The focus on the prayer and fasting guide for today is for the children and teenagers of the church. Our church’s vision is to present every person fully mature in Christ. This includes everyone whether it is our children, teens, the young and old - every person whether married or single. Christ will return and His coming is imminent so, as a church, we want to be prepared just as Jesus illustrated in his parable about the 10 virgins. 5 were foolish (thoughtless, silly, & careless) and five were wise (far-sighted, practical, & sensible). Jesus is calling us to be wise, to grow up in all things.
But how do we measure growth? If we think of physical growth, some families have a place on the wall where they mark off how tall their child grows each year. We can measure the growth of a baby, to when they become a toddler, a preteen, teenager, and then a young adult. There are other ways to gauge growth as we get older - through education, professional development, earned degrees, and accomplishments.
However, the biblical understanding of growth is holistic, it encompasses your total being - not just physical or mental growth but gauges our emotional and spiritual growth as well. Jewish parents were commanded to teach their children wisdom, not merely training them to do follow rules but to reverence the Lord and to do what is right and good (Deut. 6:1–9). Prov 22:6 tells us to train up a child in the way he or she should go [teaching him or her to seek God’s wisdom and will for their abilities and talents], because even when they are old they will not depart from it.
We see in the book of Proverbs, that wisdom is not only personal, but it is a path or way that we should take and principles we should apply in any given situation. Wisdom (hokma) includes more than making moral decisions, it is the ability to make the right decisions when there are no clear moral laws telling us what to do. Some decisions require only knowledge like getting information from an instruction manual or being up-to-date on CoV restrictions and regulations but the path of life requires more than just having the correct knowledge or truth on a matter: It is knowing what truth to apply and how to apply it in a particular situation or circumstance.
That being said, the Bible doesn’t cover every possible scenario or decision you will have to make in life, like who to marry, whether to pursue a career in engineering, music, or culinary arts, who to hire for a particular job, etc. But the Bible does provide knowledge and wisdom for what type of qualities to look for in a potential marriage partner, how to discover your gifts and talents and make decisions for your future accordingly, what type of character traits and work ethics you look for when you hire someone to do a job. By applying godly principles in our daily decisions we begin to grow mentally, emotionally, and spiritually into the type of person who is able to make wise choices in life.
As we will read in Proverbs 2, there is a price for learning Wisdom’s way which far outweighs the costs. Warren Wiersby said, “There’s a price to pay if we would gain spiritual wisdom, but there’s an even greater price to pay if we don’t gain it.”
Prov 2:1-16,20-22 (NLT)
1 My child, listen to what I say, and treasure my commands. 2 Tune your ears to wisdom, and concentrate on understanding. 3 Cry out for insight, and ask for understanding. 4 Search for them as you would for silver; seek them like hidden treasures. 5 Then you will understand what it means to fear the LORD, and you will gain knowledge of God. 6 For the LORD grants wisdom! From his mouth come knowledge and understanding. 7 He grants a treasure of common sense to the honest. He is a shield to those who walk with integrity. 8 He guards the paths of the just and protects those who are faithful to him. 9 Then you will understand what is right, just, and fair, and you will find the right way to go. 10 For wisdom will enter your heart, and knowledge will fill you with joy. 11 Wise choices will watch over you. Understanding will keep you safe. 12 Wisdom will save you from evil people, from those whose words are twisted. 13 These men turn from the right way to walk down dark paths. 14 They take pleasure in doing wrong, and they enjoy the twisted ways of evil. 15 Their actions are crooked, and their ways are wrong. 16 Wisdom will save you from the immoral woman, from the seductive words of the promiscuous woman. 20 So follow the steps of the good, and stay on the paths of the righteous. 21 For only the godly will live in the land, and those with integrity will remain in it. 22 But the wicked will be removed from the land, and the treacherous will be uprooted.
This passage reveals that any believer can develop a relationship with wisdom and learn wisdom’s way - it’s a decision we make each day. Proverbs 2 reveals the way of:
Wisdom
The Wicked
The Righteous
1. The Way of Wisdom - walking with God
This father was telling his child that maturing in wisdom doesn’t happen automatically. If you really want to know the wisest paths to take, if you want to live skillfully, have the best quality of life and experience growth, then it will require some discipline and determination.
Are you willing to pay the price for spiritual wisdom? If you are then it will take...
1. Being receptive to what Wisdom has to say.
V. 1 says: If you will receive my wisdom - being receptive means you welcome God’s instructions and welcome God into your life as your Teacher and Friend as you would warmly welcome a guest into your home, readily receiving His truths with open arms, mind, and heart. God’s Wisdom first comes through instruction - training and strong accountability.
2. Storing up and treasuring my teaching.
For those who are old enough to remember Y2K, it was when we were transitioning from the 20th century into the 21st century. Everyone was worried that when the clocks on our computers changed from December 31, 1999 to Jan 1, 2000 that there would be a complete meltdown resulting in food shortages, bank and government records being lost, that would wreak havoc on every level. Do you remember that? So to prepare for this impending doom, people stored up canned food, powdered and dried foods, water and lots of toilet paper. So when Y2K came and the world did not end, many people had mass amounts of dried food, water and toilet paper. The point is many laid up future provisions in the event of a possible disaster. This meltdown, fortunately, did not happen but people were ready.
God does call us as His children to “store up” His instruction and commands in our hearts and minds because one day it’s not a matter of if we will need but when we will need it. It’s not the same as with Y2K with a sense of impending doom and panic, and it may not be right now, but having God’s Word stored up in our hearts will benefit us each and every day as well as in the day of temptation or calamity. Psalm 119:11 says: “Your word I have treasured and storied in my heart, that I may not sin against you” (AMP).
We have been watching the teenagers in our church grow up so fast and I know you parents are very much aware that when they become young adults, they will have to make their own decisions about which paths they will take. They will have to make a decision about what they will do after high school, vocational school, or Gymnasium, where they will work, how they will handle their own money, which friends they will keep once they graduate and which new friendships they will forge.
Because most of us have already been down that road, made good and not so good decisions along the way, we pray that our words of wisdom, instruction, warnings, and investment of God’s Word in their lives will positively impact their future actions, attitudes, and decisions. Life is unpredictable so we have no idea who they will meet or what challenges they will face in their journey, but we know, just like our parents knew, that they will need wisdom.
In v. 2 Solomon is exhorting his child to give undivided attention to what is being said, to let what he has heard find a place to land deep in his heart.
Let’s be honest, how often has what we’ve heard gone in one ear and out the other? Even now, are we really listening or is there something dividing our attention? Growing up I can think of how challenging it was for my parents to get us to sit down long enough to focus on our homework. For teachers in this CoV restricted environment it is really tough to get students to tune into the lessons they are trying to teach. For those parents who are weary of trying to motivate their sons and daughters who just don't seem to "get it," I would like to encourage you to keep at it. One day you may be very surprised about the seemingly unheeded words that are being stored up in your kids’ hearts and minds. One day they will get it (they will understand), in fact as they grow older and face more of the uncertainties and hard realities of life, they will begin to appreciate the value of your godly wisdom.
Like I had mentioned last week, life will not always go well but we can through life's hard lessons learn wisdom’s way. How many of us have realized, only after the fact, that the wisest advice we received was from godly friends who have walked the same path before us?
Wisdom is saying: you will find my way if you humble yourself and listen to my instruction, if you store my lessons in your heart, if you learn from them and really labor to find me like you were mining for gold or silver. This is Wisdom’s way.
Not only will wisdom protect you from so much evil, vv. 9-10 says,
Then you will understand what is right, just, and fair and you will find the right way to go. For wisdom will enter your heart, and knowledge will fill you with joy.
God’s wisdom gives us the ability to choose the best way, it gives us the ability to discern the many sides of people’s motives and character. It gives us the integrity to work with people from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds, in a myriad of circumstances in a way that is right, just and fair. This is especially challenging when we are faced with ethical dilemmas, to know not just what is right and wrong, good or bad, but to be able to make the best decision in a certain situation without compromising the truth. Depending on what line of work you are in, you will need wisdom in order apply the proper truth to difficult ethical issues, including wealth and poverty, marriage and divorce, birth control, abortion, end of life decisions, gender issues, business practices, environmental stewardship, and the list goes on. The more wisdom one learns the better we are at handling life, in fact wisdom protects us from making poor decisions that we may later regret in life. Wisdom delivers us from...
2. The Way of the Wicked
Wicked -“describes what is unpleasant, bringing pain and misery.” from evil people... whose words are twisted. Twisted speech described here refers to two things:
1. The first is about those who speak falsely against us with deliberately offensive speech. The Hebrew word (tahpukot) used here describes dishonest and wicked speech, which is purposefully offensive, contrary, rebellious, or obstinate. Secondly, It includes using even good words for the purpose of turning things upside down and inside out. Words can easily be twisted to mean the opposite of what is actually being said. Twisted words are words that can be used to control the narrative, that turns good into evil and evil into good. Words should represent reality, they should be true to what is, but unfortunately that is not always the case.
Nowhere do we see that more than in today’s post-modern, progressive world. Words that redefine reality, morality, equality, and then impose that reality on you. With so much daily exposure to these words and ideologies, it’s impossible not be affected.
In verse 13: “These people are headed on a downward descent. They have deliberately departed from the path of uprightness, and walked in the ways of darkness. They no longer feel guilty for their sin, in many cases they don’t even acknowledge sin but but actually enjoy it and are happy when others join in with them (Rom 1:32); "they exult in the worst things". Psalm 81:12 says, these stubborn people walk in their own ways, and follow their own advice. They think they know better than God.
V. 16: Wisdom also saves us from the seductive, flattering words of an immoral women
Someone has said that flattery isn’t communication, it is manipulation; it’s people telling us things about ourselves that we enjoy hearing and wish were true. The promiscuous woman knows how to use flattery successfully. She has no respect for God because she breaks His law (Ex. 20:14); she has no respect for her husband because she violates the promises she made to him when she married him. She no longer has a guide or a friend in the Lord or in her husband because she has taken the path of sin. Anyone who listens to her words and follows her path is heading for the cemetery.
The ways and outcome of the wicked clearly indicates why we should not follow in those paths because they take us far from God and His people. Instead we are encouraged to follow the steps of the good - and stay on the paths of the righteous. Wisdom is more than avoiding sin, wisdom actually directs us onto the right path and places us with the right people.
Which brings us to our last point - Wisdom directs us to...
3. The Way of the Righteous
V. 20 says,
So follow the steps of the good, and stay on the paths of the righteous.
He who walks with the wise becomes wise, but a companion or friend of a fool comes to destruction. We need to walk in the way that godly men and women have walked, and keep the paths of the righteous because the way of the godly leads to life - not to death (Prov 12:28). Wisdom says that when you walk on my path you will never lack godly friends. Who are your closest friends? What type of life do they lead? What kind of an example do they set for you? How are they speaking into your life? What kind of an example are you setting for them and for others? This is why we want to encourage people to join a life group because it’s in this environment and with these people that we can grow in wisdom together.
V. 21 says,
For only the godly will live in the land, and those with integrity will remain in it.
There is a promise of a future blessing/reward for the godly, for those who have integrity. Having integrity means being without blemish, complete, mature, sound in faith, upright and whole. We want to be people of integrity which is only possible with God’s power.
If you search for the Source of all wisdom and knowledge, the writer says, then you will find God. This is not only where wisdom begins, it is its end goal.
Jesus said there is a blessing waiting for those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. They will be completely satisfied (Matt 5:6). In yesterday’s, The Way of Wisdom devotional, the prayer was,
Lord, how easily we Christians talk about “blessings.” But when I ponder the power of the biblical promise, I do hunger for the blessed life. But let me remember, “Blessed are those who hunger...for” not blessedness but “righteousness” (Matt 5:6). - Tim & Kathy Keller
There are so many blessings/rewards waiting for those who seek God’s Kingdom first and His righteousness. Do we believe this?
V. 22 says,
But the wicked will be removed from the land, and the treacherous will be uprooted.
“But” shows a contrast here between the future of the godly and wicked. The wicked may appear to be succeeding, but in the end their ways catch up with them (Ps. 37).There is no future promise, no blessing waiting for them, there is no hope for the wicked. “They will not inherit life in the earth; they will be removed from the land.” The land reminds us of the promised land that God promised to give to the nation of Israel.
Yet, there were some who did not enter it because of their disobedience (Hebrews 3:16-19) because of their unbelief. The land represented God’s blessings, provision, protection and promises. Just like a dead tree is uprooted and pulled out from the ground, the wicked will be pulled out from God’s blessings, protection, provision and promises. This is their reward.
If you are standing at the crossroads, with different paths to choose from and knowing where the path leads to, the question is which path will you choose? Who’s word will you believe? God’s or someone else’s opinion?
When faced with temptation, like Joseph was with Potiphar’s wife in Genesis, how will you face it? Joseph said to his boss’ wife, “How then could I do such a wicked thing and sin against God?”(Gen 39:9) and in the moment of temptation he ran far from it. Joseph’s convictions were already stored up, settled, even before he faced the temptation. He had already had convictions about what he would do in this type of situation and didn’t have to consider the options.
We are faced with choices everyday: what to prioritize in our schedule, how to spend our money, relate to people, move forward each day. If we aren’t focused on God and on what’s important to Him we will likely make short-sighted and unwise decisions that we will eventually regret. Instead, we can choose each day to store up wisdom, to walk with integrity, walk on the path of righteousness - choosing to be sound in faith, upright and whole. Because the path and the direction you choose will determine your destination.
