Wisdom in Warning (2)

Grace to you and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. It is a privilege to share the Word of God with you all this evening.

I’ve recently been reading a book called Habits of the Household. In the book the Author is making a case and giving instruction for how to integrate our faith into everything we do within the homes. He primarily focusses on parenting, but gets into all aspects of the Christian Household. Some of the things he talks about are to be expected. Things like praying with your children, not disciplining out of anger but to correct harmful behavior, and carving time to intentionally spend time with your wife. I’ve read about those ideas from a lot of different sources. But there was one habit he mentioned that I hadn’t really thought of, but when I read it, it instantly clicked.

He suggested that Parents bring their children to work with them. Not everyday, sure they have to go to school and still be children, but parents should on regular occasion, take their children to work with them.

I hadn’t really thought about this before, but as I was reading, I was instantly drawn back to my own childhood. My father worked in the food industry. He was a chef and a food and beverage director at a variety of different places. I still have vivid memories of going to work with him when I was kid. I remember touring through the large and loud industrial kitchens. I remember watching him talk on the phone and set up meetings. I remember just thinking how impressive the big wooden desk in the office was! I would spend hours just punching away at the calculator with the little printer on the back. I loved it! There were some big time equations going on in young Brad’s brain! I loved being at work with my father.

But why would I have so much fun just tinkering around in the office? There weren’t a bunch of toys, very limited screens. It was just a desk, some papers, a calculator, a boy, and his dad. I didn’t understand everything my dad was doing at work, but I was invited in to see him. I learned that my dad did something for others and that he enjoyed directing things.

Now my dad didn’t invite me to come to his work because he needed my help. Seeing this through the lens of now being a father myself, I am all but certain that the little boy’s presence made getting things done more difficult. But my father loved me and invited me into his work because he loved me. I was given a formative memory of working with my father.

When fathers invite their children to work with you, it is more profound than we could know. When they invite their children to work with them, they are in many ways modeling the love and invitation God the Father has for His Children. Let me quickly break this down by zooming through the beginning of the book of Ephesians:

When you receive Christ as Lord of your life you become a child of God, you are adopted into the family of God.

Ephesians 1:3–5 (ESV)

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will,

There is a lot of theological goodness going on in those verses but I want to Highlight just a few things for our purposes this morning. God the Father blessed us with Christ. Christ pay the cost of the sin for all those who believe in Him. Those who have Christ as Lord are seen as blameless and holy. Out of God’s LOVE he ADOPTED us to be His children, and did so through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

Now skip with me over to chapter 2.

Ephesians 2:10 (ESV)

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

We are the workmanship of God the Father, the same Father who loves us invites us into His work! He has prepared good works for us to do beforehand that we should walk in them!

Now let me ask a question: Does God NEED us, does He NEED our work, to accomplish His will? No! He created the entirety of existence by the power of His voice! But out His great love He brings us into His work!

Some of us may have fond memories of our fathers, for others of us, our earthly fathers may be difficult to deal with. But all of us who know God the Father through Faith in God the Son, can take it to the bank that we are loved and He invites us to work with Him for the purpose of His will.

I said all of this as an introduction to where we are going to be picking up this evening in Proverbs because the Wisdom shared in this section is given from the perspective of a father talking to their son. If you haven’t already, open your Bibles to Proverbs 1. We’re going to start in verse 8. When we think back to what we learned last time, we understand this book ultimately be a collection of GOD’s Wisdom. So when we see the father Solomon, writing this to his son, we understand that relationship, but the implication goes beyond! This is God the Father, talking to us! Talking to those saved by grace through faith in Christ!

We should all be at attention right now because the Father who loves us enough to save us and give us a work to do, is here giving us instruction!

Read with me starting in verse 8.

Proverbs 1:8–9 (ESV)

Hear, my son, your father’s instruction, and forsake not your mother’s teaching, for they are a graceful garland for your head and pendants for your neck.

This section of scripture is using the metaphor of parental instruction to gain the readers attention.

The parental instruction given to the child is very beneficial! It is likened to a graceful garland on your head and pendants for your neck. What are those things? Well a graceful garland would have been a victor’s crown! The pendants for the neck was a mark of prestige. Hearing and obeying this parental wisdom would beautify the child’s life in a remarkable and noticeable way. This all illustrates:

The Value of Wisdom

Before we go any further, if you know the Lord, you should be giving thanks for the Wisdom He has given to you through His Word. You can wear the victor’s crown because of Christ who leads you in triumphal procession. It is His victory in which you share. When God adopted those who believe in Him into His family, He has made them a chosen race, a royal priesthood. He has given believers heavenly prestige! This should not cause us to gloat, but rather to appreciate the riches the Lord has for us! We should cherish God’s Word and God’s Wisdom. Believers should sincerely desire to display His blessing in every aspect of life.

The reality is that we often over look the value of God’s instruction! These opening verses call our attention back to the worth of Godly wisdom.

Seeing my son start to eat real food has been quite the joy. If you haven’t seen him lately, then just know, that boy ain’t going hungry. He’s tried a lot of different foods and will eat just about anything, but his absolute favorite food is blueberries. That kid will eat blueberries nonstop. If I were to set in front of him a filet mignon, cooked to perfection, and cup of blueberries, he would pick the blueberries every time. Now, as a child that’s fine. Honestly, it’s really helpful on the budget of the house that he’s good with blueberries over high dollar steaks. But there is no doubt that the steak is more valuable than the blueberries. As AR grows up I suspect that his appreciation for steak will grow.

But to push this metaphor back to our text, in our sinful flesh we often overlook the value of God’s wisdom and follow bad instruction, that’s an even worst decision than choosing blueberries over filet mignon. That’s like being offered filet mignon and saying, “nah, give me canned sardines!”

Don’t overlook the value of God’s Instruction! We should approach this study of Proverbs joyfully! We’re on a treasure hunt and we’ve been given the map! It’s right here! X marks the spot and the treasure contained herein is GOOD.

Now, we’re about to read 10 verses of what I would call “negative wisdom.” That is, these are things that are to be avoided. But before we get into the particulars here I want to say one more overarching lesson we glean here. The father in this context is not about to mince any words nor beat around the bush.

We should note that good fathers speak truth to their children. It is not loving to send children out into a world deceived by the one who seeks to steal, kill, and destroy without warning them of the danger!

Too often we want to skip over the hard conversations that need to be had with our children. Well allow me to say, we aren’t doing that today. I don’t want to pull any punches. I value you all too much to hold back.

So Let’s now look at warning God the Father has for His children starting in verse 10.

Proverbs 1:10–14 (ESV)

My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent. If they say, “Come with us, let us lie in wait for blood; let us ambush the innocent without reason; like Sheol let us swallow them alive, and whole, like those who go down to the pit; we shall find all precious goods, we shall fill our houses with plunder; throw in your lot among us; we will all have one purse”—

In the first part of the Warning, we see the invitation of the unrighteous.

The Invitation of the Unrighteous

It begins, my son, if “sinners” entice you. We should first ask ourselves who are the sinners that are being referred to here. We know that we are all sinners. All we like sheep have gone astray—every one—to his own way. But the structure in Hebrew here lends itself more to a more specific usage. We see this noun used time and time again to describe those who are set against God and His people.

The reality we find ourselves in is that this world is full of people who have no interest in God nor His righteousness and they will do whatever it takes to find whatever it is they define as personal success.

The direct invitation given by the unrighteous in verses 10-14 is basically asking the son to join a gang. These hooligans would want him to join them as the wait for unsuspecting travelers to come by. They promise riches will be at the end of the endeavor.

Now for some this may be a very pertinent teaching. When I was a youth pastor, I worked with a lot of inner city youth. I have lived in some of the sketchiest parts of the big city of Lexington. Now, I’m not saying that Lexington is Chicago, but I’ve seen some things. It seems like there is a new story every evening about another young person caught with or caught by a shooting of some sort. While many of us may never encounter some one offering us to join their gang, we would be naive to think that such a thing is irrelevant in our time.

The principle we should be seeing here is that the offer to join in unrighteous behavior is all around us. For some it may be an offer very close to what is described in verses 10-14, for others it will look different, but make no mistake, unrighteousness is always destructive.

We are all going to be confronted with self-centered, narcissistic backstabbers. One pastor put together a list of how this plays out in day-to-day life:

• bullies at school ganging up on another kid, tormenting him or her to the point of despair

• computer hackers stealing people’s identity and money

• Wall Street insiders exploiting the system for their own selfish gain

• political candidates stealing elections and defrauding the voters because winning, not serving, is the goal

• neighbors who need bad things to be true of someone else in order to justify themselves, gossiping that person’s reputation to death

These are all different contexts in which some one is basically saying, “come with us, let us lie in wait for blood.”

The allure of these promised riches can be very enticing, but we should be weary of these licentious offers for four reasons.

(PUT UP SCRIPTURE FOR REFERENCE ONLY

Proverbs 1:10–14 ESV

My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent. If they say, “Come with us, let us lie in wait for blood; let us ambush the innocent without reason; like Sheol let us swallow them alive, and whole, like those who go down to the pit; we shall find all precious goods, we shall fill our houses with plunder; throw in your lot among us; we will all have one purse”—

Look at where the offers are coming from. In the context of Proverbs, these are the thieves. These are the people running havock on the city. The son would have likely witnessed some of the damage this band of marauders had done in the past. In our context, we absolutely should be looking to make relational inroads with people from all backgrounds. There is no one too far gone to experience the grace of God. However, we must remember that as Jesus crossed paths with characters from all walks of life, He did so without ever falling into sin. In fact even the must unseemly of characters He would tell to “go and sin no more.” While we must take the Light of the Lord into the Darkness that does not give us an excuse to participate in darkness. You should not be accepting invitations to participate in ungodliness. Witness to others without sacrificing righteous living for the glory of God.

We should also be weary of these kinds of offers because these fools are overreaching in their ambitions for violence and wealth. They are discontent with their own lives so they seek to tear down the lives of others. Christians know better: 1 Timothy 6:6-7 “But godliness with contentment is great gain, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world.”

From a purely pragmatic stand point, the offer in verse 14 is highly suspect! They say we’ll keep all the treasure in one purse! That means they are going to keep the money all together in one pot. They’ll let you have your cut when its time *wink wink*. How can you trust these people who are willing to devour the lives of others to treat you well at the end? The same thing happens in modern occurences. People promise to be there for one another, but when the heat is turned up, they turn on each other.

The final reason to avoid the offer of the unrighteous comes from the beginning of verse 10. Our loving Father has already told us that when the sinners entice, do not consent! These people don’t love you! They want to use you for their own gain! You’re loving Father is warning you not to get caught up in this! Who should you listen to!?

But the loving Father doesn’t just tell his son what the offer may look like. He goes into greater detail of why the son should flee from them. Look at verses 15-19

Proverbs 1:15–19 (ESV)

my son, do not walk in the way with them; hold back your foot from their paths, for their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed blood. For in vain is a net spread in the sight of any bird, but these men lie in wait for their own blood; they set an ambush for their own lives. Such are the ways of everyone who is greedy for unjust gain; it takes away the life of its possessors.

It’s been said before that “the feet follow the heart”. Later on in Proverbs you will read that from the heart flows the springs of life and because of that fact we are to guard our hearts. Here in verse 15 we are given a practical way to do just that. The father says hold back your foot from their paths. The father is making it clear that having deep association with these people is not a wise option for the son. Don’t walk the path they walk! Why? Because the path they are on is evil! It leads to bloodshed. These people are setting the trap of their own destruction. It is greed that will be their downfall.

The imagery used in this section is intentionally graphic. While most of us will never presented with the opportunity to join a gang, the results of following wickedness are just as destructive as what is listed here. You may not cause physical blood shed in your misdeeds, but you can sever relationships. You may not attack others physically for financial game, but you may be invited to prey on the vulnerabilities of others. Participation in any kind of unrighteous living is setting yourself up for failure. That is what is meant when the proverb says these people set an ambush for their own lives.

Don’t we see this happen time and time again in the dog-eat-dog world we live in? We see people selling out another person just to turn around and fall into the same thing they were calling out just moments prior?

Let me just say this, I don’t know if you have been following me thus far, but even if not, here is the basic lesson we learn from this section of proverbs 1:8-19. This world does not love you.

This World Does Not Love You

This world will not keep its promises to you. This world will chew you up and spit you out. This world does not care about you, but instead uses you for the spread of evil from one broken person to the next. On and on, over and over, the unrighteous tempt others to join them in debauchery with promises made to be broken.

But also know this: There is a better way. You don’t have to go searching for riches in life through joining in on illicit schemes when you realize that you have already been given a graceful garland for your head and pendants for your neck. You don’t have to chase after money when you have been given a heavenly inheritance. This world and those who love it are driven by building up personal treasure. Those who know the Lord are shown a better way!

Hebrews 13:5 (ESV)

Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

We’re shown in Hebrews that the promise God gave to Israel through Moses, that He would be with them, is extended not just to that particular time and people but to all of God’s people! All those saved by the grace of God through faith in God the Son are sealed by the Holy Spirit and can take it to the bank that Triune God will never leave us nor forsake us. That means we won’t be abandoned by God. That means we can stand against the wicked schemes of the world and not give into temptation to join them. Instead we join in with the rest of the redeemed reciting the next verse there in Hebrews:

Hebrews 13:6 (ESV)

So we can confidently say, “The Lord is my helper; I will not fear; what can man do to me?”

Those who know the Lord can CONFIDENTLY say the Lord is my helped! I’m not afraid of sinful man. There’s nothing that man can do to me to separate me from my God. He’s never gonna leave me. He’s never gonna abandon me. He’s never gonna Forsake me.

And to tie this all together, one of the ways the Lord is actively with us is through guidance of His Word! The Lord is our Helper, He has given us the Holy Spirit to understand His Word. We can read this section of Proverbs today and see that God our Father has given us loving instruction. He has given us guidance. We can see that our Good Good Father has shown us the follies of following wickedness. We can walk out into the world with clear eyes, knowing that there is real wickedness and that through the power of God and for the glory of God we can seek righteousness. We can deny the opportunities for illicit gains that come our way because our Father loves us and has shown us His goodness is better than anything this world could offer.

Here in this section of proverbs we see that the world is wicked and enticing. But we also see that there is a better way. This world is wicked because of sin. Because the tempter came to Adam and Eve many years ago and our first parents gave into temptation. They sinned against the Holy God. Ever since this world has been a playground for evil. But also ever since the fall God has been redeeming His people. Satan seeks to kill, steal, and destroy. The gang of marauders in our text today fall right in line with him. But praise be to God that God is still saving His people. Jesus Christ, the Son of God said,

John 10:10 (ESV)

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

All who receive Christ as Lord find life! But not just simple plain life, it is life abundant! It is life adorned with the graceful garland of His wisdom. It is life given meaning and purpose. It is life that is life-giving! When you find this abundant life in Christ Jesus you are then commissioned to tell others where to find the same!

So how do you find life abundant? How do you come to Christ? By first coming to end of your self. By realizing that you are not enough on your own and nothing in this world will satisfy the craving you have in your heart. Then when you see that Jesus stepped out of heaven to live a perfectly righteous life, die on a cross, and rise on the third day, you see that He did that to pay the debt of sinned owed by a sinner such as yourself. And when you see the great glory of what Christ did for a sinner, for a wretch, like you, you see that He truly is Lord, worthy to be followed. He gives you the desire to serve Him. You come to know Him as your Shepherd. You heard His voice and follow Him.

If any of this resonates with you today and you want to know more about what I’m talking about, respond today. Come forward during this hymn of response. Reach out. Find me after. But know this, this world has nothing to offer you, but all who come to Jesus find life and life abundant.