Proverbs 28: Running Away When No One Is Chasing

I remember one year during spring break a group of friend and I went on a spring break trip. We went down to the Outerbanks (Duck if I remember correctly) and we spent a couple days their before we went north to Baltimore (went to a concert) and then headed further north to the suburbs of NYC. Well anyway we thought it would be cool if we got some fire works and set them off on the beach, which is not allowed in Duck. So we found a fireworks store that sold us a really large firework from a back room. It was supposed to fire off 20 times. So we bought it. We went out to the beach late at night and we fire it off. The very moment the first one went off, we all started running. It shot up in the air probably about three stories, and made the beach look like daylight as each of the 20 shots went off. We were not being chased, but we ran anyway. The first verse in this chapter says “The wicked flee when no one pursues, but the righteous are bold as a lion.”
When you are doing what is right, you do not need to hide it. When you are acting wickedly that is when you hide what you are doing. We were doing what was wrong, and ran from absolutely nothing. We could have been without fear if we had not been guilty of doing something wrong.

Proverbs 25: Seeking Your Own Glory

Have you ever eaten to much sweet things and gotten sick? I know I have. Even worse is when you eat to many sour candy’s and your mouth and tongue are raw and read and hurt for days. Yeah, I used to have a self control issue when it came to sour candy (yeah...used to...). It is true if we eat to much of something it can often times make us sick. Well Solomon uses this as an illustration for people who are seeking their own glory. Verse 27 says “It is not good to eat much honey, nor is it glorious to seek one’s own glory.” We get sick if we eat to much honey, we also get sick in a different way if we are seeking our own glory. We get spiritually sick. We were designed to seek glory for God, not glory for ourselves.

Proverbs 20: Alcohol Can Be Dangerous

Many people drink alcohol in todays society, but it is not always a wise action. People drink to escape from life but it often makes their situation more difficult. I know that as a teenager it is a big temptation to party and drink to be cool, or because it looks like fun, but it is very dangerous. Listen to verse one of this chapter:
“Wine is a mocker and strong drink is a brawler;
whoever goes astray by them is not wise.”
Alcohol will promise one thing and give another. It often changes how you act and who you are, causing you to do things you never would of done had you been sober.

Proverbs 7: You Will Find It If You Look

We often put ourselves in a position that will cause temptation and lead to sin. We allow ourselves to be put in situations with people of the opposite gender where we are going to be tempted to sin sexually. In some ways it is like we are looking for sin, or at least trying to see how close we can come to it without falling into sin.

This does not only apply to sex, but in other areas as well. For instance, some people want to go to parties where a lot of people are drinking, yet they say they do not want to drink. This is getting dangerously close to sin. This chapter is written so that we would avoid sexual sin. It is written so that we would avoid even being tempted by such sin and instead would flee it. It might appear to be fun at the time, and sin can be seductive, but we need to run away from it.

Verses 8-9 say, "and I have seen among the simple, I have perceived among the youths, a young man lacking sense, passing along the street near her corner, taking the road to her house."

The man is heading to the prostitute's house. He is seeing how close he can get to sin, and in the end he falls into it. Let us not be like him, but instead flee from sin.

Acts 5: A Biblical Horror Story

Ever tried to lie to God? A couple observations:
1. It doesn’t work. (God is omniscient.)
2. It is dangerous. (God is all-powerful.)

These two things are something that the early church figures out rather quickly at quite a cost to a couple among them.

They sell their field and give some of the money to the church, which is not a problem. The problem is that they wanted people to think that they were giving all of the money to the church. They attempted to deceive the Apostles and God.

The problem with their plan was that God still knew. In verse 3 the Bible says, “Then Peter said, 'Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land?'”
God knew, and God revealed it to Peter.

The second problem with their plan shows the power of God. Verse 5 says, “When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard what had happened.” God killed him for his deceit. His wife dies shortly after her husband because of the same deceit.

Proverbs 28: Confess Your Sin

Verse 13 says something that we do not like to hear. “Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy.”

We like to hide our sins; we even try to hide them from God. This verse is saying instead of hiding our sins, we need to confess them, say that they are wrong, and not do them any more. 

This is a harder way to live, since in and of ourselves we would like to assign blame and make excuses. However, this verse says we will be shown mercy if we confess and forsake our sins, but bad things will happen if we dont.