Christians, you look like the world when you do this...

Wise Disciple

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All right, look, it's time to have a serious talk, okay? This video has been a long time in the making. There's no reaction today.

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There's just you and me. If you've watched any of my videos and really enjoyed the clash, as we call it in debate, then this video is especially for you.

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Christians, we have a problem, and this problem is not a surprise at all. I'm seeing it as I look around the culture right now, and you're seeing it, too, whether you realize it or not.

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And this problem is deeply concerning. If you're not deeply concerned by it, then you should be, because this problem is merely an expression of the fact that the influence of the world is creeping into the church, and we don't even see this.

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The sheep, as well as the shepherds, are oblivious to what's happening. We're just blind. We think that we're doing something righteous, when in actuality, we are disobeying the scripture.

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So here's what I want to do today. I want to show you some scripture that you probably didn't even know was there at all.

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Your pastor is not preaching on this, and your church leadership is not relaying this through small groups or anywhere else.

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It's a whole category of biblical teaching that is not taught, and so therefore we disobey it.

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God's Word says, don't do this, and we disobey it. I want to show you what I'm talking about.

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This is an article from Fox News. This is from a few years back. This is a perfect example of how we completely screw this up, guys.

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Take a look at this. The title is, Today's Atheists Are Bullies, and They're Doing Their Best to Intimidate the

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Rest of Us into Silence. There's no polite way to say it. Atheists today are the most arrogant, ignorant, and dangerous people on earth.

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We've all seen how these pompous prigs get offended by the slightest bit of religious imagery in public and mortified if even a whisper of Merry Christmas escapes the lips of some well -meaning but naive department store clerk during the holiday season.

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To cite a few examples, last December, the group American Atheists launched its annual billboard campaign with the slogan,

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Just Skip Church, It's All Fake News. In February, the American Humanist Association became furious when

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President Trump had the gall to mention Christianity and Jesus Christ without also mentioning atheists at the

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National Prayer Breakfast. How dare he? And just this month, the Freedom from Religion Foundation raised holy hell because the

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Reverend Billy Graham was laid out in state in the Capitol Rotunda before his burial.

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The modern breed of atheist is arrogant and dangerous. Too many books written in response to these pseudo -intellectual hate mongers have been altogether too nice.

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Too many Christian authors have tried to be kind and amiable in an effort to demonstrate that believers don't have to sink into the mud in order to defend the faith.

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Let me read that one more time. Listen to this. Too many Christian authors have tried to be kind and amiable in an effort to demonstrate that believers don't have to sink into the mud in order to defend the faith.

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That tact is very charitable, but unfortunately, it just doesn't work with bullies, and that's exactly what modern -day atheists are.

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They're bullies. Bullies who are doing their best to intimidate the rest of us into silence.

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There is only one way to deal with bullies, even in this politically correct world, and that is to stand up to them and fight them, to fight them in a bold, aggressive, and fearless way, and to fight them now.

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I see an article like this, and my fists immediately start to ball up. I start grinding my teeth, and I start growling like a caged tiger, right?

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By the way, do you agree with that article? Today's atheists are bullies, right? They're doing their best to intimidate the rest of us into silence.

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I agree with that. From my vantage point as a Christian in today's culture, I think that's pretty spot -on.

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But this article is an artifact that reveals the problem with our current cultural mindset.

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This mindset has been adopted by both believer and non -believer alike, and it goes way beyond disagreement about the existence of God or the truthfulness of Christianity.

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This broadens out to basically everything in society. We have adopted what

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I call a clash culture mindset. In other words, we have been implicitly trained as a culture and as a people to find points of disagreement with other people, to seek out those points of disagreement, to identify them, and then to clash over them.

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This was not how we typically acted as a society in the recent past, and yet here we are.

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And this is certainly not how Christians should act as followers of Jesus Christ, and yet a lot of us

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Christians in the church are just as guilty of clashing with folks as our non -believers.

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This is completely unbiblical, ladies and gentlemen, and I'm going to show you from the scripture. Proverbs chapter 9 verse 7 says this,

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Whoever corrects a scoffer gets himself abuse, and he who reproves a wicked man incurs injury.

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Do not, do not reprove a scoffer, or he will hate you.

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Reprove a wise man, and he will love you. Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser.

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Teach a righteous man, and he will increase in learning. Okay, so at this point, a good

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Bible study question is, what does the Bible mean by a scoffer? Thankfully, the Proverbs answers this question for us because it contains other instances of scoffers, and it describes scoffers.

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We can start to fill in the picture of what the Bible is talking about when it talks about scoffers. There's actually a collection of terms in the

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Proverbs that are very often used synonymously. They are scoffers, mockers, scorners, and fools.

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All of these words are very often treated as synonymous to each other. Again, scoffers, mockers, scorners, and fools, and they all have a very wicked connotation attached to them.

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To be a scoffer, according to the Proverbs, is to be someone who shows contempt for others.

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Scoffers, they don't listen, particularly to correction. Scoffers are not teachable.

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Scoffers actually run away from wisdom. Does that describe anyone in today's culture?

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Proverbs 21 verse 24 says this, scoffer is the name of the arrogant, haughty man who acts with arrogant pride.

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Okay, so the scoffer is filled with pride to the point of arrogance and haughtiness.

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They lash out at righteousness with insults and verbal abuse. That's what we see back in Proverbs chapter 9.

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Scoffers respond with hatred. They have hardened hearts. And so to correct or to reprove a scoffer is to invite all of the wicked qualities and characteristics of a scoffer to be unleashed upon ourselves.

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It's a fruitless endeavor. And so the wisdom of Proverbs tells us not to do it.

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Instead, we are supposed to go find wise people, people who display wisdom and focus on our efforts on those kinds of folks.

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Those are the folks that we should be engaging. Now, the question is, you know, why not destroy scoffers, right?

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These kinds of people with facts and truth, right? That's what we're doing right now in today's culture, isn't it?

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If somebody punches us, we punch back twice as hard. Did you hear that one before? Right? You know, why don't we do that?

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Why don't we just partake? Destroy people, right? I don't know how many YouTube titles say that somebody's been destroyed by logic and facts.

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I think the reason why we we do this is because we don't understand why scoffers scoff.

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And if we did understand, then this biblical teaching would actually make a lot more sense. Again, Proverbs explains this to us, and we just cannot miss this point, friends, because it's so crucial to get and, like, almost none of us are thinking along these lines.

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It's such a shame. In Proverbs chapter 1, wisdom asks a very specific question that shines a bright spotlight on what

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I'm talking about. In verse 22 of chapter 1, wisdom says, How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple?

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How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge? Isn't that interesting?

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Scoffers delight in their own scoffing and fools hate knowledge.

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These are emotional terms. Do you see that? See, when I first became a Christian, I operated under the assumption that non -believers who rejected

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God and Christianity, they did so because of their ignorance, right? Maybe they hadn't heard the right argument yet or seen enough evidence yet.

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And so, for people to reject Christianity, I assumed it meant that they must not have the right data.

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They must not have the right information. They're missing key arguments and evidence such that if they could only hear those missing pieces of information, they would immediately become

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Christians. Listen to me, friends. The Bible says that's not true. The Apostle Paul actually dispelled my assumption about people rather handily in Romans.

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This is what he said in Romans chapter 1. Romans chapter 1 verse 18, For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.

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For what can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them.

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It's not that people reject God because they don't have enough information to make a decision. It turns out that they don't believe in God because they don't want to.

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That's the dirty little secret about fallen humanity's heart. People don't go to hell because they are victims of a lack of information.

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They go to hell because of their rebellious disobedience. They don't want it to be true. And so when they see righteousness, when they are corrected from their folly, and they hear the truth about the world and about God and about Jesus, they hate it.

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I've mentioned this before, but I just want you to catch this again, okay? Jonathan Haidt, he's a social psychologist and a professor.

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Not a Christian, as far as I can tell. But in one of his books, he likens decision -making to a rider on an elephant.

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He says, imagine an elephant and a rider on top of that elephant. In that dynamic, who's really in control?

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Well, the elephant is, of course, because wherever the elephant desires to go, the riders belong for the ride.

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Well, Haidt says that the rider represents our reason, our rationality, and the elephant represents our emotions.

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And the elephant leads the rider around. See, my mistake was to think that people were predisposed the other way, that when people are engaging each other, it's purely through reason and evidence.

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That's just not true. The emotions go where they desire, and the mind typically follows the emotions.

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As a matter of fact, Haidt says that people justify their emotional decisions with rationality after the fact.

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Why do scoffers scoff? Because they are emotionally invested in their own sin.

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They love their own lifestyles too much to give it up. That's why scoffers delight in their scoffing, and that's why fools hate knowledge.

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Now, what does that mean for us? I mean, we're surrounded by a majority of people in our society— a majority, in my opinion—who have adopted a clash culture mindset.

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So how do we navigate our faith in a manner that is effective while still obeying

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God's Word? And the answer is, we need to be better readers of the text of Scripture.

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Because if we can really see what's going on, even in the Proverbs, we'll know what to do in our own circles of influence today.

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Amen? When I was a kid, one of my favorite stories to read was

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The Hobbit. There was a really awful and boring 1970s cartoon movie version of The Hobbit.

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Any of you see that one? I used to beg my parents to rent it, you know, and then re -rent it so I could watch it over and over again.

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And I loved it because, guess what? Peter Jackson wasn't around, and I didn't know any better. But here's the dilemma with The Hobbit.

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If you only read The Hobbit, you won't understand and appreciate the fuller story, right?

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In The Hobbit, the main character goes on an adventure, finds a ring that makes him invisible, and he uses that ring to kill a dragon.

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It's a great story. But that's not the whole story. As it turns out, the ring that The Hobbit finds is the ring of power.

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And it gives anyone the ability to conquer the whole world. And there was a greater history of men and creatures fighting over this ring.

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All of this is detailed in The Lord of the Rings, the book series that came out after The Hobbit.

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So in other words, the story of The Hobbit was just the tip of the iceberg. Because there was all this other meaning and layers and depth to it under the surface of the story that could not be understood until you read

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The Lord of the Rings. Okay, you with me? Hey, real quick. I'm so grateful that you're watching. If I've earned the right to get your sub,

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I'd love it if you would just click the like and subscribe button. It would really help me to get the video out to more and more people.

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I really do appreciate you. The book of Proverbs is the tip of an iceberg, ladies and gentlemen.

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A lot of people think that the Proverbs is just a series of wise sayings in order to live a successful life.

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Certainly, the Proverbs will give you success in life. But that's only the tip of the iceberg. There is something much greater underneath the surface that Christians also need to understand.

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Okay, if you zoom out chapter 9 here, right? And you just take a look around at the whole entire chapter, you begin to notice that wisdom is not something you own.

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It's not. Wisdom is something that you enter into relationship with. That's why wisdom is personified as a woman.

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In chapter 9, actually, there are two women who are trying to get everyone's attention. There is

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Lady Wisdom, and then there is Lady Folly. Lady Wisdom calls those passing by, and she says,

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Come to me, all you who lack understanding. Right? Lady Wisdom brings life to your soul.

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She keeps you from stumbling. On the other hand, Lady Folly calls out her invitation, but she brings people down to death.

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Both ladies are making an appeal right here in chapter 9 of Proverbs. You can see it right at the very top, and also, again, right at the very bottom.

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Now, do me a favor. Let's just put on our gospel glasses for a moment, okay? Lady Wisdom and Lady Folly represent the invitation of God and the invitation of the devil.

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How do I know that? Lady Wisdom in Proverbs 9. Right in those first few verses, she calls from the tops of the heights of the city.

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A Jew reading this particular text would immediately recognize that is where the temple of God sits.

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The temple of God that Solomon built was erected at the top of the height of Jerusalem.

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And so the invitation of Lady Wisdom to come and be with her and eat her food is really the invitation of God to be with God.

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Proverbs 9, verse 10, this is what it says, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the

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Holy One is insight. In contrast, Lady Folly also invites.

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She also invites from the high places of the city. She invites folks to do the same thing that Lady Wisdom invites, but she wants you to go do it with her.

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Come and eat with her. But guess what? Her meal is stolen. This is an invitation to idolatry, friends.

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The tops of the high places was where pagans would go to worship idols as well. So the greater underlying story here is that those who are wise accept the invitation to be with God and live, and those who are wicked accept the invitation to be with the devil and die.

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That is also present here in Proverbs 9. That's what underlies the book of Proverbs.

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That's also why Jesus makes allusions to the Proverbs in his Sermon on the Mount. So what does this reveal about God?

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It reveals God's desires for people to be with him, because to be biblically wise means that we have to be in relationship with God.

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Why? Because wisdom is from God. We don't own wisdom.

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We must be in relationship with wisdom. Wisdom is displayed through us as a product of our relationship with God.

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That was Adam and Eve's lesson, ladies and gentlemen. That's the whole issue that led to the first sin in the garden.

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So what does this have to do with Proverbs 9? What does this have to do with our situation? It simply shows us a little bit of what it looks like when people desire lady wisdom and when they love lady folly, right here.

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It plays out in verses 7 through 9. It's also playing out right now before our very eyes in our society.

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So the question is, what do we do? Do we fight back against bullies by giving them a taste of their own medicine and then we just praise

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God after? No, friends. The Bible teaches us the opposite. God's wisdom tells us not everyone deserves an answer.

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Somebody needs to hear this in the video right now. Not everyone deserves an answer. Only those who desire wisdom deserve an answer.

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And what happens when you engage someone who desires wisdom? Verse 8 says, they'll love you for it.

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Remember at the beginning, I talked about, you know, we live in a clash culture mindset.

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The people of today's culture, they love to clash. They get something out of it.

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You've met these people already, you know. Man, they just, they really enjoy it, right?

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And so once they clash with somebody over there, they go seek another person to go clash with. It's like they're feeding off of it.

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And here we come, thinking as I used to think, well, you know what I'm gonna do? I'm just gonna drop a truth bomb on this person and that we're actually being good

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Christians if we do that. And the truth is, we're not. We're deviating from the example of Christ given to us in the

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Scriptures. Somebody might be thinking, wait a second, Nate. Didn't Jesus engage everybody in the Gospels?

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You know what? He didn't. Let me give you two quick examples of this. In Luke chapter 20, the chief priests and the scribes, they question

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Jesus' authority in the temple. Okay? This is what it says, verse 2. And he said to him, tell us by what authority you do these things or who it is that gave you this authority.

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Now, this is not a sincere question of authority. Later, the Bible tells us that the

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Pharisees who were talking to Jesus, they were trying to find fault with him so that they could arrest him. Jesus knew this, so this is how he responded.

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Watch this, verse 3. I will also ask you a question. Now tell me, was the baptism of John from heaven or from man?

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The Bible says that the priests and the scribes, they struggled to come up with an answer that was advantageous for their purposes.

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So they, at the end of it, they just kind of shrugged their shoulders and said, we don't know. To which

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Jesus replied in verse 8, neither will I tell you by what authority I do these things. He didn't answer their question.

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He did not engage them. Why? Because God's Word says not to. Somebody who doesn't know better, they, you know, they might look at this and they go, well, wait a second.

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Jesus missed an opportunity to preach the gospel. No, he didn't. Jesus was living out the biblical principle found in Proverbs chapter 9, verses 7 through 8.

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He even told his disciples something very similar in Matthew 7. Don't cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet and then turn to attack you.

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Jesus, as the very wisdom of God, chose not to engage certain kinds of individuals, even when they asked him a question.

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Let me give you another example. In Luke chapter 23, Jesus was arrested before Herod. It says in verse 8, watch this.

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When Herod saw Jesus, he was very glad, for he had long desired to see him because he had heard about him and he was hoping to see some sign done by him.

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Wait, did it say that he was hoping to hear the gospel? Was he hoping to hear and receive the true wisdom from God?

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No, Herod wanted to see Jesus perform a magic trick. And so verse 9, this is what it says.

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He questioned Jesus at some length, but Jesus made no answer. Today's culture invites us to clash.

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It invites us to look and act just like the scoffers, mockers, scorners, and fools that the

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Proverbs describes in the Bible. Don't do it, ladies and gentlemen. The Lord commands us not to be like them.

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The way that we engage the people around us must be just as gospel -filled as the message that we give them.

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God's wisdom tells us not everyone deserves an answer. Only those who desire wisdom deserve an answer.

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Practically speaking, it's really not that hard to identify a scoffer. Scoffers today actually make it very easy for you to identify them.

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They constantly change the subject on you. They resort to name -calling. They deny your arguments anyway, or all of the above.

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It doesn't matter if everything you said was flawless. Engaging scoffers today is frustrating.

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It's unproductive. It's exhausting because it seems that they feed off the constant clashing, this adversarial back -and -forth that eventually leads to nowhere because they've already decided that nothing you say is ever going to change their mind.

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And the worst part is, hear me, friends. Many of them sit in the church right next to you.

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Do you know somebody like this? Here's a gut -check question. Are you somebody like this?

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Let the Lord examine you because if you are, you need to repent right now. What about those who desire wisdom?

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What do they look like in today's culture? Well, this is someone who is willing to consider what you have to say without interrupting.

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They're willing to listen without spewing venom in return. Someone willing to ask genuine questions, intellectually honest questions, without trying to win, right?

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Without resorting to intellectual dishonesty. Someone who, perhaps in very small ways, is already revealing a heart that is willing to submit.

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That's who you should be looking to engage in today's culture. Guess what? That wipes out about 90 % of Facebook.

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Does it not? That takes care of about 100 % of Twitter. That probably takes care of the vast majority of folks on YouTube.

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Do you hear me, friends? Let me address one last question, and then we'll close, okay?

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Because I think somebody might be thinking right now, Nate, are you telling me not to talk, you know, at all to certain kinds of people?

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Are you telling me to avoid completely certain kinds of people? No, I'm not. Absolutely not.

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The Bible teaches us to go make disciples of all the nations. You can't do that if you become a hermit and disengage from the world altogether.

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The only way that you're going to determine who displays biblical wisdom and who displays the qualities of a scoffer is by talking to everyone, initially.

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And loving everyone by spending some time with them. But understand, as you do that, it is your responsibility to determine who you're talking to.

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That is biblical wisdom. God's wisdom tells us not everyone deserves an answer.

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Only those who desire wisdom deserve an answer. Sit with this, friends. Listen to this again.

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I don't know. Share this with somebody. We all need to get on the same page as Christians. Thank you for hearing me out, and thank you for watching all the way to the end.

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Here's what I can promise you, okay? Once you really let this sink in, you'll realize that the pressure is off you to immediately respond to everything that you hear.

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Right? There goes all your hot takes. Right? Chuck them right out the window. And it also should help you to realize that the way that you are going to stand out and identify yourself as someone that the right kinds of people will listen to is by being more quiet.

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Not more aggressive. By being more Christ -like. Not more obnoxious.

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And you'll discover that your conversations will become much more effective, much more meaningful, and much more productive on behalf of the

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Lord. Let's be different, friends. Starting right now. Let's pray and ask the

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Lord to make us stand out and be different in a society that wants us to clash like never before.

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And let's trust the Lord that he'll use us in a mighty way to spread his kingdom here on Earth. Okay, now it's your turn to weigh in.

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What do you think about all this? What's your take on what's going on in the culture right now? Am I right or am I way off?

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What's your take on Proverbs chapter 9? Let me know in the comments below. Hey, if you made it all the way to the end of the video, you definitely should join the

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