Proverbs 17:1 (KJV)
Better is a dry morsel,
and quietness therewith, than an house full of sacrifices with strife.
People live differently.
· Some are content and very happy with only a little
· Others are aggressive, productive and builders
We ought not judge
either home, except for this, let there be no strife.
We have seen a number of
passages, and I have done several lessons now on the priorities of stewardship.
· Wisdom is better than Wealth and Precious stones
· Righteousness is better than riches
· The fear of the Lord is better than great treasure
· Love with little is better than hatred with much
· Simple contentment is better than greedy gain
The passage this morning
teaches us that
· Quietness with little is better than strife with fullness
I want to address then
the home, marriage and family.
· What you have as a family is much more important than,
· What you have as a household
I take it that the house
full of sacrifices
*I. IS A REFERENCE TO POSSESSIONS
Proverbs 17:1 (KJV)
Better is a dry morsel,
and quietness therewith, than an house full of sacrifices with strife.
Solomon was a very rich
man.
He could offer 1000
sacrifices in one day.
I expect that there were
others in Israel who couldn’t offer one quarter of that in their whole
lifetime.
God made provisions in
some cases that if a family could not afford a lamb, two birds would be
sufficient.
People would offer to
God
· Meat
· Meal
· Oil
· Cloth and
· Precious metals
at various times in
their lives.
It is obvious that they
could not have all offered the same things or the same amounts of the same
things.
A house full of
sacrifices simply refers to the things a person may possess in their home.
It leads me to wonder,
have you ever inventoried your things and considered that each and every item
is a potential sacrifice to God?
We get such attachments
to things don’t we?
Some people have little
problems writing a check and putting it in the offering plate.
· It’s impersonal
· It’s technical
· It’s almost businesslike
But what about:
· The wallet
· The cash we have stashed away in there
The things in our home:
· The keepsakes and heirlooms
· The jewelry and artwork
· The collections and investments
· The gadgets and conveniences
Every one of those
things belongs to God and could be a potential sacrifice and offering to the
Lord.
II. THE
PREFERENCE IS QUIETNESS RATHER THAN STRIFE
Proverbs 17:1 (KJV)
Better is a dry morsel,
and quietness therewith, than an house full of sacrifices with strife.
The passage reminds me
of another we have already considered
Proverbs 15:17 (KJV)
Better is a dinner of
herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith.
· Dinner of herbs – something you can pick wild along the road
· Stalled ox – and animal kept only to eat
A dry morsel would be
like the table scraps.
· The word dry means something ruined or wasted
· The word morsel is a fragment
The word quietness
means: peace, security, ease
Strife means just what
it sounds like: controversy, enemy, battle
You ever been at a nice
restaurant when suddenly someone at one of the tables gets into an argument?
You wished you were home
eating a liverwurst sandwich, didn’t you?
That leads me to finish
with this point
*III. WE OUGHT TO STRIVE FOR QUIETNESS SO THERE IS
NO STRIFE
Proverbs 17:1 (KJV)
Better is a dry morsel,
and quietness therewith, than an house full of sacrifices with strife.
In the home, the
priority, the thing more important than possessions and property, is peace, security and quietness.
A. Peace –
Everyone in the home is
in fellowship with the other.
B. Security –
There is commitment in
the relationships in the home.
Therefore there is
C. Quietness –
The home is a pleasant
place to be. It is a sanctuary from the evils of the world.
Those are the things to
focus on inside the house.
Not all those things God
could rightly expect of us if we had them.
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