The Path: Making a Course Correction
Notes
Transcript
Let us pray…Gracious and Loving God, we come this day seeking your words and direction for us in this moment. As we delve into the book of the Bible that teaches us about wisdom and how to use it when we have it, open our hearts, our minds, and our spirits to your small, still-speaking voice so that we might gain wisdom and not just inelligence, Amen.
Today, we are going to take a look at a piece from the 27th Chapter of Proverbs. As a way to get us started, here are just a few facts about the book of Proverbs which will serve as our introduction to this study...we believe that this particular Proverb might have been written by someone other than Solomon and that the statements in this Chapter were compiled during the time of King Hezekiah. Each verse could be its own standalone Proverb, however these verses have been put into a collection that we now call Chapter 27. I would love for us to digest all of these statements this morning but we really don’t have the time to be able to digest them all. However, there is one that I would like to focus our attention on in particular, the proverb that happens to be in verses 11-12.
Before I get ahead of myself, there is just one last piece of introduction…this past Wednesday, we spent some time looking at Chapter 7 of the book of Proverbs and we learned that the path that we choose to take in our lives, impacts where we will end up. In other words, our direction determines our destination, much like driving on the highway, if we want to go north, we better be on a road that says “North” and not “South” because if we are, we are certainly not going to get to the same destination, right? And here’s the thing, no matter what aspect of life that we observe, this statement is always true. Our direction, our decisions and actions, determine our destination. I bring this up because as we continue to explore our paths this Lent, this concept will recur over and over again. The other piece that we must remember from the Book of Proverbs is this…the Proverbs are wisdom literature, which means that they give us advice and try to teach us how to be wise. Remember this too…just because someone has intelligence, it does not necessarily mean that they have wisdom. While related, the two are distinctly different…just to illustrate this a bit…and this is based upon a true story:
For the second week in a row, a friend of mine and his son were the only ones who showed up for the son’s soccer practice. Frustrated, my friend told his son, “Please tell your coach that we keep coming for practice, but no one is ever here.” To which my friend’s son rolled his eyes and said, “He’ll just tell me the same thing he did before.” Waiting impatiently for the end of the statement, my friend said, “Which was?”. “Well,” the boy started, “That practice is now on Wednesdays, not Tuesdays.” [rd.com].
That being said, let’s take a look once again at the first part of verse 11...
Be wise, my child, and make my heart glad. Then I will be able to answer my critics.
At the surface, this could be a worthy piece of advice for any child, right? I mean how many of us have ever heard these words or similar words from our parents in our lifetimes? This is almost as if the writer of this Proverb wants to make sure that all children recognize that what we do reflects upon our parents and has a direct impact on their own lives.
However, if we really want to talk about what might be going on here, let’s take it just a bit further. This does not only apply to parents and children, right? We can apply this to all aspects of our lives. I mean if we are at work and make a major mistake, that reflects on the people who hired us and trained us and supervise us…on down the line. This kind of likens back to what I said on Wednesday evening…our direction will determine our destination. No matter what, the decisions and actions we take determine where we are going. If we look at it in terms of who we are as Christians, the decisions we make and the actions we take based upon those decisions will affect others who sit in the pews or watch online with us too, right? So that makes this advice not just about parents and children but also about our spiritual lives too.
The writer of this Proverb helps us a bit with this in the previous two verses...
The heartfelt counsel of a friend is as sweet as perfume and incense. Never abandon a friend— either yours or your father’s. When disaster strikes, you won’t have to ask your brother for assistance. It’s better to go to a neighbor than to a brother who lives far away.
From the perspective of our wisdom, our friends, if they are true friends, will always give us the truth of any situation no matter how painful it might be to hear. That’s what makes them a true friend. If we are true disciples, then we too should always be seeking the counsel of someone who might have been in our shoes or been where we are at the moment. How do you know if you have chosen wise counsel? Again that depends upon the situation but I would guess that you probably have an instinct about what they are telling you or maybe you just have had such a long and healthy relationship that you trust what they say. No matter how you feel it, I would think you would just know where you can get wise counsel.
The next part of this Proverb speaks about what it means to be able to change course if we need to…
A prudent person foresees danger and takes precautions. The simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences.
I don’t know about you folks but there are some words in here that kind of rub again my somewhat pc sensibilities…so let’s try to define those words a bit…What does a prudent person look like?
The other word I struggle with is simpleton…any ideas of another word we can use here?
How about we re-word this particular Proverb as...
A prudent person foresees danger and takes precautions. The simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences.
Now that we have re-worded it, does it make a little more sense to you? It does to me…you see, in my mind at least, the writer of this Proverb is trying to remind us that if we have made a bad decision, we might actually be able to see it before anything bad happens, but only if we are wise enough and careful enough to be prepared.
Now, let me caution you here…will you ever be able to project all outcomes of a situation and always be able to pick the outcome that works the best for you and everyone involved? I hope you are screaming “NO” in your heads. There is absolutely no way that we could ever do that but just like the game of chess, we can be prepared for what may come. Recently, I heard someone describe it this way…“if you are doing something that you would not want you mother knowing that you did, are you actually doing something wise?” I had never heard it put that way but obviously it stuck in my head…and this leads me to the second part of this instruction for us…being foolish about our decisions is always going to get us in trouble. There are no if’s, and’s, or but’s about it…a foolish/rash decision will nearly always get us into hot water.
It’s like walking forward while constantly looking over your shoulder. You know you shouldn’t do it because if you don’t at least glance forward from time to time, you know you will eventually trip and fall. And if we can agree on this, why is it that we continually want to look back at how things used to be and want to continue to do them that way? If we are not looking forward at the possibilities, we are likely going to miss something good that is in front of us. By always looking in our rear view mirror or over our shoulder, we are likely going to continue making the same mistakes.
Being Wise and Prudent
Being Wise and Prudent
Constant being on guard is also not going to help us…I don’t think it is not wise or prudent by any stretch of the imagination and I don’t honestly think that’s what God has in mind for us. We need to be aware of what is happening around us, we need to be alert for warning signs, and we need to be looking forward at the path before us. If you have ever hiked up at Lake Jean or at Bushkill Falls, you know what I mean. You have be constantly aware of the trail/path conditions before you so that you do not slip, fall, or worse land in a ravine where no one will find you for a very long time.
I know that sounds like a scary way to end our time of reflection this morning, but it is the truth and we need to be aware that bad things can happen if we are not being prudent and wise about the path that we are on. Again, I ask how do we know if we are doing the right things...This proverb is telling us...The primary difference between the prudent and the simple is not what they see but how they respond to what they see.The prudent see danger and take refuge. The simple see danger and keep going. Both of them see danger. One responds by changing course, the other keeps going and hopes that the danger will never arrive. It’s like the ostrich who buries his head in the sand: “If I can’t see it, it can’t see me. If I ignore what I know is out there, it can’t hurt me.” So, I am encouraging us this Lenten season to not bury our heads in the sand, no matter how much it might hurt not to do so and spend some time assessing the paths that you and we are on…if we need to make a course correction, now would be a really good time to do so. Amen.