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Proverbs 1:20-33 Hearing The Voice Of Wisdom 6.30.19 · HBCWestminster

• 0:00
  Allow me to read our text this morning. We'll jump straight in. Verses 20 through 33 of Proverbs chapter 1. It says, Wisdom cries aloud in the street. In the markets she raises her voice. At the head of the noisy streets she cries out. At the entrance of the city gates she speaks. How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple? How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge?
• 0:30
  If you turn at my reproof, behold, I will pour out my spirit to you. I will make my words known to you because I have called and you refused to listen, have stretched out my hand and no one has heeded because you have ignored all my counsel and would have none of my reproof. I also will laugh at your calamity. I will mock when terror strikes you, when terror strikes you like a storm and your calamity comes like a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you.
• 0:59
  Then they will call upon me, but I will not answer. They will seek me diligently, but will not find me because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord would have none of my counsel and despise all my reproof. Therefore, they shall eat the fruit of their way and have their fill of their own devices 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.
• 1:29
  And Lord, I pray a blessing on the hearing of your word this morning. Lord, may your word be faithfully preached from this pulpit and at this church. God, we thank you for abundantly blessing us. We thank you for your grace. Grace upon grace, we thank you for your mercy. Mercy new every morning. And it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Well, we're going through a series called The Beginning of Wisdom. We said that the life of wisdom is the life skillfully lived.
• 2:00
  As Christ's followers, those who know the Savior and have therefore been found by God, those who have been imbued with purpose and mission, we don't want to just live. We want to live well. We want the abundant life that only Christ offers. And this morning, we turn our focus to fear. Imagine how the things that you are afraid of change as you get older. The things that you were afraid of as a child are no longer the things
• 2:33
  that you are afraid of now. When Hallie and I were in our mid-20s, and in fact, she, at the time, pregnant with our oldest son, Pearson, we decided we were living in L.A. County at the time. We decided that we were going to go with all of our friends, who were also in their 20s, to Universal Studios. And Universal Studios had a new attraction that I didn't know anything about, based on a movie called The Mummy. The Mummy was a movie about some mummy, ancient mummy, who had come back from the dead.
• 3:01
  you know, scary and thrilling and suspenseful and all of these things. Well, I didn't really care about the movie at all, but they had this new attraction and I didn't know anything about it. I assumed that it was a ride. And so all of the husbands decided we were going to go on this new attraction, assuming it to be a ride. We walked in and the line itself looked like a museum. So there's artifacts. You go along, you look at these things. You're like, I don't know, fake museum. You know, museums are hard to endure sometimes anyway.
• 3:29
  But when the artifacts are fake, it's that much worse. I'm like, what are we doing here? And we're walking through this fake museum. And as we're going deeper and deeper and deeper into the cavern that is the mummy attraction, I noticed that it was getting darker and darker and darker. There was a group of high school kids behind us, a bunch of boys who were very mouthy, very proud of themselves, bragging to themselves about how great they all were.
• 3:58
  They all had their girlfriends with them, you know, and they're all laughing and mocking as we go along. We walked through and as the chamber that we were walking into became darker and darker and smaller and smaller, the floor turned from stone to padding. It was a padded floor. And I thought, man, that's weird. They're expecting us to fall. We continued on our way. What we came to find out was that the mummy attraction was not a ride, but instead a haunted house. I'm not for haunted houses. I don't like them.
• 4:31
  But I also know that they're fake, right? Nothing in there real. Nothing in there is actually going to touch you. They're just trying to scare you. And so as we got further and further and further into the mummy attraction, the kids behind us got quieter and quieter and quieter. The boastful boys became younger and younger and younger.
• 4:56
  To the point that me and my couple of buddies that were there as we're walking through, we found that they were actually getting closer and closer and closer to us. At one point, one of those young men that was mouthy on the way and asked us, is it okay if we walk with you? Yeah, I guess. And, you know, we continued as we came to the very end. And it was, you know, it was scary. It was a scary thing as we came to the end.
• 5:27
  One of them became so afraid that I was just walking through. I was in kind of the front of our group. I was walking through and I felt a hand reach up and grab mine. And I looked back and it was that kid. He walked through and he was holding my hand on the way through the very last, you know, little scare on the way out the door. Fear paralyzes its victims. Timidity kills.
• 6:02
  Can you imagine how much different our lives would be if we had been unafraid to take that step or to ask that question? Imagine how much different our lives would be if we didn't chicken out. I've shared this with many of you, but I one time wrote a poem. It's the only poem that I've ever written. I wrote it to ask a girl out. She said, yes, we got married. We now have three sons.
• 6:32
  Our son's very existence is a result of my ability to muster the courage to write a poem. Right? You know, I'm not afraid of haunted houses anymore. And I'm not afraid of talking to Hallie anymore. Our fears as we grow change. Today, any fear of failure or fear of looking like a fool, fear of loss or loneliness, a fear of sickness, maybe even a fear of death.
• 7:10
  Fear paralyzes its victims. Can you imagine how much different your life would look if you had the ability to live with biblical courage? In Joshua 1 and verse 9, it says, Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened. Do not be dismayed. For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. 1 Corinthians 15, 55 says, Death, what is what most people on this earth are most afraid of?
• 7:39
  Our biggest fear, death, is swallowed up in victory. Oh, death, where is your victory? Oh, death, where is your sting? The sting of death for those who are in Christ has been removed. The scariest thing on this earth has been neutered in Christ. Its power gone, vanquished. Now, I do not believe that the Bible calls us to be reckless, but I do know that the Lord has called us to courage.
• 8:10
  And courage because we who are in Christ know what we are here to do. The course has been marked out for us, Hebrews says. We can live without any doubt and without any fear. And in our text this morning, we find four truths. What one man describes as inescapable realities. Inescapable realities, which if understood and properly applied, promise security and ease. And if you look at verse 33.
• 8:41
  A life removed of dread. No dread of disaster. No more fear. And so go through these this morning with me if you would. The first one, the inescapable reality that wisdom is not a thing. Wisdom is a person. The essence of the book of Proverbs.
• 9:04
  can only be understood if one grasps the concept of this passage. The one that we're about to talk about this morning is the hinge for understanding the rest of the book. And oftentimes, wisdom is erroneously defined as a set of ideals. Wisdom is like a list of things or rules, which if lived by will produce a long and happy life. However, our passage this morning personifies wisdom.
• 9:29
  Ultimately, the book of Proverbs says wisdom is not a list of sayings, but rather a person and specifically the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus is wisdom. He is the rock upon which we must build our lives. And only in our knowledge of Jesus can we truly understand what our lives were meant to be. This is why the book of Proverbs in chapter 1 and verse 7 begins with the fear of the Lord as the beginning of knowledge wisdom.
• 9:59
  and instruction, because you cannot have wisdom apart from knowledge of the one who embodies wisdom itself. Now, you'll notice in verse 20, right off the bat, that wisdom is not only personified, but wisdom is personified as a woman. And if I could take an aside here for just a moment, why, if wisdom represents Jesus Christ, is wisdom presented as a she?
• 10:28
  You'll notice in verse 20, she raises her voice. Verse 21, she cries out. She speaks. Why? If wisdom is Jesus, is wisdom presented as a woman? Now, we should not make more of this, I think, than the Lord intended. The simplest answer is that the Hebrew noun for wisdom, what in Hebrew is hakmah, that Hebrew noun is feminine.
• 10:57
  So it makes sense for the author to speak of wisdom as a woman. But let us not also forget last week's sermon. Remember last week's sermon? But a father pleading with his sons? What better way to do that than to present wisdom as a beautiful woman whom his sons should pursue and commit their lives to? You know, Disney has made billions exploiting this concept.
• 11:35
  Wisdom is Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Rapunzel, Ariel, Pocahontas, Jasmine, Elsa, Moana, Mulan, Belle, and Snow White all rolled into one. Wisdom is the woman that every little girl wants to grow up to be like, what every little boy should desire to marry. No, I'm not sure how you dress as wisdom for Halloween, but that should be our goal. That's what it's doing. It's personifying this.
• 12:06
  beautiful woman, the typical woman, right? The archetype woman who we want to become or we want to marry. And that's what this wise father is doing for his sons. Let me paint you a picture of this beautiful woman wisdom that you should follow. It's not just a list.
• 12:25
  Of pithy sayings. That's first. The inescapable reality. That wisdom is not a thing. Wisdom is a person. And specifically the person of Jesus Christ. Second. The inescapable reality. That wisdom is actually easy to find. And here we get into our text. Verses 20 to 22. It says wisdom cries aloud in the street. In the markets she raises her voice. At the head of the noisy streets she cries out. At the entrance of the city gates she speaks. Now what does she say? How long oh simple ones. Will you love being simple?
• 12:54
  How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge? Not only is wisdom personified, but she is presented as a turner burn, Bible thumping, fire and brimstone street preacher. She cries aloud in the streets. You can imagine her fearlessly interrupting traffic. It doesn't say on the street corner. She's in the street, walking straight down the center median.
• 13:24
  She finds the crowds. She enters the marketplaces. You can imagine her planting herself at the entrance to Walmart or to Costco or at the food court in the mall, the places where everybody in town has to make their way. She preaches at the entrance to the city, this says. She has found a way to get on the agenda of every city council meeting. Every major intersection has a billboard with her face on it.
• 13:53
  You may be saying, man, princess wisdom sounds annoying. You know, that's kind of the point. The wisdom of God is so freely offered that it is actually inescapable. You can't get around it. I mean, you can get away from it. You can ignore it or reject it, but you will be confronted with it. One of my spiritual mentors used to say that his job was simply to lay wisdom at our feet.
• 14:30
  Lay wisdom. He said, I'm just going to lay wisdom at your feet. It's up to you to pick it up. He would also say that if you want to refuse it, you will have to knowingly step over it. And that's what wisdom does here. It can't force us to live according to God's word, but we are going to be confronted with the wisdom of God. And I love this promise from the book of James in chapter one and verse five.
• 14:58
  If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given to him. If we are to live our lives without the wisdom of God, we can never, ever, ever claim ignorance, can never claim that the Lord withheld his wisdom from us. That's two. Wisdom is easy to find. Notice third, the inescapable reality that rejection of wisdom will bring disaster. You pick up in verse 24.
• 15:30
  Says if you, because wisdom continues, because I have called and you refused to listen, have stretched out my hand and no one has heeded because you have ignored all my counsel, would have none of my reproof. I will also laugh at your calamity. I will mock when terror strikes you like a storm and your calamity comes like a whirlwind when distress and anguish.
• 15:57
  come upon you. And again, wisdom's persistence is clearly described. I have called, she says, I have stretched out my hand. I have offered counsel. I've offered reproof, but all of wisdom's help was refused. She wasn't heeded. She was ignored. She tells a story to illustrate the foolishness of the person who would ignore her call. She says, calamity, distress, terror, anguish will strike that person like a storm, like a whirlwind.
• 16:29
  And it's reminiscent of the story Christ tells to conclude the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew chapter 7. He describes two men who build two houses, right, upon two different foundations. One upon the rock, one upon shifting sand. There's two men, two houses, two foundations, but there's one storm. The same storm hits both. It says the man who built his house on the rock stands firm. The man who builds his house on the sand goes splat.
• 17:00
  Then he finishes with this, everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like the man who built his house upon the rock. That is the same promise that wisdom offers. Build your life upon my words and the storm will not bring disaster. John Akin has said this, said, it is said that hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, but those who scorn lady wisdom.
• 17:32
  will encounter fury like no other. The man who hears the voice of wisdom and obeys has no reason to be afraid. His life is protected, but the fury of the storm will triumph over the life with the poor foundation. Let's continue in verse 28, 28 to 32. You continue this disaster because of rejection of wisdom. 28 says, then they will call upon me in that moment, but I won't answer. They will seek me diligently, but will not find me.
• 18:02
  Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord. Would have none of my counsel, despised all my reproof. Therefore, they shall eat the fruit of their own way. Have their fill of their own devices. For the simple are killed by their turning away and the complacency of fools destroys them. Wisdom warns against the danger of what I'm going to call eventual thinking. Eventual thinking is the thinking that allows us to continue.
• 18:33
  in sin, to continue embracing a life of dissipation, a life of vapor, a life that does not satisfy what King Solomon described as a life of chasing after the wind. Eventual thinking causes us to believe the lie that we can always repent tomorrow. I'll give my life tomorrow. I'll always have time to get right.
• 18:59
  with Jesus. That's someday, but not today. Today, I want to live for myself. I want to satisfy my flesh. And this is, according to wisdom in Proverbs chapter 1, a dangerous presumption upon the grace of God. The Bible describes repentance not as an act that we perform. The Bible says that repentance is a gift that we receive.
• 19:34
  But it is a gift that may only temporarily be offered. We've all been offered that gift of repentance. But there may be a day, the Bible says, where that fountain of grace will be replaced by a throne of judgment. That repentance that is so freely offered now may not be so freely offered tomorrow.
• 20:04
  Throughout scripture, the Lord pleads with those who have rejected his grace and they only to find that his pleading with them eventually turns to rejection. The book of Exodus says that Pharaoh, you guys remember the story, famously hardened his heart again and again, hardening his heart until the Lord one day hardened Pharaoh's heart. He took away his ability to obey. Romans chapter one says that God has made his existence.
• 20:35
  His mercy and love and power plain to all of mankind. Romans 1 verse 22 says that we human beings claiming to be wise chose folly instead. We exchanged the glory of the immortal God for God's creation instead and began to worship the creation rather than the creator. Two verses later, it says, therefore, God gave them over to it. Two verses after that, verse 26, for this reason, God gave them over.
• 21:06
  Verse 28, and since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them over. There may be a time where wisdom's plea is shut off, where that open door of grace closes. Let us heed wisdom's warning. Although her grace, her offer of grace is extended freely today, let us not assume that every day will be like today.
• 21:36
  If you have never received the grace of God, make today the day of salvation for you. If you're hearing wisdom's call and you're saying, you know what? I've never done that. I have been guilty of eventual living. I knew years ago I should give my life to Jesus. I should get right with Jesus. But man, I've just been waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting because I want to live my own thing. I want to do my own thing. Can I implore you? Make today the day of salvation. And if you know the Lord, but you're living in sin,
• 22:10
  Repent. Receive the blessing of the Lord's forgiveness yet again. We would be foolish based on this passage. We would be foolish to assume that we will always have time. That's third. The inescapable reality that rejection of wisdom will bring disaster. And then fourth and last is the inescapable reality that acceptance of wisdom will bring blessing. You guys, if you were paying attention, notice I skipped verse 23. The inescapable reality.
• 22:40
  that acceptance of wisdom will bring blessing. Verses 23 and 33. And these simple promises given in these two verses should be enough to persuade any passersby to follow wisdom's instruction. Notice first that the promises are conditional. Notice verse 23. It begins with what word? If. Do you guys see that? If. You know, God never promises to bless people who never repent. The love of God is unconditional. It is.
• 23:16
  But the blessing of God is contingent upon our obedience, upon our repentance and confession of sin. It is conditional. Verse 23, if you turn at my reproof, you notice the two promises given in verse 23. First, I will pour out my spirit to you. I will pour out my spirit. Now, the reality that believers in Christ have received his very spirit is hard to fathom.
• 23:47
  The Spirit of God hovered over the waters at creation. The Spirit of God brought plagues upon the Egyptians until they released God's people. The Spirit of God led the Israelites in the desert, provided for their needs. The Spirit of God directed the construction of the tabernacle and the temple. That same Spirit of God anointed the shepherd David to become king. The Spirit of God empowered the prophets to speak His word and to perform miracles.
• 24:18
  The Spirit of God even led and directed Jesus and the Messiah while he walked the earth. The Spirit of God in Acts chapter 2 birthed the church and transforms the hearts of every believer to become like God's Son. And here we see in verse 23 that that same Spirit will be given. It doesn't just say, I will give you my Spirit. What does it say? I will pour out my Spirit.
• 24:48
  In other words, the spirit of God is not given with an eyedropper, right? Can you imagine that little tiny thing? Right? Little drops of the spirit. That's not it. The spirit of God, it says, will be given with a fire hose. I will give you my spirit. And what is the spirit's function in our lives? He continues in verse 23. I will make my words known to you. I will make my words known to you. The spirit of God is given.
• 25:18
  in order for us to understand the words of God. And not only to understand them, but to apply them as well. I have heard the term spirit-led as defined as having the ability to act apart from or independent of God's word. I have heard preachers of God's word say that they need very little preparation because they are spirit-led.
• 25:55
  What this says is that the Spirit of God moves in accordance with and as a complement to God's revelation in His Word. The Word of God and the Spirit of God are inseparably linked. I will pour out my Spirit to you so that you will know my words and have the ability to apply them.
• 26:23
  That's the first promise, the promise of the Spirit and the Word. But notice the second promise, and this is verse 33, and with this we end. Verse 33 says, But whoever listens to me will dwell secure, will be at ease, without dread of disaster. Ultimately, the street preacher, princess wisdom, promises victory to those who would follow, victory over death, even victory over fear, victory over dread. And whatever you're afraid of, be it loss or sickness,
• 26:57
  or failure, or loneliness, even death. Fear has lost because of the work of Christ. Let us heed his call and become freed from fear. Amen, church. God, thank you for your word. And I pray, God, that we would not be like the fools who look at your word, look at our faces in the mirror, and go away and immediately forget what we look like. But Lord, may we put them into practice.
• 27:29
  And God, I pray for every heart and mind who may be battling with the idea of giving their lives to Christ this morning, hearing the gospel preached, hearing the words of Christ preached, God, knowing that they should get right with your son, but resistant, hesitant. God, we were all there at one point. I remember that day for myself. And God, may they come forward and even bow the knee to your son, Jesus Christ. May they be filled with liberation and freedom.
• 27:57
  and a sense of confidence, having the guilt and shame removed, and joy and hope put in their hearts in its place. And God, if we are holding on to our sin, give us that gift again to repent. God, may we experience the joy of forgiveness yet again. We love you, Lord, and it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen? Amen. Let's stand and sing together.