The Folly Of Spiritual Fools

The Folly Of Spiritual Fools

Text: Prov.1: 7, 22

Intro: A “fool” may be defined as, “a person lacking in judgment or prudence.” This definition refers to one who is not necessarily unaware of the proper course of action, but lacks the wisdom and forethought to act upon what they already know to be right. This is a person who acts contrary to accepted norms for prudent and wise conduct.

Foolish conduct is often attributed to youth. However, all young people cannot be classified as fools, because their lack of judgment and prudence is simply a characteristic of youth and inexperience. And whether we would like to admit it or not, we have all, at some point in time in our youthful days, done some pretty foolish things.

Today however, I am not concerned with the person who gets intoxicated and plays the fool while in his/her drunken state, or with the person who acts like a raving maniac due to their uncontrolled anger. Though these are fools in their own right, they are not the type of fools that concern me today. The type of fools that concern me today are those I have dubbed “spiritual fools.”

Spiritual fools are those who can look at all the evidence, scriptural or otherwise, concerning their need for God and His salvation, and yet choose to ignore all of it. And yet this reaction really shouldn’t surprise us, for this is precisely what Paul referred to when he said, “But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: In who the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not” (II Cor.4: 3, 4a).

As we examine the folly of spiritual fools today, I trust it will spur us to pray more diligently for those around us who are lost. May we begin to pray that God would open their spiritually blinded eyes, that they might realize their need for God’s grace and salvation through faith in Jesus Christ.

Theme: The spiritual fool ignores:

I. THE SIGNS OF A GOD WHO IS SOVEREIGN

Ps.14: 1a “The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God…”

Rom.1: 21 “Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imagination, and their foolish heart was darkened.

22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,”

A. And This In Spite Of His Tremendous Wonders.

1. The heavens have the signature of God upon them.

Ps.91: 1 “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth his handywork.”

Rom.1: 20 “For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:”

NOTE: [1] How can one not acknowledge the God who created the vastness of space and all of its marvelous wonders? Space is so vast that astronomers “…had to devise special units to keep their figures manageable. Their basic unit of distance is the light-year—the distance light travels in 1 year, or about 6 trillion miles (6 followed by 12 zeroes).” (Readers Digest Book Of Facts, published by The Reader’s Digest Association, Inc., copyright 1987, pg. 382).

[2] Our nearest star, Alpha Centauri, is so far away that if one traveled at 30,000 miles per hour, it would take 100,000 years to reach it (Ibid, pg. 389).

[3] According to astronomers, “…there are more than 100 billion stars in our own galaxy…” (Ibid, pg. 395). That’s just in our galaxy alone. Each one of those stars has different characteristics; they are all unique in some way.

[4] “On its annual journey around the sun, the earth as a whole moves at about 67,000 m.p.h.” (Ibid, pg. 398). If you’ve ever wondered why your head sometimes seems to spin, maybe that’s the reason.

2. Man himself is a tremendous wonder of God’s genius.

Ps.139: 14 “I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.”

NOTE: [1] According to one estimate, “…your brain can store 100 trillion bits of information…” (ABC’s Of The Human Body, published by The Reader’s Digest Association, Inc., copyright 1987, pg. 62). I know that some of you are just sure that that estimate has to be wrong, since sometimes you have trouble remembering where you put your car keys. But that’s what the scientists tell us.

[2] The heart and circulatory system is an amazing illustration of the wisdom and forethought of God.

Your heart weighs only 10 or 11 ounces…and it’s not much bigger than a clenched fist…At a rough estimate of 70 beats per minute for an adult (105,000 beats per day), this works out to more than 1,800 gallons…of blood pumped every day through the body’s 60,000 miles…of blood vessels.