Proverbs 20

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Okay, as I said, I want to look at a couple of verses in Chapter 20 and focus in on them.
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And the thought tonight will be about the ways of business.
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The ways of business.
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And I think it's an interesting topic, and I do think it's a topic that sometimes we don't always pay enough attention to.
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But the whole idea of how we are given by God specific instructions on how we ought to conduct business, business affairs in the world, business affairs, whether we own our own business or are involved in a company or anything like that.
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But I wanted to look at it tonight.
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I wanted to start this way.
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Maybe you will remember it.
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Some of you, at least, will remember, and this goes back to 2009, and I would think most of us were here in 2009.
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So you remember, perhaps, a man named Bernie Madoff.
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And Bernie Madoff was in finance, and if you remember what happened, he was arrested for a Ponzi scheme.
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Now, I'm certainly no expert in Ponzi schemes, but basically a Ponzi scheme is where you take people's money, and you say you're going to invest it, and by them giving you money, you inflate your net worth.
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And by inflating your net worth, you attract other people to come in and to invest in your portfolio, because he was in finance, and you just continually take the investments, inflate the worth of it, but yet you pocket the money that's being invested.
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Again, that's a very simple definition of a Ponzi scheme, but it really is something that back in 2009 and back still to today, he was arrested for it.
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He was, they said he had done it for almost 17 years, and that he had basically defrauded families, retirees, investors out of billions and billions and billions of dollars.
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And he was convicted, sentenced, and he was sentenced to 150 years in prison, and he's ruined many a life.
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There were people who actually, if I remember right, there were people who actually committed suicide because they had gone from having what they thought was a lot to having Zippo, and I believe he died in 2021 in prison.
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But the reason why I mention that is because he's a vivid example of what I want us to look at tonight, and it has to do with how we ought to use right means and right measures.
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And I'm going to show you these verses tonight that are in the chapter when we're conducting business.
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And again, I don't care if it's a lemonade stand.
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I don't care if your business is in the tens or in the millions or in the billions.
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It's the principles that we ought to enact in prison, in business, and that you and I need to think about those things.
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And I would say if you look at Proverbs chapter 31, you certainly will see even the woman who stays at home in that realm is full of business.
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I mean, she's always conducting business, always taking care of the house.
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So this applies to all, young, old, in business, working, someone else in business.
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And again, I think it's important for us to realize that there are so many different things that we need to consider in our lives.
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And so let me ask you to look at the verses with me, and then we'll go back over them and dig in a little bit further.
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So in chapter 20, look at verse 10.
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Diverse weights and diverse measures, they are both alike an abomination to the Lord.
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Diverse weights and diverse measures, they are both alike an abomination to the Lord.
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And then I want you to look at verse 14.
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And again, I'm gonna try to tie these verses together.
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In verse 14, it says, "'It is good for nothing,' cries the buyer.
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"'But when he's gone his way, then he boasts.'" And then I would ask you to look at verse 17.
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"'Bread gained by deceit is sweet to a man, "'but afterward his mouth will be filled with gravel.'" And then finally, verse 23.
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"'Diverse weights are an abomination to the Lord, "'and a false balance is not good.'" Diverse weights are an abomination to the Lord, and a false balance is not good.
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And as I said, we all conduct business, and so I think it's practical for all of us to consider.
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And I wanna add, before we look a little bit further at the individual verses, that if you were to think about how the world thinks about this whole subject, the business, many would not have the slightest bit of concern about what the Bible says in conducting business with just weights and just measures, because to many, what's the answer to business? But the bottom line, and again, as many of you know, I managed for a long time for the company.
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I worked for businesses.
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I started up new businesses.
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I always had a business plan, and it was, you know, I think the most I've ever had is like $18 million in revenue for a year, that I was personally responsible for the bottom line.
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And although many other things entered into it, HR, safety, and diversity, and this is going back now, but even then, all these other things, guess what was the final, what was the biggie? Bottom line, right? And if you didn't make the bottom line, you could be the most diverse, you could be the most pleasant, you could be a bunch of wonderful things, but you're out the door, because again, you're responsible for your own business plan.
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And I will say, there were many that I have seen come over 30 years working for that company who had thought that diverse weights and diverse measures was going to be the way for them to prosper, and many of them, and as I was also, I was incentivized by my business plan.
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In other words, I would, if I met my bogey, if I met my plan, or I even exceeded it, there was an incentive that was attached to me, and it basically was founded upon that business plan.
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So, I can tell you from both managers and vice presidents and all the way up to food chain, there were many who could care less what the Bible says about diverse weights and measures, because their only concern was, make sure you exceed the bottom line, make sure you get your bonus, and that's the end of it.
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I would also add that, if you think about it, there's a mentality that many have, and it's perhaps something that we, people think of almost unconsciously, and I'm thinking of the thought of how people say, never trust a car dealer, right? Because he's always gonna use diverse weights and measures, he's not gonna be honest, he's always gonna be trying to swindle you, to try to manipulate you, try to get your business to add to his bottom line, right? I would add to that telephone stores, by the way, but that's because I just had an experience with AT&T, and it was, I mean, it was.
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But there are people who have that mindset, and the mindset is, you can't trust the car dealer because he's dealing in diverse weights and measures, not being honest, not being sincere, he's seeking to get something over on you.
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Many people feel that way about the government, that the government does not deal with diverse weights and measures, and that they seem to wanna take advantage of you, and then the response to that is, well, if they're gonna take advantage of me, well, then I should try to take advantage of them, because they're trying to take advantage of me.
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And so when you think about this whole idea of business, and again, I don't care what business you're in, or what level it is, I believe that we need to understand that using diverse weights and measures is akin to stealing.
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It's what it is.
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Where you're not being honest in your affairs, and you have many motives, and we're gonna look at some of those motives in a minute, but that it basically is stealing, and if you think about it, even what we know to be true from God's word, in so many ways, and I thought about what the apostle Paul said, that let him who stole, what? Steal no more.
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And I would think, Mike, you could probably add a lot to this conversation, being in your own business, and for anyone else that's been in their own business, you know that there is a great temptation, and the temptation is that if I'm going to succeed, and others are not playing by the rules, so to speak, not using honest weights and honest measures, therefore, if I'm going to be able to compete with them, what? I, therefore, must use diverse weights and diverse measures because they've got an advantage on me.
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And you know what? Whenever it involves self, whenever it involves me, there's danger.
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There's always danger when we are trying to figure out things for us.
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We need to have our perspective and our minds fixed on the things above.
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I'll just remind you as we go through this, now, do you remember that lovely married couple in the book of Acts? Ananias and Sapphira? They found out that diverse weights and diverse measures wasn't really what God was desiring of them, right? So, sold their land, said they got X to the apostles.
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They really, they ran a Ponzi scheme, in a sense.
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They said they got X, they really didn't get X, they got X plus, and they pocketed some of it, and so, again, what happened to them, we know the story of them.
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So, again, just think about that as we go through this.
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And again, there are many traps that you and I need to avoid.
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And again, whether you do it in a business setting, whether you do it in the marketplace, whether you do it at the flea market, either from buying or selling, and I'll show you that as I believe one of these verses speaks directly about that.
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That you and I have to consider the temptation not to be those who use proper weights and proper measures, and that we need to remember that, even as God says, be sure our sins will find us out, right? So, I'm gonna read to you what it says in Leviticus.
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This is Leviticus 19, you don't have to turn to it.
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It says, you must not use dishonest measures of length, weight, or volume.
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You shall maintain honest scales and weights and honest ephah and honest hymn, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt.
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So, that's Leviticus 19.35.
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And really, what it was, if you think about what it's saying there, and this is how it worked out, that if you were selling something and you were to use, what they used to use was weights on a scale, right? To measure, whatever it is that you bought or whatever it is that you sold, you would weigh it out and they didn't have digital scales and all that good stuff like we have today.
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So, they would use rocks that were considered a certain weight or considered a certain measure.
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And so, what is being warned about here is that when you sell something, you don't use a light stone so that you don't put it, you don't have to put as much product to balance it out and you win.
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And then you take a, when you're buying something, you put a heavy stone on the scale so that you get more than you should in order to balance the scale out.
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So again, it's diverse weights and diverse measures.
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And the warning, the principle is, do not use them in a way that you are being dishonest or simply looking to advance yourself over, over abusing someone else.
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In Proverbs chapter 11, it says, dishonest scales are an abomination to the Lord.
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Proverbs 11, one.
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Dishonest scales are an abomination to the Lord, but listen to what it says.
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A just weight is his delight.
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Dishonest scales are an abomination to the Lord, but a just weight is his delight.
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And that's what has to be what drives us, isn't it, folks? What drives us is that we want God to be delighted with us, delighted in us, delighted because he has brought us out of the land of Egypt, spiritual Egypt, and spiritual bondage, and that because he's redeemed us and because he has spent it all to bring us to himself, that you and I are responsible to seek to do things to delight him and not merely, again, to make sure that we win or we get more or we accumulate or this, that, and the other thing.
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So that's why it says in verse 10 of chapter 20, diverse weights and diverse measures, they are both alike an abomination.
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God doesn't just say I'm not really that happy about it.
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God says it's an abomination.
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An abomination, my friends, is something that is disgusting.
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It's disgusting to God.
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It offends God.
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It's an offense to him, to his being, his holy being, his character, his grace, his mercy.
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So you and I, we need to think about that.
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I wanted to read something to you, and again, you don't have to turn to it.
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I've kind of marked it in, got it set up here so I can flip to it real quick.
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It's in Deuteronomy 25.
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Deuteronomy 25, 13 says this.
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It says, you shall not have in your bag differing weights a heavy and a light.
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You shall not have in your house differing measures, a large and a small.
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You shall have a perfect and just weight, a perfect and just measure that your days may be lengthened in the land which the Lord your God has given you for all who do such things and all who behave unrighteously, and here it is again, are an abomination to the Lord our God.
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My friends, we've just thought about a couple of different things here, and so far we've seen that these things are not only a minor offense to our God, but it's an abomination to him.
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He's disgusted by the activities, and so that's why I say to you, that's why many people in business of any kind, if they are going to be honest with the word of God, they're going to have to deal with the dishonesty of the world, because in so many ways, the world is, well, let me put it to you this way.
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Cheating in business is big business.
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Cheating in business is big business, and usually, as many would say, that it might not be the best thing to do, but man, it pays off great, and again, whether you're young, old, or in between, cheating in business might be big business, but cheating in business is an abomination, and the temptation is to think, again, if we don't use the world's methods, how am I going to survive? And again, when you're a man, and you're feeding, or even a woman, and you're providing for yourself or for others, that's a great temptation, to put bread on the table, and to be right with God, or to suffer the consequences of using honest measures and honest ways.
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Again, whether you own your own business, and I'm sure you could address this in many ways of situations that you've run into.
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I know Brother Mike could, and I think many of us can.
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And we could see, and I'm sure, Brother, you could probably talk about it from the military side, where you see these things, and there's not always honest measures and honest ways, and it's always to the advantage of the one who's looking to get more rather than less.
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Look at verse 14, and in fact, this one I thought was interesting.
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And here's the, again, the deceitfulness in the mind.
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It's good for nothing, cries the buyer, but when he's gone his way, then he boasts.
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You know what I thought about immediately when I read that? Porn shops, because that's exactly what their premise is, right? Many of them, you go in there, and I can remember when we were younger, we didn't have much, and the kids were growing, and honestly, we pretty much sold everything that we had just to keep things flowing.
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And I can remember going back into the porn shops, and things that I know that were worth a whole lot more, you'd go into the porn shop, and I can remember, honestly, and Candy would testify, we, at one point, were trying to pawn silver that we had in order to basically buy food, clothing and shelter.
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And I can remember going into the porn shop, and the guy, well, you know, let me do a couple tests on it, I'll be right back, and he goes in the back room, and goes, well, it's not really sterling silver, it's, you know, and here I am, I'm just trying to keep the river flowing.
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And so what did I do? We sold it, but that's not the point.
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My point is that people who do that, and that's exactly what happens.
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It's good for nothing, cries the buyer, until he gets it, and then what? Look what I did.
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Look how I pulled the wool over these people.
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Or I knew that they were at a disadvantage, so what? I took advantage.
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And again, friends, these are things that I think many times, if we are not consciously desiring to be just in our business, will slip past us, and we have to work at that area of our lives.
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And again, I can remember, and I'm not gonna insult my grandson, my grandson's 15, and anyway, it was a couple years ago, what he was doing was, he went online, Amazon, and he was buying pencils.
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Now, he must have been in fifth grade at this time.
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He was buying boxes of pencils for like, I don't know, a couple bucks.
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And he was going to school, and he was selling the pencils for a buck a piece.
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And he was cashing in.
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And finally, my son and my daughter-in-law, they found out, and they approached him, and he thought he was just being smart in business, and perhaps he was, but at the same time, really wasn't honest weights and honest measures.
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Now, don't misunderstand me.
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I'm not saying we shouldn't have a profit, because if anybody goes into business and doesn't desire to have a profit, you either got to get out of the business or have your head examined, right? Because business is based on the premise of the gazinters are more than the gazouters.
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But I remember my son having this talk with Noah and trying to explain to him, Noah, it might work, but it's not really the best.
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But like I said, he thought he had a home run.
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So that's an interesting verse, isn't it? It is good for nothing, cries the briar, but when he's gone his way, then he boasts.
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All right, I wanna look a little further.
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Look at verse 17.
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And this one, again, is also, I think, very instructive.
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Bread gained by deceit is sweet to a man, but afterward, his mouth will be filled with gravel.
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Bread gained by deceit is sweet to a man, but afterwards, his mouth will be filled with gravel.
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That's quite a contrast, isn't it? And as I thought about this, and I thought about how we can reply to this in our minds and in our thoughts, I believe that we have come, particularly in our country, and in other countries, but particularly in our country, especially in today, that we no longer consider hard work.
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We're not as geared towards the sweat of our brow.
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We live in the instant pudding society, right? Everything's gotta be instant.
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And if it wasn't for microwaves, half of people today would starve to death.
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But we live in a day when it's not as desirous to put the time in, in order to get to the place you either need to be or wanna be.
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That people today, if they can get bread by deceit, they're just as happy.
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It's so sweet to them to physically go out and steal or con somebody.
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I mean, you think about all these robocalls that people get.
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And you ever notice really the two groups that they focus in on? It's either the very young or the very old.
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Because they know that those people are susceptible, right? They know that many of them will fall and that they can make a quick gain.
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And that that quick gain to them is all they care about.
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And it's sweet.
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And then it says, the contrast is, but afterward his mouth will be filled with gravel.
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We need to consider that.
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And I don't care what area of business we're in.
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That we ought to be those who are not slothful in business, Paul says, right? Those who are willing to put our hand to the plow.
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So just a thought, think about it, how not too long ago, apprenticeship was a very valued trade.
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If you wanted to be somebody, whether it be an electrician or plumber or carpenter, whatever it was, you had to do what? You had to put the time in.
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It wasn't just a snap of the finger and you got where you wanted to be.
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And it seems to me we're drifting further and further away from that.
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We're coming to the point where it doesn't matter whether we use diverse ways.
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It doesn't matter whether we're dishonest.
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It doesn't matter that we're not following the word of God.
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It doesn't matter whether God is delighted or angry.
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What matters is, does it taste sweet? Does it get me where I wanna be? And here's the reality of it, friends.
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It might very well get you where you wanna be.
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Bernie Madoff thought he was flying high.
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It was sweet.
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He bilked people out of billions of dollars until his mouth was full of gravel being sentenced to prison for 150 years.
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And then he's gotta go out and meet God.
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We need to think about these things and we need to teach these things.
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We need to teach these things to younger people.
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We need to teach these things to older people.
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We need to teach each other about it.
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That our affairs are to be open and honest.
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Whether you be a man or a woman, big business person, lemonade stand, I don't care what it is.
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Again, I am not, I am a capitalist.
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So I think I told a couple of you, we had bought a boat a couple of years ago, me and my son-in-law, and between my eye and his back, we figured, gotta get rid of the boat.
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Because either we're gonna sink or kill each other.
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But anyway, I was so thrilled that I got more money when I sold my boat than I paid for the boat.
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Capitalist.
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Cool.
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But I didn't do it by diverse weights and measures.
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I simply brought, had I brought the boat back to the same person who bought it the first time and they gave me, who sold it to me the first time and they gave me more money the second time.
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Because the value in the economy and all those things.
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Man, I was good.
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So was my son-in-law.
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But how many people will try to get over, try to take advantage, try to misuse, use diverse weights, cry it's really not worth as much, and to find a quick reward, only to find out later that it comes back and it's gravel in your mouth.
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I think this is really practical, friends.
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I think we need these kinds of practical, considerations in our lives, because we all are members of society.
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We all interact with others, right? You have dealings with many, many people.
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And many people have dealings with you.
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And so we ought to consider the importance of not offending God, not being those who use diverse weights and diverse measures.
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And I really do believe that some of the issue really comes not only from seeking to gain, but being lazy and not willing to put in the honest, upright work that's involved in order to prosper.
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And I'm sure again, brother, you could probably attest to this.
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We all can, but I know you manage your own business in some, in these days.
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So again, something to think about.
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And I always had to remember when I was, because there was opportunities, even though I had people overlooking me when I was managing $18 million a year worth of revenue, there were ways, I knew the ways to pad my bottom line.
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There was some managers, what they would do is they would get a bill and they would charge it to someone else's location.
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And that other manager wouldn't be watching, wouldn't look at his detail of his expenses, and he'd wind up paying for the other guy's expense.
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That's free money, right? And there was a temptation.
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And you have to fight that temptation.
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And you and I again, and if you desire to go into business, consider these things before you go into business.
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Because you're either gonna serve God or you're gonna serve man.
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And you can't serve God and you can't serve mammon at the same time.
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You will love one and hate the other.
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So something to think about.
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Okay, one last verse and then we'll end it for tonight.
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And that is verse 23, look at it again.
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And it's interesting, it's almost repetitive of what he said in verse 10.
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Verse 23, diverse weights are an abomination to the Lord and a false balance is not good.
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A false balance is not good.
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Again, God finds no delight in uneven business.
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And that even goes as a principle, even among God's people.
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I think it's interesting that as you read in the Old Testament, that if you lent money to one of your brethren, you could not charge them interest.
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Now, if you lent to a stranger, you were allowed to charge interest, but you couldn't gouge.
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And even restoration had a just weight and a just measure.
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If you remember some of the laws that were laid out in the Old Testament, if someone did this or if this happened or someone's animal died and you had to restore it, then you had to add sometimes a fifth or you had to add this many shekels to it, you had to add this, that, but it was a just balance and a just weight, right? It was almost, and if you read, it's interesting how many people will say an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
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But if you really read in the context of what that's talking about, it's really talking about remuneration and restoration.
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And that there has to be a just weight and measures even in retribution.
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And again, if you consider these words that a false balance is not good, that you and I would consider this, that we really need to have a constant understanding of being in God's presence.
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Now, that doesn't mean that we're walking around in the heavenlies, because none of us are, but an abiding understanding of God's presence that he sees all.
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And not only does he see the outward business, he sees the inward business.
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He reads our hearts.
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He knows our minds.
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He knows if we're trying to abuse a situation or abuse a person or abuse an opportunity.
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And so again, my friends, we ought to be those who use just weights, just measures, and not follow the ways of the world and not conduct business according to the world.
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And I'll put it to you this way as we begin to close, character is of greater worth than cash.
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Character is of greater worth than cash.
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Again, I'm not against investment.
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I invested in the stock market.
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I did that, all that stuff for all those years and I'm thankful for it and it's paid off for me.
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It allows me to be able not to work.
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But if I had to choose between dishonest gain and godly gain, I would hope that I would and I will choose godly gain.
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And not fall into the traps because it's an offense of how many people use it.
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And again, nothing slides below the radar, friends.
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And I'll close with that.
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We really need to understand we ought to do good to all men, especially to those that are household of faith and that our God not only sees our actions, he sees our hearts.
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So may God help us to, by his spirit, in all our business dealings, use just weights and just measures for his glory and ultimately for our own eternal good.
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Okay, let's close with a word of prayer.
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Our father, God, thank you for your truth, Lord, even how it affects our relationship before you and our relationship before men.
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For Lord, that's what you have given us to do, to have a vertical relationship with you, the God of all the earth, through our Lord Jesus Christ, by the power of the spirit and a horizontal relationship to men.
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And Lord, help us, give us grace, each one of us, men, women, young, old, in between, that we might be honest in all our dealings in business and in all our dealings in all things, Lord.
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Bless us tonight, Lord.
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Be with those who are, again, suffering from the storm, even those that are yours in that area, and keep us safe till we meet again.
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In Jesus' name, amen.