The Beginning of Wisdom

Introduction

If you have a Bible with you, please take it and open it with me to the book of Proverbs and chapter 1.

We have two weeks before the Advent seasons in here, and I thought I would take these two weeks to take a quick dive into the book of proverbs. My desire is to help us see what the book of Proverbs is and what its value is in our relationship with Jesus Christ.

With that in mind, lets read together Proverbs 1:1-7

READ

PRAY

In these opening verses of this book we are told what this Proverbs and what this book is. It is a collection of sayings. A collection of sayings that are to make one wise.

That is what **v.2** means when it gives us the purpose of the book when it says **READ**

Before go any further, and look at the main point of this passage, we must understand what it means to be wise.

Being wise is not having knowledge. You could know or memorize the whole Bible with the right heat attitude, but this is not wisdom.

In his commentary on Proverbs Ray Ortlund defines wisdom this way:

Proverbs—Wisdom that Works (The Goals) Ray Ortlund

Wisdom is skill, expertise, competence that understands how life really works, how to achieve successful and even beautiful results.

They sayings that we have been given in proverbs then a given to change the way we live in our everyday lives. They are given to give us skills to live lives that are pleasing to God, that bring glory to God.

That is the purpose of this book of Proverbs. Solomon wrote it so that kings in the next generations would have instruction for how to be wise kings, how to be kings that would bring glory to God with their authority.

This passage gives us the purpose of this book, but it also give us the key to unlocking the whole book.

V.7tells us this key.

READ

What were then told in these opening verses of Proverbs is this:

A life that pleases God begins with a heart that fears Him.

That is what I would like to look at this morning too how if we want to gain wisdom from this book, if we want to live lives that please (whether that be as individual Christians or families, or as a church) we must have hearts that fear God.

You may be wonder already what it means to have a heart that fears God, and we will get to that in a bit, so you will have to stick with me before we I answer that question, so have no fear, I will.

Let’s got back to verse 2 and see what it means to live a life that pleases God.

In this verse we are given told this. It says

READ

To live a life that please God we must:

First, know wisdom and instruction or Have godly character which Solomon explains more in verse 3

Secondly, to live a life that pleases God we must Have a good judgment which we see explained in verse 4.

Let’s now look at those two things.

Godly Character v.3

What does it mean to have godly character? verse 3 describe it as this:

READ

These are words of the kind of ruler, the kind of king one would want. At the beginning of his rule this is what we saw of Solomon. Let’s turn to 1 Kings 3:16 to an example of Solomon means to deal with others in righteousness, justice, and equity (or fairness).

READ 1 KINGS 3:16-28

The way in which Solomon deals with these two women it says in verse 28 made all Israel in awe of him, why? Because his character displayed that he had wisdom that only could come from God.

He did what was right, justice was accomplished and he treated this women fairly, as they deserved.

The way in which Solomon lived brought glory to God. He pleased God with his how he treated others.

To please God we must deal or interact with other people as he would, as Jesus did when he was on this earth.

Proverbs has many of these sayings to instruct us. For example Proverbs 3: 28-32 gives us a few.

READ Proverbs 3:28-32

To live lives that please God, this is how we ought to live in our day-to-day dealings with others, and even more that is in this book, because that is what it means to have godly character.

Good Judgement v.4

To live a life that is pleasing to God we must also have good judgment. Good judgement is what we have described in **verse 4**.

Prudence is not the best word here, its would be better translated shrewd, which is: *to have sharp powers of judgement. *

There other word here in **verse 3** that describes one as having good judgment is discretion. Which is cautious thinking we need to see through and battle the many temptations of everyday life.

When you combine these three words, shrewd, knowledge, and discretion you get a person who has good judgment.

Again, if we look back to the example of Solomon’s example back in **1 Kings 3:16** we see his good judgment.

The one mother comes trying to trick him, to get him to give her the baby, or at least make sure that the other mother does not have a baby either.

Solomon is able to see who’s the liar, who is the false mother by seeing how they acted. He is like the original Sherlock Holmes.

Like how Sherlock can tell a man where he shops for clothes, what he had for breakfast, and what is occupation is after meeting him for one minute, Solomon had the good judgment to look at these two ladies and see the true mother.

To live lives that please God, we must have godly character and good judgment.

Naturally, We are not Either of these things…

Now after coming to that conclusion, you may have a one of two responses.

1. Okay, now I know what I need to do to please God, so I will read this book of Proverbs and get to it and accomplish this, I will get it done.

2. Wow, this is a lot. This standard is high. To be have godly chacacter and good judgement, I cannot do that. (And you feel like just giving up on trying)

Response number 1 is honourable. It is a good goal to live a life that pleases God. But just as we did not save ourselves from our sin, we cannot live a life that pleases God by ourselves.

Response number 2 gets this truth. This standard of a live that please God is not somewhat that we can reach alone. Yet the feeling of giving up is a lie. We cannot have godly character by trying hard to, and we cannot have good judgement just by reading and studying the Bible and good books.

So what are we left to do?

If we go back to **1 Kings 3:5** we see how Solomon had this godly character and good judgment;

**READ 1 Kings 3:5-12**

Solomon does not have godly character because David raised him well or because it was natural to him.

Solomon does not have good judgment because of his training or some skills he was born with.

Solomon was a wise king, the wisest of time, because God gave him wisdom. Solomon was able to to please God with his everyday life because God gave him godly character and good judgment as a gift to Solomon.

We too cannot live lives that please God alone. No matter our natural aptitude to have good judgment or be kind or nice person, we will fall short at points in our days and moments in our lives.

Even with this gift from God Solomon did not always live a life that pleased God. Solomon, who had been given wisdom from God ended his life living a life not with godly character or good judgement.

**1 Kings 11:1-6** tells us what happened to Solomon.

**READ**

Solomon, in his old age did what was evil. He did not love, or follow after God with his whole heart. He did not live a life that was pleasing to God.

What went wrong?

Solomon had forgotten the key, the beginning to having wisdom that he wrote about in Proverbs…

**READ Proverbs 1:7**

Solomon no longer feared God, but he loved his many wives. What does it mean to *fear God*.

The concept if not that we are scared of God like one might be scared of the dark, or scared of being on or near water, or scared of spiders.

What this verse means when it uses the word fear, it means an awe. There is both a joy and respectful fear with this awe.

An awe like standing on a cliff looking over a beautiful view. There is joy from the beauty, but you respect that you could fall down to your death if you get too close to the edge.

This is what this verse means to fear God.

It means that we have joy and reverence of God. It means we can appreciated His great beauty, but understand His unlimited power and authority.

It like a child, who knows the strength of authority of their dad will obey them, but at the same time can play and wrestle with them.

Fear of God is about knowing and trusting God. It’s means that we cling to God, not to others.

Solomon lost this in his old age. His love clung to his many wives. With this his good judgement went with it. With it went his godly character. God was not loved, followed, and stood in awe alone, but was just one of many gods.

Solomon forgot that a life that pleases God begins with a heart that fears Him.

Solomon went from a man, a king who feared God and had wisdom, to a foolish king who dispised wisdom and instruction.

Solomon disobey God’s command about who to marry. He dispised God’s instruction. The love of his wives caused to worship other god. He dipsied wisdom.

What the end of the book of Kings tells us is Solomon was not the wisesets king to live. He lived wisely, by the grace of God, for a time, so wise he brought glory to God. Yet his live ended in tragedy. His rule ended, and so did the kingdom he cared for.

But Proverbs is not a book about how wise Solomon was. It is not a book about how wise you or I can be. This book is about the real wisest king. A king who lived a life that pleased God all of time. A king who wore a crown of thorns so that we all could one day be wise too. Proverbs is a book about Jesus.

When we come to the book of Proverbs, we are reading more than just collection of wise sayings for life, but we are reading a collection of sayings that tell us more about the saviour who lived this kind of life.

This why the fear of the Lord is the key to this book. If you are not in awe of the one who this book is about, who you will please and bring glory by living life, then the rest of this book will be a best interesting to you, but it will not make you wise, it will not change your life.

Conclusion

If you came this morning to get some information, to learn something to take home, to gain some knowledge. This passage is telling you that’s not what the Christian life is about.

The Christian life is not about gaining knowledge about God, but fearing God. It’s about knowing who God is, having your heart captured by this truths, and having a life transformed into one that pleases God.

Christinianty is not a religion of knowledge. It’s not about being the smartest or wisest people. It’s about being humbled people. Humbled by a God who being the wisest died on cross to save those who are foolish. Humbled by a God who is so wise and powerful he could make a plan to save foolish sinners.

If you have lived trusting that your own knowledge of God saves you. That having the right theology or doctrine in you head is what saves you. The passage this morning is telling you that’s not true. What saves you is trusting is Jesus, the true wisest king. Do you fear him? Do the truths of his prefect, sinless life, his death on the cross for sins, and his powerful resection from the dead cause you to be in awe of him. To realize that you are not wise. That you cannot be godly. Does it cause you to give up trusting in yourself and trust in Him?

Christians. Did you come this morning to worship this God or did you come thins morning hoping to get something out of the service or the sermon? To be clear it is not wrong to get something out of this service, and it’s my desire that you will each Sunday.

But this is not the ultimate goal of a worship service or a life of worship. It’s not about what we get, but who is being pleased, who is being glorified.

This passage reminds us that we live each day in awe of God, pleasing him by how we live. It’s not about what we get out of this life.

So for Sunday’s that means we with hearts clung to the wise king, not hearts clung to get something form the singing, or the praying, or the preaching.

The lie Satan puts in our ears is not to come because we probably won’t get anything out of the service or I am not giving anything to it.

Your presence brings glory to God. We gather as Christians and we see other lives that have been redeemed. Young and old, single and married, anglophone and francophone, Canadian, Unkirane , Philipon, and more.

By coming a taking a seat you have worshipped God and the service has not even started yet.

Perhaps we are tempted this way because as Christians because we read verse 7 and think it says, it’s the beginning of wisdom.

So we think, oh well I have turned from my sins and trusted in Jesus, I stated it. Thats it I am good to go.

But that is not what this verse means or how it should be applied. Fearing God, being awe of God is beginning of a journey that will never end. It’s the beginning of life starts to learn what it means to please God, but even when we see Jesus face to face the journey is not over. We will see more of God’s character, his beauty, his power, and our fear of him will only grow more.

A life that pleases God begins with a heart that fears Him, but it does not end, it is only the beginning of a great adventure with Jesus.