When Sinners Entice You, Do Not Consent.

Sermon Transcript

A wise dad knows that there are times when he needs to put his arm over his son’s shoulder and say, “Son, I love you and I want to teach you something important about life in the real world.” My own son is getting to that age when, if he’s not already, he’ll begin noticing girls in a new way. I want so much to be a wise dad to him. So, recently we were driving and I said to him, “Son, when you begin to be interested in a girl, don’t talk to your friends who know nothing about girls. Talk to me. I’ve been married to the most amazing woman for longer than your friends have been alive.” Sometimes a dad has to put his hand tenderly on the shoulder of his son or daughter and say, “Best buddy” or “Little angel,” I want to teach you something significant about life and I want you to listen.” That’s the image that dominates our passage from Proverbs this morning. A wise dad putting his arm around his child and softly saying something of the utmost importance. Maybe you don’t have a dad who did that. I certainly don’t. That doesn’t mean we are excluded. As one scholar has said about this passage, “God is speaking to us through a father advising his son.” So, what is he saying? Proverbs 1:10 captures the heart of it: “My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent.” Solomon, the wisest mortal to ever live, draws his son close, tells him to listen up for the sake of his life, looks him in the eye and says, “when peer pressure comes at you, just say no”?! “When bad companions tempt you, turn your back”? Why that? Because I bet you can’t think of a single wise person or fool who got that way on their own. Your companions will make you or break you. It’s not for nothing that Solomon will say later in Proverbs, “He who walks with the wise grows wise, but a companion of fools suffers much harm.” Therefore, God, through the voice of a dad speaking to his son, wisely says to all of us this big idea of our passage this morning: When sinners entice you, do not consent. When foolish friends tempt you, as Nancy Reagan said, “just say no.” When sinners entice you, do not consent. Easier said than done! The older we get the more we realize that peer pressure often ramps up rather than down as we age. Thankfully, our passage provides strategies that will help you not consent when sinners entice you. 1. Hear your parents’ instruction (1:8-9) 2. Imagine where sinners will lead you (1:10-18) 3. Turn to the better way (1:19)

HEAR YOUR PARENTS’ INSTRUCTION

The first strategy that will help you not consent when sinners entice you is to hear your parents’ instruction. Who would have thought that the first strategy for saying “no” to foolish friends is to listen to your parents. Proverbs 1:8-9 – Hear, my son, your father’s instruction, and forsake not your mother’s teaching, for they are a graceful garland for your head and pendants for your neck. A garland is like a victor’s wreath and a pendant displays prestige. In other words, the dad says to his son, “Hear your mom and my instruction and correction, build your life on the wisdom we pass down to you, and as you get older, don’t forsake it because if you do, it will crown your life with true beauty, success and prestige, instead of the destruction that will result if you consent when sinners entice you. Hear us and you’ll be able to stand up to a mob. Hear your parents’ instruction and when sinners entice you, you won’t consent.

Obviously, these verses apply somewhat differently to different groups of people. If you’re a parent, these verses are an invitation to instruct and teach your children God’s wisdom for life. Parents, please hear me for the sake of your children. Your primary parental privilege and responsibility is not to nurture your child’s self-expression. It’s not to make them great athletes, it’s not to get them into an Ivy League school, and it’s not to provide them with a lot of stuff and experiences that they really don’t need. Our privileged responsibility is to take the body of wisdom that we have received from God’s word and pass it on to them so that they can be wise and say “no” when sinners entice them. Parents, you are God’s ambassador to your children. Be bold. Delight in them, teach them the Bible, teach them sound doctrine and theology so that they know what the Bible teaches about everything, teach them to walk personally with Jesus Christ, and discipline them consistently when they’re foolish so they learn a better way. Don’t know where to start? Have a blast doing what they love at their age, take them to church every Sunday, do devotions and catechisms with them throughout the week, talk to them about wise living along the way, and be very thoughtful and prayerful about who you entrust their education to when they are school age. Need more insight, then talk to one of your pastors and his wife. We’d love to help. Moms and dads – our passage commands your children to hear your instruction instead of peer pressure, so give your children a shot at obeying that by teaching them God’s wisdom from his word. Of course this passage doesn’t only apply to parents. It also applies to kids who still live at home with a godly mom and dad, or a godly single mom or single dad. Kids, there will be times when foolish people tempt you to disobey God, even your friends may. It’s going to be tough to say no, but the best way you can prepare is by learning to be wise by listening to your parents. Listen when they teach you. Change when they correct you. If they don’t read the Bible with you regularly, ask them nicely to start and be a great listener. If you do, you’ll be ready for peer pressure. Finally, the command to hear your parents’ instruction applies to older sons and daughters of godly (imperfect) parents. As you age, do not forsake your parents’ teaching. John Piper is among, if not the, most significant American theologians of the last 25 years. During a panel discussion at a conference he was once asked, “Why do you believe in the inerrancy of Scripture?” Piper answered, “Because my momma told me it’s true.” That’s biblical. Brothers and sisters, you are going to encounter countless professors, peers, politicians, and professional mentors who will directly or indirectly entice you to forsake your parents’ godly and wise instruction from the Bible. As you age, don’t forsake it. Now, if you did not have godly parents, you’re not excluded. We’ll get there later. To not consent when sinners entice you, first strategy: hear your parents’ instruction. Second strategy…

IMAGINE WHERE SINNERS WILL LEAD YOU

What does it sound like when sinners entice you? Proverbs 1:11-14 helps us know what sinners who entice you are going to sound like: If they say, “Come with us, let us lie in wait for blood; let us ambush the innocent without reason; like Sheol let us swallow them alive, and whole, like those who go down to the pit; we shall find all precious goods, we shall fill our houses with plunder; throw in your lot among us; we will all have one purse.” Now, I imagine it has been a while since someone enticed you toward robbery and premeditated murder, promising that you’ll get rich and have one purse with them. How might sinners sound today according to these verses? Ray Ortlund is helpful here. He writes, “The key to this human profile is anyone who gets ahead by his own devices, anyone who is out for number one.” In light of these verses, here is what it sounds like. When sinners entice you, it sounds like a direct or indirect invitation to walk on others to get ahead or fit in. Sometimes when sinners entice you to walk on others to get ahead or fit in, it sounds as direct as Proverbs 1:11-14. One child says to another, “let’s not include her. If you want to be friends with us, you have to join in teasing her.” It sounds like one co-worker saying to another, “Let’s fudge this a little bit, let’s take credit for their work and say we did it, scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours, we’ll get ahead together.” What does it sound like? Walk on others to get ahead or fit in. However, more often when sinners entice, it’s a less direct invitation to walk on others to get ahead or fit in. Sinners enticing you can simply be the peer pressure you experience to fit in by participating when others gossip or complain against another peer, a client, a patient, a teacher, a professor, a co-worker, a manager, a fellow church member, or one of your pastors. Factions can destroy a company, a division, a department, or a church – and it takes very few people to get it going. Why do we participate? To get ahead, feel better, or fit in. Other times it’s the peer pressure you feel to participate in the common practices of exaggerating your accomplishments, embellishing your products, or downplaying the accomplishments of others, in order to walk over someone else to get ahead. When sinners entice you, it sounds like a direct or indirect invitation to walk on others to get ahead or fit in.

When sinners entice you, it will be enticing. It’s so hard to resist. Who doesn’t want to get ahead or fit in. What can possibly keep us from consenting and joining in? The wise dad says, “Son, to not consent, you need to imagine, you need to vividly visualize where it’s going to lead if you consent to walk on others to get ahead. Proverbs 1:15-18 – “…my son, do not walk in the way with them; hold back your foot from their paths, for their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed blood. For in vain is a net spread in the sight of any bird, but these men lie in wait for their own blood; they set an ambush for their own lives.” When sinners entice you to walk on others to get ahead, you have to imagine the two places that will lead.

First, it will lead to hurting the innocent. When you follow foolish friends into walking on others to get ahead, feel better, or fit in, it leads to shedding blood that should not be shed. You have to imagine the pain you’ll cause if you’re going to say no when sinners entice you. A child can carry the scars of being teased, excluded, or bullied long into adulthood. Kids, if you’ll imagine the pain it will cause, you won’t consent to teasing or putting down another child to their face or behind their back. A decent leader or manager’s reputation or career can be destroyed by gossip. You can set a co-worker back years simply by exaggerating your accomplishments, downplaying theirs or taking credit for their work. A pastor or fellow church member can lose countless nights of sleep simply by a little acceptable Christian gossip. When sinners entice you, it’s powerful. When the backstabbing begins, it’s so hard to pull away or ask others to stop. You have to imagine the pain you’ll cause, the blood you’ll shed because if you do, when sinners entice you, you won’t consent. The second place it leads is destroying yourself. How long do you think you can walk on others to fit in, feel better, or get ahead until you’re the one getting walked on? Blood-lust is so blind that it blinds you to the trap you’re laying for yourself. Our passage says that even a tiny-brained bird has the instincts to see the trap and fly away from it. However, when you accept your foolish friends’ invitation to walk on others to get ahead, you’ll blind yourself to seeing the trap you’re laying for yourself. What goes around comes around. You have to imagine other walking on you to get ahead, feel better, or fit in and you won’t do it to others. Imagine where sinners, foolish friends, and bad companions lead, and when sinners entice you, you won’t consent. And that leads us to the final way to not consent when sinners entice you…

TURN TO THE BETTER WAY

Our passage concludes with the father telling his son the stark truth about where trampling on others to get ahead or fit in will ultimately lead. Proverbs 1:19 – Such are the ways of everyone who is greedy for unjust gain; it takes away the life of its possessors. Friends – this indicts all of us. As Ray Ortlund says in his commentary on this passage, “Deep in every heart is a kind of blood-lust…” Sinners have enticed us and we’ve consented to walking on other image-bearers of God to get ahead or fit in. We deserve God’s just and eternal punishment. Who can rescue us from our blood-guilt? Only David’s greater Son, the One who never went along with foolish friends or the enticement of sinners the Lord Jesus Christ. We all have blood-guilt on our hands. But thanks be to God, He sent Jesus Christ His Son who allowed himself to be trampled down on the cross in order to die for our sins. We all bear the guilt of blood lust, but the Lord Jesus Christ shed his blood on the cross so that by grace through faith in Him, our blood-guilt is removed. Turn to Him to forgive your sins and follow Him as the better way.

Something truly glorious happens when you turn to Jesus the Better Way, who forgives your blood-guilt through his bloody cross. He also radically redefines for us what it means to get ahead and fit in. Think about getting ahead. Through faith in Jesus, all your guilt is removed, your true identity is a beloved child of God himself, and your new destiny is the joy of everlasting life with Him. With all that, you’re free from needing to walk on others to get ahead and you’re free to serve others, build others, honor others, and do honest work to the glory of God, entrusting the results to Him. That’s so much better than backstabbing.

And think about fitting in. When he forgives our sin and adopts us as God’s children, Jesus Christ puts us into a forever family called the church where Christ fits us all in despite our crazy. And in the church we get the wise instruction of new brothers, sisters, mothers, and fathers. In the church we get together with one another every week in our CG’s and then we meet with each other 1:1 and 1:2 to teach each other how to apply God’s word, whether our parents taught it to us or not. It’s a far better way. Why would you want to stay on the periphery of that?! When sinners entice you, don’t consent. Turn to the better way of Jesus Christ and his family, the church.