The Treasure of God’s Wisdom: The 2nd Fatherly Address

INTRODUCTION

In 1995, the Canadian company Bre-X claimed to have found a massive gold deposit in Indonesia.

When they announced the news, their stock price shot through the roof and their company was suddenly valued at $6 billion.

You can imagine that the champagne bottles were popping around the head office.

However, just two years later, it was discovered that the gold samples they had submitted from their find had been tampered with.

Within the blink of an eye, investors jumped ship and they were bankrupt.

Ultimately, Bre-X is not the story of a treasure hunt that hit it big, but of fool’s gold in one of the biggest mining scandals in world history.

Tonight, as we open out Bibles to Proverbs 2, we see a call to seek for understanding like silver and to store up God’s Word like treasure.

It is a call for a treasure hunt.

And we will also see that for those who refuse to search, they will be in great danger.

They will be in danger of evil men.

They will be in danger of promiscuous women.

And most alarmingly, they will be in danger of divine judgment.

God’s wisdom is gold. The world’s wisdom is scandalous fool’s gold.

Whichever one we choose will determine the course of our lives, as well as our eternity.

CONTEXT AND SCRIPTURE

Before I read the passage, let’s remember where we are in Proverbs.

There are seven collections of Proverbs in the book of Proverbs.

We are still in the first, which spans the first 9 chapters.

In these chapters, there are 10 fatherly addresses.

Tonight we will cover the 2nd.

Let’s read the passage:

Proverbs 2 ESV

My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you, making your ear attentive to wisdom and inclining your heart to understanding; yes, if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding; he stores up sound wisdom for the upright; he is a shield to those who walk in integrity, guarding the paths of justice and watching over the way of his saints. Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good path; for wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul; discretion will watch over you, understanding will guard you, delivering you from the way of evil, from men of perverted speech, who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in the ways of darkness, who rejoice in doing evil and delight in the perverseness of evil, men whose paths are crooked, and who are devious in their ways. So you will be delivered from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words, who forsakes the companion of her youth and forgets the covenant of her God; for her house sinks down to death, and her paths to the departed; none who go to her come back, nor do they regain the paths of life. So you will walk in the way of the good and keep to the paths of the righteous. For the upright will inhabit the land, and those with integrity will remain in it, but the wicked will be cut off from the land, and the treacherous will be rooted out of it.

OUTLINE

As we study this chapter, you can really split it right in half.

The first 11 verses tell us how godly wisdom is developed.

The second 11 verses tell us how godly wisdom will defend us.

And we will have a teaching point to go with each set of eleven verses:

1. The treasure of godly wisdom is developed by hunting for it (v. 1-11).

2. The treasure of godly wisdom will defend us if we receive it (v. 12-22).

HUNTING FOR GODLY WISDOM (v. 1-11)

Let’s start with #1 by studying the first half of the chapter:

1. The treasure of godly wisdom is developed by hunting for it (v. 1-11).

In Luke 2:52, the Bible says this:

Luke 2:52 ESV

And Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.

If the Son of God incarnate increased in wisdom, then so must we.

There is a level of wisdom receive as Christians when the Holy Spirit of God begins to dwell in us, upon our conversion.

And yet, it is not like upon becoming a believer, God give us a wisdom deposit and we never need any more.

Instead, we must increase in wisdom.

Throughout our lives, we must grow and develop in wisdom.

So how do we develop in wisdom? We hunt for it.

This is what the first half of Proverbs 2 is telling us.

In these eleven verses, Solomon’s message to his son can be broken up into “3 IF’S” and “2 THEN’S”.

IF you will do these three things…THEN you will get these two results.

Let’s start with the IF’s.

IF YOU RECEIVE MY WORDS (v. 1-2)

The first IF is found in verses 1-2.

If you receive my words...

What does it look like for Solomon’s son to receive his words?

And by extension, what does it look like for us to receive God’s words in these Proverbs?

Well first of all, if you are truly receiving the words of wisdom, then you will be treasuring up God’s commandments within you.

As opposed to the world, who reject the wisdom of God and refuse to give it a place in their lives, we should accept the Word of God and store it in our hearts.

The way you would keep treasure locked up in a safe place, we should keep the commandments of God stocked up within us.

This is reminiscent of the Psalmist in Psalm 119:11

Psalm 119:11 ESV

I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.

We must treat the commandments of the Lord like treasure by hiding it in our hearts.

Secondly, if we are truly going to be receptive of God’s words and commandments and we are going to develop in wisdom, then we will make our ear attentive to wisdom.

We will tune our ears to God’s wisdom.

When I was a kid, my dad had a little portable TV in the garage.

I would play basketball out there and watch sports while I did it—fantasizing that I was a sports star myself.

To get this TV to play, you had to tune it to the right station and then you had to get its little antenna in the right place.

It was a delicate process.

But once you got it, you could pick up whatever NBA or NFL game that was I was trying to keep up with.

This is what we need to do with our ears.

We need to adjust them to be receptive to the wisdom of God and not receptive to the wisdom of the world, which is only fool’s gold.

When our ears are too influenced by the talking heads on TV or unbelieving friends, we need to adjust them.

We need to put them in a position to hear more of the Word of God.

More time studying our Bibles.

More time praying.

More time sitting under the teaching of the Word.

More time reading good theological books to help us grow in our understanding of who God is and what He wants from us.

If we don’t, we shouldn’t be surprised when our sight is fuzzy and we are experiencing a lot of static.

Thirdly, if we are really receiving God’s words, then we will be inclining our heart to understanding.

Understanding is competence.

It is “know-how.”

Our hearts must be inclined to competence in the words and commandments of God.

The heart is important in Proverbs.

It is spoken of 46 different times.

It is central to a person’s emotional, intellectual, religious and moral state.

Your heart is who you really are.

To incline the heart to understanding means to yield the heart to understanding.

It means to turn your heart toward understanding.

This is the opposite of hardening our hearts to God.

So this is the first way in which we hunt for wisdom.

We must receive the words of God by:

Treating it like treasure

Tuning our ears to His wisdom

Inclining our hearts for understanding

IF YOU CALL OUT FOR INSIGHT (v. 3)

The second way in which hunt for wisdom is found in the second IF. It is in verse 3:

If you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding.

The first IF was more passive.

It was about the way in which Solomon’s son receives the words of his father.

But the second IF is not passive at all.

We should lift up our voices and call out for insight and understanding.

We have already established that understanding is spiritual competence.

Insight would be spiritual perception.

It is the ability to see things God’s way.

Spiritually perceptive and insightful people distinguish right from wrong and good from bad based on God’s standards—not their own.

And certainly not the world’s standards.

We should desire these things. We should desire to be more spiritually competent and more spiritually perceptive.

And if this is indeed something we desire, then it is something we should pray for.

Ultimately, this is what verse 3 is about.

It is not a call to just cry out to the Universe to make you wise, like you see many Millennials and Gen-Zers doing with their postmodern, New Age spirituality.

It is not a call to reach out into the world and ask them to make you wise.

This is about asking God to make you competent and insightful.

We hunt for wisdom by praying for wisdom.

Solomon knew this better than anyone:

He prayed this in 1 Kings 3:9

1 Kings 3:9 ESV

Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, that I may discern between good and evil, for who is able to govern this your great people?”

The New Testament verse that serves as a compliment to Proverbs 2:3 is James 1:5

James 1:5 ESV

If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.

God loves to give His children His wisdom.

All you have to do is ask Him for it.

And yet, we would say there is a caveat to this.

This isn’t magic formula that works regardless of our living.

If we ignore the first IF and we are not receptive to God’s Word and we live according to worldly wisdom, we can’t think that we will ask God for wisdom and He will pour it out.

This is why James also says:

James 1:6–8 ESV

But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

The one who asks for wisdom from a heart of faith is the one who depends on God and has a living trust in Him.

Instead of being double-minded, they are single-minded and resolved to live on the very words of God.

The double-minded, hypocritical man, should not think they will receive any wisdom from God.

In fact, if they are hardened toward God, He very well may give them over to their own wisdom to show them just how foolish and futile it is.

But for those who know and trust the Lord, they should constantly be asking God for wisdom.

I think we can forget this.

We get way too pragmatic in how we live.

When we are hurting and upset, we ask doctors and counselors and friends and relatives what we should do.

But why don’t we go to God?

Why don’t we cry out to Him?

When things are going well and we have an abundance and we are considering what to do with it?

Why don’t we cry out to God for guidance?

When we have multiple options in front of us and none of them seem particularly wrong, but we can’t figure out which option to choose—why don’t we go to God for wisdom?

And how often do we settle for the fool’s gold of the world’s wisdom simply because we forget to pray?

And how often does that fail us?

Let us pray for wisdom.

God is good to direct us to places in His Word to find it.

He is good to send us godly friends to give it.

He is good to remind us of things we have learned so that we may be wise.

Don’t forget to ask God for understanding and insight.

At the end of chapter 1, Christ, who is our wisdom, is crying out for someone to listen.

Here in chapter 2, we are the ones who must cry out and ask for Christ to give His precious wisdom.

IF YOU SEEK IT LIKE SILVER (v. 4)

And then we have our third IF in v. 4.

“If you seek it like silver and search for it as hidden treasures...”

When I was a kid and we would go to the beach, my dad did what every middle-aged man did in the 90’s—he metal-detected.

He would come back with a pocket full of coins and the occasional pocket knife.

But in the same way that you could count on the sun rising and the tide coming in, you could count on seeing my dad with a pair of headphones and a metal-detector hanging off his right arm.

He knew he wouldn’t find a chest of gold, but it was the thrill of the hunt.

Now maybe it isn’t very exciting to say that we should seek God’s wisdom the way a middle-aged man searches for coins on the beach…if it helps you more—think of Indiana Jones.

The bottom line is that we should hunt for the wisdom of God like hidden treasures.

We should be aggressive about it.

Just like the second IF, this third IF is active.

We must search intently.

We can’t be lazy about it.

If you don’t sit under preaching...

If you don’t read your Bible...

If you don’t pray, as we just talked about...

If you don’t seek out godly conversation with good brothers and sisters...

If you don’t commit yourself to growing in the knowledge of the Lord, then you cannot be surprised when you constantly are lacking in wisdom.

And do you know why you must be active?

Because if you are passive, you will end up taking in the fool’s gold of the world’s wisdom.

You don’t have to work for worldly wisdom.

It is everywhere, in abundance, all the time.

If you are passive, you will end up living on the wisdom of news anchors, podcasters, co-workers, TikTok videos and celebrities.

We are inundated with that stuff.

We have to be vigilant about aggressively seeking the wisdom of God.

So these are the three IF’s.

v. 1- IF we receive the words of the Proverbs...

v. 3- IF we call out for insight...

v. 4 - IF we seek it like silver...

Now let’s look at the two THEN’s in v. 5 and v. 9, which will show us the results of our hunting.

THEN YOU WILL UNDERSTAND THE FEAR OF THE LORD (v. 5-8)

We find the first THEN in verse 5.

Then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God.

This is the key to the whole book of Proverbs repeated.

We first saw it in the instruction manual in chapter 1, verse 7.

Proverbs 1:7 ESV

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.

There is no way to gain wisdom apart from fearing the Lord.

This is where wisdom begins.

The idea in Proverbs 2:5 is that the more you hunt for God’s wisdom, the more you will grow in the fear of the Lord.

And in finding the knowledge of God, you will not just know about Him, but you will know Him.

What verse 5 tells us is that God does not disappoint.

We know that fearing God is where wisdom starts and if you search for wisdom, the fear of God and the knowledge of Him is what you will get.

You will be a wise person that has an intimate relationship with the living God.

How can we be sure of this? Look at verses 6-8.

The reason we get wisdom is because God gives it.

It reminds me of the child asking the candy shop owner how Willy Wonka makes such fantastic candies at the beginning of the Gene Wilder, Willy Wonka movie.

The shop owner says, “He does it because he was born to do it.”

Making magical candy bars is just who Willy Wonka is.

Well this is just who God is—He is by nature, a wisdom-giver.

He is all-wise.

He is all-knowing.

He has all understanding.

And He is a generous God who loves to give to His children.

Therefore, He gives wisdom.

When He speaks to us, knowledge and understanding comes from His mouth to our ears (v. 6).

And His wisdom will never run out.

He has a storehouse of sound wisdom for the upright (v. 7).

The upright are those who walk straight. They are not crooked.

They are not bending down, trying to get under and around God’s commandments.

They live according to them.

God loves to help the upright continue to be upright.

He is a shield for those who walk with integrity (v. 7).

The Hebrew word is easy to say and remember: tom.

It literally means normal.

It is normal to walk in the commandments of God.

It seems abnormal because the whole world lack integrity.

But in reality, the world is abnormal.

The Lord’s way is normality. It is how things were supposed to be.

And when people walk in His ways, they will stand out in the midst of all the abnormalities of this world.

This might draw the ire of the world.

It will certainly draw the ire of the devil.

And yet, we see in v. 7 that God will be a shield to those who walk with integrity—those who walk normal according to God’s standards.

As we walk the path of justice, He will watch over our way, for we are His saints.

We are sinners that He has made righteous by the blood of His Son.

He adverts His eyes from sinners who are His enemies.

But He keeps His eyes on every step that we take.

Psalm 121:3 ESV

He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber.

He never falls asleep.

He is always watching over our steps as we seek to walk justly before Him and with Him.

THEN YOU WILL UNDERSTAND (v. 9-11)

The second THEN is found in v. 9:

English Standard Version Chapter 2

Then you will understand righteousness and justice

and equity, every good path

Unless you know the Lord and fear Him, you will never truly understand righteousness and justice and fairness.

The world uses words like this all the time.

You will hear them use the words “justice” and “equity.”

But without the wisdom of God, they will never actually grasp what these words mean.

You must have the Lord as your Shepherd if you are truly going to walk paths of righteousness.

Psalm 23:3 ESV

He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.

Followers of the Lord don’t always stay on this path.

Sometimes we veer to the right or to the left.

But in principle, the only way to truly know how to live or what to do, is to know God and fear Him and know His wisdom.

When we truly understand righteousness and justice and equity and every good path, it will have a two-pronged effect in our lives:

On one hand, wisdom will come into our hearts and knowledge will be pleasurable to us. (v. 10)

Why do Christians come to church and sit there and listen to a bald guy talk for 45 minutes every Sunday?

Why do they get up early to read an ancient Book?

Why do they go to Bible studies and sit around in a circle discussing things like watchfulness and knowing God?

Because, the wisdom of God—Christ Himself—has come into our hearts, and the knowledge of Him has become pleasant to our souls.

We find pleasure in knowing Him and knowing about Him.

God made us for this pleasure and we can’t get enough.

So that is one effect—pleasure. The other effect is protection.

Discretion and understanding will be like two guard dogs, acting as sentinels to keep us safe.

The shrewdness that God gives us will make us wise as serpents and this shrewdness will be like a private security guard for our lives.

It will keep us from unnecessary harm.

His understanding will be our guard.

The way the “big uglies” (as John Madden called them) on the inside of the offensive line protect a quarterback, the understanding God gives us will protect us.

And this is our focus for the rest of tonight’s sermon.

Summing up our first teaching point:

The treasure of godly wisdom is developed by hunting for it.

We hunt for it by:

Receiving it

Asking for it

Intently seeking it

This will grant us an understanding of the fear of the Lord

This will grant us an understanding of every good path

And now to our second point tonight...

THE DEFENSE OF GODLY WISDOM (v. 12-22)

2. The treasure of godly wisdom will defend us if we receive it (v. 12-22).

We know that the discretion and understanding wisdom provides will be like guard dogs for us. Verses 10-11 shows us that.

But what we see in the last half of this chapter shows us exactly who and what we are guarded from.

There are two WHO’S and one WHAT that we are protected from in these verses.

Wicked men

The Forbidden Woman

Those are the WHO’s

The Judgment of GOd

This is the WHAT

WICKED MEN (v. 12-15)

We see that wisdom will guard us from wicked men in verses 12-15.

They walk on the way of evil (v. 12)

They are perverse in speech (v. 12)

They forsake the paths of righteousness that wisdom has taught us to understand (v. 13)

They walk in the ways of darkness (v. 13)

They rejoice in doing evil (v. 14)

They delight in how wicked evil is (v. 14)

They have crooked paths (v. 15)

They have devious ways (v. 15)

These would be the very sorts of men that Solomon warned his son about in chapter 1.

Proverbs 1:11–14 ESV

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 chapter 1, Solomon offers his son a hypothetical, but what we know from living in the world is that the hypothetical is all too real.

A parent gives these hypothetical situations to their child because they know that in this fallen and sick world, there will come a time in which their child is tempted to cast their lot in with men like this.

It is the wisdom of God which will ultimately guard their feet from going along with them.

People want all sorts of things for their kids.

People will spend thousands of dollars and hours on travel sports.

People will seek the best education for their children and pay for tutors.

People will advocate for their kids to have the best of whatever is offered.

But what are we doing to ensure they have the wisdom of God?

This is why I believe that if your kids are here tonight, they are in the best place they can be.

The wisdom of God will do far more for them in this world than any athletics or arithmetic they will ever learn.

Not to say those things don’t have value—but God’s wisdom has ultimate value.

It must be prioritized.

And it must be prioritized in our lives as well.

We cannot assume that our marriages...

Our godly habits...

Our good decision-making...

Our Christian friendships...

Will always continue on in a healthy manner.

When we become relaxed about these things, we are most vulnerable to Satan’s traps by the means of wicked men.

We must be vigilant about the development of wisdom that we have talked about tonight, so that we will not be easy prey for the enemy and those he uses to try and knock us off the path of righteousness.

The second we assume everything will always be fine, it the moment we have left ourselves unguarded.

Pursuing wisdom equals pursuing protection from wicked influence.

FORBIDDEN WOMAN (v. 16-19)

We have another threat in v. 16-19.

This time it is the Forbidden woman—an adultress with smooth words (v. 16).

She forsakes the companion—or husband—of her youth and forgets the covenant she made with God (v. 17).

Her house is like the house of the witch in the Hansel and Gretel story.

There is nothing there but death.

To walk the path to her house is to depart from the Lord (v. 18).

Those who go there do not come back.

Giving in to her temptation brings ruin and death to their soul—they do not find the path of life again (v. 19).

The Forbidden Woman will appear throughout Proverbs in a few different ways.

In particular, we will see her in chapters 5-7:

Proverbs 5:3–7 ESV

For the lips of a forbidden woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil, but in the end she is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword. Her feet go down to death; her steps follow the path to Sheol; she does not ponder the path of life; her ways wander, and she does not know it. And now, O sons, listen to me, and do not depart from the words of my mouth.

Proverbs 6:23–26 ESV

For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching a light, and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life, to preserve you from the evil woman, from the smooth tongue of the adulteress. Do not desire her beauty in your heart, and do not let her capture you with her eyelashes; for the price of a prostitute is only a loaf of bread, but a married woman hunts down a precious life.

All of chapter 7 will focus on this woman:

Proverbs 7:4–5 ESV

Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,” and call insight your intimate friend, to keep you from the forbidden woman, from the adulteress with her smooth words.

She is the opposite of Lady Wisdom, who is representative of Christ—the wisdom of God, calling out to us in chapter 1 and again in chapter 8.

Lady Wisdom will show you the paths of life.

The Forbidden Woman will lead you to death.

We’ve all heard stories of men throwing away their lives and their families for the allure of lust.

We have seen preachers lose their ministries because they went to this woman’s house.

We have seen marriages destroyed. We have seen legacies ruined. We have seen reputations obliterated by walking on her path.

Men—how do we make sure this would not be our end?

How do we make sure we would not make a shipwreck of our lives?

The answer is—be a hunter of God’s wisdom.

Receive it.

Beg God for it.

Incline your heart to it.

How do we make sure our boys don’t end up in destruction at the house of the Forbidden Woman?

Teach them wisdom.

You can teach them to fish.

You can teach them to throw a spiral.

You can teach them how to shave.

But teach them wisdom and they will be protected and guarded men.

JUDGEMENT OF GOD (v. 20-22)

And then finally, in verses 20-22, we see the WHAT we are protected from and that is the judgment of God.

In many ways, the final three verses summarize the entire chapter.

Who inhabits the land?

Those who walk in the way of the good and keep to the paths of the righteous (v. 20).

Those who remain in it will be those with integrity (v. 21).

The Hebrew word for “Land,” literally means earth.

Who inherits the earth, according to Jesus?

Matthew 5:5 ESV

“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

And who are the meek, but those who have been made new by God’s grace and walk in the way of the good and keep to the paths of the righteous?

Who are the humble and the gentle, but those who walk with integrity, according to the wisdom of God?

In saying this, we are not saying that salvation is something you earn through upright living.

Salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

But those who truly belong to Christ will demonstrate it by persevering to the end.

This is why in Revelation 19, in the picture of the marriage supper, John records that believers are clothed in their righteous deeds:

Revelation 19:8 ESV

it was granted her to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure”— for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints.

We are saved by faith, but saving faith will work—thus the garments of righteous deeds worn by the Bride of Christ.

So those who belong to God will inhabit the land they inherit.

This is the blessing of salvation and the end of a life of wisdom.

But on the other hand, those who are wicked and reject the wisdom of God, will be cut off from the land.

This is judgment.

The treacherous who are traitors toward God, will be rooted out of the land.

They will be plucked up and cast out.

Living without wisdom results in more than just an unnecessarily difficult and despair-filled life in this age—it results in eternal judgment in the age to come.

Revelation 20:14–15 ESV

Then Death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.

Understanding this, wisdom doesn’t just protect us from dangers under the sun, like wicked men and wicked women.

It protects us from the ultimate danger found after death—standing before the wrath of a holy God whom we have made our enemy, by hardening our hearts again and again against His Word.

CONCLUSION

The treasure of godly wisdom, which we should hunt for if we are the Lord’s people, will protect us.

The samples we find in His Word have not been tampered with.

The stock of heaven will not fall.

The investment will have its return.

It is as certain as the God who has promised it.

But the wisdom of this world is nothing more than fool’s gold. It is like the deposit of Bre-X.

It is bankrupt and it will make you bankrupt.

Don’t spent your days hunting for that which cannot and will not satisfy.

Don’t live your life under the guide of worldly wisdom that will land you in the way of the wicked and the at the house of the Forbidden Woman.

Don’t invest in the wisdom of an age that will pass away when the Lord uproots the treacherous and gives a restored earth to the meek.

Hunt for it like silver. Treat it like treasure.

It will guard you now and forever.