The sermon, titled 'The Proverbs 31 Man – Pt 2,' delivered by Peter Allison, centers on Proverbs 31:8-9, emphasizing the responsibility of men to defend the poor and needy. The speaker explores the biblical rights of the poor, such as gleaning and the year of Jubilee, which allowed the poor to gather leftover harvests and regain sold property. Criticizing modern societal structures, the sermon argues that current laws, like minimum wage and property taxes, often oppress the poor rather than assist them. The speaker highlights the importance of generosity and the biblical command to support the poor without charging interest. The sermon concludes by linking Proverbs 31 to the teachings of Jesus Christ, portraying Him as the ultimate embodiment of the Proverbs 31 man. Through obedience, particularly Christ's, liberty and freedom from oppression are achieved, and believers are called to act justly and defend those who cannot speak for themselves.

Proverbs chapter 31. We'll Be looking at verses 8 and 9 specifically this morning, but I'd like to read the first 9 verses The words of King Lemuel the utterance which his mother taught him, What, my son, and what, son of my womb, and what, son of my vows? Do not give your strength to women, nor your ways to that which destroys kings. It is not for kings, O Lemuel, it is not for kings to drink wine, nor for princes intoxicating drink, lest they drink and forget the law and pervert the justice of all the afflicted. Give strong drink to him who is perishing, and wine to those who are bitter of heart.

Let him drink and forget his poverty and remember his misery no more. Open your mouth for the speechless in the cause of all who are appointed to die. Open your mouth, judge righteously and plead the cause of the poor and needy. May the Lord revive our hearts according to His loving kindness. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word that you have preserved, that you have given to us.

May we prize it and may you open our ears now that we may hear it and may you sanctify my sinful lips that they may proclaim the gospel of the grace of God. In Jesus' name, Amen. The Proverbs 31 man. Proverbs 31 we saw last week was written by a mother instructing her son, or sorry, it's written by a king, Lemuel, about the prophecy of his mother with which she instructed her son. On all the important things in his life, how to avoid the ways that are destructive to kings, which she listed as giving his strength to women and the use of alcohol.

And what it is important for him to do. So what it was important for him not to do, avoiding the ways that are destructive to kings, what it is important for him to do, which we'll look at this morning. And then lastly, the bulk of this chapter is very famously, how to find a virtuous wife, how to recognize a virtuous wife. And I'd love to get to that section, but there are two verses here on the treatment of the poor and needy before we get there. And these should not be missed because they are important for a couple of reasons.

In this chapter, these are the only instructions on what real men do do or ought to do. All the prior instruction has basically been about what should not be done, what real men do not do. And secondly, and more importantly, these instructions are important because they concern matters that are especially important to the Lord. At Mount Sinai, God gave the Ten Commandments, which we just sang. It's a summary of the Law of God.

But He also gave Moses at that time a number of other laws. Remember, Moses was 40 days upon that mountain. And these other laws comprise, some of these laws, comprise the bulk of Exodus 21 and 22. And in the middle of these chapters, which immediately follow the Ten Commandments that we sang, that God spoke from Mount Sinai. In the middle of these chapters, right in the middle of a section dealing with capital crimes, Crimes for which the death penalty was to be given.

We find these laws regarding the needy and the helpless. And I'd like to just read the context of these laws regarding the helpless and the needy. Exodus 22 verse 18 begins, You shall not permit a sorceress to live. That's witchcraft, which is where to be executed. It's capital crime.

Verse 19, whoever lies with an animal shall surely be put to death, another capital crime. He who sanctifies to any god except to the Lord only, he shall be utterly destroyed." Remember, this was the basis on which Elijah executed the prophets of Ashtra and Baal. He devised a scheme whereby he had all of these prophets, 900 or 850 of them, sacrificing to an idol for hours in the front of the whole nation of Israel. And when they were done, and the Lord had answered His sacrifice by fire, then he gave the command to execute all those prophets. This was the basis, this was the law by which he made that command, by which he had Israel execute these people.

They had sacrificed to an idol and he'd set up a trial where that sacrifice was publicly done in the presence of all Israel convened as a court by King Ahab. Verse 21, You shall neither mistreat a stranger nor oppress him, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. You shall not afflict any widow or fatherless child if you afflict them in any way. And they cry at all to me, God said, I will surely hear their cry, and my wrath will become hot. And God said, I will kill you with the sword, and your wives will be widows and your children fatherless." For what?

Afflicting a fatherless child, afflicting a widow. In any way. When they cried to God, God said His wrath would be hot. If you ever take your neighbor's garment as a pledge, you shall return it to him before the sun goes down, for that is His only covering. It is His garment for His skin.

What will He sleep in? And it will be that when He cries to me, I will hear, for I am gracious." This is how significant this matter is of not oppressing the poor. Of doing justice, bringing justice to the needy and the afflicted. This prophecy that King Lemuel was taught by his mother in which he wrote here in Proverbs 31. It says, open your mouth for the speechless and the cause of all who are appointed to die.

Open your mouth, judge righteously and plead the cause of the poor and the needy." See this is not just instruction on what to avoid, it is a call to actively defend the poor and the needy and to speak on their behalf. What were the rights of the poor in the Scriptures? What are the rights of the poor? Well, they had the right of gleaning the fields. After a farmer, after a farm owner, a land owner had harvested his crops, the poor had a right to come onto that property, private property that had been harvested, and gather what was left.

In fact, God's people were instructed not to harvest the corners, you know, everything. They were instructed to leave some. In other words, to not go back and get every last piece of food out of the crops. If you've ever gardened, you know that's really not possible. Because things don't all ripen at the same time.

If you're picking a crop of peaches, not all the peaches are ripe. You know, the bulk of them will come ripe in a certain window, and you can come through and pick that crop, but then there's always late ones that weren't ripe. And those were to be left for the poor to gather. There are things that get dropped, that get just lost in any process. And God's Word says in Leviticus 19, When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not wholly reap the corners of your field, nor shall you gather the gleanings of your harvest.

And you shall not glean your vineyard, nor shall you gather every grape of your vineyard. You shall leave them for the poor and the stranger I am the Lord your God It doesn't say you're to pick them and give them to them It says you're to allow leave them there for them to come and get in other words they had to be willing to work. They couldn't simply sit at home and wait for somebody to bring them food. If they weren't willing to work, the Bible says they shouldn't eat. And so there's a process here that requires diligence on the part of the poor.

But it's also a requirement for those who are gardening, who are farming, or any other business, that there is food left for them to gather. Deuteronomy 24, another passage, when you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it, for it shall be for the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands. And when you gather the grapes of revenue, you shall not glean it afterward, for it shall be for the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow." You see minimum wage laws and child labor laws oppress the poor because it prevents all those who are not worth the minimum wage from working. And those are typically the poorest people. There are many little jobs, and you could translate this out of the farming example in which it is given here into an economy like ours where there are more industrial and commercial jobs there are many little jobs That people can do that aren't worth the minimum wage, but would be a very it would be a help to those businesses and But our laws prevent that.

They prevent 14, 15, 16 year old young men from working at the low paying jobs where they could begin to learn. They're not allowed. You're not allowed to pay somebody less than the minimum wage which means that every job that's worth less than that you can't fill if you are if you want to follow these oppressive laws. Child labor laws arose because people were not pleading the cause of the poor and the needy. You see, but man's solution only brings more of the same problem they were trying to avoid.

In the name of trying to save the child's children from oppression, they've only succeeded in bringing more oppression on the poor and on the fatherless. If you read, can't think of the guy's name now, Ralph Moody. Ralph Moody, I don't believe he was a Christian, but he was an outwardly upright, righteous man. He wrote about his life a hundred years ago when he was born and growing up. His father died when he was nine and much of his story is about how he was able, even beginning as a nine-year-old, to work and provide, help to provide for his family, and how he grew up and continued to do that work.

What he did wouldn't be very easy to do today, if possible at all, because our laws, our own laws, would forbid it. Those are laws that oppress the poor and the needy and the fatherless. In the sabbatical year, the poor were to be able to gather their share of produce from the fields and the vineyards. Exodus 23 says, Six years you shall sow your land and gather its produce, but the seventh year you shall let it rest and lie fallow. That the poor of your people may eat, and what they leave, the beasts of the field may eat.

In like manner, you shall do with your vineyard and your olive grove. And the Sabbath's produce of the land shall be food for you, for your male and female servants, your hired man and the stranger who dwells with you. You see, much of farming today has been taken over by commercial operations with insurance requirements. And these insurance requirements dictate many things that can and can't happen. And many things that they dictate can't happen are good things that should happen.

Restaurants can't give out certain food. There are these requirements. Instead, the people have to dig it out of the trash bin when they should be able to receive the food directly from them. See, these are laws that oppress the poor and the fatherless. Thirdly, the third rite of the poor is that in the year of Jubilee, they recovered their property.

Leviticus 25, which is a great chapter on the Jubilee, says, If one of your brethren becomes poor and has sold some of his possessions, and if his redeeming relative comes to redeem it, then he may redeem it, what his brother has sold. Or if the man has no one to redeem it, but he himself becomes able to redeem it, then let him count the years since its sale and restore the remainder to the man to whom he sold it that he may return to his possession. But if he isn't able to do that, then what belonged to him is returned to him in the year of Jubilee. It's released. This land that had to be sold because of poverty, because of debt, it comes back.

It's given back. Property tax has a number of problems. The biggest problem is it's an illegitimate claim to ownership of the land because to tax something implies an ownership of it. It implies that you have a right to it. The state doesn't own our land.

They have no right to tax it. So there's a number of problems with it, but it also violates this Jubilee Principle against permanent indebtedness. Under a property tax system people are permanently indebted and never stop making payments on their property And that violates this Jubilee Principle. That is oppression against the poor. Yes, when you're young and you're earning money, you can handle that oppression.

Handle it. Still oppression. But it's the poor, it's the widows, it's those who lack income that are hurt the most by property taxes. They end up having to sell their family land where they should be living. The land that they bought, the land that their husbands bought, that labored for.

They have to sell it because of this oppression. And they're not able to live there and to die in peace. It should be no surprise that property tax came to us as a part of communism. It's one of the planks in the Communist Manifesto. Because communism in its philosophy is a direct attack on Christianity.

It's diametrically opposed to the Scriptures at every point. It was an idea of satanic men, satanically moved men, who were seeking to attack the family and attack a righteous government and a righteous culture. It's something that we've accommodated ourselves to. But it's an impression. It's an impression of the needy especially and of the poor.

And we don't have to look beyond that to answer why God's wrath is hot against our land today. The poor have a right not to serve as slaves. And if one of your brethren who dwells by you, Leviticus 25, says, becomes poor and sells himself to you You shall not compel him to serve as a slave As a hired servant and a sojourner he shall be with you and you shall So and shall serve you until the year of Jubilee. And then he shall depart from you, he and his children with him, and shall return to his own family. He shall return to the possession of his fathers." See, the biblical, the Bible's support of slavery is one of the areas that scoffers and the profane like to mock.

But the system of slavery described in the Scriptures is very, very different from the slavery that was practiced in America in the antebellum south. Or what most people envision when they think of slavery. In the Bible's system of slavery, there was a right to someone's labor, but not to their personhood. You had a right to command their labor if they were indebted to you and obligated. You had a right to that labor, but not to them as a person.

What we have today is oppressive. If somebody steals something and they can't pay it back, and it's deemed a big, big theft, then what do we do with them? We lock them up in jail and require the person they stole from to support them, to feed them and to clothe them. Well, they sit idle. It's absurd and it's oppressive.

Who is it oppressive? It oppresses the very victim, the person that was robbed, who deserves restitution. Instead, that person is the one who becomes the supporter of the one indebted. It's oppressive of the person who committed the crime. He has no way to redeem himself.

He has no way to make restitution. He's simply forced to be idle. Very difficult to work. Rather, the biblical system is much more gracious, much more compassionate. Because it would allow that person to work, to support his family, and to pay off the debt.

And it gives the right of the one who he's indebted to to command his labor, to have some control, to ensure that that work is done. Directing where he might live and what his work hours might be, for example. You see there's a protection here. He's to be treated humanely. And the next rite is that he is to be set free.

Bond servants were to go free in the seventh year, or the year of Jubilee. If your brother, a Hebrew man or a Hebrew woman is sold to you and serves you six years, and in the seventh year, you shall let him go free from you. And when you send him away free from you, you shall not let him go away empty-handed. You shall supply him liberally from your flock, from your threshing for, and from your winepress, for what the Lord has blessed you with, you shall give Him." He's a person. He has a family.

There's a respect for the person. You've extracted the labor for the restitution of the debt, and now he is to be released. From what the Lord has blessed you with, you shall give to Him. You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God redeemed you, therefore I command you this thing today." You see, even the ownership of labor was not permanent. Ownership of property was permanent, but not the ownership of people's labor, what we might call an indentured servant.

It came to an end. If you didn't own it indefinitely, you didn't will them to your children. These were abuses that were practiced in our land. They're not biblical. They are an oppression of the poor.

I think one reason you can say that the South lost was for these oppressions in their practice of slavery. They traded in stolen people, is another big one. Leviticus 25, now if a sojourner or a stranger close to you becomes rich. And one of your brethren who dwells by him becomes poor and sells himself to the stranger or sojourner close to you or to a member of the stranger's family. After he is sold, he may be redeemed again." Did you catch that protection?

There was always, at any point, the right to redeem. Somebody who owned somebody's labor could not refuse to redeem that person. They couldn't say, oh, he's mine, I don't want to sell him back. If somebody came and was able to pay the indebtedness, they had to release him. It's a protection that's not afforded by our prison system.

After he sells himself to a stranger, after he is sold he may be redeemed again. One of his brothers may redeem him, or his uncle or his uncle's son may redeem him, or anyone who is near of kin to him in his family may redeem him, or if he is able, he may redeem himself. Thus he shall reckon with him who bought him. The price of his release shall be according to the number of years from the year he was sold to him until the year of Jubilee. It shall be according to the time of a hired servant for him.

If there are still years remaining according to them, he shall repay the price of his redemption from the money with which he was sold which which he was bought and if there remain but a few years until the year of Jubilee then he shall reckon with him a court and according to his years he shall repay him the price of his redemption. He shall be with him as a yearly hired servant, and he shall not rule him with rigor in your sight. And if he is not redeemed in these years, then he shall be released in the year of Jubilee, he and his children with him. See, there not only was the ownership of labor not permanent, but there was always the right of redemption. This slave owner could not refuse anyone who wanted and was able to redeem that slave and pay off the indebtedness.

Sixthly, another right of the poor is that interest was forbidden. Interest was forbidden and any pledge, any article that was taken as collateral was to be returned before the sun went down if it was a garment for a poor person. Exodus 22, if you lend money to any of my people who are poor among you, you shall not be a money lender to him. You shall not charge him interest. If you ever take your neighbor's garment as pledge, you shall return it to him before the sun goes down for that is his only covering it is his garment for his sin skin what will he sleep in and what and it will be that when he cries to me I will hear for I am gracious.

Leviticus 25, take no interest, take no usury or interest from him but fear your God that your brother may live with you. Or Deuteronomy 23, you shall not charge interest to your brother, interest or money or food or anything that is lent out at interest. To a foreigner you may charge interest, but to your brother you shall not charge interest. That the Lord your God may bless you in all to which you set your hand in the land which you are entering to possess." Now this has been a bit of a perplexing passage. Can we charge interest to people for a loan for their house?

Well if it's a brother, this passage says, no, you can't. But it can be charged to a foreigner. You can charge interest to a foreigner, but you can't charge it to your brother. So if somebody is in the money lending business, then Could anybody in the church go to this brother who's in this business? It would seem that well, he can't because there shouldn't be interest charged between brothers.

And so how's that helping this brother who's in business if nobody in the church can go to their business? And so this has been difficult. How does that help either party in that case? I think the only way to make sense of this passage is when we see debt as the Bible sees debt. It's not wrong, it's not a sin, it's not forbidden, but it is considered a tragedy to have debt.

It's considered a catastrophe, A loss, not a normal way of life. It's not a desirable way to live. It's not the way we should expect to live. A hundred years ago, mortgages were much, much, much less common. And if you did get a mortgage to buy a house, you would put down 50% and it would be a five-year term repayment.

The fact that 30-year mortgages and even reverse mortgages are commonplace should be an indication of just how great our poverty is and how great the oppression of the poor in our land is. In the Bible's view, if we have to borrow money to buy a house, we're destitute, we're poor. It's a tragedy. And the fact that So few people can afford a house is simply an indication of just how poor we are and how oppressed the poor are by our land, by our laws and our land. The World Economic Forum is quite famous for a video they put out a few years ago before COVID.

In which they were laying out their view of the ideal world. Let me tell you their view of the ideal world is more like a hell. One of the things in that, in their ideal view of the world, is that you will own nothing and be happy. You will own nothing and be happy. That's the ultimate oppression of the poor.

Being sold to us as the ideal way of life. That we should be happy owning nothing. Being oppressed. That's the mark of slave owners. Many, many people that are trafficked today, especially young women, are raised or taught by the trafficker that they're being loved and they're being cared for and they're being protected.

That's I would say equivalent to this message of the World Economic Forum that we will own nothing and be happy. It's the oppressor telling us we should be happy being oppressed. We should be happy being in a state of oppression and poverty and destitution. When you lend your brother anything, you shall not go into his house to get his pledge. You shall stand outside and the man to whom you lend him shall bring the pledge to you.

And if the man is poor, you shall not keep his pledge overnight. You shall in any case return the pledge to him again when the sun goes down, that he may sleep in his own garment and bless you, and it shall be righteousness to you before the Lord your God." Now why take a pledge at all if it had to be returned at the end of the day? We see in this not only a respect for the poor, but also protection against Abuses by the poor. You were not to go into his house. You were to respect his house.

It's his, not yours. Just because he's indebted to you doesn't give you a right to go into his house and search for something that you want. That's his house. You were to stay outside, to respect him as a person, to respect his property and his home where he lived, even if it was a home that maybe he was renting. But there was to be collateral for the debt.

Because If you say, well, why take the collateral if I have to return it every night? And the answer is to protect against abuses by the poor. If you didn't take any collateral, and you just let him keep the collateral without ever having custody of it, then what's to stop that poor person from borrowing from ten different people with the same collateral? Because he's holding it the whole time. The fact that you took, that he had to give that collateral up in the daytime, is a protection against, from him abusing, the generosity of people that are loaning to him.

You took physical custody of it. If you have physical custody of it, he can't be using it to get a loan from somebody else. Of course, that's what the Federal Reserve does with their money. They have the same money loaned out to hundreds and hundreds of people, the same money, and they get interest on that money that they've loaned out to hundreds and hundreds of people. Be like Avis being able to rent a car to 20 different people, the same car all at the same time.

Where's my car? Well, you just have a picture of a car. It doesn't get you anywhere. But it works with money. At least it seems to work.

But it doesn't really. It is absurdity. It is nonsense. There was to be generosity toward the poor. If there is among you a poor man of your brethren within any of your gates in your land which the Lord your God has given you, you shall not harden your heart nor shut your hand from your poor brother.

But you shall open your hand wide to him and willingly lend him sufficient for his need whatever he needs. Beware lest there be a wicked thought in your heart saying, The seventh year, the year of release is at hand, and your eyes shall be evil against your poor brother, and you give him nothing. And he cry out to the Lord against you, and it become a sin among you, you shall surely give to Him, and your heart shall not be grieved when you give to Him. Because for this thing the Lord your God will bless you in all your works, in all to which you put your hand. For the poor will never cease from the land.

Therefore, I command you saying, you shall open your hand wide to your brother, to your poor, and to your needy in your land. It's to be a generosity, a willingness to give to those who are in need. And the poor, I have it as number 8, I've lost count otherwise, but the poor have a right to the poor tithe. Deuteronomy 14 teaches, at the end of every third year, you shall bring out the tithe of your produce of that year and store it up within your gates. And the Levite, because he has no portion or nor inheritance with you, and the stranger and the fatherless and the widow who are within your gates may come and eat and be satisfied that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hand which you do." This is what we call the poor tithe.

It was one third of a tithe. It was stored up and taken every third year. Deuteronomy 16, when you have finished laying aside all the tithe of your increase in the third year, the year of tithing, and have given it to the Levite, the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow, so that they may eat within your gates and be filled. Then you shall say to the Lord your God, I have removed the holy tithe from my house, and also have given them to the Levite, the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow according to all your commandments which you have commanded me. I have not transgressed your commandments nor have I forgotten them." this is the Bible's answer to poverty the poor tithe It's one-third of the tide there was a first tithe that was given to the church For the preaching of the gospel and the work of ministry and the teaching is given to the Levites and to the priests.

Ten percent is given to the Levites, the Levites gave to the priests. And that was for the work of the church. That's the Lord's tithe. There was a second tithe that was for rejoicing. That tithe was kept by the person.

But it was money that was reserved for rejoicing before the Lord for the days of feasting that they were to go to Israel for. And if they were too far away to bring their tithe, then they could sell their tithe. And when they got to Jerusalem, buy with it whatever their heart desired. Strong drink, meat, whatever their heart desired they could buy. That was the rejoicing tithe.

But then there's this third tithe, which is one third. It's a third tithe, and it's also one third of the tithe. And that was saved up for the poor. See when you just dribble out a monthly allotment to the poor, you never help them get beyond their situation. But the Bible has an answer to poverty that helps people, that moves them beyond continuing to live in poverty all their life if they are willing to work and are able to work.

Sometimes people aren't able to work and through no fault of their own. But in this case, this tithe is set aside And it's given in a lump sum. And that allows for a radical change in a person's situation. See when you save up a tithe like that, and you have a whole church and a whole society that's saving up this kind of tithe, then they can come into a poor family, into a situation, and buy a house, for example, and provide a house for a poor family. You see, that radically changes their financial picture.

Because they don't have to, they have a house now. And where they were laboring maybe with a mortgage or laboring with rent, now that is removed. And if they're diligent, that may be what they need to get on their feet again and to cease living under this poverty where they're in debt. It. These second and third tithes were not given to the church.

They were retained by the people themselves. And it's the people that are giving their own money in this case of the poor tithe. See, when the government is responsible to give out money, they simply create more of what they're trying to alleviate. Because in a sense they're paying for poor they're subsidizing the poor and you get more of whatever you subsidize so they just get more poverty and so this great war on poverty that was declared 50 years ago in the decade I was born, has only resulted in greater and greater and greater poverty. And with that poverty, it's become so prevalent and so pervasive, we don't even think about it as poverty anymore.

We've come to accept as normal living in what our ancestors would have considered poverty. But the Bible, when we look to the scriptures, there are real solutions for these real problems. If we are willing to believe God and to take Him at His word, you know, in the area of tithes is one area where God says we are to test Him. Try me, He says. Try me.

If we see a land of increasing poverty, Maybe it's time we need to start looking back to God's Word and asking why is there poverty in our land? Are we failing as God's people to follow His Word? I have not been personally to India, but I have been over into South Asia and have seen some of this but I have heard colleagues describe flying into Mumbai and flying for a long time over nothing but cardboard shacks. Millions of people living in cardboard shacks. When we look around our cities, there was somebody who did a documentary on the city of Seattle.

It was quite eye-opening. He documents the stunning poverty of the homeless and the lawless that are just living on the streets. And that's because we're seeing more and more of it. It's not uncommon now to drive under a bridge in even our town and see a row of cardboard shacks of people that are homeless. Some are homeless because of sins, because some people, and some are homeless because they want to live there.

Again, mental illnesses and many of which are the result of sins that haven't been dealt with, not exclusively, but often that's the case. But we're seeing this poverty arising around us, I think because we have ignored God's Word and haven't pleaded the cause of the poor and the needy. The poor have a right to be paid daily. Wages were to be paid at the close of each day, Leviticus 19, you shall not cheat your neighbor nor rob him. The wages of him who is hired shall not remain with you all night until morning." Now, certainly we can make arrangements by mutual agreement.

We can decide on a time to be paid and in most cases today it's mutually beneficial to both parties not to be paid every day that I wouldn't want to be paid every day that'd be just a lot of extra work But we need to remember it is the right of the poor to be paid on a daily basis. So that when if somebody is in need and works for you, it's good to pay them the day they do the work. It's their right as a poor. And what are the things that that oppress the poor? Well, the inflation of the money supply steals the wealth of the people.

Inflation is not when prices rise. That's the effect of inflation. That's a result. Inflation is when the amount of money increases. And we have a system in our country that allows for and is built upon massive inflation of the money that can result in prices rising, but it steals from the people.

Inflation of the money supply devalues the money. And when people tell us today that our dollar is today worth only 5% or 1% of what it was 100 years ago. That means that all that, that's the amount of wealth that's been stolen from us. The fact that it happened gradually and that it's distributed over a whole culture so that we don't experience it directly, doesn't change the fact that it was still stolen. The monopoly on the practice of law especially oppresses the poor.

We have a monopoly, a government monopoly on the practice of law. You have to have a license from the government in order to practice law. I can't just go out and hire somebody who is very good at law. I'm not able to do that. And that oppresses the poor.

We talk about today that justice only is available to the wealthy. A big reason for that is because of this monopoly on the practice of law. Government-enforced monopolies always result in higher prices and limited availability of service. And the poor are most affected by these monopolies because they're least able to hire a member of the cartel to defend them. The cartel to defend them.

Government monopoly on medicine has the same effect. Increasing the cost of it and reducing the availability. People in Canada used to come down to America and pay a lot more money because they could get medical treatment right away. Rather than having to wait months and months and months and months. I have friends in the UK and you have to wait months and months over there to get medicine And we're coming we're becoming the same way because because of our monopoly We're not maybe quite as bad, but we're on the road there Government monopoly on medicine these things we've we've come to accept them and live with them but they are not the way it used to be.

You didn't used to have the government permission to practice medicine. It's not about quality of medicine that everybody agrees on. It's about control. You control people's food, you control their medical, you access to medicine, and you control their access to justice, and you you have slaves. You have a nation of slaves.

The reason doctors get higher pay than engineers and other professional people is because of the monopoly. It didn't used to be that way. Doctor was a respected man just like any other professional. But with the monopoly, you drive down the availability and you increase the price. And you also control.

See, with government monopoly on medicine, you only get the medicines that the government wants you to have. These are all things that especially oppress the poor. The wealthy are able to escape them. They can go to another country and get the medical treatment of their choice, but those that are poor don't have those options. The other command that is given to real men, in addition to pleading the cause of the poor and the needy, is to open their mouth for the speechless and those who are appointed to die.

The cry of the gladiators in Rome was those about to die. Hail Caesar, those about to die salute you. How very different is the scripture, O please, that the groaning of the prisoner come before you, and according to the greatness of your power, preserve those who are appointed to die. And return to our neighbors sevenfold into their bosom, their reproach with which they have reproached you, O Lord. So we, your people, in the sheep of your pasture, will give you thanks forever.

We will show forth your praise to all generations." You see, the Proverbs 31, man had a great respect for life. Human life is to be respected because it's been made in the image of God, and for that reason alone, we should respect it. But it's also to be respected because it's not ours. We don't own it. We don't own our own life.

We certainly don't own anybody else's, and neither does anybody else own their life. It's a trust that we are to guard. And so one of the most obvious applications is the unborn. Jeremiah 5 says of Israel, that they have grown fat, they are sleek, Yes, they surpass the deeds of the wicked. They do not plead the cause of the fatherless, yet they prosper.

And the right of the needy, they do not defend. Shall I not punish them for these things, says the Lord? Shall I not avenge myself on a nation such as this?" what would the Lord say to us? A nation that kills unborn. What is the greatest threat facing our nation?

I say it is the murder of the unborn. Because it brings God's wrath upon us. It brings all of His judgments of poverty, of oppression, of indebtedness, of foreign ownership, and all the other things that are part of God's judgment. Starts with that. But another area are the political prisoners.

Political prisoners are people who have done no wrong but have been imprisoned because they have courageously spoken truth to power, to those in authority. I used to think that political prisoners were something I used to read about, or I used to think they were in other countries. And I grew up reading through the voice, through what was called Jesus to the Communist World, which today is renamed Voice of the Martyrs. But back in the late 60s, 70s, Jesus to the Communist World would continually publish every month stories of political prisoners in Russia, in communist China, and other places. People who were in jail because they had spoken the truth, because they had testified to the gospel.

And I never imagined that I would live in a day when our nation had political prisoners. And it's no longer just a few. There are hundreds now, hundreds and hundreds of political prisoners that are in our jails, that are being denied trials. Ebed Melek in Jeremiah 38 heard about Jeremiah being cast into the well, into that dungeon. And he was a eunuch in the king's house.

And when he heard that, he went to the king. And he spoke to the king, saying, My Lord the king, these men have done evil, and that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet, whom they have cast into the dungeon. And he is likely to die from hunger in the place where he is, for There is no more bread in the city. Now why was Jeremiah in prison? Well, one of the reasons was because he was telling the truth about the nation.

And the king didn't like to hear that his nation was under God's judgment, and that Babylon was going to come and carry them into captivity, and that they should accept that. And so he put him in prison. Put him in a dungeon to die. So, Ebed Melek is a brave man for going to speak to the king about Jeremiah. When Paul was in a similar situation, everybody deserted him.

Nobody stood with him in his imprisonment. Nobody testified for him. They all deserted him, Paul said. But here's this man, this eunuch, going to the king, pleading for him. He said, they have cast him into the dungeon.

He is likely to die from the hunger in the place where he is, for there is no more bread in the city. And then the king commanded Ibn Malik, the Ethiopian, saying, take with you some men, 30 men, and you get them out. Lift them out. And he did that. And we see in Jeremiah 38, sorry, in Jeremiah 39, in verse 15, The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah while he was shut up in the court of the prison saying go and speak to Ebed Melech the Ethiopian saying thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, behold I will bring my words upon this city for adversity and not for good.

And they shall be performed in that day. But I will deliver you in that day." Ebed-Mellak would be delivered. Where all the city was going to be destroyed, he would be delivered. I will deliver you. And you shall not be given into the hand of the men of whom you are afraid.

I will deliver you and you will not fall by the sword, but your life shall be as a prize to you, because you have put your trust in me, says the Lord." That was his reward because He went to the king. See, we have this right of habeas corpus, a right to have the body, that it is an oppression to lock people up and never bring them to trial and never allow them to be cared for and never allow them access to lawyers and to the court. The right of habeas corpus, the right to have the body. And that's what Eben Malik exercised. He went to the king and said, I want the right, I want Jeremiah.

I want his body to be delivered from that dungeon. That's a biblical right and it's an oppression of the poor. We are to open our mouth for the speechless and the cause of all who are appointed to die. All of this finds its answer in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the Proverbs 31 man.

And when he began his ministry in Nazareth, where he'd been brought up, and he went into the temple, or synagogue, he opened the book to Isaiah 61, and he said, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has appointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. Jesus Christ is that man. It's described in Proverbs 31. It is through His obedience and His obedience alone that any liberty comes to anyone.

Liberty comes through obedience. It's the only way there is ever any liberty. Liberty Bell had written on it, proclaim liberty throughout the land. That was a quote from Leviticus 25. And I remember looking at a replica in the city of Philadelphia with another pastor and he saw that and he shook his head and he said, oh, what a misuse of scripture.

But it's not at all. When we rightly understand what that passage is saying. Liberty comes through obedience. Tyranny is the inability to obey the law of God. A tyrant is a tyrant because he makes it hard or impossible for people to obey the law of God.

Jesus Christ brings liberty. He brings liberty by His obedience. Because by His obedience, all of the benefits of redemption come to us. There's one word to summarize the ground of our redemption. It's the obedience of Jesus Christ to the law of God.

Because He obeyed the law of God, we are made righteous. And because He obeyed the law of God, and because He died on the cross to save us from the penalty of our sins, we are set free from bondage to sin. And we are given the Holy Spirit and enabled to obey the law of God. Without Christ's obedience, that wouldn't happen. All liberty then comes through obedience, specifically through the obedience of Jesus Christ.

He is the Proverbs 31 man in whom alone is liberty and freedom and deliverance from oppression. Father in heaven, we thank you for the liberty that we have in Christ. We thank you that you are the perfect man, that you have perfectly obeyed the law of God and through your obedience you have brought to us liberty and peace, and you are in justice, for you have paid the just penalty of the law for us. We thank you, Father, that you are our deliverer, our redeemer, that you are our savior. We thank you that you love us.

We thank you for your laws that you have given to us, that we can walk in them, that we can delight in them, that we can also follow in your footsteps to be a voice for the speechless, to be your hands and your feet to those who are appointed to die, to those who are oppressed and needy. Oh Father, we ask that through your name we might triumph over your enemies. In Jesus name we ask, amen.