Proverbs 21:17. He that LOVETH pleasure shall be a poor man: he that LOVETH wine and oil shall not be rich
ASH WEDNESDAY !
Well Friends, the partying done now! Yes, it’s Ash Wednesday morning, the first day of Lent, so I hope that you exercised and exorcised all your pleasure demons over the last few days of serious partying. (smile) That’s because now is a time to settle down, a time for serious reflection on our relationships, especially between God and us.
Lent is the time to look deep into our souls and examine what we truly believe, and consequently how we live our lives, based on our grounding belief, our foundational faith, for all of us have faith in something, hopefully Jehovah God, and not man or some man-made idol.
Anyway, this season of Lent is a serious time, and we ought to seriously consider how we live our lives, giving the pleasure centres of our bodies and souls a well-deserved break. Hn, hn!
Now that doesn’t mean we ought to stop enjoying life, or eschew all pleasure, but rather not let the pleasures of life be all that important. Instead, let’s contemplate on how Jesus fasted for forty days in the wilderness and how Lucifer tempted Him, tried his very best to get Him to go against God’s will.
And in light of that, let’s see what temptations have been coming against us, and how we’ve been handling them, hopefully with graceful aplomb like Jesus, telling the deceitful fool Lucifer: ‘Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve.’ (Matt.4:10)
And we all know my brethren, that that’s truth of the highest order! But that doesn’t stop the ole scoundrel from continually snapping at our heels, especially in one soft and weak area of our sinful nature, that of pleasure.
That’s why Cousin Sol declared so profoundly unto us, the words of our Bit. ‘He that LOVETH pleasure shall be a poor man: he that LOVETH wine and oil shall not be rich.’
And unfortunately, I know that Lucifer has a wide grin on his evil, devilish face this Ash Wednesday morning, because over the last few days, he’s managed to get many of us to compromise our godly beliefs in the pursuit of fleeting worldly pleasure.
But please remember that ALL of it can be forgiven, though only some forgotten, and a lot of it will haunt us for the remainder of our lives. There will always be some reminder of our less than stellar performance during that period.
The important thing though is not to beat up ourselves and continually bewail our misery over it, since that portion of our lives cannot be relived, and our mistake(s) be undone. And this wisdom comes from personal experience, not hearsay. We need to come to God in sincere repentance, ask for His merciful and generous forgiveness, then face the problem squarely; stand our bounce.
That’s one thing I’ve always tried to drive into my children’s head from they were young, and try to practice it myself. If you’ve done something wrong, be man or woman enough to take the responsibility for it.
And after all that ‘sermonizing’, (smile) let’s look at some scriptures that uphold the truth of our Bit. And we’ll begin with some instructive words of Bruh Paul to Timothy, re widows. ‘But she that liveth in pleasure (indulgence) is dead while she liveth.’ (1 Tim.5:6)
And the scholars’ note says: ‘5:6. This may be paraphrased, “But the widow who indulges in luxurious living, though physically alive, is spiritually dead.”
And I just want to point out here my people, that that statement also applies to widowers, in fact to all and sundry, because once we’ve allowed earthly indulgences to control our lives, we do become spiritually dead.
Then in Hebrews 11, that great chapter on faith, in talking about Moses, the author proclaims: ‘By faith, Moses, when he was come to years (came of age), refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter; Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures (passing pleasures) of sin for a season;
Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasure in Egypt: for he had respect unto (looked at) the recompense of the reward.’ (Heb.11:24-26)
Yes my brethren, likewise, we are to shun the calling of the pleasures of sin, and esteem the reproach of Christ of greater sanctity and worth than that of the world.
And we’ll let James take us home with his very voluble and valuable warning to the rich. ‘Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted (have rotted), and your garments are moth-eaten.
Your gold and silver is cankered (corroded): and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for (in) the last days.
Behold, the hire (wages) of the labourers who have reaped (mowed) down your fields, which is of you (you kept back) by fraud, crieth (cry out): and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth (Hosts).
Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton (indulgent); ye have nourished (fattened) your hearts, as in a day of slaughter. Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you.’ (James 5:1-6)
Yeh Friends, that’s the way it goes! All our riches, garnered on the backs of those unfairly treated will eventually rot and be of no use to us. We who have lived to serve pleasure, will in the end reap displeasure!
So please, as true believers, let’s wake up and see unrestrained pleasure for what it really is nuh – an unwise and foolish means of moving away from Jehovah God to the sinful camp of Beelzebub.
Now is that what we really and truly want to do? I sincerely doubt it. So please, let’s pull up our ‘britches’ (breeches) nuh, and stop allowing the sinful pleasures of our sinful world to control our lives. Now that’s the ultimate in wisdom! Much LOVE!
…Cousin Sol had it all…wisdom, wealth and time…but found no satisfying, gratifying, or long lasting pleasure…in the worldly pleasures his divine blessings afforded him…
SCRIP-BITS 