September 10, Day 253 – The Purity of God’s Word

Proverbs 22:7-16; Isaiah 20-23;

2 Corinthians 11:1-15

"Three Young Gardner Children" © by Terri L. Stricker - Original Acrylic on Canvas

All of our readings today testify to the purity of God’s Word.  Once again, we see that Proverbs 22:7-16 presents pure wisdom that God desires for us to apply to our daily lives.  Here, we see that “the rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender” (verse 7).  Regardless of one’s view of money, wealth certainly enables people who have it to enjoy benefits and favors that elude those who lack it.  Greater wealth implies greater power and authority, so those who are poor – especially borrowers – find themselves at the mercy of those who lend.  This passage teaches the pure wisdom of living within our means rather than on living on credit (verse 7); practicing justice and fairness instead of sowing wickedness (verse 8); sharing one’s blessings generously with the poor (verse 9); identifying, separating, and removing mockers from our presence (verse 10); loving others with a pure heart (verse 11); speaking graciously (verse 11); avoiding the snares of the adulteress (verse 14); and disciplining our children properly (verse 15).  These principles are not difficult to follow, and where God finds them practiced faithfully in our lives, He is pleased.  Christians need to remember that God established these practical principles of pure wisdom for us so that we might apply them skillfully to our daily lives.

In Isaiah 20-23, we encounter pure prophecy.  We see Isaiah’s continuing prophecies against Jerusalem and its various surrounding nations.  In chapter 20, Isaiah says that “Sargon, king of Assyria, sent his commander to Ashdod and captured it” (verse 1).  Then the LORD gave Isaiah a strange directive – to go “around stripped and barefoot for three years” (verses 2-3).  The intent of this command was to present an embarrassing human spectacle against the nations of Egypt and Cush.  The king of Assyria would come against these nations and lead them away – naked and ashamed (verse 4-6).  Chapter 21 contains prophecies against Babylon (representative of God’s judgment on idolatry); Edom (representative of judgment on the flesh and man’s contempt against God); and Arabia (representative of judgment against counterfeit religious systems). In Isaiah 22, Isaiah prophesies against Jerusalem and the Valley of Vision – places of rejection and sadness (verses 11-12).  The prophecy against Shebna, who was an unrighteous steward, pictures the Antichrist at the end times, and God promises to replace Shebna with His servant, Eliakim (verse 20), who portrays Jesus Christ, the Messiah.  He alone holds the key to the house of David (cf., Revelation 3:7). Chapter 23 is an oracle [i.e., prophecy] against Tyre (representative of God’s judgment on materialism and commercialism).

In 2 Corinthians 11, Paul employs sarcasm as a literary device to help the Corinthian church understand and practice the purity of heart which is addressed in Proverbs 22 (cf., 2 Corinthians 11:3).  On the basis of his apostolic authority, Paul warns the Corinthian believers to recall that Satan is capable of deception, and it can lead us “astray from sincere and pure devotion to Christ” (verse 3).  The Corinthians may have fallen prey to the danger of “a different [i.e., unbiblical; impure; satanic] gospel” (verse 4).  Paul insists that his unselfish love for the Corinthian believers is the basis for his concerns that they follow the untarnished truth of God’s Word.  In our present age of rampant deception and religious gibberish, may we always examine ourselves to maintain the purity of God’s Word and the chastity of a spotless, biblical faith (cf., 2 Corinthians 13:5; 2 Peter 1:10).