Wisdom from God
Proverbs 2:1-11
(August 19, 2001)
Introduction
Jack was a big man who always seemed to have a smile on his face. In fact, joy and happiness seemed to bubble in his life. His happiness was so genuine that others discovered that joy and happiness increased in their lives when they were around him.
But, why shouldn’t he be happy? He had a good family. He had a lovely wife and two college-age daughters. He had a large home in the country. He was active in his church. He was the vice-president of a large defense-oriented company and it paid him a six-figure salary. He seemed to have it made.
One day, without warning, he was called into the boss’ office and fired. He was devastated. He had invested his life in the company. He had worked his
tail off. He had helped the company grow and now, they were letting him go.
Financially, he was set for life. But he was devastated that his company would let him go in the prime of life. For weeks he was lost and didn’t know what to do.
His self-confidence was replaced with frustration. His friendly attitude changed to one of bitterness. The anger and emptiness he felt even made him consider suicide.
After weeks of feeling helpless and not knowing what to do, Jack began to
take an inventory of his life. His wife, who had been his high-school sweetheart, still loved him. His children were in college and their grades were excellent. He was still a respected member of the community. His only real problem had been that he had allowed the anger and bitterness and
rejection to wage a war within his soul.
Once he stopped dwelling on what was wrong in his life and started looking at what was right, once he understood that his only real problem centered on the way he looked at himself, once he stopped waging war within himself, Jack was wise enough to realize that he was on his way to living an
effective life.
And what is the secret of effective living?
The writer of Proverbs paints a beautiful panoramic view of wisdom being the secret of effective living. Wisdom is depicted an essential characteristic for every man or woman if they are going to experience any
joy in living. The writer of Proverbs expressed this very clearly when he
wrote:
Happy is the man who listens to me (wisdom) watching daily at my gates,
waiting beside my doors. For he who finds me finds life and obtains favor from the Lord.(Proverbs 8:34-35)
This tantalizing glimpse at wisdom is clearly portrayed as an appeal for men
and women to discover her secrets. Wisdom offers a high reward to those who
follow her way and the reward is not just in money and wealth. The reward of
wisdom is the secret of effective living.
It’s been said that “nobody likes a wise guy.” And I suppose that’s true.
But being a wise man or woman and being a wise guy are two very different things. Wisdom is to be valued, and it is, whether it is in business, spiritual life, or whatever context it is necessary.
Wisdom is valuable not only for the sake of making smart decisions, but also for making the most of life in general. We will look at one important aspect of that later, but I think you will find very few people who discount wisdom.
I’d like to point out a couple definitions of wisdom that are printed in your bulletin.
The Bible Knowledge Commentary defines wisdom this way: “to be wise is to be skilled in godly living.”
And J.I. Packer, in his book, Knowing God, says this about wisdom: Wisdom is the power to see and the inclination to choose the best and highest goal, together with the surest means of attaining it.
Let’s turn to today’s Scripture passage, Proverbs 2:1-11. If you are using the Bibles in the seats, you can find our passage on page 450.
My son, if you accept my words and store up my commands within you,
2 turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding,
3 and if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding, 4 and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, 5 then you will understand the fear of the LORD
and find the knowledge of God.
6 For the LORD gives wisdom, and from his mouth come knowledge and understanding. 7 He holds victory in store for the upright, he is a shield to those whose walk is blameless, 8 for he guards the course of the just and protects the way of his faithful ones.
9 Then you will understand what is right and just and fair--every good path.
10 For wisdom will enter your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul.
11 Discretion will protect you, and understanding will guard you.
My purpose this morning is to encourage you to desire and seek wisdom, and give you some direction to get it.
And I want to do that by exploring how to find it, where to find it, and why to find it. May you leave here to day excited about gaining insight to the heart of God in wisdom.
First, let’s look at…
I. How to find it (vv. 1-5).
Finding wisdom is not like finding a quarter on the street. It takes effort. And part of the effort is to make sure you find the right kind of wisdom as opposed to wrong kind.
James tells us there is a difference between heavenly wisdom and earthly wisdom.
Listen to this from James 3:13-18 –
Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show it by his good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom. 14 But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. 15 Such "wisdom" does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, of the devil. 16 For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.
3:17 But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.
So how do we gain this kind of wisdom? I’d like to offer a couple ideas, so let’s move to the first one,…
A. Gain knowledge of Scripture.
The main resource of godly wisdom is His Word.
Time in careful study of the Scriptures cannot be stressed enough. Personal devotions, attendance at church and Sunday School, going to such things as the Firm Foundations Discipleship class, and so on.
If you have never done it before, I would suggest reading through the Bible every year. It gives you wonderful insight into how Scripture fits together and you see the overall picture so much better than by picking and choosing a verse here or there.
Take it from someone who’s done it, it is a great thing to do.
Get time in the Word.
Be careful: knowledge alone can be dangerous. 1 Corinthians 8:1 tells us that knowledge puffs up the knowledgeable person.
The Pharisees were full of knowledge of Scripture, but couldn’t see the Messiah, about whom the Scriptures were written!
There is a difference between knowledge and wisdom. There are a lot of incredibly intelligent people who are fools.
They can’t apply their knowledge to wise living.
Many of you are familiar with “The Jesus Seminar,” a group of scholars who have made it their mission to discover and reveal the “historical” Jesus.
Unfortunately, they have chosen to look at how to cast doubt on the truth of Scripture rather than to look at the mountains of evidence that affirms not only Scripture in general, but Jesus in particular.
This is another example of smart people without wisdom.
Many people study the Scriptures yet fail to gain wisdom. Why is that? They look for information about, not intimacy with God.
And that, my friends is the difference.
Gain a knowledge of the Scriptures, with the ultimate goal not of information, but rather life change.
The next way to find wisdom is to…
B. Search for understanding.
Look at the verbs in the first 4 verses:
Accept my words; store up my commands within you; turning your heart to wisdom; applying your heart to understanding; call out for insight; cry aloud for understanding;
These are action words. But look again at verse 4:
and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure
Wisdom doesn’t come to people like flies to a spider web.
Spiders just kind of hang around waiting for something to happen. They don’t go searching for their food in most cases.
Wisdom is available for anybody who will take the effort to search for it.
And we are to search for it like we would search for riches. History is filled with stories of people who died looking for buried treasures.
We are to look for wisdom as if for buried treasure.
In the movie, The Searchers, John Wayne plays a returning Civil War veteran, who begins to search for his nieces, kidnapped by hostile Indians.
He searches for them for over 4 years, finally finding the one left alive.
He refused to give up, basically deciding that he would find her or die trying.
He came across hardship, cold trails, and dead ends, but his niece was more valuable to him than his life. The goal of returning his niece safe and sound was worth the effort.
Take the effort. Make the time. Search the Scriptures. Call out to God.
By the way, that is the next section,…
II. Where to find it (vv. 6-8).
Verse 6 tells us that the Lord gives wisdom, and from His mouth come knowledge and understanding.
Here’s what verse 7 says in the New Living Translation:
He grants a treasure of good sense to the godly.
Isn’t that great?
He is the source.
There’s the story of an angel appearing at a college faculty meeting and tells the dean that in return for his unselfish and exemplary behavior, the Lord will reward him with his choice of infinite wealth, wisdom or beauty. Without hesitating, the dean selects infinite wisdom.
"Done!" says the angel, and disappears in a cloud of smoke and a bolt of lightning. Now, all heads turn toward the dean, who sits surrounded by a faint halo of light. At length, one of his colleagues whispers, "Say something."
The dean looks at them and says, "I should have taken the money."
This obviously fictional story stands in contrast to another person who asked for wisdom.
Most of you are familiar with the incident of Solomon, who shortly after becoming king of Israel, was visited by God.
The Lord told Solomon to ask for whatever he wanted, and it would be given him. He, like the man in our little story, chose wisdom, and the Lord gave it to Him.
While God has not chosen to give everybody wisdom in the same manner as Solomon, He is nevertheless the source of wisdom, ultimately.
The Lord gives wisdom through…
A. The Scriptures.
We have already spent considerable time on the importance of time in the Word, but let me just reiterate once again how important it is to make the Scriptures central to your life.
Second, God gives wisdom through…
B. People.
Proverbs 13:20 says:
He who walks with the wise grows wise, but a companion of fools suffers harm.
This kind of says it all – if you want to be wise, you hang out with the wise.
But you need to be careful who you consider wise. Wisdom isn’t something you can measure by outward appearance.
1 Corinthians 15:33 tells us that bad company corrupts good character.
It is very hard these days to know who to believe. Everyone is trying to lead us to their version of truth.
A freshman at Eagle Rock Junior High won first prize at the Greater Idaho Falls Science Fair by showing how conditioned we have become to alarmists spreading fear of everything in our environment through junk science.
In his project he urged people to sign a
petition demanding strict control or total elimination of the chemical "Dihydrogen monoxide" because:
1. It can cause excessive sweating and vomiting.
2. It is a major component in acid rain.
3. It can cause severe burns in its gaseous state.
4. Accidental inhalation can kill you.
5. It contributes to erosion.
6. It decreases the effectiveness of automobile brakes.
7. It has been found in tumors of terminal cancer patients.
He asked 50 people if they support a ban. 43 said yes, Six were undecided
And only one knew that the chemical is ... water.
How many of you knew that?
God has blessed me with many people who have allowed me to hang out with them in different settings.
Pastor Joe Colaw let me tag along on evangelism visits when I was in college.
Pastor Sam Crabtree gave me more time than I will ever deserve, and the same for Pastor Tim Purcell in Brookings.
They have wisdom that I need if I am to be successful, especially being a pastor.
Sam Crabtree also imparted much wisdom for Debra and I in our marriage and child-rearing.
Many people have contributed to my life, and I am grateful.
Hang out with quality people, and you become a quality person.
Thirdly,…
C. Experience.
How many of you have ever said, “If I had to do it over again, I’d…”
Why is that? Because we later learned something that would have made it better than we actually experienced.
For me, I say, “If I had to do it over again, I would have had a better attitude toward math in college.”
Not only did I have a horrible attitude, it effected my grade point average, and kept me from graduating with a “B” average in college.
But the worst part is, I can’t even balance my checkbook! Thank the Lord He gave me a wife who took math a bit more seriously than I did.
We can learn from our own experiences as well as from the experiences of others.
One of the expressed purposes of Scripture is to tell us what others have done so we could avoid their mistakes.
For instance, we learn from the Israelites that grumbling against God can have rather negative effects.
We learn from the Book of Judges that as the nation of Israel turned their backs on God, they were oppressed by their enemies, but calling to Him in repentance brought relief.
We learn from 2 Chronicles that when the book of the Law was found, Josiah led nationwide revival, bringing favor from God on Israel.
Solomon, though he possessed vast amounts of wisdom, and actually authored most of Proverbs, including our passage today, chose to throw his wisdom to the wind, and it caused his downfall.
We read of his realization of his waste in the book of Ecclesiates.
And there are many such examples.
I mentioned before that God had given me the opportunity to be around and spend time with many quality people.
He has also worked to help me learn from the failures of others.
A wise man learns by the experience of others. An ordinary man learns by his own experience. A fool learns by nobody’s experience.
Don’t be caught in the trap of repeating the negative experiences of others. Look at the lessons to be gained not only from the bad experiences, but also from the good experiences.
There is a famous saying that those who ignore history are bound to repeat it.
Oh, and I thought I’d better mention this: One way we display wisdom is in our personal evangelism. Proverbs 11:30 says that he who wins souls is wise. As we reach out to those who don’t know Christ, not only will people see the love of God in our hearts, they will see a people who have wisdom from God.
Where do we find wisdom? The Scriptures, people, and experience.
Let’s move on now to the…
III. Why to find it (vv. 5, 9-11)
The “why” is shown us in verses 5, and 9-11. First,…
A. You get what you look for.
Verse 5 says that after we undertake the effort of finding wisdom we understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God.
Some of you might be asking, “what’s the fear of the Lord got to do with wisdom?”
That question is answered in verse 7 of chapter 1: The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
The long and the short of it is, you can’t get godly wisdom without reverence of God Himself.
Verse 9 tells us that we will understand.
Our efforts are not fruitless! They are not in vain. God tells us here that we will be rewarded by His provision of the very thing we seek.
And if that weren’t enough…
B. You gain victory and protection.
Verse 9 also tells us that wisdom helps us make right choices, and right choices equal safety from wrong choices.
Remember J.I. Packer’s definition at the introduction?
Wisdom is the power to see and the inclination to choose the best and highest goal, together with the surest means of attaining it.
Verse 11 tells us we gain protection, and understanding will guard us.
With all the hazards to our spiritual health in our culture, we need all the help we can get, amen?
I love what verse 10 says about knowledge being pleasant to your soul.
You undertake the labor of attaining wisdom from God, and the reward is sweet. Boy, that’s good news!
But here’s some more good news: I didn’t get this in your outline, but look back at verses 7-8:
He holds victory in store for the upright, he is a shield to those whose walk is blameless, 8 for he guards the course of the just and protects the way of his faithful ones.
He grants us victory! He grants us protection – He is our shield. He guards the course of the just and protects the way of His faithful ones.
The search for wisdom now only results in our gaining wisdom from God, that very wisdom grants us protection from God. Amen!
There you have it: the how to find it, the where to find it, and the why to find it.
Conclusion
Before we leave here today, I want to stress that the seeking of wisdom is not merely an intellectual exercise.
It involves our entire being. It takes our heart, will, everything. But it aids us in living out the greatest commandment to love the Lord our God with all our heart, sould, mind, and strength.
Seek it with everything you’ve got. I am trying to do so, and it is changing my life more than I ever thought possible. I certainly don’t have the corner on wisdom, and I’ve got a long way to go, but I am enjoying the journey, and I am seeing the fruits of the labor even as I go.
But there is one pre-requisite to obtaining godly wisdom that we barely touched on. And that is that you must be in a right relationship with God.
If you are a born-again child of God, you are given access not only to the wisdom of God, but to heaven itself.
God provided a way out of the punishment we all deserve by sending His Son to die on the cross, shedding His blood to cover our sins.
If you want to know for sure when you leave here today that you will spend eternity in heaven, then like the man calling out for wisdom, call out to God for forgiveness and purpose to turn from your sins with God’s help, asking Him to give you eternal life in heaven and make you a new creation in Him.
The Bible says that this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life, he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. Give your life to Him and let Him do a wonderful work in you.
He longs to do it, and you will not regret it.
Others of you may have taken care of your place in heaven, but maybe haven’t yielded yourself to Him as you should have lately.
Return to Him, giving Him the control He deserves as your creator, and relive the joy that was once yours.
And watch Him grant you the wisdom we so desperately need in our time.
Shall we pray.
Offering
Closing Hymn # 206 Wonderful Words of Life
