The righteous will never be shaken, But the wicked will not dwell in the land.  Proverbs 10:30

My brother was a missionary to the Philippines where he experienced his first earthquake, which came in unison with the eruption of Mount Pinatubo.  We grew up outside Chicago, so earthquakes were something we knew nothing about.  Wind we knew, snow we really knew - but earthquakes were foreign to us.  My brother's explanation was amazing to me.  When the earthquake hit, he thought the house was collapsing, and that was what was causing the shaking.  But when he ran outside, the ground there was shaking and rolling too.  For him and his family, this was a very disturbing thing.  They took for granted that the ground was firm.  Now it was shaking, and that was very disconcerting to them.  What they thought was stable, was being shaken.  This describes the hearts of many who are relying on things that can be shaken - as if they could not be shaken.  When the shaking starts, everything that they thought they could rely on became "shake-able."  But this is not the only thing shaken in these circumstances.  When it seems that everything can be shaken, your confidence in anything and everything is shaken as well.  Is there anything in this world that cannot be shaken?  That is what today's proverb is going to address. 

What we are told as wisdom is that the righteous will never be shaken.  Now, this promise does not speak of being exempt from earthquakes or other natural occurances where the earth around us is shaken.  What it does address is an even more wonderful promise - and that is an inner spiritual stability that cannot be shaken by anything - either earthly or unearthly. 

Note that the group who will not be shaken is the righteous.  These are those who stand before God and are viewed as righteous in His sight.  That cannot happen biblically except by faith.  There is no man who can ever stand before God as righteous on the basis of his own works.  Our works reveal us not as righteous, but as sinful and fallen.  If we are righteous, it is by faith in what God has done for us.  This He did through Jesus Christ at the cross.  But when we put our faith in Jesus Christ - God declares us righteous.  These are the ones who cannot be shaken.  This is something we need to grasp - spiritually. 

The Bible presents the physical world as shadows - with the reality being the spiritual.  Therefore, the ultimate shaking will be when we face our ultimate spiritual test - the judgment at the end of the age.  It is in this moment that many will learn that althought they thought they were unshakable in life - in death they will truly be shaken.  The word for shaken in Proverbs 10:30 is the word "mot" which means to be removed or to fall.  It was used often in the Old Testament to refer to the shaking and removing of things previously thought to be unshakable.  What shook them was the fierce judgments of Almighty God.  This shaking is promised for the wicked and the ungodly.  This is the term that is used when it is said that God will remove the mountains - and also of Him removing the entire earth.  Indeed there will be a shaking of eternal proportions that will come to the earth.  But after the earth is destroyed by fire, there is an even more terrifying event to come.  All mankind will stand before the judgment bar of God Himself.  This is the ultimate accounting - and the sole basis upon which our entire eternity will be based.  Oh what a shaking will come for all philosophies, all worldviews, and all religious beliefs.  They will be tested - and all but a faith in Jesus Christ will be found wanting. 

The righteous do not have to fear in that day - for the righteousness given to them by God on the basis of faith will stand.  It will not be shaken for it rests on the person of Jesus Christ as well as His death, burial, and resurrection.  It was the blood of Jesus that paid the debt of sin and paved the way for God to make us righteous by faith.  But for every other religious or non-religious view - this will be a day of horror.  It will be a day to be terrified as they learn that their self-made, man-made, or demonically-inspired religious and philosophical views will not remain.  We are promised that the wicked will not dwell in the land.  They will not stand, nor will they know an eternity in God's presence.  They will be judged and eventually cast into the lake of fire.  This will be their ignoble end - for they held an ignoble faith.  Their beliefs did not honor God or give Him thanks.  Their view saw god as something or someone they could manage by their own thoughts and philosophical positions.  Thus the land God is preparing for us will not be where they will dwell.  They will dwell in the outer darkness where there will be weeping and knashing of teeth.  They will dwell in a place where the smoke of their torment will go up forever and ever.

Let me the thoughts for today with a quote from the book of Hebrews.  There we read of this day of shaking with the following description.  "See to it that you do not refuse Him who is speaking. For if those did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape who turn away from Him who warns from heaven.  And His voice shook the earth then, but now He has promised, saying, 'YET ONCE MORE I WILL SHAKE NOT ONLY THE EARTH, BUT ALSO THE HEAVEN.'  This expression, "Yet once more," denotes the removing of those things which can be shaken, as of created things, so that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.  Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire."  (Hebrews 12:25-29)  There is a shaking coming and it will shake anything and everything which can be shaken.  Heaven and earth will be shaken on that day.  But there will be a kingdom on this day that cannot be shaken.  The context of this shaking is the judgment of God.  God warns of this day from heaven.  He also works that anything created will be shaken, and even more than shaken, they will be destroyed.  Therefore we are urged to prepare for a shaking that will also involve standing before God, Who in that day, will be a consuming fire.  Are you ready for that day?  Do you have something, beyond things in this life and this world, that will not be shaken when they all are shaken?  Are you ready to stand before God as a consuming fire - and have what it will take to make it through the shaking and through the fire?  There is only one thing that will stand in that day - it is what God has given to us through His Son, Jesus Christ.  On that day only a righteousness gained by faith in Jesus will stand.  May both you and me prepare for THAT DAY, so that when it comes - we will not be shaken.

And you will be like one who lies down in the middle of the sea, Or like one who lies down on the top of a mast. Proverbs 23:34

Drunken fools are unstable.  This could have multiple meanings, but in this verse in Proverbs it actually only means that they are physically unstable.  The drunker the fool gets, the more he is unable to control himself.  He will eventually stumble around and fall down a lot.  This is because of how alcohol affects both his brain and his muscles.  Both are adversely affected and are hindered from functioning normally.  In dealing with the previous verse we saw how both sight and muscles are weakened and disfunctional when the blood alcohol level of a person rises.  The lack of sight - and the inability of the brain to handle the direction and regulation of our muscles is what causes this instability.

The actions of the drunken fool are compared to those who lie down in the middle of the sea.  This first phrase refers to one who has sunken down into the sea.  Similar words were used of Jonah and his fall into the depths of the waters in Jonah 2:4 - thus this is a picture of a person who is either drowning or in danger of drowning.  He is lying in the midst of the sea - which is literally the heart of the sea.  In his intellectual confusion he slowly passes into a state of unconsciousness - where he is no longer in control of his life.  The drunken fool drinks until he is fighting a battle with being conscious.  Even if he is conscious physically, often the drunk cannot remember what he did the night before.  Some fools who have lived like this even find that they have injured someone, impregnated or have been impregnated by someone they don't even know, or in severe cases have even killed someone.  Truly just as the man sinking in the heart of the sea is no longer in control of himself - so the drunken fool has lost control and places himself in grave danger. 

The second statement here is that he is like someone who lies down on the top of a mast.  This place mentioned here is the crow's nest or lookout mast on a ship.  These are not made for anything except standing.  When a man is standing in one he can hold on and can determine direction and warning for a ship.  For a man to be lying down in such a place is foolish on several counts.  First of all, doing this means that he is most likely lying down on top of the nest itself - with no way to hold himself stable.  Since the motion of the ship on the sea is greatly exaggerated here, he is more likely to be thrown from the nest into the sea or to his great injury or death on the ship below.  The drunken fool is similarly in danger because drunkenness greatly impairs his ability to protect himself and guide himself safely wherever he is.  He too is in danger of injury or death in his drunken state.  The second way this is foolish has to do with being watchful.  If you are lying down on top of the mast you are not watching.  The ship could run aground and face terrible problems when its lookout is asleep or lying down on the job.  If enemies approach he is supposed to be the first line of warning.  But since he is lying down on the job - he is subjecting the ship to a condition of having no lookout at all.  The drunken fool is similarly abandoning watch over his life, his family, his friends, and most especially his testimony.  He is a man adrift with no one at the helm - wandering through life with no direction as well as no protection.  Some who choose to live this way, ruin their lives in the course of one night. 

The wise man does not impair himself willingly.  He keeps his wits about him and keeps watch over his life and testimony.  He knows that drunkenness will severely blind him to everything around him and also will leave him without any discernment or prudence in his decision making ability.  Therefore he avoids drunkenness like one would avoid the plague.  He knows that rather than being drunk he is to be filled with the Holy Spirit.  That way he has a teacher and a guide who can keep him safe.  He knows that under the influence of This Spirit he will not have to wake up in the morning wondering what happened and whether he will need to be ashamed of the previous night's activities.