How can we enjoy the quality of life we long for?
Text: Proverbs 10:22
Hosts:
J. Kent Edwards
Vicki Hitzges
Nathan Norman
Narrator: Brian French
The CrossTalk Podcast is a production of CrossTalk Global, equipping biblical communicators, so every culture hears God’s voice. To find out more, or to support the work of this ministry please visit www.crosstalkglobal.org
Produced by Nathan James Norman/Untold Podcast Production
© 2026 CrossTalk Global
Brian: What does it mean to live a high-quality life? When the European Union set out to answer this question, it identified a number of key indicators that included employment opportunities that provide an income that meets and exceeds daily needs, quality affordable healthcare, educational opportunities that provide prospects for advancement, and numerous social connections that include access to sporting and cultural events. You and I long to live a comfortable life that includes all these elements, as well as a thriving family, good friends, and great marriages. But how is it possible for ordinary people like us all over the world to live a high-quality life. If you want to live your best life possible, then stay tuned to the advice of King Solomon. He doesn't promise everyone the life they may have dreamed of, but he does point out how we can live our best life now. Interested? Then listen in as Nathan Norman, Kent Edwards, and Vicki Hitzges try to discover Solomon's secret in Proverbs chapter 10 22. Welcome to Crosstalk, a Christian podcast whose goal is for us to encourage each other to not only increase our knowledge of the Bible but to take the next step beyond information into transformation. Our goal is to bring the Bible to life into all our lives. I'm Brian French. Today, Dr. Kent Edwards, Vicki Hitzges, and Nathan Norman continue their discussion in the book of Proverbs. If you have a Bible handy, Turn to Proverbs 10:22 as we join their discussion.
Kent: Vicki Nathan, with apologies to Joel Osteen, if someone wanted to go beyond the European Union's indicators, what are some of the things people want to live their best life now?
Vicki: Oh, I think women want to be thin and rich.
Nathan: Yeah.
Vicki: Oh, there's all kinds of things. You want to have a beautiful house, a beautiful car, lots of friends.
Nathan: Great vacations, good relationships, money, money, money, right? You want to have influence over other people. Uh, you probably want to have some sort of job, but not too tenuous of a job, right? Uh, not, not working long hours. You want people that can work for you and not have to do the laborious things like clean the house and do the dishes and watch the kids that, uh, that you don't necessarily want to do. Probably unlimited sex. Sorry, that was the guy answer right there.
Vicki: Yeah, that was a guy answer. Oh gosh.
Kent: God never promises to make everyone's life perfect, but he did tell us what we can do to enjoy a fulfilling life today. And he does so through King Solomon, in Proverbs 10:22.
Vicki: Oh, I'll read it. It says, "The blessings of the Lord brings wealth without painful toil for it." That's what you just said, Nathan.
Nathan: That sounds awesome.
Kent: Yeah, it does. I was going to say, that sounds good, doesn't it?
Vicki: It does, to get rich and not have to painfully toil for it.
Nathan: I'm all for that.
Kent: And at first glance, Solomon appears to guarantee that all of God's people will be millionaires, right?
Vicki: I don't know that he says that, but he says they'll be wealthy and not have to work hard.
Kent: While you're wealthy. Yeah, however you define wealthy.
Nathan: 900,000 heirs.
Kent: And if you look at the text closely, you know, you can get that impression, because the word translated in the text as wealth— guess what it literally means? Wealth or treasure. Solomon here is talking directly about money.
Vicki: Cool, keep talking.
Nathan: So, no, no, or stop right there.
Vicki: Yeah, better yet.
Nathan: There's a but coming.
Kent: So, but if people read that and say that therefore all of God's people will be wealthy, well, that doesn't seem to ring true, does it?
Vicki: No, it's not true with the Bible. No, you know it's not true. You're right, there is a but coming. Uh-huh.
Kent: Well, I mean, there were wealthy people in the Bible, right?
Vicki: Yeah, but there's poor people in the Bible and in real life, unfortunately. Rich people: Abraham, Solomon, David, Job. Poor people: Jesus.
Nathan: Well, fine. Yeah, yeah. The disciples, the apostles.
Vicki: Yeah, yeah.
Kent: And Jesus said in Matthew 26:11, do you remember that verse?
Vicki: The poor you'll always have with you.
Kent: So even among God's people, there are going to be people who are not rich materially, right?
Vicki: Yeah.
Kent: And we see that not only in the Bible, we see the fact that not all God's people are wealthy. Look around the world, look across the globe.
Nathan: Well, don't even look at the globe, just look at your own church, right? Most churches— I'm in a wealthy area in Westchester County, New York, and there's still the full gambit of wealth and poverty here. When I was in Michigan, my church there, a lot of people who had some wealth and people who were in poverty. And my church in Southern California, same thing. Uh, so, so you're going to find that in almost any context, in any, uh, church setting and situation. But like you said, you look around the world, I mean, most of the world lives in poverty.
Kent: Yeah, many people around the world have no food, they have no health care. All the things that we said at the beginning we would like to enjoy Yeah, they would not describe that as their best life now.
Nathan: Yeah, I know as we were traveling, uh, to Vietnam, you know, you'd pointed out that the vast majority of the world's protein comes from chicken eggs, and, uh, and that's a staple for everyone to have these eggs, and that's, that's pretty much the main protein that they get. Maybe at Christmas or Easter, some celebration, you know, they get to have actual chicken or, or beef, but, but those are rare. And we can have that every day here in America.
Kent: As we record this podcast, there's a lot of turmoil and suffering in the country of Cuba. Mm-hmm. When I was in Cuba some time ago, and I asked one of our leaders of Crosstalk, I know there's a protein shortage. How come you don't keep chickens? They said, we can't afford the feed. Wow. That's poverty. Wow. When you can't afford the feed for chickens. And these are dedicated Christians. So how do we square that with the blessing of the Lord brings wealth and he adds no troubles to it? Maybe we need to remind ourselves what a proverb is. Nathan, help us here. What is a proverb?
Nathan: They are general observations on how best to live life. Not guarantees. So the technical term, I believe, is nomik wisdom, general wisdom or general knowledge. Generally, this would be true, but there are exceptions to the rule.
Kent: Yeah. So a good example might be, oh, I don't know, Proverbs 22:6. You're familiar with that one, Vicki?
Vicki: Yes. It says, "Train up a child," or in NIV it says, "Start off children," the way they should go. And then it says, even when they are old, they will not turn from it. And generally that's true. My mother used to say, if you don't have a child by the time they're 2, you won't get that child.
Kent: Hmm.
Vicki: Wow.
Kent: But it's not always true, is it?
Vicki: It's not always true. I can think of a family, wonderful parents, kids turned out great. With the exception of one child, and when I say didn't turn out great, totally turned from the Lord. Bright kids, all of them, including the one that didn't, but he's hostile to the Lord. And I don't know the story. I saw them again later in life. But, you know, generally it's true. The other kids all turned out, love the Lord. They're all, including the one, all successful. But, you know, all trained the same way, and one just is hostile to the Lord.
Kent: Yeah. Yeah. Proverb tells us a general truth, and we see the truth of Proverbs 22:6 worked out in the Old Testament. I'm fascinated when you look at Eli, who was not a great prophet in the book of Samuel. He was walking very far from the Lord. And you were not surprised his kids went far from the Lord. Yet it's fascinating to me that in 1 Samuel 8, Samuel, who was a very godly man, we learned that his children were not walking with the Lord. So bad parents, bad kids. Sometimes the best parents have kids that walk away from the Lord. That's true for child rearing, but the whole area of understanding the general nature of a proverb comes up with, oh, I don't know, wine drinking, doesn't it?
Nathan: Yeah, Ecclesiastes 1:19, it says, "A feast is made for laughter. Wine makes life merry." Is that true? Well, it worked at the wedding at Cana as Jesus' first miracle. His first miracle.
Vicki: His first public miracle.
Nathan: So, uh, so story ends right there. Boom, end podcast.
Kent: Uh, yeah, at the same time, Solomon points out— who wrote Ecclesiastes?
Vicki: But he points out in chapter 23:31-32, he says, do not gaze at wine when it is red, when it sparkles in the cup and goes down smoothly. In the end, it bites like a snake and poisons like viper.
Kent: Yeah.
Nathan: So white wine only, have a zinfandel.
Vicki: There you go.
Kent: That's what it means. Of course.
Vicki: No, I have a friend that's— a couple friends that are alcoholics and it's ruined their life, just ruined their life. You know, other times you can have wine at a party and everybody relaxes and has fun, but boy, alcohol can truly just wreck lives, wreck it.
Nathan: And decimate families, right? We see that with Noah. I mean, it just ruined his family dynamics. Absolutely. His drunkenness after leaving the ark.
Kent: Yeah. Yeah. So proverbs are general truths, but they're not absolutes. Sometimes great Christian parents have great Christian kids. Not always. Wine can make the heart merry, but be careful, it bites like a snake and poisons like a viper. But here in Proverbs 10, the contrast is seen in a single verse. It seems that there are two ways to pursue wealth and the kind of life that it can bring. Vicki, remind us of verse 22, just the first part.
Vicki: Okay, the first part says, "The blessing of the Lord brings wealth." Okay, how does a person receive the blessings of the Lord?
Nathan: Well, we saw all the way back in Psalm 1. This is like, I don't know, 3 years ago when we talked about this. Says, blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord and who meditates on his law day and night.
Kent: So Vicki, who are the blessed people?
Vicki: The ones that follow and yearn after the Lord.
Kent: Yeah, particularly meditate on his law day and night. They meditate so they can live that way. And you remember Psalm 1, the person who does that, they are fruitful. Do you remember the metaphor that the psalmist uses in Psalm 1?
Nathan: You're like a tree planted by a river.
Kent: Yeah. And that's why in Psalm 112, we read that, "Blessed is the man who fears the Lord and who finds great delight in His commands." So if you want to be blessed by God, the requirement is what? If you want to enjoy God's blessing?
Vicki: You'll obey Him. You'll live a life of obedience.
Kent: Why? Why does obedience to God's commands lead to wealth? Vicki, do you remember the statement your father, Haddon Robinson, made so often?
Vicki: Oh yeah, something is not true because it's in the Bible. It's in the Bible because it's true.
Kent: So God doesn't give commands because he's mean. He doesn't give commands irrationally. His commands are guidelines for how to best live life. You can ignore them at your peril, but you will suffer the consequences. You can pretend, though, as your father has said, if you can pretend there's no such thing as gravity, but when you step off the roof, what you believe doesn't really matter. What we're discovering here in Proverbs 10:22 is that if we choose to live a life according to God's commands, his will, we are far more likely—not guaranteed—but far more likely to flourish in all of life. You know that's true. Consider the consequences of not living according to God's commands. So, for example, what are the financial implications if you're an alcoholic?
Vicki: Well, it depends. I know wealthy alcoholics, but if you're an alcoholic and you don't finish your work, if you don't show up for work, you can go broke and you can end up divorcing your wife. You can end up letting your kids down and your family totally splinters and everybody ends up hating you. That's a big price to pay for alcohol.
Nathan: And there's health implications down the road.
Vicki: And there's health implications.
Nathan: Even if you're rich. I mean, some of these, these people who their, their collections of alcohol are just enormous. How many villages could you feed? Right.
Kent: So if you ignore God's command and abuse wine, alcohol, you can destroy your life. What are the financial implications of divorcing the wife of your youth? I mean, Malachi is pretty big on not doing that in his book. What if you ignored that command and decided to do that? That can cost you.
Vicki: That can cost you a lot. And a lot of people feel great guilt years later. Great guilt. And there's no guarantee that if you run off with someone else, that's going to make you happy. I mean, forbidden waters taste sweet, but sometimes the forbidden water gets poisoned.
Nathan: There was a band— actually, I think they still are around— called Starflyer 59. They were a Christian kind of alternative group, and there was a whole concept album with a lot of these themes. And I remember one song was called New Wife, New Life. And it was about, right, you left your wife, you left your spouse, and everything changes. You break all these family ties and you break the family ties if you have children, right? Their ties are now strained or broken. You introduce awkwardness with in-laws that you might have had a good relationship with and now you just can't have the relationship with them anymore. It really pulls apart of the life.
Kent: It really does. And I had a friend who mentioned to me just the other day that they had learned from a wise man many years ago that preparing for successful retirement financially is not that hard. He said, "All you have to do is have one house and one spouse." The financial implications of divorce could be devastating. There's many people who can attest to that. What about the financial implications of laziness? God tells us to be diligent and not be lazy. What if we disagree and decide to spend most of the time of our days with our feet up on the coffee table?
Nathan: I am aware of someone— this is a bit of an extreme example, but he was coddled by his parents. They never had forced him to go to school. They didn't force him to get a job. And so eventually he He, when he graduated, basically limped across the way to graduate from high school. He didn't get any degrees, he didn't go to trade school, he didn't really get a job. He would hold jobs down here and there, but most of his time he lived in his parents' basement watching movies, playing video games. He didn't have a social life because while everyone else is getting a job or getting married or going to events, he's just kind of sloughed off into oblivion doing almost nothing. And, uh, and he, he had a premature death at, I, I want to say in his mid-30s. Wow. Um, from, uh, from like a heart attack. I mean, he just didn't exercise, he didn't eat well, he didn't have a social life, he didn't have friends. Um, it just, it just ended in a very, very premature, uh, and tragic death.
Vicki: You know what too, there's a, a lack of satisfaction being lazy. Yeah. When you are lazy, you don't want to work. Yeah. But yesterday I had a couple really creative things I needed to do, and I just didn't want to do them. But I thought, get in there and do them. So I did. And when I was done, I just felt so good about myself. There's just a satisfaction that comes from getting things done that you don't get when you're lazy.
Nathan: Yeah, Vicki has a good video out there about like, if you're procrastinating, the answer to it is just do it, right? Like, just start it.
Vicki: Just start it. Start. Yeah, just start. That's the hardest part. It's really helpful. Yeah.
Kent: Good advice. Thank you. And if you don't adopt it, you're going to have trouble in the workplace. You can lose a job or not get a job. You can be destitute. Absolutely. The financial implications of lying. God is all about telling the truth. Let your yes be yes and your no be no. But if you choose to be a liar, what are the consequences? All the above.
Nathan: I don't know. It depends on who you're lying to, right? If you lie to the police or the FBI, you can go to jail. Sure, right? They could, they could be questioning you about something that, uh, that you're totally innocent of, but you start lying to them. Now, now you've created a felony, right? Uh, depending on what it is. Um, if you're lying to your boss, they don't trust you anymore, so you might lose your job, or you might get looked over for promotion. If you lie to your friends, they don't want to be your friend anymore, so you lose your social, uh, capital. If you lie to, uh, your children, right, they don't trust you. And when they get older, I mean, they just They leave. Jettison. Absolutely. Yeah. Hmm. Yeah, it depends on who you're lying to.
Kent: Yeah. And if you lie to your kids, you can destroy your relationship with your own children. Mm-hmm. And possibly grandchildren as well. Oh, absolutely. Deep consequences. So I find it fascinating that when Solomon says here, "The blessing of the Lord brings wealth and he adds no trouble to it." It's interesting when I look at the words, "no trouble to it," it talks about painful toil. It could be translated as sorrow, hardship, and pain. Those of us who choose to walk away from a life that will be blessed by God, disregard the commandments of God, we walk into a life of sorrow, hardship, and pain. If we live in obedience in God's Word, we will enjoy God's blessing in every aspect of life, even in our finances. But if we choose to disregard God's command and live according to our own moral standards, we forfeit the blessing of God. Instead, we will live a life full of trouble.
Nathan: Kent, that sounds all well and good, but how can we know that we are pursuing God and not just trying to follow after him so that we can get rich quick?
Kent: Yeah, well, that's a good question. As I look at the Bible, one thing I find fascinating is that godly people are always generous. People who are transformed in the image of God, they don't obsess with their net worth. They may have it, but they don't obsess over it. Like God, they are generous with others. Think of the ways that God has been generous with us. Vicki, how would you— how has God been generous to you and me?
Vicki: Well, I'm amazed at how God has been generous. I look at the family that I grew up in. My father was a headin' Robinson. He was exceptionally gifted, but he didn't choose to go after money. He lived his life to honor the Lord and to teach, to preach and to teach other people to preach. And we lived in a very modest house. And yet, We traveled around the world and he spoke all over and he took us with him and he met incredible people. There's a proverb, I'm going to butcher it, but it says basically, "If you use your gifts, you will walk among kings." And he did that. And they valued him and they valued his wisdom. And And I said to him once when I was a teenager, "Daddy, do you wish you had—" because we were with some very wealthy people at the time. And when we were back in our room, I said, "Do you wish you had a yacht?" And he laughed and he said, "No, Vicki, of all the sins I've perfected, envy's not one of them." And I knew he didn't. You know, he wouldn't want to take care of a boat or, you know, whatever. But he got to use those things because people invited us to country clubs and to be on ships and do this and that. And then, you know, I got divorced, which was heartbreaking to me, but it was also terrifying to me. I didn't know what was going to happen. And one of my dad's friends said to me, "Vicki—" Well, I won't give the exact quote because I'm going to give the name away. But he said, "With or without your husband, you are going to do fine." And I thank the Lord all the time because I did do fine. I did do fine. God took care of me. I just see God's hand all over. God is a good God.
Kent: And he's been generous.
Vicki: He's been very generous.
Kent: What's interesting is that in my experience, limited though it may be, sometimes people with the most money are the least generous.
Vicki: That's true. In fact, I understand that Louisiana and Mississippi, where the people tend to have the least money, are the most— two most generous states.
Nathan: Isn't that something? It reminds me of what C.S. Lewis said about George MacDonald. Chesterton was generous in a way that only a poor person could be. Hmm. You don't have a lot. And you know others are in need just like you are, and so you give whatever you can.
Kent: So you give it away. Yep. I have seen that. Years ago, when I first started doing international work, it was in southern India. I have never seen poverty before or since like I saw in southern India.
Vicki: I've never been there, but I hear that too. Go ahead. It is just People are hopeless.
Kent: They have nothing.
Vicki: And yet they give?
Kent: Well, I was preaching and this one family wanted to say thank you. They invited me to their house. It was modest. Can I say that? I mean, it was a tin shack with their kids stacked up like on bunks in a submarine. I mean, they had very little, but they had a chair. They asked me to sit on it. And I saw the wife whisper into one of her sons' ears, and he ran off and came back with some dates. And they gave me a date. A date. I have never seen such generosity. People who are spending their days in the trash heaps looking for pieces of plastic they might be able to sell wanted to be generous with me and gave me a date. It was the sweetest and most difficult thing I've ever eaten because I knew how much it meant to them. Godly people are generous people. What does that mean? Seems to me that the goal of our lives is to love God, not money. Solomon is talking about wealth, but what he's saying is wealth, like everything else you value in life, only comes when you want God and honor his commands primarily. This way to succeed in life is to be obsessed with being conformed into the image of Christ. When we live godly lives, we'll avoid the painful toil and the consequences of sinful choices and learn firsthand that the blessing of the Lord will bring wealth. In every part of our life. According to Solomon, how could Israel enjoy wealth without painful toil? By living a life that God will bless. How can we enjoy the quality of life we long for? By making life decisions that invite his blessings. So the secret to living our best life now is holiness. Let's— let's focus on pursuing God with all of our heart, mind, and will. Because if we do, we will enjoy the blessings that will inevitably follow. That is how we can live our best life now.
Brian: How can we enjoy the quality of life we long for? As we just heard, we can make life decisions that invite God's blessings. I trust that today's discussion of God's Word has been helpful and served as an encouragement to not just be hearers of the Word, but doers. Together, let's bring God's Word to life, to our lives this week. The Crosstalk Podcast is a production of Crosstalk Global, equipping biblical communicators so every culture hears God's voice. To find out more about this educational nonprofit organization, please visit www.crosstalkglobal.org. Crosstalk just finished successful trainings in Bucharest, Moldova, Southern California, and Kansas this season, and we're getting ready for another training in Kenya this summer. Help us train the next generation of biblical communicators. All you have to do is click Donate in the show notes and make a donation of any size. You can also support this show by rating it on whatever platform you're listening to us. Be sure to listen next Friday as we continue to learn from God's wisdom in the book of Proverbs. You won't want to miss it.
Nathan: Okay. Interested? Then listen in as Nathan Norman, Kent Edwards, and Vicki Hitzges, just spelt correctly. See, I'm going to give you— I saw that. I'm going to give you some good props when they're deserved. Thank you. Thank you. You know, this so rarely happens that I have to throw them at you when you get it right. Try to discover Solomon's secret in Proverbs 10:22.
Vicki: Proverbs didn't do so well.
Nathan: Proverbs. Proverbs.
Kent: Let's get that V in there. Did I ever mention that I didn't take typing in high school?
Nathan: Listen, um, I— because of this, this is, this is true. I had once made a mistake on our sign outside. I tell you how, on my sign I put the question for the big idea, and it gets— and we've gotten people, people come to the church because they're like, I gotta know the answer. And, um, I had misspelled something at one point, or I forgot a word on one side, and on social media people were like, oh, you know, you got some— no one engages with it at all unless it's wrong. So, I'm like, man, maybe I should— maybe I should—
Vicki: Screw it up every week.
Nathan: —type those regular— but I can't tell anyone. Just put them in regularly. That way people watch it more and engage with it more and they think I'm an idiot and that's fine. That's fine as long as you're engaging with it. Anyways. Yeah.
Kent: See, that's exactly why I left out the V.
Nathan: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Proverbs. Proverbs. Okay. Hmm. All right. There we go. All right. We're stopping.