, you were talking about, Jay.
01:06:29Like, I don't understand.
01:06:30And I think me and you have had these comments, like, I just don't get it, why they don't
01:06:35see it.
01:06:35Because finally, when I just read it myself, I got it.
01:06:39And I'm not, and I'm nothing special.
01:06:42So I just don't understand why other people don't get it either.
01:06:45But, you know, it's them seeing, seeing you change in time through the word.
01:06:52And just being so loving to everyone and not being, seeing that, depending on who you are,
01:06:59being flustered on things.
01:07:02And seeing that there's this change in your heart and in your ways and letting things go.
01:07:09And, you know, it does take time for others.
01:07:11But that is going to draw people more over your way than anything else you can do.
01:07:21It doesn't matter, right?
01:07:22Like, for me, it does, because I just don't, I'm maybe less emotional.
01:07:28But if you give me scriptures, and you just tell me, just listen to me, man, hear this,
01:07:33and I think about it.
01:07:34Yeah, that's attractive to me.
01:07:36You know, the kindness part, of course it is, but not, maybe not as much.
01:07:40Or maybe, hopefully, there's a balance there.
01:07:42But for everybody else, it's just being so, like, loving and kind with your words.
01:07:49And I think I was, while I was going through the words, through the scriptures back and forth,
01:07:57there's, I can't remember where I was at, but I think it was, let me see if I can quickly find it.
01:08:02No, I'm not going to find it.
01:08:04But it was saying something about, that we have to encourage each other.
01:08:11Encourage each other.
01:08:12Yeah, go to verse 12.
01:08:14You just outlined verse 12.
01:08:16Okay.
01:08:17Like a gold ring or an ornament of gold is a wise reprover to a listening ear.
01:08:22That's really kind of just what you said.
01:08:27So, anyway.
01:08:30Yeah.
01:08:31Yeah, it says 11 and 12.
01:08:33Yeah, it's 11 and 12.
01:08:35Yeah.
01:08:35Yeah, they are kind of like mirror images of each other, where the first one is saying a word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in a setting of silver.
01:08:43Right.
01:08:44So, this is, this is a wise or encouraging word.
01:08:49And then on the other side, like a gold ring or an ornament of gold is a wise reprover to a listening ear.
01:08:55Verse 11 was talking about, you know, the person bringing the words was beautiful to the one hearing.
01:09:03And then in the second one, it was the one who's willing to hear who was beautiful to the one speaking.
01:09:08That's still true that, you know, someone who is receptive to good advice is, that's like a cold drink of water, you know, to borrow another one of the proverbs in this chapter.
01:09:20Someone who will actually hear you when you've got something to say to them versus someone who just gets mad or misunderstands you or assumes that you're saying something.
01:09:30But I'm not sure why I read that verse backwards.
01:09:34Maybe that's just what I needed to learn.
01:09:36I don't know.
01:09:38But yet, what you're saying also reminded me of James 3, where he talks about how the, you know, the tongue is like a rudder that steers a ship and it can steer you straight into the rocks.
01:09:50I don't think he says it that way exactly.
01:09:53But he says,
01:09:53He says, all kinds of animals, birds and reptiles are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind.
01:10:00No human being can tame the tongue.
01:10:02It's a restless evil full of deadly poison.
01:10:05He was being hyperbolic there.
01:10:06I mean, because he goes on in the next few verses to talk about taming the tongue.
01:10:11So it is possible to tame the tongue, but it's hard work.
01:10:14It's really difficult.
01:10:16But this idea that the tongue is full of deadly poison, poisons are also medicines.
01:10:23You know, too much of something is poison.
01:10:25But in the right amount at the right time, it's a medicine that can heal or bring peace.
01:10:31Though when you do tame that tongue, you know, like when it's talking about in Proverbs 15 about, you know, through patience, a ruler may be persuaded and a soft tongue can break a bone.
01:10:44It's talking about it in a good way.
01:10:46You know, it's not talking about you can use gentle words to hurt people.
01:10:49That's not the point.
01:10:51The point is there's power in a gentle word.
01:10:54And if there is power in a word harshly spoken, there is also power of a different kind in a word gently spoken at the right time.
01:11:03Well, I'll tell you from experience that I have at times shut down and chosen not to speak a word because I did not wish to provoke or antagonize or create a difficult situation.
01:11:29And unfortunately, that in and of itself was creating a situation.
01:11:38But it would have been worse if you would have spoken properly.
01:11:42What's that?
01:11:44But if you would have spoken, it may have been worse if you would have said something.
01:11:49Well, that's why I was...
01:11:50If you were quiet, it was painful.
01:11:52Yeah.
01:11:52If you said something, it might have been worse.
01:11:54Yeah.
01:11:55That's what I was trying to avoid.
01:11:57And sometimes that's misinterpreted as you're shutting down, you don't care, you're not responding to my need, you know.
01:12:09Yep.
01:12:10So I don't know how that interplays with it, but it does to a degree because it's talking about soft words.
01:12:17And if you don't use words, it can be a negative thing.
01:12:22So I'm thinking it's saying, yeah, sometimes you just need to speak gently and rather than to be silent.
01:12:32I don't know how to do that sometimes.
01:12:34That's why I'd be silent, you know.
01:12:36Well, it takes practice to do that, for sure.
01:12:41I'm still learning.
01:12:42I just wanted to say that as a sense of encouragement, but, you know, I don't know who may need that as listening, but it's just better to be self-spoken and gentle.
01:12:54There's no need.
01:12:55I was thinking about that the other day.
01:12:57I think you have two choices.
01:12:58You can either speak gently or walk away with the silence, and I think that's fine.
01:13:03I think the scriptures may even say, I can't think on the top of my head, but I think there's time just to be, not to say anything.
01:13:09I'm sure, I think that's your two options, but saying nasty, mean things, that's not the right thing.
01:13:19And that's not my character either.
01:13:20I don't say those things anyway, but I think for me, it's just, you can see the frustration in me, even if I wasn't saying bad things.
01:13:32So, taking it even a step further of, you know, not showing the frustration and saying kind words, or not kind words, but soft words.
01:13:45When somebody is cursing you out, what soft words can you say?
01:13:52It's not the easiest thing to do.
01:13:55You have to say it on the fly.
01:13:59You can't say, well, I'm up to, or something like that, you know, to somebody that's just cutting you on the side of the road, right?
01:14:05Because that would sound sarcastic.
01:14:08And that's not something that I would say, honestly.
01:14:10Somebody cuts me on the side of the road, gives me the finger, it would be normal for me to say, well, I love you too.
01:14:17So, you know, you can feel the sarcasm just oozing out of me, right?
01:14:22Because I like sarcasm.
01:14:23I think it's just hilarious to see as a sense of comedy.
01:14:26But, you know, somebody in front of my face, it's just better not to say that.
01:14:31It's just better to maybe say, my apology, I didn't see you there.
01:14:35You know, even if that's not the case.
01:14:38Even if that is that person's fault.
01:14:41But there's discernment that goes through that, and we can be all day talking about those things.
01:14:45But I think, take the high road, in other words, of just being gentle and kind and not let them see your frustration.
01:14:53Because we're supposed to, and that's the thing, like, there's so much responsibility.
01:15:00I've thought about this.
01:15:02There's so much responsibility once we make that covenant with him, and we've decided to take that word into our hearts and into our minds.
01:15:12Because we're being put under a microscope, right?
01:15:15People constantly saying, oh, well, you know, you think you're high and mighty.
01:15:21How many times have I said that I'm not?
01:15:23You know, like, I'm not.
01:15:25I'm the least.
01:15:26A representative of him.
01:15:28And that's an awesome responsibility.
01:15:31Yeah.
01:15:32It's awesome.
01:15:32And intimidating responsibility, too.
01:15:35Intimidating.
01:15:35Yeah.
01:15:36I mean, very, very fearful.
01:15:39Because you don't want to be a stomach block to anyone.
01:15:42So taking that seriously, you know, it's like, okay, I need to be my, my, P's and Q's.
01:15:50But it's helped me, to be quite honest with you.
01:15:52It's not.
01:15:53But it's a wonderful thing, because if we're in him, we're supposed to have this shalom just oozing out of us at all times, right?
01:16:02Because we're in peace.
01:16:03Because if we, boy, you tell me you believe in the creator of the heavens, the earth, and the seas, right?
01:16:07That he'll be the provider of everything.
01:16:09That you will not need anything, right?
01:16:11So why are you afraid of losing your job, or the things are not going well, or what's going to happen tomorrow, or anything like that?
01:16:19You have to be in this consistent peace.
01:16:22Now, I'm human.
01:16:23That's not always the case.
01:16:25But, you know, it's better than, it's a challenging thing for all of us.
01:16:31Because, again, it doesn't matter how long my tzitzits are.
01:16:34And it doesn't matter that I carry the scriptures around all the time, wherever I go.
01:16:40But if I'm not showing or reflecting what the word says outside, then it doesn't matter.
01:16:47It doesn't matter.
01:16:48They're not going to get it.
01:16:49Like, there's less grace and mercy on them to us than the other way around, maybe.
01:16:56You were talking about poison in the tongue.
01:16:58There's something interesting.
01:17:00I was thinking about, I mean, some of the poison on the tongue.
01:17:03People poisoning other people with their tongues.
01:17:06Sometimes, Lashon, hurrah, you know, with curses.
01:17:12And I'm talking about cursing somebody out.
01:17:16And there's a Hebraic difference between curse words and profanity that we look at.
01:17:23Curse words are intended to cause harm, like saying, I wish you would, you know, so-and-so.
01:17:30Or this person is going to jump off a cliff, et cetera, et cetera.
01:17:35That's actually what the curse words actually are.
01:17:37But what we speak, we call curse words, is profanity.
01:17:42It's crude.
01:17:43It's not holy.
01:17:45It's not a holy tongue that we're speaking when we're saying bad words.
01:17:50But the targeting of words, I mean, we could say something like, you know, something bad to somebody and wish ill harm on them.
01:17:59That's where you get into the curse aspect.
01:18:02Like, look at what happened with Balim.
01:18:06And he was going to curse Israel.
01:18:09He was asked to curse Israel with a powerful curse.
01:18:13He was a sorcerer, a very renowned sorcerer of that time.
01:18:19And the evil king, I think he messed him around and cursed Israel about three times.
01:18:25Instead, he blessed them three times because God had threatened to take his life if he cursed them.
01:18:31And the donkey, you know, bucked him.
01:18:35We know the story on that.
01:18:36But the cursing, the poison of the tongue, like you said, medicinal, too much medicine, it can be poison.
01:18:48If you're constantly trying to give information, helpful information, you're poisoning them because you're spoiling them.
01:18:57They're not learning things on their own.
01:18:59You only want to belay so much information that makes them search out the truth.
01:19:05That goes for even speaking the gospel or witnessing to people.
01:19:09You don't want to give them a dump in a whole bunch of information, like casting pearls before swine kind of thing,
01:19:17because you're actually poisoning their potential walk with God.
01:19:23They only need to hear about Yeshua and the gospel.
01:19:27And if they reach out, back out, and then they start learning, that's where you can continue to give them information.
01:19:35Because if not, they're going to close their hearts, they're going to close their minds, and they're not going to give an inch.
01:19:41And I've been in that boat many, many times with people.
01:19:45It's sad, but it's just the way people are.
01:19:50Yeah.
01:19:50Yeah, good word, Daniel.
01:19:52I wanted to bring up one more proverb.
01:19:55You know, Solomon had a lot to say about speech.
01:19:57It's one of the three top topics through the whole book of Proverbs.
01:20:03And this chapter is full of when to speak, when not to speak, how to speak.
01:20:09Verses 21 and 22.
01:20:12If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat.
01:20:14And if he is thirsty, give him water to drink.
01:20:16For you will heap coals of fire on his head, and Adonai will reward you.
01:20:21Got the TLV version up right now.
01:20:23Most of this chapter is about what to say and what not to say and what circumstances.
01:20:29And this is probably intended to be understood in that context, although, I mean, it certainly applies far beyond that.
01:20:36So when somebody does something evil to you, if you respond with kindness instead of in kind with evil, it says you're going to heap coals of fire on his head.
01:20:48And I've heard a couple of different explanations for that.
01:20:52You know, the first one is it's going to make him, you know, it's like a passive aggressive revenge.
01:20:57Paul quotes this in Romans.
01:21:02I think this is Romans.
01:21:04Yeah.
01:21:04In Romans chapter 12.
01:21:06And he says, don't take revenge.
01:21:08On the contrary, and then he quotes this verse, if your enemy is hungry, feed him.
01:21:13If he's thirsty, give him something to drink.
01:21:15In doing so, you will keep burning coals on his head.
01:21:18Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
01:21:21So this is clearly, at least Paul understood, that this is not talking about taking revenge.
01:21:26And I've heard other teachers say that this is about, you know, how people used to carry burdens.
01:21:32And, you know, they carry, they have a, you know, a basket or a bowl on their heads and they carry hot coals from one place to another.
01:21:40And, you know, one of the good things you can do for your enemy is you can give him some of the coals from your fire and he can take it home and, you know, he can use that in his house.
01:21:50That just doesn't fit the context of the verse.
01:21:53Because it says, by doing good to him, you will heap coals of fire on his head.
01:21:58So the coals of fire is not the good thing you're doing to him.
01:22:00And that's the result of the good thing.
01:22:03What I think it's really saying is you're going to disrupt whatever he was trying to do.
01:22:08You're going to throw him into chaos and he's not going to know how to react.
01:22:12I mean, what would you do if somebody dumped a pile of coals on your head?
01:22:15Well, you wouldn't be attacking them.
01:22:17You'd be backing up and batting the coals off your head.
01:22:20And I think Solomon's point with this verse is to say, if somebody does something evil to you, if they're trying to hurt you and you respond by being kind to them, you're going to throw them off their game.
01:22:32You're going to throw them off their attack.
01:22:34And, you know, maybe they'll get mad and attack you again.
01:22:37But there's also a good chance that they're going to stop and think, what is going on here?
01:22:42And give you a chance to have some reason, some dialogue with this person.
01:22:47Yeah.
01:22:48Well, I think it's a law, too.
01:22:50It's in the Tanakh, right?
01:22:53It's a law that tells you how to treat your enemy.
01:22:58I think you do have to.
01:22:59And all this other stuff.
01:23:00And that's a tactic that the United States used differently than everybody else.
01:23:06You know, once it became a superpower, they treated the enemy like people were.
01:23:12I think there was, I can't remember what battle, whatever.
01:23:14But I think I remember hearing, like, maybe it was in Germany, said they had to.
01:23:20They were going to give up.
01:23:21But they were like, to who, the Russians or the Americans?
01:23:24Like, no, man, let's go back that way.
01:23:28Even if we have to go further back.
01:23:30But let's just give ourselves to the Americans.
01:23:32And, you know, the allegiance that came afterwards between the Germans and the Americans afterwards, you know, it's known.
01:23:39But they, you know, they gave them all, they divulged all kinds of information after World War II, the Germans to the Americans.
01:23:46Because they knew that the Americans would treat them much better than the Russians would.
01:23:49So, makes sense.
01:23:50So, West Germany became a prosperous country, while East Germany became a third world.
01:23:56Oh.
01:23:56Yep.
01:23:57And West Germany has been one of our closest allies ever since.
01:24:01I mean, maybe not so much today as over the last 50 years, but for the last 80 years, however long it's been.
01:24:09It's a very foreign concept.
01:24:10I had my friend Tamir relayed this story to me.
01:24:16And I still, to this day, I scratch my head thinking about it.
01:24:20But he, being Jewish, applied this literally.
01:24:25He had a waitress that gave him horrible service.
01:24:28And he gave her a $50 tip.
01:24:32And I'm like, why'd you do that?
01:24:34I wanted her to think about it.
01:24:37It was a concept very different from what I, from my experience and my response.
01:24:44But it was unique, for sure.
01:24:47I have no idea if she thought about it or not.
01:24:50But definitely an interesting approach.
01:24:54Yeah.
01:24:55Yeah.
01:24:55If she was conscious of the bad service she was giving, then I'll bet she did think about that.
01:25:01Right.
01:25:02Like, if you see it, if you see it, I've done this before.
01:25:05If you see that they're just having a bad day or, you know, and they just took it out on you service-wise, I've done that.
01:25:13I've given, you know, a nice tip, which I don't know whatever happened with that, right?
01:25:19But there's times where there's this conscious effort or there's this either conscious effort or just don't care about the service.
01:25:28That's a whole different story, I think.
01:25:31Yeah.
01:25:31I wasn't there.
01:25:32I don't know the particulars, but, you know, his story intrigued me.
01:25:36Yeah, that's a great story.
01:25:37I agree.
01:25:37I agree.
01:25:38I agree.
01:25:38I agree.
01:25:42I agree.
Be the first to comment
Add your comment

Recommended

Proverbs 24 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
3 weeks ago
Proverbs 18 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
2 months ago
Proverbs 27 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
4 days ago
Proverbs 26 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
5 days ago
Proverbs 21 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
5 weeks ago
Proverbs 13 with CSBS (full length)
American Torah
2 months ago
Proverbs 19 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
7 weeks ago
Proverbs 28 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
3 days ago
Proverbs 16 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
2 months ago
Proverbs 5 with CSBS (full length)
American Torah
7 months ago
Proverbs 29 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
1 day ago
Proverbs 10 with CSBS (full length)
American Torah
3 months ago
Proverbs 17 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
2 months ago
Proverbs 20 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
6 weeks ago
James 1:19-27 with CSBS
American Torah
6 months ago
Proverbs 14 with CSBS (full length)
American Torah
2 months ago
Proverbs 15 with CSBS (full length)
American Torah
2 months ago
The Words of Whispers and Sycophants in Proverbs 26:22-23
American Torah
3 years ago
Proverbs 6 with CSBS (full length)
American Torah
7 months ago
Proverbs 30 - Who Was King Agur
American Torah
3 years ago
James 5:1-6 - Abuses of Power
American Torah
2 months ago
The Secret Things - Deuteronomy 29:29
American Torah
11 months ago
Bless, Rejoice, and Weep - Romans 12:14-15
American Torah
1 year ago
James 5:7-12 - While we wait
American Torah
2 months ago
Proverbs 30 with CSBS (full version)
American Torah
56 minutes ago