Righteousness or Lawlessness - Which will it be?

We'll be back in chapter 11 of the book of Proverbs. Now last week you know we finished up chapter 10. I took two messages to get through chapter 10. Now if you really think about how we dealt with chapter 10, we really did have two approaches with the chapter. The first message within the chapter, chapter 10, I took the time really just to divide three verses. We looked at verse 1, we looked at verse 8, and we looked at verse 14. And I really went deep with those verses. I spent time in those verses. I got all that I could get out of those verses. Truthfully there's a lot more, but we would have had to have gone even longer.

But the second message in chapter 10, I really covered a lot of material really fast. I didn't go quite as deep in the messages. Now I bring that to your attention because we really need to develop two disciplines in our study. And then also when we're teaching God's word, there's a discipline of study and then there's a discipline of listening. We need to develop the discipline, the practice of going deep. Taking one verse, going deep, maybe several messages there, studying it, meditating over it, praying over it. And then there are times when we take scripture, we look at the meaning real quickly, and then we move on.

There's a time and a place for both. Now remember that we're in a different portion or section of the book of Proverbs. chapters 10 to 31 is much different. Chapters 1 to 9 is the introduction to the book. Bible scholars that know a whole lot more about the book tell us that. But we will see a difference when we get into the chapters. Chapter 10 on into chapter 31. And it's different because of the construction. Now chapter 11 is much like chapter 10. I said this last week, I'll say it again. There's a lot of one liners and then there's a lot of two liners. One liners and two liners. Now let me go a little deeper with that.

Let me explain to you the form of what's called the literature or the writing. This will be a little bit of an education here. Now the reason that we see these one liners, these two liners, is because this originally was Hebrew poetry. This was originally Hebrew poetry. These Proverbs are mostly called what is called couplets. Couplets are two phrases which are generally related to each other by what is called parallelism. Hebrew poetry was full of repeating and contrasting thought. And that is why we see the repetition. That's why we see contrasts. And this is extremely important. And I want to give you a little more of this information.

I want to give you a little more in this literary construction, the education here. And this will help us more than you know. There are three types of parallelism. You know what I mean by parallelism? Things that run parallel. Three types of parallelism in Proverbs. First there is what's called synonymous parallelism which simply restates the same thought. Let me just say it a simplistic way. This is a statement that is made and then the same idea is restated kind of in another way. And I think that's obvious. And then second there's what's called this antithetical parallelism which simply contrasts the thought.

Now let me explain that simply. A statement is made and then a contrasting idea is put right there beside it. And then third there's what's called a synthetic parallelism which simply is a developing thought. Simply this means there is a statement that is made then there's a second statement and it just continues and it develops that thought. So this is the types of parallelism that we see in the book of Proverbs. Now truthfully I know how some of us think, some of us might think why do we need to hear that? Listen, knowing how the Proverbs are written and why it helps us understand.

If we know how it's written and we know why it's written that way then we understand the light bulb will go off. Some of us will say oh okay I get it and you'll start to recognize it. Now my encouragement is for you to understand that construction. This will help you when you study. Remember I'm encouraging you to study behind, read last week's chapter, then read this week's chapter, then read a chapter ahead. I was talking with one of the men of the church. He was telling me how he was doing that and he was explaining that that was been good for him. And if you understand the construction as you're reading you'll begin to see it.

It'll make sense and then it'll help you in your grasp and understanding of the verses. Now I said earlier we're going to be in chapter 11. We're going to look at various subjects because there's all kind of subjects in the chapter. We're not going to cover all of it. I'll go ahead and give you the title of what we're going to look at. I'm going to bring the title up all throughout the message. We're going to be looking at what I'm calling righteousness or lawlessness. Now you see I've got a question right after or just after the title. I'm going to come back to that question but we're going to be looking at righteousness or lawlessness.

We're going to look at three subjects. Next week we're going to look at three more subjects out of the chapter. We're going to look at some different subjects out of the chapter that we don't have time to look at tonight. Truthfully there was one subject I wanted us to look at but we just don't have time. We'll get there next week. So I want to go ahead and show you the information that we're going to look at. These are what I call the major truths. So we're going to be looking at number one fault scales or correct scales. This comes out of verse 1. Fault scales are correct scales. Look at verse 1 of chapter 11.

A false balance is an abomination to the Lord but a just weight is His delight. Now right in this one verse, verse 1, we see a reference to many things that would have gotten the attention of Solomon's young son. Let's do not forget the fact that Solomon is writing all of this to his young son. Lots of stuff would have gotten his attention especially verse 1. This verse would have really resonated with the people in Solomon's day. Numerous pictures would have come to their minds. Even sounds would have come into their ears. Sounds and thoughts would have come to their mind.

No doubt even names and experiences would have come to the young son's mind. Now let me show you what I mean. I'm going to have to explain some of this language. Look back at verse 1. A false balance. I'm going to have to explain that. So first the word balance here. It refers to scales. That refers to a set of scales. Scales were used in everyday life in their day. Scales were used to measure out or to weigh items. I'll give you an example. If wheat or corn was sold, well it was weighed. So the word balance would bring up the imagery of scales in the young son's mind. He would have known exactly what they were. I thought about an example.

When you go into Wal-Mart and you go into the produce section, you know where you buy bananas and all that stuff, there are scales there. There are scales. If you go into certain supermarkets, they might have these big scales where you weigh certain things. If you go to checkout, sometimes they'll have a digital scale there. Maybe if you go to a feed store, there's a particular feed store where I trade. I've bought seed before and they'll weigh that seed. So this is referring to scales. That's not as common for us in our day. I'm going to talk a little more about that.

But second, the word balance here, it is a reference to a particular part of the scales. On one side, they had stones in that day for weights. On the other side, it was the item that was being weighed. Now let me explain what I mean. So they had the scales. Just in my mind, I think about it like this. If they had a five pound weight over here and they were trying to sell or measure out five pounds of wheat or corn, well, it would even out. You get the idea. So the balance here would refer to the weights that went on the scales, that were on one side of the scales. So the word balance would bring up the image of the stones.

That automatically reminds me of something that I experienced as a kid. My grandfather had these antique, he called them pea scales. I've seen them in stores throughout the years and antique stores and such. And I think my grandfather probably got them from his father. And we used to weigh deer with those things. When we were kids, we'd kill a deer and he'd weigh those deer. But he had on one side a weight. And oh, he was real careful about that weight because if you didn't have the weight, you couldn't weigh whatever you were trying to weigh.

So when I was studying this about the balance and the stones, I automatically thought about that weight that went on those scales. But then third, the language of the scales and the weights would bring up the sights and the sounds of commerce or trade. It would bring up the imagery of the market, buying and selling. They had large open markets in that day. Really that was the grocery store of their day. They had open markets where they would trade goods. And so those selling goods, they had scales to weigh out all sorts of items. I've told you all numerous times about going to India and going all over the place in India.

I remember being in the capital city. We would go through all of these markets. I remember going through the meat market. Yeah, there was this long street and they had raw meat hanging up, no refrigeration, all types of meat. People were buying that meat. And I remember on the left side one day, we were riding down through the meat market and somebody said, well, that's where they sell dog. And they had dog. They were selling dogs. And I remember going through the market. You would see them like you see maybe on television. They had scales and they were weighing out items all the time. And what am I trying to show you?

That's the imagery here. And this young man here, he would have known the sights and the sounds and the smells of the markets and merchants and individuals using those scales. But then fourth, there's the phrase false balance. Look at the phrase, a false balance. Now this really would have gotten the young son's attention. This is a reference to crooked scales or faulty measurements. This would have brought up the imagery or the idea of a crooked businessman, a liar, a cheat. This would have brought up probably the names and the faces of those who were trying to get something over on someone.

They were trying to cheat them, get the best of them. Now I could have gone a lot more with that. I think you understand the background here and we can get the meaning of the teaching tool. There's a teaching tool in the verse. So the teaching tool is the scales, a tool that was used to measure out goods for trade. But we need to see what Solomon is trying to teach his son. We need to see that there's one lesson here and it's taught in two ways. Now look, here's our parallelism contrast. We're going to see that there's parallelism here. Now first I want us to see that Solomon is teaching that God detests a cheat.

Look at the verse, verse one, a false balance is an abomination to the Lord. So what are you saying right away here? Solomon is saying that God does not like dishonest scales. Now is God saying he doesn't like the scales themselves? No. He is saying that God hates the practice or the use of dishonest scales. God hates dishonesty. God hates no integrity. He is not happy with the one who's cheating somebody. Somebody thinks they're buying five pounds of corn and they're really getting three. God hates it. The man thinks he's buying a certain product, but he's not. God hates it. Then second, God delights in honesty.

Look at the contrast, but the just weight is his delight. What is Solomon saying? God loves, he delights on his scales. Again, is he talking about the scales, the stones? No, he's not talking about the physical scales. He is saying that God loves honesty. He delights in the one who deals with other people honestly. So what do we see, there's a lot in that one verse. This is simply a lesson on honesty. One verse, obviously contrasting pictures. We have here contrasting ideas. Again, parallelism. One lesson on honesty, but Solomon uses or illustrates that in two ways.

He brings up the idea of a crooked businessman and the idea of an honest businessman. Now what does that have to do with us today? Some of you might not even know how scales work. Some of you might not have even seen a pair of scales or a set of scales. Maybe the only scales you've ever seen are bathroom scales. We don't like those, do we? Or maybe the scales in the doctor's office. Last time we took one of our children to the doctor's office, I jumped up on the scales because I don't think our bathroom scales are accurate. But what does the verse mean here? How does it apply to us? Should we just ignore this?

Should we come to this and say, "Well, we don't really trade like that, so we don't really need to look at that." No, that's not the case. We need to see how this applies to us. God wants us to be honest. He wants us to have integrity. I'll give you a good example. Some of you know that I used to do what's called hospice work. That meant I worked for a company and I went and traveled around and I prayed with and prayed for sick families. And I was accountable for all of my mileage. I was accountable for my time. And I had this tablet that I used. I had to put in my mileage. I had to put in my time.

And from the second I started working, I was accountable for every minute. And I was supposed to stay in certain places a certain amount of time. I had a certain amount of time to get from point A to point B. And you know, I just did it. I just worked on it. As a matter of fact, I had a notebook. I wrote all that stuff out, my mileage, my time. And then I put my information in my tablet because that information was sent to my office. It was sent to my boss. And I'll never forget one day my boss looked at me and she said, you know, I don't have to worry about you. And I said, what do you mean? She said, you go where you say you're going to go.

You do what you say you're going to do. And I know it. And it wasn't just that she was looking at what I sent in. See that tablet that I had was trackable. She could see if I said I was in Macomb, she could see if I was in Macomb. And I looked at her and I said, you mean to tell me there are certain people you have to worry about? And she said, if you only knew people say they're at work and they're shopping with her mother. I just said, how in the world can you do that? And she said, I don't have to worry about you. I worry about others. You know what she was saying? Brother Chris, you're honest. You have integrity.

See, God hates dishonesty. If we were going to put this verse into our language and with that job setting, you could say God hates a dishonest tablet because you're cheating. You are being dishonest. I give you another example. Brother Keith and Mr. Teresa just sold their older minivan, their Nissan van. And I remember when Brother Keith was selling that van, he was advertising it. And he told me many times he wanted to be honest. He wanted to tell everybody what the people that were buying it, if there was anything wrong with it, he wanted to show them every little scratch or every little dent or any tear in the seat.

He said, because I want them to know what they're getting. And if I see them in Walmart later, I don't want them to be mad at me. That's honesty. I never forget years ago, I sold a car and I told a man everything and I didn't know that anything was wrong with it. And he broke down a week later and he really did think I cheated him. And I did not. Honesty and integrity. I think you can get the idea. But you know, I think about some hypotheticals, adults, when we get ready to do our taxes, we can fudge the numbers. We can just add a zero, take a zero out.

You know, when we're dealing with family and inheritance and all, and you know, do we make sure we get our own when we really just fudge things? See there are all kinds of things. What about you teenagers in your school work and in your tests and in your projects and in your homework, do you do those things with honesty and integrity? When you make an A on a test, did you earn it or did you look on somebody's paper? Did someone do that school project for you and you put your name on it? What is the lesson here? Why am I spending so much time with that one verse? God hates dishonesty. God hates dishonesty. He delights in honesty.

And so here's my question. Are you detestable? Are you detestable in the eyes of God or are you a delight? What does the verse say? A false balance is an abomination. It is detestable to the Lord, but a just weight, honesty, it is a delight. Does God look at what you do with delight or does he detest it? What's the title of the message? Righteousness or lawlessness? What is right? Honesty. What is lawless? Dishonesty. And see, we must take the time to study this because we must be honest. This is fundamental to the Christian faith. Listen, this affects our reputation. This affects how lost people see us.

You think anybody's going to listen to us tell them about Jesus if they know we're a crook? No. I know we spent a lot of time there, but I wanted us to look at that very, very needed lesson. Let's move into number two, let's look at what I'm calling the benefits of righteousness. The benefits of not righteousness. Now here we seem to have a grouping of passages on one particular subject. Now starting in chapter 10, we're going to see the groupings become less and sometimes they will seem a little more random. Now we will see this type of grouping just occasionally. But notice the word righteousness in the verses as we read them.

Look at verse four, riches do not profit a day of wrath, but righteousness. Look at verse five, the righteousness. Look at verse six, the righteousness of the upright. Look at verse eight, the righteousness is delivered. And look at verse nine, with his mouth, the godless man would destroy his neighbor, but by knowledge the righteous are delivered. Now I'm not going to read the rest, I'll read them as we go through. What do we see? The subject of righteousness and righteous living in these verses. Now I'm going to move a little faster here. I'm going to move a little faster in these verses.

Now here's where you'll need to do some study on your own. I'll give you a little instruction here at the end. But notice, notice what I did in verse one. Remember my illustration I talked about last week, a rifle shot or I talked about a shotgun. Listen, verse one was a rifle shot. One verse, I aimed it right between your eyes. But here in these verses it's kind of like a load of buckshot. It's just going out there, okay? And I'm going to speak about this subject of righteous living and we're going to see where it hits all of us. Notice first, righteousness delivers in death.

Look at verse four, "Riches do not profit in the day of wrath, but righteousness delivers from death." Here Solomon is teaching his young son what will deliver him in death. Solomon knows that death comes to all. He knows there's an afterlife. He is telling his son here that death will come and he needs to know this. Now, it's important for us to understand here that the saints in the Old Testament were saved the same way that we are today. That is by grace through faith. Abraham, Isaac and Jacob were saved the same way we are today. Abraham, the father of the faith was justified by grace through faith.

Romans four verses one to eight teaches us that. But what is he saying here? righteousness delivers us in death, not a righteousness that we earn. No, a righteousness that comes by knowing God. I've shared with you many times how God saved me. I was lost and without Christ. God saved me. I was saved by grace through faith, not something that I have done. And we must see that our only hope in death is a righteousness that comes from Christ, not religion, not how good we are, not if our good outweighs our bad. That doesn't get us to heaven. No, our only hope in heaven is a righteousness that comes by grace through faith from Christ.

Then second, notice righteousness keeps one's way right. Righteousness keeps one's way right. The righteousness of the blameless, the righteousness of the blameless keeps his way straight. Here Solomon is teaching his son what will make his life correct, what will make his life good, what will make his life straight. That's righteousness. First knowing God and then second applying God's ways to his life. Simply knowing God and living God's word. Solomon is telling his son what will keep his life straight. And so we must see, listen, we must see what will give us a straight life. We must see what will give us the good life, not a perfect life.

If we're going to have honesty in our work, like we talked about. If we're going to have honesty with our boss or with our job. If we're going to have honesty in school, it's going to be by living God's way, God's righteousness. Then third, righteousness delivers in life. We see that's in verse 6 and 8 and 9. Here in three verses we see the same theme. Look at verse, the beginning of verse 6. The righteousness of the upright delivers there. Look at the beginning of verse 8. The righteous is delivered from trouble. Look at the end of verse 9. But the knowledge of the righteous are delivered. Now here's an important question.

Is Solomon promising his son that if he lives a righteous life that everything will be perfect? There will be no troubles? No. We learned in chapter 10 verse 3 that some of these proverbs must be understood in light of eternity. They do have a general application for the tier and nail, but ultimately these verses must be understood in light of eternity. So what do we see here? This delivers us to life. And then fourth, notice righteousness blesses people. Righteousness blesses a people. I want you to look at verse 10 and 11. When it goes well with the righteous, the city rejoices. Verse 11. By the blessing of the upright, a city is exalted.

Now these proverbs can stir up some questions. He can stir up some confusion for some. I ran across a resource that used a good illustration here. And notice what he said. This resource talked about how King David and Saul are good illustrations of this verse. When King David, when David was king over Israel, Jerusalem became a great city. It became a great city. When King Saul died, there was not much mourning for him because what? He did not bless the city or the people. Now let me help you by giving you what I see as a general principle here. God blesses the righteous and through them others are blessed. That's what we see.

Let me show you some examples. Leadership in government. When we have presidents and those who are in Congress in Washington, when they do right things, it blesses us. When you think about governors, those who are in leadership positions in states, when they do things the right way, God's way, it blesses us. When I think about city officials like a mayor or police officers, when they do things the right way, God's way, it blesses others. Leaders in society, principals, coaches, school teachers, when they do things the right way, it blesses others. I give you a real life example. Brother Keith teaches.

He teaches at a local community college and he does things the right way, God's way, and he is a blessing to others. But think about leaders in other areas of our lives. Family. When we have a mother or a father who live God's way, God's word, it blesses children. In the workplace, when we have a boss who is a godly man and does things God's way, it blesses the employees. Oh, listen, if you're an employee and you live God's way, you bless other employees and even those who are over you. You see what I'm saying? Now, in summary, what are we seeing here? This is a lot. We have a few pictures.

We have a few scriptures grouped together here and Solomon is teaching on the righteous life. He is explaining to his son the benefits of righteous living. Now look back at our verses. Look at verse four. Notice the contrast, riches do not profit in the day of wrath. That's death. But righteousness delivers them from death. Now notice that I taught you the positive. Look at the end of verse four. But righteousness delivers in death. I taught you the positive. But the second part of the verse is the contrast. Remember I gave you that big word, the antithetical parallel? That's what's here. Now here's your assignment.

You go study the passages and you look at the negative parallels. I gave you the positives. You go look at the negatives. I taught you the benefits of righteousness. Now you go study and look at the results of choosing unrighteousness. And you know what you're going to see? Lawlessness. You're going to see foolishness. So what do we see the title of the message? Righteousness or lawlessness? I've shown you the positive, the benefits of righteousness. Now I'm going to transition back to a rifle shot. Remember that illustration? I took verse one and I really aimed it at you. We looked at a whole lot there in those verses.

Now I'm going to move to one verse to verse 14. And there's some other verses I wanted to cover. I'm going to save those for next week. This third thing that I want us to see, the third truth I want us to see is don't reject sound counsel. Look at verse 14. Where there is no guidance, a people falls. But in an abundance of counselors, there is safety. Again Solomon is teaching his young son valuable practical lessons in life.

Now I ran across someone, I don't remember where, but I ran across someone several weeks ago that said they envisioned Solomon's son as grown up son and they envisioned Solomon's son kind of going away into college and he needs some instruction. I like using our imagination like that. We don't know how old his young son was, but based off the proverb we have to see that he was older. But notice two sides of the proverb. Again this is that contrasting parallel here. First people fail with no guidance. Look at verse 14. Where there is no guidance, a people falls.

Here Solomon is telling his young son that without sound, good counsel, without wise advice, without good, godly guidance, listen, you are bound to fail. See young people you need to see this. Let me ask you a question here. Do you ignore wise counsel? Do you ignore wise counsel from your parents? Do you ignore wise counsel from your family? Do you ignore wise counsel from the ministers that God has put in your life? Do you ignore sound counsel from teachers, from neighbors, family members, coaches? Any adult that is in your life, young people, if they give you biblical sound, good counsel, do you ignore that?

Well if you ignore it, you're bound to fail because the proverb says it. Where there is no guidance, a people falls. So if you ignore it, you're going to fail. But then notice the opposite. Wise counsel, it prospers us. Look at the end of the verse. But in an abundance of counselors, there is safety. This is the opposite. The one who has an abundance of wise counsel is in a good position. The English standard that I'm reading from uses the word safety. They are safe because the wise counsel has enabled them to make good decisions. And I say to you young people again, do you have wise counsel around you? Do you have wise parents?

Do you have adults? Do you have family members? Do you have ministers around you that are giving you wise counsel? And if you heed that, if you accept it, if you take it, if you will take it even when you don't like it, you will prosper. But in an abundance of counselors, there is safety. So what do we see in this one verse? The person who keeps wise counsel is smart. The person who has an abundance of wise counsel around them that gives them good advice, biblical advice, they're in a good position. But there is a catch. Not only must you receive it, you must act on it. You can't just receive it, you must act on it.

Now let me tell you a story. I remember years ago, I had a young man in my life. He came to me and he was moving on into adulthood and he came to me with certain problems in his life. He was humble. He said, "Brother Chris, can you help me here? Can you help me here? Can you help me here?" A lot of this had to do with his marriage. A lot of this had to do with his job. A lot of this had to do with his finances. And I set him down and I gave him a clear path. I gave him sound advice. I gave him good counsel. I talked about my own experiences, positive and negative. He said, "Yes, sir, I like that.

I'm going to write that down." He received it and I was encouraged. But it wasn't just that he received it. The question was would he act on it? But he didn't. He didn't act on it. He ignored sound counsel. He rejected it because he said he received it, but he did not act on it. And he put himself really in a difficult position. Why? Because he did not receive it and act on it. And so, young people, I want to ask you this. I want to say this to you. You need wisdom around you. You must have parents that love God and teach you God's ways.

And moms and dads, we must be that sound, godly counsel in our young people's lives, our sons and our daughters. And listen, young people, if you don't have that from your parents, you have it here. You have other adults in the life of this church who will be sound counsel for you. Adults, we need wisdom around us. And look, there are adults who have parents in their life, family, that don't give them wise counsel. Many times we can have brothers or sisters in our life, or mothers or fathers or grandparents that do not give us wise biblical counsel. If that's the case, we need to break off from that.

We don't need to let them be an influence into their life. And look, here's a test. Those who are around us, look at their life. Are they obedient to God's word? Do they live a true Christian life? Look at their church life. Look at where they go to church. Look at their life over time. Anyone can fake it for a little while. And so what I want us to see is we must have wisdom around us, good counsel. And if we have those around us that are the wrong influence, we must break away. And for you young people, if you don't get it at home, if you don't get it anywhere in life, you can get it here. You can get it here.

Remember the title, righteousness or lawlessness. If you receive sound counsel, that leads to righteousness. But if you reject it, it's going to lead to foolishness and folly, and it's going to lead to lawlessness. Now in conclusion, what have we seen? I told you it's going to be all kinds of practical lessons. Some of this stuff just doesn't relate. Remember I talked about it's just like buckshot. It just kind of goes everywhere. But what have we seen? Fault scales versus correct scales. Honesty or integrity? Are you dishonest? Are you honest? Do you live with integrity?

Do teachers and neighbors and bosses and coworkers look at you and say, "I know you're honest. I know you don't cheat." And the benefits of righteousness. If we receive righteousness and we live righteousness, there are all types of blessing in life. Not perfect life. Not a life free from troubles, but there are blessings in life. Blessings in this life and the life to come. And then receiving sound counsel, wise counsel. Receiving having those around you who will influence you God's way, that will influence you to do God's life God's way. Now as I begin to close, I want to tell you a couple of stories. I like to tell stories that illustrate.

I go back and I go back and I go back to my early years when I was first a Christian. I never forget being in the life of the church. There was a young man in the life of our church. He just said he loved God. He always had his Bible. He came to Sunday school. And look, he was always talking about Jesus. And he just seemed to be a super Christian. But you know, time shows us who people really are. Time does. And let me tell you what happened to this particular young man. Over a period of time, we started to notice a habit. He always rejected godly men in his life.

The godly men who had gray hair, who lived life for a little while, when they came into his life, he got mad and he pushed him aside. He never let his pastor speak into his life. He pushed him aside. And see what he was saying was, I know best. I know best. I know best. And you know what? That safety that we saw there, he moved out of a safe position. And listen, he became an island. He rejected sound wisdom. He rejected men and people in his life. And he's all alone even today. And listen, his life is not blessed by righteousness. Oh, he's got religion. But his life is blessed with righteousness.

And you know, ultimately, we begin to see something. It's honest scales because it was all about himself. All about himself. Now, listen, he's got religious words. He's got religious ways, but it's not righteousness. It's lawlessness. But there was a day you could go back. You would have just bet everything. He was the one that was going to live that righteous life. So here's where I come back to the title of the message. I told you that I would. I went ahead and told you or gave you the second part of the title. What do we have? Righteousness or lawlessness? Which will it be? So my question is, what are you going to do with this teaching?

You might say, oh, brother Chris, this is simple. No, it's not. Righteousness or lawlessness? Will you receive it? Are you going to reject it? Are you going to receive everything? Say, Lord, I want that. I want that. So my question is righteousness or lawlessness? Which will it be?