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Proverbs Chapter 30
Prophecy is not merely foretelling something in the future as most of us suppose, it is speaking forth anything that comes from God. It could be a message of repentance, joy, comfort, warning or even what we think of as prophetic future events. Agur was the son of Jakeh who lived in Solomon's time. He spoke these words to Ucal and Ithiel. We never hear much about Agur but from his words we can determine his character.
He considers himself less wise than others and doesn't think of himself as a person of great understanding.
Here is a person who is like most of us. We want to share God's word but we feel so unlearned and weak. In this case we have to rely on God and God alone for our wisdom.
The only way to know God and His ways is to seek Him for wisdom.
There is really no other way to obtain the correct understanding and wisdom. The author of this passage realizes that compared to God, we know nothing. To understand, we must seek God who is all power and wisdom. There is nothing, absolutely nothing that even remotely count as wisdom if it is not from God or outside of God's domain. Here we have mention of God having a son along with the words of ascending or descending. In Ephesians we read about Christ descending and then ascending to heaven. The Son of God whom we know of as Jesus Christ, Yeshua is the only one that has ascended or descended from heaven and back to heaven. God is full of wisdom and knows all things.
Christ completed all the necessary things for our salvation. When He left, He gave gifts of the Spirit to enable us to spread the gospel to the entire world.
Wow, this is a verse to remember. The word of God is pure and a word that we can trust. The word is quick, powerful and everlasting.
The word is our only way to discover eternal life as we see in John 5:39.
One way: Jesus is the Christ who came for the purpose of dying for our sins and granting us eternal life. This is for all who receive Him.
Jesus was and is eternal just like God the Father and the Holy Spirit.
Jesus came full of grace and truth. He is the word made flesh and the only way to salvation.
So good of our God to provide both Jews and Gentiles a way out of sin and a lost forever condition.
We have verses of comfort, joy and peace but also verses of warning. To be balanced, we must read and keep both. We must not add to or take away from the word. We must not change the way of salvation by adding or taking away the way for mankind to be saved.
It is, except a man be born again he shall not enter the kingdom of God. He must be born of water and of the spirit to be saved. Jesus Himself said that if we do not believe that He is the one God sent to save from sin we shall not be saved and enter into eternal life.
God's written word makes everything plain to understand if we diligently seek Him.
Jesus is the Christ and the only way of salvation. We may call Him Yeshua or another name in a certain language we may speak but the Jesus who died for sins over 2000 years ago, the Son of God, is our only way of salvation.
Riches are snares that can easily separate us from God because we will begin to depend upon the money, fear of losing it and we become actually a slave to it. To have enough to survive and not enough to exalt one's self, is sufficient. We see also over eating is just as dangerous to the body as smoking and drinking. We have too much, we jeopardize our health. Removing ourselves from vanity and lies benefits our spiritual health. Both are a waste of time. Being one that loves the truth and strives to stop false rumors get the attention of God.
Since this verse follows the one which mentions vanity and lies, I would guess this means false accusation. I'm sure if we saw someone committing a crime, we should report it but be careful to get the facts straight and not give a false accusation or exaggeration.
We are living in that type of generation. We are quick to curse father and mother and not respect them in this generation.
Here we see another description of our own generation. We think we are pure yet we are full of evil. We measure someone's righteousness by his education, his success in business and his wealth. High paying jobs impress people also but does not impress God. We admire the football heroes and movie stars, yet many of them have lives full of sin but we don't see it as sin. Multiple divorces, unfaithfulness, adultery, fornication are no longer considered sin. Breaking up families and divorcing multiple time is the norm rather than a rarity in today's culture.
This continues the thought in verse 12 of seeing ourselves as pure yet being full of evil. Pride is described in verse 13 and we know from other verses that pride goes before a fall. This is the opposite of whom the Lord spoke of in Matthew 5, "Blessed are the poor in spirit" meaning humble and more likely to rely on the Lord for salvation rather then have any self righteousness.
All throughout history we've had much exploitation of the poor. Even the church of that day would justify taking money from the poor. There was such a thing called debtor's prison also. The poor were considered the lowest of human beings and the rich exploited them and misused them. The opposite extreme is to despise the rich and force by law those that work hard for a living to give to those that do not want to work thereby enabling laziness with no responsibility.
Symbolic of greed and never wanting enough. a horseleach is a leech that sucks out blood. Here are the things that are never full:
Fire will burn and burn at will and it is hard to stop. The grave is never full. A disobedient child that is never satisfied is another example of never getting enough to stopping their behavior.
When one continues to do evil and overrides their conscience, it isn't long until we feel it is not wrong. We should always rejoice when the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin because at least we know that our conscience is not seared and He is still working within us. Glory to God. Sometimes a conviction may be because of how we were brought up and the feelings of people around us but when we are sure it comes from the Holy Spirit, it is to be welcomed and we should allow it to bring us reproof. I had a person try to talk me into something once. As far as I know this person wasn't even a person who trusted in the Lord yet but she tried to talk me into doing something I thought was wrong and went on to tell me that after I do it a few times, I would not feel it was wrong any longer. Well, that stopped the temptation right then and there because I remembered being taught that we could override our conscience enough until we do not feel it is wrong any longer and I didn't want that.
For a person who is not brought up to learn how to handle wealth and power, they can easily abuse it if they happen to get the power to rule over men. Using one's wealth to help others is a good thing to have. This would be willingly, not the government over taxing them and forcing them to give up what they earned. An odious woman is one that is full of hate and and is an enemy to her own husband.
Its amazing to see the hard working ants and insects that work hard to build their places of habitation. Outside my back window was a nest that a robin built from scratch. To watch him was fascinating.
This is how we should be in a way. Like a lion that fears nothing but goes forward and turns not away, we should be like that in the things of the spirit. We go forward living for the Lord, walking in the spirit and in love, doing and working righteousness without wavering, without fainting in our hearts, trusting the outcome to the Lord.
Proverbs covers so many things we need to get along with people and live in moderation.
Lifting up ourselves in pride, thinking evil and forcing wrath works evil and not the righteousness of God. Slow to speak, humble in spirit and trusting in Christ is the only way to bring forth fruit and walk in holiness. In Hebrews chapter 12, it mentions that without holiness no man shall see the Lord; sometimes we emphasize the holiness part and neglect the first part of that same verse that says to follow peace with all men. That is holiness also. Going about stirring up trouble, walking in pride, backbiting, and speaking evil is not following peace and is not holiness. The fruits of the spirit, love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance (self control) is holiness, not the man made outward holiness we substitute for the real holiness. I'm not saying true biblical holiness that comes by the Holy Spirit would not affect the way we dress, but the dress itself is not holiness. True holiness is from the inside out, not the other way around. -Dorna
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