Let’s take our Bibles together and turn to the passage just read, Proverbs 7:1–27. When I was about nineteen years old, I went to a Promise Keepers event in Dallas, Texas with a good friend who was somewhere around fifty years old. And while we were at this event, a pastor gave a wonderful message about the importance of purity. He preached on Joseph in the OT, and how Joseph rejected the advances of Potiphar’s wife (Gen 39:1–23). I was really moved by that message, and so was my friend.

And on the way home from that conference, I asked my friend, “Why do you need to hear a message on purity? You’re married; and you’re like fifty years old. This is young guys’ stuff.” And my friend, very graciously said, “Brother, don’t think of the male sex drive as a mountain peak that escalates till age thirty and then drops off dramatically. Think of it more like a plateau that slowly, very slowly, declines over time.” 

It was good for me as a young man to hear that. Temptations likewise don’t peak at age thirty and then disappear afterwards. Satan is still actively trying to lead a man and his family to destruction through sexual sin. I should remind you that Solomon’s own father, David, was approximately fifty years old when he committed adultery with Bathsheba sending his family and his kingship into a tailspin. 

Today’s message is entitled “Sexual Sin II: A Cautionary Tale.” And this is actually the third section in the book of Proverbs that Solomon has talked directly about sex. You might say, “Why sex again?” “Why does Solomon spend so much time talking about sex in these first nine chapters of Proverbs?” “Why does he dedicate three substantive passages (Prov 5:1–23; 6:20–35; 7:1–27) to this topic?” Well, some things need to be repeated again and again before they sink in. Some things are worthy of a second and third statement for emphasis. If Solomon’s son was anywhere between thirteen and thirty when he wrote this, his son needed to hear this message repeated.

And, like I said, it’s not like sexual temptation just disappears when a man turns thirty either. The dangers are ever-present, and the stakes get higher and higher as a man moves into adulthood with a wife and a family and a reputation in the church and in the community. 

So, today’s message is for all of us. It’s a cautionary tale for young and old, male and female, married and unmarried alike. So, let’s heed what Solomon says in this passage. 

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Here’s the first point from our text today. And I’m going to frame the five points for this message ironically with this statement, “If you want to fall into sexual sin.” This is a cautionary tale. And my hope in stating it this way is that the stark reality of these statements will press your soul to do exactly the opposite. 

If you want to fall into sexual sin, 

1) Be dismissive of God’s Word (7:1-5)

Take God’s Word as suggestive. Don’t take it literally. Don’t interpret it and apply it. Just kind of gloss over it. Isaiah 66:2 says the following: “But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.” If you want to fall into sexual sin, don’t do that. Don’t tremble at God’s Word. 

Solomon says in verse 1,

1 My son, keep my words and treasure up my commandments with you; 

This is not unlike what Solomon has been saying throughout the book of Proverbs. He’s reiterated this again and again throughout the book. And these commandments that he commends his son with are not novel things that originated in Solomon’s mind. These are principles that predate Solomon in the Mosaic law. Sexual sin was something that Moses dealt with extensively. So, this is God’s Word that Solomon is commending to his son. And we likewise, fathers, should be commending them to our children. 

2 keep my commandments and live; keep my teaching as the apple of your eye; 

Keep them as your most precious possession. And in the same way that you guard your eye as a sensitive and a vulnerable part of your body, guard these commands. They are precious. 

3 bind them on your fingers; write them on the tablet of your heart. 

Now we’ve seen this metaphor before. We’ve heard Solomon say bind these “around your neck” and “on your heart” already (Prov 3:3; 6:21). But this is the first time we’ve heard fingers used. And I think the idea here is that the fingers are instruments of activity. Your digits do things externally, and your heart internalizes things. So, the father is saying to his son, “Embrace these commandments with your heart (internally) and with your actions (externally).” Derek Kidner says this in his commentary, “The best advice is useless against strong temptation unless it is thoroughly taken to heart and translated into habits.” 

Solomon says in verse 3,

4 Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,” and call insight your intimate friend,

We saw the need in Proverbs 4 to woo lady wisdom. The metaphor changes here to the image of a familial bond. Solomon says to his son, “Cherish ‘wisdom’ like you would your own sister. Treat ‘insight’ like you would an intimate friend.” 

In other words, get tight with them. My sister and I were tight in high school. We watched out for each other. We confided in one another. We trusted each other. 

At this point the son again is asking the father, “Okay dad, where are you going with this? Don’t beat around the bush, just tell me. I know I need to heed your words that are based upon the Word of God. But what are you getting at with all this wisdom-speak?” 

And now the father drops the hammer. “Here’s where I’m going, son.” Look at verse 4.

4 Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,” and call insight your intimate friend, 

5 to keep you from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words.

SON: “Come on, Dad, not the sex-talk again.” DAD: “Yes this is the sex-talk again. You need to hear this. You need to know just how serious this is. You need to know about the vixens out there who hunt down impressionable young men like yourself.” 

So far, this father has taught his son about good sex (Prov 5:1–23) and stupid sex (Prov 6:20–35). Now he’s going to tell a cautionary tale about stupid sex. 

And there are two characters in this story: there is a femme fatale, and there is the dimwit. There’s the seductress and the simpleton. We can call this story “Beauty and the Beast.” But this is not the “tale as old as time… Beauty and the Beast.” In this story, beauty seduces the beast, and the beast gets slaughtered in the end. 

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Look at verse 6 with me.

6 For at the window of my house I have looked out through my lattice, 

7 and I have seen among the simple, 

This word for “simple” here is the word פֶּתִי. It’s a word that is somewhere between naïve and dimwitted. “Stupid” is too strong a word for this person (The Hebrew equivalent for that word is used elsewhere—see Prov 12:1). But this is a gullible young person, a simpleton. This is a young man who lacks intelligence. One commentator used the term “featherbrained” to describe this person. That’s probably close to what Solomon intends here.  

I have perceived among the youths, a young man lacking sense,

Literally this young man lacks “heart” (Hebrew: לֵב). This same phrase was used of the man who commits adultery in Proverbs 6. He is spiritually, mentally, and volitionally dull. You almost feel sorry for him, except the implication here is that he’s dull because he has failed to acquire wisdom. Young men aren’t dull and senseless because they are young. Young men are dull and senseless because they fail to acquire wisdom. But we know, even from the NT that it doesn’t have to be that way. 

Paul said of young Timothy, the pastor over the Ephesian church, “Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity” (1 Tim 4:12). Don’t ever let people sell you a false bill of goods that somehow wisdom and youth are mutually exclusive. They aren’t. Robert Murray M’Cheyne was a famous Scottish pastor who died at age 29. Today, almost 200 years after his death, people twice his age still quote him and reference him.

Yet generally speaking, younger men are gullible and impressionable. And that’s who Solomon is describing here with the פֶּתִי. 

6 For at the window of my house I have looked out through my lattice, 

7 and I have seen among the simple, I have perceived among the youths, a young man lacking sense, 

8 passing along the street near her corner, taking the road to her house 

9 in the twilight, in the evening, at the time of night and darkness.

Now there are some foreboding elements to this story already. There are some less-than-wise decisions that this young man has already made. First of all, it’s late at night. The Hebrew indicates here that this is the darkest part of the night. Nothing good happens after midnight. This is a time for sleeping not meandering around the city. 

Secondly, he passes right in front of “her” corner taking the road to “her” house. Who’s the “her” in that passage? Well, she’ll show up in just a moment, but from the father’s previous testimony it’s none other than the forbidden woman, i.e. the adulteress from verse 5. For the record, I don’t think this dimwitted young man is looking for sin; he’s just oblivious. He lacks sense. He lacks discernment. 

You might say, “Aw, bless his heart. He’s just a nice fellow who doesn’t know any better. Poor little guy!” But that’s not how this adulteress sees him. She sees him as prey. 

10 And behold, the woman meets him, 

There she is. She just shows up out of the blue. It’s kismet! What a happy coincidence!  

10 And behold, the woman meets him, dressed as a prostitute [dressed to kill you might say], wily of heart.

This is no coincidence, by the way. She has been lurking in the shadows. She has hunted him down. She is a huntress. And she has just caught her prey.  

Here’s the second point from our text today. If you want to fall into sexual sin…

2) Be oblivious to your vulnerability (7:6-10)

Look, if you want to fall into sin, go ahead and have that drink with your coworker you’ve been casually flirting with for months. Or ladies, respond to another man’s advances while your husband is out of town. Read those books that romanticize adultery and feed your imagination with that stuff. Nobody’s going to tut-tut you in this modern-day world where everyone is swimming in a sea of sexual permissiveness. But let me warn you—if you play with fire, you’re going to get burned. “Can a man carry fire next to his chest and his clothes not be burned” (Prov 6:12)?

In the realm of pornography, go ahead, turn on your TV late at night after your wife and kids have gone to bed. Go and watch that movie with your friends that has sexually explicit content in it. Don’t ask ahead of time. You want plausible deniability. Go ahead and be oblivious to your vulnerability. Don’t have an accountability partner. Don’t put filters on your computer or smart phone.  

As Christians, we’ve got to develop a wartime mentality with this stuff. Satan is prowling around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour, and some of us are absolutely oblivious to how susceptible we are to sexual sin. We need to wake up! And we need to take sin seriously. 

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Write this down as #3. If you want to fall into sexual sin, be dismissive of God’s Word, be oblivious to your vulnerability, and thirdly, 

3) Be hesitant to run when you are hunted (7:11-20)

Back to our cautionary tale—there’s still hope for this guy in verse 10. Yeah, he’s made some mistakes. Yeah, he was oblivious to his surroundings, but he can still run away from this seductress. 

Remember Joseph when he was entrapped by Potiphar’s wife and her amorous intentions? What did he do? He ran. That’s what this guy should do when this woman, “meets him, dressed as a prostitute, wily of heart” (7:10).

Solomon says about her in verse 11,

11 She is loud and wayward; her feet do not stay at home; 

In other words, she’s done this before. This is not kismet. This is cool, calculated entrapment. 

12 now in the street, now in the market, and at every corner she lies in wait. 

13 She seizes him and kisses him, 

Now let me just stop right there. This is so over the top in a Jewish culture, it’s almost laughable. For any woman, let alone a married woman, to seize and kiss a man is totally inappropriate. Even today, in some parts of Jerusalem, you can’t kiss or hold hands with your wife. 

I heard Tommy Nelson tell the story once about holding hands with his wife in a certain part of Jerusalem. If a man does that, some of the Hasidic Jews will come and thump you on the head. And that’s because PDA is disrespectful in that culture. 

So, for a woman, a stranger, to publicly seize and kiss a man would be the ultimate taboo. And for a man, this whole situation is really quite emasculating. He’s not the pursuer, he’s the pursued. She’s the aggressor in this liaison. And if he’s smart, he would run, right now. 

You kind of want to yell at this young guy right now and say, “Run, man, run. Run for your life.” 

13 She seizes him and kisses him, and with bold face she says to him, 

14 “I had to offer sacrifices, and today I have paid my vows; 

What in the world does that mean? Well according to the NET Bible she’s communicating one of two things. 1) She brought an animal sacrifice to the temple and has leftover meat from that sacrifice at her house. Meat was a rare treat in this era. So, what’s she’s doing is she’s trying to entice this man with both sex and food. What’s amazing here is how these sacred sacrifices before God meant so little to her. 

2) She’s telling him she’s ceremonially clean and ready for sex. This is kind of a superstitious way of saying, “I’ve made a sacrifice for my sins in advance. So come have guilt-free sex with me.” The notion is ridiculous. But there are some even in our day who try to assuage their guilty conscience with vows and sacrifices.  

14 “I had to offer sacrifices, and today I have paid my vows; 

15 so now I have come out to meet you, to seek you eagerly, and I have found you 

Well, that’s flattering. Everyone knows the best way to seduce a man is to stroke his ego and that’s exactly what she does. Look at verse 16.

16 I have spread my couch with coverings, colored linens from Egyptian linen; 

17 I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon 

By the way, fragrances were thought to have aphrodisiacal powers in the ancient world. Even in our own world the sense of smell can be a turn-on or a turn-off, depending on the smell. 

18 Come, let us take our fill of love till morning; let us delight ourselves with love [or another way to translate this is lovemaking]. 

The language here is extremely erotic. She is essentially telling this young man, “Tonight is going to be the night of your life. Everything is ready for an evening of extraordinary, passionate lovemaking.” It’s almost as erotic as the description of sex in the context of marital love that Solomon describes in Proverbs 5. It’s almost as erotic as some parts of Song of Solomon. 

And in many ways the liaison that is being described here is intentionally trying to mimic passionate, God-honoring, marital lovemaking that is delightful and pleasing to the Lord. This woman is offering a delightful counterfeit. She’s taking God’s good gift of sex and fabricating it. It’s a poison that goes down smooth, but slowly kills you afterwards. 

Look at verse 19.

19 For my husband [the cuckold] is not at home; he has gone on a long journey; 

20 he took a bag of money with him; at full moon he will come home.”

This is her way of saying, “We can have sex without consequences. And we can commit adultery with impunity.” Part of her pitch is that sin has no consequences. That’s how the devil tempted Eve in the Garden of Eden. We know that’s not true; sin always has consequences. Even if the husband never finds out, there are still consequences. And nobody’s sin is hidden from the Lord.

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Now let’s just pause for a moment. Let’s just assess this young man’s situation. He’s being seduced. He’s got himself in a bad situation. Maybe he did some foolish things to put himself in this situation. But even this late in the game there is a chance, there is a glimmer of hope that maybe, just maybe, this dimwitted young man will come to his senses. I think one of Satan’s great lies is that temptation is the same as sin. And if you are tempted to sin, you might as well follow through with it. But that’s a lie. Temptation is not the same as sin. And even this late in the midst of a temptation, there’s still a way out. Take that way out!

Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10:13, “No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.” Temptation is not the same as sin. And in those moments when temptation is getting the best of you, activate an exit strategy. Call a friend. Leave the place of temptation. Like Joseph in the OT, run if you must! 

Think about your children. Think about your spouse. Think about your parents. Think about the God who loves you and sent his Son to die on the cross for your sins. And get out of that situation!

That’s what this guy needs to do. And if you remember from last week, adultery was punishable by death (Lev 20:10; Deut 22:22). So, this guy especially needs to get out of this situation! 

And this is the crucial moment in the story. This is what literary critics call the rising action. This is where the climax of the story takes place and what follows is the resolution. What’s this guy going to do? Is this going to be a comedy or a tragedy? Is this guy going to become the next Joseph? Or is he going to become the next Samson? What happens?

Let’s see. Look at verse 21.

21 With much seductive speech she persuades him; with her smooth talk she compels him. 

22 All at once he follows her, as an ox goes to the slaughter,

You know what this is? This is a Shakespearian tragedy. This is “Romeo and Juliet.” This is “Othello.” All the wheels fall off, and this guy falls victim to his own vices. 

Verse 22 is the climax. 

22 All at once he follows her, as an ox goes to the slaughter,

Like a dumb ox who is “whistling dixie” all the way to the guillotine… Like some dumb animal that can’t control its sexual urges… this guy gets slaughtered. 

In his commentary on Proverbs, Bruce Waltke writes, “The ritual pure slaughter of an ox involved slitting the neck beneath the jugular, whereby the air tube, esophagus, and large neck veins are severed and the bleeding led to immediate death.” The Israelites would have been very familiar with that process. They had seen sacrifices of oxen before. And that’s the picture that God uses in his Word… that’s the illustration he employs for adultery. Remember that image the next time you are tempted to flirt with a person who is not your spouse.  

Here’s another image. Look at verse 22.

22 All at once he follows her, as an ox goes to the slaughter, or as a stag is caught fast 

How do you kill a deer? You rattle antlers. You put out musk. You put out food. Food, sex, and pride. That’s the recipe for a dead deer.

23 till an arrow pierces its liver [that’s a painful way to die, by the way]; as a bird rushes into a snare; he does not know that it will cost him his life. 

Solomon likes these animal images, doesn’t he? He likes to use animals as illustrations: the ant, the doe, the mountain goat. The ox, the stag, the bird, etc. And the idea here that he’s trying to convey to his son is this, “Son, don’t be a dumb animal. Control your sexual appetite. You’re not an animal. Control yourself. Otherwise, you will suffer underneath the consequences of your actions, like an ox to the slaughter.” 

I mentioned earlier that Solomon’s father, David, brought great harm to himself and his family as a result of his adultery with Bathsheba. Here’s a few things that happened afterwards: 1) The baby that Bathsheba conceived died, 2) David’s daughter Tamar was raped by her half-brother, Amnon 3) Amnon was murdered by Tamar’s full-brother Absalom, 4) Absalom started a rebellion against his father David, 5) David’s reign lost the smile of God. His throne never regained its former stability.

R. Kent Hughes says this about David, “Men, we must understand that David would never have given more than a fleeting glance to Bathsheba if he could have seen the shattering results.” And then he adds this “I believe that few, if any, would ever stray from God’s Word if they could see what would follow.”  

Here’s the fourth point from our message today. If you want to fall into sexual sin… 

4) Be ignorant of the consequences of your actions (7:21-23)

In his book Temptation, Dietrich Bonhoeffer made the observation that “at [the moment of temptation] God is quite unreal to us. He loses all reality… Satan does not here fill us with hatred of God, but with forgetfulness of God.”

The trick is being cognizant of those consequences in the heat of the battle with sexual sin. You need to be able to deconstruct Satan’s lies like … “If it feels good it must be right” … or … “God’s most important priority is my happiness. God wants me to be happy, doesn’t he?” … or … this is even more deceptive “You can always repent afterwards and ask God for forgiveness.” 

I see Christians justify their actions with that understanding all the time. I’ve done that myself. “Oh, go ahead and sin! You can always repent afterwards and ask God for forgiveness.” Is that statement true? Sort of. There may be forgiveness on the other side of your sinful indulgence, but that doesn’t mean God is going to spare you from the consequences of your sin, which could be drastic. That’s what we see with David and his moment of indiscretion. 

There’s a better way for us. That better way is “self-control” that is wrought by the Holy Spirit. That better way is God’s sexuality, gospel sexuality. That better way is submission to Jesus Christ who died on the cross for our sins to give us freedom from the sins that so easily entangle us. There is victory in the blood of Jesus. There is hope in this world that is saturated with sexuality. But without the fear of God and without the victory that God alone can provide us we are sunk.

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Finally. One last point. If you want to fall into sexual sin,   

5) Be resistant to godly counsel (7:24-27)

Solomon gives one final plea to his son. He counsels him one last time on this subject of sex.

24 And now, O sons, listen to me, and be attentive to the words of my mouth. 

“Listen to me, son. Pay attention. I’m not messing around here. This is important stuff. Here’s the moral of this story. Here’s the principle that you should derive from this cautionary tale.”

25 Let not your heart turn aside to her ways; do not stray into her paths, 

26 for many a victim has she laid low, and all her slain are a mighty throng. 

The language here is the language of war. She might look and smell sexy, but she’s a killer. It might be aloes and myrrh and lovemaking for the night, but in the morning, you’ll be in a body bag. And you’re not the first one that she has victimized either. The dead are strewn out in front of her house. 

25 Let not your heart turn aside to her ways; do not stray into her paths, 

26 for many a victim has she laid low, and all her slain are a mighty throng. 

27 Her house is the way to Sheol, going down to the chambers of death.

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Now, let’s be clear about something. This gruesome depiction of sex and slaughter is being used metaphorically as a deterrent. The reality today is this—if you sleep with a man or a woman who is not your spouse you probably won’t die. Nobody’s going to stone you for that action. This picture here of people slain before the house of the adulteress and her house going down to Sheol is a metaphor for spiritual death not physical death. Solomon uses this gruesome picture, this macabre illustration, to scare his son straight. He’s trying to convince him that sexual sin is serious business. 

And that prompts the following question—why does God care about this so much? Why does God care so much about sex and marriage and adultery? Doesn’t God have more important things to do than give us commands to guard our sexuality?

Well let me posit an answer to that. First of all, God the Son died on the cross for our sins. And he doesn’t want the cross, or our salvation, to be used as a license for sinfulness. That would be shameful of us. Our goal as Christians is “gospel sexuality.” The ultimate goal of our sexual purity is to please God, not to earn his favor or retain it. It’s an act of obedience in light of what Christ has done for us at the cross. Sexual purity begins at the cross. It must proceed from redemption and forgiveness.  

But there’s an added reason why adultery is such an affront to the God of the Universe. This last week at VBVF, we did a seminar on homosexuality. And one of the things that I said is that homosexuality is a violation of God’s creative intent. And it’s a violation of God’s beautiful typological picture of love between Christ, the bridegroom, and the church, the bride. 

But that’s not the only sinful violation of God’s typology. Adultery is a violation too. Can you imagine, in any possible way, Christ being unfaithful to is bride, the church? No. And Paul says to husbands in this room, “Love your wife as Christ does the church” (Eph 5:25–33). 

Now that means a lot of things. We as men spend the rest of our married lives trying to live up to the amazing example of Christ Jesus. But at the most basic level of that command, Paul is telling us, “Don’t you ever, ever be unfaithful to your spouse. Would Christ ever be unfaithful to the church? God forbid!” So don’t violate the imagery of love and faithfulness that marriage is for us. 

And if you have made mistakes in your life… if you have erred in your marriage… if you have made mistakes that have left you broken and scarred and guilty before a sovereign, holy God, confess that to him today. Embrace the free gift of forgiveness that he gives and start fresh. From this point forward honor Christ as Lord of your life. Honor him and love him with your whole heart, soul, mind and strength.