Look First To The Word

Look First To The Word

GNLCC 11/2/2003 Proverbs 2:1-15 2 Timothy 3:10-17

Meet Clarissa. She is a beautiful seventeen year old junior in high school. If her smile does not light up a room, her sense of humor surely will. She needs a good sense of humor coming from a poor family with 13 children, and no man hanging around long enough to be called Dad. Very few of the 13 call the same man father.Life for the family is a struggle with a lot of people living under one roof

Meet Jamale. He is standing all of six feet two with the athletic build and the lines that could melt a girl’s heart. Jamale is also in school. He and Clarissa start seeing each other. But they follow that path, that far too many of us travel of thinking we can handle the situation. But then discover temptation is far greater than we thought.

Jamale assures her that nothing can go wrong. Well something does go wrong and she finds out she’s pregnant. It’s a lonely place to be when you’re pregnant and you don’t want to be. Jamale has decided on his own, that this pregnancy is not his responsibility and there’s no way this could be his child. Jamale already has his eyes on another girl in the class, and now they’re kicking it together.

Clarissa is absolutely miserable, isolated, and feeling alone. What should she do about this pregnancy? What should she do with her life. She comes to you for advice. What are you going to tell her that her options are? Where is your source of wisdom going to come from? Can Clarissa leave you having received a biblical perspective on her situation?

Diane comes home from the end of the first semester and announces to her father Daniel, that after thinking things over, she’s decided that she is a lesbian. Diane has always been a good girl who never gave the family any trouble. But Diane also says that she wants the family to meet her new lover during the Christmas holidays.

Daniel is in a state of shock. This is one thing he did not see coming. Not his beautiful little girl who he loved as a father should. He sees his dreams, his hopes, and his desires for your daughter going up in smoke. He has no idea of how the rest of the family is going to deal with this. He is also hurt and angry at the same time. He wants nothing to do with this lover and tells his daughter so. “don’t you bring that woman into my house.”

Diane refuses to speak to her father. He has come to you for advice. What is going to be your response? Will it be based on what’s on something you saw on TV? Will it be grounded in Scripture?

If we are Christians, then we are counselors. Not because we have a degree in counseling, but because the word of God has made us to be. Jesus told us, “you are the light of the world.” How many of you know that light attracts others. When someone is stumbling around in the dark, they are looking for a light in order to get their bearings straight. As a Christian, God expects you to be as spokesperson for Him in the world. God has provided us with the greatest counseling tool available known to the world. We call it the Word of God and the Bible.

Too many of us treat the bible as being so holy that we will not even touch it and read it to see what it has to say. But God does not give us the Bible to have a big pretty book on the coffee table, or to put it under the broken leg to keep the table from falling down. God gave us the bible to equip us to be the counselors to provide light for the world. We are to look first to the word of God in trying to deal with situations that come into our lives.

Have you ever met a person that’s really smart, but lacks plain common sense? We lack common sense every time we choose to ignore the Word of God. There is a pride in us that just does not like anyone or anything telling us what to do. How many times have you heard people say “I want to live my own life” and then when they do and screw up, they came back to you asking for help.

The bible is not just a bunch of stories or a bunch of history. It is a book written for us to get the most enjoyment and benefit out of life regardless of what our circumstances are. In our Old Testament reading, it is clear though, that the benefits of God’s word is an option in life. In Proverbs 2:1, the writer clear states, “if you accept my words.” God will not make us obey Him. God will not make us obey His word. It is a decision on our part to turn our ears to wisdom and to apply our hearts to understanding.