Financial Wisdom: Proverbs 13:1-25

You're listening to the Bible guys, a podcast where a

couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun in

practical ways. Hey, good morning everybody. We're the Bible Guys.

Yes, yes we are, Yes.

That is who we are. And today we're going to

start out with a segment.

And oh, I thought I was going to be listening

to an episode of This Old House.

Right, but it actually says you're listening to the Bibble

to the Bible guys.

That's right, the.

Podcast where a couple of friends talk about the Bible

and fun and practical ways. So anyway, Desiree put together

a segment called Stump.

The Pastor and Dumped the Pastor. These are fun.

These are fun? Man?

You like st the Pastors?

I do. I like it a lot. I think that

people probably wish for more of them, depending on the question.

So the day that we're shooting this episode, I'm with

our Young Adults Ministry. Yeah yeah, and a big part

of the event to night, we're cooking.

Yeah, they're going to do questions, but.

It's open form Q and a's you can ask any question, right, Yeah.

Do you like that? Do you like the open forum?

I think it's great. I think that there are times

where somebody will ask you a question that requires a

very long answer, and and it's usual.

You don't like long answers. I like long answers.

I just think that, like sometimes the questions, the multitude

of questions is what's interesting to me, not necessarily, not

necessarily a twenty minute answer to one question that ten

percent of the room is interested, That's all I was

trying to say. So when they ask questions that require

a really long discussion, I'm like, oh, I would have

preferred to have ten more other questions.

Oh yeah, you know what I mean. Yeah, I like

the long ones because I think one of the arguments

is a lot of times, you know, for people who

struggle with the church or struggle with faith, they'll say, well,

you know, I used to go to church, and then

when I had questions, they were like, just believe it

because it's in the Bible.

Yeah.

Right, Well that's not a bad answer. It's not a

wrong answer, it's just a bad answer.

Right.

So I love it when when we can just go, okay,

there's a reason less you're going to ask you a

question to take a long time. You guys want to

take a long time on this one.

Yes, okay, And so what I do, what I've done,

what I've done, I've only done it once actually, But

what I've what I've done is I've been in those

situations where I've said, hey, uh, I probably assume there's

about ten people in this crowd that are interested in

this answer. I was like, so, after we're done and

we dismiss, I'm gonna be right over here in this corner.

I'll give the long answer to the to anybody who

wants to listen because they want to waste the crowds time.

So it turns out there was like five people and

they were riveted, you know, by the answer. But I

just didn't feel like, you know.

Not me. Everybody's getting it. Everybody's getting it's open for him.

Yeah that's right.

And by the way, that's how you manage and control

open for him. Yes, that's right. That's wax aliqin on

this stuff. That's not going to get you eaten alive.

That's true. Okay. So anyways, here we go stump the pastor.

Yep, this is this is from Tim R.

Hi Tim R.

Yes, and he wrote in a question you can Tim Nope,

it's Tim R.

Kim R.

Timmy Tim Uh Hey, he actually wrote in uh something

that anybody could write in and you you want to,

you want to email us email us at info at

the Bible guys dot com with any of your questions

and we might use them in the future episode. Tim

writes this, if big extravagant miracles were regular occurrents in

the early Church, why don't we see them as frequently

as today or frequently today?

Well, God fell asleep.

God is in the restroom.

He's not paying attention.

That's what That's what Elijah said.

That's what I said. That when when it was haunting

the the prophets of Ail.

You got in the restroom. Uh. That's a great question, Tim,

because we do see miracles today for sure. But the

big extravagant miracles is what he said, right, which is

take up your bed and walk kind of miracles. Right.

You know your daughter's not dead, she's only sleeping, that's right, right. So,

so so where are they today? So I got to

tell you something. It's an interesting thing for me. You

and I both just went to a conference by the

Timothy Initiative in Florida, and it's interesting to me how you.

Which is a church planting movement all around the world. Yes,

in the least reached people groups around the world.

Yes, and and and I have a tendency to be

around some of those things. And you always hear of

extravagant miracles around the world. So you always hear of like,

for instance, when we were there, Uh, these people who

I believe in and know personally and trust stand up there.

And there was this one one Indian pastor who shared

a story Reggie about a guy who became a Christian

but he couldn't read and uh, and he and he

prayed that God would uh, you know, give him the

ability to read and uh and he prayed for a

long time. And everybody knew in the village that he

number one, grew up not being able to read. And

number two, they also knew that he'd been praying this

prayer and he was praying this audacious, radical prayer of

he just wanted God to give him this ability to read.

And they actually have it on video. They showed it

on video where he actually picked up the Bible and

one day just started reading.

Yeah, but only the Bible, but only the Bible read

anything else.

Can't read a newspaper can't read anything else, and this

and this Indian pastor, Reggie was just you know, shouting

this thing.

And then.

All of a sudden he shows this video and this.

You know, here's this guy sitting in this plastic chair

in this dusty old room and he's reading this Bible.

And then all of a sudden, ninety eight percent of

the village became Christians because of the miracle, the extravagant

miracle that God did. And so you and I hear

of these miracles. And so as being a skeptic, and

I don't think people truly understand the word skeptic because

when I say I'm a skic, people think, oh, okay, yeah,

I have my doubts too, And I'm like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

that's not what a skeptic is. A skeptic is I

don't believe you. I flat out do not believe that sentence.

That is what a skeptic is. Until you prove to

me that that is true. I don't believe it. And so,

because I'm a skeptic at heart, there's always something in

me that goes come on right. It's not that I

doubt God. In fact, ironically when I take my spiritual

gift test, you know what, My number one spiritual gift

is faith. Faith. So it's like it's like it's like

I'm a skeptic. God made me a you know why

am I a skeptic God? But at the same time,

I have faith. So when it comes to me serving God,

faith is just it comes to the surface immediately. But

when it comes to you know, hearing other people around

the world going I just started to read, I go,

come on, And I don't know why I'm that way,

but I sure am.

Well you saw the video of that one.

Well not only that, but here's the thing you have

to to ask yourself, do I believe that this person

is trying to lie? And what do they have to

gain to lie? And and you know, and here are

they creating a lie? Where here's this man who just

becomes a Christian. He's known throughout the village of not

being able to read, and then all of a sudden

I see him reading. It's like he would have to

have a lifetime, quite literally, a lifetime of pulling that prank, right,

And so then you're just sort of forced to look

at the evidence to go it is a miracle and

it's an extravagant one, and it happens around the world.

So I had a professor who was a missionary. He

was in his eighties, in nineteen eighty nine, nineteen ninety,

he was in his late eighties. So he was a

missionary in those explorer missionary times, yes, in the twenties

and thirties. Right, yeah, it's really really.

A missionary gave up their lives and talk to cannibals.

Well back when you got on a boat, right and

went to where you were going, right, that's where. And

he always was in places where there had never been

the gospel. And so somebody, a student asked the same

question in one of the classes.

So the same question were the same same.

Question, tim is asking here, right, And that is I

read the Book of Acts. It's miracles all the time, which,

by the way, there's about sixteen or seventeen miracles depending

on how you count them, maybe twenty miracles in the

twenty six chapters of the Book of Acts. So they're

recorded because they're so out of the ordinary, just to

point that out, by the way. But anyways, doctor Champlain said,

so when the student said, you know, why don't we

see miracles today, he said, oh, where the Gospel is

moving for the first time, it's still always only miracles.

That's what's happening all the time. He said, if you're

living a life that needs miracles, God will give you miracles. Right.

But what you think is you're asking for miracles to

make your personal life better. But God, if you read

the Bible, miracles are always happening on the front lines

of where the Gospel is moving. So if you need

miracles and want miracle in your life, you need to

be on the front line of the move of the Gospel.

So God's agenda for miracles is to further his word

so that people would not go to hell and go

to Heaven.

That's right, Yeah, that's right. And so that that's the

story Reggie told, or bekaylay Shenko told the same story. Right,

he's the vice president of a similar story. He's vice

president of the crew in charge of church planting around

the world. And it's the story of his father who

I mean, Bekayleay and his father served the witch doctor,

most powerful witch doctor in Ethiopia and on top of

the mountain's that's what they did. And then Bekaylay's father

became a Christian, began to beg God to teach him

how to read because he couldn't read. And then God

miraculously gave an ability to read. And now in their

tribe of over a million people, ninety eight percent of

the people are Christians, over a million, over a million.

That's yeah. Yeah, they're building the largest cross in Africa

on the mountain where that witch doctor used to be.

Wh used to be, you know, called down lightning from

the sky. It was pretty pretty incredible, right, So it's

neat stuff. Well, there's lots of those. I mean, I've

heard of people, you know, being given their sight back.

I've known of people that were completely unable to walk

that God restored their strength in order to be able

to get to the next village. And I've seen people

that it just so many stories. I've heard so many stories,

and I met so many people where it was the

first move of the gospel in that village or the

first move of the Gospel in that tribe. And God

did miraculous things. So God does miracles for his purposes,

and what we want is God to do miracles for

our purposes. Well, when you align your purpose in God's purpose,

you'll see miracles. But when it's your purpose apart from

God's purpose, well you may or may not, because God's

going to say, I gave you my word, and I

gave you the wisdom of the word. You know, yeah,

work it out well.

When I traveled in Africa and I went to with

Julius Morgre and we went up to the regions of

the Pocot and he wanted me to preach under this

tree this tree church, and the pastor Solomon I met.

Sulomon said, hey, by the way, these men are going

to heckle you, and remember this story, and anyway, I'm

not going to retell the whole story. But the men

came to Christ that day, which was amazing. But when

he said they were going to heckle you, he had

told me the backstory, and he told it as if

it were just an average every day Tuesday. He said, yeah,

he said, they came out tried to kill me. I

was injured to where I couldn't even move to go

to the hospital. And we were in the tent and

these men who left me to die under this tree,

thought I was dead. But the women rescued me, dragged

me back to the tent, and they did so because

he was bringing the gospel to that village, that's what

he was doing. And so then all of a sudden,

the men came into the tent where he was being

protected by the women, and the men, the elders of

that village laid down offerings of sugar bags of sugar,

and said, we feel as if we have angered your God,

because God miraculously caused all of our sheep to go blind.

And so all of the sheep imagine you know me

shot there are village right, and there's one hundreds.

Especially among the po cuts, because that's what they are,

is they're herders.

Yes, yeah, yeah. So he said, all of our sheep

went blind. They're all blind. Think about that. And he

goes and so he goes, and this happened right after we,

you know, tried to kill you. And they said, so

we bring this offering of sugar to you, uh, and

and that we want you to accept and forgive us.

And he said, I'll forgive you on one condition that

that I am able to uh plant a church here,

and that I have a tree, I have church underneath

the tree that you left me under that that that

that you want to kill me, and and they said,

we have to talk about this, and they left. They

went back, had a meeting, came back and said, Okay,

we'll let you have church under one condition, as long

as the men attend and we're able to navigate and

monitor everything that you're saying to our to our village,

to our women. And he's like, uh so, the so

the condition is you attend the church. He's like done,

And he said then, and then here's the best part.

And he says, and then right after that, all the

sheep were going to regain their sight. Now come on, now,

he told me this. I was there.

I was literally spoken the church there.

I spoke in the church. And then when I spoke,

all I said was is that the Gospel is not

proven with just words, It's proven with sacrifice. And I

talked about how Julius Morgart sacrifice his life. I talked

about how our team was there to figure out how

to get them water, which means that love is proved

not with action or not with words, but just action.

And then I used Pastor Solomon as an example. Right,

you know, he says he loves you, but guess what

he does because of these actions and then I used

the cross right, and then Jesus love does and then

all of a sudden the men came up and they

all turned their lives over. And here I am lucky

enough to, you know, reap the harvest of all the

watering that Solomon did, right, and then all of a

sudden they all come to Christ underneath that tree. And

I'm just like, this is miraculous. And I guess I

ended up did telling the whole story, just not in

great detail. But so the only part that I did

left out was before every church service, they all had tea,

and Solomon would walk around with that bag of sugar,

sugar and spread and and he would put it in

everybody's tea and he'd say, the sweet forgiveness of God,

the sweet forgiveness of God.

It's powerful.

Makes me want to cry.

So those kind of miracles happen all the time, every

day at the cutting edge of where the gospel is spreading.

So you want more miracles in the life, get a

part of that, right, And we have the benefit of

being a part of that. God does other miracles. I mean,

I've prayed over people that the doctors said there's no hope.

He's going to die this afternoon. That one of the guys,

he's on our safety team, and this was ten years ago, right,

and he's up and walking around, and I don't think

this guy's ever going to die. It seems like it's

like the Energizer Bunny. Now. So I've been around lots

of really incredible miracles. We played prayed for a tornado

one time, and God gave us a tornado seven days

later tore down a building we needed torn down. Oh

that's right, right, that's a whole other story. I've been

around incredible miracles that God does. Those are are few

and far between, but they're always in alignment with His purposes,

not just with our appetites or what we want. Right,

and so that would be it so great question, Tim.

Let me encourage you to get involved with organizations and

things and places that where miracles are happening. That's that's

what you want to be a part of. Yep, yep,

because that's where God's working. Instead of asking God to

work in me, I want to work on what God's doing. Yeah, right,

that's what I want.

Well, we took extra time for that, but now we're

going to launch End of Proverbs chapter thirteen.

This is good. Yeah, so the reason why we took

time on that one is because this is more of

the same, and you're going to notice the same themes

in these.

Right that that was a fantastic stump of past.

Your coredulous question. Here you go. A wise child accept us,

accepts a parent's discipline. A mocker refuses to listen to correction.

Wise words will win you a good meal, but treacherous

people have an appetite for violence. Those who control their

tongue will have a long life. Opening your mind can

ruin everything. That's a good that's good marriage counseling, right there. Yeah,

Lazy people want much but get little, but those who

work hard will prosper. That verse three, those who control

their tongue will have a long life. Opening your mouth

can ruin everything. These genes make my yeah, make me

look fat? Yeah right right, well actually, yes, right right,

so funny. Anyways, I'm sorry, that's how my brain works.

Lazy people want much but get little, but those who

work hard will prosper. There's that hard work theme again.

The godly hate lies man. There's his honesty theme again.

The wicked cause shame and disgrace, Godliness guards the path

of the blameless, but the evil are misled by sin.

Some who are poor pretend to be rich, Others who

are rich pretend to be poor. The rerisch can pay

a ransom for their lives, but the poor won't even

get threatened. The life of the godly is full of light,

and but the light of the wicked will be snuffed out.

Pride leads to conflict. Those who take advice are wise.

Wealth from get rich quick schemes quickly disappears. Wealth from

hard work grows over time. Hope deferred makes the heart sick,

but a dream fulfilled is a tree of life. People

who despise advice are asking for trouble. Those who respect

the command will succeed. The instruction of the wise is

like a life giving fountain, and those who accept it

avoid the snares of death. A person with good sense

is respected, a treacherous person is headed for destruction. Wise

people think before they act. Fools don't even brag about

their foolishness. An unreliable messenger stumbles into trouble, but a

reliable messenger brings healing. If you ignore criticism, you'll end

in poverty and disgrace. If you accept correction, you will

be honored. It is pleasant to see dreams come true,

but fools refuse to turn from evil to attain them.

Walk with the wise and become wise. Associate with fools

and get in trouble. Trouble chases sinners, while blessings reward

the righteous. Good people leave an inheritance to their grandchildren,

but the sinner's wealth passes to the godly. A poor

person's farm may produce much food, but injustice sweeps it

all away. Those who spare the rod of discipline hate

their children. Those who love their children care enough to

discipline them. The godly eat to their hearts content, but

the belly of the wicked goes hungry. There's a bunch

of good ones in there, yeah for sure. Yeah.

And I've heard you quote hope deferred makes the heart sick.

I've heard you quote that one hundred times.

Oh, people get angry and upset is because they were

expecting something that didn't happen, right, And so you just

kind of have to be patient in that moment and

just understand, Hey, they were hoping for something that didn't happen,

and they're blaming you.

Right, right, And so there's wisdom and trying to not

be the person that gives them false hope, right, right,

So you shouldn't be the person to give somebody false

hope because hope, for it makes the hard say that's right.

Yeah, it's hard to lead long term if you're constantly

making people sick instead helping fulfill the dreams. Right to

the other side of that.

Yeah, right, that's really cool.

Have you noticed how often he talks about accepting criticism

wise people accept criticism wise people?

He said two weeks ago or last week, I think

maybe you mentioned about Dave Harrington. Would you say he

made a comment something is love was a criticism candor?

Candor is love?

Candor is love?

Yeah, Candor is caring? Yeah, can is caring?

That's what he said. Yeah, yeah, and uh and and

by the way, that's assuming that the person who's being

you know, giving you the candor is uh saying the

right thing, and they're a godly person, right and they're wives.

That's that's probably what you have to sort wisdom out.

And the only way you can sort out wisdom is

first of all, does it align with scripture? Does it

go against scripture? And secondly, how often does he mentioned

common sense, right, So does it? Does it make sense?

Because we've all received criticism from a fool, and that's

not what it's talking about out here, right, He's not

talking about Hey, pay attention to the criticism from a fool, right,

because that's not going to get you. You know, poverty

versus prosperity.

You have to sort out. Are they a wise person?

That's right? That's right. So I was.

Going to say, I saw verse twenty here walk with

the wise and become wise, and I was thinking, you

have just gotten wiser and wiser and wiser as I've

known you.

Chad, so much more time with Chad.

You got me, you got me.

Oh there you go. Hey, you finally you finally. Uh,

you didn't play the higher road first.

You got me?

You got good Chad like that too, Chad.

Absolutely take one.

For the team.

I want to I want to point out one. And

this might be contrary from a pastors from what you

would think of pastors say, but verse twenty two says

good people leaving inheritance to their grandchildren. King says leaving

inheritance to their children's children. Right, But the sentner's walk

passes to the passes to godly. You know, we have

this tension of Jesus, you know, tells us to be generous.

All these things the Bible tells us to be generous.

The Bible commands us to tithe. Ten percent of our

resources should go to God's kingdom. Right, that's rent for

living on the planet. God promises us to bless us

when we'd get there. He doesn't promom us to bless

us when we're not there. So tithe is the beginning.

But then above our tithes and offerings, he tells us

that we should be generous people. And so Christians have

a hard time. Does that mean I should give everything away?

I feel guilty?

Right?

I feel Oh, I got so much blessed it. Never

feel guilty about God's blessing in your life. And as

a matter of fact, it says a good person is

going to build generational wealth, right right. So what I

found is, as we've obeyed God with our tithes, God

has blessed us beyond my comprehension to this point. As

we've stepped out and been more generous the over and

above our tithes, and we begin giving offerings, God continues,

I can't outgive God, But He's also given us the

opportunity to begin to build wealth that would go beyond us, right,

And there is something about that that you should have

a good plan. A lot of Christians have no financial plan.

You don't have and there are so many mechanisms to

be able to give God even more if you knew

about how taxes work, and how inheritances work and all

these things. There's so many things. But we need to

be diligent in that area. And the huge majority of

Americans have not been diligent in planning for what happens

after them. And so I just want to encourage Christians

that are listening today if you need help, we have

a team at Heritage at our church. If you are

here in southeast Michigan, we have a team that's moving

into this area to help people make good plans for

the future. Not to get money from you, but just

we believe that this is a biblical idea. Right, It's

a biblical concept to prepare to leave in inheritance to

your children's children. Yeah, and there's something about that well,

preparing for the future.

Yeah. And I got to be honest when I when

I went into ministry, it was a small bat this church,

you know, and Liz, my wife, looked up to our

lead pastor at the time and his wife. They were

sort of, you know, who she wanted to be, and

they were wonderful people. And I remember surrendering to ministry.

I use that word surrender, right, you know, instead of

volunteering administry or call to ministry. We back then we

said surrendered the ministry, as if as if it was

a struggle and as if like you're gonna have a

life of difficulty, right. And I remember them sitting me down,

and this is what they said. They said, if you

go into ministry, you will be poor. They said, you

will be prepared to cut coupons, be prepared to live

on nothing and have hand me downs and make your

own clothes. And I'm not even kidding, I'm not even

saying things that aren't true. I'm legitimately telling you that

they said you will be poor. And that's the way

that ministry is, and so just expect it. So when

I went to my first job and they said, you know,

the church of one hundred and eighty people, and they said, okay,

we're going to hire you at twenty eight thousand dollars

with no insurance. We're not going to pay you any insurance.

I said, okay. And then over the next seven years

when I worked there, I put like twenty thousand dollars

on my credit cards for every medical need that we had,

just because I was always taught from the very beginning

that you know. And yet you know, it took me

a long time to figure out. It's like, oh, that's

not the way that you know. There's not the biblical model, right,

right Jesus It says that Jesus didn't have a place

to lay his head, but it didn't mean that he

was poor, right, right, right?

So anyway, Well, one of the wisest Christian men I've

ever met challenged me when I was younger, with the

idea of building a life ten ten to eighty. Have

you ever heard that?

Yep?

And so he said, give God the first ten percent,

save the second ten percent, and then live on the

eighty percent, right, And he said, that sets you up

to be able to fulfill this verse. And he quote

this verse specifically you if you don't begin planning today

to put money aside, you will never have the ability

to fulfill Proverbs, chapter chapter what thirteen, verse twenty two. Yeah,

leave inheritance to your children's children. You have to make

that plan, so prepare and I said, okay, that's what

I want to do. And I haven't always been perfect

at it, but we're getting there.

That's awesome. So wey that is our time and so

hopefully we will see you tomorrow on the Bible gush