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“For What Should We Seek?”
The Resolved Church
March 7th, 2010
Ted McCann

We’ve just read a number of verses from the book of Proverbs that will serve as my texts for today’s message.  These verses contain commands that God, speaking via the Holy Spirit through King Solomon, wants us to heed.  Now it’s interesting to note that Solomon begins this section as an address to someone he calls “my son” or “my children.”  But while it may be that Solomon originally wrote these passages, at least in part, to a child of his own, I think we can safely apply them to us as well.  After all, Jesus Himself said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live be bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God’” (Matt. 4:4).  Further, since we who have come to believe in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior are said to “children of God” in 1 John 3:1, then commands such as these can easily be understood as originating from our Heavenly Father, and are intended for us to understand and obey.

Our passages begin with an exhortation to “Hear…instruction” and “give attention…to understanding,” (v 1).  Often, in the parallelism of Hebrew poetry, an idea will be stated one way in the first section of a verse, and then expanded upon via a restatement in the second section.  In this opening verse of chapter 4, we can see that the command to “hear” is not simply a command to let something fall upon our eardrums.  No, it is tied in to the next line which says, “give attention to.”  In other words, we are being commanded to be alert and attentive to what we are being taught.  We are to pay close attention to the Word of God as it is preached to us or as we read it on our own.

As we pay close attention to what is being taught throughout God’s Word, we are also commanded to understand what we hear.  In fact, verse 5 practically yells at us, “Get wisdom!  Get understanding!”  This is not simply a “nice” suggestion; “Hey, it would be cool if you understood what I’m saying here.”  No, it is a direct command from almighty God Himself.  As such, we need to take it to heart and seek to obey it as best we can.  It is, therefore, a duty, but it is also more than a duty—it is something to be done out of a love for God.  As an example:  if you have a husband or a wife, or a boyfriend or a girlfriend, imagine saying to them, “Well, of course I love you, but I’m just too busy right now to get to know you better.”  Or, “I love you, but not enough to really understand where you’re coming from.”  Or, “I love you, yes, but I find spending time with you kind of boring.”  How well do you think that would go over?  Or how long do you thing that relationship will last?  One problem that plagues many of us, if not all of us, is the problem of becoming complacent in regards to reading and treasuring the Word of God.

Two examples illustrate this from opposite angles.  A number of years ago, I was speaking with a woman from my church who related that she was going through a period in her life of “feeling dry” and distant from the Lord.  When I asked her if she was reading her Bible everyday, she answered hesitantly, “No.”  She then confessed, “I know I should be because the Bible is a good resource.”  After pause—in which I think what she said sank in to her—she added, “Oh, and it’s the Word of God.”

A second story from the same church occurred when the pastor’s father, who was about 85 years old at the time, came to visit the church from out of state.  In a Sunday school class, this 85-year-old man attested to the depth and riches of the Scriptures when he told us, “I have been reading the Bible for over 80 years, and every time I do I discover something I hadn’t seen before.”  Imagine that:  a man reading the Bible at least a few times a week if not everyday for over 80 years, and still not being able to exhaust the depth and breadth of what it says.

Furthermore, we are to apply the teaching we receive to our lives.  Years ago, when I was an actor, I was rehearsing a show with a director who wanted the performers to rehearse their songs exactly as they were going to sing them in the performance.  He used a phrase that I think is applicable here, “Practice makes permanent.”  By this he meant that what you do on a regular basis, and how you do it, will become habits which you will begin doing without much effort or thought.  A number of exhortations to this kind of thing are found throughout this fourth chapter of Proverbs.  For instance, verse 4 tells us to “retain” the words of God; verse 8 tells us to “embrace” wisdom; verse 11 tells us to “walk” in the “way of wisdom;” verse 13 says to “take firm hold of instruction;” and verse 14 warns us to “not walk in the way of evil.”  In conjunction, we read in 2 Peter 3:18 that we are to “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”  The sense we get from all these passages is that we are not to be lazy in our faith or take God and His presence in our lives for granted.  Rather, we are to be diligent to know the Word of God and to apply its teachings to our lives in practical ways.  You’ve probably heard the phrase, “Practice what you preach.”  Well, when it comes to Scripture, we are also to “practice” what we read.

At this point, the question may arise in someone’s mind, “Why should I bother with what you’re suggesting?  It sounds like a lot of trouble to me.  What benefit could be gained by such a time-consuming endeavor?”  Well, our texts answer those questions.  We are told, for example, that if we retain God’s words and keep His commands, we will live (v 4).  Verse 6 tells us that wisdom will preserve us and keep us safe.  In verse 7 we are told that if we “exalt” wisdom by cherishing and making the effort obtain her, she will “promote” us.  And verses 8 and 9 tell us, she will adorn our heads with grace and glory.  Verse 10 says that when we follow the ways of God’s wisdom, our lives will generally be longer and more productive.  Our steps will not be hindered, verse 11 tells us, and verse 12 says we won’t stumble when we run, in part, because the path of those who walk justly is well-lit by a shining light (v 18).  This is in contrast with the wicked who stumble because their way is like darkness (v 19).  Wisdom is said to be our “life” in verse 13, and verse 22 says the words of God are “life and health.”

Some of you here today can maybe attest to these facts in your own lives.  There have been times in your life where you’ve walked in wisdom’s ways and been preserved from some kind of trouble or harm.  Perhaps there have been times when you haven’t walked wisely, and paid a price for it.  But even with the witness our own lives, and even with the list of benefits that I just read that come from following the wisdom of God’s Word, sometimes we still do not walk in the ways of God’s wisdom.  Why is that?  Well, the main problem is that we are naturally sinful and “hard of hearing” when it comes to God’s Word.

There’s a joke about an old man who was afraid his wife was losing her hearing.  So one night he stood in the doorway behind her as she sat in a chair watching television.  “Honey,” he said, “can you hear me?”  When there was no answer, he took a couple of steps into the room and said a little louder, “Honey, can you hear me?”  When she still did not answer, he got up right behind her and yelled, “Honey, can you hear me?!”  She quickly turned around and said, “For the third time, yes!”

Without God’s help, we are all as unable to hear as that husband.  Jesus paints this picture vividly in the book of Matthew, chapter 13, verses 13-15, when He describes the great multitudes to whom He spoke:  “Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.  And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says: ‘Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, And seeing you will see and not perceive; For the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing, And their eyes they have closed, Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, So that I should heal them.’”

And why is it that we are so hard of hearing?  The Scriptures tell us that this is an aspect of our sin nature that keeps us from hearing or understanding what God is saying to us.  1 Corinthians 2:14 says, “But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.”  Our hearts are naturally bent toward evil.  Consider what Jesus said in Matthew 15:18-20a: “But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile a man.  For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witnesses, blasphemies.  These are the things which defile a man…”  Or consider what the prophet Jeremiah wrote in chapter 17, verse 9: “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked; who can know it?  Or Genesis 6:5: “Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”  Whew!<

It is with good reason that the Scriptures inform us in Proverbs 28:26 that “He who trusts in his own heart is a fool, but whoever walks wisely will be delivered.”  And do we not see this happening all around us in the world?  Don’t we see and know people who are walking in foolish, destructive ways because they are following the desires of their own fallen hearts?  Do we not even see a disturbing amount of this in the church today?

So, is there a remedy?  And if so, what is it?  Yes, there is good news.  In fact, it is the good news of the gospel.  When we realize our own sinfulness and the wicked bent of our hearts, it should cause us to fear the Lord and His holy judgment.  The Bible informs us in Proverbs 9:10 that “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”  It is wise, in and of itself, to fear the almighty Creator of Heaven and Earth, but doing so also leads us to acquire more wisdom.

A few nights ago, my family watched a DVD wherein an underwater diver was showing photographs and film he had taken of squids off the coast of Mexico.  He spoke of the “fear and respect” that the local fishermen have of these squids because they can be aggressive and dangerous.  On their tentacles they have suctions, and on the suctions they have teeth that can grab and hang on.  And these fishermen have discovered that as they pull up a fish they have caught, the squids sometimes are trying to eat the fish too, and they can reach up and grab a fisherman and drag him overboard and eat him.  Just as we should rightly be fearful and respectful of such dangerous sea creatures, so should we be fearful and respectful of the Lord God who made them.  In that fear, we should cry out to God for help, and then look to the one whom He has provided for us to be our Savior.  Just as the wisdom of God in the book of Proverbs commanded us to “hear” the Word of the Lord, so in the New Testament, God says of Jesus, “This is My beloved Son.  Hear Him!”  Do you hear the same refrain that was present in Proverbs 4?  We are to hear; we are to listen; we are to pay attention to and follow what God in the person of Jesus is saying to us.  Since Colossians 2:3 tells us that, in Christ “are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,” how appropriate it is that we should be commanded to listen to, understand, and apply His instructions for our lives.  Indeed, Jesus said, “Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.” (Matthew 7:24:25).  And where do we find those saying of Jesus?  In the Bible—the Word of God.

Consider what the apostle Paul wrote to Timothy in 2 Timothy 3:14-15, “But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.”  “Wise for salvation…”  Some of you who know me know how much I harp on reading the Word of God everyday.  I encourage you all to do that because it will make you “wise for salvation.”  It will feed your soul.  We feed our bodies everyday, and usually with healthy, nutritious food (I hope).  So why not feed our souls everyday?  And how is it that the Scriptures can do these things?  The answer is in verses 16 and 17 of 2 Timothy 3, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”  The Scriptures can do these things because they are the very Word of God; they are “living and active” as Hebrews 4:12 tells us.  And one of the things they actively do is “make us wise.”

Have you been starving your soul recently?  Have you found it easier to read something else, or surf the ‘Net, or do something other than pick up the Bible and read?  O, beloved brethren, if you are a Christian, remember that God has intervened in your life, and has called you out of darkness and into the kingdom of His dear Son.  God gave a promise back in the days of the Old Testament prophets.  In Jeremiah 32:38-40, God says, “They shall be My people, and I will be their God; then I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear Me forever, for the good of them and their children after them…I will put My fear in their hearts so that they will not depart from Me.”  Additionally, in Ezekiel 36:25-27, the Lord promised a day in which He would change the hearts of His people: “Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols.  I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.  I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.”

Ah, what great news!  We can be saved unto good works, and grow in our understanding of God’s ways.  By God’s amazing grace we can, like the Thessalonians of the first century, turn “to God from idols to serve the living and true God” (1 Thessalonians 1:9b).  This, in itself, doesn’t save us.  We are saved by God’s grace imputing—or crediting—the righteousness of Christ to us.  In John 6:28-29, the disciples asked Jesus this question, and it is still applicable to us today:  “‘What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?’”  Jesus answered and said to them, “‘This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent.’”  It is by grace through faith that we are saved.  If we confess with our mouths the Lord Jesus, and believe in our hearts that God has raised Him from the dead, we will be saved, but we will be saved unto good works—good works which God prepared beforehand for us to walk in (Ephesians 2:10).  And those good works include the seeking of wisdom for our daily lives.

So, if you believe in Jesus, my word of exhortation to you today is: seek Him, and love and serve the living and true God by studying His Word and applying it to your lives.  If you already do these things, then let this serve as an encouragement to you to continue on that course.  Keep growing in wisdom and knowledge, and as you walk in God’s wisdom, God’s wisdom will keep you on a better path.  May we remember that we are cleansed by the Word which Jesus has spoken to us (John 15:3), and may we search that Word with joy and love, and in true communion with the Holy Spirit, in order that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to us the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Jesus (Ephesians 1:17).  As we come to the communion table, let us remember the body of Jesus, broken for us, and the blood of Jesus, shed for the remission of our sins.  Then let us, in faith and gratitude for that great sacrifice on our behalf, be enabled and strengthened to go forth and walk in His wisdom.  As James 1:5 says, “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.”

Let us pray.