WWUTT 1499 A Gentle Answer Turns Away Wrath (Proverbs 15:1-10)

The way of the wicked is an abomination to God, but his favor is upon the one who loves righteousness. And our righteousness is given to us in Christ, when we understand the text.

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Proverbs 15:1-3 and the Wisdom of Gentle Speech

Thank you, Becky. We come back to our study in the book of Proverbs. We're up to chapter 15 this week, and I'm going to begin by reading the first 10 verses. This is Proverbs 15, starting in verse 1 in the Legacy Standard Bible.

A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. The tongue of the wise makes knowledge look good, but the mouth of fools pours forth folly. The eyes of Yahweh are in every place, watching the evil and the good.

A tongue that brings healing is a tree of life, but perversion in it breaks the spirit. An ignorant fool spurns his father's discipline, but he who keeps reproof is prudent. The house of the righteous has much treasure, but in the income of the wicked there is trouble.

The lips of the wise disperse knowledge, but the hearts of fools are not so. The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to Yahweh, but the prayer of the upright is his delight. The way of the wicked is an abomination to Yahweh, but he loves one who pursues righteousness.

Grievous discipline is for him who forsakes the way. He who hates reproof will die. Sometimes we talk about the Proverbs as being general wisdom. I don't think this is the case with every single proverb, but generally.

We talk about the Proverbs being general wisdom. This is not going to be the result every single time, but generally this is true. Proverbs 15 .1 is a good example of general wisdom. A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.

Is that always true? Not necessarily, but generally it is the case. If you're yelling at somebody, what are the odds that they're going to yell back at you? A lot higher than if you were speaking calmly with one another.

A gentle answer turns away wrath. A lot of times when this word wrath is used, it's used in connection with some sort of violent response. We're even talking here about not just two people yelling back and forth at each other, but stirring up a person to respond violently to the way that you answer.

If you answer calmly, if you respond gently, if you respond with wisdom, we can also read it that way since we're talking largely about applying wisdom as we go through Proverbs. A gentle and wise answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.

If you speak harshly, if you demean the other person, you cut them down, you try to make yourself look better than they are, well, that's going to stir anger. That's going to, you know, tensions are going to rise, things are going to get heated, might even respond violently.

But generally we understand that a gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. I could certainly give examples of times when a gentle answer did not turn away wrath. And you could probably think of occasions as well.

There was a couple of years ago, there was a man in my church who had been caught in adultery. And it was one of those things where he couldn't even deny it. He was caught, so he had to admit it. But admitting it was not the same as repenting of it.

So we met together to, for me, basically just to confront him on the fact that you haven't repented of this yet. You're showing no fruit in keeping with repentance. And as I was talking with him about that, he got extremely angry at me, rose up out of his chair, got his finger out, is pointing at me, yelling and screaming and throwing curse words.

There were other people in the building that heard his reaction. I was nothing but calm and in my seat that entire time. So that was one such occasion in which a gentle answer did not turn away wrath.

But more often than not, the gentle answer will yield a gentle response. It shows love. It shows intentionality. It shows a confidence in something other than yourself. Like if confidence is just in yourself, where I'm going to yell and scream and do whatever I need to do to make my answer the most intense as possible.

So to try to get a result out of you that I expect. But my confidence is not in my ability to persuade somebody else. My confidence is in Christ. And if somebody is going to be changed and transformed, it is going to be the Holy Spirit that is working in that person's heart.

So I don't need to respond with anything other than a gentle response. There are certainly times and occasions in which a more harsh word is applicable. And I mean, that was even the case with Christ.

He fashioned a whip of cords, right? And drove people out of the temple. So sometimes that harsh word is indeed needed. But as we speak and respond and advise one another, let it be with the intentionality of gentleness first, before we get to that place of escalation.

Verse 2, a tongue of the wise makes knowledge look good, but the mouth of fools pours forth folly. And this really goes right with what we just read in verse 1. You're talking about a wise answer, a gentle answer.

And the way a wise person speaks, the way that they are patient, slow to speak and quick to listen. And then giving a response according to the situation, that which benefits the hearers and builds each other up.

Well, that makes knowledge look good. You know wise people in your life, right? That when they speak, it just makes learning fun. I want to learn what that person knows, that I may be able to respond and give answers in that way.

That I may have confidence in my circumstances that God is working all things together for good. And so a person who is able to speak wisely in that way makes learning, makes the pursuit of knowledge look good.

But the mouth of fools pours forth folly. It's discouraging. A foolish person, if you're following a fool, if you're listening to a fool, then what you get is foolishness. And that foolishness can be, as I said, discouraging in that you really don't feel like doing anything.

You don't feel that you need to pursue knowledge or grow in an understanding of your situation or your circumstances. Because what am I going to get? The same foolishness that this person is pouring forth?

You just look at our leaders in a practical sense. Look at somebody who is a governing authority. Those who are the most wise tend to stir up people that want to do what they challenge others to do. But the person who speaks as a fool doesn't really stir anybody up.

Andrew Cuomo, who is the governor of the state of New York, at least for a little less than two more weeks since he just resigned. He is a person who is discouraging and he's destroying his entire state.

The city of New York is losing people because of the foolish policies that have been passed in the state of New York. To the point that Andrew Cuomo has had to beg businesses to come back to New York City.

It's become so hard in New York City that businesses can't even thrive there anymore. They're packing up their stores and they're moving to other places because the governing authorities are so bad at their jobs.

So you don't hear a wise word encouraging people to thrive and do good. You're hearing foolish people that just pour forth foolishness and drive people away. Verse three, the eyes of Yahweh are in every place watching the evil and the good.

Now, this should be this should be such a verse that would cause us to tremble because we know that God is watching everything we do. He knows every action, as it says in Revelation, chapter three, that he is searching the hearts and the minds of everyone.

This is not the way that we judge one another. In fact, it's impossible for us to really know the intentions of a person's heart. Well, maybe not impossible. It's those things tend to reveal themselves over time.

But it's difficult on a first a first impression to know what a person's intentions are. Right. Sometimes you just kind of have to wait for things to unfold before you figure out, OK, that's what that person was up to.

But but God always knows the intentions of the heart. He knows what we're thinking and what our motivations are, even if we may not admit that's what our motivation was. In First Samuel, chapter 16, verse seven, God said to the prophet Samuel, do not look at his appearance or at the height of his stature because I have rejected him.

For God sees not as man sees. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart. Seems like in the Western world right now, everybody is being judged by their appearance, by the color of their skin.

But God has never judged anybody by the color of their skin. The Lord looks at the heart. Take your your temptations, your trials, your hurts, your anxieties, your frustrations. Take all of that before God, your sins, confess before God, ask him to forgive you and make you new.

And he will give you a new heart. As it says in Psalm 51, we continue on into verse four. A tongue that brings healing is a tree of life, but perversion in it breaks the spirit. Here we continue this theme of speaking of encouraging words or discouraging words.

Even as we get here to verse four, a tongue that brings healing is a tree of life. How is it that a person brings healing with their words? Certainly by the word of God. If we have an encouraging word according to God's word, then that is a word that brings healing.

But perversion, a person who speaks perverse things, who speaks with the mind of a man instead of with the mind of God, he breaks the spirit, tears a person down, is not encouraging or building up. You just think about Job's friends.

Job's friends did real good when they sat with him in dust and ashes and wept with him. But then once they started speaking to him and attempting to encourage him, that was when they showed themselves to be fools and they broke down his spirit instead of built this man up.

But one who speaks a word from God brings healing and a tree of life. When you consider that it is the word of God that brings salvation, it is in the hearing of the gospel that we repent of our sin and put our trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.

And so we are saved. When we hear about our sin, when we hear that Jesus died on the cross for our sin, he rose again from the grave so that all who believe in him will not perish. But we also receive his resurrection and have everlasting life.

All who put their faith and trust in him, that's life. In Christ is life. In the rest of this world is nothing but death. Verse 5, an ignorant fool spurns his father's discipline, but he who keeps reproof is prudent.

Now, this is something that as a parent, I've come to recognize in the way that I discipline my children. When you discipline a child and they get angry about their discipline, like whether it's grounding, you know, you take away TV and video games from them or you give them a spanking, whatever that might happen to be, whatever the punishment is, your child generally gets mad, right?

That's usually the response. Who are they mad at? They won't say, but very rarely are they mad at themselves. They're mad at you. And so that's why it's very important as parents, when we discipline our kids, that we explain to them that they're getting disciplined, not just because I'm mad at what you did.

You're getting disciplined because you did wrong and I want to teach you what is right. So the person that you have to be mad at is yourself, not at me or with my daughters. They will usually be hurt by the punishment that I have inflicted upon them.

And even there, it's to encourage them to recognize you only have yourself to be hurt by, to mourn over the fact that you did wrong so that you will repent of this wrong and not repeat it. Instead, desire to do the right thing.

So an ignorant fool spurs his father's discipline, hates his discipline, doesn't learn from it. But he who keeps reproof, is prudent, gives thoughts to his ways, will be wise in the decisions that he or she makes.

So as we issue discipline or even as we correct one another in the church, encouraging or admonishing one another as the occasion fits, as it says in Colossians 3 .16, even in those occasions where we have to admonish someone, we're clear that we're doing this because we want them to repent of their sin and follow in righteousness.

Proverbs 15:6-10 and the Treasure of the Righteous

Speaking of righteousness, we go on to verse six. The house of the righteous has much treasure, but in the income of the wicked, there is trouble. And as I talked at the beginning about, you know, spiritual application to these proverbs and practical application, you can certainly see the spiritual application to this, right?

The house of the righteous, the person who desires to do good, who has built his house, his life on the rock who is Christ. As Jesus gave that illustration of the wise man and the foolish man at the end of Matthew chapter seven, the one who builds his house on Christ, builds his house on righteousness, and he has much treasure.

As Jesus said in Matthew six, still in the Sermon on the Mount, to store up treasure in heaven, where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. And there in heaven, where your treasure is, moth and rust cannot destroy.

Nobody can take it from you. It is an eternal investment that you will receive in full on the day of glory. So the house of the righteous, much treasure, eternal treasure, in fact, but in the income of the wicked, there is trouble.

The things that a wicked man does, the wages that he receives for his wickedness is just trouble. He brings trouble upon himself. He'll bring trouble upon those who are who are in his vicinity or who follow after his way.

And ultimately, at the final judgment, there will be trouble for eternity in that he will be cast from the presence of the Lord into the place of eternal punishment, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

That kind of goes back to the discipline proverb that we looked at before. It's kind of like when you discipline a child, the two responses are either weeping or gnashing of teeth. But you need to direct your child toward recognizing that they are the one who are who is at fault for the wrong that they have done.

So they mourn over their sin or they're angry at themselves for their sin and repent of it and desire to do what is right. Verse seven, the lips of the wise disperse knowledge. We come back to speaking words again, wise words, the lips of the wise disperse knowledge.

But the hearts of fools are not so. Now, it's interesting that we go from lips at the beginning of the proverb to hearts in the second half of the proverb. But remember that the two are connected for, as Jesus said in Matthew 12, 34, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.

What's in the heart is going to come out of the mouth. If the lips of the wise disperse knowledge, the whip, the whips, the lips of the wise, if the lips of the wise disperse knowledge, what comes from their heart wisdom.

And in fact, in the Proverbs, we've read about desiring to have a heart of wisdom. What's going to pour forth from the mouth is what comes out of the heart. What's in the heart of a fool? Foolishness.

So what comes out of his mouth? Foolishness. The hearts of the fools are not going to bring forth any beneficial knowledge. We go on to verse eight. The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to Yahweh.

But the prayer of the upright is his delight. Just like the previous proverb, we see two different words in the parallelism, and yet they're connected. The sacrifice of the wicked and the prayer of the upright.

So the sacrifice, a matter of worship, the kind of worship that the wicked do is an abomination to Yahweh. It is not unto the Lord. It is unto themselves. It may be unto false gods, but they're still false gods that have been fashioned in their image.

So the wicked offer sacrifices. They offer wrong worship. It is not the kind of worship that God has said that we are to offer or to do, which is only to be unto Yahweh and not to anyone or anything else.

So the sacrifice of the wicked becomes an abomination to God, and they will suffer punishment because they rebelled against God and went after their own way. But the prayer of the upright, and here this is even a matter of worship, the prayer of the upright, the one who walks in the wise way of God.

This is God's delight. He delights in the one who walks in his ways. Consider Psalm 1, verse one, how blessed is the man who does not walk in the council of the wicked, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers.

But his delight is in the law of Yahweh, and in his law, he meditates day and night, and he will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither.

And in whatever he does, he prospers. The wicked are not so. They are like chaff, which the wind drives away. Therefore, the wicked will not rise in the judgment nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.

For Yahweh knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish. It also goes back to Proverbs 15, 3. The eyes of Yahweh are in every place watching the evil and the good. So Yahweh knows the way of the righteous.

It is pleasing unto God, but the way of the wicked will perish, leads to judgment and leads to destruction. Consider this next proverb. It looks just like the previous one. So in verse eight, we read the sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to Yahweh.

Verse nine says the way of the wicked is an abomination to Yahweh. Even looks like what we read in Psalm one, but he God Yahweh loves one who pursues righteousness. Jesus said in Matthew six to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all the things we need will be added to us as well.

God delights in the one who pursues Christ for he is our righteousness. Verse 10. Grievous discipline is for him who forsakes the way. He who hates reproof will die. We come back to the one who hates discipline again.

Grievous discipline is for him who forsakes the way, who doesn't go in the right way, who goes in the way of the wicked. Back to verse nine. He who hates reproof, who hates to be disciplined, he will die, will perish forever in his sin.

May we repent of our wicked ways and follow in the righteousness of Christ. Amen. Heavenly Father, teach us to love wisdom. For as we've been told at the beginning of Proverbs, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge.

Knowing you are God, we are reverent before you, offering right worship to you that we may be blessed by you and receive everlasting life through your son, Jesus Christ. Teach us this gospel message that we may also share it with others.

They too will turn from their sin, repent, walk in the righteous way, and live. In Jesus' name, amen.

This has been When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabriel Hughes. For all of our podcasts, episodes, videos, books, and more, visit our website at www .utt .com. If you'd like to submit a question to this broadcast or just send us a comment, email whenweunderstandthetext at gmail .com and let your friends know about our ministry.

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