SERMON: Proverbs 7: Prognosing Sexual Sin (Part 1)

Thank you for subscribing to the shepherds church podcast. This is our Lord's Day sermon. We pray that as we declare the word of God that you would be encouraged strengthened in your faith. And that you would catch a greater vision of who christ is.

May you be blessed in the hearing of god's word and may the lord be with you. In the last several weeks. We've been talking about sexual sin. And maybe you are like me and you've never really heard a single sermon at the depth that we've been preaching at on this topic.

You never heard anything as as biblical as what we're talking about here much less hearing multiple sermons on the topic and. The temptation. I'll admit the temptation for me and maybe the temptation for you would be to say that okay.

We've covered the topic. Let's move on. But how can we do that? Because from proverb 6 the end of proverb 6 all the way till the very end of proverb 7 There are 39 verses that are related to this topic.

And in those 39 verses It speaks about this topic in a variety of different ways. It's a multifaceted approach to talking about this topic. And in that point god we must admit cares deeply about the subject of sex.

It's central to the creational order. It's the glory of a godly marriage. It magnifies the mystery of his gospel. And the topic shows up in over 400 verses in the bible. Let me put it to you this way.

There are more verses in the bible about sex. Than prayer baptism the lord's supper and predestination combined. So when we say that god cares about this topic. He does and he cares about it through the volume with which he speaks about it.

Again, I can totally understand that. We've been talking about a topic that most churches avoid most churches. Skip, but with that in mind We have to. We have to talk about it and with the amount of perversion that we see in culture and in the world not just today.

But throughout history we have to talk about this topic. Which is exactly why we've slowed down recently and covered this. We've been in a sort of a mini series on this topic. Uh in week one we talked about the parental protection and prevention of future sexual sin.

And and how.

Critical a parent is a mom and a dad is the remember the commands of the father and the teachings of the mother are to. Helping a child navigate a world that is sexually insane. In week two, we talked about the punishment the price.

Of what sexual sin will cause you the heavy punishment that comes with it. It will not only ruin you and zap you of your vigor and your vitality. But it'll ruin everyone around you like nuclear fallout in your family.

And now today as we turn the page to chapter seven, which is entirely devoted to this topic I want to talk about it in a little bit of a different way. Because there's all kinds of things in this passage that are relevant to both men and women.

So we're going to take it in part. We're going to speak to the men then we're going to speak to the women. But today I want to I want to do this in a in a unique sort of way. I want to do it like a doctor.

Who you go to visit when you're sick? And you sit down on the crinkly paper. Oh, that is so annoying. I don't know if I don't know if you dislike that or not. I know it's for sanitary reasons, but the crinkly.

Every time you move it just oh, it's annoying. I hope that this sermon isn't like that for you but I want to treat this like A medical doctor who's looking at your chart. And it's going through a list of symptoms that's going to lead to a disease.

If you're not careful. It's gonna it's it's almost like don't do these things because if you do these things you are going to end up in the disease of sexual ruin. I want to do that and at the same time I want to also because a good doctor.

Whether you agree with modern pharmacology or not. A good doctor will actually give you a remedy. And Jesus is the true and great physician. So as we talk about symptoms of sexual ruin, I also want to give you remedies.

So that you will not face sexual ruin. And that's going to be how we face this today. We're going to be in the er. You're going to be talking with the scriptures.

And.

I pray that that this is helpful. I pray this is practical now I will ask a couple things first ladies ask for your patience today. Because this text is primarily about the men last week was too I ask for your patience because solomon is addressing this to his son and he's saying be on guard for these things so we need to talk to the men because Men face sexual sin in our culture at an alarming rate and it's destroyed many men.

So we need to talk to the men. Your grace is a gift in that so that we can deal with this topic and surgically expose it. So men's can grow healthy because if men are healthy. This is just the way god made the world.

If men are healthy women will be thriving. And if men are broken women will suffer so we have to talk to the men we have to help our men grow in Holiness because it will bless everyone in the church to the men.

We're going to be going through 15 symptoms and we're only going to be able to cover six this week because I can't Do 15 to 15 point sermon and nor do you want me to? And not everything in this sermon is going to hit you.

There's going to be some symptoms you say I don't deal with that. Praise god for that. There's going to be some that that do. So take those hear them pray through those. And apply the remedy that we're talking about because it will help set you free.

Also if you are one of the rare people Who has absolutely no interaction with sexual sin? And you've walked through the culture that we lived through completely unscathed praise god for you. As we go through this message pray and pray for brothers and pray for sisters because it's been my experience as a pastor that more people than More people than not have some sort of history of trauma dysfunction or sin in this area.

And it's an area of great shame. So if you have by god's grace walked through life unscathed pray for your brothers and sisters and pray that this church Would be a model of purity and gospel health. Amen.

Proverbs 7 and the Spiritual Diagnosis of Sexual Sin

So if you will let's turn to proverbs chapter 7 i'd like to read the whole chapter this week. And i'd like to read the whole chapter next week and i'd like to read the whole chapter the week after that.

And knowing me You don't know what's it could be four weeks. I'm i'm committed to making this three. So we'll see what happens. But let's read proverbs chapter 7. This is the word of the lord. My son keep my words and treasure my commandments within you.

Keep my commandments and live. And my teaching as the apple of your eye. Bind them on your fingers write them on the tablet of your heart say to wisdom. You are my sister. And call understanding your intimate friend.

That they may keep you from an adulteress. From the foreigner who flatters with her words. For at the window of my house. I looked out through my lattice and I saw among the naive. And discerned among the youth say young men lacking sense Passing through the street near her corner.

And he takes the way to her house in the twilight in the evening in the middle of the night and in the darkness. And behold a woman comes to meet him dressed as a harlot and cunning of heart. She is boisterous and rebellious.

Her feet do not remain at home. She is now in the streets now in the squares and lurks by every corner. So she seizes him and kisses him and with a brazen face. She says to him I was due to offer peace offerings.

Today I have paid my vows. Therefore. I have come out to meet you to seek your presence earnestly. And I have found you. I have spread my couch with coverings with colored linens of egypt. I have sprinkled my bed with myrrh aloes and cinnamon come.

Let us drink our fill of love until morning. Let us delight ourself with caresses for my husband is not at home. He has gone on a long journey. He has taken a bag of money with him. At the full moon he has come home.

With her many persuasions she entices him with her flattering lips. She seduces him. Suddenly he follows her as an ox goes to the slaughter. Or as one and fetters to the discipline of a fool. Until an arrow pierces through his liver as a bird hastens to the snare.

So he does not know that it will cost him his life. Now therefore my sons listen to me and pay attention to the words of my mouth. Do not let your heart turn aside to her ways. Do not stray into her paths.

For many are the victims that she has cast down and numerous are all of her slain. Her house is the way to shield descending to the chambers of death. Let us pray. Lord, we thank you for today. We thank you for the frankness of your word we thank you for the.

For the way that it speaks down to the most essential elements of human life. Lord we thank you that we are not a sheep without a shepherd. We have clear teaching on this topic. And lord, I pray that as we speak of it today that we will speak about it in a way that is helpful in a way that points to faithfulness fidelity impurity.

And lord ultimately to christ. Lord help us. It's in jesus name. We pray amen. Again before we dive in we need to look at the spiritual mri of sexual sin. It's not it's not that sin happens immediately on the surface it it festers for a while for a season for maybe for a long season as a tumor that is multiplying underneath.

And today I want the scriptures to surgically scan the soul and to light up any bright spots of compromise to reveal Any hidden infection that's been killing your strength or zapping your purity and your joy.

And I want each verse of this to be a kind of diagnostic Indicator. I want it to be like lab results. I recently had a physical and I got the results back from the lab and I had to put them into chat gbt to even understand what they're talking about, but there's a lot of things.

There's a lot of levels. There's a lot of things that were being tested to see if I were in was in a healthy range. And then later I had a conversation with my doctor on the things that were not in a healthy range.

That's what I want today to be. For you to get the results of where you are.

Deficient.

That need gospel help in gospel. Hope. So that's our our goal. And because when you're using a pathological metaphor. To advance the entire sermon why not get creative and adopt points that have pathology sounding titles.

So i'm gonna i'm gonna give diseases that sound like real diseases, but I made them up. And that was fun for me. The first one is called scriptura malnutritia. Scriptura malnutritia. Solomon says in verses 1 2 and in verse 5 my son keep my words and treasure my commands within you.

Keep my commands and live that they may keep you from the adulterous. From the foreigner who flatters with her words. Notice again. This is what it said in in proverbs 6 20 through 24 that it's the father and the mother's teaching.

That keeps a child from sexual ruin. It's the teaching. It's the it's the comprehension of the bible. It is the understanding knowing and being insatiated with the word of god. And in that sense. Even if you did not have a father who brought you to the word.

You have a heavenly father who gave you the word. So you have a responsibility in that sense to be nourished by the word of god. Because it is your primary defense against sexual sin. So that if you are fat on the word of god, you will be starved of sexual sin.

If you are fat on the word you will be thin on sexual sin. But the opposite is also true if you are starved of god's word. You will become increasingly vulnerable to sin in general and to sexual sin in particular.

In that sense the disease doesn't begin in the bedroom. It begins with the bible that lays closed in the cupboard. And it's the way that it's laid out in the bible. Solomon opens up this chapter in the exact same way that he does ending chapter six.

He says keep my words treasure my commandments make them the apple of your eye, which is such a fascinating little phrase. Because you're like I don't have any apples in my eye. What does that even mean?

Well, I don't know why it got translated the way that it did actually uh in hebrew. The most idiomatic and literal translation of this is not apple at all. So I don't know how it got there. The the translation in hebrew is the little man in your eye.

Which could even seem a little bit more confusing. What it is Is when a man and his wife Are face to face. A man can look in the reflection of her eye and see the little man looking back at him. That's what it means because he's so close to her.

That he sees his own reflection in her pupil. What god is saying is that you must be so close to his scriptures. That you could even see your own reflection being read back out of them. Isn't that beautiful?

That's what that's what the bible's saying that we should be that we should be that close that intimate that that have that much intimacy with the word of god so that we will be protected from the foreign strange.

Woman.

This is especially true for men. Who are not called just to lead themselves but are called to lead families. How much more. So should we be intimate with the word of god so that we could lead ourselves?

And lead those who god has given us. The first symptom of a downfall of sexual ruin. Is spiritual malnutrition? Scriptural malnutrition. A starving soul. A dusty bible. A man who is spiritually emaciated by skipping meals with god.

Just like a body becomes weak without food the heart becomes weak without truth. You begin to lose clarity. You begin to lose conviction you you begin to lose the fight before it even starts. And in this way.

You didn't fall into lust because it's just one of your proclivities. You fell into lust because you were empty. You fell into lust because you were not filled with the scriptures. I remember in England they said of john bunyan that if you if you were to prick him he would bleed.

Bible verses brothers and sisters. That's the level Of biblical saturation that we need. So that we are protected in the day of temptation. This is what really no one wants to say out loud. Is that porn and sexual sin didn't cause your soul to rot?

It was a rotting and neglected soul that went looking for them. It starts first with the rotten soul. When the word of god is absent from you just as when an iron. When iron is absent from the bloodstream your soul grows weak.

And lust becomes the desperate solution of the spiritual anemia. You self-imposed. Solomon says without the word. You will treasure something. And often it is.

Lust.

The remedy for that. Now, what's the remedy. The remedy is easy here. Feast upon the word of god. Feast it plunder it. Gorge yourself on the scriptures. There is nothing on earth that you can gorge yourself with that.

That's not called gluttony except the bible. You eat a delicious cheeseburger too much. You're going to be a glutton If you drink too much water. It's possible for you to die by drinking too much water.

If you breathe too much air gluttonously you will hyperventilate.

But with the word of god, you can't out eat it. You can't be a glutton.

So do it plunder it. It is your life raft in an ocean of temptation.

And it is your life raft.

In an ocean of temptation. Imagine how White knuckled your fingers are on the little life raft in the middle of the ocean. And that's the posture we ought to have for the word of god. That's why jesus says man shall not live on bread alone.

But everything that proceeds out of the mouth of god he goes down to the level of bread.

It's more important than bread.

And i'm guilty of this. Of the very thing that I need the most doing it the least right? You don't fight sexual sin. With manosphere podcast. You don't fight sexual sin by grinding it out and trying to endure the temptation.

You don't fight it in the dark. You don't fight it alone. You fight it by storing up the word of god in the marrow of your bones. That's the first symptom that leads to the disease. The second is what i'm calling boundaria collapsia the collapsing of your boundaries.

Solomon says in Proverbs 7 8. Passing through the street near her corner and he takes the way to her house. Do you see what's happening in this? He's not at home. He's not in the safeguards that have been established for him.

He's.

Bumbling down the street near where jezebel lives. And he's gandering and looking to see if he can get a glimpse. He's put himself in the position to where his boundaries are gone. He's put himself in the environment for where he's going to fall thinking that he won't like an addict Who goes down the wrong street at night? and tells themselves I'm, just i'm just tired.

I just maybe I just need a little ride. Knowing that he's going to find what he's looking for. In the same way this man went knowing what he was going to find but didn't have the courage to admit that he was looking.

For it.

How often do we live in that denial? When it comes to our sin we go right up to the line and we tiptoe and we say oh I won't fall in. And we do and we do. And we do. When we flirt with temptation it leads towards death.

And this is what happens when you forget to tell yourself. No, when you forget to reinforce your boundaries. When you forget your safeguards. When you forget your accountability. This is what happens you allow yourself the devastating and dubious freedom of dawdling in the dangerous places.

And this may manifest itself literally by driving down the wrong neighborhood Where you know that the harlots are? But it also may manifest by having a drink with your co-worker Who is of the opposite sex and saying that i'm only being friendly.

This may happen from keeping a particular app on your phone. This may happen by messaging the old friend. This may happen by putting yourself in situations where you know that you are not strong and you fall.

But thinking somehow this time is going to be different. Lust wins because it's stronger than you. Lust wins because you're no match for it. We don't fall into sexual sin brothers because we lack masculinity.

We fall into it because it's an enemy. We can't defeat. This man look at him. He doesn't touch her doesn't even notice her at first doesn't see her and yet he is Well on his way to ruin. Because he's put himself in an environment where he can't win.

He's put himself in the magnetic pull of sin. And he's like i'm a man of metal. How many how many of us men we think we think i'm strong? I'm made of iron. I'm made of steel. Well, guess what magnets like metal.

And this is a magnet that's going to draw you in.

Men.

And women but men today. We don't fall into sexual sin in an instant. We drift by inches. And we drift by millimeters and we drift by eventually by yards. And then the fall. By the time you've fallen you've lost hundreds of times.

Because your boundaries were eroded. Because you loitered where demons play. You can't play with fire and walk away without getting singed this. I thought about this this would be like a man who set a campfire in his living room and then tried to file An insurance claim when it burned his house down.

You fool. But that's exactly what we do with sexual sin. We play with it. And then we're surprised. And even appeal to heaven i'll never do it again. I I can't believe. I You can't believe you did it.

You put yourself in the situation where you know, you're going to fall and you fell. Don't put yourself there ever again. What's the remedy. Build fences build gates build walls build structures. That will hold you accountable so that you don't get into the environment where 10 sins later you end up in sin.

Distance yourself from it. In a way that you actually don't get to the slope. That leads to ruin. This is a war. And you have to fight by building Accountability and also by letting other people help you where you're weak build that accountability for you.

And that's the definition of spiritual insanity. It's not it's not a sin to admit you're weak. I think all of us are. It's a sin to think you're strong and to live in a delusion that causes you to fall again and again and again.

That's the definition of spiritual insanity. That's number two number three is Sistoral diminishing disorder. Sistoral diminishing disorder. Solomon says say to wisdom. You are my sister and call understanding your intimate friend.

That's proverb 7 -4. This sin this symptom is a distorted vision of womanhood. This is a distorted vision of what woman is. Look at what solomon does here. He says say to wisdom you are my sister. I love that I love that.

Because he says you are my sister. He casts wisdom as a woman of holiness. Look to her approach her rightly. If you hollow out wisdom. One of the results of that will be that you hollow out womanhood.

Men.

If you have a hollow view of what wisdom is you will eventually have a hollow view of what woman is. Either you will be Tyrannical in a patriarchal way. I think patriarchy is biblical by the way. But you'll be tyrannical in a patriarchal way or or you'll be a a boy who treats every woman as an object.

But if you don't have wisdom you will hollow out what god meant when he said she was very good. To say that a different way when a man disregards wisdom When she's compared to a woman He will usually disregard women In his lack of wisdom.

If you don't have a high view of wisdom, you're not going to have a high view of womanhood. And when that happens You will not view her as god views her. You will view her as something to be flirted with or gawked at.

Vision is the issue not just behavioral. It's it's a vision issue. Because at the end of the day What god is saying through painting wisdom as a woman Is that there is a way to view womanhood with wisdom.

And by calling her a sister I think there's a paradigm here for how to view all women.

A sister.

Except for your wife. There's mothers. There's sisters and there are wives. All are glorious, but you only have one wife. You only get to look at one woman the way that you look at her. Everyone else is a sister everyone else.

And I will say this In every culture that has ever existed. It is a disgusting and a deplorable act for a brother to sexualize a sister. Every woman you look at inappropriately you are doing the same thing.

It is a deplorable thing.

And.

You would then be listed among the great perverts of earth by looking at a woman who's your sister in that way. Which means that we need to have a kind of mental sobriety we need to have a a redefinition of what woman is.

We need to pray that god would allow us men to look at all women.

As our sister.

Worthy of protection worthy of care not worthy of. Fantasizing about what's the cure here repentance? Repentance and prayer. Pray that the lord of glory would make your eyes holy again. Pray that the lord of glory would transform your vision to where you see women.

As your sister.

That you have the kind of courage that a brother has to protect her against all enemies. You ever watched a four-year-old little boy protect a two-year-old little girl. Not against my sister. That's how we men must look at all women except our wife Who we have been given god's grace To enjoy in the bounds of covenant marriage, but every other woman is our sister.

And if you don't look at women that way you will fall victim to temptation in this way. That's number three. Number four is omnipotence delusia. The delusion Of grandeur that leads you to think you're omnipotent.

Solomon says.

That they.

Remember the they is the commands And the teaching that they the commands and the teaching may keep you from the adulteress from the foreigner who flatters with her words.

Proverbs.

Uh, yeah, seven five. This is the man who ignores the commands of god on purpose. This is a man who thinks i'm too strong for this. I can handle this. I'm not gonna fall in this. I don't need protection in this.

Which is a kind of delusion of exceptionality. It's the delusional belief that you are the exception to the rule. I remember talking to a man once who said You know, I don't I don't struggle with this at all.

And then two years later.

There was a blow up.

I think it's right and good to admit that every man Without christ without the gospel without grace struggles in this area. I actually think that's good and right and holy to admit that because when we have the right expectation we know how to fight the war.

If you go into a war unaware Then you can't fight it. What was it. Sung zhu who said know thy enemy. One some ways brothers. You must know thyself. Because in a lot of ways you are the enemy. Your flesh is the enemy and you must crucify it Repent of it.

Pray to the lord to kill it. Remember, uh romans 8 13 b. If by the spirit you're putting to death the misdeeds of the flesh, then you will live. So living is an act of killing. If you want to live you have to kill.

What do you. Kill your flesh. Every day daily. Wasn't it john owen who said.

Um.

Be killing sin.

Or sin be killing you. To know this about yourself is good. It's not bad. But when you act like it doesn't affect you. When you act like That you're stronger than this you live in a kind of arrogance and amnesia, which are twin sisters.

You live in a radical arrogance that you will fall. Just like you did last week and the week before. But you're so arrogant you have an amnesia. Remember. Amnesia and arrogance are best friends. They're bosom sisters.

They hold hands. And your past failures do actually inform your future battles. Overconfidence today will guarantee defeat tomorrow. Don't do that. It's like a man running into a burning building and saying because I have courage the the fires will not kiss me.

That man's a moron. And you may think that that's a strong word, but i'm saying brother. If you keep putting yourself in situations where you're prone to fall And are surprised that you fall. You're a moron.

You need brothers to hit you over the head and say wake up, dude.

You need brothers to hit you over the head.

So that you can actually fight in a way that actually will lead to victory. Our job is not to lose on purpose. We're not we're not we're not a basketball team. That's that's trying to lose so that they can get the lottery pick.

We actually want to win, right. Well, if you want to win you have to actually know that you're. You have to know your proclivities. You have to know where you fail. You have to know where you fall. You have to know how to surround yourself with the right kind of accountability that will actually let you win.

Humility. Humility, it's a christian virtue. Is so helpful here. Because doubting yourself actually puts you in a place where you can fight In a way that will actually lead to victory. That's number four number five.

Cognitive naivete syndrome. This is a man who's too dull to even understand that there's a danger that's present. Don't ask me how to spell naivete.

I'm not a.

Spell check. I think burned up by trying to make that word. Proverbs 7 7 says and I saw among the naive a discern and discerned among the youth a man who was lacking sense. This is cognitive naivete this condition.

Of men who are so naive and so dumb to the danger that that they stumble in unaware untrained. The fool Is not evil in and of himself he's evil and he falls into evil because he's empty. Solomon peers through the lattice and he looks down and he sees the man who is clueless lacking sense and because of that he's doomed.

He doesn't even recognize that because i'm going on this stroll. I'm going to go down to sheol. What is the remedy for this? Wake up and grow up. It's okay to be naive once. It's not okay to be naive perpetually.

Wake up. Put the foolish things aside. Take on knowledge and wisdom and discernment. Do as paul said that when I was a child, I thought as a child. But when I became a man, I thought like a man. Think like a man.

You can only use the naive card a couple times before. You're full of it. Put away childish thinking and think like a man. Proverbs 13 20 says he who walks with wise men will be wise. But the companion of fools will suffer harm brothers.

If there is ever an admonition that you hear do not be a man. And at least in this time period I think all time periods it applies alone. This idea of john wayne lone ranger clint eastwood by myself. I'm a hero is what crushes so many men.

Do not be alone. Walk with men. Walk with men who are further along than you and listen to what they say. Look at how they interact in their families. Surround yourself with the community because by yourself you are a target.

Don't surround yourself with fools. Surround yourself with men who love jesus more than you. Who pray harder than you who study the scriptures more than you? And watch how the lord blesses you. In community with other men.

It will grow you but by yourself you are as vulnerable. As a gimpy gazelle in the middle of the serengeti. You're going down. It's only a matter of time. That's number. It's number five number six. Not just the last one for today.

Nocturnal erosive disorder. Solomon talks about nightfall as The place where sin festers. This is what he says in the twilight in the evening in the middle of the night. And in the darkness proverbs 7 9 he cast the the the circumstance of all of this as being in the night.

And the scripture does this so much too, doesn't it? As live in the light instead of in the dark. We were transferred out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. Why. Because there is Potential for sin in the shadows that doesn't exist in the light.

I don't think that this is an incidental detail. I think this is a forensic Detail where solomon is saying that in the shadows is where you struggle. So avoid them. And you say how do you avoid them? As we said earlier Your approach to the night Goes with your approach to building walls and fences and borders and boundaries.

So that you are protected when the sun goes down. Because when the sun goes down after dinner your body relaxes. And if your accountability structures fail you then you're left alone unguarded and unprotected.

And sin loves the shadows. When the house is quiet when the conscious is tired when the only thing that's glowing is a screen. Don't be surprised when the demons come out and play. Because they don't sleep.

And they love to tempt men under the cover of night.

Brothers.

There's more that we could say. But ephesians 5 15 through 16, I think says it. Well be careful how you walk. Making the most of your time. Because the days are evil. This doesn't just mean repent of your sin.

It means restructure your schedule. Be careful how you walk. Be careful where you walk. Look at the man in this passage in proverb 7. He was walking. Dumbly into ruin. So what's the antidote? What's the remedy.

Walk intelligently? Walk with holiness. Walk with righteousness. What does psalm 1 say? That you don't walk in the way of the wicked or sit in the seat of scoffers or go down like. Walk with righteousness.