Proverbs 6:1-35 TLB

[1] Son, if you endorse a note for someone you hardly know, guaranteeing his debt, you are in serious trouble. [2] You may have trapped yourself by your agreement. [3] Quick! Get out of it if you possibly can! Swallow your pride; don't let embarrassment stand in the way. Go and beg to have your name erased. [4] Don't put it off. Do it now. Don't rest until you do. [5] If you can get out of this trap you have saved yourself like a deer that escapes from a hunter or a bird from the net. [6] Take a lesson from the ants, you lazy fellow. Learn from their ways and be wise! [7] For though they have no king to make them work, [8] yet they labor hard all summer, gathering food for the winter. [9] But you-all you do is sleep. When will you wake up? [10] "Let me sleep a little longer!" Sure, just a little more! [11] And as you sleep, poverty creeps upon you like a robber and destroys you; want attacks you in full armor. [12] Let me describe for you a worthless and a wicked man; first, he is a constant liar; he signals his true intentions to his friends with eyes and feet and fingers. [14] He is always thinking up new schemes to swindle people. He stirs up trouble everywhere. [15] But he will be destroyed suddenly, broken beyond hope of healing. [16] For there are six things the Lord hates-no, seven: haughtiness, lying, murdering, plotting evil, eagerness to do wrong, a false witness, sowing discord among brothers. [20] Young man, obey your father and your mother. [21] Take to heart all of their advice; keep in mind everything they tell you. [22] Every day and all night long their counsel will lead you and save you from harm; when you wake up in the morning, let their instructions guide you into the new day. [23] For their advice is a beam of light directed into the dark corners of your mind to warn you of danger and to give you a good life. [24] Their counsel will keep you far away from prostitutes, with all their flatteries, and unfaithful wives of other men. [25] Don't lust for their beauty. Don't let their coyness seduce you. [26] For a prostitute will bring a man to poverty, and an adulteress may cost him his very life. [27] Can a man hold fire against his chest and not be burned? [28] Can he walk on hot coals and not blister his feet? [29] So it is with the man who commits adultery with another's wife. He shall not go unpunished for this sin. [30] Excuses might even be found for a thief if he steals when he is starving! [31] But even so, he is fined seven times as much as he stole, though it may mean selling everything in his house to pay it back. [32] But the man who commits adultery is an utter fool, for he destroys his own soul. [33] Wounds and constant disgrace are his lot, [34] for the woman's husband will be furious in his jealousy, and he will have no mercy on you in his day of vengeance. [35] You won't be able to buy him off no matter what you offer.