Calvary Chapel Staten Island

Guest (Female): You're invited to pull up a chair on Lisa Harper's back porch where faith meets real life. Welcome to Back Porch Theology. Each episode helps you dive deeper into God's word and discover that the gospel isn't just good news for eternity; it's great news for everyday life because God is for you, and he's always been restoring our value and drawing us closer to him. With honest conversations, a few laughs, and guests ranging from close friends to brilliant theologians, Back Porch Theology is thoughtful, meaningful, and never stuffy. So grab some coffee or sweet tea and join Lisa Harper on Back Porch Theology. Subscribe now wherever you listen to podcasts.

Guest (Male): Hello and welcome to God in Our City, the daily edition. Your host and Bible teacher is Pastor Dave Watson. Pastor Dave has been the pastor of Calvary Chapel on Staten Island for 35 years. In addition, he is the co-founder and president of the New York Institute for Biblical Studies. To receive a special downloadable gift from Pastor Dave, please go to calvarychapelsi.org/gioc. That's calvarychapelsi.org/gioc. Now, here's Pastor Dave and our show.

Pastor Dave Watson: Thank you so much for joining us. This is God in Our City. This is Pastor Dave Watson, pastor of Calvary Chapel on Staten Island, as well as the co-founder and president of the New York Institute for Biblical Studies and the person who has the incredible privilege of hosting this broadcast.

We've been doing this daily now for a little over a year. I guess technically speaking, you'd have to say we're in our 17th month. We're very, very pleased to be with you. It's just an incredible opportunity to share God's word with our city. In this case, our series "Living iSmart in an eStupid World" is just so applicable in the society that we live in. It's an incredible privilege to speak the truths of God's word to our culture, to our city, and really across the globe now. What used to be common sense is no longer common, and Proverbs has so much incredible stuff to share with us. That's why we picked it as the book that we're studying.

If you're joining us for the first few times, we pick a book of the Bible and we go through it pretty thoroughly. That's our goal. We've gone through James, 1st Peter, 2nd Peter, and Jude. We've looked at the Christian life. We've looked at a lot of good stuff and we will continue to do so. Thank you for joining us. We want to give you some resources that will make your time with us even more profitable. If you haven't already, download the study guide. The study guides are really an essential part of what we do. They help you to follow along and then they help you to put it into your life.

Please take advantage of the study guide and the free Proverbs and Bible verse pack we want to send you. That's free too. You just fill in the little blank, tell us where we're sending it, and we send it. We pay for the postage and the handling. Then the Proverbs study takes you through the book of Proverbs using various and sundry topics. You can go through the entire book and make your own Proverbs concordance. Consider, while you're there, making a donation to God in Our City.

The verses we've been focusing on as our memory verses, or our meditation verses, as I have to say it that way because some of us don't have as easy a time memorizing as we used to, is Proverbs 6:6-19. It says there are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers. These are things the Lord hates.

Let's pray. Lord, please help these not to be true of us in any way, shape, or form. Please help us during our time together today to understand your word and to put it into practice in our hearts and lives. Lord, you've been incredibly good to us. We're grateful for your goodness and your help in every area of our life. Now, in this area of wisdom, help us to pay the price to be wise. Help us to take the truths that we are now examining and use them in an incredible way in our life. Lord, please minister to each of our listeners. Thank you that they've taken the time to listen. May you encourage them greatly. Touch each of their hearts, we pray. Help us to listen to you now. In Jesus's name, amen.

Amen. So we're talking about iEscape, escaping certain behavioral patterns that can really mess us up. We talked about iEscape from being an indebted person from the first five verses, iEscape from being a lazy person in chapter 6, verses 6 through 11, and then iEscape from being a worthless person from 6:12-19. Now, we're going to talk about escaping from being an immoral person. Proverbs 6:20-35. If I am eStupid, I will be destroyed by my senselessness. That's what the text is going to bear out for you and me.

We want to escape being an immoral person. In our society, it is almost considered virtuous to be immoral. How many people have you been with? People are taken and discarded by the numbers. What's your body count? How many people have you slept with? It's crazy, not realizing the damage that's being done to people. People aren't like used cars. You don't take them out for a spin; you don't test drive them. When you do, you cause serious problems.

We have adultery, which is being married to someone and having sex with someone outside of your marriage vows. Or you're two people, neither of you are married, and you get involved with each other. That's immorality. It is displeasing to God. The immoral person can be someone who commits adultery or someone who just commits fornication, sex outside of marriage even though you're single. But in either case, it's immoral, even if you have the word fiancé somewhere in there. It doesn't please the Lord.

That's our goal. But there is a path to immorality, to being this kind of person. We like to play the victim. It wasn't my fault I got in over my head with credit card debt and I'm paying ridiculous amounts of money. It wasn't my fault; give me a way out. Help me to declare bankruptcy or help me to do something so that I don't have this anymore. Help me to get out of this. Oh, it's not my fault I'm lazy. You have to understand when I was younger, blah, blah, blah. It's not my fault that I'm a worthless individual, that I'm a person who's just bad. It's not my fault; my great uncle on my mother's side was mean to me or taught me how to drink or taught me how to be stupid. It's not my fault.

We need to take responsibility, and that is true with becoming an immoral person. If I allow that to happen, I will be destroyed by my senselessness. It'll destroy me. Sooner or later, it will destroy me. There is a path regarding my senselessness. Proverbs chapter 6, verses 20 through 24 says it this way: "My son, keep your father's commandments and forsake not your mother's teaching. Bind them on your heart always; tie them around your neck. When you walk, they will lead you; when you lie down, they will watch over you; and when you awake, they will talk with you. For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light, and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life, to preserve you from the evil woman, from the smooth tongue of the adulteress."

The what here? It says, "Keep." Keep what? Your father's commandments. Forsake not your mother's teaching. It goes back to that first chapter in Proverbs. Our attitude toward the teachings and commandments of those in authority over us. When we think we always know best, we are not smart. We're not living iSmart; we're living eStupid. So keep these things. Forsake not these things. And do this: bind them on your heart, tie them around your neck.

I think in both cases here, it's talking about doing something spiritual, but put them front and center in your life so that you always see them. You and I have almost the same thought every day when we get up and look in the mirror. That's why it's important that we control those thoughts. One way to control the thoughts is to take the memory verses that we are walking through here and put them in a prominent place and keep thinking about them. Or if you're tempted or in spaces where sex out of marriage is going to be an issue for you, maybe put some verses regarding that on a sheet of paper and put it in a prominent place so that you see it continually. Put it in your car, carry around file cards with you. Do everything you can to be different.

Pastor, that's hard. I appreciate that, but you know what's really, really hard? Coming back from destroying your life. It's like impossible. So let's do the hard stuff now. Keep the commandments; forsake not the mother's teachings. Bind them on your heart; tie them around your neck. Remember: "Your word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against God." When will they lead you? You do this one thing privately and then publicly, when you walk, they'll lead you. When you lie down, they'll watch over you. When you awake, they'll talk with you.

See, you're putting it in your heart and you're tying it on your neck privately, and then when you're living your life, these things, these truths will be part of you. We've done a bad job of helping people absorb the word of God to the point where they're allowing it to run their life. I don't know all the answers to that, but I do know that if you put the word of God deep inside of you and it's constantly in you, "the word of Christ is dwelling in you richly," there's a good chance you'll hear it and you'll do the right thing.

Why should we do this? Because the commandment is a lamp and the teaching is a light. The reproofs are ways of life. They take control of us and they keep us out of trouble. To preserve you, it says here, from the evil woman, from the smooth tongue of the adulteress. You don't want to fall into immorality. It's an easy thing to have happen, and we want to be preserved from that. We want to have the other set of truths walking in our head so when the worldly wise woman, whether it be the world or a woman herself, comes along, they cannot destroy us. They cannot mess us up because we are listening to what God's word says. It's in us.

Now, that doesn't mean that we're continually having an argument of whether or not to do this or that. What does it say to do with youthful lusts? We flee from them. But we set ourselves up; we set ourselves in a position where we're going to do the right thing. That's the path of my senselessness.

And then there's the pain of my senselessness. "Do not desire her beauty in your heart. Do not let her capture you with her eyelashes. For the price of a prostitute is only a loaf of bread, but a married woman hunts down a precious life." A married woman does what? She hunts down a precious life to destroy you. She's not loving you. It's not going to be an amazing affair that no one will know about. It will cost you your life. The prostitute will cost you dearly as well, but the adulteress is actually hunting you. It's a very, very serious thought.

The pain of my senselessness is borne out in chapter 6, verses 27 through 35. "Can a man carry fire next to his chest and his clothes not be burned? Or can one walk on hot coals and his feet not be scorched? So is he who goes in to his neighbor's wife; none who touches her will go unpunished. People do not despise a thief if he steals to satisfy his appetite when he's hungry. But if he's caught, he'll pay sevenfold; he will give all the goods of his household. He who commits adultery lacks sense; he who does it destroys himself. He will get wounds and dishonor, and his disgrace will not be wiped away. For jealousy makes a man furious, and he will not spare when he takes revenge. He will accept no compensation; he will refuse though you multiply gifts."

If someone gets involved in an adulterous relationship, what is the end? Can you find a way to satisfy the man with whose wife you have cheated? The answer is no. Will people understand what you did? No. You can understand a thief stealing because he's hungry. Can you understand someone trying to steal somebody else's wife or entering into an affair? Will somebody understand that? No.

And look how he asks this rhetorical question: "Can a man carry fire next to his chest and his clothes not be burned?" Of course not. "Can you walk on hot coals and his feet not be scorched?" He's not talking about some motivational speaker walking on coals; he's talking about just if you walked on coals, what would be the product of either one of these things? You would be burned. You would be burned. He's trying to make the point that you will be punished. This doesn't end well; you will be burned.

It goes on to say that he who commits adultery lacks sense and this person destroys himself. Do you see that? You get wounds and dishonor and disgrace and they'll not be wiped away. They're permanent. Jealousy makes a man furious, and he will not spare when he takes revenge. He won't accept compensation. But look what one does to oneself with an adulterous relationship. Whether it be a woman with a man or a man with a woman, it's destruction. You're destroying your life.

Solomon is saying this to his sons, as it were. That's what the picture is, and we just as men, I would tell you, we need to have these conversations with our sons. Just frank conversations. This is what you will do to yourself. This is what you will do to your family name. You will never rise again. You will put a ceiling on how far you can go. When we look in our world, people are rewarded for being immoral, but they really aren't. If you follow their careers, if you follow their lives, you see that it comes back to haunt them. It comes back to destroy them. You only have one life; don't allow it to be destroyed by being involved in affairs, illicit relationships, and being an immoral person.

Listen to what your father has said. Listen to the teaching of your mom. Bind them on you so that when you're tempted—not if you're tempted, so that when you are tempted—you go in the right direction. It's a tough message, but it's one that must be told over and over and over again. We've talked about escaping from indebtedness because it will hunt you. We've talked about escaping from laziness because it'll rob you. We've talked about escaping from being a worthless person, for it will break you. But if I will be an adulterer or an immoral person, it will simply destroy me. It will destroy me.

If you're involved in that right now, the quicker you can get yourself out of it, the better. Go to a pastor, go to a church leader. Say, "This is what's happening in my life. Help me. I'm stuck in this relationship. I'm stuck in this situation." Go to someone and get help. Admit you've been foolish. Admit you've made a huge mistake. Admit that you have believed a lie and do it today.

Let's pray. Lord, I'm talking to some folks today. Maybe they're just tuning in and they're just realizing, Lord, that what they're doing is wrong and they need to get right with you. Help them even in this time frame, Lord, to see their need, to see that they're not in a good spot and they're destroying their life. They're tossing it away. Lord, help them to come to you, get forgiveness. Help them to come to you and get help and help them to get out of this situation no matter what it takes. Thank you for restoration and forgiveness, God. Please help them to experience it. Lord, minister to every one of our listeners today. In Jesus's name, amen.

If you know someone who's involved in a relationship like this, be a real friend to them and tell them, "You need to get out of this and you need to get out now." Hey, please download the resources we have for you at calvarychapelsi.org/gioc. Calvarychapelsi.org/gioc. Please consider making a donation to God in Our City. Please join us again tomorrow for another edition, the daily edition, of God in Our City.

Guest (Male): Thanks for listening to God in Our City with your host, Pastor Dave Watson. We hope the show was a blessing to you. Again, to receive a downloadable gift from Pastor Dave, go to calvarychapelsi.org/gioc. That's calvarychapelsi.org/gioc. Please check out Pastor Dave's blog at nycshepherd.com. That's nycshepherd.com. Please invite a friend and join us every weekday for another edition of God in Our City.

Guest (Female): You're invited to pull up a chair on Lisa Harper's back porch where faith meets real life. Welcome to Back Porch Theology. Each episode helps you dive deeper into God's word and discover that the gospel isn't just good news for eternity; it's great news for everyday life because God is for you, and he's always been restoring our value and drawing us closer to him. With honest conversations, a few laughs, and guests ranging from close friends to brilliant theologians, Back Porch Theology is thoughtful, meaningful, and never stuffy. So grab some coffee or sweet tea and join Lisa Harper on Back Porch Theology. Subscribe now wherever you listen to podcasts.