598. Gospel of Luke, Chapter 11 (#2) - A Friend Comes at Midnight - July 17, 2024

[00:00:06] Welcome to Wisdom Today. My name is Bill Kelley and I'll be your host. In this podcast, we will be exploring the book of Proverbs.

[00:01:11] The false lips, a liar, listens eagerly to a spiteful tongue. He who mocks the poor, repurchase his maker, he who is glad at calamity will not go unpunished. Children's children are the crown of old men,

[00:01:31] and the glory of children is their father. Excellent speech is not becoming too a fool, much less lying lips to a prince. A present is a precious stone in the eyes of its possessor,

[00:01:47] wherever he turns he prospers. He who covers a transgression seeks love, but he who repeats a matter separates friends. Review is more effective for a wise man than a hundred blows on a fool, and

[00:02:07] evil man seeks only rebellion. Therefore a cruel messenger will be sent against him. Let a man meet a bear, robbed of her cubs, rather than a fool in his folly, whoever rewards evil for

[00:02:26] good, evil will not depart from his house. The beginning of strife is like releasing water. Therefore stop contention before a quarrel starts. He who justifies the wicked and he who condemns

[00:02:44] the just, both of them alike are an abomination to the Lord. Why is there in the hand of a fool the purchase price of wisdom since he has no heart for it? A friend loves at all times,

[00:03:02] and a brother is born for adversity. A man devoid of understanding shakes hands in a pledge, and becomes surety for his friend. He who loves transgression loves strife, and he who exalts his gate seeks destruction. He who has a deceitful heart finds no good, and he who has

[00:03:31] a perverse tongue falls into evil. He who begates a scoffer does so to his sorrow, and the father of a fool has no joy. A merry heart does good, like medicine, but a broken spirit drives the bones.

[00:03:51] A wicked man accepts a bribe behind the back to pervert the ways of justice. Wisdom is in the sight of him who has understanding, but the eyes of a fool are on the ends of the earth.

[00:04:08] A foolish son is a grief to his father, and bitterness to her who bore him. Also to punish the righteous is not good, nor to strike princes for their uprightness. He who has knowledge spares his words, and a man of understanding is of a calm spirit.

[00:04:33] Even a fool is counted wise when he holds his peace, when he shuts his lips. He is considered perceptive. Prince would I like to do today is go over proper 17 verse 17,

[00:04:51] a friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity. Friends, we will take a closer look at that verse prior to closing today, but what I'd like to do is go back to our

[00:05:09] study of the Gospel of Luke. And on Monday's podcast we began chapter 11, and I will just for a moment refresh our memory if you did not get a chance to listen to Monday's podcast. The first four verses in Luke's Gospel chapter 11 talks about the Lord's prayer.

[00:05:34] And let's review we are to honor God in every one of our prayers. We are to magnify God, remind God that we know who He is, and we're to ask Him for our daily bread. It's important that

[00:05:52] God meets our need. It says that in Matthew chapter 6 verse 33, seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added to you. Friends, God knows everything

[00:06:09] that you have need of and He will meet your basic needs as long as you seek Him and find Him and have a relationship with Him. We also talked about the fact that He is to forgive us of our sins.

[00:06:29] Now we all know that when Jesus died on the cross, that all of our sins are forgiven. However, I also talked about a Monday's podcast how we still all fall short of the glory of God, and we still do

[00:06:46] sin from time to time regardless of how hard we try not to. So it is important if you knowingly sin and someone may be hurt that we ask God for forgiveness and finally in verse 4,

[00:07:05] we talked about the fact that we ask God to keep us from the evil one. Let's begin right where we lift off there and we're going to read four verses of scripture and this is called a friend

[00:07:22] comes in the night. Let's begin in verse 5, and He said to them, which of you shall have a friend and go to Him at midnight and say to Him, friend, let me three loaves for a friend of mine has

[00:07:40] come to me on His journey and I have nothing to set before Him and He will answer from within and say, do not trouble me. The door is now shut and my children are with me in bed. I cannot rise and give to you.

[00:08:01] So friends my first point for today is please don't visit your friend at midnight. Now I want you to think about that. Now what could we do as an alternative? Now friends, if you

[00:08:19] don't have stuff to make sandwiches well what do you have in your house? Could it be possible that you have cereal and milk or is it possible that you have maybe a dozen eggs and you could just

[00:08:35] have like an egg on it? Friends we need to try to find a way out of this situation and the last thing that we want to try to do is to go to a friend's house at midnight and pound on the door. I'm also

[00:08:56] going to bring up my second point on this first and the second point is you may end up regretting it. Now friends, if you not on that door at midnight and if he tells you

[00:09:15] he's at home for the night his kids are with him that is a clue that we are not to keep knocking at the door. Let's go to verse 8. I sent to you though he will not rise and give to him

[00:09:35] because he is a friend yet because of his persistence. He will rise and give him as many as he needs. So friends, my third point today is this being persistent may end up costing you a friend.

[00:09:56] I want you to think about that. Is it worth it to lose a friendship over some minor detail? Some petty quarrel. Really, really give it some thought because friends can be hard

[00:10:16] to come by. Now friends, I am reading out of the Nelson study Bible and I would like to read the commentary in my Bible for verse 8. Persistence here refers to shameless boldness more than

[00:10:36] to tenacity. Jesus' point is that in prayer, the disciple is to be bold. The example in the parable verses 5 through 7 is a man who goes boldly to his neighbor to seek what he requires. Likewise, the disciple is to go boldly to God with that which is needed.

[00:11:03] Now friends, what I'd like to do here is to go over three verses that kind of relate to this passage of scripture. Going to a friend's house at midnight and what I'd like for you

[00:11:19] to do is, this is what I'm going to do. I'm going to reread those first four verses and then I'm going to read three additional verses and I want you to see that these verses kind of are

[00:11:33] related and then I'm going to give a little bit of commentary of how we can go about going through this malage and find out something that we may want to try. Which of you shall have a friend and go to him at midnight and say to him, friend,

[00:11:55] let me three loaves for a friend of mine has come to me on his journey and I have nothing to set before him and he will answer from within and say, do not trouble me. The door is now shut

[00:12:10] and my children are with me and bed. I cannot rise and give to you. I say to you, though he will not rise and give to him because he is his friend yet because of his persistence, he will rise

[00:12:28] and give him as many as he needs. Now listen to these three verses which kind of correlate with this passage. In proper 25 verse 17, and friends you may want to write these down,

[00:12:47] in case this happens to you at some point in the future. It says, seldom set foot in your neighbor's house, list, he become weary of you and hate you. Let me read that again. That is worth repeating,

[00:13:07] proper 25, 17. Seldom set foot in your neighbor's house, list, he become weary of you and hate you. Now friends that is really significant when you think about knocking at their door at midnight. Now let's go to proper 27, 17. As iron, sharpen's iron, so a man sharpens the countenance of his

[00:13:39] friend. Now what do you do about that verse if you have a good friend and your in need at midnight? It's possible that you have a friend who will open the door for you at midnight. It's very

[00:13:58] possible. Most people, I venture to say, don't have a friend that would not really, really be irritated with you for waking him up and the entire family at midnight. Now what I'd like to do

[00:14:15] is go to the book of James and read a passage of scripture, four verses, and this is entitled do not boast about tomorrow. This is found in chapter four of James, beginning in verse 13.

[00:14:33] Come now, you who say today or tomorrow, we will go to such and such a city. Spend a year there by and sell. Am make a profit, whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow.

[00:14:52] For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanish as a way. Instead, you ought to say if the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that. But now you

[00:15:11] boast in your arrogance, all such boasting is evil. Therefore, say Him who knows to do good and does not do it. To Him, it is sin. Now friends, in context of our lesson for today, verses five through

[00:15:35] eight, the 11th chapter of Luke. How do you handle that situation? What if you are the friend in this situation? Listen to our 17 again to Him who knows to do good and does not do it

[00:15:53] to Him it is sin. So here is a good friend of yours knocking at the door and he's asking you for something to eat at midnight. I ask you, should you let him in? Is it sin if you don't let it in?

[00:16:15] So I just kind of want you to think about that. These are verses in scripture and we know that every verse in scripture is there for a reason. So what do we do when we have things that

[00:16:33] kind of lean towards one way or the other and how do we interpret one verse versus another? And how do we go about that? Friends, before we close today, I'd really like to go back to our

[00:16:50] verse today and we are in Proverbs 17 today and let's look at verse 17. A friend loves at all time and a brother is born for adversity. Now I often say on this podcast, I like to

[00:17:09] I like to relate my verse of the day and incorporate it in to our story. And this fits beautifully today, a friend loves at all times. So if you are a true friend, wouldn't you be willing to open the door

[00:17:33] if another friend of yours comes and is indeed a food? Friends, my call to action today is very simple. And I want you to think about this because it actually has profound meaning and really is

[00:17:51] vitally important as to which type of life you're going to live. Would you be willing to open the door for a friend of yours at midnight? Is there anybody in your life that you would be willing to do

[00:18:09] that for? And if you only have one or two people that you would do that, let me ask that you consider having the ability to open the door to more people. It would be. I want you to think about that

[00:18:28] because we are to be hospitable. We are to help our neighbors out. We are to help our friends out. We are to help our family out if we are truly Christians, something to give some thought and

[00:18:46] ponder over. Friends, I will never end a podcast without giving anyone an opportunity to receive Jesus as their Lord and Savior. If there is anyone listening to this podcast and you've never taken

[00:19:01] that step, I invite you to repeat a simple prayer after me today. Jesus, thank you for coming to earth and dying on a cross for me. I believe by doing that that you have forgiven me of all

[00:19:16] of my sins. Jesus, I believe that you are the Son of God, you came to earth, died on that cross and were buried. On the third day you rose from the dead and now sit at the right hand of God

[00:19:32] the Father. And yet, Jesus, even though I know you forgiven me of all of my sins, I still need your help. I want you to come into my heart. I ask that you lead me and guide me from this point

[00:19:48] forward in my life. I make you my Lord and Savior. Friends, if anyone repeated that prayer, you are now a full, fledged member of the family of God. Welcome to the family. Now,

[00:20:06] may the Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make us face shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace. Friends, please join me again tomorrow as we further explore wisdom today.