The Meaning Of Life

https://biblehub.com/nkjv/proverbs/3.htm

Good Morning! It’s a beautiful morning here in southcentral Kansas, the sun is shining, the beautiful blue sky that our Father created are gorgeous, and we’ve had an unusually warm February and tuffs of green grass are just starting to sprout.

I can remember when there were just three channels on the television. There were movies on Saturday night, a Disney movie on “The Wonderful World of Disney” on Sunday nights, and other than that, you had to go to the theater if you wanted to watch any other movies. Saturday morning was dedicated to cartoons for children, and Saturday afternoon and Sunday was dedicated to sports with college games on Saturday and professional sports on Sunday. If you wanted any other sporting event, you had to buy a ticket and attend the game. There were no video games; if you wanted to play a game, it was a game of cards or a board game, both of which required someone else to play with you. About the only game you could play alone was “solitaire”; as my father would say, you “try to beat ol’Sol”.

Today, to put things in perspective, our local movie theater has to periodically have a fund raiser just to keep the doors open. Everyone that wants to watch a movie has endless selections of purchased DVD’s (and even those are outdated), or pick from one of many “streaming” movie services. Video games about; you can play alone or online with others around the world. When I was young, you either watched one of the three channels on TV, read a book, listened to a transistor radio, or went outside to play.

Church wasn’t so difficult. Yet, even I felt left out, observing a Saturday Sabbath, because as I was in church, my friends were home eating sugary cereal and watching Saturday morning cartoons. I can’t begin to imagine what it is like trying to encourage children today to give up three hours of their personal time, of their phones, computers, and video games, to attend church.

I drifted from the church in High School, and there wasn’t many tempations to draw me away…today, temptation is everywhere. You are truly, truly special and were truly raised right if you can be a child today and still manage to be a Christian and cling to church.

But Proverbs 3 didn’t recommend you be “special”. The wisdom of Proverbs 3 was to get close to God when you were a youth, and stay close to God, living a Godly life from youth to death. I had two sisters that were “special”, never leaving God or the church, but I and another sister didn’t have the drive or endurance to remain faithful. And while my parents urged me to stay in church, ultimately they were like my Heavenly Father and they gave me the choice. God doesn’t force you to love Him or to remain obedient to Him. He asks you to. He tells you it is wise to do so. But God gives you the choice, just like He gave Adam and Eve the choice to eat the forbidden fruit. And while Satan has no end to his temptations, our society, the entertainment industry, social media, has all become the “forbidden fruit” that tempts the youth of today. Enough rambling on that subject.

The next thing that struck me about this proverb, and something I have always missed in my past reads of the Bible, is the language of “laws on the heart”. I’ve always been under the assumption that the Old Covenant, the tablets of stone stored in the Ark of the Covenant, were there for the purpose of guiding the Hebrews down through the generations, and when that didn’t work, Jesus was sent to write those laws on our hearts and between the couplets of our eyes (i.e. in our hearts and minds). But right here in Proverbs 3, it tells you to write the law on the “tablet of your heart”. God always wanted His law to be in our hearts and minds. And it isn’t a matter that He is requiring you to keep His laws in your hearts and mind, it is wise to do so. When we start our day thinking about God, it is so much easier to resist temptation. If we wake up in prayer, thanking God for another day of life, and remain prayerful with God on our hearts, His laws will be in our hearts.

I can remember when I was a young fireman who had to be at work by 7 a.m., I always got up at 5 a.m. and had to drink a pot of coffee and smoke a half pack of cigarettes just to wake up and get in the shower. If I instead woke up to a half hour of Bible Study, I would have had another 30 minutes of sleep and would have been much healthier doing without cigarettes. (We didn’t wear airpacks in those days, so the cigarettes weren’t really that much more of a health hazard than our jobs were. Most of the time when we came out of a burning building, the first thing we did was light up a smoke.)

And if I had of awakened to a half hour of Bible Study, I would have started off with God’s laws in my heart and mind. With the bustle of today’s life, it is difficult to keep God’s law in your heart and mind, but you have to remember, that is what Satan wants. He wants us to either sleep late, or get up and smoke cigarettes and drink coffee as the priority in our life.

And the last thing I have room to write about is Verse 9. How many recognize that everything they have is God’s? The clothing you wear belongs to God, the car you drive belongs to God, your house belongs to God, the money in your bank and the food in your fridge, all belong to God. We did not get all of these things on our own, they are all “gifts” from God. If we accumulated them on our own, then everyone would all drive a Cadillac and live in a half-million dollar home. God blesses you with everything you own, as the saying goes, “The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away”. So we have to be thankful for everything, and I mean everything, that we have.

That said, God only asks for a tenth of it back. And you really aren’t giving the money to God, you are giving it so God’s messengers can live. Remember, God assigned the task of caring for the tabernacle to the Levites. They did not get a share of the promised land; their job was to care for the tabernacle, to minister to the people, to lead the people in worship and musical praise. God ordered you to give your first born and your first fruits to Him, a portion of which went to the Levites. It hasn’t changed today. Your church pastor is paid from your tithe. If you do not tithe, the church has to make business decisions.

When I was young, we had to share a pastor with three other towns because our churches weren’t big enough and didn’t bring in enough tithe to pay for four. So it was a logistical nightmare. On one Sabbath, our pastor went to a nearby town and they had church service early, followed by Sabbath School, and while he was conducting church services there, we were having Sabbath School. After church services there, he got in his car and drove quickly to our town and ended with church services here. The next Sabbath he did the same, but in reverse order. We had church services early with him, then he sped to the nearby town to have church services with them. And the next two Sabbaths, we didn’t see him at all because he was repeating that process with Churches 3 and 4.

And sadly, the church population declined to the point that two of the four churches have now closed down; there simply wasn’t enough tithe to support paying a pastor for those churches. Don’t get me wrong, you don’t tithe to keep the church open, you tithe to pay the minister, just like the Hebrews tithed to pay the Levites.

I can remember coming back to God, selfishly, when my wife was diagnosed with a terminal illness. I remember when I told her that I wanted to start tithing again (I didn’t have a church to give my tithe to, but there were plenty of online ministries I could donate to). She said I couldn’t do it, that in order to tithe, I would have to give up the extra snacks I bought at the grocery store, and I would have to make other drastic cuts in my spending in order to “afford” tithing again.

I was dedicated though, not for my love of God, but because I was wanting His blessing on my wife’s illness. You know what, I never missed a penny. In fact, when I started tithing again, I seemed to have more money left in the bank on payday than I normally had when I didn’t tithe. It is astonishing how much God blesses you when you obey Him! You have trouble and turmoil in your life? Turn to God, obey His commands, and you won’t be able to comprehend the blessings you will receive!

And that, in a nutshell, is God’s promise to us. If we love and obey Him, while we are living on this earth for a very short while, He will bless us with everlasting life in Heaven, and not only that, it will be a life that we cannot humanly comprehend. We think we know what Heaven will be like, but our earthly human minds do not have the ability to imagine or comprehend what it will be like. Life in Heaven will be filled with a love like we’ve never felt before.

As we’ve already read in just the first three chapters in the Book of Proverbs, it is wise to love God and to obey His rules. Because His rules aren’t restrictive, His rules are to ensure we have a safe, healthy, and prosperous life while we live on this rock. Amen!