“Take away the dross from silver, and it will go to the silversmith for jewelry. 5. Take away the wicked from the before the king, and his throne will be established in righteousness.”
The proverbs come so fast when I am reading them that it is difficult to remember each one, but occasionally, one will stop me in my tracks and I will have to deal with it. That is what happened with Proverbs 24:4-5. The truth in it is so plain and simple that it would be difficult to miss. In fact, you would have to try hard to miss the point. Here is what I deduced from it: First, we need to clearly define “dross.” It is an impurity of any kind. The impurities must be taken from silver for it to become jewelry. Just so, wickedness must be removed from before the king, and from the king himself, if his throne is to be established in righteousness. Solomon, of all people, knew the truth behind that proverb. The same is true in our lives. We need to get rid of the dross that we know is dragging us down and belittling our witness before people. We have to get rid of the dross in order for us to shine for the Lord. To be sure, getting rid of the dross is not a one-time thing, but it is a lifelong effort for the Christian. I want to share with you some of the dross that we need to get rid of. Lest you think, I’m looking down my nose at you, I am writing from personal experience, but I think that you too will know what I mean. We need to get rid of the dross of a critical spirit. A critical spirit is, indeed, dross that we need to get rid of in our lives. I do not mean that we can never be critical. There are things that need criticizing. What I mean is that we do not need to let a critical spirit be the tone of our lives. We can become so critical that we become self-righteous and bitter. This makes us look like the Pharisees that Jesus was so hard on in the gospels. If we find ourselves being too critical, we need to look in the mirror, and we can probably find a lot to be critical of from the person staring back at us in the mirror. I do not literally do this in front of a mirror, but when I find myself being critical of someone else, I start to think of what I need to straighten out in my own life. This doesn’t mean, of course, that I excuse sinful lifestyles, it means that I want to make sure that I am keeping tabs on my own life. You might want to do the same. (By the way, if you are reading this and you are not a Christian, you might want to think of your critical spirit towards those of us who are Christians.) We need to get rid of the dross of lustful thinking. I know that I am touching a tender spot in a lot of lives when I mention this. With all of the information that we have at our fingertips today, it is easy to find a lot to lust over. Of course, this is of a sexual nature, but lust is not just about sex. We can lust about a lot of things. We can lust about what other people have and wish that we have what they have ourselves. We can lust over all of the luxuries that are available to us today. There will never be a point in our lives that we will have everything that we want. That’s why Paul wrote in Philippians 4:12-13: “I know how to be abased (do without) and how abound. Everywhere and in all things I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and suffer need. 13. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” We are surrounded by so many “things” that it is difficult for us to be satisfied. We need to get rid of the dross of doubt. Of course, I don’t mean that there is nothing that we should doubt. Dr. Ted Adams, one of my professors at Southeastern Seminary, told us, “Do not doubt your beliefs and believe your doubts.” I am referring specifically to our belief in Jesus. I like what the father of the demon possessed boy said when Jesus challenged him to believe and his son would be healed: “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief.” That should be our prayer when doubt begins to creep up on our faith. If we let doubt rule our lives, we will not have joy or victory. There are a lot of other things that I could write about, but these three “drosses” can keep us busy. Selah Bro. Joe
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AuthorDr. Joe Beauchamp is the author of this blog and website. Categories
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