Latest / Men's Morning Devotional / Learn From Men Who Have Been There
Transcript
- 0:01SPEAKER_00: Gentlemen, every day is a battle.
- 0:04SPEAKER_00: A battle for your faith, your family, and your purpose.
- 0:08SPEAKER_00: The men who stand strong don't prepare when the battle arrives.
- 0:12SPEAKER_00: They prepare before it begins.
- 0:14SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the men's morning devotion.
- 0:17SPEAKER_00: Let's get into God's word.
- 0:19SPEAKER_00: It's time to man up.
- 0:27Chris Alessi: All right, men, it's Friday.
- 0:29Chris Alessi: Happy Friday, man.
- 0:30Chris Alessi: Way to get to the end of the week.
- 0:32Chris Alessi: Listening to this podcast all week.
- 0:34Chris Alessi: Proud of you.
- 0:35Chris Alessi: My name is Chris Alesi, and it's an honor to host another day of Men's Morning Devotional as we continue to dive into wisdom.
- 0:43Chris Alessi: Particularly this week, we're looking at Proverbs chapter 7.
- 0:48Chris Alessi: And Solomon actually closes Proverbs 7 the same way he opened it.
- 0:52Chris Alessi: As a father speaking directly to his son.
- 0:56Chris Alessi: All week we've been talking about keeping wisdom, writing it on our hearts, binding it on our fingers, letting it keep us, and watching what happens to the man who walks in the wrong direction.
- 1:08Chris Alessi: Today Solomon lands the whole chapter with a final plea, and it's pretty urgent.
- 1:14Chris Alessi: So here's your Friday man up moment.
- 1:17Chris Alessi: The wisdom that saves a man's life is almost always the wisdom someone tried to give him before he needed it.
- 1:26Chris Alessi: Look at verse 24 through 27 in the book of Proverbs 7.
- 1:30Chris Alessi: Solomon says, And now, O sons, listen to me, and be attentive to the words of my mouth.
- 1:37Chris Alessi: Let not your heart turn aside to her ways, do not stray into her paths, for many a victim has she laid low, and all her slain are a mighty throng.
- 1:49Chris Alessi: Her house is the way to Sheol, going down to the chambers of death.
- 1:54Chris Alessi: I feel like my dad would really like to know that I'm making this episode this week with the title and everything.
- 2:01Chris Alessi: I think I would love to think my son in the future is making a podcast this simple, but uh essentially I'm making this point.
- 2:09Chris Alessi: We've got to listen to the voice of our fathers.
- 2:12Chris Alessi: That's why Solomon says, Sons, listen to me after everything he has said, after the keeping, the binding, the writing, the story of the young man in the twilight.
- 2:24Chris Alessi: He comes back to his own voice, a father's voice, direct, urgent, personal, not a lecture, but a plea, almost begging his son to listen.
- 2:36Chris Alessi: It's the kind of thing a father says when he knows what's at stake, and he needs his son to actually hear it.
- 2:42Chris Alessi: What strikes me about this closing, and it's why I use it to close out our week, it's this phrase many a victim has she laid low, and all her slain are a mighty throng.
- 2:55Chris Alessi: Solomon's not describing some rare danger.
- 2:59Chris Alessi: He's describing, unfortunately, a well-worn path with a long casualty list.
- 3:05Chris Alessi: The men who went this way before, men of strength, reputation, men who probably also thought they had it handled.
- 3:13Chris Alessi: Those men are counted among the fallen.
- 3:16Chris Alessi: The wrong path doesn't discriminate.
- 3:18Chris Alessi: It is taking down mighty men too.
- 3:21Chris Alessi: And it will take down the man who thinks he's too strong to heed Solomon's warning.
- 3:26Chris Alessi: Here's what I want every man to hear as we close this week.
- 3:30Chris Alessi: The wisdom Solomon is offering in this chapter is the wisdom of a father who has watched.
- 3:36Chris Alessi: He's seen it from the window.
- 3:39Chris Alessi: He knows what the twilight walk leads to.
- 3:42Chris Alessi: He knows how the story ends.
- 3:44Chris Alessi: We find it in Ecclesiastes.
- 3:46Chris Alessi: He says, At the end of my life, I can now see it clearly.
- 3:51Chris Alessi: It's the whole point of the other book of wisdom that he writes.
- 3:55Chris Alessi: And he's giving us the ending before we have to live it.
- 3:59Chris Alessi: It's an extraordinary gift if we will receive it.
- 4:04Chris Alessi: The man who listens to his father, his earthly father, when his father is wise, but his heavenly father always, that man is the one who gets to learn from someone else's window instead of his own wreckage.
- 4:18Chris Alessi: That's not weakness, that's wisdom.
- 4:22Chris Alessi: So keep it.
- 4:23Chris Alessi: Let it keep you.
- 4:25Chris Alessi: Listen and live.
- 4:28Chris Alessi: So here's your man-up challenge for this Friday.
- 4:30Chris Alessi: And I think it's good to take you into the weekend.
- 4:33Chris Alessi: Write down one piece of wisdom a father figure, your dad, a pastor, a mentor, even God through Scripture, has given you that you haven't fully applied yet.
- 4:44Chris Alessi: And this weekend, apply it.
- 4:47Chris Alessi: Don't let it stay as advice you heard.
- 4:50Chris Alessi: Let it move from your head to your heart, all the way to your hands.
- 4:55Chris Alessi: Let it become a life that you have lived.
- 4:58Chris Alessi: Let's pray.
- 5:00Chris Alessi: Father, thank you for speaking.
- 5:02Chris Alessi: Thank you for the warnings, the wisdom, the voice that's been calling towards us and calling us towards life all along.
- 5:11Chris Alessi: We choose to listen today.
- 5:13Chris Alessi: Really listen, and to let your words do what they were meant to do.
- 5:18Chris Alessi: To keep us, guard us, lead us in the paths of life.
- 5:23Chris Alessi: In Jesus' name, amen.
- 5:28SPEAKER_00: All right, gentlemen, you've heard God's word.
- 5:31SPEAKER_00: Now go live it.
- 5:33SPEAKER_00: Lead well, stand strong, honor God in everything you do.
- 5:38SPEAKER_00: Share this devotional with another brother.
- 5:40SPEAKER_00: Remember, every day is another opportunity to man up.