Dr Greg Bahnsen - Proverbs: Proverbs 13:12 (Sweet Desire) (Part 48)

As we continue to work through the Book of Proverbs, I think you're going to notice, if you're paying much attention, and I hope you are, that the chapters are falling by the wayside much faster now, as it took quite a long time to get through chapters 9, 10 and 11, numerous sermons on them. But what I have been doing is as I preach a sermon on Proverbs, I check off those passages which we deal with. And of course, that entails usually more than just the text of the morning. As we go through the book, passages on the same topic are dealt with. And so now as we move into those further chapters, many of those verses that you find in the chapters have been preached upon already. And so we move through the chapter much quicker. Then that is, it takes maybe two or three Sundays in some cases, and we're done with the chapter. This week we come to Proverbs, chapter 13, and we're going to be looking at verses 12 and 19 and other passages on the same topic of sweet desire. Please turn with me then in God's word to the 13th chapter of Proverbs, where we'll read the 12th verse and the 19th verse as our text of the morning. Hear God's word, hope deferred, maketh the heart sick. But when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life. In verse 19, the desire accomplished is sweet to the soul, but it is an abomination to fools to depart from evil. And thus far the reading of God's word. Now, the Book of Proverbs is a very unusual book if you're going to preach Christian ethics, because the Book of Proverbs does not fall, first of all easily into an outline. Secondly, the Book of Proverbs touches on things that are not easy for us to get hold of and to deal with as readily as laws and commandments from God. We could go through the Book of Deuteronomy and find a number of commands very explicit, very dealing with external matters. What do you do with your ox? What do you do with a burning field? What is your relationship as husband and wife? These sorts of matters. But the Book of Proverbs tends to touch on those soft areas of life, if you want to put it that way. Not the readily touchable, the readily dealt with matters such as do this, don't do that. The Book of Proverbs deals with our emotions, it deals with our thought, life deals with our daydreams, and as we see this morning, it deals with our desires. The Book of Proverbs, you see, is communicating wisdom to us. And it is quite possible for somebody to know the law of God and to know it very much in detail and still not be a wise person, not be able to apply the law of God in a sensitive way, in a righteous way, not be able to apply the law of God, first of all to himself before he applies it to the external world, to his relations with others. The book of Proverbs, in that sense, you see, is an awkward book for us because we look at some of these things, some of these proverbs, and we say, well, now, what do I do with this? Well, in the case of this morning's message, what you're to do with what we're going to look at is you're to change your inward desires. You're to try to change the kind of person you are. And that doesn't come easily because we like quick fixes. We as Americans like the idea that if you've got a pain, you take an Aspirin, in 20 minutes, it's gone. It's like that. And if it isn't that simple, you go to the doctor, you find a diagnosis, he does whatever treatment is necessary, and it's gone. That's that. If you got a financial problem, you go and you get an extra job, you get the money, and that's that. We like personal problems and solutions very neatly packaged. We like things to fall into place, and we like things to be done quickly. We don't like to agonize over our problems. We don't like the idea that it may take a long time and gradual movement to change the things in our lives that need to be changed. We like quick fixes. The book of Proverbs, however, expressing the wisdom of God, recognizes that sometimes quick fixes are not going to fix us, that what we need to do is to change some soft areas of our life, if you will. Not the tangible, not the readily dealt with, but those areas of our lives that really control who we are and the kind of people we are. And that entails changing our desires. You might ask yourself, what is unique about a human being as an animal in this world? We are not unique because we have bodies. Other animals have bodies. There are other living beings that have bodies. So that's not it. What is it that makes a human being unique? And I could take you. It's not the subject of this morning's sermon, so I won't do it. But I can take you through a number of options that have been proposed throughout the years, some that are a little humorous. One philosopher Comments the human animal is the only one that's always in heat. Human beings are the only living beings that are always engaging in sexual contact. They are not in some kind of phase of life or through a period of heat as many animals go through. Human beings are rational animals. Others do not reason, do not think. Human beings are verbal animals. Although, you know, pop psychologists like to point to experiments with animals and how sign language is used with Koko the ape and that sort of thing. The fact of the matter is much of that is bogus. And what is not bogus is just not that impressive. When we talk about the verbal power and ability of a human mind, it's just incredible. So there are many things that set us apart this morning. However, what I want you to think about is, is that human beings are uniquely desiring animals. Now, that isn't to say your dog doesn't have desires. I'm sure that your dog would like to have water on a hot summer afternoon. Dogs have desires. Animals have desires. But when I'm using the word desire this morning, I'm talking about something that isn't just a momentary itch or a momentary twitch. I'm talking about something that is sustained over time, a matter of looking forward to things, wanting things to take place, seeking and working diligently to achieve certain goals or ends. Animals do not do that. You know, as much as you see, a mother bear loves her cubs, and in fact, if you get in the way of her and her cubs, you're in a lot of trouble. So there are desires, there are feelings that we can impute to bears and other animals. The fact of the matter is, when those cubs are gone, she forgets about that. And if you were to steal her cubs in a matter of time, she'd go back to her own habitat and her own ways, not human beings. Steal my child and I won't get over that all the days of my life. Human beings are unique in that way. Sustained desire. It's hard to talk about these things, I realize, because again, it's part of the soft element of life, of human nature. Not easy to get hold of, not so tangible, not so readily categorized. But the fact is that desire is part of what makes us human beings. And if it's part of what is uniquely human, then it must be dealt with by the Bible. If the Bible is going to address all of man's problems, if it's going to address man in the wholeness of his being, the Bible, it should not surprise you. The Bible addresses our desires as well. Now There have been other philosophies about desire that would be worth talking about. I won't take a long time. One that engages me this morning though is that of the Stoics. The Stoics said, if you would be a happy person, eliminate your desires. See, this is a particularly inhuman philosophy, Stoicism, which often has been adopted by Christians as something of a parallel or a shadow of Christian morality. Stoicism is really quite anti Christian, is really quite unhuman in its approach to things because the Stoic said, if you want to be happy, minimize your desires and that way it'd be easy to fulfill them. Lower your desires, or better yet, have no desires at all, and then just accept the way things go. Accept nature, the law of nature, or as they said, as the Logos, the reason is flowing through all things. Just go with the flow, just fit in. To be Stoic then is not simply to have a stiff upper lip. To be Stoic means to empty yourself of desire. And if you empty yourself of desire, there won't be any difficulty in you being happy because you won't have any unfulfilled ones. I like what Jonathan Swift said about the Stoics. You know, Swift was a satirist, a very good writer in many ways. And Swift said, the Stoic scheme of supplying our wants but by lopping off our desires is like cutting off our feet when we are in want of shoes. In other words, you can be very happy if you just get rid of your desires. And if you don't have shoes, cut off your feet and you won't need shoes. Right? That is not the biblical approach to desire. Control your desires by eliminating them. No, the Bible has something better to say. And the Bible is very realistic. Just look at this first verse that we considered this morning. Proverbs 13:12. Now, last Lord's Day, we began a study in the book of Proverbs by looking at a heavy heart. In chapter 12, verse 25, we read, Heaviness in the heart of a man makes it stoop, but a good word makes it glad. I hope you remember what I said to you about the need for goodwill toward men and how we should have a word that lifts people's hearts. But in chapter 13, verse 12, we read, not of a heavy heart, but a heart that is saved.

Sick.

Hope deferred makes the heart sick. What makes us heart sick is the delaying of our hopes, the lack of fulfillment of our dreams, our wishes not coming true. Does that surprise you that that sort of thing would be found in the Bible? It shouldn't, and it shouldn't surprise me, but it does. You know, the Bible really understands us. The writers of the Bible, inspired by the Holy Spirit, understand our human psychology. And it says very plainly here that when you defer your hope, it makes you heartsick. To defer a hope doesn't mean to revise it or to cancel the thing that is desired, but rather, as the Hebrew says, to have it long drawn out. A deferred hope is one that is delayed. You have to wait a long time for it. Now, which of us here can't understand that? Come on. We all experience that. It's hard to wait for the things that we've been promised. It's hard to wait for the things that we wish to obtain. It's hard to wait for our desires to be fulfilled. Just think of children and Christmas. How difficult Christmas can be. Something you look forward to, Something that is just a grand day for the children. But boy, there's four more months until I get that bicycle. Four more months until I get my baseball bat, whatever it is. But what the book of Proverbs is telling us here, this psychological insight is not simply applied to children. We need to understand. We're not talking about childlikeness here. We're talking about what makes us human. That's true of all of us. It's not just Christmas and how we have to wait for it to come. Many of us have sad hearts because we've had to put off getting married. Some don't have someone to marry, and that makes you heartsick. And some who do have people to marry know what it is to wait, to wonder when it's going to take place. We know the depression that comes because of that. Or how about obtaining your degree? You know, there are some of you who are still plodding away there to get that graduate degree or to get that undergraduate degree. Some maybe even to get your high school diploma. But you want to do it. But it makes you heartsick. It makes your heart heavy as you look. When will this ever be done? Or gaining a promotion at work? There are people who really hurt over the fact that they have been overlooked many times. And they just have to stick with it and stick with it. How about being successful with an idea? There are entrepreneurs in our congregation. It's not just the entrepreneurs, but they especially know what it is to have some brilliant insight. Something that could work, but waiting to see the success come and sticking with it patiently. It's hard recovering from an illness, let me tell you, that can make your heart sick. Even when it's not your heart that's sick, just waiting, when will I be back to normal? When will I be able to do the things I want to do? And so, in so many different ways we see this. It's a clear psychological insight. It's accurate. Hope deferred makes the heart sick. Sometimes we can be so discouraged, so saddened by the delay of realizing our hopes and our desires that it saps our vital energy. We can just make ourselves miserable and sick. Now, the second line of this proverb tells us that a fulfilled desire, as the New English Bible puts it. I like this. A wish come true, a fulfilled desire has the refreshing effect upon us of a tree of life. Psychologically speaking, when our desires come true, when we realize the things that we most want, it revives our drooping spirits.

Isn't that true?

Well, you may be having a miserable week, but at the end of the week, if one of those things you most desired comes through, you forget all of that. You're just elated, you're walking on air. As we say, our spirits revive. It's like a tree of life. Now, earlier in the book of Proverbs, this image of a tree of life had been applied to wisdom. In chapter three, verse 18, wisdom is a tree of life. In chapter 11, verse 30, righteousness is a tree of life. The literary figure of speech of a tree of life points to something which brings refreshment and joy in the midst of the death threatening desert in which these people read these proverbs. That's what the realization of our desires is like, a tree of life. And of course one can't help but remember, of course, the tree of life that lies as the background of, for that figure of speech, the tree of life that man lost in the garden, and the tree of life which according to the book of Revelation will be our highest joy when we finally go to heaven. Well, what does this proverb teach us then? It's not just the psychological insight, but it's meant to say something to us. Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but when the desire comes, it is a tree of life. Obviously, I think the proverb encourages us to be people who are patient, patient, willing to wait for the fulfillment of our wishes. People who do not demand immediate gratification, people who do not let the fact that they're going to have to work hard and be patient and stay with a project keep them from doing the things they should be doing. Just think of the father of the faithful, Abraham, who, according to Romans the fourth chapter in hope, believed against hope in the promise of God and wavered not in unbelief. Now, what did Abraham hope for? What did he hope for against hope? Well, God had promised him when he was 75 years old that he was going to have a son, that he was going to be the father of many nations through that son. Abraham, by the time he was 90, wondered if this was going to be true, decided to take his wife some very bad advice, and to have a child through her handmaiden, Hagar, the Bible tells us. Nevertheless, when God told him, no, that's not the way I'm going to fulfill this promise, Abraham continued to believe in God, but he believed against hope because his wife was barren. But God said, you're going to have a child through your wife, Abraham, 75.

How many men do you know at.

75 would believe they're going to bear a child, they're going to beget a child, and that their wife is going to bear a child?

How many believe that their barren wife.

Is going to bear a child? And now Abraham's 90. And God says, no, you've got it wrong, Abraham.

I meant you and Sarah will have a baby.

Mm. But in hope, he believed it and he held onto that. And 10 years later, when he is a hundred years old and his wife Sarah is 90, she has a child. The father of the faithful. Sure as one of the best illustrations of what this proverb should be teaching us about patience and believing. Believing the promises of God. And boy did Abraham's heart rejoice when Isaac was born. But it took patience to get there. James the Fifth chapter, verses 7 and 8, calls upon Christians to establish their hearts with patience. And there James uses the image of a farmer who waits for the fruits of the earth at the time of harvest following the two seasons of rain. James says, that's what you must be like, patient people. Let's read that together. James 5, 7, 8. There's an ironic aspect of this, and that's that in James particular case, the motivation for this patience is the coming of the Lord. James 5 at the seventh verse. Be patient, therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient over it until it receive the early and latter rain. You also be patient, establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. The reason that's ironic is that he's saying, the coming of the Lord is at hand, so be patient, meaning be willing to wait a long time because it's at hand. We'll Talk eschatology some other day. The moral point here in James, though.

Is that we need to be patient.

As the farmer is patient.

Do you know what it is to be farmers?

We live here in Southern California. It's tough for us to understand this.

Very hard for me.

I like the idea that I go to the grocery store and whatever I want is right there. I buy it, you know, I go to the checkout stand, put down the money, I go home, and that's it. Farmers don't live that way, though. They may go to the market these days. But the farmer, you see, is the one who plants. He waits for the rain, he tends the ground. He waits for the latter rain and finally harvests it. It takes a few months for that to happen, and in some cases the.

Better part of a year for a crop to grow.

You cannot be a farmer and be an impatient person expecting immediate results. Impatience is what we as Christians are to demonstrate. Establish your hearts with patience, James says. Proverbs 13:19, same chapter, just down a few verses. The desire accomplished is sweet to the soul, but it is an abomination to fools to depart from evil. When our desires are accomplished, when they come to be. The experience is one that is sweet and pleasant to the soul, the Bible tells us. And I don't need to illustrate that, do I? You understand that from your own experience what it is to have your dreams come true, to have your wishes fulfilled, to have the thing you desired finally come into your grasp. And it's sweet to the soul. It makes us happy. It lifts our spirits. By contrast, if what you desire is evil, as it always is with fools, the Bible says if what you desire is evil, then it will naturally be detestable to you to depart from it. Because, you see, you really believe that the evil desire can bring your soul sweetness. Of course, it's really impossible that an evil desire could bring sweetness, pleasantness to the soul. It's really impossible that it could do so, because this is God's universe, and God is not mocked. In God's universe, evil desires do not ultimately bring sweetness to our souls. Evil proves to be destructive. It proves to bring us very low. It proves not to be what Satan often portrays it to be, something that will give us bliss. So we learn then that getting our heart's desire will bring happiness, but only if we desire the right things. It's characteristic of godly people to have the right kinds of cravings. We should have cravings, we should have desires, we should have dreams that we want to come true, but we need to have the right kinds of desires. Proverbs 11:23 says, the desire of the righteous is only good. If we are righteous people and we do an inventory of our desires, we look at our dreams, we consider those wishes that we want to have come true, will find that they are only good. Jesus put it this way in the Sermon on the Mount. Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. Is that what you're hungry for? Do you ever sit around and daydream and say, I wish I were a more righteous person. I wish I could control my tongue better. I wish I could relate to people more peaceful. I wish I could show more goodwill toward men. I wish I could be more holy. I wish I read my Bible more. I wish I could find time to pray. Do you ever have desires like that?

I don't mean do you ever have.

New Year's resolutions where you say, I'm going to pray more. I'm going to be nicer to my, you know, Aunt Bertha or whatever it may be. We have those kind of commitments.

I want to know, do you desire that? Is that what you wish for? Would that be a dream come true that you could be more righteous?

Jesus says, blessed are those happy are.

Those who hunger and thirst after righteousness.

Because God will see to it that those desires are fulfilled.

And so deferred.

Desire, when it comes, is sweet. The Bible teaches us. The book of Proverbs would also teach us that haste for our desires will bring sin. Proverbs 21:5. The thoughts of the diligent tend only to plenteousness. But every one that is hasty hasteth only to want. Remember here that the word thoughts in the Hebrew actually means plans. Thinking about things you're going to do. What we learn is that those who are hasty to achieve their ends, to fulfill their plans, will be left wanting the very things they wanted. Proverbs 28:2022 says that that is particularly true when it comes to those who are in a hurry to be wealthy. Proverbs 28:20. A faithful man shall abound with blessings, but he that makes haste to be rich shall not be unpunished. And look at verse 22. He that hath an evil eye hasteth after riches, and knoweth not that want shall come upon him. Don't be hasty to get your heart's desire. That's another very difficult thing for us to control. We do not live in a world that encourages patience. We live in a world that encourages to have instant gratification, to make Snap decisions to act in haste. Proverbs 19:2 says, when we do that, then we miss the way. Proverbs 19:2. Desire without knowledge is not good. And he that hasteth with his feet misses the way, or sinneth. If you have different translations, it means to miss the mark, to just fail to get what you want altogether and.

To fall into trouble.

And so the Bible would teach us that anything worth desiring is worth pursuing in the right way. Much of the unrighteousness of our culture.

And much of our own lack of.

Integrity as individuals comes precisely from impatience with our desires.

Think of people who go into debt.

That they might get their pleasures right then and there.

Think of people who engage in fornication.

To satisfy their urges just because they are their urges.

Think of people who cheat to achieve their grades. Think of people who gossip and lie.

To get themselves ahead of others.

We have desires, but we're in a.

Hurry to realize them. And so we cut corners and we lack integrity. And we haste to not only want, that is, we haste to not get the things that we were looking forward to, but we hasten also to sin and to fall into the displeasure of God. Don't be in too much of a hurry to get the things you want. But there's another message in the book of Proverbs here that I want us to focus on as we have some concluding observations. And that is very simply, learn to desire the right things in the proverb. We just looked at Proverbs 19:2. Notice it says also desire without knowledge is not good. Proverbs 21:10 teaches us that the soul of the wicked desires evil, as the.

Righteous desires only good.

The wicked desires evil. But in God's universe we cannot expect the desire for evil to bring that sweetness and that refreshment of soul that.

We'Ve been talking about. And that is made all the more.

Evident as we look at Proverbs 19:2.

For there we read, desire without knowledge is not good. The word also I want you to tie it together with the verse that.

Precedes it, because the thoughts are parallel.

In Proverbs 19:1, we read, Better is the poor that walks in his integrity.

Than he that is perverse in his lips and is a fool. Better to be a poor person with integrity.

Better to have desires that are knowledgeable desires.

Verse 2 says, Than to haste with your feet and to fall into sin.

The word that is found in Proverbs 19:2 and translated probably in many of your versions, as soul. I have been reading as desire, and I want to Explain why that is very briefly the word soul in Hebrew.

Also in Greek, by the way.

But the word soul in Hebrew originally referred to man's breath and therefore to his life, his life breath. In time it took on further connotations such as the neck or the throat, that is referred to as the soul sometimes. And then man's emotive responses such as enthusiasm are called full fold responses. Even in our day we speak of the spirit spirited response, we mean one that's full of spirit, full of enthusiasm. And then the appetites which compel our responses are used for. Are translated by the word soul as well. In chapter 6, verse 30 of Hebrews, excuse me, of Proverbs in the book of Hebrew, you will find men do not despise the thief if he steal to satisfy his soul when he is hungry. But in your translation, English translation, you'll have to satisfy his hunger, which is.

Appropriate because that's what it means in.

That particular place, those appetites which we have in the most general terms, the soul is not an inner ghost within us that goes to heaven when the body dies. It's simply the person, it's the self, it is our life. And so there are a number of possible translations that we could have for the first line of this proverb. But many translators, many modern ones, translate it in the way that I've been speaking this morning of man's desire. Desire without knowledge is not good. The soil without knowledge is not good. And so we have in the New English Bible, again, desire without knowledge is not good. The man in a hurry misses the way. It's a very common theme in literature. It goes way back, goes back further than Goethe. But Goethe's Faust has this theme. And in our day, a recent movie, the Witches of Eastwick, has the same theme. It is something that men have explored and explored and explored. And that is the theme that getting what you want is not always getting what you want.

Think about that.

Getting what you want isn't always to.

Get your heart's desire.

Achieving short sighted ends with satanic help, for instance, calls for an enormous price to be paid at the end. And when people think they can be happy just as long as they get those initial desires, no matter how they get them, they find out how wrong they are because those desires don't make them happy. What you thought would make you happy is not at all what makes you happy. Now that is a very important insight about human nature and one which our culture has no appreciation for it. Our instant gratification, hedonistic epicurean, culture does not understand that. And you know what makes me even sadder is that I think most of.

Us who are Christians don't understand that either.

We live more like the world than we do. Like the wisdom of the Book of Proverbs, we tend to think we just.

Get what I want, you know, that.

Immediate gratification, then I'll be happy, but you won't be. And so the proverb says, desire without knowledge, it's not good. It takes knowledge to have desires which will prove to be really sweet in their realization. You need to remember also that the word knowledge in the context of the Book of Proverbs almost always means knowledge.

Of God and his ways.

It isn't just any kind of information that you have, or any kind of understanding that may come to you, but it's the knowledge of God that is in view. The one who wants quick rewards, the second line tells us, will strike from the right path.

But he that hasteth with his feet sinneth.

And so when we take all this into account, what we're being counseled in this proverb is to have well thought.

Out desires which keep the knowledge of the Lord in view.

Desire without knowledge is not good.

Think about what you desire. Meditate on it.

Have the right kinds of desires, you know.

There's further biblical confirmation of this insight that we can see.

The Bible clearly recognizes that not all.

Desires are legitimate ones. Not all desires should be nursed, nurtured and pursued.

Indeed, in the tenth Commandment we have God dealing directly with that matter under the sin of coveting. Interestingly, in the Deuteronomy 5, 21 translation of the Ten Commandments, you'll find not only the word covet, but the word.

Desire, unlike the Exodus version, But nevertheless.

Desire and coveting are used to describe the sin involved. Not all desire is proper desire. We see this also in that the word desire is used in the name of one of the camping stations of the Israelites in the wilderness when they were punished by God for their complaining about a lack of meat. Do you remember the story? And is found in Numbers 11. The Israelites had been fed on manna for a long period of time, and they started grumbling and complaining about that. And the sojourners in their midst, those who came out of Egypt with them, they started saying, remember back in Egypt, the meat we had, and the leeks and the onions and all these wonderful things? What do we have out here? Just this manna every day. And so God sent quail to them, but in sending quail he Also sent a plague among them. And so the Bible says, before they could even have the teeth, the meat between their teeth, many of them died.

Because of God's judgment.

And in Numbers 11:34, we read, and the name of that place was called Kibrith Hathavah, because they were. Because there they buried the people that desired. Now, the Hebrew there, Kibreth Hattavah means graves of desire. If you understand that. That's a really riveting story, isn't it? Here the people wanted something very badly. They had these desires. They cried out to God for them. He said, have your desires.

And they call the place graves of desire.

Not all desire is legitimate. Not all desire pleases the Lord. And so Psalm 106, 15, speaking of this experience of the Israelites in the wilderness, says, and he gave them their.

Request, but sent leanness into their souls.

That's the pattern of human sin. God gives us our request and sends leanness into our souls. He gives them the request, and they go to their graves with it. A pattern of sinful human experience. Think of Lot. He got what he wanted, but didn't.

Get what he wanted.

Think of the prodigal son who got what he requested, but leanness in his soul along with it. And so not all desires prove to really be sweet in their fulfillment and realization. Proverbs does not teach indiscriminately that all men can get their heart's desires, whatever those desires may be. See, that's the kind of hokum Christianity that is preached by many preachers today. Become a Christian. You can have anything you want. You want a pink Cadillac, you can have it. You want to be rich, you can have it.

You want to.

You want to be famous, you can have it. You can have anything you want. If you become a Christian, all your heart's desires. And I'm telling you that is not a biblical message. That's a satanic message. You say, but these men look so Christian, they act so nice, they seem so sincere. And Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. Yes, they look good. Examine the message. Is it true that all of our heart's desires will be fulfilled and should be fulfilled for Christians? No, it's not true. And if you read the book of Proverbs, you would know that Proverbs 10:24 says, it's the desire of the righteous.

That shall be granted.

And the same verse adds, by contrast, that the fear of the wicked shall come upon them. Now, it sometimes happens that wicked men get everything they thought they wanted, only then to Be deprived of the opportunity to enjoy it.

Look what Solomon says in Ecclesiastes 6, verse 2.

A man to whom God giveth riches, wealth, and honor, so that he lacketh nothing for his soul of all that he desireth, yet God giveth him not.

Power to eat thereof, but an alien eateth it. This is vanity. It is an evil disease. Solomon says sometimes people get exactly what they want, and then they're not able to enjoy it. Remember the fool and Jesus stole, who.

Built his barns and filled them. And finally he says to his heart, take my leisure, eat, drink, and be merry. I mean, you've got it made. And the response of the Lord is, you full. This night your soul will be required of you, and what will you show for it before the judgment bar of God? Barns full of all the goodness that you wanted will do you no good at all.

From Ecclesiastes 6:2.

One way or the other, sin does not reap rewards from fools. But joy will be the outcome of.

Righteous desires and righteous aims.

Look also at Ecclesiastes 2, 10:11. And whatsoever mine eyes desired, I kept not from them. I withheld not my heart from any joy, for my heart rejoiced because of all my labor, and this was my.

Portion from all my labor.

Now I looked on all the works.

That my hands had wrought, and on.

The labor that I had labored to do.

And behold, all was vanity and a.

Striving after wind, and there was no.

Profit under the sun.

Solomon says, you can gain all your heart's desires only to find that they're futile, only to find that they are vanity and that they are unprofitable. And therefore let's learn this principle from the wisdom literature of God's word. This principle that fulfilled desire is refreshing, fulfilled desire is sweet, all of our dreams come true, can bring us happiness and pleasantness of soul. But that principle is to be applied only. Only when the object of our desire.

Is a worthwhile one. And so desire without knowledge of the Lord is not good. So what should our desires be? If we take the knowledge of the Lord into account, knowing that, then we will get our heart's desire and we will get pleasantness and sweetness of soul in our lives.

Well, I want to add one thing.

Before we close, just to help you see your way through. In answering that question, I want you to remember that having the right desires in a biblical framework does not exclude suffering.

Our minds don't think that way. We haven't been brought up to think that way.

Our culture doesn't encourage us to think that way.

But if we desire the right things, we do not necessarily desire a life of ease and a life of luxury.

Where nothing unpleasant is to be endured.

The Bible says to live godly in Christ Jesus will involve sacrifice, will involve.

Persecution, but that's what we should desire.

We should hunger and thirst for righteousness.

And God will fill us.

The selfish people desire not to go.

To war when an enemy threatens.

Selfless people desire to win the war, knowing it will involve hardship, but promises.

A more genuine peace and satisfaction than capitulation to the enemy. Does that get the point across?

Here is a threatening enemy you want. Your desire is to be fulfilled. Your desire could be. Well, let's not have any confrontation.

Let's give in. The selfless person, however, desires to meet.

The enemy and win the battle, knowing that there will be hardship, knowing there will be suffering, knowing there will be some death, but that the end product.

Will be genuine peace, genuine satisfaction. And as Christians, we should think in the same way. We should resist the temptation to think in terms of our wayward culture's idea of what makes a heart happy, what makes a content True sweetness of soul.

Comes not by avoiding the difficult path altogether, but in attaining the reward that.

Comes by walking that path.

We should desire, not difficulty, for difficulty's sake.

We should desire to walk the path of difficulty, to get to the end product. The Christian believes that sweetness can come out of bitter experience when our hearts are set on the right things.

That's an irony. That's a paradox.

The world doesn't understand that sweetness can come out of bitterness if our goals are the right ones. Jesus said, make this your goal. Seek first the kingdom of God and its righteousness.

And what does the rest of the verse say? Seek first the kingdom of God in its righteousness, even if it means persecution, even if it means martyrdom, even if it means ridicule. The lack of reputation, the. The losing of your money and your status, the losing of your family, no matter what it is. Seek first the kingdom of God and its righteousness, and all these things shall.

Be added to you. You see the point?

Have the right desires, have the right goals. Sneak them even through adversity, and you will be filled.

You will be taken care of. And of course, in this, as always, it's our Savior who is the true example. What does Isaiah 53:11 remind us?

He shall see of the travail of.

His soul, and shall be satisfied by.

The knowledge of himself.

Shall my righteous servant justify many, and he shall bear their iniquities. Jesus shall see of the travail of his soul and satisfaction will come. Christ, you see, could only accomplish the desire of his heart through the path of suffering. And what was the desire of Christ's heart? The desire of Christ's heart was to save us from our sins, to reconcile us to himself, to create a kingdom of God's people that would enjoy his fellowship forever. That's what Jesus wanted above all.

But you know, Jesus knew he couldn't.

Get it unless he went to the cross. And the prophet Isaiah said, he will see of the travail of he will suffer that indignity, that rejection.

He will suffer that humiliation, that pain.

And agony, and he'll be satisfied. We read it in Hebrews 12, verse.

2, that Jesus, for the joy that.

Was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Above all, Jesus is the one who shows us what it is that the right desires and to be willing to suffer to attain them.

So God obviously has a very blessed.

Desire toward us, one for which he was willing to suffer to the uttermost. What now are our desires toward him? I know this is not as easy as dealing with the outward tangible details of life. We're talking about the soft and subjective matters of life. But what are your desires today? Do you have righteous desires and daydreams, hopes and wishes? Are you willing to pursue their realization by righteous means, not hastening after them.

Cutting corners, lacking integrity?

And are you willing to endure suffering along the way to gain those desires? Jesus did it for you. And very simply, the Bible calls on you now to realize in wisdom that's the way to desire and to get true pleasantness of soul. Want all your wishes to come true. Then wish for what God wishes. Let's pray. Lord, we ask that you would change our inner being this morning, that you would reform not simply our outward words and our outward deeds and our relationships with others, but that you would change the kind of people we are.

As we know that often the kind.

Of people we are is betrayed in our desires, in our hopes, in our dreams. Those things that we most wish for give us the proper kinds of wishes, so that as righteous people we'll know that all our dreams come true.

We'll know that pleasantness and sweetness to.

The soul will be the end product, even if it means a path of suffering and persecution in this world.

Father, help us to hunger and to.

Thirst for righteousness, confident that then we will be filled. And then we'll be truly happy. For it's in Jesus name that we pray. Amen.