A corrupt generation

In this passage, Agur talks about the generation he saw in his own time.

(The word translated “those” in this passage, is actually most often translated “generations” throughout the Old Testament.  I suppose it was translated “those” to soften the sweeping indictment Agur made of the people he saw.)

What kind of people were they?

They were people who cursed their fathers and refused to bless their mothers (Proverbs 30:11). 

The first command God gave concerning human relationships in the 10 commandments was to honor your father and mother.

God himself recognized the importance of this relationship if society is to not only survive, but thrive.

Unfortunately, we see so many who not only don’t honor their parents, but actually despise them.  And God will judge them for that someday (17).

They were people who were self-righteous (12).

They saw all the faults of others, yet couldn’t see the filth of their own souls.

They were people who were proud, and disdainful of others (13).  

While taking a higher view of themselves than they should have, they looked down on others who were also created in God’s image.  As a result of that…

They took to bloodshed, and took advantage of the weak and needy, rather than caring for them  (14).  

They also acted this way because..

They were full of greed.

They were like leeches, always taking and never giving.

And as the grave never has its fill of death, as a childless woman constantly cries out for a baby, as a thirsty land longs for water, and as a fire that will consume anything that gets in its path, so these people are constantly crying out for more, consuming all that is placed before them, and yet are never satisfied (15-16).

They took something God created to be beautiful and turned it into something ugly.

As amazed as Agur was by God’s creation, he was amazed at how God created man and woman to be one in marriage.  (18-19).

But what did this generation do?  They glorified adultery, and made marriage a miserable thing where a wife is unloved and is cast aside for another (20,23).

The unqualified became rulers, and those who were rich lived only to indulge in their pleasures.  (22)

That was the generation Agur lived in.  It’s amazing how little has changed in the millenia that have passed since then.  If anything, things have gotten worse.

Paul himself foresaw our generation, saying,

But mark this:  There will be terrible times in the last days.

People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God– having a form of godliness but denying its power.

Have nothing to do with them.  (2 Timothy 3:1-5)

This is the generation that we live in.  But this is not what we are called to be.  That’s not what we are.

What are we?  The apostle Peter tells us.

But you are a chosen people (generation — KJV), a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.  (1 Peter 2:9)

That’s what we are.  So let us live that way each day.