Wednesday Night November 28, 2012
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scriptures: Proverbs 20, Matthew 5
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In the 20th chapter of Proverbs, we should be 20 chapters wiser
Proverbs 20:18-22
We all need people who will give us good counsel.
vs 19
People who spend a lot of time talking about people will also talk about you. Don’t get involved in that.
vs 20
Always be respectful of your parents. God pays attention to people who are not respectful to their parents. That is one way to shorten your life. God hates that. He even uses that as a sign of how the world gets worse.
Even if your parents are not right, you can still be right in your responses.
vs 21
A person may get get gain quickly, but that doesn’t mean that he knows how to manage it rightly.
vs 22
Many times people want to answer argument for argument, or express their anger. That is not what God wants you to do. He wants you to handle yourselves wisely, not saying that you acted out of control because someone else acted wrong.
Even if you have the correct stance on someone’s wrong, you can be considered at fault if you also present yourself in a ungodly way.
No matter how much you can explain someone’s faults, you still have a responsibility to treat them well.
Matthew 5:43-46
Some people are wrong because they are upset for no good reason.
Even if you are upset for a genuine offense, God says to love your enemies.
You are to love, do good, not just avoid fighting.
Just calling a person who does you wrong the devil is not helping you.Quit complaining about people. You always have opportunity to do good to people, bless them.
Am I supposed to be unloving just because someone “doesn’t like you”?
This includes people in your family, people at school, etc. Whether people are supposed to be close to you or not.
That last time you were really mad, did God care? Was He angry about the same thing, having the attitude?
He already knows the situation, and He knows if you are responding they way He wants.
If you cannot do this, then you are not the Father’s child. That affects where you will end up.
Your emotions can keep you from Christ.
God knows that you have no desire to try to reconcile or operate in peace.
A Christian is different on the inside. Those that are the children of God have love as their response, even to when people don’t like them or treat them well.
After you explain how evil someone is, does your life speak of you as being a blessing person.
Anger, malice, and wrath are some of the things that we are commanded to put off, out of our lives.
If someone who provokes you gets a response from you that is being mean or trying to hurt, then there is something wrong.
Even miscommunications, where you think someone is harming you, still should generate a response of loving, blessings, goodness from believers.
You can be a good son or daughter, husband or wife, friend, in Christ, because you have Him directing your character, not just the other person’s good or evil. You never have an excuse to be a bad anything.
vs 46
A lot of people are cool with people that are cool with them. Are you cool with people that are not cool with you? Do you treat them badly.
Some people are too unstable emotionally to deal with this verse. You have to let God’s desire overtake any emotions or feelings that make you want to not love. You have to obey God and trust Him for the consequences.
If this is in you, you have to come to God in repentance.
Do you really pray for people who treat you like an enemy or who you consider to be so evil? Do you want God to hurt them or do you desire healing and peace?
Proverbs 20:22-24
Don’t recompense evil toward people. Wait on the Lord and He will take care of you.
vs 23
It is not good to try to cheat people. It is an abomination.
vs 24
A lot of people are emotional people. They are not yet Christian.
God made man. He knows His purpose for us. Most of us spend time worried about what we want instead of trying to know and do what God wants.
The wicked know not at what they stumble. Without God, how can you understand your own way? If you are not trying to search for His will in your life, you can’t know that you are doing what you are supposed to do.
People are so busy trying to understand himself and what he wants. We need to seek to understand what God wants and serve Him.
There are people who got all that they wanted but don’t have what they need.