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We're going on tour this fall. We're bringing the live podcast show to four new cities. We're coming to Nashville, San Diego, Chicago, and Birmingham, Alabama. If you've ever wanted to see the live podcast in person, go to jesusinthestreet.org tour and get your tickets. It's going to be a powerful night of worship and the word that God is storing in my heart is going to be different and unique to each city we go to. So come out jesusinthestreet.org tour get your tickets and we'll see you in Nashville City, San Diego, Chicago and Birmingham this fall. What's going on guys? Welcome back to the second episode of the Proverb series. My name is Bryson. Today we're going to be going over Proverbs 2. If you guys want to follow along and print out the PDF to track your progress, go to jesusinthestreet.org Proverbs download the free PDF today. It's going to be awesome, guys. I'm super excited for Proverbs chapter 2. It's going to be great. Now, something I forgot to mention in the last one is the book of Proverbs. It says the Proverbs of Solomon. Most of them were written by Solomon, but there's a couple other authors in the Book of Proverbs and they clarify it. But this is Solomon's book. He probably took a collection of the writings and put them together. Okay, so we're going to read Proverbs Chapter two and break it down starting in verse one. My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you, let's stop right there, right off the bat. If if meaning you have the option to choose to receive the words of God or not. This means that wisdom cannot benefit us if we don't receive it or treasure it. Store it up. Prepare. Right, because here's the thing. We have to be ready. There's going to be times in life and trials in life that are going to come at you and that you don't expect. And things are going to happen in your life and moments and interactions. You're going to lose friends, gain friends. You're going to lose your job, get a new job, this, that, and the other. But if we store up the word of God and write it on the tablet of our heart, then we will be prepared to make a defense to anything that happens in us. We will have the hope inside of us. Store it up. Wisdom can't benefit you if you don't store and treasure up in your heart. Verse 2. Making your ear attentive to wisdom and inclining your heart to understanding. What does it mean to incline your heart to wisdom? This means that it implies effort. There is a sense of effort necessary and required to incline your heart to wisdom. That means you have to try. That means you have to care. That means you have to be ready. Be active, be moving, be focused, dialed in sharp. Trying to apply yourself to the heart and wisdom of God. It must be sought out like hidden treasures. Verse 3. Yes, if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding. If you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the the knowledge of God. For the Lord gives wisdom. From his mouth comes knowledge and understanding. Proverbs 25, verse 2. Later on we'll get to it says the glory. It's the glory of God to conceal things, but it's the honor of kings to search it out. God conceals things for a reason. It's a glory of God to conceal things. But man, there's something about pursuing God and pursuing wisdom that God loves. And it tugs on his heart and it moves God's heart. So in those verses down to verse six, Solomon actually writes, here's the ways to receive wisdom. So if you're wondering how to receive wisdom, here's what Solomon says. He says, we receive wisdom. These are the ways to seek wisdom. Sorry. We receive wisdom, treasure wisdom. Incline your ear to wisdom. Apply wisdom to your life. Cry out for wisdom. Seeking and searching out wisdom. James tells us, if anyone lacks wisdom, ask God and he will give it to you generously. Holy smokes. Did you know that when you read the Bible and when you better, you better be doing this when you read your proverb series, when you're following along in the proverb series and you're reading your Bible on your own and you're researching things, you have this dude. Yeah, his name's the Holy spirit. And John 14 tells us that he's a helper to teach us things, bring conviction and be the seal on our hearts that we know, that we know, that we know. And when we ask God for wisdom, he will give it to us generously. Meaning if you don't understand something, hey God, can you help me understand this passage? God, I'm going through the situation. Help me understand what you have in store for me through this so we can receive wisdom, treasure it, incline our heart and ears to it, apply wisdom to our lives, cry out for wisdom and seek and search it out. Then verse 6. For the Lord gives wisdom. Wisdom. From his mouth comes knowledge and understanding. The most significant way God speaks wisdom to us is through His Word. There are four ways that God speaks to us through His Word. Through signs, through people, and intrusively. His Word is going to be the number one way you speak to us. If you're not in the Word of God, then you're in your feelings. If you're wondering why you're messing up, if you're wondering why you're sinning so much, if you're wondering why you're stumbling so much and you feel like you're falling all the time, you must not be in your Word. You must be basing everything off of feelings. Because when I'm not in the Word of God, right? And my feelings triumph the Word of God, because I'm not. I'm not feeding myself. Man shall not live by bread alone. We can't just live. But we live by every word that is breathed off of the mouth of God. If we are living in our feelings, then they're going to triumph us and live on us, and they're actually going to dictate our lives. And that's not good. Like we said last episode, Proverbs 14. There's a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death. So the Word of God. We need the Word of God then through signs. God can use signs to speak to us. God can use people to speak to us. God might be using me to help you understand Proverbs right now. By the grace of God, His Spirit speaking through me, lastly, intrusively. If God lives inside of us, then that means he consumes our thoughts. Now, not all of our thoughts are going to be from the Lord, but that's where we use discernment. Now, how do we use discernment? We need to know the Word of God to understand if thoughts are aligned with God's character or far from his character. We need the Word of God stored in our hearts so that we can understand if that the thing that is in my thoughts, thought. If it's going to draw me away from God or draw me to God. Because God's not going to speak something to you that draws you further from Him. God's going to call you to something that draws you closer, intimately to Him. All this is founded on the Word of God. If we don't know the Word of God, then we're going to be lost and confused. Verse 7. He stores up sound wisdom for the upright. He's a Shield to those who walk in integrity, guarding the paths of justice and watching over the way of his saints. Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity and every good path. Verse 10 and 11 for wisdom will come into your heart and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul. Discretion will watch over you. Understanding will guard you. Spiritual joy humiliates sin. When you have the joy of the Lord inside of you, it makes sin look like a pile of dog crap because it is. It doesn't benefit you, it only harms you. Sin feels like freedom until you try to stop. Then when you try to stop sinning, you're. You're dying inside, you're trying to starve your flesh and it's killing you and inside. And it feels like the only way to stop that feeling is to sin more. But then you're really killing your soul. Sin feels like freedom until you try to stop. Verse 12 delivering you from the way of evil, from men of perverted speech who forsake the paths of uprightness, who walk in the ways of darkness, who rejoice in doing evil and delight in the perverseness of evil. Men whose paths are crooked and who are devious in their ways. Solomon is writing here and saying the wisdom of God is going to help you use discernment on who to freaking listen to. Because there's an abundance of information but a lack of clarity. Meaning there's a lot of people saying a whole lot of mumbo jumbo that isn't going to help you. And so if you don't know the wisdom and understanding of God, if you don't know the wisdom and instruction of God, then of course you're going to walk down the path of evil. It's going to be easy to listen to men of perverted speech, it's going to be easy to walk in the ways of darkness. But if you have the word of God stored up in your heart, it's actually going to help you stay away from bad company. Like Proverbs 1 says, Stay away, keep your foot from the path of evil. Like Proverbs 1, verse 16. So you will be delivered from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words. Here we go. This is big about to talk about something huge. Who forsakes the companion of her youth and forgets the covenant of her God. For her house sinks down to death and her paths to the departed. None who go to her come back, nor do they regain the paths of light. Now we see what I mentioned in the last episode. There's going to be Two different types of women described in Proverbs. A woman is wisdom is. Is described as a woman. And sexual immorality is described as an adulteress. We see in Proverbs, chapter 2. Sexual immorality is a sin that is completely different than any other sin and the Bible, because it is a sin against your own body. When you commit sexual immorality, you are devaluing the vessel that God has graciously giving you. So what he's saying here is the word of God is going to actually help you stay away from sexual immorality. So, and what does he describe here? This adulterous woman has smooth words. They're enticing. It's like an adulteress, you know, it sounds good. Who forsakes the companion of her youth and forgets the covenant over God. Her house sinks down to death and her pass through the departed. None who go to her come back, nor do they regain the past life. Solomon is saying, hey, most of the people that go down this road of sexual immorality, there's very few that make it back. There's very few that don't die down that path. Sexual immorality will kill you physically and spiritually. It will callous your heart from hearing the voice of God. Sexual immorality will callous your heart from knowing what love actually is and what the love of the Father is. And the wisdom and instruction of the Lord will help you stay away from sexual immorality. That's beautiful, isn't it? So many people always ask Bryce, how do I stop watching porn? Bryce, how do I stop having sex outside of marriage? Bryce, how do I do this, that and the other concerning sexual immorality. And my first response is like man, what is in your heart? What are you consuming? Are you consuming the actions and the exaltation of the world? What the world is exalting? Are you consuming the word of God? Verse 20 through 22 to close. So you will walk in the way of good and keep to the paths of the righteous. For the upright will inhabit the land and those with integrity will remain in it. But the wicked will be cut off from the land and the treacherous will be rooted out of it. Verse 20 through 20 through Tell us the consequences of the of the path of the adulteress. There's an invitation of the judgment and discipline of God when you go down the end the path of the adulteress. And this is a reflection of the covenant with Israel, right? We see all throughout the Old Testament that the upright, the righteous will dwell in the land and the unfaithful be will be uprooted and kicked out. We see that in the Old Testament. So it's important for us to understand that we will walk in the way of good and keep the paths of righteousness if we treasure and store up the word of God in our hearts. If there was a thesis statement for Proverbs chapter 2, it would be if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you. Verse 1 Proverbs chapter 2, verse 1 is a thesis statement of Proverbs chapter 2. Store up and treasure the righteous words and wisdom and instruction of the Lord, and it will keep your path straight. And I really believe that verse 20 in Proverbs 2 is a prophetic declaration spoken over us by the Lord by saying, you will walk in the ways of the good and you will keep the paths of the righteous. Meaning, this doesn't have to be your life. You don't have to live a life of foolishness. You don't have to be a simple one anymore. You don't have to keep struggling with the same sin habit. You don't have to keep indulging in sexual immorality. This doesn't have to be your life anymore. There is freedom. If you will just submit yourself to my instruction. My way is better. The lie of the American dream is that money, sex, women and power is the American dream. But it will crush your soul. But God's way is better. Guys, I pray that Proverbs chapter 2 was an encouragement to you guys. I love you guys and we'll see you guys tomorrow for Proverbs Chapter three. Guys, thank you so much for watching and listening to this episode. If you guys like it, subscribe to us on YouTube, follow us on Spotify, Instagram and Tick Tock. Bless you guys and see you guys next week. For the next episode.