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Proverbs 1:8–19 — “When Sinners Entice You.” · A Tithe of Time Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to A Tithe of Time, Rooted in Wisdom, Growing Wiser, one passage at a time.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: Today we'll be looking at Proverbs 1, 8-19, reading from the ESV.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Hear, my son, your father's instruction, and forsake not your mother's teaching, for they are a graceful garland for your head and pants for your neck.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_00: My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: If they say, Come with us, let us lie in wait for blood, let us ambush the innocent without reason.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: Like Sheol, let us swallow them alive, and whole, like those who go down to the pit.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: We shall find all precious goods, we shall fill our houses with plunder, throw in your lot among us, we will all have one purse.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: My son, do not walk in the way with them.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: Hold back your foot from their paths, for their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed blood.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: For in vain is a net spread in the sight of any bird, but these men lie in wait for their own blood, they set an ambush for their own lives.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: Such are the ways of everyone who is greedy for unjust gain.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: It takes away the life of its possessors.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: The passage begins with something simple but important.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: Wisdom is meant to be received.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: The son is told to listen to his father's instruction and not abandon his mother's teaching.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: Their guidance is pictured as something honorable, a graceful garland and pendants, not as a burden.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Then comes the warning: if sinners entice you, do not consent.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: Notice that the danger begins before the violence.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: It begins with an invitation.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: They say, Come with us.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: They promise belonging, shared profit, and a common purse.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: That is part of what makes temptation powerful.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: Wrongdoing can be presented as friendship, opportunity, or simply a chance to get ahead.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: But look at where their invitation leads.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: They want to ambush innocent people and take what belongs to them.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: When they say, like Sheol, let us swallow them alive, Sheol is the Old Testament term for the place of the dead.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: The picture is of consuming their victims so completely that it is as if death itself had swallowed them.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: But the father tells his son to look past what they are promising and see where their path actually leads.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: Do not walk in the way with them.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_00: Hold back your foot from their paths.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: That is an important picture of wisdom.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: Wisdom is not only recognizing that something is wrong once you are already involved.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes wisdom means refusing to take the first step toward it.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: Then Proverbs exposes something these men cannot see.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: They believe they are setting a trap for someone else.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: But the passage says, these men lie in wait for their own blood.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: They set an ambush for their own lives.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: The trap they are preparing for others is ultimately a trap for themselves.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: And then the final verse widens the warning beyond this one group of violent men.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: Such are the ways of everyone who is greedy for unjust gain.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: So the deeper issue is greed, a desire for gain that becomes willing to exploit or harm someone else to get it.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: And Proverbs gives a serious warning about where that kind of greed leads.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: It takes away the life of its possessors.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: They think the gain will improve their lives.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Instead, the thing they are chasing begins to destroy them.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: Here's the picture Proverbs 1 8-19 leaves us with.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: Wisdom recognizes that temptation often arrives as an invitation, promising belonging or profit while hiding the cost.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: The wise response is to refuse the path before it carries you somewhere you never intended to go.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: This concludes Proverbs 1 8 19.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: Next, we'll continue with Psalm 3.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: And remember, tithe your time.