50 DAYS OF WISDOM - DAY 39 "WHY BEING RICH IS NOT SAFE" PROVERBS 18:11

SALT WATER

Great aerial shot from my friend Justin Calvert of the point in El Palmar

CLEAN WATER

Testing the water system in Dana Point Harbor that we sent to Indonesia. This system is operational and helping many villagers get their water for a cost of zero.

LIVING WATER

Having church at. Sur Coffee before the construction was finished. We did not wait long! Haha

WHY BEING RICH IS NOT SAFE - PROVERBS 18:11

Today, I want to talk to you about Proverbs chapter 18 verse 11. This is our 244th episode of teaching. I'm glad that you can join me. This particular Proverbs is very interesting. It says that the rich think of their wealth as a strong defense. They imagine it to be a high wall of safety. Now, in this Proverb, as in so many of them, there's a lot to unpack.

In the next few episodes, I'm literally going to be dealing with one verse at a time because there's so much to get into. Let's unpack this one.

It says, first of all, the rich. Now, the rich, does this mean a literal definition of being rich or is this figurative? And it gives us two different definitions, two different approaches to this scripture.

The first one could mean literal, that the person has more wealth than they need. In fact, there's enough for others. Or it's figurative, and this has to do with a person who defines what their richness is. So one could be physical rich. The other one could be a person who has a proper scoreboard or a proper definition of success whereby they determine their own wealth. You see, a lot of people think that being rich is actually needing less things and not needing anything. That would be my definition of what it means to be rich.

So could be literal, could be figurative. Let's just assume it's either one.

It says, the rich think of their wealth as a strong defense. And I titled this episode, Why Being Rich Isn't Safe. And the reason why it's not safe is because it has assumptions built into it that are unhealthy. A person who thinks that they don't have any physical needs in this world thinks of themself as safe all the time. They think of themselves as having a strong defense. But really, this is built on a mirage, understanding of reality that isn't grounded in what is real. And the reality is that our health and our wealth can be taken from us at any time.

This is why we're not supposed to trust in our riches, but we're supposed to trust in God. Now, there's a tendency for people who have more to trust in that as their sense of security. That's a bad assumption. It says that they imagine it to be a high wall. Now, they imagine that their wealth keeps them above problems and away from problems. It literally means here, too high to capture.

So the person who has a lot of wealth, has a lot of material, thinks of themselves as sort of untouchable in the world. That's simply not true at all. And then it says that there to be a high wall of safety. This has various applications and it really has to do with their own imagination.

The rich person trusts in their riches, gets their sense of security from their riches, draws a false sense of safety from their wealth, whether it's literal or figurative. And it has to do with them getting their peace in life from their substance, from their own substance and their own sufficiency. The wise person understands that all of their substance comes from God. It's a gift to be stewarded, not to put your trust in. And also that our substance comes from God and our sufficiency comes from God.

The rich man thinks that his substance is his and he trusts in it and his sufficiency and being a self-sufficient person. These are both to be put in God, both our substance and our sufficiency, our trust, everything that we have in life because it can be taken away literally in an instant. So this scripture, the rich think of their wealth as a strong defense. They imagine it to be a high wall of safety.

The Bible teaches us it's not wrong to have things. It's wrong when those things have us and we're to put our trust in our faith completely in those things. God who's given us all of our substance and all of our sufficiency.

As you can see, there's a lot here. Thank you so much for joining me. Until next time, I hope you have a beautiful day.