Episode Transcript
Proverbs 13, verse 8.
We just got through praying for y'all.
Proverbs 13, verse 8.
The title of the message tonight is "A Poor Man's Ransom."
"A Poor Man's Ransom."
So, verse 8 starts off with the words "the ransom."
"The ransom."
And when we think of "ransom" in our English language, we usually think of the sum of money that a kidnapper may charge to release the hostage they've taken.
But there's more of a legal usage here, not the typical usage in our verse tonight.
The word ransom literally means to buy back, like redeem.
It's a cousin word to redeem.
But it means to buy back.
And legally it has the idea of a sum of money that's paid to secure a pardon for some offense.
So somebody does some great offense and now that person is going to die and now in order to save that person's life, a great sum of money is given to the court and that person's life is spared.
That would be the legal idea of a ransom.
So the English word ransom, as I said earlier, and the English word redeem, share the same root words.
So we're dealing with a legal situation here tonight in which a ransom for one's life is involved where someone is going to die and it takes a price being paid to spare that person's life.
And we know that it's talking about one's life being spared because it says, if you I look back at the text, the ransom of a man's life, of his life, not his freedom, but his life.
This isn't a fine paid for a parking ticket.
This is talking about a man being in legal peril and is in jeopardy of losing his life for an offense that he's committed.
And this is not speaking about an earthly offense either.
It's speaking about a spiritual offense.
Not an offense committed against the state, but an offense committed against the kingdom of God.
And all men are guilty of committing this offense against the kingdom of God.
That's what's important for us tonight.
And we'll see here in just a moment how we know that is talking about a spiritual offense.
But it's talking about a spiritual offense against the Kingdom of God and all men are guilty of committing this offense.
Romans chapter 5 verse 12.
Romans chapter 5 verse 12 says, "Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, death by sin and so death, we're talking about the ransom of a man's life, death passed upon all men.
You know another way of saying that?
Have you ever heard of passing judgment?
The death sentence passed upon all men.
Why?
For that all have sinned.
And so if death passed upon all men, then all men need a ransom for their life.
All there together.
And so Solomon is talking about the ransom of a man's life tonight.
For if we don't have a ransom for sin, then what is our judgment?
Death has been passed upon us.
The sentence of death has been passed upon us.
And so if we don't have a ransom for the sin that we've committed that has put our life in peril, then we're up the creek without a paddle.
Now we spoke about the meaning of the English word ransom earlier, and I don't do that very often, but it helps us understand why the translators choose certain English words sometimes it gives us a better picture of what we're reading.
But I'd like for us to talk about the meaning of the Hebrew word that's translated ransom tonight.
The Hebrew word that's translated ransom is the same word translated pitch in Genesis 614.
And if you've been through the Genesis to Jesus class, then that will be significant to you.
God told Noah in Genesis 6, 14, "Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch; or you shall ransom it within and without with ransom."
That's literally what he's saying.
The pitch of a man's life, you could do it that way.
If you move that over to Proverbs.
So the word literally means covering.
You cover that ark with that tar, that pitch, and then it seals the judgment out.
And so we're looking at a covering here, this pitch, as God covered Adam and Eve with the animal skins so they wouldn't die that day.
As Noah covered the ark with the tar so they wouldn't die in the flood.
And as the blood of the animal sacrifices covered the people of those who had sinned, so they wouldn't die, they'd be saved from their sins.
So every person needs a covering.
Every person needs pitch.
And that covering, that pitch, that ransom is Jesus Christ.
Jesus is the ransom for the life of every man.
Jesus said, now this is Jesus in the Old Testament.
Jesus said in Hosea chapter 13, remember when we studied Hosea?
Jesus said in Hosea chapter 13 verse 14, "I will ransom them from the power of the grave."
Man, that is... that's a stake right there to sink your teeth into.
That's a promise from our Savior.
"I will ransom them from the power of the grave."
The grave has a legal claim on us, because death has been passed upon all men.
And if we don't have a ransom, the grave is going to take us.
Our life is in peril.
Jesus says, "I'll ransom them.
I'll ransom them from the power of that grave."
He says, "I will redeem them from death.
O death, I will be thy plagues.
O grave, I will be thy destruction."
You realize one day Jesus is going to destroy the cemetery business?
There won't be a grave anywhere.
There'll never be another grave dug again.
Never.
Not even an animal will die.
I'm going to destroy graves.
He says, "Repentance shall be hid from my eyes."
In other words, I'm not changing my mind on this.
Jesus said in the Gospel of Mark, chapter 10, verse 45, "The same One who just promised in Hosea in the Old Testament that He will ransom us from the power of the grave."
He said in Mark 10, verse 45, for even the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give His life a ransom for many."
Now we know what the price of the ransom is.
We know what the cost is, don't we?
He says, "I will ransom them from the power of the grave.
Death, I will be your plagues."
And now we see the price of the ransom, he says, to give his life a ransom for many.
How is Jesus going to be the plague of death?
By taking on the plague of death.
And then by coming up out of the grave, he then overcomes death.
He then overcomes the grave and destroys it through his resurrection.
But He's going to give His life a ransom for many.
And now on this side of the New Testament, He has given His life a ransom for many.
That means our ransom has been paid.
That's good news.
He gave His life a ransom for many.
Our ransom has been paid.
1 Timothy chapter 2, verses 5 and 6 says, "For there is one God and one mediator between God and men."
How many men?
All men.
One mediator between God and men.
The man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for how many?
For all, to be testified in due time.
Powerful verses.
Now, for those Calvinist people, who teach that Jesus didn't die for everybody and didn't give His life a ransom for everybody, He only gave His life a ransom for the elect.
The Apostle Paul once again said in Romans 5, 12, if we'll go to that slide next, "Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned."
And then Paul said in 1 Timothy 2, verse 5 and 6, "For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all.
What all?
The all men that all have sinned.
He gave himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time.
So what do we learn from this?
We learn, number one, that all men need a ransom.
And number two, Jesus gave himself a ransom for all men.
But a verse tonight says, The ransom of a man's life, if you look back now in Proverbs, are his riches.
His riches.
And this is speaking about the natural man, who trusts in his riches rather than his God.
Mark chapter 10, verse 23 and 24.
The ransom of a man are his riches.
Mark chapter 10 verses 23 through 24, "And Jesus looked round about, and saith unto his disciples, How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God."
Why?
Because to those people, the ransom of their life is their riches.
They get in a bind, I got money for that.
I trust in my riches.
Verse 24, Jesus says, and the Bible says, "And the disciples were astonished at his words, but Jesus answereth again and saith unto them, Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches to enter into the kingdom of God."
Jesus clarified.
Jesus first said, "Man, It's hard for a rich man to enter into the Kingdom of God.
And then they look puzzled.
And then he says, "Well, let me tell you why."
Because most people who have riches, trust in their riches.
They become dependent on their riches.
They put their hope in their riches.
And you can't trust in riches and get into heaven.
A person can't enter into the Kingdom of God, trusting in their riches as the ransom for their soul.
I've been saving money all my life.
My daddy taught me to save money.
I haven't been able to save a lot of money all my life, but I've saved money all my life.
But you know what?
If I scraped all of my money together, every penny I ever saved, and I'll go better than that, if I even scrape Brother Shepherd's money and added it to it, added my dad's money to it.
If I took all the rare earth minerals, all the natural gas, all the gold and silver, and every bank account in this entire world, if I just took the whole world, and I owned the entire world, it would not suffice for ransom for my soul.
They say that there's at least, I think it was 7 trillion stars for every person on earth.
There's just so many stars, there's no way they can number them.
That's just what they know about.
And there's all these planets out there.
Jesus could have grabbed a number of planets, stars.
He could have made a new earth and just handed it to God, say, "Here's a ransom for them."
It took His life.
It took His life.
And so, all the riches in the world can't serve as a ransom for our soul.
A person can't enter the Kingdom of God trusting in the riches as the ransom for the soul because the Bible says in 1 Peter 1, verses 18 and 19, For as much as ye know that ye were not redeemed, or ye were not ransomed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers, which has been passed down through Adam, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot, that was the only ransom that would suffice for us.
The only way the rich man Jesus spoke about can enter into the kingdom of God is if he quits trusting in his riches and realizes that he is poor without Jesus.
He's destitute without Jesus.
And realizing that he is poor without Jesus, he then trusts in Jesus as the ransom for his soul.
You're not redeemed with corruptible things such as silver and gold, but with the precious blood of Christ.
You know what that word precious means?
You've heard of precious metals, precious stones?
And so what's really precious is the blood of Christ.
It's the rarest of the rarest.
There's only one, Jesus.
There'll never be another one after Him.
There never was another one before Him.
It's the greatest price that's ever been paid, the most valuable gift, the greatest treasure that a person can possess.
And so true riches isn't the corruptible trinkets and junk of this world.
It is the precious blood of Jesus Christ, which thereby gives us all things.
And so, when a man realizes, when that rich man realizes that without Jesus he's destitute, and then he considers himself to be actually poor and destitute and needy, and that he accepts the free gift of the precious blood, the treasure of Jesus Christ, not only has he become rich, but now he's become redeemed.
He's become ransomed.
And that brings us back to our previous verse last week.
Proverbs 13 verse 7.
Which says, "There is that maketh himself rich, yet hath nothing.
There is that maketh himself poor, yet hath great riches."
You see how these two go hand in hand.
One follows the next.
And this is why I was telling you, you'll find out it's talking about a spiritual ransom, not a physical, not an earthly type of ransom for an earthly type of offense.
You see, as we go, it's tied in to the previous verse here.
The ransom of a rich man's life or his riches, look back in your text in Proverbs 13, 8, But the poor, but the poor, oh, the precious poor man is the rich man, remember?
There is that maketh himself poor, yet hath great riches, that's me.
But the poor, the man who realizes he is impoverished without Jesus Christ, he then makes himself in his heart, poor in spirit, and he believes on Jesus as his Savior, that man is truly rich.
For that poor man, not trusting in his earthly riches, but trusting in God's only Son, Jesus, look back in your text, what happens as a result of him making himself poor?
"He heareth not rebuke."
See how that works?
"He heareth not rebuke."
Now there's a time in Scripture where a proud person won't listen to rebuke, but that's not what that's talking about here.
And this is another reason we know that this is not talking about an earthly offense, because plenty of poor people go to prison.
Plenty of poor people die.
Plenty of poor people commit homicides and end up going on death row.
But the poor, from the previous verse, that makes himself poor and yet now has great riches because of it, that poor person hears not rebuke.
In the last day, the rebellious will hear the rebuke of God's final judgment.
"Depart from me, ye workers of iniquity."
Speaking of this time, the Bible says in Isaiah chapter 66 verse 15, the Bible says, "For behold, the Lord will come with fire and with his chariots like a whirlwind, to render his anger with his fury and his rebuke with flames of fire."
When God comes back, when Jesus comes back, He's going to come back as the world's rebuked, and as the church's ransom.
When Jesus comes back, He's going to come back as the world's rebuked, and the church's ransom.
In Isaiah 66, verse 15, He's talking about Jesus coming back to this unbelieving world and they're going to be rebuked with flames of fire.
But the poor in spirit shall not hear the rebuke of the Lord, for they have taken refuge in the Lord Jesus Christ, not in their riches. but having esteemed the treasure of the gospel to be their wealth, they have taken refuge in the Savior God sent.
When Jesus comes back, He won't be their rebuke, He'll be their ransom.
Instead of hearing God's rebuke, Matthew chapter 25, verse 23 says, "His Lord said unto him, 'Well done.'"
That's what they're going to hear.
"Well done, good and faithful servant, that has been faithful over a few things, thou wilt make thee ruler over many things, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.
No fury for them, no flames of fire, no war chariots coming to conquer them.
But the Redeemer, who says many, many, many years earlier, I will redeem them from the power of the grave.
"Oh death, I'll be your plagues.
Oh grave, I'll be your destruction."
Another reason tonight for us to not put our trust in earthly riches, and to not esteem ourselves rich, except through the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Father, we thank you so much for your precious word.
Lord we thank you, Father.
Lord that God, the world, the ransom for a man's life is his riches.
When push comes to shove, that's all he can do is gather up what he's accumulated and try to hand it off to somebody.
And that may work in earthly court, but it won't work in your court.
You already own the world anyway.
And you're going to make it new.
You're going to do away with the world that is.
You don't want a corruptible earth.
And Lord, I thank you, Father God, that you've given us something that we can give you that you will accept.
And that is Father God, the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself a ransom for all.
Thank you, Lord, that he didn't leave a single one of us out.
He's paid the price.
He's ransomed us all from the power of the grave.
And Lord, I thank you, Father, that we get to choose riches or ransom, rebuke or our redemption in Jesus.
Thank you for the wonderful choice, and we choose your Son.
His name we pray, Amen.
