Untitled Sermon

Begin

January 1st, 2017

BI: Pursue Wisdom by growing your reverence for God.

OS: The author illustrates this with two contrasting invitations.

Intro: Happy New Year!

If you have a bible go ahead and open to .

We have great timing. We get to meet together on the very first day of the year, and look at the first chapter of a book that talks about beginnings. And it all lines up with our two-year reading plan. Truthfully however, it wasn’t planned this way. It just ended up this way.

I will read the first seven verses for us to begin our time.

Read

Let’s Pray.

I. Background

Proverbs is in a genre called Wisdom literature. There are several genre’s in the Bible.

· Genesis: Historical Narrative

· Isaiah: Prophecy

· Psalms: Poetry

· Proverbs: Wisdom literature

o Written by Solomon, wisest king.

Wisdom literature often reads like a “How-to” manual. Sort of the nuts and bolts on how to actually live out a life that pleases God.

This isn’t a strange genre for us today. People still crave this kind of writing, even when they don’t look to the scriptures for it.

· Self-help, inspirational, motivational books

· Lifestyle Magazines: Health, fitness, decoration

· Advice articles online.

We love this genre, because I would go on a limb and say everyone in this room has at least one area of their life they wish they could improve. And this genre of writing is written to address those areas.

It’s appropriate that we’re here this morning. It’s New Years day. We love to make resolutions for this day. All the ways we’re going to improve.

But the problem is we’re usually terrible at keeping resolutions.

Illustration: 45 worst days for a bakery.

Proverbs shows us a roadmap of how to grow, specifically in wisdom.

First, look at the groups he addresses in verses 4-5. This is for the simple, the youthful, the wise, and the discerning. Solomon has a wide audience in mind.

My challenge to you: don’t disengage. Read this chapter and put yourself in it. If you are young, and I say this for myself as much as anyone else: Don’t assume there is nothing to learn. We’re talking about wisdom and knowledge, and while it may seem like young people have this all figured out, it’s not true.

If you identify more with the wise and discerning, if you been around the block a few times: Don’t assume there is no growing left for you to do.

Wherever you are at in your life or your faith, whether simple or discerning, whether young or wise. Solomon’s words are for you.

In the first chapter, there are 3 sections. A plea, followed by two invitations.

II. Plea

First: A parent’s plea

Solomon wants his readers, to pursue wisdom. To chase after sinners, or fools, is to chase your own destruction.

Read

We must understand the stakes. This isn’t about living a better life versus living a worse life. This isn’t about financial security versus financial uncertainty. Solomon is not merely giving out tips on how to be more comfortable as you move through life. Yes, there is a wealth of practical advice in this book. There is common sense in every chapter.

But Solomon sees life as presenting you with two options. Following sinners, or wisdom. And he has great concern that his readers choose the latter. Because chasing sin ends so disastrously.

His plea: Run from the foolish, wicked, sinful ways of the world. Don’t follow the false wisdom that saturates the culture.

When we read this chapter with a Theological understanding of our sinful nature we’re left with two conclusions about this plea.

1. We are all enticed by sin.

a. For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God ()

2. Apart from the saving grace of God we are powerless to it’s influence

a. And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— ()

In light of the Gospel, we know that this exhortation: to flee from sin, is only possible by the grace of God.

Solomon sees two options a life that follows sin, or a life that follows wisdom, and he shows what the invitations of both look like.

III. First Invitation

First the invitation of sinners.

Look at Verse 11

Read

Solomon gives a pretty blatant example. “Let us lie in wait for blood”. He’s showing in somewhat overstated terms what an invitation of sin will look like.

Sin won’t always be this blatant. Sometimes sin will be much more subtle and hard to identify.

Sometimes sin will try to look noble.

Illustration:

· I know my work load has been difficult on my family. But it’s so I can better provide for them. It’s just temporary

· I know this sounds like gossip, but how else will people know they should pray for this person?

· I know I ought to have that hard conversation. But I don’t want to upset them.

Think about how sin often convinces us to act against what we know is right.

Look at the sales pitch: Follow us, sow chaos and destruction, push others down.

All bad things! Why would anyone listen to these people?

Read 13-14

“And you can improve your situation. You can make yourself rich!”

Sin seems enticing because it promises to deliver what the heart wants.

But what Solomon tells the reader: Sin lies.

Read

These sinners thought they knew best, they thought they knew how to get what they wanted, but in the end, they were the ones trapped, they were the ones destroyed.

Verse 19: Such are the ways of everyone who is greedy for unjust gain; it takes away the life of its possessors.

Sin will try to entice our desires, but lies about the outcome.

So to live a better life that’s one option. A terrible one. But there’s a second way.

IV. Second Invitation

The invitation of wisdom.

Read

Wisdom is personified as a woman standing in the public square crying out: You’re not walking in wisdom, turn and change your ways.

This invitation starts out with a negative tone. Wisdom is assuming that people, by default are walking in foolishness and sin. This makes sense in light of our understanding of sin.

But here’s the invitation: If you turn, I will pour out my Spirit to you. The words of wisdom will be revealed to you.

If not wisdom spells out an expanded version of Solomon’s earlier warning: It will go poorly. If you follow foolishness you won’t get the better life you always imagined. It may work out for a little while. But in the end they will be destroyed.

Wisdom says she will laugh at their calamity. Because they refused to listen.

Why did this happen? Look at Verse 29

Read verse 29

This calls back to Verse 7 that we read at the start.

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

When we read Proverbs, a book about wisdom, that talks about knowledge, it can be easy to go into it and ask “What do I need to know? How should I think?”

Instead, Wisdom is showing us an entirely different question to ask: “What do I need to feel?”

Answer: Fear. Specifically, you should fear the Lord.

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of Knowledge.

This is the motto of Proverbs, it’s repeated several times.

Knowledge and wisdom, right thinking, start with fear, right feeling.

The Fear of the Lord is a tricky topic to talk about. We’re often afraid of things that are bad. The sinners in tremble because they are meeting destruction.

We feel fear when our car hits a patch of ice and we go spinning out of control. We feel fear when the doctor is telling us the result of the test.

We often think of fear as that anxious, unsettling, butterflies in the stomach feeling when things are going wrong.

So what does it mean to fear the Lord?

It’s a phrase used all over the scriptures. One passage that is particularly helpful for us this morning is .

God showed his power, authority, and holiness to Israel. They realized his own smallness compared to his grandness. They realized the complete and total judgement he will bring against those whose who sin against him.

And we like them stand in fear of who God is. But through the blood of his son we stand in the assurance of our favor with him.

Look at how this chapter ends

For the simple are killed by their turning away,

and the complacency of fools destroys them;

but whoever listens to me will dwell secure

and will be at ease, without dread of disaster.”

V. Conclusion

So how do we grow in wisdom in 2017? New Year’s resolution fail so often.

We recognize it’s not just a matter of making up our mind. And just gritting our teeth and act in a different way.

There is a war for our affections.

And it comes down to what does your heart desire? Ask the Spirit to fan the embers of your affection.

If you want to live a life that is marked by discernment you have to start by recognizing the proper order of the entire universe. That God is above all.

Jonathan Edwards resolution:

Resolved, whenever my feelings begin to appear in the least out of order, when I am conscious of the least uneasiness within, or the least irregularity without, I will then subject myself to the strictest examination.

Let’s pray