Verse by verse teaching - Proverbs 11:30 "Soul Winning"

The tile of message tonight is soul winning. Soul winning. Proverbs 11 verse 30 begins like this. It speaks about the fruit of the righteous. The fruit of the righteous. We see oftentimes in God's word, both Old and New Testaments, repeatedly where God uses fruit as a teaching metaphor. And sometimes people get confused about fruit metaphors. They get troubled by fruit metaphors and they just don't understand them. But I pray that we'll all get a better understanding tonight by studying this verse. And the first thing we want to see here, we're looking at the fruit of the righteous. Of course, if we're born again through faith in Jesus Christ, then we are righteous. We have the righteousness which is of God by faith. So we are the righteous. And the first thing I want you to see tonight about the fruit of the righteous is that fruit is a creation of God. Fruit is a creation of God. Look with me in Genesis chapter 1 please. Verse 11. Genesis chapter 1 verse 11. The Bible says, "And God said, 'Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind.'" And there's the first fruit tree mentioned in the Scripture, the first mention of fruit here in Genesis, "whose seed is in itself upon the earth, and it was so." So God created the fruit trees. God created fruit. Christians aren't fruit makers. They're fruit bearers. And there is a difference. We'll say it again. Christians aren't fruit makers. We're fruit bearers. And a lot of Christians get bogged down with the concept of trying to make fruit when they can't make fruit. We're supposed to bear fruit. We don't create fruit. God creates fruit yielding trees. Say that again. I want this to sink in tonight. We don't create fruit. God creates fruit trees. He creates fruit yielding trees. In Ephesians chapter 2 verse 10. Watch where this is going. Ephesians 2 verse 10. The Bible says, "For we are His workmanship created," look at that. "created," how? "in Christ Jesus, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." Or we could say, "We are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good fruit, which God hath before ordained that we should bear." But notice it's God's workmanship and we are God's creation. How does God create fruit bearing trees? Well, go back to Genesis 1.11 again. Genesis 1.11 begins like this, "And God said, 'Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after His kind, whose seed is in itself.' And it was so. So, 'And God said,' and it was so. God said, and it was so." That's how it works. God creates fruit trees with His word and when God says, it is as God said for it to be. And by faith in Christ, as we mentioned earlier, we are made righteous legally. But we are also made fruit trees botanically. By faith in Christ, we are made righteous legally, but we are made fruit trees botanically. You, if you're a believer in Christ, you're a fruit tree. Here's the kingdom and truth for you tonight. People who believe God's words bear God's fruit. People who believe God's words bear God's fruit. God created those fruit yielding trees by His word. They came into existence by the word of God. They bore fruit by the word of God. And people, because we're also God's creation, we are His workmanship. We have been created in Christ Jesus unto that good fruit. People who believe God's word bears God's fruit. Psalm chapter 1, verse 1 through 3. "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor siteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law doth he meditate day and night." Notice that. His delight is in the law of the Lord. That's God's word. In his law, in God's word, doth he meditate day and night. And what happens when he meditates in God's word day and night? He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water. Now if you meditate in God's word, you're not going to be a fruit tree. You were a fruit tree the moment you put your faith in Jesus as your Savior. You are God's workmanship created, remember if any man be in Christ, we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus. Created in Christ. And the Bible says if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature. So the moment we put our faith in Christ as our Savior, we became fruit trees. But when we meditate in God's word day and night, we don't become a tree, but we become a tree planted by the rivers of water. Have you all ever gone to Lowe's and bought your favorite tree and you had all these great dreams of these beautiful peaches and pears or apples or whatever you wanted, whenever you bought it, you took it home and the summer killed it. You got hands going up everywhere. So it was already a tree. You couldn't put water on that tree and make it any more a fruit tree than what it was when you brought it home from Lowe's. But had you kept the water on it, then you could have had it bearing fruit as it should have borne. And so we're all fruit trees, but when we meditate in God's word, God's word creates the tree. God's word creates the fruit. And if we meditate in God's word day and night, then we become as a tree that's planted by the rivers of water. In other words, our roots get down deep into the life giving word of God. It says, "He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water that bringeth forth his fruit in his season." Isn't that great? There's Psalm 1, 1 telling you right there, "You are a fruit tree believer in Christ." If you want to bear fruit, you got to get your roots down in the water of God's word. The Bible says that Christ has died for us and he might sanctify and cleanse us with the washing of water by the word. It says, "His leaf also shall not wither and whatsoever he doest shall prosper." Now, how many of you have ever seen fruit on a tree? We all have. How many of you have ever seen a tree bearing fruit? You've seen fruit on a tree, but how many of you have seen a tree bearing fruit? Only nobody. You wake up, you go out and you look, well there's some little buds on there. You go out and they're a little bit bigger, but those trees don't do it. You don't see those trees doing anything like this and making fruit like that. You just don't see it. Fruit trees are, they're some of the laziest things I've got in my backyard. We've got chickens and they're very active, but our fruit trees, you don't see them do anything. They're just lazy. But you know what they do? They bring forth fruit in their season. That's what they do. They just sit in the same place all day long. The Bible doesn't say that the man who meditates in God's law will be like a tree that's a real go-getter. And that's what a lot of people try to do to bear fruit. It says he'll be like a tree planted by the rivers of water that brings forth his fruit. Fruit bearing is not about what you do. It's about where you're planted. As a child of God, it's not about what you do. It's about where you're planted. A Christian planted in God's words is going to bear fruit in his season. Why did God make fruit trees? That's the next thing we want to look at. Why did God make fruit trees? Anyone tell me? Think back in Genesis. It's easy. What do you say? To have fruit? I'm sorry? Feed people. That's it. Yes, to have fruit, but for what reason do we have fruit? There's a purpose for having the fruit. So people could eat it. God made you a fruit tree so people could eat the fruit that he bears on your limbs. It's really an amazing thing when you think about it. Genesis chapter 1 verse 29. Genesis chapter 1 verse 29. This is after God created the fruit trees. God said, "Behold, this is him speaking to man. I have given you every herb bearing seed which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed. To you it shall be for meat or for food." Our fruit is edible. Here's the kingdom truth. Christians bear edible fruit. Christians bear edible fruit. God created us to bear fruit for people to eat. We're not pecan trees. We're not avocado trees. We're not peach trees. As much as I love peaches or pears. No, a person who's been created in Christ Jesus is, look back in your text, what kind of tree are we? We're a tree of life. We're a tree of life. That's kind of awkward because you think, "Well, there's only one tree of life that was in the Garden of Eden." No, no, no, no, no. If you believe in Christ, what happens when we believe in Christ? We shall not perish but have what? Everlasting what? Life. So we have life in us. A tree doesn't bear anything but what's already inside it. Think about it. Whatever comes out of that tree was put in there by God when he made it. It's already inside that tree. You just add water and what God put in that tree comes out of it. When we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, we then have the life of Christ and then we bear that life-giving fruit. The fruit we bear is viable. It's life-giving. God created us to bear fruit for people to eat and we are a tree of life. We are trees that bear the fruit of God's life in His Son. When people eat our fruit, they live. They may receive joyful life when they eat our fruit. They may receive instructive life. They may receive corrective life, encouraged life. They may receive emboldened life. And if we're sharing the Gospel, they'll receive everlasting life. And it's going to be some form of life. Everlasting life is not life in its totality. You know that? Everlasting life is not life in its totality. How do we know that? Because after Adam and Eve sinned, now they immediately experience fear. They immediately experience shame. They immediately experience a separation from God and God comes in the garden and they hide. Nevertheless, God let us know in the Scriptures that there was the possibility that if they in that condition still ate from the tree of life, what would have happened to them? They lived forever. So had they eaten of the tree of life, they could have had eternal life, but it could have been a miserable life. I don't want to live eternally as a sinner. I don't want to live eternally frustrated with my fellow man in a world of chaos. And so eternal life is not life in its totality. They're all manners of life for us to experience. Life of joy, life of peace. What if I said, "Well, may God give you a life of peace, but not give you a life of joy?" And so you become like a Christian that's on an eternal valium, but you have no bubbling joy. What if I told you we're going to give you joy, but no peace? So you have joy until something happens and, "Oh, you don't want that." So there's all manner of life. A tree bears different manner of fruits. Turn if you would to Revelation chapter 22. A tree of life bears different manner of fruits. Revelation chapter 22 verse 2. In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, now look at there, here's a tree of life by the river again. How about that? Isn't that neat how that repeats itself? By the way, there was a river in the Garden of Eden too. Do you know that? So rivers and trees of life, they go hand in hand. That's why we, being trees of life, need to make sure we're planted by the river. Now one day we're going to be planted by that river permanently. I mean, we're just going to be in constant union with the Spirit of God. And so in the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bear, look here, 12 manner of fruits, plural. Not just one kind of fruit. We got this idea there being a fruit tree there in the Garden of Eden that's got an apple on it. Man, whoever taught that in Sunday school, they should be tarred and feathered. It's got many different kinds of fruit on it. And here there's 12 manner of fruit, and that's symbolic in and of itself. And it bears its fruit each month, and how many months are there? There's 12. Here you got 144 again, like your 144,000. Everything's symbolic, but you see that there's different manners of fruit. Proverbs chapter 15 verse 4a says, "A wholesome tongue is a tree of life." A wholesome tongue is a tree of life. People who believe God's words bear God's fruit, and the tongue is the branch on a tree of life that bears the fruit of the Gospel. Repeat that again. Now I can bear fruit with my hands. How can I do that? I'm in the body of Christ. I'm a member of Christ's body. As a member of Christ's body, my head, I have the life of my head in me. If I minister Jesus to you, and Jesus ministers to you through my hands, then that is a tree of life, and you are receiving the quality life-giving fruit through Jesus' ministry through my hands. But the member of the body that bears the fruit that gives eternal life is the tongue, or the pen, right? The hand that writes, or types. So a wholesome tongue is a tree of life. People who believe God's words bear God's fruit, and the tongue is the branch on the tree of life that bears the fruit of the Gospel by which people eat and live forever. Did you know that the only way that someone can live forever is by fruit-bearing of a Christian. That's the only way someone can live forever is if they eat the fruit that's born on a child of God, a tree of life. The Bible says, "How can they hear without a preacher?" What's the preacher? He's a tree of life with a wholesome tongue that preaches the Gospel. And it gives the manner of fruit that people eat thereof and live forever, as the Lord said in the Garden of Eden. We who believe the Gospel bear the Gospel. And when someone partakes of the Gospel fruit that we bear, they are taken from this world of sin and death. When someone eats from the Gospel fruit that we bear, they are taken from this world of sin and death. In the Bible prophecy, the world is a sea. Many times you'll see a creature come up out of the sea, a beast coming up out of the sea. Well in Bible prophecy, the sea is a picture of the fallen world because it's not solid, it's back to and fro and rocking to and fro. And if you remember even in New Testament prophecy, Jesus referred to it the same way. Jesus spoke about the kingdom of God being likened unto a sea and the children of God casting a net in that sea. And they drag that net across that sea and they take out of that sea all manner of creatures. All manner of creatures means the sea is tumultuous, it's the world, because the world is tumultuous, it's chaotic. But in the world, you have all manner of creatures, you have both clean and unclean. And so the Gospel net will drag across that sea and it will gather people into the church who are both saved and lost. At the end of the catch, at the end of the net dragging, the fishermen sort the catch and they toss back what's unclean and they keep the clean fish. And when Jesus was explaining that parable of the kingdom, what he was teaching was that the Gospel is this net that we drag across the sea and it's going to pull people in the church who aren't believers, just like Judas wasn't a believer, but he got drug in. But you know what, he got separated too. And at the end of the day when Jesus comes back, he's going to separate the sheep from the goats or he's going to separate the unclean sea creatures from the clean sea creatures. However you want to put it, it's all the same action. And so here's the sea. Now why are we saying that? Because, as we're looking here at this parable, the people who are saved by believing the life bearing fruit of the Gospel that comes from a child of God as he's sharing the Gospel, they're taken from the world by that Gospel as a fish is taken from this chaotic world by the Gospel net and it's delivered from this fallen world because it's been caught by the Savior and the people casting the net. You with me? All right. So with that said, we go on here and Solomon says, "The righteous are a tree of life," look back in your text now, "and he that winneth souls is wise." If you have your Bible open and you have a pen above the word win or winneth, write the word take, takes, T-A-K-E-S. If you still want to make it King James sound and put taketh in there, I don't care what you do with it. All the same thing. This word in the Hebrew that's translated winneth, it literally means taketh. I mean you look this up in the Hebrew dictionary, you're going to see almost every time it's take, took, taken. It's going to be some form of take. In fact, the only time out of the many, many, many times this word's used in the Bible, the only time it's translated winneth is right here. The only time that it's translated winneth. So the Bible's saying, "He that takes souls is wise," because they're bearing the gospel fruit to take people from this world of sin and death that they may live through Jesus Christ. That's a wise thing to do. Now with that in mind, look in the Gospel of Luke with me as we're beginning to close, Luke chapter 5, Luke chapter 5, and let's look in verses 1 through 10. "And it came to pass that as the people pressed upon him to hear the word of God, he that is Jesus stood by the lake of Gennesaret," we're by a body of water now, "and saw two ships standing by the lake, but the fishermen were gone out of them and were washing their nets." In other words, they didn't shut down for the day. So they're washing their nets. Verse 3, "And he entered into one of the ships which was Simon's and prayed him that he would thrust out a little from the land," let's just push out a little bit from the shore here. "And he sat down and taught the people out of the ship. Now when he had left speaking, he said unto Simon, 'Lunch out into the deep.'" Let's take the ships out in the deep now. Go on out in the deep and let down your nets for a drought. Now they've already finished working. They've already cleaned their nets. For the shepherd, that would be like going to the firing range and you just got through cleaning your pistol and the Lord tells you to go shoot your pistol. You just got through cleaning it. So verse 5, "And Simon answering said unto him, 'Master, we have toiled all night all the night." "All night long and have taken nothing." You see that word taken? Taken nothing. You see how he's talking about catching fish using the word taken because they're taking that fish out of that body of water with a net. We've taken nothing. "Nevertheless, at thy word," ha, ha, ha, look at there, "those who believe God's word bears God's fruit." So we've worked and we haven't taken anything because Christians don't make fruit, they bear fruit. And it's borne by God's word. So he says, "Nevertheless, at thy word I will let down the net." Now that's how you bear fruit. We're letting down this net at God's word. Verse 6, "And when they had this done, they enclosed a great multitude of fishes in their net break. And they beckoned unto their partners which were in the other ship, that they should come and help them. And they came and filled both the ships, so that they began to sink. When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, 'Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.' For he was astonished, and all that were with him, at the drought of fishes which they had taken. He that taketh souls is wise." Watch this now. "And so was also James and John, the sons of Zebedee, which were partners with Simon. And Jesus said unto Simon, 'Fear not, from henceforth thou shalt catch men.'" You'll take men, Simon. You'll win men, Simon. It's all the way of saying, "Simon, you're going to take souls. You're going to win souls." The fish were taken from the sea by net, and souls were taken from the world by the gospel. And it takes men to let that net down. The fish were taken in obedience to Christ. They had gone out on their own. They were doing the same things. You know why a lot of people don't see results from things they do? They're doing just like Peter. They're laboring in the night, and Jesus is nowhere around. And they're not doing it by faith in his word. Jesus has to catch the fish. We're not fish catchers. We're not soul winners. We win souls, but we're not soul winners. Jesus wins the souls. We let down the net. We do it at his word. They had a relationship with Christ. They were walking in the Spirit of Christ. He said, "Lord, at your word, this is what we do." They were trusting Jesus to do the work, and they were just having a part in that work. That's all. The fish were taken in obedience to Christ. Their fish were taken by the work of Christ. And men are taken the same way. We simply launch out. Jesus said, "Launch out." That means go out into all the world. Launch out into the deep. Go out into all the world. And we launch out at his command. Then we cast out. We launch out. We go out into the world. Once we go out into the world, Jesus said, "Go you into all the world." What's he saying? He's saying, "You launch out into the deep." And then once you launch out into the deep, you cast out your net. So you go into all the world, and what do you do? You preach the gospel. And you do it at his word. He is the one who must draw them to the net. There's nobody else who can draw them to the net. Nobody. You know what? I was thinking about old Peter and all them when they were launching out and casting out. You can't see the fish until they're caught, brother. You can't see it. It's dark in that water. You can't see those fish until they're caught. You don't know who's going to be saved, who's not going to be saved. You don't know if you preach the gospel over here, if there's fish over there, or if you preach the gospel over there, there's going to be fish over there. We just launch out, we cast out, and we pull the net in. That's all we can do. But if we'll do it at his word, he'll gather the fish and he'll make sure they run into that net. And he'll get them out of that body of water. He's good at what he does. Our job is to bear that gospel fruit. When it comes to the gospel, Jesus' fish are always biting. And Jesus' gospel is the only net that will draw them out of this world. When we sent the 50,000 gospel booklets to the Philippines, "Lord, God, at your word, I pray they'll go out." When we sent those 50,000 gospel booklets to the Philippines, we launched out far. We launched out to the deep. And by God's grace, being so many, they'll cast a wide net. And when we launched the gospel locally, when we put a little sticky track up, or you witness to one of your fellow men and you share the gospel with someone, then we're staying a little closer to shore, aren't we? Little closer to shore. But the key is to bear the fruit. That's the key. To bear the fruit that we believe that others may hear and believe and live forever. He who wins souls is wise. With that, we'll go ahead and stop tonight. Father, we thank you so much for your word. Lord, I pray tonight, Father. Lord, I know it's going to be a while before these gospel booklets get to the Philippines. Before these banners get printed and get disseminated. Lord, we put no trust in our nets. The nets were woven by man, but they were cast out by faith. Father, we put no trust in any net that we've woven. We put no trust in any money that we've spent. We put no trust in any man that hands them out. Lord, apart from you, apart from your spirit, dear God, we are all people toiling in the night with no fish. Father, we pray, Lord, for the people, Father, who need to hear your word. Father, we don't send these things out, dear Lord God, trusting in the paper, trusting in the writing, trusting in anything, Lord God, that we do. Trusting in the banners, trusting in any kind of mechanism. Lord, I pray that we have these go out, Lord, at your word. Because you told us to launch out into the deep. Because you told us to go into all the world and preach the gospel, Father, to every creature, Lord. You are the one who must do the work, and we trust in you, Father, to do that work. We just let down the nets at your word. We can't see the fish, but Lord, we trust you. We trust your word. We trust the gospel. We trust the process, dear Lord God, of you redeeming, Father, your elect from all corners of the earth as you said you would. We believe in you, Lord, and we pray, Father, Lord, that you will bring great honor and glory to your name. And Lord, I pray, Father, that you will let us see our boats, Father God, begin to sink. Father, we pray for many to come to faith in Jesus Christ, Lord. And may our response, Father, be like Peter. Lord, we're sinful men. We're sinful men. Lord, when we see all the fish, Lord, at the end of the day, we're still just sinful men. And we thank you, Father, that Christ redeemeth sinful men. In His precious name we pray, Lord, Amen.