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Exposition of Proverbs 11:1-3

The Righteous and The Wicked: Part One

Proverbs 11:1-3

Introduction

Have you ever noticed how many of the Proverbs seem to be stuck together in no particular order and don't go together? One verse will talk about one thing and the very next verse talks about something else. A seminary instructor once said that he could find some excellent sermons in the Proverbs, but there was always one point that didn't go with the others. He said he'd have two good points to preach, but the third point would be so far off the mark that it would be like announcing that he had to go to Wal-Mart when church was over.

Why is that? It's because Proverbs doesn't fit our modern idea of what a book of the Bible is. It's not in the form of a letter or a story. It's not even a long poem. A Proverb is a short saying, and the book of Proverbs is a collection of those short sayings.

Because man has created chapters and verses, it looks like all the Proverbs in a chapter ought to be related, but they don't necessarily have to have anything to do with one another. To the credit of whoever put this book together in Old Testament times, many times the verses will be loosely related, and whoever put the chapters together tried to group those verses together, but they weren't always successful.

Proverbs Chapter 11 is one of those collections of loosely related verses that approach the same subject in many different ways. Primarily, it's 31 verses in which God declare the advantages or blessings of righteousness to the miseries of wickedess or a wicked life or existence. God doesn't leave any room for argument - He tells us the way it is.

In this writing I invite you spend some time looking into what God says about the righteous life versus the wicked life. Since these verses are not necessarily related, I'm going to take them one at a time and try to explain them very thoroughly.

Let's look at the declarations in the first three verses.

I. Verse One

¹A false balance is abomination to the LORD: but a just weight is his delight.

A. I kind of imagine our kids reading this verse and scratching their heads unless they go with you to the grocery store every week.
1. A false balance is a scale that has been altered to give a false reading.

Illustration
Have you ever seen a scale like that in the grocery store? The scales at Wal-Mart Supercenter are not the same thing they had in Bible days, but they can be false. In a modern grocery store, scales are either digital or you put your produce in a metal basket that hangs from a scale that has a needle on it. That needle shows you how many pounds are in the basket so you'll know how much you're going to get and pay. Once or twice when I've paid attention I've noticed that the needle is already sitting on one pound. I don't know if that's on purpose and I'm not pointing fingers. There may be a reason for it, but it suggests deceit. If I put five pounds on the scale and I pay for 6 because the scale is set to be wrong, that's a false balance.

2. A false balance is abomination to the LORD. What exactly is God making reference to here?

a. I want you to think of a balance, a scale, with a two baskets hanging on a crossbeam, like the scales of justice. You all know what that is.
b. If a man in Bible times went down to buy 5 pounds of beans from the pinto bean merchant, the store owner would put a 5 pound weight in one of the baskets. Then he'd pour five pounds of beans on the other side. When the measurement was perfect, the arms of the scale would balance out.
c. What would happen if the weight was changed? You could deceive people into paying more. The Bible says that is an abomination to Jehovah. An abomination is something so horrible and disgusting that it makes you sick.

B. Now think about this: why is the Bible giving us this information. Do you really think God gets bothered by a scale? Does he get disgusted with a set of scales or with the wicked heart who planned to change the weight on that scale?

C. God is sickened and disgusted by the sinful heart who sets out to cheat his fellow man through deceit.
1. Have you ever been deceptive and cheated someone?

a. Ever cheated when you were playing a board game like Monopoly?
b. Ever cheated on a test?
c. People cheat on their taxes all the time, don't they?

2. What's the difference between cheating and lying? None.
3. In Exodus 20, the ninth commandment says, "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour."

A false witness is a liar and a law breaker, isn't he?
Anyone who deceives his fellow man to cheat him is a lying, cheating, law-breaker.

4. Did you notice how this verse really zooms in on people who own stores and run businesses?

a. It makes God sick for business owners to lie and cheat people.
b. I wouldn't be afraid to say that God is probably pretty disgusted with oil companies.

Illustration
Several years ago when I lived in norteast Texas there was an ice storm and we were without electricity for a week. The grocery stores closed and you couldn't buy anything. Life just stopped while the electricity was off. Trucks couldn't deliver anything. I remember it well because my daughter was a baby and I went outside and filled my ice chest up with icicles so could I keep her milk from ruining. It was like the end of civilization!

During that time, there was a business that promoted itself as a "friendly little country store." When everybody was hurting and needed help, that friendly little country store sold gas for over three dollars a gallon. They sold tobacco products like snuff for 7 and 8 dollars a can. Everything they sold was marked up to make a double profit. Their excuse was that they had to drive all the way to Dallas to buy that stuff and they had to make their money back.

Well, what they did is called price gouging, and because of that, those particular people don't operate that friendly little store anymore. They got in trouble. They took advantage of people and deceived them into thinking they were only making their money back. That's a false balance just as sure as there's a nose on your face. People who own and operate businesses need to be careful in their dealings because God is watching.

5. ¹A false balance is abomination to the LORD: but a just weight is his delight.

a. A just weight is a stone you put on the scale to measure against. If you say it weights 5 pounds and it does, that's just weight and God's delight.
b. That's God's very poetic way of telling us to be fair in our dealings with people. Don't cheat people. Don't deceive people.
c. The world is full of lost people who do enough lying and cheating for all of us - we certainly don't need to claim to be Christians and do the same thing.

6. So...God hates lying...but He loves fair dealings.

II. Verse 2

²When pride cometh, then cometh shame: but with the lowly is wisdom.

A. By definition, a Proverb is a short saying that is true in general. For instance, Proverbs 22:6 says, "Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it." That's true in general, but not always. Some parents do just what God has told them to do and their child is in the penitentiary.

B. Sometimes a Proverb can be true absolutely. We just looked at verse one and it's true all the time. I think verse two is always true. In fact I think it's one of the Bible's spiritual laws.

There are laws stated in the Bible that are just as true in the spiritual realm as the law of gravity is in the physical world.
Whosoever calls upon the name of the LORD shall be saved. That's a spiritual law that always true.
The wages of sin is death. That's a spiritual law that's always true, just as surely as gravity is holding you down.
I believe verse 2 is also a spiritual law. When pride comes, shame is going to follow it, every time. A proud look is named as one of the things God hates in Proverbs 6.
Proverbs 16:18 Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall. That's true all the time and I've seen and experienced it time and time again.

Illustration
Folks, you can be dressed up in your best outfit and be "sharp as a tack." You can be super proud of the way you look and just know that all eyes are on you. Well, you'll get in the middle of the restaurant or wherever you're all dressed up to go, and you'll stump your toe in front of everybody and fall. Or you'll knock you tea glass off in the floor and look like a fool. Something's going to happen every time to knock that pride out of you, and you'll be ashamed.

Saddam Hussein sat on his throne in Bagdad. He was on TV in a splendid uniform and he was as proud as he could be. He wore suits that cost more than the blue book value of my pick-up. He talked about the mother of all battles and how the United States had never had a defeat like they would get if they set foot in his country. About a year after that, soldiers pulled him from his hiding place in hole in the ground. He was shown on the news half-naked while medics were giving him a physical.

When pride comes, then comes shame. Something or somebody is going to knock you down. That's true, true, true, all the time. You may never see it happen to anybody, but it will. Even if it only takes place in eternity, it's going to happen to you!

C. It's an unrighteous person who is consistently full of pride. Now let's look at the opposite of that. God also says, "but with the lowly is wisdom."

If God will give us the grace not too think too highly of ourselves and not to get proud and especially not to run our mouths, we'll learn more and become wise.
That's a continuation of the spiritual law in verse 2. Jesus stated it as a fact.
In Luke 18, a proud Pharisee stood in the temple and prayed to God. He called it a prayer: what he really did was to tell God how good he was. Jesus said he "prayed with himself."
Another man came to the temple, and he didn't make too far in the door. He wouldn't even look up. He didn't tell God anything, but he said, "God be merciful to me a sinner."
Jesus said "this man went home justified, but the other man didn't."
Do you know how he summed up His teachings? He said, "every one that exalts himself [lifts himself up in pride] shall be abased; and he that humbles himself [becomes lowly] shall be exalted. Luke 18:14
With the lowly is wisdom, because God responds to the lowly, but he hates pride.

III. Verse 3

³The integrity of the upright shall guide them: but the perverseness of transgressors shall destroy them.

A. Integrity means innocence. Upright means people who walk a straight path: a life that is pleasing to God. "Shall guide" is one word in the Hebrew language and it means to be transported or to be led, like a sheep being led by a shepherd.

The innocence of the upright shall guide them. This lets us know immediately that God is at work in such a life, because no one but God can pronounce innocence on anyone. We're talking about saved people who are sealed and indwelled by the Holy Spirit of God.
Such people ought to be upright, and led by desire to live for and please the God who saved their souls.
Their very salvation should make them want to live for God. It should make them learn His word in order to stay on that straight path that pleases God. It should guide them to do what God wants them to do. It ought to light a fire under them that stays lit.
That all depends on whether a saved person wants to act like he's saved. Or she's saved. We have a choice in that matter.
How many times have we seen people who claim to be saved, yet not living the life of the innocent, the upright? More than once.

B. The next declaration in verse three tells us something about the fate of those who are not innocent and/or don't live like it.

I believe this verse is talking more about saved people who act like lost people than it is anything else.
The perverseness of transgressors shall destroy them.

a. Perversness means something that's distorted.
b. A transgressor is someone who commits sins and does wrong, knowing it's wrong to do it.
c. The difference between transgression and sin is that you sin whether you know you do or not. When you transgress, you know you're doing it and you know better. There's nothing more perverse or distorted than a saved person who's living it up in sin and knows.

3. I take this part of the verse to mean that a saved person who doesn't act like it, doesn't live like it, refuses to be led or to allow God to lead him in a life of righteousness, is in extreme danger.

a. Since he can't lose his salvation, the only thing left is that he's in danger of destruction right here on earth.
b. A saved person who is not in God's will and not having anything to with God whatsoever is the most miserable sort of person.
c. He's never going to be happy no matter what. He's never going to be satisfied with anything.
d. If he/she's living like a heathen, they'll eventually bring themselves to ruin.
e. I don't know might be include in that, but it's interesting to me that the words "shall destroy" means both "to be wiped out" and "to lay waste."
f. That could mean they'll end up bringing their own death on themselves, perhaps by judgment. It definitely means that they'll lay waste to their own lives. A saved person who does not live to serve God automatically wastes his life. It doesn't matter if you have ten doctor's degrees on your wall. If you do and you didn't serve God, you're a waste.

C. So, while I may not know with absolute certainty what it means to be destroyed, I do know how to solve the problem before it gets to that point: don't quit serving God after you get saved, and if you do, then repent and ask God to forgive you. He will, and he'll put you to work doing something for Him. I know that sounds overly simple, but it's just simple. Repent and God forgives.