[1] Finding a good thing It’s the end of the year. As you look back on 2014, maybe it was a good year. You got a job. Your kids didn’t do anything stupid. You didn’t do anything stupid. For most people living in Zimbabwe, 2014 wasn’t their best year. But you got by. It was an OK year. For others, it was an awful year. Perhaps it was bad financially. Or in employment. Or at school. Maybe it was another awful year. If you had a bad year I hope your friends helped you through. Good relationships make a difference. But if you’re sad at end of 2014, maybe you’re sad because of your relationships. Maybe your relationship to your spouse. [2 ] Or maybe your lack of a relationship to a special person. My title is He who finds a wife finds a good thing Pro 18:22. If you’re single, this is specially for you. Last week Frank told an embarrassing story from his childhood about lying. So I’m gonna tell another embarrassing story... about Frank. No that would be cruel. Lemme tell you one about me instead. Paul was my best friend at university, Paul had a girlfriend. Actually he had a series of girlfriends. After counselling yet another broken-hearted ex-girlfriend of Paul, I decided it was time to get me a girlfriend. Good reasoning? Nah. Stupidity . (3) Parents, you’re kids do stupid things sometimes, don’t they? You ask your son, “Why did you do that stupid thing?” He says “Because Johnny was doing it”. Then you’ll ask the classic parent dumb question. “If Johnny put his hand in the fire, would you put your hand in the fire?” Ever heard that one before? Your son knows the “correct” answer. He says “No, Dad”. He But he’s lying. He wants to say “If Johnny tries it, then of course I’ll try it; I’m not a wimp”. Guys are like lemmings. Lemmings follow each other over a cliff to destruction. Its a sad truth about us guys. We’re like lemmings. That’s a warning for us guys to remind ourselves of our stupidity. You ladies knew that about us already, right? There was a girl in my youth group, Linda. She was cute. So I asked Linda out, to spend the afternoon with me at a park in central London. I thought we could get to know one another. Don’t remember what we talked about. It was awkward. But I do remember what happened at the end of the date. As I was saying goodbye, I tried to kiss her. Very bad idea. Very embarrassing. She literally ran down the station steps to catch the underground train. The next week, Paul came up to me with a smile on his face. “My girlfriend tells me the girls at youth group have given you a new name” . Uhhh Whats that? They’re calling you “Too Fast Foster”. I love us guys. When you mess up, what do other guys do? Do they help you get over it. No, they’re not ladies. They’re guys. Guys humiliate you. They never let you forget. I see Paul 40 years later. When we’re alone, he says “Do you remember the time....” Yeah Yeah. Guys if you want help, don’t ask yer mates, join a Life Group. So singles this morning’s for you. Some girls are looking back at 2014 thinking “Why did I not find Mr Right this year. What’s wrong with me?“ Guys are thinking “Why did I not meet Miss Perfect?” Its nearly 2015. Some of you will a NY resolution:. “I resolve in 2015 to search for my soul mate. God helping me”. If that’s your resolution, I want to help you get God’s help.We’ll look at what a good spouse looks like. We’ll describe how God describes an excellent wife in the Book of Proverbs.
[4] Proverbs 31:10 asks “Who can find an excellent wife? Bible says its not easy to find a good wife. Guys think its a piece of cake. Not true. Guys think they are good judges of women. Definitely not true. When it comes to women, guys don’t think with their brain. They see something with their eyes, the safety switches trip out and act, they don’t think.. And ladies, you’re not much better. You think you’re a good judge of men. The guys a smooth talker, he looks like he’s got money so he’ll make a good husband. But you’re as deceived as the guys. You can make a mistake with your job. You can make a mistake with your education. But don’t make a mistake about your partner. Or else you might screw up the rest of your life. Who you decide to marry and grow old with is the second biggest decision in your life, (The most important decision is to believe in Jesus, that He died for your sins and rose again and that you invite him to be the Lord of your life) [5] So what does an excellent wife look like? Proverbs 31 says “She is more precious than jewels." So lets call her Precious. Now you don’t find precious jewels easily. You don’t think one day “I’m going to Chiadzwa to find me some jewels” No you have to work at it. . Make sure you’re not being duped. Look in the right places. Let me tell you about the excellent wife called Precious Jewel. She’s a hard worker. A home maker. Financially capable. Wise and Godly. And she is different from the many other negative women described in the Book of Proverbs. I’ll introduce you to some of them, like Foolish Florence. Irresponsible Ida, Argumentative Amy. And Promiscuous Primrose. Sorry ladies. It’s gonna be a downer on women. I promise to even things up in two weeks when I talk about negative men in Proverbs. You know some of these guys already don’t you ladies. There’s Bossy Bob. Little boy Larrie. Macho Mike. Arrogant Arthur. And Good-time Gary. So forgive me if I leave the negative men till then. [6] So firstly I’d like you to meet 1. Foolish Florence [7] "The woman Folly is loud; she is undisciplined and without knowledge." Proverbs 9:13 Proverbs gives this negative lady a name: “Folly”. We’ll call her Florence.“Foolish Florence”. Florence is sure of herself. And she’s loud. She thinks she knows what she’s talking about. But she spouts rubbish. And she shouts. She thinks “If I yell and scream and throw a few pots around, people will take notice”. Florence lives in a good part of town. She sits at the door of her house. She invites people to visit. Maybe she runs a bible study. She rants and raves. She has strong views, especially about relationships. She tells ladies “You should be strong like me; I once had a husband; but he left. So now I’m not just loud, I’m single and loud”. One of my best friends is a pastor in Spain. He and his wife were having problems. His wife met a foolish Florence. They spent time together. The wife then told my friend she wanted space and asked him to move out of their home. He left his wife and 8 children. Later she served him with divorce papers on their wedding anniversary. They divorced. She stayed single and became bitter like foolish Felicity. Some of you ladies get bad advice from other women. Like Foolish Florence. She says “sleep with your boyfriend or he’ll leave you”. Don’t sleep with your husband until he does what you want”. Foolish Florence is loud, undisciplined and ignorant. Don’t listen to her!
[8] Gals, maybe you are struggling with affairs of the heart.. Don’t go to foolish women like Florence for advice. Maybe you’re struggling in your marriage. Get advice from Precious. She’s an good counsellor as well as an excellent wife. She opens her mouth with wisdom (v.26) Florence is loud, undisciplined and foolish. Precious is quiet, disciplined and wise. Be careful where you get your advice. [9]
2. Irresponsible Ida – this is a beautiful lady with a nose ring. I’ll explain why.
Some of you ladies are beautiful. And you know it. And you use it. You know you can get your way with men. Men do what you say because you use your charm and your beauty to get what you want from them. That’s because you lack discretion. [10] "A beautiful woman lacking discretion and modesty is like a fine gold ring in a pig’s snout " Prov 11:22 Before I met Libby, I knew an Irresponsible Imelda. Teresa was a good looking maths student I met at university. Beautiful Teresa hung out with me. And she hung out with a bunch of other guys too. We were the hopefuls. After leaving university, Teresa got a job as a maths teacher. Teresa used her charm with men. I desperately chased Teresa. I was blind to the fact that she was a gold ring in a pig’s snout, a beautiful woman lacking good judgment. I prayed about Teresa. God answered my prayer by sending me Libby. By a God-ordered coincidence, Libby who was in my youth group at our church in London had Teresa as her sixth form maths teacher. Later, we discovered that Teresa privately encouraged each of us to date. I wanted Irresponsible Ida. But God gave me Precious Jewel. Some advice for guys looking for Miss Right. “Cute” is a fine starting point. God made men and women to be physically attracted to each other. But don’t just look at physical attributes. Keep your animal instincts in check. Don’t make snap judgments about ladies based on their looks and charm. Don’t waste your time chasing Irresponsible Imelda. You’ll waste your money and maybe you’re life. She lacks judgment. She’ll drop you when she gets tired of you or you cross her. [11] Prov 31 ends by describing Precious Jewel as a woman who fears the Lord. Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.” She is contrasted with Irresponsible Ida. Beautiful women may be vain and deceitful when you look on the inside. Precious Jewel may not be physically beautiful. But she is spiritually beautiful on the inside because she fears God. [12] Peter says the same. “Don’t be concerned about the outward beauty of fancy hairstyles, expensive jewelry, or beautiful clothes. 4 You should clothe yourselves instead with the beauty that comes from within, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is so precious to God. 1Pe 3:3:4 Precious Jewel with her gentle and quiet spirit is precious to God as well as to her husband. Guys, Don’t just look at the externals, the sensual and physical of women. Observe her in action. Understand her character. Look on the inside that women are godly and spiritual. 13] 3. Argumentative Amy Important negative women. The quarrelsome wife is mentioned 5 times in Book of Proverbs. [14] “A quarrelsome wife is as annoying as constant dripping 19:13. "27:15 They had plumbing problems in Solomon’s time 1000 BC. If you find a dripping tap irritating, you’ll find a woman like Amy annoying. She can wear you down just like what those drips do to the sink enamel. She’s frequently picking fights and brawling with her husband. [15] Better to live on the roof than share a house with a quarrelsome wife." Prov 25:24 , 21:9
So what do you do if things get really bad. Gets comical now. Step 1 is to climb up onto the roof and pull the ladder up afterwards. You’re still sharing the house with your wife. But you’re avoiding and ignoring one another And What do you do with Amy if it gets worse? You move out. [16] "Better to live in a desert than with a quarrelsome and angry wife." Proverbs 21:19 If things get really bad, step 2 is to move out and go and live in the desert. Deserts are hot and dangerous. But they’re its safer living in the desert than with a heated and dangerous wife. Sometimes when couples are fighting, the only answer in the short term is for one of them to move out. Especially if there’s violence. We usually think of a husband inflicting violence on his wife. But the opposite happens more frequently than you might suppose. Wives certainly can inflict emotional harm on their husbands. And sometimes even physical injury. In Canada husbands are more likely to be being violently attacked by their wives than vice versa. Among black couples, wives were as likely to murder their husband as the reverse. Murder convictions don’t lie. [17] So should a good wife not stand up for herself? Of course she should. A wife should submit to her husband but she should not become a doormat. Precious Jewel is a strong woman. But the teaching of kindness is on her tongue. She does not harm her husband. She is careful what she says about him in public. She does him good not harm all the days of her life. She tries to help him. The proverbs 31 excellent wife tries to help her husband become the Proverbs 32 excellent husband. (Thats difficult because there are only 31 chapters in Proverbs). I wanna thank God for giving me a Proverbs 31 wife. We’ve been married 35 years. I’ve never had any occasion to think my wife was flirting with another man. She has never spoken ill of me. She has helped me become a better leader, a better father, a better husband and a better person. She has never done me harm. She’s a strong woman. But she puts forward her point of view without shouting or ranting. She’s an excellent wife. I thank God for my priceless far above rubies wife. [18] You may have met our last negative woman, Promiscuous Primrose Men are warned about women like Primrose throughout the Book of Proverbs Primrose is single. Or she’s a married woman whose husband is away. She’s not a prostitute. She’s a nice religious girl. [19] So she goes out looking for men. Just then, a woman met a foolish young man - she'd been lying in wait for him, dressed to seduce him. Prov 7:10 She’s dressed like a prostitute. Hemline. Neckline. Men can tell what she’s looking for by how she is dressed. When a woman like Primrose walks into the room, every guy notices INSTANTLY. She draws attention to herself by how she is dressed. She’s like gravity. She just pulls men in. And all the wives antennae go up. The women say "That’s a demon in a dress." But the guys never see it – they’re like, "She is so nice." No, she’s not. She’s a witch. That’s why Prov 23 warns young men who are around Primrose to make sure their eyes follow God’s ways. Otherwise they’ll fall into a deep pit. Guys. - Its your eyes. We got eye troubles. [20] Its not just how she’s dressed. Listen to her speech! For the lips of a forbidden woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil. Prov 5:3 Oh, she’s so smooth. She’ll walk up to a guy, "Oh, you look really nice. You losing weight? I like your haircut. That’s a nice looking outfit." They’ll flatter guys about their jobs.
[21] You ever seen cows on the back of a lorry being delivered to the butcher? The cows always seem oblivious and happy. Proverbs 7:22 says a guy around Primrose is like a calf led to the butcher house. Women like Primrose are really smooth. And guys are so dumb; like "Where did you say we are going?" Some women play men like instruments with what they say. Because men are dumb! If a woman says, "You are so good looking, and you’re strong, and I feel safe when I’m with you". The guy says, "Well, of course you do. It makes sense that you would think those things around me." Dumb ox! [22] Some of you ladies know women like Primrose. You are not happy when you see your boyfriend or husband talking to them. There are certain women, you go into a room and you see her walking toward your man. You know she is nothing but trouble. Proverbs says Promiscuous Primrose uses her body to suck in attention and suck in men. Her steps lead down to hell. Some women lead men to destruction. Primrose is just desperate for a man. She gives herself to men hoping one of them will stick. She thinks men like her. But there are women that men will marry. And there are women that men will sleep with like Primrose.. Men tell Primrose they love her. When they get what they want, they drop her. If she was a fly on the wall, they’d hear the man talking about his conquest saying “Oh Primrose, she’s cheap, quick and easy”. [23] Be a Proverbs 31 woman. Precious Jewel is different from Promiscuous Primrose Read about Precious in Proverbs 31. She is full of wise words. Her husband trusts her completely and she does him good. She dresses well. She works well. She manages money well. But Proverbs records none of her words. She doesn’t need to speak. Her life is a sermon. Her husband praises her. Her children praise her. The elders praise her. The poor she helps praise her. The Proverbs 31 women is different from the Proverbs 7 woman, Promiscuous Primrose . Sometimes people think that the woman who does excellent things described in Proverbs 31 is the ideal woman. They think that her standards are not attainable. But Proverbs says that MANY women have done excellent things. Every woman who believes in Jesus as her Saviour and follows Him as Lord can be a Precious Jewel. Every woman can be like her! CONCLUSION:
1. [24] Get God’s thinking on women. I want to give the ladies an assignment for the 12 days up to Christmas. Ladies, I want you to fast for the 12 days of Christmas. (pause) I’m not asking you to fast from food. Here’s the ice bucket challenge. I want you to fast from the false teaching that you’re hearing every day about women. Every day in the media, you hear false teaching about women. Foolish Florence, Irresponsible Ida, Argumentative Amy and Promiscuous Primrose are held up as role models. So try to go 12 days without washing trashy soaps on TV. Don’t read trashy novels. Avoid women’s magazines. Yes, even fast from Keeping up with the Kardashians. And while you do this fast, meditate on godly women in the Bible. Read the books of Ruth, and Esther. Read the book of Proverbs. Read it again and again. Then at the end of 12 days, watch a sitcom or pick up a womens magazine. And tell me that you now can see how the world has been deceived about woman by a woman called Folly (Prov 9:13), the woman who is loud, undisciplined and FOOLISH but who has many converts. I think some of the ladies here need to undergo a renewing of their mind.
2. [25] Say sorry: Second application is to respond. Repentance is saying sorry. As I’ve been speaking, some of us are convicted by the Holy Spirit. We need to say sorry to God and perhaps to someone else.
Some of us men here have sinned against women. Some of us men ARE sinning against women. You need to respond by repentance, saying sorry to God. Some of you ladies here are sinning against men. You’ve believed lies and have been deceived. You need to respond by repentance, saying sorry to God. Maybe both you and your boyfriend need to come before God to say sorry, to repent by agreeing before God that sleeping together when you are not married is wrong. Ask God to forgive you in Christ and He will. Jesus died so that your sins might be forgiven. Maybe you need as well to say sorry to your boyfriend or girlfriend or to your husband or wife. You don’t need to keep on sinning. God will provide you with the strength to escape from temptation.
3. [26] Maybe 2014 even though it was a year of living dangerously was not a good year for you in finding a good thing. So my wish for you is that 2015 will be a year of living even more dangerously by finding a good thing. And for those who have good things and those who are single, may we all know God’s blessings through our relationships with Jesus and with one another