Dr. Spencer explained the biblical term lasciviousness to be the final warning sign on the road to eternal death. In the process, he identified other sinful states that are signposts which precede lasciviousness.
In his discussion, he talked about the progressive nature of sexual sin and drunkenness in a very graphic manner.
I am posting this study to identify the state of corruption that occurs after those discussed by C. H. Spurgeon in the last post.
The following are sermon highlight points [below the video are scriptural examples wherein lascivious was used]:
- Spencer gave the history of the word
- Jezebel and her manner of Baal worship, characterized this word
- The display of a petulant spirit daring anyone to stop them from continuing on in their wretched behavior
- No longer able to restrain oneself
- Dominated by demonic forces
- The spirit of lasciviousness is the place in the road just before the point of no return regarding eternal death, the final warning
- Words that accompany Lasciviousness in scripture
- The lascivious one, does not care who knows what type of person he is
- He is rushing greedily into the pit of hell [gratifying every lust he can]
- Each step in his progression is also a warning sign to turn back and to put himself under the restraints of the word of God
- Drunkenness and immorality are steps along the way of lasciviousness, warning signs
- The progressive nature of sexual sin…lasciviousness
- Playing in the shadows of seeming sensual pleasure could catapult one onto the downward path towards lasciviousness
- Sodom and Gomorrah, their sins
- Exchanging Bible doctrine for the doctrines of demons; preferring to walk in the flesh rather than the Spirit; refusal to repent –> lasciviousness
- Those inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah did not begin in the state which they were in upon destruction; sexual sin is progressive, leading one towards lasciviousness
- False doctrine and corruption: false teachers tolerate fleshly people and their sins, not confronting them, but promoting them; the end is spiritual and physical bondage
- Sexual uncleanness…Lasciviousness…Demon worship: the apostle Paul ordered them so
- Do not play in the shadows, repent
[On 5-30-23, I added a commentary excerpt from Matthew Henry at the very bottom of this post, it has some great thoughts about Proverbs 5; Dr Spencer’s message could have been about that text, as Henry’s words remind me of Spencer’s ]
This post was a followup to the Spurgeon sermon posted on the same date, 8-10-20; that post discussed three lesser states of corruption
The Greek word, aselgeia is translated “lasciviousness” in the following scriptures; below these, the same Greek word is translated “wantonness.” For a better understanding, you might want to read the following verses in the NIV or some other modernized translation of the Bible, as you read the KJV renderings.
Mar 7:21 For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders,
Mar 7:22 Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness:
Mar 7:23 All these evil things come from within, and defile the man.
2Co 12:21 And lest, when I come again, my God will humble me among you, and that I shall bewail many which have sinned already, and have not repented of the uncleanness and fornication and lasciviousness which they have committed.
Gal 5:18 But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law.
Gal 5:19 Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,
Gal 5:20 Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,
Gal 5:21 Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
Eph 4:17 This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind,
Eph 4:18 Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart:
Eph 4:19 Who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.
1Pe 4:1 Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind: for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin;
1Pe 4:2 That he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God.
1Pe 4:3 For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, excess of wine, revellings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries:
1Pe 4:4 Wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you:
Jud 1:4 For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.
Below, the Greek word Aselgeia is translated “Wantonness:”
Rom 13:11 And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.
Rom 13:12 The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.
Rom 13:13 Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying.
Rom 13:14 But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.
2Pe 2:18 For when they speak great swelling words of vanity, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness, those that were clean escaped from them who live in error.
2Pe 2:19 While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption: for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage.
WORDS FROM THE COMMENTARY OF MATTHEW HENRY ON PROVERBS 5:
Comments copied and pasted from Bible Hub: https://biblehub.com/commentaries/proverbs/5-1.htm
My son, attend unto my wisdom, and bow thine ear to my understanding:
Chapter 5
The scope of this chapter is much the same with that of ch. 2. To write the same things, in other words, ought not to be grievous, for it is safe, Phil. 3:1. Here is, I. An exhortation to get acquaintance with and submit to the laws of wisdom in general (v. 2). II. A particular caution against the sin of whoredom (v. 3–14). III. Remedies prescribed against that sin. 1. Conjugal love (v. 15–20). 2. A regard to God’s omniscience (v. 21). 3. A dread of the miserable end of wicked people (v. 22, 23). And all little enough to arm young people against those fleshly lusts which war against the soul.
Verses 1-14 [The following has been broken into shorter paragraphs for ease of reading; also, some areas are emboldened for emphasis]:
Here we have,
A solemn preface, to introduce the caution which follows, v. 1, 2. Solomon here addresses himself to his son, that is, to all young men, as unto his children, whom he has an affection for and some influence upon. In God’s name, he demands attention; for he writes by divine inspiration, and is a prophet, though he begins not with, Thus saith the Lord. “Attend, and bow thy ear; not only hear what is said, and read what is written, but apply thy mind to it and consider it diligently.” To gain attention he urges, 1. The excellency of his discourse: “It is my wisdom, my understanding; if I undertake to teach thee wisdom I cannot prescribe any thing to be more properly called so; moral philosophy is my philosophy, and that which is to be learned in my school.” 2. The usefulness of it: “Attend to what I say,” (1.) “That thou mayest act wisely—that thou mayest regard discretion.”
Solomon’s lectures are not designed to fill our heads with notions, with matters of nice speculation, or doubtful disputation, but to guide us in the government of ourselves, that we may act prudently, so as becomes us and so as will be for our true interest. (2.) “That thou mayest speak wisely—that thy lips may keep knowledge, and thou mayest have it ready at thy tongue’s end” (as we say), “for the benefit of those with whom thou dost converse.” The priest’s lips are said to keep knowledge (Mal. 2:7); but those that are ready and mighty in the scriptures may not only in their devotions, but in their discourses, be spiritual priests.
The caution itself, and that is to abstain from fleshly lusts, from adultery, fornication, and all uncleanness. Some apply this figuratively, and by the adulterous woman here understand idolatry, or false doctrine, which tends to debauch men’s minds and manners, or the sensual appetite, to which it may as fitly as any thing be applied; but the primary scope of it is plainly to warn us against seventh-commandment sins, which youth is so prone to, the temptations to which are so violent, the examples of which are so many, and which, where admitted, are so destructive to all the seeds of virtue in the soul that it is not strange that Solomon’s cautions against it are so very pressing and so often repeated. Solomon here, as a faithful watchman, gives fair warning to all, as they regard their lives and comforts, to dread this sin, for it will certainly be their ruin. Two things we are here warned to take heed of:—
That we do not listen to the charms of this sin. It is true the lips of a strange woman drop as a honey-comb (v. 3); the pleasures of fleshly lust are very tempting (like the wine that gives its colour in the cup and moves itself aright); its mouth, the kisses of its mouth, the words of its mouth, are smoother than oil, that the poisonous pill may go down glibly and there may be no suspicion of harm in it.
But consider, (1.) How fatal the consequences will be. What fruit will the sinner have of his honey and oil when the end will be, [1.] The terrors of conscience: It is bitter as wormwood, v. 4. What was luscious in the mouth rises in the stomach and turns sour there; it cuts, in the reflection, like a two-edged sword; take it which way you will, it wounds. Solomon could speak by experience, Eccl. 7:26.
[2.] The torments of hell. If some that have been guilty of this sin have repented and been saved, yet the direct tendency of the sin is to destruction of body and soul; the feet of it go down to death, nay, they take hold on hell, to pull it to the sinner, as if the damnations slumbered too long, v. 5. Those that are entangled in this sin should be reminded that there is but a step between them and hell, and that they are ready to drop into it.
(2.) Consider how false the charms are. The adulteress flatters and speaks fair, her words are honey and oil, but she will deceive those that hearken to her: Her ways are movable, that thou canst not know them; she often changes her disguise, and puts on a great variety of false colours, because, if she be rightly known, she is certainly hated. Proteus-like, she puts on many shapes, that she may keep in with those whom she has a design upon. And what does she aim at with all this art and management? Nothing but to keep them from pondering the path of life, for she knows that, if they once come to do that, she shall certainly lose them. Those are ignorant of Satan’s devices who do not understand that the great thing he drives at in all his temptations is,
[1.] To keep them from choosing the path of life, to prevent them from being religious and from going to heaven, that, being himself shut out from happiness, he may keep them out from it. [2.] In order hereunto, to keep them from pondering the path of life, from considering how reasonable it is that they should walk in that path, and how much it will be for their advantage.
Be it observed, to the honour of religion, that it certainly gains its point with all those that will but allow themselves the liberty of a serious thought and will weigh things impartially in an even balance, and that the devil has no way of securing men in his interests but by diverting them with continual amusements of one kind or another from the calm and sober consideration of the things that belong to their peace. And uncleanness is a sin that does as much as any thing blind the understanding, sear the conscience, and keep people from pondering the path of life. Whoredom takes away the heart, Hos. 4:11.
That we do not approach the borders of this sin, v. 7, 8.
(1.) This caution is introduced with a solemn preface: “Hear me now therefore, O you children! whoever you are that read or hear these lines, take notice of what I say, and mix faith with it, treasure it up, and depart not from the words of my mouth, as those will do that hearken to the words of the strange woman. Do not only receive what I say, for the present merely, but cleave to it, and let it be ready to thee, and of force with thee, when thou art most violently assaulted by the temptation.”
(2.) The caution itself is very pressing: “Remove thy way far from her; if thy way should happen to lie near her, and thou shouldst have a fair pretence of being led by business within the reach of her charms, yet change thy way, and alter the course of it, rather than expose thyself to danger; come not nigh the door of her house; go on the other side of the street, nay, go through some other street, though it be about.” This intimates,
[1.] That we ought to have a very great dread and detestation of the sin. We must fear it as we would a place infected with the plague; we must loathe it as the odour of carrion, that we will not come near. Then we are likely to preserve our purity when we conceive a rooted antipathy to all fleshly lusts.
[2.] That we ought industriously to avoid every thing that may be an occasion of this sin or a step towards it. Those that would be kept from harm must keep out of harm’s way. Such tinder there is in the corrupt nature that it is madness, upon any pretence whatsoever, to come near the sparks. If we thrust ourselves into temptation, we mocked God when we prayed, Lead us not into temptation.
[3.] That we ought to be jealous over ourselves with a godly jealousy, and not to be so confident of the strength of our own resolutions as to venture upon the brink of sin, with a promise to ourselves that hitherto we will come and no further.
[4.] That whatever has become a snare to us and an occasion of sin, though it be as a right eye and a right hand, we must pluck it out, cut it off, and cast it from us, must part with that which is dearest to us rather than hazard our own souls; this is our Saviour’s command, Mt. 5:28–30.
(3.) The arguments which Solomon here uses to enforce this caution are taken from the same topic with those before, the many mischiefs which attend this sin. [1.] It blasts the reputation. “Thou wilt give thy honour unto others (v. 9); thou wilt lose it thyself; thou wilt put into the hand of each of thy neighbours a stone to throw at thee, for they will all, with good reason, cry shame on thee, will despise thee, and trample on thee, as a foolish men.”
Whoredom is a sin that makes men contemptible and base, and no man of sense or virtue will care to keep company with one that keeps company with harlots.
[2.] It wastes the time, gives the years, the years of youth, the flower of men’s time, unto the cruel, “that base lust of thine, which with the utmost cruelty wars against the soul, that base harlot which pretends an affection for thee, but really hunts for the precious life.” Those years that should be given to the honour of a gracious God are spent in the service of a cruel sin.
[3.] It ruins the estate (v. 10): “Strangers will be filled with thy wealth, which thou art but entrusted with as a steward for thy family; and the fruit of thy labours, which should be provision for thy own house, will be in the house of a stranger, that neither has right to it nor will ever thank thee for it.”
[4.] It is destructive to the health, and shortens men’s days: Thy flesh and thy body will be consumed by it, v. 11.
The lusts of uncleanness not only war against the soul, which the sinner neglects and is in no care about, but they war against the body too, which he is so indulgent of and is in such care to please and pamper, such deceitful, such foolish, such hurtful lusts are they.
Those that give themselves to work uncleanness with greediness waste their strength, throw themselves into weakness, and often have their bodies filled with loathsome distempers, by which the number of their months is cut off in the midst and they fall unpitied sacrifices to a cruel lust.
[5.] It will fill the mind with horror, if ever conscience be awakened. “Though thou art merry now, sporting thyself in thy own deceivings, yet thou wilt certainly mourn at the last, v. 11. Thou art all this while making work for repentance, and laying up matter for vexation and torment in the reflection, when the sin is set before thee in its own colours.”
Sooner or later it will bring sorrow, either when the soul is humbled and brought to repentance or when the flesh and body are consumed, either by sickness, when conscience flies in the sinner’s face, or by the grave; when the body is rotting there, the soul is racking in the torments of hell, where the worm dies not, and “Son, remember,” is the constant peal [plea?].
Solomon here brings in the convinced sinner reproaching himself, and aggravating his own folly. He will then most bitterly lament it.
First, That because he hated to be reformed he therefore hated to be informed, and could not endure either to be taught his duty (How have I hated not only the discipline of being instructed, but the instruction itself, though all true and good!) or to be told of his faults—My heart despised reproof, v. 12.
He cannot but own that those who had the charge of him, parents, ministers, had done their part; they had been his teachers; they had instructed him, had given him good counsel and fair warning (v. 13); but to his own shame and confusion does he speak it, and therein justifies God in all the miseries that were brought upon him, he had not obeyed their voice, for indeed he never inclined his ear to those that instructed him, never minded what they said nor admitted the impressions of it.
Note, Those who have had a good education and do not live up to it will have a great deal to answer for another day; and those who will not now remember what they were taught, to conform themselves to it, will be made to remember it as an aggravation of their sin, and consequently of their ruin.
Secondly, That by the frequent acts of sin the habits of it were so rooted and confirmed that his heart was fully set in him to commit it (v. 14): I was almost in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly. When he came into the synagogue, or into the courts of the temple, to worship God with other Israelites, his unclean heart was full of wanton thoughts and desires and his eyes of adultery.
Reverence of the place and company, and of the work that was doing, could not restrain him, but he was almost as wicked and vile there as any where.
No sin will appear more frightful to an awakened conscience than the profanation of holy things; nor will any aggravation of sin render it more exceedingly sinful than the place we are honoured with in the congregation and assembly, and the advantages we enjoy thereby.
Zimri and Cozbi avowed their villany in the sight of Moses and all the congregation (Num. 25:6), and heart-adultery is as open to God, and must needs be most offensive to him, when we draw nigh to him in religious exercises. I was in all evil in defiance of the magistrates and judges, and their assemblies; so some understand it. Others refer it to the evil of punishment, not to the evil of sin: “I was made an example, a spectacle to the world. I was under almost all God’s sore judgments in the midst of the congregation of Israel, set up for a mark. I stood up and cried in the congregation,” Job 30:28. Let that be avoided which will be thus rued at last.
The following words of Proverbs 2 are the remedy in the situation spelled out above:
1My son, if you receive my words
and treasure up my commandments with you,
2making your ear attentive to wisdom
and inclining your heart to understanding;
3yes, if you call out for insight
and raise your voice for understanding,
4if you seek it like silver
and search for it as for hidden treasures,
5then you will understand the fear of the LORD
and find the knowledge of God.
6For the LORD gives wisdom;
from his mouth come knowledge and understanding;
7he stores up sound wisdom for the upright;
he is a shield to those who walk in integrity,
8guarding the paths of justice
and watching over the way of his saints.
9Then you will understand righteousness and justice
and equity, every good path;
10for wisdom will come into your heart,
and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul;
11discretion will watch over you,
understanding will guard you,
12delivering you from the way of evil,
from men of perverted speech,
From Bible Hub: https://biblehub.com/esv/proverbs/2.htm