Proverbs 10, verses 6-21. These are God's words. will fall. He who walks with integrity walks securely, but he who perverts his ways will become known. He who winks with the eye causes trouble, but a prating fool will fall. The mouth of the righteous is a well of life, but violence covers the mouth of the wicked. Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all sins. Wisdom is found in the lips of him who has understanding, but a rod is for the back of him who is devoid of understanding. Wise people store up knowledge, but the mouth of the foolish is near destruction. The rich man's wealth is his strong city, the destruction of the poor is their poverty, the labor of the righteous leads to life. the wages of the wicked to sin. He who keeps instruction is in the way of life, but he who refuses correction goes astray. Whoever hides hatred has lying lips, and whoever spreads slander is a fool. In the multitude of words, sin is not lacking, but he who restrains his lips is wise. The tongue of the righteous is choice silver. The heart of the wicked is worth little. The lips of the righteous feed many. but fools die for lack of wisdom. Amen. So far the reading of God's inspired and inerrant word. The main subject of these verses, the reason we're taking verses 6 through 21 as a unit, is because this whole section is especially on the use of the tongue, the use of the mouth. As we began last week, this new section in Proverbs beginning in chapter 10, We had the 5th commandment and 8th commandment especially emphasized in the first 5 verses, and now in the next 16 verses we have especially the 9th commandment, the proper use of the tongue, emphasized. And within that we actually have one unit that all holds together in verses 6 through 11, and you can see that because of the repetition at the two bookends. Verse 6, blessings are on the head of the righteous, but violence covers the mouth of the wicked. And then the slight modification in the parallel in verse 11, The mouth of the righteous is a well of life, but violence covers the mouth of the wicked. You see, the one who is wise in the way that he uses his mouth, he does himself good, and the one who is foolish in the way that he uses his mouth does himself harm. But not only does he do himself good, blessings are on the head of the righteous, but he does others good. The mouth of the righteous is a well of life, verse 11. And so verses 12 through 21 go on to emphasize especially how the mouth of the righteous, the mouth of the wise, doesn't just do himself good, like we heard in verses 6 through 11, but it does others good as well, which is the main theme in verses 12 through 21. So this first unit then, with these two bookends, with violence covers, the mouth of the wicked. This actually can be read two ways, and probably both are intended in the poetry. First is that the violence that covers his mouth means that which comes out of his mouth, everything that comes out of his mouth. does harm to others, but also it covers his own mouth. It silences him. It keeps him from breathing. It condemns him to death. You remember when we were reading the book of Esther recently and Haman had fallen on the couch to plead for his life with Esther right as Osiris came back into the room and he said, will he attack the queen in her own palace? And the servants of the king covered his head as the words left the king's mouth. The wicked, the foolish who speak, not only do they do much harm to others, their mouth is covered with violence in that way, but their mouth is covered by the violence. They condemn themselves. And if we have a sensitive conscience, we can often feel this with respect to foolish things that have come out of our mouths and how they have harmed not just us, but ourselves. Not only does the blessing then come on the head of the righteous from God, but others recognize that the righteous is blessed. Verse 7, the memory of the righteous is blessed, but the name of the wicked will rot. And then we have this second kind of nested section. in verses 8 through 10, which again you have this parallel, the wise and heart will receive commands, but the mouth of foolishness, or rather a fool of lips, quite literally will fall. And then verse 10, he who winks with the eye causes trouble, but a fool of lips will fall." And again, the poetry is very literally graphic. It draws a picture for you where not only is he saying that his lips are foolish, like the hand of the diligent, the hands that are diligent back in last week's portion, but the fool of lips is a person who's so foolish that it's like he's made entirely out of lips. God has given us two ears and one mouth, we have often pointed out. And the scripture is quite plain when it says that we should be slow to speak and quick to listen. The fool is so quick to speak and slow to listen, it's like his whole body is made out of lips. He's missing his ears, he's missing his eyes. He does not learn things from others or observe things carefully. Just as soon as something occurs to him, it comes out of, his mouth. Well, if we do not have that control over what's coming out of our mouths, if we do not have that biblical filter so that we only say those things that scripture encourages and instructs and requires us to say, then we will be a fool of lips and we will fall. This tells us then what one of the main parts of walking with integrity is. There are many things involved in walking with integrity, being consistent, being diligent, willing to suffer for the sake of what's right and what's good. But by placing verse nine in the middle of verse eight and 10, it draws especially attention to the integrity of the proper use of the tongue, the proper use of the mouth. And we see that the heart and the mouth and the eye are all connected. The wise in heart is the opposite of the fool of lips in verse eight. And then in verse 10, it's now not an opposite, but two similar ones. The one who winks with the eye causes trouble. And so he is a manipulator from his heart, and therefore he's a manipulator in his facial expressions and mannerisms. And one of the things then that he does with his mouth, one of the filters that he's missing, is that he uses his mouth to pursue his own agenda, rather than serving the Lord by serving others. In how he speaks, he's trying to bend others to whatever his own will. happens to be. Be careful with those who are skilled in manipulation, but the Lord will make them themselves fall. Instead of being someone who winks with the eye, trying to get others to do what you want them to do, seek to use your mouth to help them in knowing the Lord and knowing His word and receiving a good word in season, a word that is fitly spoken. The mouth of the righteous is a well of life. It doesn't just bring blessing on one's own head, as in verse 6, but now verse 11. It's always reliable, can always be relied upon to do good to those who hear, to edify those who hear. That brings us then to the second section in which this contrast between doing others good and doing others ill is emphasized and many details of it fleshed out. Verse 12, Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all sins. This is generally true, but this is especially true with the mouth. That we be very careful with our mouths, that we not be those who bring heat, who bring increased conflict to a situation. That love would keep our mouths shut, so that rather than making people's sins known, and provoking strife, even if it's true. But not everything that is true needs to be said. And so love is willing to restrain its lips in order not to become the occasion by which strife occurs. Similarly, you find in verse 13, What happens, the second half of verse 13, the rod for the back of him who is devoid of understanding, that's not talking about parental discipline, that's talking about corporal bodily punishment by the magistrate. If you don't learn to use your mouth in service of God as a well of life for others, then you will end up using your mouth in a way that brings you under civil punishment. And so wisdom is found on the lips of him who has understanding, but a rod is for the back of him who is devoid of understanding. Why? Because if you don't give yourself to receiving the word of God and living in the fear of the Lord and the knowledge of the Holy One, which is understanding, then our failure to take care of our hearts, is going to show up in what comes out of our mouth. And either we will take care of our hearts, we'll have understanding, wisdom will come out of our lips, and knowing and conversing with us will be a blessing to others, because whatever comes out of our lips promotes life, or will fail to keep our hearts, out of our mouth will come whatever foolishness occurs to us in the moment, will do things like stir up strife among others, and when the root of the conflict is discovered, we will come under discipline or punishment. Therefore, since we need to have this understanding, the wise person, instead of always seeking to talk, is always seeking to gain. The wise person is storing up knowledge. He's like Sophia with her special rocks, although she hasn't done this in a while. But every time she was outside, she'd be scouring the ground with her eyes for more pieces of gravel from the driveway to add to her special rock collection. The wise person is always scouring every conversation, every interaction, every time he comes to read the Bible, every time he reads or learns or hears something that even isn't from the Bible but can be brought under the governance of the Bible. He loves to store up knowledge. He's more interested in hearing and understanding and learning. Wise people store up knowledge, but the mouth of the foolish is near destruction. He's not storing up knowledge. He's spewing things out. The problem is, he doesn't have the store of knowledge that the wise person has. So what's going to come out? It's going to be that which is harmful, that which is unreliable, that which is destructive. And he will end up doing things like trusting in wealth. Both the rich man and the poor man, in verse 15, has the wages of the wicked. because this rich man thinks that his wealth is his strong city. Well, what happens when his wealth is taken away? And this poor man thinks that his poverty is his destruction. Whereas if he had wisdom, if he had the fear of the Lord and the knowledge of the Holy One, If he had righteousness, then whether he was rich or he was poor, whatever he did before the face of God, independence upon God, and according to God's word, it would be leading him to life. Whether God's providence to him in this world was that he would be rich, or whether God's providence to him in this world was that he would be poor, The thing that makes his labor profitable is not the earthly wealth that it's producing, but the right relationship to God in the doing of it. The wages of the wicked lead to sin, whether it is the sin of trusting in your wealth, or whether it is the sin of covetousness, thinking that poverty itself is destruction. And so we have this value on storing up knowledge, which comes in a section on how we use our lips, because it is very difficult to store up knowledge if you're always running at the mouth. And so, verse 17, he who keeps instruction is in the way of life. but he who refuses correction goes astray. So first half of verse 17, this is someone who is eager to hear from others so that he can keep what he is instructed in. He's all ears. The second half of verse 17 is someone who actually needs correction, but even when he comes to the place where he needs correction, he still doesn't want to listen. It's not just that he doesn't desire instruction, but when God gives him in his providence someone who gives him a corrective word, he rejects it. Then there's not just the issue of how much we use our lips and our humility and desire for knowledge and instruction and correction, there's also the issue of having a murderous heart. And verse 18 now ties 6th commandment violation to 9th commandment violation, because a good name is better than riches. And a man's reputation is a significant part of his identity and his life. And so the one who hides his hatred, he comes to you and he's talking to you, to your face, he's polite enough, but once he gets behind your back or in other conversations, he insinuates this and implies that, and maybe outrightly states a partial truth, and he's spreading slander. And so sometimes, The person talking to you seems kind enough when they talk to you, but they're really full of murder. So verses 19 through 21 continue the same theme. In the multitude of words, sin is not lacking, but he who restrains his lips is wise. Now, even if there is not the hatred that we see in verse 18, we may still end up harming others just by speaking too much. The wise restrain their lips because increased quantity of words necessarily correlates to decreased quality of words. The more you say, the more likely you are to say something that is sinful, something that is harmful. And so verse 20, the tongue of the righteous is choice silver. What's the connection there with verse 19? Well, the idea is, first of all, the righteous one has been storing up the knowledge and not only does he store up knowledge, but then he restrains his lips. And so he's got a good repository to begin with in his heart, but he only selects the best things in his repository to bring out. so that when something comes from his mouth, it's like choice silver. And that's a helpful way for each of us to be thinking about how we speak and what we say. That, A, first of all, we want to store up as much good knowledge as we can so that we may have good things to say, but then part of the wisdom is not saying all of the good things that we have to say, but just selecting the best ones, the best things, the tongue of the righteous, choice silver. On the other hand, you have the Wicked, who not only does he have no filter, but his repository in his heart of things, the storehouse from which he might bring things out to say, there's almost nothing worthwhile there. And so, you know, it's the difference between kind of the heart and mouth of the righteous is like the carefully collected, valuable antiques that have been well-maintained. There's a quality of material and craftsmanship and skill that has gone into it. And the person who's been gathering it is bringing out just the very best pieces. But the heart of the wicked is like a landfill, and he's continuously dumping all the rubbish on anyone who has the misfortune of ending up having a conversation with him. So even the heart of the wicked is worth little. The lips of the righteous feed many. Not only have they learned wisdom and learned righteousness, stored up the knowledge, filtered it over their mouth, and so now whenever they bring something out of their mouth, it's useful. Not just valuable, verse 20, but useful, verse 21, to whoever hears. But the fool, because he's always talking, it's not just that he isn't able to help someone else with useful words. He doesn't even have anything useful in himself. He's going to die of starvation. He dies for a lack of wisdom. So unable is he to help others or to profit others that he himself does not have what he needs in order to live well before the face. And so may the Lord help us to walk in the fear of Him, especially as touches the use of our mouth. A, that first of all, we would not use it so much so that we may continue to heed the instruction so far in the book of gaining knowledge and storing it up and receiving instruction. And then when we do use our mouths, let us seek to bring out only the best thing that the Lord has enabled us to store up by gaining true godly knowledge. Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, especially when it comes to you, we pray that you would make us to be quick to listen and slow to speak, even as we heard about Ecclesiastes 5, so that by your spirit storing up the knowledge and instruction from this portion of your word and from other portions of your word for us, we would be enabled not only to live ourselves by your grace, but to be a blessing to others. So grant that your blessings would be upon our heads. Grant that we might be a well of life to others, and to feed many, and that our speech in our conversations would be like choice soap. and guard us from being a fool who is all lips, lest we harm ourselves, and harm others, and stir up strife, and our names come at last to rot. Help us, Father, we pray, to be like our Lord Jesus, who always spoke well. Thank you that his speech has counted for us, that he is our righteousness. And now grant that your Holy Spirit would make us to know that we would have of his light his character, for we ask it in his name.