PROVERBS OVERVIEW TO BEGIN 2022

The Book of Proverbs has 31 chapters, 915 verses, 15,043 words, if you are interested in that information.

PROVERBS OVERVIEW

The Book of Proverbs has 31 chapters, 915 verses, 15,043 words, if you are interested in that information.

This is all the maxims, epigrams, proverbs, and homilies of the ancients condensed into one book. Really, if you searched out much of Plato, Socrates, Euripides, the Greek philosophers, the Greek writers: What they got, they got from this man. They got from Solomon. And some on them had the honesty to mention that. Some of them didn’t. Some of them want you to think it was original material, but it wasn’t. All they got, they got from this man, Solomon.

Proverbs lays down the emphatic principle of dualism. Liberalism and false religion will try to do away with dualism. Dualism—right and wrong, heaven and hell—things like that. Proverbs is strong on a dualistic outlook. Absolute opposites.

“The wise shall inherit glory: but shame shall be the promotion of fools” (Proverbs 3:35 KJV).

Apostate religion, ungodly religion, false religion does not like to admit dualism. Most anti-religions will attempt to do away with the dualistic outlook. Even Roman Catholicism will attempt to do away, in a sense, with dualism—how do they do that? Well, they do away with the Bible definition of sin and they call some sins mortal sins and some venial sins. So that is trying to temper sin. To try to do away with hell and invent purgatory, to try to do away with the absolute opposite of heaven. Every heretic has to eventually do the same thing with his doctrine, because he only has the flesh to work with—and “all flesh is grass.” It’s all the same, all religions are basically the same.

There is two ways to deal with the awfulness of sin.

1. Experience. And they say that that is the best teacher, but it is certainly the hardest teacher. 2. Hearken to wisdom.

Two ways to learn the awfulness of sin.

Now, as wise as this man was—smart as he was, experienced as he was, rich as he was—there was probably never a man alive that was ever smarter, or richer, than Solomon; and yet the Bible said about Jesus Christ, “a greater than Solomon is here.”

Now this Book will give you “wisdom” on how to deal with the real problems. You realize that most Americans don’t have really big problems. Psychiatrists and psychologists say that most of the problems in America are imaginary, and they are soap opera problems. Soap opera problems are (if you ever watch soap operas, which I wouldn’t recommend for anybody to watch) imaginary. Soap opera writers have produced plays and situations where two women are vying against one another, and they are always picking at each other over some little issue—and that is always the big issue in the play. It’s usually always two women, one getting mad about what one said about the other and then they blow it up clear out of proportion. And that has become the way of life in America. Americans blow everything way out of proportion. Nine times out of ten, the problems are no way as big as they really are.

You think you got problems, you ought to live in Afghanistan. In this country, you have to go to a funeral home to see death. But in some countries, it is laying right out in the streets. It’s all together different, we live in a candy-coated world.

Wisdom will show you how to deal with real problems.

The book is written by Solomon.

“And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea shore. And Solomon's wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the east country, and all the wisdom of Egypt. For he was wiser than all men; than Ethan the Ezrahite, and Heman, and Chalcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol: and his fame was in all nations round about. And he spake three thousand proverbs: and his songs were a thousand and five” (1Ki 4:29-32 KJV).

I don’t know how many proverbs of Solomon we have in the book of Proverbs, but he wrote 3,000 of them in all. We have just a sampling of them here of what he really wrote.

In the book of Ecclesiastes, chapters 1 and 2 we find that Solomon is the most ‘experienced’ man that ever lived. The wisest man that ever lived, the richest man that ever lived, and the most experienced man that ever lived. We need to hearken to the proverbs of Solomon.

But, just to prove to you that “all flesh is grass,” how did Solomon end up? He was an apostate. He didn’t follow his own advice, he didn’t listen to his own counsel. He wound up with 700 wives and 300 concubines (1Ki 11:3), he married the daughter of Egypt, took the idols and gods of foreign lands, and became completely apostate. And it was only because of God’s promise to David that He didn’t split the kingdom under Solomon. Because of God’s promise to David in Second Samuel chapter 7, God did not do anything during the reign of Solomon—but as soon as the reign of Solomon is over with, the next king Rehoboam splits the kingdom and part of it goes to Jeroboam with ten tribes to the north, and the two tribes of Benjamin and Judah stay in the south—and all because of the apostasy and wickedness of Solomon. A man who allowed himself to get carried away with women.

Now you would think with as much as he wrote and with as much as he experienced, that that wouldn’t get him—but that is what got him—wine, women and song, which has taken a lot of men away.

The thing you want to see about this man, and his backsliding in 1 Kings 11, is the conclusion that he came to— “all is vanity” –it says that in Ecclesiastes, and it really is. Now, that is things that are “under the sun,” that’s not ‘spiritual’ things. It is not vain to plant the seed of God, that is eternal, that’s useful. But when it come to things “under the sun,” life and the physical realm, “all is vanity.”

And when he wrote that, seven years later he backslid. It really doesn’t take long to get away from God. A man can be living for God today, and there is just no telling where he’ll be a year from now. That is what we learn from the life of Solomon.

The word “Proverb” means to “make something like something,” so that you might understand it. A “similitude” or “comparison.”

The real “proverbs” don’t actually start until chapter ten, and then you get a bunch of verses that contrast and compare. “You have this . . . but . . . then you have this.” You’ll get comparisons. Now, verse seven is a proverb.

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction” (Proverbs 1:7 KJV).

There is a comparison . . . a contrast. A proverb sets something down alongside of something—to place side-by-side—that you might be discreet, that you might be discriminatory, you know, tell white from black, tell right from wrong, tell smart from stupid.

Two words that you want to notice quite a bit, and it’ll be like this all the way through Proverbs and also in the Bible, are the words “as” and “like.” When God wants to teach us a thing, He’ll say it is “as something,” or “like something.” When God wants to show you something you can’t understand or see from the physical senses—He will liken it to something in the physical realm.

He said about His word: “as the snow from heaven,” as the “rain from heaven,” “so shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth” (Isa55:10, 11).

So, again, you want to watch for those two words, “as” and “like.”

Okay, briefly, the Book of Proverbs has a simple outline, it has five basic sections.

1. Chapters 1 through 9 you have wisdom and folly contrasted. 2. Chapters 10 to 24 you get into the real proverbs. A lot of the proverbs have a conjunction in the middle of it, again, for contrast and comparison.

It is strange how colors don’t look the same when they are put alongside other colors. It’s amazing how different colors of blue will wind up a little bit differently when you compare them with other colors. Some blues almost look like black, until you lay them alongside black. Some of those navy blues look so dark that under some light they will look black—and you’ll swear that they are black. You’ll put on a black suit and grab some socks that you think are black and later on you find out you have blue socks on.

3. Chapters 25 to 29 are more of Solomon’s proverbs, but they are collections made by Hezekiah’s men. 4. Chapter 30 contains the words of Agur. 5. Chapter 31 are the words of Lemuel.

Every young person ought to study Proverbs. It’s really just how to live, and how to avoid a lot of trouble. You want to learn the awfulness of sin? As mentioned, there are two ways. By experience, or by listening up. Most young people will not listen—do not listen. The majority of them are bound and determined to experience it all for themselves, and to see if they can’t beat the system. That’s what Proverbs teaches you, you cannot beat the system.

There are physical laws in the universe, and God has established those laws, and those laws cannot be broken ‘permanently,’ (they can be overcome ‘temporarily’), but not permanently. Eventually, everything that goes up will come down. There are only the ‘exceptions’ to the rule. And in spiritual matters, you “reap what you sow,” “be sure your sins will find you out.” Those are spiritual laws, and you cannot break them. You can temporarily overcome them, but eventually that law will catch up.

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