Flattery - Proverbs 29:5

but the light seems to be coming from over there.

The man quickly assures them he knows exactly what he is doing and that he is a great judge of character who only accepts the company of those with the same dedicated inclinations as him. He goes on to ask Christian and Hopeful to share about their very brave adventures so far and that he will be forever indebted to them for doing so.

Well, I don't know, there are so many,

Christian exclaims. He then goes on to boast about all the experiences he has gone through, such as surviving the swamp of despondency, the valley of humiliation, and escaping the castle of despair. The man responds,

well, aren't you guys the greatest fools?

And at the same time, a net quickly swoops up, Christian and hopeful, and it is not till they are stuck in the net that they remember the words of the shepherds,

beware of the flatterer.

Now, I hope you leave here tonight realizing that flattery is a dangerous trap, so beware of flattering others and beware of being flattered yourself. And this leads us to three key questions. Number one, why flattery is so dangerous? Number two, how can we avoid flattering others? And number three, how can we avoid being flattered? So first, why flattery is so dangerous? And why is it like spreading a net for our feet? Well, because the person flattering someone is trying to make or convince his neighbor to think or do something that will benefit himself. That's what makes this evil and dangerous. It's a lie masquerading as encouragement. and it comes from a selfish motive to manipulate the hearer in order to achieve the flatterer's covert purpose. For example, remember when the scribes and chief priests were plotting to destroy Jesus? They sent spies to him who pretended to be sincere in their questions, and they flattered him to try to entice him to answer. They said,

We know you speak and teach rightly and show no partiality, but truly teach the way of God. Is it lawful for us to give tribute to Caesar or not?

The real intent, though, was to catch him saying something that could lead to him being arrested. And this shows us very clearly how flattery can be a trap. Now, I still think many of us are quick to think, well, of course, I'm not a flatterer. which further shows the danger of it because it can be easy to think that it's not a big deal and does not harm anyone. But even subtler forms of flattery can do more damage than we realize. For example, do you encourage others gratuitously or insincerely? Or about giving vain or insincere compliments? Do you ever do it with the hope of building up some good credit with them? to redeem it at a time of your choosing for something that you want? Think about the effect this could have on them. Because of an insincere compliment, they may have a wrong view of their giftings, or be set up for failure, or you may even be encouraging pride. Or what about our jobs? Flattering the boss with the hope of getting favor from them or that desired promotion? The boss might think, hey, I can really invest in this person. He is so loyal, and I want to reward that. But if we were only looking out for ourselves because we were just trying to get that desired promotion or climb the corporate ladder and leave for the next job, we have set a trap for the boss's feet. What about when someone is doing something sinful or wrong? Do you flatter them by giving approval for what they are doing? By making it seem like their sin's okay and not a big deal? Flattery can come at the expense of godly rebuke. When we fear man too much to tell them hard truths, we set a trap for their feet. I hope you can see now why flattery is so dangerous. And this leads us to our second question, how can we avoid flattering others? Well, first off, we should seek to be genuine and sincere. Since flattery is something you wouldn't say behind someone's back, a great question we can ask ourselves is, would I say this about this person to others? We need to think intently before speaking. We should look for things where we can genuinely compliment someone and have meaningful encouragement to give so you don't replace it with meaningless flattery. Additionally, we should think about our heart motives behind what we are saying. Is this for the good of the person or is there an ulterior motive? Am I acting selfishly or loving people? Am I being manipulative or genuine? Now where might we be guilty of flattering others? Under the disguise of being nice, do we isolate commendable qualities in people and exaggerate them? This could be making decent work sound amazing or a small sacrifice seem large. Or do we twist ungodly qualities to seem less destructive? Like framing greed as just ambition or pride as just self-confidence? Or what about a ministry? From the pulpit or through evangelism, it can be tempting to tell people what they wanna hear. Downplaying sin or avoiding saying offensive things that are true. Listen to what Paul says about this, insisting on not committing flattery. Regarding his ministry to the Thessalonians, he says,

for our appeal does not spring from error or impurity or any attempt to deceive, But just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, so as we speak, not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts. For we never came with words of flattery, as you know, nor with a pretext for greed. God is witness.

So as we have seen, flattery is a trap and is very dangerous. And while flattery is directed outwards towards someone else, it comes from within. Our own desires are put first in flattery, and the Bible aligns flattery with selfishness. God tells us we are to love him with all our heart, soul, and mind, and to love our neighbor as ourself. In contrast to this command, we see that flattery is not loving our neighbor as ourselves, it is working ruin. As Proverbs 26, 28 says,

a lying tongue hates its victims and a flattering mouth works ruin.

Now, as we seek to flee flattering others, are we just supposed to live our lives in silence to avoid falling in this sin of the tongue? Well, no. And Lord willing, we'll be learning more about the sin of silence next week. So that's not the solution. We are told in scripture to encourage one another and build each other up. And with this in mind, I think a question for us to wrestle with is how can we as Christians best encourage one another without it becoming flattery? Is the praise I'm going to give true? What is my motivation behind what I'm saying? Our words should be truthful and aimed to be God-honoring. Christ spoke the truth in love and in rebuke, but never in flattery. As Christians, we are commanded to

let no corrupting talk come out of our mouth, but only such as good for building up as fits the occasion that it may give grace to those who hear.

We should seek to be familiar with how our Lord and Savior encouraged others and ask God for wisdom through prayer and how to encourage people well. And this brings us to our third and final question. How can we flee being flattered? We've looked at how to avoid laying the nets, but how can we avoid stepping in it? Proverbs 27, 21 says,

the crucible is for silver and the furnace is for gold, and a man is tested by his praise.

Intense heat tests the quality of gold and silver. You see if it is truly gold by it being put in a refining furnace. Likewise, praise will reveal what kind of person you are. It will prove either a spirit of godly humility or a spirit of pride. So how do we respond in this? Or how do we respond in praise? We can avoid stepping in the net by being quick to give God credit and glory instead of soaking it in for ourselves. We see from the story in Pilgrim's Progress that at first, Christian is suspicious, questioning the man, taking them away from the light. But once the man starts complimenting him, Christian gives in and quickly turns to boasting. Our verse shows us that for the person being flattered, there is a net waiting for them at their feet. Now this conveys the image of a trap for an animal. It is just sitting there, waiting for them to take the bait And once it closes, it's very hard for them to get out. And for us, the bait is false praises that appeals to our pride. Our sin nature wants to be flatter because it loves to be admired. Our pride can blind us so much that sometimes it doesn't matter if we know the flattery is insincere, if it makes us feel good or improves our image in the eyes of other people, we walk right into the trap. We see that accepting flattery comes from pride and is the cause of much sin in the Bible. Flattery is what the adulteress uses to seduce the young man in Proverbs 7, which says,

with much seductive speech, she persuades him. With her smooth talk, she compels him. All at once he follows her as an ox goes to the slaughter or as a stag is caught fast till an arrow pierces its liver. As a bird rushes into a snare, he does not know that it will cost him his life.

Now the woman flattered and seduced him, but the man was lured and enticed by his own desire. And this is how flattery works on us. It seduces us, but only because our pride finds it appealing. And if we take the bait, it will lead to destruction. So how can we avoid this? Remember how quickly Christian and hopeful forgot about the verse? They abandoned sound guidance they heard to blindly follow a stranger. We need to take this verse to heart and let the words of Christ dwell in us richly to teach us and admonish us in wisdom. With this in mind, it's important to note that Christian and hopeful did not stay stuck in the net. With help sent from heaven, they were freed and set back on the right path. And the reality is this is an area that we have all fallen short in. The net of flattery and of sin has entangled us all. And as Bunyan captures, the pilgrims did not get free on their own strength, but through the grace of God. We must guard against wanting to take credit for our Christian journey ourselves and acknowledge that it is by God's grace that we are saved and by his grace that we stay on the path and do his will. Now, we know for certain that God is the opposite of the flatterer. He doesn't tell us how great we are or puff us up. He tells us the truth about our sin and frees us from the net. Now, if there are any non-Christians here tonight, to be clear, the goal is not to clean ourselves up and make our speech good enough for God. We will utterly fail in that. There is nothing in us that commends us to God. Only through faith in Christ and repenting of your sins can you be made right with God. All of us were in the net of our own sin before knowing the Lord. We were dead, unable to get ourselves free, but praise God, he did not leave us there. In the wonderful plan from eternity about the glory and love of God through the righteousness of Christ, we can be made right with God. Jesus came and lived a perfect and sinless life that none of us could and died a death that we deserve on the cross. We need his substitutionary sacrifice and his perfect life provided for ours. Now, as we close, I want to encourage us to think about what is coming out of our mouths and how is it being used for the sake of the kingdom of God? Will you pray with me? Heavenly Father, thank you for this time to be able to consider the truth of your word. We ask for your help in bridling our tongues and I pray that we would beware of and seek to kill the sin of flattery in our lives. I pray that we would encourage one another and build each other up in the faith to stay on the right path as we seek to serve and glorify you. We love you and praise you in Jesus name, amen.