Agur's Confession

Introduction

Everyone has that drawer at home.

It’s got a busted tape measure.

It’s got a few batteries from 2006.

It’s got some gift cards in there and no one really knows if they are good still.

Maybe a few paper clips and a dog leash.

We lovingly call it a junk drawer.

If you don’t have a drawer like this at your house, you probably have an engineer or a military man or woman in your family!

This week, I read a Bible commentator say that Proverbs 30 is kind of like that drawer in your house at first glance.

There are a lot of words and you aren’t quite sure how they all connect together.

It just seems to be a lot of wisdom thrown together in a hodge-podge.

But of course, it is not.

This is God’s Word and none of it is purposeless or aimless.

In reality, Proverbs 30 shows us the confession of a man who wants a right heart before God.

And then, it shows us how we should see the world if we have gained a heart of a wisdom.

Context

So today, we just look at the first part.

We look at the first nine verses, where we meet a man named Agur who is asking God for the right things, that he may have a right heart posture before God.

And as we do—here is the Big Idea:

Big Idea

Where human knowledge fails, God’s truth is sufficient and it teaches us that the Lord is enough for our souls.

Outline

1. Confess With Humility (v. 1-4)

2. Trust in the Truth (v. 5-6)

3. Pursue Contentment in God (v. 7-9)

Background on the Author/Text

Author

Before we get into the first point, it is worth us stopping to look at the author of this chapter and a couple of unique things about the chapter.

In terms of authorship...

So far we have seen Solomon write.

We have seen Solomon compile wise sayings from surround Ancient Near Eastern culture—especially Egypt.

We have see Hezekiah’s men take Solomon’s words and compile them years after Solomon’s death

But this is the first time we have a completely different author in Proverbs.

We have Agur.

I’d love to tell you all about him, but we really don’t know much about him.

It is the same way with King Lemuel, the author of Proverbs 31.

We can say that he is the son of Jakeh.

v. 1 tells us that much.

Judging from his name, Agur is probably not Jewish.

Judging from his writing, Agur does seem to be wise.

Text

When it comes to this whole passage, verse 1 tells us that Agur is speaking an authoritative oracle from God.

This is a pronouncement.

It is a divinely-inspired confession.

So then, we have a wise man, who is likely a Gentile, who is the son of someone named Jakeh, being inspired by the Spirit of God to give us truth in the Word over our next couple of times together in Proverbs.

The whole of chapter 30 is Agur’s oracle.

But it begins in a very odd way.

The end of verse 1 reads this way in our ESV Bibles:

The man declares, I am weary, O God; I am weary, O God, and worn out.

But listen to how it is rendered in the CSB:

Christian Standard Bible Chapter 30

The man’s oration to Ithiel, to Ithiel and Ucal:

That is pretty different from what the ESV says!

Why is this the case?

It comes down to the fact that ancient Hebrew is a language written in consonants with no vowels.

Most of the time, we know what the original language is saying with no problem.

Here, there is a dispute to how words are broken up and where vowels should go.

Some translators, like the ones who work on the ESV, say this Hebrew phase should read like a lament about weariness from man’s insufficiencies.

Other translators, like the KJV and the CSB, say that the phrase is actually addressing two individuals—Ithiel and Ucal.

We will stick with our ESV rendering today, but ultimately the meaning of Agur’s Confession doesn’t change.

It begins with an expression of humility.

1. Confess With Humility (v. 1-4)

Worn Out by the Insufficiency of Human Wisdom (v. 1)

If the ESV translators are correct, this passage begins with a lament.

Confessions often do.

As humans come confessing insufficiencies to the Lord, it is often done through the lament of our limitations.

We come groaning about what we have not grown out of.

We come with honesty about how we are really out of ideas.

Agur is worn out to start this chapter of the Bible.

He is weary and tired and he expressed it to God in his prayer.

But why is Agur so tired? Why is he weary enough to say it twice?

Why is he exhausted and worn out?

It seems to be be the realities that are expressed in v. 2-3.

A lack of knowledge—especially personal knowledge of the Holy One.

Agur is tired from his own inadequacies.

Maybe you have been there before.

Sub-Human (v. 2)

In the case of this mysterious sage, he confesses that these insufficiencies in knowledge and wisdom even make him feel subhuman.

They make him feel like some sort of brutish animal.

It is reminiscent of Asaph in Psalm 73.

Asaph grows envious of wicked people and he confesses that this unwise way of thinking has made him like a brute toward God:

Psalm 73:21–22 ESV

When my soul was embittered, when I was pricked in heart, I was brutish and ignorant; I was like a beast toward you.

Agur doesn’t come to God as an embittered man in Proverbs 30.

But he does come as an exhausted man, confessing the same brutish, subhuman state before the Lord.

His knowledge is lacking.

He is honest with God about it. And he is honest with God about how it makes him feel.

Lacking understanding makes him feel like something less than a man

The language is pretty extreme, but that is purposeful.

Agur is use hyperbole in order to make his point with God.

Education Has Failed Him (v. 3)

The confession continues in verse 3, where Agur says that his education has failed him.

I have not learned wisdom...

Was it because he had bad teachers?

Was it because he didn’t grasp it?

Was it some mixture of both?

Either way, Agur feels he is without what he needs.

He needs a personal, intimate knowledge of the Holy One—the God of Israel.

But he confesses that he does not have it.

The First Sign of Humility (v. 1-3)

All of this shows us the first sign humility in Agur’s confession.

He doesn’t come before God saying, “I am glad I am not like other people.”

Instead, he examines himself and says the opposite to God— “Because of my lack of knowledge, I am WORSE than other people. I am a like an animal!”

If we are going to people of humility, we have to be people of honesty when it comes to the state of our lives.

We aren’t always aware of all the ways we need to grow.

God is kind to show us in time and NOT all at once!

But if we really examine ourselves, we all should be able to find a handful of places that we know we should pursue wisdom and holiness with more zeal.

We cannot stick our head in the sand about these things—we need to look them in the eye, call them for what they are and bring our insufficiencies to the Lord.

The door frame of humility is a low one.

You have to stoop low before God or you will never walk through it.

Humility requires getting low before the Lord with our own lack and need.

The Second Sign of Humility (v. 4)

But that is not all that Agur does in his confession.

He doesn’t just look within, but he looks up to the heavens in v. 4.

He doesn’t just examine himself.

He examines God.

There are five rhetorical questions asked in this verse. They boil down to this:

Who can bridge the gap between heaven and earth?

Who can control the wind and use it for His purposes?

Who can move the water to and fro to accomplish His will?

Who established the earth in the beginning of history?

What is his name and His son’s name? —> In the context of Proverbs 30, this is not speaking to Jesus, but to Israel being God’s son—something even a Gentile can see

The rhetorical nature of the questions are captured in the final sentence of v. 4—Surely you know!

Surely we all know!

Surely we all understand the gap between the knowledge and ability of humanity and the knowledge and ability of the Sovereign God!

The questions here are similar to the ones that God asks Job in Job 38, so that Job would feel the size of the gap between himself and the Creator.

Job 38:3–4 ESV

Dress for action like a man; I will question you, and you make it known to me. “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding.

Job wasn’t there when the foundation was laid any more than Agur is able to hold wind in his fist.

The questions expose that men and women are finite and small in comparison with God.

This includes our knowledge and wisdom.

Agur’s rhetorical questions are just more confession.

He is not God and it’s not close.

A Humble Confession

Ultimately, Agur is giving us a picture of a true humble confession of human folly and flailing before God.

There are two signs that he is truly humble.

He honestly examines himself and he brings his weariness and weakness to God in prayer (v. 1-3)

He honestly examines the Lord and rightly sizes Him as the Creator, the Sustainer and the Father (v. 4)

We should desire to see this sort of humility in our own lives and in our prayers.

Sometimes we examine ourselves and then that leads us to examine the Lord—seeking grace and mercy from Him

Sometimes we examine Him and that exposes our sin, which leads us to examine ourselves and bring our sins to God—seeking the same grace and mercy.

But whatever the order, humble confessions like the one we see from Agur, should be regularly present in your life if you are living wisely

Get low before God and get honest with God about HIM AND about YOURSELF.

2. Trust in the Truth (v. 5-6)

Every Word of God Proves True (v. 5a)

Agur turns his attention away from the insufficient knowledge of man and he turns his attention to the fixed, trustworthy, sufficient knowledge of God.

Knowledge that has been revealed in God’s Word.

And unlike man’s shaky so-called wisdom, the wisdom of God’s Word proves itself true.

We understand what it means for something to be proven true.

This is why we all check reviews for products online before we buy them.

We want to know, “Has this product been proven true?”

We read the reviews and we are hoping to learn:

Has the quality of this product been learned through data and analysis?

Is this product authentic or some sort of knock-off?

Will this product do what it promises to do?

Well, the reviews are in on God’s Word.

It proves true.

The quality has been determined through the analysis of fulfilled prophecy.

We know God’s Word is true because of how it has come true.

700 years before Christ was born, Isaiah predicted that He would be born of a virgin and that He would live a perfect life and be slaughtered like a sheep.

A millenium before Jesus died a Cross outside Jerusalem, King David prophesied breathtaking details that clearly fulfilled in the crucifixion, right down to the soldiers who gambled over His clothes.

We know God’s Word is authentic because of the evidence that it brings to the table.

No other ancient book comes close to being able to prove its accuracy with ancient manuscripts.

We have thousands of Hebrew and Greek manuscripts that are dated impressively close to the events they describe.

And as scholars have studied them, they have found incredible consistency across the copies and the centuries.

You may not believe the WORDS of the Bible, but you cannot criticize it for being inaccurate to the original author’s words.

If the Bible is going to be accused of being inaccurate, then every ancient book must be accused, because they have far less manuscript evidence than God’s Word.

And we know God’s Word will do what it promises because we can see the lives it has changed.

We’ve seen lives change.

We have seen lost souls turn from their sins and place their trust in God for salvation.

We have seen the blood of Jesus wash away sins and the Spirit of Jesus take up residence in peoples’ lives.

We have seen them transformed—taken out of the domain of darkness and transferred into the Kingdom of the Beloved Son.

We have seen churches start and churches grow.

We have seen God’s provision trusted in and His blessings flow.

We have seen prayers answered.

We have seen saints be faithful to the end.

In 1 Thessalonians 2:13 Paul says this:

1 Thessalonians 2:13 ESV

And we also thank God constantly for this, that when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men but as what it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you believers.

God’s Word has proven itself true as it has worked in the lives of believers.

We testify to that inside the church.

But I have even heard unbelievers take note when transformation happens.

They will notice that entire lives have changed.

The True Word Shows Us True Refuge (v. 5b)

If every Word of God has been proven true, that means that it can be trusted.

The Word of God is a worthy recipient of the trust of your soul.

I don’t want to trust in things that will fail, but God’s proven Word will not fail.

If it could fail us, it would have happened already.

But instead, what God’s people have found throughout the years is that if they take God at His Word and they trust in Him, He will be a shield to them.

Here is how that works.

The proven Word reveals a powerful God who Created the World and He will Judge the World.

He is also revealed as the God who saves the world through His perfect plan and His perfect Son.

John 5:39 ESV

You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me,

When someone comes to God and says, “I will trust in YOU, my Creator and my Judge, to be my Savior and my Sustainer,” the Lord becomes their refuge.

And the picture we get in v. 5 is God acting as a Mighty Warrior and protecting the one who trusts in Him on the battlefield.

When someone has the humility to refuse to trust in their own wisdom and they trust in God’s Word, God holds out His impenetrable shield and He says, “Get behind it. You’re safe with Me.”

What a turnaround this is for Agur.

He is weary from trusting in his own wisdom. He is worn out.

Vulnerable. Too Stupid to be a man.

But by trusting in the Lord’s proven Word, He is now protected.

He has a refuge—a place to run for safety and security.

Man’s wisdom leaves us weary.

God’s Word leaves us well-guarded.

Man’s wisdom leaves us:

Unsure of ourselves

Making bad decisions

Opening our relationships up to foolishness

Prone to suffer without hope, which makes us bitter

Distant from God

But God’s Wisdom guards us by:

Giving us concrete wisdom to live by

Calling us to righteous thinking and righteous action

Teaching us how to be godly in how we deal with others

Delivering hope to us during our hard seasons

Bringing us closer to God

Trust in humanity’s wisdom—you will be unguarded and unprotected.

Trust in God’s wisdom—the humble man or woman will find a refuge behind the Shield of the Warrior of Heaven in the battle of life and eternity

No Adding to the Words (v. 6)

Now let’s look at v. 6.

If every Word of God proves true—and that is the place for weary humans to find wisdom and refuge, then we should not be tampering with it.

There is no room for improvement.

If man’s wisdom is clearly imperfect and insufficient, how would it make any sense to take it and try to use it to improve upon God’s perfect and proven wisdom in His Word?

The Old Testament and New Testament are filled with warnings to avoid this sort of behavior.

Old Testament—

Deuteronomy 4:2 ESV

You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you.

This is repeated in Deuteronomy 12.

New Testament—

Revelation 22:18–19 ESV

I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.

Tampering with God’s truth by seeking to adjust it and edit it is dangerous.

This sort of thing will bring God’s discipline into our lives.

He will rebuke us and leave us exposed as liars who don’t love the truth, but who try and get around the truth as it is.

There are a number of ways we might try to add to God’s Word:

Treating our personal convictions and preferences as if they are holy, divinely inspired Law and trying to bind the conscience of others—that is adding to God’s Word

Promising things that God’s Word doesn’t promise—like false Prosperity Preachers who use their teaching to turn God into a Vending Machine you put money into in order to get what you want.

There are also ways in which we try to take away from God’s Word:

Softening commands because they are personally or culturally inconvenient

Treating some passages like they are outdated and don’t need to be paid attention to

Instead of trying to stand over God’s Word and dictate to it what should or should not be contained in it, we must retain the humility shown at the beginning of Agur’s confession.

We need to get low before God’s Word and say:

Lord, I trust your Book as it is. Every proven Word. It reveals You. Let me find my refuge in You, by finding You IN THE WORD!

3. Pursue Contentment in God (v. 7-9)

Confess With Humility

Trust in God’s Word

Pursue Contentment in God

Two Requests for the Sake of Contentment

As we get to verse 7, Agur says, “Two things I ask of You...”

Agur loves to talk like this throughout chapter 30.

Two things (v. 7)

Two daughters (v. 15)

Three things (v. 15)

Four things (v. 15)

Three things two wonderful (v. 18)

Four I don’t understand (v. 18)

Under three things the earth trembles; Under four it cannot bear up (v. 21)

Four things on earth are small (v. 24)

There’s more but you get the point.

Here, Agur has two prayer requests and they are urgent.

He wants them answered before he dies (v. 7)

He is chasing something in this life and in this age

First of all, this wise man wants to live in the truth (v. 8a)

He wants all falsehood and lying out of his life.

He wants his life to have an integrity that matches up with the proven Word of God that he has extolled in v. 8.

This is how intimacy with the Lord is maintained.

Those who live in the truth, live with God.

Psalm 15:1–2 ESV

O Lord, who shall sojourn in your tent? Who shall dwell on your holy hill? He who walks blamelessly and does what is right and speaks truth in his heart;

Agur has had enough of living in the slums of humanity’s failing wisdom.

He wants to live in the truth so that he can dwell on God’s holy hill and enjoy His presence.

Secondly, this wise man wants to live with contentment in God (v. 8b-9)

His 2nd request is that he would not have:

An abundance—For this would cause him to be full and proud and to deny the Lord by saying, “Who is the Lord?”

He fears an abundance would trick him into relying on the riches, rather than the proven words of God.

Poverty—For this would cause him to have want. In his poverty, he would be tempted to steal and dishonor God’s name.

He fears lack would trick him into not trusting in God and taking matters into his own hands

So he asks for neither.

Instead, Agur asks that God would give him just what he needs.

He asks for what is necessary.

He doesn’t chase luxury.

He doesn’t choose poverty.

He simply asks for God to fill his table each day.

If he just gets what he needs, the idea is that dependence on God is renewed each day.

There is no surplus to coast on

There is no lack that causes us to scramble

Instead, it is just enough.

And in receiving just enough, Agur must have to come back each day praying that familiar prayer that Jesus taught to His disciples:

Give us this day our daily bread.

When we depend on God like this every single day, we learn to trust Him.

And we learn that He is all we really need.

We don’t need the abundance.

We just need Him.

Thomas Watson explains this in his book, The Art of Divine Contentment.

He says that if someone has poverty, they are prone to cast a jealous eye on the prosperous. And a jealous eye is an evil eye.

If someone has abundance, they are prone to cast a jealous eye on anything they don’t have. They see the world and think, “Could it be mine?”

Watson asks:

God has supplied our wants, must He satisfy our lusts, too?

Thomas Watson

Agur asks that the temptations to lust would be removed from Him and He would have just enough where he would have to learn to depend on God day after day for His provision.

Israel in the Wilderness (Exodus 16)

This all reminds us of Israel in the Wilderness in Exodus.

The people of Israel needed food and God provided manna for them each day.

And that is what it was meant for—daily provision

If they tried to hoard an abundance, it had rotted.

Exodus 16:20 ESV

But they did not listen to Moses. Some left part of it till the morning, and it bred worms and stank. And Moses was angry with them.

But those who gathered up just what they could eat, had no abundance or lack:

Exodus 16:18 ESV

But when they measured it with an omer, whoever gathered much had nothing left over, and whoever gathered little had no lack. Each of them gathered as much as he could eat.

This was by God’s holy design.

He wanted them to depend on Him and not trust in the manna itself.

He didn’t want them finding contentment in bread, but in Him.

Nothing Has Changed

Nothing has changed with us.

God doesn’t want us trusting in money, houses, clothes or any scheme we could come up with to get the world’s goods.

He may give us those things—even in abundance at times.

But if we are going to be like Agur the Wise Man, we cannot allow those things to undo the work that God’s grace and God’s Word has done in us.

Agur is a man who has come to the end of himself.

He comes to God in humble confession about what he cannot do

He comes to God, trusting in what God’s Word can do

And now, He comes to God saying, “I just want You.”

Give me just enough of the world’s riches to keep me walking in integrity and depending on You daily

Give me the amount that will help keep me from being:

Prideful

Profaning

This is the attitude that God wants you to have in your heart, no matter what your bank account looks like.

He wants to depend on Him and His Word everyday.

He wants you to trust in Him and not yourself.

He wants you to find contentment in Him—not in what ends up on our table and going into our bellies.

God wants us to discover what the Apostle Paul discovered:

Philippians 4:11–13 ESV

Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned, in whatever situation I am, to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.

Paul says that whether he has a lot or a little, he has learned to be content.

How?

By depending on the strength of God.

He can do all things through the Great Sustainer’s strength.

Knowing that, he can be content in any situation.

Is this where we are this morning?

Or—if we are honest, does the idea of abundance excite us and make us feel safe and happy, while the idea of lack brings on pure fear and dread?

These could be signs that your heart trusts in what God provides more than God Himself.

Let us come humbly before God our refuge and confess once more that He is truly all we need.

Gospel Conclusion

In v. 1—9, Proverbs 30 introduces us to a wise man who:

Confesses with Humility

Trusts in God’s Word

Pursues contentment in the Lord alone

This is a man who sees himself and the Lord rightly.

Next time, we will look at v. 10-33 and see how a man like this sees the world around him.

But for today—maybe you need to move from folly to wisdom.

Maybe the Lord’s Word has exposed something in your heart that you don’t like:

A pride.

An assumption that I can live life how I want without God’s Wisdom and God’s Word

An obsession with what you have

If we want freedom from these things, we need an even better Sage than Agur.

We need Christ, who IS the Wisdom of God.

In v. 4, we learned Israel is God’s son.

But if you read the Old Testament, you realize that Israel was a son who failed.

They were prideful.

They were untrusting.

They were complaining instead of content.

They were sinners in need of salvation—just like you and me.

And so this morning, we stop and consider the fact that God has brought that salvation to us in the Lord Jesus Christ.

His perfect Law exposes our pride for foolishness.

It exposes us sinners who are separated from God.

His perfect Word shows us the way of salvation.

And His perfect Son gives us everything we need to be saved forever and to live righteously today

If we want the heart of Agur, we must bring our hearts to Jesus.

The perfect Son lived a perfect life.

He suffered and died on a sinner’s Cross.

And He resurrected from a rich man’s grave.

He is the Humble Champion over sin and the grave.

He is the greatest proof of God’s Word.

And if you come to Him, confessing your sins and asking for a new heart, you will find that He will be your great contentment—now and forever.

Human knowledge will fail, but Christ our wisdom is more than enough for our weary souls.