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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 another episode of the Bryce Carver Podcast. I'm Bryce, and today we are on Proverbs chapter 7 out of 31 of chapters of Proverbs. We're going to be breaking down the whole book of Proverbs this month. If you guys want to follow along, track your progress, go to Jesus and the street.orgproverbs download the free PDF today and follow along. But Proverbs chapter seven, we've got another warning against the adulteress, a warning against sexual immorality. Going to read it and break it down. Let's read verses one through four really quick and see the value of wisdom, my son. Keep my words and treasure up my commandments with you. Keep my commandments and live. Keep 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 insight your intimate friend. Just like every other proverb. Proverbs 6 is the only one that doesn't mention this. But every other proverb outside of Proverbs 6 so far has emphasized us to value wisdom. There's been a call to value wisdom. And so Solomon is actually training you and I. He's training his son Rehoboam. But God through Solomon, is training you and I to have a living, breathing relationship with what? The Word of God. Because we need the Word of God to separate the soul from the spirit. As Hebrews 4:13 tells us, to separate the way that seems right to the man, the way that seems right to God. We got to change the way we think now that reading the Bible, it doesn't provide some magical protection on your life, but if someone were to keep his commandments, they'll naturally not walk sin out. That's the crazy part, is that when we read the Word of God, you're not casting a spell over your life as if you're never going to sin again. But if you naturally submit yourselves to the precepts, the character and the righteousness of God, you will find yourself sinning, quote, unquote, less. And that phrase in verse four say to wisdom, you are. My sister is saying, love the word of God like it's your blood, like it's a part of you, like it's actually something inside of you that is attached to you and a part of your daily life. But what's the benefit of keeping wisdom close to you? Verse 5 says to keep you from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth lips. The wisdom and power of God's word can actually help you stay away from immoral men or women. That is a benefit of keeping the commandments and the word of God close to you. Because immorality has words and speaks to us to draw us into sin. Sexual immorality entices us and seduces us. But we need the greater power of God's word to keep us away from the enticement and the seduction of the words that come and breathe from sexual immorality in the adulteress. Now, verses 6 through 9 are interesting because we're about to get a picture here of seduction. So Solomon's gonna paint a picture of seduction here. He says, for at the window of my house I've looked out through my lattice and I've seen among the simple. I have perceived among the youths a young man lacking sense passing along in the street near her corner, taking the road to her house in the twilight, in the evening, at the time of night and darkness. So he looked out his house one and saw a man passing by. So Solomon saying, hey, I looked outside my house and I saw this dude passing by. And this man wasn't stupid, but he was labeled as simple. Now what is the simple man labeled all throughout Proverbs, Someone who is gullible. This implies that the man you saw outside of his window was gullible. He didn't have the years of wisdom underneath him either. He said, I perceived him among the youth. He was a young man lacking sense. He, he just didn't have wisdom. And with the lack of wisdom, this means that this man was an easy target for sexual immorality. Maybe one reason why you're falling to sexual immorality so much is because you wisdom. And the book of James says, if anyone lacks wisdom, what? Ask God and he will give it to you generously. So maybe an antidote to your struggle with sexual immorality could be just that you lack wisdom and need to grow deeper intimacy in the Lord. When you read the parable of the 10 virgins in the Gospel of Matthew, he says, keep oil on your lamp. What is oil? Intimacy with the Lord. Keep it in there. And then when you read verse, night, black and dark, night, this in the twilight, in the evening, at the time of night and darkness. Foolish men like to hide themselves from God. And they think that going in the dark and at nighttime is hiding themselves from God because they're trying to hide God from themselves. They think that they're hiding themselves from God, but in reality they're hiding God from themselves and they commit sexual immorality. So after we paint the picture, the story of seduction, this man goes in the nighttime. He lacks sense. He's an easy target. And chat in Proverbs 7, verses 10 through 12 are going to be the story of meeting the immoral woman says and behold, the woman meets him dressed as a prostitute. Wily of heart, she is loud and wayward. Her feet do not stay home. Now in the street, now in the market, and at every corner she lies in wait. Notice how the woman meets the man, the adulteress meets the man before he even makes it to her house. Isn't that crazy? This means that sex for this man and the adulteress was a transaction and not an experience of intimacy within marriage. That's what sexual immorality does to you. Sexual immorality actually says, hey, listen, sex is a transaction. Sex is a feeling that you can give me, but once the feeling's over, you're kicked to the curb. See you later. It's a transaction, not an experience of intimacy for the man and the adulteress. And that phrase, her feet don't stay home. The access and ease to achieve sex from the immoral woman was what attracted the man. Isn't that crazy that sex wasn't this prize to be enjoyed in the covenant of marriage? But one thing that attracted this man was the fact that it was easy and the access was achievable. To get this from the prostitute and the adulteress. And now the next few verses. From verses 13 through 18, the seductive woman, the immoral woman, is about to make promises to the man. She seizes him and kisses him, and with a bold face she says him, I had to offer sacrifices, and today I have paid my vows. So now I have come out to meet you, to seek you eagerly, and I have found you. I have spread my couch with coverings, colored linens from Egyptian linen. I have perfumed my bed with myrrh Aloes and cinnamon Come, let us take our fill of love to the morning. Let us delight ourselves with love. So she caught him, gives this idea that the immoral woman has now trapped the man. The man is now trapped underneath the power of the seductiveness of the adulteress and a bold face. Her grabbing him by the face is implying her way on the man. She is implying her way. She's implying her intention. She's implying her actions on the man. Now, verse 14, it shows I had to offer sacrifices, and today I paid my vows. It shows that the immoral woman actually wasn't against religion, but is against the moral code of God. She says, look, I mean, I did my vows, I had my sacrifices today. Look, she's playing face, but there's no depth. There's no intimacy. It's all a face card. But there's no depth there. And he's saying, look, the immoral woman wasn't against this religiosity, but she was against the moral code of God because she's trying to hide herself from who, God, to commit this act. And in verse 15, I've come to meet you, to seek you eagerly. She's making the man feel desired. To my women out there watching and listening. When you get a significant other and you commit yourself to a man, I want to challenge my women out there. Make your man feel desired. Make your man feel like you care about them. Now, look, the role of the man is to do hard things. I mean, Ephesians 5 tells us that we better be willing to lay our life down for our significant other from a man's perspective. But from the woman's perspective, men do hard things. Men are supposed to be good leaders. Men are supposed to be willing to lay their life down, make them feel desired. Because oftentimes, one reason why cheating happens, one reason why adultery happens, is because people don't feel desired. So they go outside of marriage to go seek it somewhere else. And when they realize that this feeling of desire was actually just a facade, it was fake, then they wish that they had never done it in the first place. And look at this. Verse 16 and verses 17, she says, I spread my couch with coverings, Egyptian linen. I perfumed my bed with myrrh. Now she's saying, look, I've not only given you sex, I'm not going to have sex with you, but I'm going to enhance this experience by saying, you will partake in nice touches and smell. Look, I got the good Egyptian linen. I got perfume on my bed. She's enhancing the experience. This is going to be amazing. It's going to be awesome. Almost like convincing him. And then verse 18 Come, let us take our fill in love in the morning. Let's delight ourselves in love. She's offering a specific and explicit kind of love to the man. It's a kind of love, but it's not the best kind or the lasting kind. It's a type, but it's not the best or lasting kind. Verses 19 through 21 for my husband is not at home, he's gone on a long journey. He took a bag of money with him. At full moon he will come home with much seductive speech she persuades him with her smooth talk, she compels, she compels him. The seduction was successful. Verse 19 implies that she's not a harlot, but she's an adulterous woman. It's crazy. And the persuasion is saying that her husband's on a long journey. Look, he's gone, it's safe. A part of the persuasion for sexual immorality was that it's a safe environment, that everything's okay, and at the end of it all, her seduction was successful. But here's the crazy thing. In the midst of sexual immorality, we forget the price we're about to pay. And Solomon is about to describe the painful price of the immoral woman in verses 22 and 23. He says this all at once. He follows her as an ox goes to the slaughter, or as a stag is caught fast till an arrow pierces its liver, as a bird rushes into a snare, he does not know that it will cost him his life. The woman appears to be very hard to resist, is what he says. And what was promised was pleasure. But in reality, slaughter awaited the man that fell to the adulterous woman. And verse 23, when it says, an arrow pierces his liver as a bird rushes to the snare, it's implying the man is carrying a guilty conscience. Right now. He only anticipated the rush of excitement and pleasure, but not the cost of being caught. Verses 24 through 27. To close, here's the learning lesson from the Amora woman. Now, O sons, listen to me and be attentive to the words of my mouth. Solomon says, let not your heart turn aside to her ways. Do not stray into her paths. For many a victim, as she laid low and all her slain or mighty throng, her house is the way to Sheol, going down to the chambers of death. The lesson has been presented, and Solomon is reinforcing his wisdom, saying, listen to my wisdom, because adultery doesn't begin in hormones, but it begins in the heart. It doesn't begin with this sexual buildup of tension. If you have sexual buildup of contention, go release it in the gym. If you go work out hard, you won't have the sexual tension. The sexual tension really is testosterone, if you want to talk about hormones, but it doesn't begin with the hormones. It begins in the heart. And many people have had their health, reputations, money and lives destroyed by sexual immorality. In the adulterous woman, rare is the person who knowingly and willingly takes their way to hell. We have to be careful with sexual immorality and adultery. I believe this sin is crushing America right now because we were never meant to have access to every human being on the planet. There's an abundance of options. It's easy to have these emotional and physical affairs now. But let me tell you something. Hold fast the wisdom of God. Take pride in the wife of your youth. Be faithful to one another. And I pray that Proverbs chapter seven was a beautiful warning for you today, a beautiful encouragement, and I will see you guys tomorrow for Proverbs chapter 8. 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 TikTok. Bless you guys and see you guys next week for the next episode.