Proverb A Day: Proverbs 30
PROVERB A DAY
Pastor Kevin leads us through a daily thought on Proverbs 30.
Transcript Below.
Well, good morning everyone. Glad you’ve joined us for another daily devotional. We’re in Proverbs 30 today with the being April 30th. That means we’re going to go all the way back to Morrow. We’ll be back in chapter one at the beginning of the book, but but today when we look at chapter 30, there’s some really interesting insights that we find on poverty and riches. In verses seven to nine. This is what we read. Two things I ask of you, Lord, do not refuse me before I die. Keep falsehood and lies far from me. Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise I may have too much and disown you and say who is the Lord or I may become poor and steal. And so dishonor the name of my God. So, so the writer here talks about two things.
He has a brief comment that he makes about keeping falsehood and lies far from him. But then the bulk of the teaching here is about poverty and riches. And, and those are two things that I think it’s easy in our culture to either idolize the one or idealize the other. So, so it’s easy for us to idolize riches. Our culture sets us up to, to always be seeking more, to be seeking better things. More money, a newer house, a better car. It’s just built into our culture to be focusing on these things. We have this picture in our minds of what the good life is. And it’s easy for us to make that the most important thing in our life to idolize it in a way. So, so that’s one side of the spectrum. The other side of the spectrum is, is this, we can actually sometimes idealize poverty.
That is, we can think that poverty is in itself an ideal to to search for it. It’s a virtue in and of itself. Especially if, if we’re struggling, it’s easy for us to maybe look at others who have more and, and to feel like like they’re not following God as hard as we are. And to believe that it’s our poverty itself that draws us closer to God. And so we can idealize poverty in that way. And problems 30 verses seven to nine points out that there’s actually problems on both ends of the spectrum here, right? So for those who would have wealth, he says, if I were to have wealth, I may have too much and this own God and say, who is the Lord? So, so it’s pointing out this danger of self-sufficiency that can be in play where, where we could find ourselves living with the illusion that we don’t actually need God, that we can take care of ourselves.
Thank you very much. And this is something that Jesus points towards as well. When in the gospels, the rich young ruler comes to him and, and when the rich young ruler leaves, Jesus says to his disciples how hard it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. The fact is our riches can be something that, that get in the way of us following Jesus whole heartedly that get in the way of us. Following after him with all of our heart. So, so that’s one side of the danger that we find in Proverbs. The, the other side is, is with poverty where he says I may become poor and steal. And so dishonor the name of my God. And the fact is poverty is something that where we can find ourselves tempted to, to either break the rules or to bend the rules to, to compromise in some way in order to get the things that we think that we need.
But those things end up being a compromise. They ended up being something that could bring this honor to the name of God to the God who tells us to be Holy because he is Holy, and to trust him with all the needs that we have. So this problem probably 30 or seven to nine has this interesting, it draws out too dangerous for us, the danger of, of disowning God because of our riches or dishonoring God because of poverty. And instead it, it asks for a middle way, right? It says, give me only my daily bread.
And, and when we’re trusting God for our daily bread, that’s this middle posture where we’re, it keeps us dependent and it keeps us thankful. Whereas we seek first his kingdom and his righteousness. We’re trusting God that he will give us everything that we need that all of these things will be given to us as well. So as you head into your day maybe you had an with, with a bit of reflection around these points are there any ways where you would be tempted to disown God? Where were you? Find yourself trusting in your resources more than trusting in your God or on the other end of the spectrum is, is the danger that, that you would dishonor God by resorting to some kind of compromise rather than trusting him to give you the things you need when you need them. If, if you see any signs of those things in your life at all take a moment to just turn back to Jesus, to confess those things and to pray in faith and with gratitude of the way that he taught us to give us this day, our daily bread, and then trust him to do that.
So grace and peace as you head into your day and that, don’t forget to read the rest of chapter 30 and put a note, put a comment on this post about what verses in Proverbs 30 are standing out to you. So we can learn and journey this way together. Blessings. Everybody.