WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:09.880 We are in Proverbs. Tonight, Proverbs chapter 2. Proverbs wants us to pursue wisdom. In a way, 00:00:09.880 --> 00:00:15.839 ! it's a really simple book. The first nine chapters of all these poetic bits, and they kind of say the 00:00:15.839 --> 00:00:22.400 same thing over and over with lots of different images and different language. And then a lot of 00:00:22.400 --> 00:00:25.839 the book is really, really difficult to understand because there are these obscure Proverbs that you're 00:00:25.839 --> 00:00:31.019 meant to think about and toss over in your mind. To say the least, it doesn't make for easy preaching 00:00:31.019 --> 00:00:36.399 necessarily. And so let's look at one of these repetitious parts and see what we can find. 00:00:36.399 --> 00:00:42.560 There's some really, really good things that the Lord would have to tell us here. I use the word 00:00:42.560 --> 00:00:50.039 pursue wisdom because it captures the different attitudes that we should have towards it, to call 00:00:50.039 --> 00:00:57.519 out for wisdom, to desire it, to search for it. Have a look at those first four verses again. 00:00:58.960 --> 00:01:05.840 My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you, making your ear attentive 00:01:05.840 --> 00:01:12.780 to wisdom and inclining your heart to understanding, yes, if you call out for insight and raise your 00:01:12.780 --> 00:01:19.820 voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures. 00:01:22.379 --> 00:01:30.299 The book of Proverbs wants us to pursue wisdom. It stresses over and over that we should listen to 00:01:30.299 --> 00:01:38.379 the voice of wise teachers, to seek after wise instruction, to embrace it as a person. Wisdom is 00:01:38.379 --> 00:01:44.780 even portrayed, personified as a woman who's calling out into the streets. She's inviting people to her. 00:01:44.780 --> 00:01:51.979 She's sort of proclaiming her own benefits and grandeur. As I said, the middle of the book has all 00:01:51.979 --> 00:01:57.419 these proverbs that are meant to build wisdom in us by giving us things to think about and things to put 00:01:57.419 --> 00:02:05.179 into action. And then the end of the book concludes with another woman, but this time it's not a kind of 00:02:05.180 --> 00:02:14.700 personified abstract thing. It's an actual woman, a mother and a wife, and she has all of wisdom 00:02:15.900 --> 00:02:20.860 with her and she's embodying it and acting in this incredibly wise way. It kind of describes all of 00:02:20.860 --> 00:02:29.260 her characteristics and behaviors. And so we're, in view of all of that, supposed to want wisdom. We're 00:02:29.259 --> 00:02:37.419 supposed to want wisdom. Imagine the deacons sent around a questionnaire today. Four questions. 00:02:39.019 --> 00:02:49.259 The first one is this, true or false? I want to be wise. True. Number two, how important is wisdom in the 00:02:49.259 --> 00:02:58.299 Christian life? Not at all. Somewhat important. Very important. The most important thing in the 00:02:58.299 --> 00:03:07.419 Christian life. Let's say somewhat important for number two. Number three, describe two ways that 00:03:07.419 --> 00:03:17.099 you've tried to become wise this week. You might have read your Bible. I might have asked for a little bit 00:03:17.099 --> 00:03:22.699 of advice, but you might come up short on that. I'll come back to that. We'll put it that way. 00:03:23.340 --> 00:03:28.859 And then number four, what does it mean to pursue wisdom? Some of you might have a nice answer. Some 00:03:28.859 --> 00:03:33.419 of you might look over at your neighbor and say, would you put for number four? What's it mean to 00:03:33.419 --> 00:03:41.099 pursue wisdom? That's a bigger question. We do want wisdom. I don't think anyone in here would come to me 00:03:41.099 --> 00:03:46.060 and say, you know what? I'd like to be a fool. Wisdom's really not my thing. I'll opt for a life 00:03:46.060 --> 00:03:56.539 of folly. Most of us do want some wisdom. Now, I don't know that it's always on a high-ranking list 00:03:56.539 --> 00:04:04.060 of Christian living, of our priorities for what it means to live in light of God's revelation, 00:04:04.699 --> 00:04:09.659 to live in light of God's community, to say, ah, wisdom for me is a priority. It's one of the top 00:04:09.659 --> 00:04:15.340 things I think about. It's one of the top things I do focus on devotionally in the week and spiritually. 00:04:17.819 --> 00:04:21.899 We're not really sure how our other efforts sometimes to worship God have anything to do 00:04:21.899 --> 00:04:30.139 exactly with wisdom. Part of what's going on here is we don't think that wisdom issues, 00:04:30.139 --> 00:04:35.500 and I'll tell us, we'll unpack what those are. Wisdom issues are that important in the Christian 00:04:35.500 --> 00:04:45.500 life. But that important for the Christian life. Let's maybe view it like this. I have the basics 00:04:45.500 --> 00:04:51.500 of what it means to be a Christian with me in my daily, in my week, okay? So we've got maybe the 00:04:51.500 --> 00:04:56.699 Ten Commandments and the armor of God. Those kinds of things, the basics of what it means to go out into 00:04:56.699 --> 00:05:04.779 the Christian life. The belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness, the helmet of salvation, sword of 00:05:04.779 --> 00:05:14.779 the Spirit, shield of faith, shoes fit with the gospel. And you go out into your day with that armor on. 00:05:15.899 --> 00:05:20.699 You go into the office and you hear someone bad-mouthing Christians, and so you take out the 00:05:20.699 --> 00:05:25.659 sword of the Spirit and you strike them down with God's truth. You strike down that opinion. 00:05:27.339 --> 00:05:31.819 You're sitting at your computer, and you're tempted to do something you shouldn't do. 00:05:33.659 --> 00:05:38.539 But you realize you're wearing the breastplate of righteousness, and you need to protect your heart, 00:05:39.899 --> 00:05:41.899 and you stand firm amidst temptation. 00:05:41.899 --> 00:05:47.500 Your kids are lying to you, to your face, actually, again. 00:05:49.179 --> 00:05:54.859 So you take out that belt of truth, and you warn them. You just warn them that lying will be 00:05:55.419 --> 00:05:56.939 punished with the belt of truth. 00:05:59.099 --> 00:06:02.539 You find a friend in need, and so you tie up your shoes of the gospel readiness, and you 00:06:03.099 --> 00:06:08.620 go right to them and bring them the peace that only God can give. What could be more essential 00:06:08.620 --> 00:06:15.579 than the armor of God, and we'll say our Ten Commandments for guidance and weekly Christian living. 00:06:18.780 --> 00:06:22.699 But there's a lot of stuff in between. There's a lot of stuff in between those core elements to 00:06:22.699 --> 00:06:28.459 Christian living and all of the world out there, right? If we can call the kind of world that we step out 00:06:28.459 --> 00:06:35.340 into every day or every week, it's a kind of white space, and we've got these black elements of the armor of God 00:06:35.339 --> 00:06:42.060 and the Ten Commandments, then we've got a lot of gray in between, okay? There's a lot of gray in 00:06:42.060 --> 00:06:46.219 between. There's a lot of things that happen out there that we're not always quite clear. They're kind 00:06:46.219 --> 00:06:52.539 of Christian-like, but at the same time, they don't always seem clearly related to these things that we 00:06:52.539 --> 00:06:58.059 have for Christian living. It's a lot of gray space, right? What kind of things do I have in mind? Well, 00:06:58.059 --> 00:07:03.419 things like financial responsibility, for example. Yeah, I mean, being a Christian really informs that, but 00:07:04.220 --> 00:07:09.740 don't always know how exactly, don't steal, I know that. Be generous, those sorts of things. 00:07:11.819 --> 00:07:18.060 Things like laziness, our reputation among other people, our appetites, physical appetites even, 00:07:18.939 --> 00:07:25.420 how we speak around other people, the way we manage our emotions. How do those things fit into the 00:07:25.420 --> 00:07:30.220 Christian life? Because those things are the things that I'm referring to as wisdom issues. 00:07:33.500 --> 00:07:36.939 I'm not going to tell you that those things are more important than some of the core aspects of 00:07:36.939 --> 00:07:43.100 the Ten Commandments, of our confession of faith, but I am going to say that they're very important and 00:07:43.100 --> 00:07:50.060 that they matter a lot to God and should matter a lot to anyone who calls themselves a Christian. 00:07:52.220 --> 00:07:57.900 That list of topics I just mentioned, finances, laziness, reputation, appetite, speech, our emotions. 00:07:59.100 --> 00:08:03.580 There's at least 20 chapters of the Bible that are dedicated to those things, 00:08:04.379 --> 00:08:08.939 how to figure out how to deal with those things well and in a godly fashion. 00:08:08.939 --> 00:08:15.259 Those 20 chapters make up two-thirds of the book of Proverbs, so they're at least worth a look. 00:08:16.540 --> 00:08:21.500 Now, as I said, Proverbs is all about wisdom. That's clear even from the passage we just heard, Proverbs chapter 2. 00:08:22.860 --> 00:08:29.100 One definition for wisdom is knowing how to do all these things well. The art of godly living. 00:08:29.100 --> 00:08:32.139 If you're going to write something down, if you're going to memorize something about wisdom, 00:08:32.139 --> 00:08:39.179 it's the art of godly living. It's not just following rules, but it's not doing away with all the rules and guidance 00:08:39.419 --> 00:08:45.019 whatsoever. It's an art form, and it's not just good living, it's godly living. 00:08:48.220 --> 00:08:53.259 Godly living, it turns out, is spreading the gospel and knowing how to talk to people well. 00:08:53.259 --> 00:09:02.860 It's about speaking truth and about making, even negotiating, peace. It's about being able to 00:09:02.860 --> 00:09:10.139 resist temptation and also about keeping the right kinds of friends and avoiding dangerous situations. 00:09:12.860 --> 00:09:19.740 Proverbs offers us something distinctive for godly living that we don't find many other places in the 00:09:19.740 --> 00:09:25.740 Bible. And so I've got some very good news today. And it's not only that wisdom is important, 00:09:25.740 --> 00:09:31.899 that we should want wisdom, but that God gives wisdom and wisdom protects us. God gives wisdom and 00:09:31.899 --> 00:09:39.580 wisdom protects us. The passage takes a weird turn, actually. We've been looking, we've been listening, 00:09:39.580 --> 00:09:44.620 we've been searching for wisdom. If you seek it like silver, if you search for it as for hidden 00:09:44.620 --> 00:10:13.820 treasures, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord 00:10:13.820 --> 00:10:23.180 gives wisdom and from his mouth come knowledge and understanding. The search for wisdom should and will 00:10:23.180 --> 00:10:33.980 likely lead us to God. God is the owner of wisdom. He possesses it, he dispenses it, he guarantees it, 00:10:34.860 --> 00:10:43.500 he can distribute it. Without God we can have no true wisdom. So the search for wisdom will bring us 00:10:43.500 --> 00:10:51.100 first to God as its source. And it's not that God gives us wisdom and has nothing else to do with it. 00:10:51.100 --> 00:10:55.740 Wisdom is not a birthday card that God might just purchase or take off the shelf, sign his name on it, 00:10:55.740 --> 00:11:00.860 give it, you know, ultimately that's for you, you keep that. It just has my name on it. And that's 00:11:00.860 --> 00:11:07.820 that's really all he has to do with it. It's not like that. God, wisdom is a God thing. Wisdom is a God 00:11:07.820 --> 00:11:13.580 thing. And it might just be on the next page actually in Proverbs 3, 3, 18 and 19. We're given a picture of 00:11:13.580 --> 00:11:20.620 what God does with his own wisdom. The Lord by wisdom founded the earth. By understanding he established 00:11:20.620 --> 00:11:26.860 the heavens. By his knowledge the deeps broke open and the clouds dropped down the dew. 00:11:28.940 --> 00:11:34.680 If you need a chapter of the Bible to read this week or tonight, maybe alone, maybe with your family, 00:11:34.679 --> 00:11:39.239 maybe with friends, whatever it is, read Proverbs chapter 8. It takes those two verses and it just 00:11:39.239 --> 00:11:45.639 magnifies them. It talks about God's wisdom and her incredible grandeur because of her proximity to God 00:11:45.639 --> 00:11:49.639 and what God did in the creating of all things. 00:11:52.039 --> 00:11:56.839 And this little poem too is trying to tell us how wonderful wisdom is, how attractive and powerful 00:11:56.840 --> 00:12:06.600 and holy wisdom should be to us. When God created the heavens and the earth, he used wisdom. 00:12:07.639 --> 00:12:15.399 He used wisdom. There are lots of examples I could give of incredible human wisdom, right? We can point 00:12:15.399 --> 00:12:20.519 to all of these things. And one of the wonderful things about wisdom is it is an area of common grace. 00:12:20.519 --> 00:12:28.519 There are ways to live well, even if we don't do it out of love for God or as God's people to live well in the earth, 00:12:28.519 --> 00:12:33.559 that we would consider wisdom, right? And that things that all people can learn. But that's different 00:12:34.120 --> 00:12:41.079 ultimately from godly wisdom. But we have all kinds of wonderful examples. I've got notes here on architecture in Singapore, 00:12:41.080 --> 00:12:47.639 but I've recently been fascinated by barrels and barrel making. There's a wonderful history of of 00:12:47.639 --> 00:12:53.480 barrel making across Europe. And of course, for a long time, people just made clay pots to keep things 00:12:53.480 --> 00:13:00.840 in. And we all, most of us have made a clay pot actually in school. But barrels were a real innovation, 00:13:00.840 --> 00:13:08.360 right? And you start first by looking for really straight trees. And then if you cut those trees into 00:13:09.320 --> 00:13:13.080 strips of wood, and of course, you put them together and you have a nice side, they're just going to 00:13:13.080 --> 00:13:18.279 create a straight line, put a bunch of stacks of wood together, and they're flush. And so you've got to 00:13:18.279 --> 00:13:24.680 carve the sides of the pieces of wood until they start to fit together into a nice ring. And then they 00:13:24.680 --> 00:13:31.960 figured out how to bend these strips of wood. They treat them with water so they don't warp in the sunshine, 00:13:31.960 --> 00:13:37.159 treat them with heat so they are resilient. They tighten them up again and again, and they can hold liquid. 00:13:38.360 --> 00:13:42.440 Hundreds and hundreds of years ago. It's really an impressive thing. So you've never geeked out 00:13:42.440 --> 00:13:47.399 about barrels. Now's your chance to look into barrels. It's an impressive feat of human engineering, 00:13:47.960 --> 00:13:54.680 skill. And in a way, it's such a meager feat compared to what we witness in God's creation. 00:13:56.200 --> 00:14:02.519 Gravity, temperature, the life cycle, the immeasurable interrelatedness of all things, 00:14:02.519 --> 00:14:08.120 the human body of loan. If you've ever had a heart scare, your heart's not beating enough, 00:14:08.120 --> 00:14:12.679 not fast enough, not in the right rhythm, things like that, it makes you very self-conscious about 00:14:12.679 --> 00:14:18.439 what that heart is doing. And you will think about it a lot, and you'll be very impressed that it just 00:14:18.439 --> 00:14:26.039 keeps going and going and going. It beats so many times every single day. So it's an incredible thing. 00:14:26.039 --> 00:14:30.360 By God's wisdom, all things were created. 00:14:33.559 --> 00:14:39.799 Now instead of architecture or beating hearts or barrels, the apostle Paul is talking about 00:14:39.799 --> 00:14:48.519 predestination and God's plans for all time in the book of Romans. But he too admires the wisdom of 00:14:48.519 --> 00:14:54.279 God. He gets to a point in asking these theological questions where he doesn't have the answers. We 00:14:54.279 --> 00:14:57.399 can say that Paul doesn't have the answers to these questions. He's not provided with 00:14:58.199 --> 00:15:02.919 the inside, a view completely behind the curtain. And so he says this, 00:15:03.799 --> 00:15:09.159 O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, 00:15:09.159 --> 00:15:15.559 and how inscrutable his ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor? 00:15:15.559 --> 00:15:21.719 Who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid? For from him and through him and to him are all 00:15:21.719 --> 00:15:31.319 things. To him be glory forever." God's wisdom is a great mystery. It's well beyond our understanding. And yet, 00:15:32.519 --> 00:15:41.159 it is important and it is to some degree shared with us by God. God provides wisdom to those who pursue it. 00:15:41.159 --> 00:15:44.199 And now we're in verse 9. 00:15:45.879 --> 00:15:51.559 Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity in every good path. For wisdom will come 00:15:51.559 --> 00:15:58.439 into your heart and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul. Discretion will watch over you. Understanding will guard you. 00:16:01.480 --> 00:16:09.399 To get godly wisdom is to undergo a sort of rebirth. Wisdom is for those who know God, and so to pursue wisdom, 00:16:09.399 --> 00:16:16.439 we must pursue God. Because it is God who gives us wisdom. It's a relational thing, and it comes into the heart. 00:16:18.279 --> 00:16:23.559 And this is why it deals with the fear of the Lord. As you saw in verse 10, wisdom will come into your heart. 00:16:24.519 --> 00:16:28.840 Knowledge will be pleasant to your soul. Discretion will watch over you. Understanding will guard you. 00:16:28.840 --> 00:16:36.120 It's also going to say there that then you will find the knowledge of God, as we read before. 00:16:36.600 --> 00:16:39.000 The fear of the Lord and the knowledge of God. 00:16:40.440 --> 00:16:41.879 And in a way, 00:16:42.759 --> 00:16:46.040 this is Proverbs way of saying you have the right relationship with God. 00:16:46.519 --> 00:16:51.080 The fear of the Lord is having the right relationship or the right kind of relationship with God. 00:16:51.080 --> 00:16:57.560 The Bible uses all sorts of names for this. Covenant membership, belonging to the people of God, rebirth, the life of faith. 00:16:58.680 --> 00:17:04.200 Anyone identifying with those titles has the right fundamental attitude towards God. 00:17:04.680 --> 00:17:10.600 As we heard this morning rightly, we need to confess. We come in repentance and faith. These are all core elements of the Christian life. 00:17:10.840 --> 00:17:12.840 But there is something 00:17:12.839 --> 00:17:18.839 about the Christian believer that at your core, you have a fear of God. You have a reverence for God. 00:17:19.079 --> 00:17:25.559 And you understand that that intimacy with God is not to be taken lightly and not to be taken for granted. 00:17:27.480 --> 00:17:33.319 That's the fear of the Lord. It's allegiance. It's acknowledging the Lord as Lord of your life. 00:17:33.319 --> 00:17:39.639 It's a baseline attitude with all the different waves of everyday Christian life on top. 00:17:39.640 --> 00:17:46.440 So this is all about the promise that wisdom will come into your heart. 00:17:47.240 --> 00:17:49.800 And I hope you're starting to see that the other stuff in life, 00:17:50.520 --> 00:17:54.440 the finances, your choice of words, reputation, friends, work ethic, that stuff 00:17:55.400 --> 00:17:58.280 is spiritual stuff and it's a matter of the heart. 00:17:59.240 --> 00:18:02.759 To live life well, by that I mean to live life in a godly way, 00:18:03.720 --> 00:18:07.560 in all domains, requires an internal change that God does to us. 00:18:07.559 --> 00:18:11.240 To live life well, by that I mean to live life in a way, 00:18:11.240 --> 00:18:11.639 in all domains, we're going to live life in a way. 00:18:11.639 --> 00:18:12.839 And we pursue it. 00:18:15.399 --> 00:18:18.200 It's not the exact same language, but similar when Paul speaks of 00:18:18.759 --> 00:18:23.399 the children of God, that God has sent his spirit into our hearts. 00:18:23.399 --> 00:18:27.240 Wisdom will come into your hearts. The spirit is sent into your hearts. 00:18:28.519 --> 00:18:31.159 This is the person who delights in the law of the Lord, who seeks 00:18:31.799 --> 00:18:35.319 God at work in everyday things, the person who's full of the Holy Spirit. 00:18:35.319 --> 00:18:39.240 That person fears God and has wisdom in the heart. 00:18:44.359 --> 00:18:49.399 You might be confused still about how Proverbs fits in and across the whole Bible. 00:18:49.399 --> 00:18:54.119 How does Jesus relate to Proverbs? How do Christians read Proverbs really? 00:18:54.119 --> 00:18:59.079 Right? We're starting to get some glimpses inside of that. But what's really a concrete way 00:18:59.079 --> 00:19:04.679 that this actually starts to fit up with our Christian theology? 00:19:06.279 --> 00:19:09.720 One of the things we can do is to think about the wisdom that God gives us, 00:19:09.720 --> 00:19:14.359 like you think about the fruit of the Holy Spirit. The fruit of the Holy Spirit. 00:19:16.519 --> 00:19:23.159 They are born on us like fruit on a tree, but God really does the producing. 00:19:23.160 --> 00:19:26.519 He produces the fruit and we simply bear the fruit. 00:19:29.320 --> 00:19:35.480 So we do and we should strive like Christ, to put on the new person, to leave sin behind, 00:19:35.480 --> 00:19:40.279 to clothe ourselves in righteousness. Right? The Christian life is an active life. We're told again 00:19:40.279 --> 00:19:46.279 and again, do these things, go after these things. But we only grow in Christlike behavior 00:19:46.279 --> 00:19:52.519 because God transforms us. He transforms our heart and our activity and our thoughts and all of these 00:19:52.519 --> 00:19:58.440 things. He unites us to Christ. The Spirit dwells within us. And so these are the basics of Christian 00:19:58.440 --> 00:20:08.839 identity. Biblical wisdom is a part, it's a part of that identity. And God gives it to us in this way. 00:20:08.839 --> 00:20:15.079 It's a spiritual gift. And it's one of the amazing blessings of knowing Christ. In a way, 00:20:15.079 --> 00:20:20.359 it is already yours. And it's something to claim and pursue and pray for. 00:20:22.839 --> 00:20:27.480 This is one of the promises of Proverbs for those who pursue wisdom. To look for it, 00:20:27.480 --> 00:20:35.240 long for it, embrace it, and God will give it. The second promise is that those who pursue wisdom 00:20:35.240 --> 00:20:41.879 will be delivered from moral danger. They'll be delivered from moral danger. Let's have a look at 00:20:41.880 --> 00:20:50.200 verse 12 and then 16. Verse 12 and then 16. Wisdom will come into your heart. You will fear the Lord, 00:20:50.200 --> 00:20:55.480 delivering you from the way of evil, from men of perverted speech. And then in verse 16. So you will 00:20:55.480 --> 00:21:00.200 be delivered from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words. Both of these groups get a 00:21:00.200 --> 00:21:08.120 description. The people tending towards evil and the adulteress, protected from both of these things. 00:21:10.600 --> 00:21:16.120 This path of evil, this way of evil. It's taken by those who lie, who cheat, who walk in darkness, 00:21:16.759 --> 00:21:24.039 who delight in things that God condemns. These are the wicked in Proverbs. So if you are reading it, the wicked 00:21:24.039 --> 00:21:31.480 shouts with his mouth, but the righteous will be prudent in his words. Something like that. The wicked 00:21:32.039 --> 00:21:38.039 are these groups in Proverbs. They follow the way and the life of evil. They're the same thing as the fool, 00:21:38.359 --> 00:21:44.920 same thing as the wayward person. So there's two elements here. There's one, an element of temptation. 00:21:45.639 --> 00:21:50.440 Right? You might be lured into getting money in an underhanded way. For example, that's something that 00:21:50.440 --> 00:21:55.960 the evil crowd might tempt people with. And wisdom is supposed to help us resist that temptation. It 00:21:55.960 --> 00:22:03.480 protects us in that way. But there's also an element of growing wisdom within us. That God grows wisdom 00:22:03.480 --> 00:22:10.680 within us and we become people who just aren't quite as tempted as we might have been by those things. 00:22:11.320 --> 00:22:14.680 Temptation just doesn't always have the same sting. 00:22:14.680 --> 00:22:20.759 Tempting. That's real deliverance in a way. Protection on the one hand and transformation 00:22:21.480 --> 00:22:26.680 on the other hand. It's kind of like learning self-defense. Someone can teach you all these 00:22:26.680 --> 00:22:31.720 different moves and you might have to think really hard about when to stick your right hand up and when 00:22:31.720 --> 00:22:37.880 to stick your left hand up in a fight. You know what to do. You can do it. You can resist and deflect and 00:22:37.880 --> 00:22:44.440 block. Protect yourself. But it's another thing to become an expert at those things and not even think about it. 00:22:44.680 --> 00:22:52.120 And just naturally do the motions, which I won't even try to imitate, and protect yourself and self-defense. 00:22:52.120 --> 00:22:57.640 That's the idea. On the one hand, it's a sort of strong-armed resistance to temptation. On the other 00:22:57.640 --> 00:23:04.279 hand, it's a people who are transformed into becoming people who have the skill of godly living. 00:23:04.279 --> 00:23:13.559 We encounter temptation, alternative ways of life every day. And I'm not talking about the obvious ones. 00:23:14.279 --> 00:23:17.799 The billboard that says this, the kind of, you know, telling your kids don't watch that movie. 00:23:17.799 --> 00:23:22.759 It's just not going to be a good idea. Are you knowing when we spend time, if I spend too much time with 00:23:22.759 --> 00:23:26.440 with that group of people, it's just not going to go well for me, right? Some of these things are obvious 00:23:26.440 --> 00:23:33.320 that we know we shouldn't do. I'm talking about some of the more muddy scenarios, some of the more 00:23:33.320 --> 00:23:44.759 challenging questions that we face. Consider this one. You work a job and you know you're contracted to 00:23:44.759 --> 00:23:55.319 finish at 5 p.m. All of your colleagues stay until 6 p.m. And you'd be very happy to stay, but by staying, 00:23:55.319 --> 00:24:00.599 you might not be able to cook a meal for your family. You might not be able to spend particular 00:24:00.599 --> 00:24:07.480 time with someone in your family. You might not get to Bible study on the time that you'd like to. 00:24:07.480 --> 00:24:15.720 It's not evil to stay in the office until 6 p.m., necessarily. Right? And you can run it through 00:24:15.720 --> 00:24:19.960 the kind of criterion of idolatry, something like that. Am I staying there just because I'm 00:24:19.960 --> 00:24:24.039 worshiping something else besides God? Well, maybe it's not clear cut. Maybe you don't feel that 00:24:24.039 --> 00:24:31.480 conviction no one else has told you. But there's still something there. It's not necessarily evil to 00:24:31.480 --> 00:24:37.079 stay in the office until 6 p.m., but it may not be the wise thing to do. And if you're the person or 00:24:37.079 --> 00:24:42.519 people at home and you're watching someone try to make this choice, it's also a question of how do 00:24:42.519 --> 00:24:46.919 you raise this issue? How do you raise these kinds of issues and questions? How do you talk about it? 00:24:46.919 --> 00:24:54.839 And so on. It's a simple example, but you've got choices you're facing that life is demanding of you, 00:24:54.839 --> 00:25:01.319 choices that we have to make. And it's not always easy to know what to do. An extra hour, in this case, 00:25:01.319 --> 00:25:05.079 at work can mean a promotion. It can mean better relationships with your colleagues whom you care about. 00:25:05.079 --> 00:25:11.240 It could mean more money, all of which seems to be good for God's people, for your family, for you, for 00:25:11.240 --> 00:25:19.879 friends. Sometimes these choices are easy and sometimes these choices are really, really difficult. 00:25:21.159 --> 00:25:26.519 Wisdom is the power from God that enables us to live well amidst all these choices of life, 00:25:26.519 --> 00:25:33.399 big choices and small choices. I'll say it one more time. Wisdom is the power from God that enables us to 00:25:33.400 --> 00:25:41.720 live well amidst all of these choices, both big and small. It protects us from going astray. It may mean 00:25:41.720 --> 00:25:46.680 that instead of making that choice alone and thinking, I can figure it all out, that you talk 00:25:46.680 --> 00:25:52.519 to the right people, that you humbly take advice on board, and you have confidence in the path before you. 00:25:52.519 --> 00:26:00.039 All of that entails wisdom, knowing who to listen to, how to be open-minded, how to prioritize God amidst 00:26:00.039 --> 00:26:08.599 confusion and temptation. Wisdom is godly good sense, and it has some power to keep us from harm 00:26:08.599 --> 00:26:16.279 in the world. It does protect us to some degree. The last thing to say is it's of course not a guarantee. 00:26:16.279 --> 00:26:23.240 Just because you read Proverbs and maybe abide by the Proverbs, it doesn't mean that something won't 00:26:23.240 --> 00:26:28.759 go wrong. Tragedy will strike. We will succumb to temptation. We will act foolishly, even as God's 00:26:28.759 --> 00:26:37.000 people. And so we continue to turn to the Lord in repentance and faith as always. Godly wisdom is a 00:26:37.000 --> 00:26:42.680 part of the Christian life. It's a part of the Christian identity. It's not the whole picture. 00:26:42.680 --> 00:26:52.200 So is wisdom a bonus? Is it a bonus in Christian living? Sometimes that's how it feels. I've got 00:26:52.200 --> 00:26:56.840 all the basics figured out, and now I've got this kind of bonus, this additive, and it's wisdom. 00:26:59.720 --> 00:27:05.200 Well, no, wisdom belongs to the core elements of the Christian life. It's a core part of the Christian 00:27:05.200 --> 00:27:15.360 life and a direct spiritual gift from God. I've given a few suggestions for application. One is 00:27:15.360 --> 00:27:22.080 to think about wisdom like we think about the fruits of the Holy Spirit, and to engage in our 00:27:22.080 --> 00:27:25.680 relationship with God in a way that expects those things, that asks for those things, 00:27:25.680 --> 00:27:33.840 and to live in a way that pursues those things. And the second one, of course, is to study Proverbs. 00:27:33.840 --> 00:27:37.200 Proverbs is going to kind of point to itself, which might be a little frustrating. It's not just that 00:27:37.200 --> 00:27:40.560 you get wisdom in the abstract, then you go out in your life. It's that you've got to read through 00:27:40.560 --> 00:27:44.799 some of these Proverbs. You've got to seek godly advice, and so on. You've got to sort of get stuck in 00:27:44.799 --> 00:27:51.680 and go for it. And the last thing is this, to ask God for wisdom. Sounds simple, but it is a really, 00:27:51.680 --> 00:27:57.680 really clear direction, particularly from the letter of James. James says this, 00:27:57.680 --> 00:28:02.879 if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives generously to all without reproach, 00:28:02.879 --> 00:28:08.240 and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith with no doubting. 00:28:08.240 --> 00:28:16.480 Again, the wisdom of God is the wisdom that's found in Christ. And there's every spiritual 00:28:16.480 --> 00:28:23.519 blessing prepared for those who fear the Lord. So let us ask God for wisdom. Let us pray.