Proverbs 20:13-17 (KJV)
Love not sleep, lest
thou come to poverty; open thine eyes, and thou shalt be satisfied with bread.
It is naught, it is
naught, saith the buyer: but when he is gone his way, then he boasteth.
There is gold, and a
multitude of rubies: but the lips of knowledge are a precious jewel.
Take his garment that is
surety for a stranger: and take a pledge of him for a strange woman.
Bread of deceit is sweet
to a man; but afterwards his mouth shall be filled with gravel.
I am going to risk
sounding insensitive[1] in
order to introduce and illustrate the point of our text this morning.
I read an article in
preparation for this lesson that says in part,
New Study Identifies that Deaths spike
on Christmas Day in the U.S.[2]
|
A new analysis of mortality rates in the United States
during different times of the year has found that people are more likely to
die during the holidays – namely on Christmas Day and New Year’s Day.
A group of
sociologists analyzed all the official death certificates during a 25-year
period in the U.S. between 1979 and 2004, and conducted that there has been
an excess of 42,325 natural deaths in the two weeks around the Christmas
holiday period. This excess is above and beyond what would be
considered the normal seasonal increase in the death rate in the U.S.
The study, published
in the journal Social Science & Medicine, is from researchers David
Phillips, Gwendolyn Barker and Kimberly Brewer. Professor Phillips of
the University of California stated that the findings are “not trivial” and
indicate that more people die in hospital emergency wards, or are DOA, on
Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Day than any other days of the year.
Phillips said that the
team’s analysis of 57.5 million death certificates shows that the chance of
dying during the holiday period increases “somewhere between 3% and 9%
depending on the demographic group you look at, and between 1% and 10%,
depending on the cause of death analyzed.”
|
As a pastor, and as one
who has two years of experience working for a funeral home, I can attest to the
fact that death rates increase during the holidays – Thanksgiving to New Years
Day.
A lot of reason can be
cited:
· Cold temperatures
· Stress and loneliness
· Alcohol abuse
And, the big one, diabetes.
One article I read said
that at least 12% of those who die during the holidays of “natural causes”
actually die of complications from their diabetes.
One of the things that
happens is that a diabetic, cons himself into thinking he can eat the sugary
sweet high carbohydrate foods that make up our traditional American holiday
fare, “just this one day.”
I know personally people
who ate their holiday dinner, went to their bedroom to take a nap[3],
and never woke up.
The food was sweet to
the taste, but not so sweet in the end.
Proverbs 20:17(KJV)
says,
Bread of deceit is sweet
to a man; but afterwards his mouth shall be filled with gravel.
*I. THE LOVE OF SLEEP
Proverbs 20:13 (KJV)
Love not sleep, lest
thou come to poverty; open thine eyes, and thou shalt be satisfied with bread.
I sometimes listen to
guys who teach motivation and success skills.
One of the things they
all insist upon is that a successful person has to get up early.
· One of them teaches to be out of bed in less than 30 seconds
after the alarm rings.
· Several of them teach that you should get up early, spend a
few moments in gratitude, and then exercise every day
· Some of them teach going to bed early too, but a handful of
them teach that a person can train themselves to live very well on just four
hours of sleep – if it is high quality sleep.
The point is this, as
sweet as turning over in the bed is, as tempting as it is to sleep as late as
you can before you have to get up to go to work, real success is only going to
happen when you train yourself to get up early enough to take care of yourself
before you go to work.
*II. THE THRILL OF THE BARGAIN
Proverbs 20:14 (KJV)
It is naught, it is
naught, saith the buyer: but when he is gone his way, then he boasteth.
I will never forget
hearing a lady I know, a salesmen herself, describe negotiating the price of a
car she wanted to buy.
She said she told the
salesman, “I know you need to make a living. I just don’t want you to make it
on me.”
I have a friend who said
when he was younger he liked to dicker the price of things. He told me that one
time he went into a mobile home dealership, picked out a mobile home he liked
and then spent a couple of hours haggling over the price until he got it down
to what was his goal price.
Then he told the man he
wasn’t really interested in buying it – he just wanted to see if he could talk
him down that much.
I learned a long time ago that I don’t want business people to
avoid me because, as a Christian (and a pastor no less) I think I should be
given deals that keep them hungry.
I try not to use high-pressure pleas to get you to give
around here.
I only ask that you be
faithful to God with giving and I will be faithful to God with stewardship.
A laborer is worthy his
hire.
It is theft to get his
labor without giving him fair pay.
*III. THE YOKE OF A STRANGER
Proverbs 20:16 (KJV)
Take his garment that is
surety for a stranger: and take a pledge of him for a strange woman.
The Bible teaches us, 2
Corinthians 6:14 (KJV)
Be ye not unequally
yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with
unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?
Being a surety for a
stranger is the same as being yoked together with them,
This passage teaches
that, as Christians, we don’t want to trust the Christian who disregards that
Bible principle.
He is going to get bit
by being unequally yoked with a “stranger” and we will get bit if we are too
yoked to him.
*IV. THE WAGES OF DECEIT
Proverbs 20:17 (KJV)
Bread of deceit is sweet
to a man; but afterwards his mouth shall be filled with gravel.
Income and items gotten
through deceptive or illegal means will never be sweet in the end.
Jesse James and the Cole
Younger gang had developed deep loyalties to one another through their Civil
War experiences. But once the gang was separated, Jesse “hired on” a couple of
outlaws who had no loyalty to him.
To them, one crooked
deal was as good as the next so, when opportunity to kill Jesse and collect a
potential reward presented itself, Bob Ford didn’t think twice. He shot him in
the back of the head.
Stolen money seemed
sweet, but its final taste was bitter.
There is one more thing
the Bible says tastes sweet in the mouth but turns bitter in the stomach
*V. THE WORD OF GOD WHEN IT IS NOT SHARED
Revelation 10:9-11 (KJV)
And I went unto the
angel, and said unto him, Give me the little book. And he said unto me, Take
it, and eat it up; and it shall make thy belly bitter, but it shall be in thy
mouth sweet as honey.
And I took the little
book out of the angel's hand, and ate it up; and it was in my mouth sweet as
honey: and as soon as I had eaten it, my belly was bitter.
And he said unto me,
Thou must prophesy again before many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and
kings.
The Word of God is
wonderful.
To be sure there are
blessings in reading, studying and meditating on what is in this book.
But it is not meant to
be kept to oneself.
Some of the unhappiest
people I have ever known are Christians who refuse to speak about Christ to the
lost around them.
Don’t be one of them.
[1] I have battled insulin
resistance for several years now and have been considered diabetic for a little
over one year. I know personally the temptations and complications of which I
speak.
[3] This is typical of
insulin resistance and diabetes. I always grow sleepy immediately after eating
high carbohydrate foods.
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