Welcome to the Daily Blade. The word of God is described as the sword of the spirit, the primary spiritual weapon in the Christian's armor against the forces of evil. Your hosts are Joby Martin and Kyle Thompson, and they stand ready to equip men for the fight. Let's sharpen up.

Welcome back. This week on the Daily Blade, we're leaning on the work of Al Robertson as it pertains to men being respectable in the context of marriage. So Al uses Job 31 to elucidate that, and we're spending time in some passages of that Old Testament chapter this week. Yesterday we used Job 31, verses 13, 14, and 15 to show how men should treat others respectably. Today we're looking at Job 31, verses 16 and 17, and 24. So let's go ahead and look at those now. Job 31, 16 and 17, and then 24. If I have withheld anything that the poor desired, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail, or have eaten my morsel alone, and the fatherless and the fatherless have not eaten of it. And then verse 24. If I have made gold, my trust are called fine gold, my confidence. So how is a man respectable? He displays consistent generosity and encourages contentment over greed. So in verse in verses 16 and 17, Job is talking about actively meeting the needs of the most vulnerable. So he is not withholding from the orphan nor the widow. He is not acting selfishly, he is proactively sharing his resources. So we see calls for this throughout scripture. So Proverbs 19, 17, whoever is generous to the poor lends to the Lord, and he will repay him for his deed. So we see this echoed by John the Baptist as he's preparing the way for Jesus. We see this in Luke 3, verses 10 and 11. And the crowds asked him, What then shall we do? And he answered them, Whoever has two tunics is to share with him who has none, and whoever has food is to do likewise. And when you act like this, you know, and approach life this way, it shows that you are prioritizing the comfort of others over yourself. So let me just ask you, are you generous like that? So I'll speak for myself here. I've actually struggled with generosity at different points in my life. I guess you say a lot of points in my life. So you've probably heard people say that the more money someone has just makes them more of who they already are, or some derivative of that. So if you're generous with a little, you'll be generous with a lot. And if you're stingy with a little, you'll be stingy with a lot. Well, I'm kind of weird because I was stingy when I had a little, and now I'm generous now that I have more, or you could call it a lot. But my biggest concern is actually just making sure for me that there is consistency in my generosity. So I try to make sure that it's not contingent on my feelings or my perceived place in life. And so let's actually look back at Job 31, verse 24 again. If I have made gold my trust or called fine gold my confidence, so this is a big one for a lot of guys because we always have a desire for more. And the more, whether it's money or land or stuff or whatever, the more is where we find contentment, security, and power. And we're gonna mainly focus on the contentment piece here. But guys, you know this to be true. Greed is a trap because you can never fully and finally satisfy the longings in your heart with capital and trinkets, right? So I mean, look at King Solomon. So super rich dude, super wise dude, got laid a bunch, and then you get to the end of his life, and he's writing the book of Ecclesiastes, and he seems just kind of worn out and beat down. And I mean, this guy had it all, including unimaginable wealth, and it just wasn't enough. He saw that it was a trap. So Ecclesiastes 1, verses 2 and 3, vanity of vanities, says the preacher, vanity of vanities, all is vanity. What does man gain by all the toil at which he toils under the sun? And then Ecclesiastes 5 10, he who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves wealth with his income, this also is vanity. But do we believe that? Because some of us will say that we do, but then all of our actions point the opposite direction. So instinctively almost, we know that money will not satisfy us, but we will sacrifice our relationship with the Lord, our wives, and our children, whom we purport to love, on the altar of more. And it's because of where we put our trust. Our trust is not in the provision and protection of the Lord. Our trust is in what we have, could, or might produce. It's in the fullness of our storehouses. But let me just tell you guys the tighter you clinch your fist around gold, the looser your connection will be to God. So, men, if you want to be respectable, especially as it pertains to your wife, you need to display consistent generosity and encourage contentment over greed. All right, guys, we'll see you back here tomorrow as we wrap up the week.

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