Read Proverbs 6:12&13  Have you ever noticed that a naughty person is usually a sneaky person?  Verse 12 says that a naughty person has a smart mouth.  Here in verse 12 Solomon calls it a froward mouth.  And then verse 13 Solomon says that the naughty person uses 3 secret signals:  he winks with his eye, he speaks with his feet - under the table - and he wiggles his finger.  May be you are sitting at the table with two of your friends.  One of them says, "Hey, let's meet down at the playground in about ten minutes."  But then he winks at you so that the other friend doesn't see him winking. Later he says, "I didn't want to hang around with him.  He'll go down to the playground and then we'll be able to play with your Play Station in your room by ourselves."  He just lied to your other friend, didn't he?  He lied with his wink.  Or may be you are sitting at McDonald's and your naughty friend says, "I'm not going to baseball practice tomorrow."  But then he kind of kicks you under the table with his foot to give you a secret signal.  Later he says that your other friend might not go to practice tomorrow and get into trouble with the coach.  Your naughty friend laughs thinking about his lie and thinking about getting your other friend into trouble.  Then may be your naughty friend is telling you a secret when your other friend comes in.  When you start to tell your friend about the secret, your naughty friend goes, "Shhhh!" with his finger up to his mouth.  He wants you to keep the secret from your other friend.  He used his finger as the secret signal.  When you have a naughty friend like that, you had better stay away from them, because you can be sure that they are talking about you behind your back too!  A sneaky friend is sneaky with you too!  They will lie about you when they are with someone else.  They are not a good friend.  They are a lying friend.  They are a not a true friend.  Get red of them.  Don't listen to them.  They are trouble.

Read Proverbs 6:6-11  These 5 verses talks about a lazy person.  Verse 6 tells the lazy person to go to the ant and to learn how they should be acting.  The ant works hard preparing for wintertime.  The ant is a tiny little creature, but is always working and preparing.  Verse 7 says that the ant doesn't even have a boss to make her do her work.  She just knows her job and does it without being told.  The ant knows that winter is coming and she had better get a lot of food stored up ahead of time.  She knows what needs to be done and no one has to tell her to do it.  That is a great example for us!  Should someone have to tell us to brush our teeth in the morning and before we go to bed?  Should someone have to tell us to get ready for church?  We can tell time - we should know when it is time to get ready for church.  Should someone have to tell us to feed the dog or to give it water?  Should someone have to tell us that the garbage has to be taken out?  When we walk by the trash can, we can see for ourselves when it is full and we should know to take the garbage out without being told.  If we want privileges like an adult, we should act like an adult!  No one should have to tell us to do our job.  No one tells the ant.  But then verses 10 & 11 describe a lazy person.  A lazy person is called a sluggard.  Have you ever seen how slow a slug moves as it slithers along the ground?  That is the same way that a sluggard moves along - really, really slow.  The sluggard lays around and puts off doing their work until it is too late.  A sluggard never has anything because they won't work to have what they need.  They are just plain lazy!  So which would you like to be like?  The lazy person with nothing or the hard working ant with plenty stored up for the winter? 

Read Proverbs 4:26  Have you ever had to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom?  You’re half asleep and don’t want to turn on the light.  So you shuffle toward to the bathroom in the dark bedroom - and stumble over that toy that you left out last night.  Your foot hurts, doesn’t it?  Solomon said in our verse that we should think about the path of our feet.  If we don’t think ahead, we are going to stumble in our life.  If we don’t do what our father says to do, we are going to get into trouble.  We should think about it before we get into trouble.  If our mother says to pick up our messy room, we should think about cleaning up before we go outside to play.  If we finish our work before we play, we get into the good habit of finishing the job.  The last part of our verse says that our ways will be established.  Good habits make for a good life.  Think about it before you get into trouble.  Watch what you are doing and establish good habits in life.  You will be glad that you did.

Read Proverbs 4:23  Solomon was a great king and a good general of his army.  As a general he was familiar with military words.  Here in verse 23 Solomon uses a military word to begin our verse.  Solomon told his son – and tells us as we read it – to keep his heart.  The word keep means to guard as a military fort would guard the road into the kingdom.  We should be careful and guard the things that enter our hearts.  We should guard what we think about; the music that we listen to; and the TV programs that we watch.  The things that we do become habits: we keep on doing them.  Some habits are good, like brushing your teeth every day.  But some habits are bad like picking your nose.  Yuck!  We should be careful about our hearts and our habits – they will become our life.  Our habits are what we are.  Our hearts are what we love.  Put a fort up!  Guard your habits and your heart!

Read proverbs 4:7  This a good verse.  But the two main words in the verse are a little confusing because they mean almost the same thing.  But they are actually different.  They are like two keys that look the same, but unlock different locks.  The keys look alike, but open very different doors.  Our two key words are wisdom and knowledge.  Knowledge is knowing things, but wisdom is more than just knowing things.  Wisdom is using knowledge to get along with people and to make things in life work.  Success in life is not just to know a lot of things.  Success in life is about knowing how to get along with people and how to help people to do better things with one another.  For example, knowledge is knowing the rules of baseball, but wisdom is getting all of the players to play well together.  It is true that you have to know the rules in order to play baseball - that is knowledge.  But getting a group of boys to play well together and to make them into a team that can win the championship, well now that is wisdom.  That takes a wise coach.  Get knowledge, but make the knowledge work.  Get wisdom.  But always remember that true wisdom comes from the Lord God in heaven, Who is all wise!

Read Proverbs 3:30  Solomon tells us to "strive not with a man without a cause."  The word strive means to fight or to argue with.  So this verse means that we should not pick a fight with someone just for no reason at all.  Sometimes when someone does something wrong to us, we have to tell them what they did.  They may not realize that they have hurt our feelings.  If we tell them, they may be sorry and apologize and everything will be all right.  And then sometimes we have to tell someone that they have hurt our feelings to remind them to be kind to us and to other people.  These are reasons to have discussions with people.  But this verse is not talking about that.  This verse is talking about arguing or fighting with others for no reason at all.  Some people like to pick and to cause trouble just for the fun of making others mad.  Those people just like to cause trouble for something to do.  God, through Solomon, says that we should not do that.  Don't pick at someone just to aggravate them.  You may like to pick and pick, but others may not like it.  Be nice.  Be thoughtful.  Be kind.  That's a much better way to be.

Read Proverbs 3:27&28  These verses sound a little complicated, but they are actually very simple.  Verse 27 states the idea and verse 28 gives an example of the idea to make it clear.  The idea in verse 27 is that when we owe someone something, and we have the money to pay them, we should pay them and not try to hang onto the money just a little longer only because we want to hang onto our money.  The example that Solomon uses in verse 27 is of a neighbor that comes to borrow some bread from you.  Back in Bible times, people didn't have Wal-Mart to go to to buy bread if they ran out.  If you ran out of bread, you would borrow from your neighbor until you could bake some more.  That wasn't a big deal because the next week, your neighbor might be borrowing from you.  In order to have bread, people had to gather wood, build a fire in their outdoor oven, grind the wheat into flour, mix the dough, let the dough rise, and finally bake the bread. It was a long process to bake bread, and you didn't do it every day.  If you ran out of bread, you just borrowed from your neighbor - just like your neighbor borrowed from you.  But if your neighbor needed bread and you told your neighbor to come by tomorrow to get the bread, when you actually already had some bread, well, that wasn't right.  That let you keep your bread another day, but it caused your neighbor to have to make another trip.  You would be taking advantage of your neighbor.  To put it in today's language, if you mow someone's yard for them and they ask you to come back tomorrow and they will pay you then, but they have the money to pay you right now, that isn't right.  If you baby sit for someone and they ask you to come by their house tomorrow to get the money that they owe you, but they have the money in their purse right now, that isn't right.  They are just being stingy - they just want to hang onto their money one more day.  Actually, they want to hang onto your money one more day.  Solomon said that wasn't right.  You should pay someone right away - right when the money is due to them!  They worked for their money.  They deserve their money right away.

Read Proverbs 3:11&12  Wow!  These are two difficult verses.  How many of you like spankings?  Well, I don't either.  Although it's been a looooooooong time since I have had one, I still remember the stinging of it!  The word correction that is used here could also mean a time out, or a talking to, or just a serious look from your parent.  Verse 11 says two things about correction.  First it says that we shouldn't despise chastening.  Despise is a pretty strong word.  It is almost as strong as the word hate.  When your mother corrects you, does it make you mad?  Does it bother you?  Do you wish that you didn't have to be made to feel like a little baby being told what to do all the time?  And then secondly, verse 11 says not to be weary of correction.  Do you get tired of being told over and over again not to do something?  Do you get weary of being told what to do?  Well verse 11 says not to despise chastening nor to be weary of correction.  Then verse 12 tells us why we should not despise or be weary of correction.  Correction is actually proof that our parents love us!  You see, your mother and father only correct their own children.  If you are playing at a party and you and another kid get into a fight, does your father correct the other child?  No.  He corrects you because you are his child.  Actually, your mother and father correct you because you belong to them.  God gave you to them.  They love you and want you to turn out right when you grow up.  Actually, if they didn't care about you, they wouldn't even bother to correct you.  They would let you grow up any way that you wanted to.  If your parents didn't care about you they would let you sleep in late and miss school and never clean up your room.  If they didn't love you they would let you grow up lazy and messy and dumb.  But they do care about you.  Verse 12 reminds us that those people whom the Lord loves, He chastens.  He corrects those children whom He cares about.  So when you are corrected at home by your parents, or when you are corrected by God, just realize that you are loved and cared about.  When God makes you feel bad about being naughty, remember that He loves you and He is correcting you in love.  And when you parents correct you, they care about you and want you to grow up to be a fine young man or young woman.  Some day you may have your own little boy or little girl.  Then you will understand correction and love.

Read Proverbs 3:9  There are different ways that we can honor God.  Honoring God means to respect Him.,  We can honor Him by obeying His Words.  We can honor God by being kind to others.  We can honor God by going to His church on Sunday and meeting with God's other children.  But this verse is talking about honoring God with our giving.  When we work and earn money, God expects us to give back part of it to Him.  He gives us the strength and wisdom to work and earn money, and He asks us to thank Him by giving back a part of our earnings to Him.  Sometimes that is called our offering - what we offer back to God.  Sometimes it is called our tithe.  The tithe means one tenth.  If you earn ten cents you owe one cent to God.  If you earn ten dollars, your tithe is one dollar.  The tithe means one out of ten belongs to God.  An offering is above that.  An offering is what we freely give to God.  We don't figure one out of ten, we just give extra to God because we love Him.  But how do we give to God?  Do we take our money and throw it up into the sky and hope that God will take what He wants.  No, we give the money at church in the offering and the church officers give the money out to needy people, to the pastor, to missionaries, to pay the electric bill at church.  They use the money as God would use it.  In the Old Testament, most of the people were farmers.  They would harvest their crops and divide them into ten parts and give God one part of the ten.  When they gathered ten baskets of grain, they gave one basket to God.  When they gathered 100 clusters of grapes they gave 10 clusters to God.  But they loved God so much that, when they began their harvest, they gave God the first basket of grain.  They gave God the first clusters of grapes.  Doesn't that show God that we really love Him! We don't just give him one of the ten baskets; we give Him the first basket; we give God the firstfruits!  Let's honor God.  Let's give Him the best.  I know that He will be pleased with our gifts to Him.

Read proverbs 3:5&6  Verse 5 has two opposites that help us to understand what trusting in the Lord is all about.  The first part tells us how much we should trust in the Lord.  We should trust in the Lord with all of our heart.  That is quite a a lot!  When a baseball player plays hard people say that he plays with all of his heart.  If a football player tries very hard to get the ball across the goal line he is said to be giving it all of his heart.  That is how we should trust God.  But the last part of the verse tells us the opposite.  We should not lean on our own understanding.  That means that we should not depend on our own understanding.  We may think that we know how to get to heaven, but our own understanding may not be correct - we have never been to heaven - we don't really know the way!  Only God knows the way to heaven because He lives there!  He knows!  We should not trust in our own wisdom.   We should trust in God's wisdom.  Verse 6 us that even though we may not know the way to heaven, we can trust in God to get us there.  If we will admit that the Lord is the boss of our lives, then He will show us the way to get to heaven and how we should act here on earth before we go to heaven.  And where do you suppose that we can learn about God and what He says about how we should live our lives?  That's right: in His Word, the Bible.  If we read and obey God's Word, and we act like He is the boss of our lives, He will give us direction in our lives.  He will guide us in the way that we should go and take us to heaven some day!  We need God now as we live and we need God when we die in order to take us to heaven.  And best of all, God wants to be our friend and to be with us every day.  And God wants to be our Savior and to take us to heaven when we die!  Let's let God be our boss and friend!

Read Proverbs 2:10-12  These three verses are hard to understand, but they are good verses and tell us how to be a wise son or daughter.  Let's take these verses one at a time and break them down so that we can understand what they mean.  Verse 10 says that we should let wisdom enter down into our hearts.  We should let wisdom become part of us deep down inside.  Verse 10 goes on to say that we should make knowledge pleasant to our souls.  That means that we should like to learn things that are good.  Things that make us better children should become habits in our lives.  Verses 11 and 12 go together.  They are opposites and help us to understand each other.  Verse 11 talks about discretion and verse 12 talks about speaking froward things.  These are opposites.  We should use discretion - a good thing- and we should not speak froward things - bad things.  The Bible speaks often about the tongue. Our tongue is a little part of our body, yet it is a powerful part.  We should think before we say something.  Once we say something, it is out and we can't un-say it.  Once we say something, we can't take it back.  So we should think before we say something.  Have you ever said something that got you into trouble?  May be it was a lie.  Or may be it was an unkind thing.  Or it was hurtful words.  Verse 12 calls these careless words froward things.  Froward means words that got out of our lips before we thought about them.  Froward words are careless or hurtful or false or wicked.  Discretion in verse 11 means tat we are careful not to say froward words as in verse 12.  Please be careful and watch your words so that no wasted words will get out of your mouth.  Once you have said something - it is out.  It's too late.  You can't take it back no matter how much you would like to.  Wisdom in verse 10 means to be smart.  Discretion in verse 11 means to be careful.  And froward in verse 12 are careless words.  Don't let careless words get out of your mouth!

Read Proverbs 1:22  Here in verse 22 Solomon lists 3 different kind of people.  If you recall, Solomon is writing to his son to encourage him to be wise and to follow God's Words.  Can you remember the three different kinds of people that are mentioned in this verse?  Along with Solomon's wise son there are simple, scorners and fools.  If I were to go into your Sunday school class, I might find all four of these kinds of boys and girls.  But have you noticed that wise children and foolish children do not have name tags on them that say wise and fool.  So, how can we tell when a kid is wise, or simple, or a scorner, or a fool?  The Bible says "by their fruits ye shall know them." Matthew 7:20.  That uses the word picture of fruit trees.  You know that a tree is an apple tree because ___.  Well, because it has apples on it.  We know that a tree is a pear tree because it has pears on it.  So, if I go into your Sunday school class and someone is making fun of the teacher I know that they are a scorner.  They mock good things and they like to do wicked things.  They are a scorner.  If the teacher says, "Okay, it's time to get quiet and start class,"  and one of the kids just keep on talking as if nothing happened, well, they are a fool.  They don't notice things.  They just don't get it.  They are a fool.  If another one of the kids laughs at the fool and laughs at the scorner and follows right along with the mischief that the scorner is getting into, then that kid is a simple child.  They don't think for themselves.  They are a follower.  Thy are easily led into trouble and are like the bird that we talked about yesterday.  They don't see that trouble is coming.  They just follow the scorner or the fool right on into trouble.  But let's not forget the fourth person.  This one is not actually mentioned in our verse for today, but is mentioned many times earlier: this one is the wise son or daughter. They listen to their father and their mother and their Sunday school teacher and their pastor.  They notice when others get into trouble and they don't do those things because they are wise.  They learn from the mistakes of others.  They watch and see when others get into trouble and they don't do do those things.  They see when others do well, and they do those kinds of things.  They are smart.  They are wise.  I hope you grow up to be a wise son or daughter.  Now let's review for a minute:  Can you list the four types of children and how you know who they are?

Read Proverbs 1:17  Solomon is warning his son here in verse 17 that he had better be careful and watch out for those who would get him to do evil things.  Bad friends always want us to get into trouble with them.  They like to have someone around to laugh at their sinful tricks.  We are warned here in verse 17 to wise up and not to follow wicked friends.  Solomon says that if we foolishly follow naughty friends into mischief, we are like a foolish bird that gets trapped.  The hunter sets a trap for a bird and then baits the trap with seed.  Although the bird saw the hunter set the trap, it looks at the seed and is so tempted with the bait that it swoops down to eat the seed and is quickly caught in the hunter’s net.  If you know that some of your friends are wicked, don’t follow them!  You should know better than to follow them into trouble.  Don’t be suckered into following evil friends.  Just like the trapped bird, you will get caught.  Don’t let Satan trap you through evil friends.  Think!  Do the right thing.  Don’t follow foolish friends!

Read Proverbs 1:10  The book of Proverbs was written by Solomon, who was David’s son.  When Solomon first became king, God asked him what he wanted God to give him.  Solomon did not ask God for victory in wars; he did not ask for wealth; he did not ask to be famous.  Solomon wisely asked for God to give him wisdom so that he could rule over his country wisely.  Since Solomon asked for something so unselfish, God said that He would give him not only the wisdom that he had asked for, but also wealth, power and fame.  Solomon wrote the book of Proverbs to give advice to his sons.  I am glad that we can read Solomon’s words of wisdom too – words that Solomon actually got from God Himself.  Here in verse 10 Solomon tells his son that sinners are going to try to get him to do wicked things.  But he says that when sinners try to get you to do evil things, just don’t do it.  When someone tries to get you to do the wrong thing just say NO!  Don’t do it!

Read Proverbs 1:7  Many times in Proverbs you will see the little word but.  But is called a conjunction.  A conjunction is a joining word.  It joins two parts of a sentence together.  But the word but is also a contrasting word.  It is joining parts that are not equal.  It may actually join opposites.   Your mom may say, “We are going to the park today, but you have to do your schoolwork first.”  Can you see the opposites that the word but is joining?  You have to do your schoolwork before you get to go to the park.  If you don’t do your schoolwork you may not be able to go to the park.  The little word but is powerful – it means a lot.  Here in our verse the word but is joining two very different parts.  The first part talks about wise children who respect the Lord.  And the second part talks about foolish children who will not respect the Lord nor listen to their teachers or parents.  And our little word but joins these two statements together.  So you see you can be one or the other of these two: you can be wise and fear the Lord, or you can be foolish and not listen to anyone.  If you are wise, you will listen to those who are over you, but if you are foolish, you will ignore everyone and go your own way.  The choice is up to you:  to be wise or foolish.  Let me use the word but one last time: you can be wise, but you can be foolish.

Before your parents read this Psalm, get your fingers ready to count.  I want you to count how many times the word praise is used in this Psalm.  Are you ready?  OK now read Psalms 150:1-6  This Psalm begins with "Praise ye the Lord" and ends with "Praise ye the Lord".  I think King David is telling us to Praise the Lord!  So, how many times did you count the word praise?  I counted eleven.  In only six verses we are commanded to praise the Lord eleven times!  In this, his very last Psalm, King David is leaving us with the importance of praising the Lord.  Here in this Psalm, there are several places to praise the Lord.  We should praise Him at home and at church.  There are several reasons that we should praise the Lord.  We should praise Him because He takes care of us and meets our needs.  There are several ways that we can praise the Lord.  We can say good things about God and we can sing His praises at church.  We can play instruments to praise the Lord.  But, most important of all, we just need to do it.  We ought to praise the Lord.  We should praise Him because we are thankful.  We should praise the Lord!

Read Psalms 147:11  This verse tells us the kind of people that God likes.  We know that God loves everyone, but that doesn’t mean that he likes what everyone does.  Some people make God sad and some people make God glad.  This verse tells us that God takes pleasure in two kinds of people.  The first kind of people that God takes pleasure in are those who fear Him.  That doesn’t mean that they are afraid of God and run and hide.  To fear God means to respect Him.  It is like you respect your father.  You like your dad and you have fun with your dad, but you know that if you do things that are naughty, you will be in trouble with your dad.  You are afraid of getting into trouble so you do not do those naughty things because you fear your father.  God likes people who fear Him.  And then God likes people who “hope in His mercy”.  God likes people who know that they are going to mess up and do wrong things – but they know that they can depend upon God’s forgiveness.  When we sin, we don’t have to just give up and keep on sinning; we can get God’s forgiveness and get back to being clean before God.  We can depend upon God’s mercy.  And God likes it when we act like we can depend upon Him.  Isn’t it great to be able to do things that makes God happy?

Read Psalms 147:5  In this verse, King David says that God is great.  Then he goes on to give us two reasons that God is great.  Can you remember what those two reasons are?  The first one is that God has great power.  When we see everything that God has made – the earth and all that is in it – we know that He has great power.  The last half of our verse gives us the second reason that God is great: His understanding is infinite.  Infinite is a word that I have a hard time with.  Infinite means never ending.  Infinite describes many things about God.  God has always existed and He will always exist.  That means He is infinite.  God’s power is greater than anything in the whole wide world.  His power is infinite.  God knows everything because He made everything.  That means that His understanding is infinite.  I am glad that God is in charge of the world because only He could know how to keep it all going.  Isn’t it wonderful that He understands us too.  Whatever problems that we have, He understands.  He understands everything!

Read Psalms 145:8  Sometimes it is hard for us to know about God because we can’t see Him.  In our verse, King David tells us four truths about God.   David tells us first of all that God is gracious.  Someone who is gracious is someone who makes you feel like they are glad to be around you.  They look at you straight in the eyes and smile.  They listen to what you have to say and laugh when you say something that is funny.  They seem to understand you.  Then, David says that God is full of compassion.  Compassion tells us how God feels about us.  God likes us and feels sorry for us and gives us what we need.  He cares about us.  The third truth about God is that He is slow to anger.  That is a great characteristic because we do things all the time that make him angry.  We disappoint Him and do wrong things all the time.  But He is slow to get angry with us.  He is patient with us and gives us a chance to ask for forgiveness for our sins before he gets angry.  Then last of all, God has mercy upon us.  Mercy means that God does not punish us for what we have done, but He forgives us.  But more than that, our verse says that God is of great mercy.  I am sure that we mess up so much that God could really get mad at us if He wanted to.  But God is merciful and even has great mercy towards us – He forgives us over and over again.  We have a great God, don’t we!

Psalm 145:4  Do you know who your grandmother is?  You probably do.  Do you know who your great-grandmother is?  You might.  But most of us have never met, nor do we know who our great-great grandmother is.  In our verse, King David reminds us that we should tell our children how great God has been to us.  We can do this because our mother told us how great God was to her.  And she can tell us how great God is because her mother told her how great God was to her.   And our Grandmother told our mother how great God was because her mother – our great grandmother – told her how great God was to her.  That is the way we can be reminded of how great God is.  Each person must tell their children those important things: how great God was to them.  I hope you realize how great God is to you.  Has God given you loving parents?  Has God given you a good church?  Has God given you loving brothers and sisters?  We do have a lot to be thankful for, don’t we!  And when you grow up and have your own children, like our verse says, be sure to tell them how good God has been to you!  Then someday, your children can tell their children about a good and great God that they heard about from you!

Read Psalms 141:3  King David was a mighty man who fought many wars.  In our verse today, he uses two military word pictures to explain how we should control our talking.  Sometimes we say the wrong thing and are careless about our words.  We may say something that is rude and hurt someone’s feelings before we realize what we have said.  David says that we should set a watch before our mouth.  That is like setting an armed guard before the door of the castle.  David says that we should have some kind of a guard that checks out everything that we say before it goes out of our mouth.  That may sound complicated, but we just need to remember to be careful about what we say before we say it.  It is hard to take back rude words once we have already said them.  Just like in a castle, once a careless guard has let a spy sneak into the castle, it is hard to find the spy and then to get capture him.  The castle is already in trouble and the spy is already in.  The guard has to do a good job keeping the spy out before he gets in.  The second military word picture is that of the gate to the castle.  Our mouth is like the gate to the castle.  Sometimes when we get ready to say something smart, we should just not say it.  We want our friends to think that we are clever and say funny things, but we may not realize that the funny things that we say may hurt someone’s feelings.  Just like the guard has to keep the gate shut, we should keep our mouth shut before we say something that we will be sorry for later.  We should think before we say the wrong thing and we should think before we say a hurtful thing.  Just like the watchman and the castle gate, we must always be on our guard.  Guard your mouth!

Read Psalms 140:12  This verse tells us that God will take care of 2 groups of people.  Who are they?  We know who the poor are, but who are the afflicted?  Someone who is afflicted is someone who is handicapped.  A handicapped person is someone who has a crooked hand or someone who walks with a limp or someone who is in a wheelchair.  A handicapped person might be someone who can’t talk very clearly or they might be someone who isn’t as smart as we are.  Handicapped people are different.  Some kids make fun of people who are different, but that makes them feel bad.  Do you like to be made fun of?  I don’t.  Neither does a handicapped person.  They may be different from us, but they have feelings just like we do.  And our verse says that God will take care of them.  God loves handicapped people and He frowns on people who make fun of handicapped people.  God takes care of the handicapped – the afflicted - and the poor.  We should take care of the afflicted and the poor as well.  I want to be on God’s side, don’t you?

Read Psalms 139:23&24  King David is asking a hard thing of God in these 2 verses.  And we should ask the same thing of God.  King David is asking God to check him out.  King David is asking God to tell him about any problems that God sees in David’s life.  We can’t see our own hair – except in a mirror.  When we are getting ready for church, sometimes our mother says, “Come here and let me see how you look.”  We can’t see our own hair, but our mother can see it.  She may say, “Here, let me fix your hair.”  And then she begins to comb our hair and to make it lay down.  If our hair is sticking up in the back and we go to church that way, some of the kids will laugh at us.  But if someone who loves us sees our hair sticking up, they will stop us and tell us that our hair is sticking up and help us to fix it so that we won’t be embarrassed and look silly.  God is someone who loves us and doesn’t want us to look silly.  We should ask God to show us problems in our life that we ourselves do not see.  We should ask God to point out anything that is wicked in our lives so that we can clean it out.  I want to be clean in front of God, don’t you?  When God speaks to your heart and shows you something that is wrong inside of you, be brave and ask for forgiveness and ask God to clean your life out.  Listen to God’s Word and obey it – you will be happy if you do.

Read Psalms 139:14-17  These verses are hard to understand, but they are very interesting.  Verse 14 begins by saying that we are fearfully and wonderfully made.  The rest of these verses go on to tell how God made us inside of our mother’s tummy before we were born!  Isn’t God amazing!  Verse 15 says that when we were inside of our mother and just a teeny tiny little growing baby, God already knew all about us.  Before anyone else knew that we were there and growing into a baby, God knew us!  God knew all about us because He was the one who made us and put us together.  Although it is true that we get half of ourselves from our mother and the other half from our father, God is the one who makes us just the way He wants us to be.  Verse 16 says that when we were just a tiny blob of cells - without legs or arms or anything – God already knew what He was planning for us to be like.  Before we were even made, God knew what we were going to be like because He was the One making us!  Our last verse is a good one because it says everything: how precious are God’s thoughts towards us!  Just like a mother takes good care of her newborn little baby, God loves and takes care of us!  God is awesome!

Read Psalms 139:7-12  King David reminds us in these verses that God is everywhere.  There are three different far away places that are mentioned in verses 8 and 9.  Can you remember them?  David says in verses 11 and 12 that even in the darkness, we can’t hide from God.  The soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq used night vision goggles to see the enemy at night.  Our soldiers could see them, but the enemy could not see us!  It is as if God has night vision goggles and sees us even in the darkness!  David says in verse 12 that the darkness is just like broad daylight to God – He sees everything; He sees everywhere; He sees all of the time!  Isn’t God amazing!  I am glad that He loves me, aren’t you?

Read Psalms 139:1-4  God is great.  God is good.  These verses remind us that God sees everything.  God knows everything.  He knows when we sit down.  He knows when we stand up.  He even knows what we are thinking!  Verse three says that God “compassest my path.”  That means that He is all around us, watching us from all sides!   The end of verse three says that He knows all of our ways.  Verse four says that God knows all of the words that our tongue says.  He knows the good things that we say, and He knows the wicked things that we say.  When we are laughing and talking to our friends and our father walks up, do we stop talking?  Do we change what we are talking about if our father is right there listening?  If that is so, we probably should not be saying those things anyway.  After all, our heavenly Father is listening to what we are saying all the time.  That’s something to think about!

Read Psalms 137:1-4  This is a sad Psalm.  When things were going good, the nation of Israel would forget God.  They would forget that it was really God who was the One who was making things to go good for them.  So God would send preachers called prophets to warn Israel, but sometimes they wouldn’t even listen to the prophets.  God would have to send in one of Israel’s enemies to teach them a lesson.  Once, God sent in King Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon who destroyed their country and carried many of the people off to Babylon.  As you could imagine, they were sad to be in a strange country as prisoners of war.  Our verses tell their sad story.  They sat down in a strange place and cried and cried as they remembered their home.  They didn’t feel like singing so they hung their musical harps up on a willow tree.  But to make things worse, the men who had captured them made them to sing songs for their entertainment!  Here they were, in a strange country, sad and away from home, having to sing happy songs.  But deep down in their hearts they longed to be at home in Israel and to be free.  I think that is when they realized what they had done.  That was when they were sorry that they had forgotten God and had neglected God’s words.  I imagine that they were truly sorry for their sins.  But do you know what – God was sorry too.  God didn’t want to punish them, but He had to so that they would see that they were wrong and would come back to Him.  Sometimes God must punish us – for our own good – so that we will learn and come back to where we belong: back to God. 

Read Psalms 136:1&26  Isn't it interesting that the first and last verse of this Psalm are almost exactly alike?  We are reminded to do what in these two verses?  It is important for us to be thankful.  The opposite of thankful is selfish.  I am sure you would rather be thankful than selfish.  No one likes to be around a selfish person.  The only thing that they talk about is themselves.  How boring.  And then the reason that we should be thankful is because the Lord is good.  Think of some of the things that the Lord has done for you today.  Then think of some of the things that God had given you today.  The last part of these two verses is exactly the same: His mercy endures forever.  Do you remember the difference between grace and mercy?  Grace is God giving us something good that we do not deserve.  Mercy is God not giving us the punishment that we do deserve.  God knows ahead of time that we are going to mess things up.  But He is willing to forgive us and to give us His mercy instead of punishing us for what we have done.  And that is just another reason that God is good!  Thank the Lord in your prayers tonight because He is good.  He will like that.

Read psalms 135:15-18  These 4 verses are pretty funny.  Yet, the subject that they are talking is not very funny.  The subject is idols.  The idols that King David was talking about in these 4 verses are different that the idols that we have today.  King David said that the idols were made of silver and gold, but they were made by people.  Isn't it strange that someone would make an idol and then worship the thing that they had just made?  That is not very smart.  And then the idols themselves were not very smart.  In verse 16, King David said that they had mouths, but they couldn't do what?  The idols had eyes, but they couldn't do what?  Verse 17 said that they had ears, but what couldn't they do?  Our verse finally says that the idols weren't even real, because there was no breath in their mouth.  They just sat there and couldn't do anything!.  Yet people worshiped them just as if they were real.  Today we have different idols.  Our idols take up our time.  Some people may worship the idol of sports.  They spend all of their time watching or playing sports.  Their idol is the idol of sports.  Other people may worship the idol of video games.  They spend all of their time playing video games.  Some people may worship the idol of television.  They spend all of their time on the couch watching T.V.  There isn't anything wrong with sports or video games or just relaxing, but when these waste so much of your time, they are an idol.  Can you think of another idol that is a time waster today?  But in the 10 commandments we are told to have no other gods before the true God of the universe.  When something takes the place of the God who created everything, that is a false god - that is an idol!  Don't forget the warning about idols and the people who make them in verse 18, "They that make them are like unto them."  If the idols are foolish, what are the people who worship them?  If the idols are silly, what are the people who worship them?  If the idols just sit around and can't do anything for themselves, what are the people who worship them?  Don't let anything take the place of the true God of creation!  Put God first in your life and you'll never be sorry that you did!

Read Psalms 133:1  This verse talks about unity.  The word unity means to get along with one another.  It is important for us to get along with one another.  We need to get along with our brother and sister.  We need to get along with our parents.  We need to get along with our teachers and fellow students at school.  We need to get along with our coach and teammates in sports.  Are you getting the picture?  We need to get along with everyone else.  Sometimes we need to change the way that we think in order for us to get along with people, but sometimes we need to get other people to understand us so that they will get along with us.  But usually we both need to give in a little bit to each other so that we can all get along together.  If we can stop and look at a situation the way that the other person sees it, we can usually learn to get along with them.  For example, sometimes we get tired of hearing our mother say, "Will you please take out the garbage."   We might think, "Why is she always bothering me about taking out the garbage?"  But if we see the situation the way that our mother sees it, we may understand.  She wants to fix supper for the family, but she can't peel the potatoes because the garbage can is already full.  And it had been full all morning.  Then she looks over to see us playing a video game while she is working in the kitchen trying to fix supper for us!  Does she think that is fair?  Shouldn't we both be doing our jobs?  Mother cleans the kitchen and fixes the meals and we take out the garbage.  That is "dwelling together in unity," as our verse says.  That is getting along together - everyone is happy.