PROFITING FROM PROVERBS

“The spirit of man is the candle of the LORD, searching all the inward parts of the belly” (Proverbs 20:27).

Any time you see the word “is” in the Bible it is about to give you a definition of what is going before it. Now, what would we use a candle for? To give light. If you are searching for something, you use a candle to shed light. God uses the spirit of a man as a candle. He does something with it, “searching all the inward parts of the belly.”

Now, this is not necessarily just the stomach, but the motives and emotions of a man. When the Bible speaks of a man’s bowels, it is looking a what a man is rather than what he ate for lunch.

There is a number of things about this spirit of man that will maybe help you out.

“For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God” (I Corinthians 2:11).

You have to have the Spirit of God to know what God is like, and you must have the spirit of man to know what a man is like. This is the reason that a woman cannot understand a man, because she has the spirit of a woman. One of the most ludicrous things anyone can come up with is that marriages are compatible. It is much truer to say that opposites attract, because those two spirits are definitely not alike. It takes compromise, it takes love, and it takes understanding. The Bible says that a man is to dwell with a woman according to knowledge; that is, he is to learn about his woman. Some men have a real quandary about buying flowers for their wives, because flowers die. They can’t understand it—but women love flowers. So, you just have to put your confusion away and go buy them flowers. Men are just too pragmatic in this area, and to him it is a waste of time and money to spend that much money on something that is just going to wilt and die in a couple of days.

These men that pretend they are women don’t even have a clue because they still have the spirit of a man.

Daily Bible study is necessary if we are going to begin our day with the right attitude and the right spiritual diet. Proverbs has 31 chapters, and most months have 31 days, so let's read a chapter of Proverbs a day and see what God might have for us. As the Lord leads, share with us what God has shown you in a special way and by His grace let us build up a devotional repository. Let's keep our knives and forks handy for some daily bread! Ideally, a chapter or two of Proverbs will fit in nicely with a good plan of reading our Bibles through each year.

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