Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Foreign.
[00:00:08] My name is Eric Bolling. I'm part of the preaching team here. And in case you may have missed it, it is Mother's Day.
[00:00:16] Yeah, we can. Okay. Yeah. There you go.
[00:00:20] And I was. I was thinking about Mother's Day, and again, I was just thinking about it from the perspective of. Of the two women in my life that I am closest to who are mothers. One is my. My own mother, and then my. My wife. And I was just thinking about what were some things that really kind of encapsulated motherhood from. From the perspective of those two. And. And Michelle mentioned this at the beginning, but really, when we think about mothers, we think about two things. One is strength.
[00:00:50] Right there. There's an incredible strength that can come through being a mother, and motherhood.
[00:00:56] You guys know, if you've been here for. At all, you know, I was a high school coach for a long time, and. And I'm going to tell you, the person I was most afraid of to come out of the stands and talk to me was not a dad. After a football game, right? Dads would come and they'd have all kinds of ideas because they watched NFL Live on espn and they, you know, they maybe played a little ball back in the day. But it was mom, especially when she thought you might have been mistreating her baby, that was uncomfortable. There's an incredible strength there.
[00:01:30] And with that, there's an incredible nurturing that happens.
[00:01:34] And you think about motherhood and putting those two things together, it's exactly how God designed and intended it to be. And so, moms, we just want to say thank you to you. We want to celebrate you. We want to know. We see you, we love you. I'm going to pray for us, and then we're going to be back in my favorite book, Proverbs. Let's pray together.
[00:01:57] Lord, we thank you for mothers.
[00:01:59] Lord, we thank you for the ability to celebrate what you created, what you designed, how you designed it to function. Lord, we know that this is a day that can bring up a lot of emotions for us, but, Lord, we just want to celebrate.
[00:02:16] Lord, thank you again for mothers and for what we learn and for how they teach us. And we pray this in your name.
[00:02:23] Amen.
[00:02:24] Well, like I said, we're back in the book of Proverbs. It is one of my favorite books of the Bible, might be my favorite book of the Bible. And I know you're not supposed to have favorites, but I love Proverbs, and I'll tell you why.
[00:02:36] I love the practicality of Proverbs I love that it gives, really, I wouldn't say simple, but pretty straightforward advice for how to live life. And then just in my own faith journey, the book of Proverbs was really pivotal for me as a young man as I was trying to figure out my life and the direction I was headed and where I needed to go. And I found myself just engrossed in Proverbs and reading Proverbs. And it helped change some of the trajectory of my life. And so today we're going to talk about the way of the wise.
[00:03:12] Next week, we're going to talk about the way of the foolish.
[00:03:15] So you want to come back for that when we jump into Proverbs, I like to mention the difference between having knowledge versus having wisdom. Cause we live in a knowledge world, right? We can know a lot about a lot of different things.
[00:03:30] In your pocket is enough, probably knowledge that exists, maybe more so than any other time in history. You can get it.
[00:03:38] And so knowledge is knowing something, right? I know. So let me give you an example.
[00:03:46] I can tell you how an airplane functions, right? I've been on planes, I've seen planes. I can tell you I know what the plane is supposed. Supposed to do.
[00:03:56] I get that. I understand that. However, if we look at wisdom, wisdom is knowledge plus understanding. I can't tell you what to do to fly that airplane.
[00:04:08] They did a study.
[00:04:10] They asked a random sampling of men.
[00:04:14] They said, if you were on a commercial airliner and there was an emergency and the pilots went down, could you land this plane?
[00:04:24] Now, men, I'm asking you, we're not even going to ask the ladies, because they know the right answer.
[00:04:33] 46% of the men said, absolutely, I could land that plane, without a doubt.
[00:04:41] I did my own little study, anecdotally, of some people around me and every single one of them, absolutely.
[00:04:49] That doesn't make any sense, right? We have knowledge. I can tell you what the plane is supposed to do. But let's be honest. If I'm on a plane with you and that plane is going down and the pilots are out, let's pray, because I'm not gonna land it. And to be fair, neither are you, unless you're a pilot. Could be a pilot among us.
[00:05:07] So it's knowledge and understanding, that's wisdom. So Proverbs as a book wants to give us really three key things. Number one is wisdom plus instruction.
[00:05:16] Number two, moral and ethical teaching. And number three, fear of the Lord, which is where we're going to start today. So today, in the way of the Wise. We're going to be bouncing around several different passages. They'll be on the screen. If you want to jot them down, take a picture, just get them. So we're going to be. We're going to be moving around a little bit, but we're going to start with this idea that the wise person fears the Lord.
[00:05:40] Let's look at Proverbs, chapter 1, verse 7 says, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.
[00:05:48] Look at Proverbs 9, verse 10.
[00:05:50] The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
[00:05:56] And so Proverbs makes it very clear to us that the starting point, the foundation, what all wisdom is built off of, is fearing the Lord.
[00:06:06] Now, that word fear for us is a little different because when we think about fear, we have a different context than what's written here in Proverbs. For us, fear is a response to a perceived threat.
[00:06:23] So you all have things you are afraid of.
[00:06:27] Sometimes they go to the point of being phobias, which is the psychological determination of something that is so debilitating you can't even function. Sometimes they're just things you dislike, but you have a fear because it's a perceived threat.
[00:06:42] I have a fear of spiders. I'd appreciate it if you don't repeat that.
[00:06:47] I do. A spider is in the room and I lose my mind.
[00:06:52] I make my wife kill them.
[00:06:56] But that's that strength, right?
[00:07:00] I just. I can't. And I. Look, I know conceptually that spider is gonna do nothing, but even talking about it, I got goosebumps up here.
[00:07:09] It's a perceived threat.
[00:07:12] And what happens when we have this fear response is it's physical. There's a fight, flight, freeze response where, you know, we just react viscerally. But there's also a psychological response, worry, dread, et cetera. But that is not the fear of the Lord.
[00:07:29] We are not to be terrified of God.
[00:07:33] Now, to be fair, there are times in the Old Testament where people have encounters with God. Think of Isaiah, where he has some of these reactions. But that is not to be fear, as Proverbs describes it. For us, the fear of the Lord is this deep reverence for God. It's deeper than even respect. It's deep reverence, it's worship.
[00:07:55] And it's this idea of when we have this deep reverence for God, we have reverence for his authority, who he is in relation to us.
[00:08:08] It's also a reverence for his love.
[00:08:11] And this idea of God is the perfect balance of authority and love.
[00:08:16] I mean, the closest thing we can get to understand this, and it pales in comparison is when a parent is parenting correctly or parenting well, they're an authority.
[00:08:28] Children need to obey their parents. Children need to be respectful of their parents.
[00:08:34] But it's done out of a place of love.
[00:08:37] Now, like I said, even that pales in comparison. So when we talk about fear of the Lord, it's this deep reverence for his authority and his love.
[00:08:46] And if you think about that, God needs to be both. Because if he wasn't, if he was only love, for example, that creates all kinds of problems.
[00:08:54] Sure, it would feel good and it would be nice and it would be loving. But if God has zero authority, then what happens to us is, is maybe random at best. He can't do anything about it.
[00:09:07] If God was all authority without being love, then he might be tyrannical. He might just have authority, but not love us. And he just commands us and tells us what to do. And what we learn from Scripture is God is not that. God is all authority and God is love.
[00:09:27] And so the wise person fears the Lord. How?
[00:09:32] Reverence, worship, but also submission.
[00:09:38] Doing what God wants us to do, being how God wants us to be.
[00:09:43] And so when we talk about fear of the Lord, if you don't remember anything else, just remember that is the starting point for wisdom.
[00:09:51] If you don't understand and fear of the Lord, if we don't have that reverence and worship of God, then everything else just falls apart.
[00:10:00] We have to start there.
[00:10:03] So as we go through this today, we're going to hit a couple of so what's as we go and one big so what at the end. So here's our first so what based off of fear of the Lord.
[00:10:15] Number one, a wise person lives in fear of the Lord.
[00:10:20] We just talked about that. Number two, a wise person acknowledges God's authority.
[00:10:27] God is the ultimate authority of true wisdom. We need to recognize that and orient our life to that. What does that mean? Practically? It means when I read things in Scripture, I am expected to do those things.
[00:10:42] It means when I am receiving that insight from the Holy Spirit, I am to follow that. And then number three, a wise person seeks to know God.
[00:10:54] We need to grow deep into our relationship with God. Why? Because that leads us into insight.
[00:11:01] And we keep coming back and building and growing. And so the first thing we understand about the wise person is they fear the Lord. The second thing the wise person does is receives correction.
[00:11:15] Now, I don't know really anybody that loves to be corrected.
[00:11:20] It's hard.
[00:11:22] But if we're Honest. We need to be corrected.
[00:11:25] Why? Because at best, we have blind spots.
[00:11:29] We don't see ourselves as clearly as we think we do.
[00:11:34] I mean, I just shared with you the example. Almost 50% of men think they could land a commercial airliner if the pilot went down. That's a blind spot. At best, we just don't. We just don't have this idea we need to be corrected. Or do you ever know somebody that thinks they're really good at something and they're just not, and you're faced with that choice of, like, we just. They're blind spots. There are things we can't see about ourselves. At worst, we have sin.
[00:12:02] We have things that we struggle with to come under God's authority.
[00:12:06] We have ways that we think and that we behave that are contrary to what God wants for us, and so we need to be corrected.
[00:12:17] Look at Proverbs 9, verses 8 and 9.
[00:12:20] It says this. Do not reprove a scoffer or he will hate you.
[00:12:26] But listen to what the wise man does.
[00:12:28] Reprove a wise man and he will love you.
[00:12:33] Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser.
[00:12:38] Teach a righteous man, and he will increase in learning. So the scoffer reacts in anger. But the wise man loves you, becomes wiser, increases in learning. Look at Proverbs 12. 1. Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge.
[00:12:57] The wise person loves correction because it leads to increased learning.
[00:13:03] It's this idea of, I don't see this. I don't know this. I need to understand this. Someone corrects you and you learn from it, which over time leads to wisdom, and you grow in that.
[00:13:21] What's fascinating is when we're corrected again, if we're honest, it's hard for us because correction reveals what's in our heart.
[00:13:32] And you. And you sometimes see this, especially with people who are younger, right? If you correct somebody, they. They really react strongly because you. It's not easy.
[00:13:44] It's hard. And there's three really negative responses to correction. Number one is we can get defensive.
[00:13:54] We're pretty good at rationalizing and defending. No, this is why I did that. This is why I know what I know. This is what I can do. Number two, we can deflect.
[00:14:02] What about you?
[00:14:06] Well, yeah, let's look at your life.
[00:14:09] Number three, we can be destructive.
[00:14:13] We can be like, look, I'm gonna pay you back. I'm gonna get you. I'm gonna destroy you. I'm gonna make you pay for how you made me feel by correcting me.
[00:14:22] All of those are negative. Responses to correction.
[00:14:29] The wise person values being held accountable and is open to correction. Now, some of you might be thinking, well, great, so anybody that tells me anything, I guess I got to listen to it. That's not what Proverbs is saying. Because there's a difference between criticism and correction.
[00:14:47] Criticism is pointing out faults without helping somebody move forward, which is critical. Think about a Yelp review or an Amazon review. I'm a big review reader. Anybody else?
[00:15:01] Okay, Nobody here? A couple people. I read it. All right. What do other people think about this when you read those? A lot of times they're just not helpful because it's like terrible, no good, don't awful or fantastic. Right. They're just critical.
[00:15:18] Right? And we see that so much. We live in such a critical time of life because it's so easy to criticize so many things quickly.
[00:15:30] You can put it out there, you can blast it out there, let alone having one on one conversations.
[00:15:37] Correction, though, in contrast to criticism, is about teaching and improvement.
[00:15:44] I would love to see a Yelp review that said, you know what, the food was terrible, but I really think if they use more tarragon in their trying to help. So this idea of correction implies that there's a proximity, there's a connection.
[00:15:59] There's this idea that, you know me, I know you, you're trying to correct, you're trying to help each other become better.
[00:16:09] And so when we look at correction, we understand ultimate correction comes from God himself.
[00:16:15] God corrects the people he loves.
[00:16:21] God corrects the people he loves out his authority.
[00:16:27] And because of his love, Scripture goes on to say that if God is disciplining you, that's a good thing.
[00:16:36] Because after the time of discipline, there's a quiet harvest of righteousness. So this idea that God corrects us because he's helping us improve to be what, more like Jesus.
[00:16:52] And so when we have these blind spots, when we have these sinful patterns of thinking and behavior, when we have these things, God corrects us to make us more like Christ.
[00:17:03] Well, how does he correct through his Word? We talked about that briefly.
[00:17:08] If you're reading something in scripture and you come across it and it sort of pricks your heart, you're like, I needed to hear that. Now you can react negatively. Like the three things we talked about before. You can get defensive, you can get deflective. Oh, man, somebody else really needs to hear, you know, who needs to hear that?
[00:17:29] My fill in the blank.
[00:17:32] They need. They really needed that.
[00:17:36] And so this idea that God corrects through his Word, through The Holy Spirit, sometimes the Holy Spirit nudges, sometimes the Holy Spirit gives you that two handed push right in the small of your back.
[00:17:49] And he's saying, I'm correcting you, I'm guiding you, I'm leading you. Other people can be part of God's correction.
[00:17:58] Think of this. We don't have time to go into it, but the story of David and the prophet Nathan, where Nathan has to correct King David, right? Other people can correct circumstances. Whatever God needs to do to bring us back into alignment with him, he's going to use it.
[00:18:17] And as wise people, we need to be open to correction.
[00:18:23] So what does this mean? A wise person is teachable and humble.
[00:18:28] We need to be humble and be willing to be corrected.
[00:18:33] If we're not at that place, we need to pray. We can get at that place where we can say, look, I don't know as much as I think I know. I appreciate the correction. Again, not talking criticism, that's a different thing. But correcting somebody saying, here's how you can improve. Here's what I see. Here's God's word helping you improve.
[00:18:52] And the next thing is a wise person loves discipline.
[00:18:57] Simply stated, learn to love discipline.
[00:19:00] Why? Because it's a necessary part of becoming like Christ.
[00:19:06] And if we're willing to undergo correction and discipline, particularly from the Lord, then we will be made into the image and likeness of Christ.
[00:19:16] I don't think there's ever a point where we kind of arrive and we're like, okay, I'm here, thanks, I'm good. No, that's a constant process. It's called sanctification.
[00:19:26] It's continuing to go. So the wise person receives correction number three.
[00:19:33] The wise person seeks counsel.
[00:19:38] And this sort of connects together with correction. But the wise person seeks counsel.
[00:19:44] If we're honest, we're not as smart as we think we are.
[00:19:48] We don't know as much as we think we know. We don't see things clearly as we think we see them.
[00:19:56] And so when we look at life, we need counsel from other people, from other places.
[00:20:03] We need this idea of, we need somebody helping us figure this out.
[00:20:09] Let's look at Proverbs 12:15 says this. The way of a fool is right in his own eyes. But a wise man listens to advice.
[00:20:21] Proverbs 19:20. Listen to advice and accept instruction that you may gain wisdom in the future.
[00:20:30] So this idea of counsel or advice, as Proverbs says, is this idea that there is a wisdom and experience beyond what you yourself know.
[00:20:43] And that wisdom and experience Provides counsel for you in order for you to grow in your own wisdom and learning and understanding.
[00:20:55] And so we have to ask the question, where do we receive our counsel from?
[00:21:01] We mentioned this before. We live in an information age. We can receive counsel from our favorite news channel. Pick whichever one that is.
[00:21:10] We can receive counsel from our favorite podcasts, our favorite YouTube videos, our favorite books we read, our favorite. I mean, keep filling it in.
[00:21:20] There's no shortage of people offering counsel to us.
[00:21:25] Some of it's good, some of it is not.
[00:21:29] And so the idea behind where we receive counsel, it's who do we receive counsel from? Because all of these things are driven by people.
[00:21:40] There is an idea that you are. That you will become most like the five people who are closest to you.
[00:21:49] Now, I don't know if you can quantify that or study that, but it makes sense that the people who are close to you, you will become like. So question for us to ask ourselves is, who do we receive counsel from?
[00:22:04] And if we're honest, not all sources in life are equal.
[00:22:10] If I went to my friends as a younger man and I said, what should I do? I was going to receive really bad coun.
[00:22:19] Depending on what the situation was, maybe even because we're all in the same boat, they don't have any more wisdom and experience necessarily than I did.
[00:22:31] And so as I've gotten older, I've learned to really value seeking out people and places with more wisdom and experience than I have.
[00:22:41] And asking questions help me understand, help me to grow.
[00:22:46] And that used to feel, honestly, a little awkward because I thought, well, I'm supposed to know all this, and the reality of it is I need counsel. So what does this mean for the wise person? The wise person demonstrates humility. I would encourage us to be open to learning from trusted people in life.
[00:23:06] Have a humility to say, look, I don't know everything. I don't see everything clearly. Help me.
[00:23:12] A wise person values growth and learning.
[00:23:17] I think if we're gonna be wise, we always need to be learning.
[00:23:22] It's shocking to me how many adults stop learning once they get done with school.
[00:23:29] They just don't keep up with it.
[00:23:32] And this is where there is no. I mean, there is no shortage of ways to learn. Read books, listen to podcasts like we talked about, watch YouTube videos, just educate and learn.
[00:23:46] Why is this important? Because your future wisdom is based off of your learning.
[00:23:53] Now, see, sometimes we think of wisdom as what would be called, like, a lead measure. Like, I read Proverbs, and I think, great, I Got it. I'm now gonna go out and I'm just gonna live amongst the wise. And, and the reality of it is it takes time.
[00:24:09] And what you learn today will help build on your wisdom for tomorrow.
[00:24:15] And so if we're always learning, if we value that, then we'll be acquiring wisdom. And the last thing, the wise person is open to God's counsel above everything else.
[00:24:28] I mean, here's the reality. If you're looking at who you get counsel from, where you get counsel from it, if it is antithetical to God and God's word, you are receiving bad counsel.
[00:24:42] If you're having conversation with people that are telling you things that are taking you away from what God wants, you are receiving bad counsel.
[00:24:52] God himself provides ultimate counsel to us through his word.
[00:24:59] God provides ultimate counsel through, like we talked about before, the empowering of the Holy Spirit through prayer, really similar to how God corrects us. He'll use what he needs to use in order to help us. But I will tell you, prayer, Bible study is probably the two things that make the biggest impact in our spiritual lives. And there's a lot more than that.
[00:25:25] But I would say if you're curious, like, where do I start? Start there, start there.
[00:25:30] So the wise person seeks counsel.
[00:25:34] The wise person controls their words.
[00:25:39] Now I'm going to be honest with you, this one was tough to go through because if I have any faults, and I have many, controlling my words is one of them. Words have power, don't they?
[00:25:55] Words have power.
[00:25:58] I was talking to an, to an elderly friend of mine who he is in his mid-90s, and we're talking about life. And he shared with me a story about something somebody said to him that really wounded him and it had to be an 80 plus year memory that he still was talking about.
[00:26:22] Words have power.
[00:26:25] And if we went around the room, we said, hey, can you share with us maybe something somebody said to you that hurt you?
[00:26:32] We'd all have those stories.
[00:26:37] But if we flipped it and we said, can you share with us something somebody said to you that really encouraged you, we'd have those stories as well. Because words have power. Have you ever received that encouragement right at the right time?
[00:26:53] Good job. I'll tell you one I remember right before I got married, 1994, I was working at the Holiday Inn in Warsaw, Indiana, very nice spot.
[00:27:06] And I worked there because I could receive free hotel rooms on our honeymoon. And I got married right before my senior year of college, so I didn't have any money.
[00:27:17] And I remember my job was to be what's called a porter.
[00:27:23] What that meant was I brought towels to people, I walked her, I helped out. I had to clean the bathrooms, I had to clean the lobby. Now, at this point, I have more education as a junior in college than most people I worked with and worked for.
[00:27:41] And I found myself kind of grumbling and complaining about this job.
[00:27:46] And I remember talking to my dad, and he said, well, why don't you just try to do it to God's glory?
[00:27:52] I was like, what?
[00:27:55] I'm gonna clean a toilet to God's glory? Like, come on.
[00:27:59] But I remember having those thoughts and, like, scrubbing. And so I'm trying to do this now. I remember I'm wiping down the front windows one time of this place and just really trying to take it to heart. And our manager walks in, like the big manager, the corporate manager, and he stops, and I'm literally on my hands and knees and I'm cleaning this. And he says, hey.
[00:28:22] He says, you do really good work.
[00:28:24] He's like, you ever need anything, you let me know.
[00:28:28] Thank you for what you're doing. And I was like, you're welcome, sir. And I started. Really?
[00:28:34] I still remember that.
[00:28:36] I still remember that. I'm like, yes.
[00:28:40] There's something about the power of words. Let's look at what Proverbs says. Proverbs 10:19 says, when words are many, transgression is not lacking.
[00:28:50] There is a danger in talking too much.
[00:28:54] Why?
[00:28:55] Because when we talk too much, we're more likely to say something careless at best, sinful at worst. And Proverbs says, when words are many, transgression is not lacking. Look at Proverbs 10:19, the end part of this. It says, when words are many, transgression is not lacking. Whoever restrains his lips is prudent.
[00:29:17] Put that with Proverbs 17:27. Whoever restrains his words has knowledge. And he who has a cool spirit is a man of understanding.
[00:29:28] Knowing when to speak and when to remain silent is a sign of wisdom.
[00:29:35] I like how Proverbs says it demonstrates a cool spirit, calmness, patience, self control, and this idea of having restraint in what we say.
[00:29:50] Just because you think it doesn't mean you need to say it or text it or email it or tweet. Okay, you get where we're going.
[00:30:00] Because wisdom says, no, no, no.
[00:30:03] There is a wisdom in slowing down, stopping, restraining.
[00:30:10] Look at Proverbs 12:18. It gets even more direct. It says, there is one whose rash words are like sword thrusts.
[00:30:19] Rash words, things said impulsively are Literally, compared to thrusts of a sword, they're like stabbing. They're designed to wound. Reckless speech wounds us deeply.
[00:30:39] I was talking about this with my family this week, and we grew up, we raised our children to be euchre players. If you have any card players here. We were from Indiana, so you sort of had to.
[00:30:53] And if you've ever tried to teach somebody how to play euchre, it's really hard.
[00:30:58] And so my children were getting older. I think my middle son was in upper high school. And I was like, we're really gonna learn how to play euchre. So I tried to teach him and he got frustrated. And I was not. I did not have a cool spirit.
[00:31:12] And I got frustrated with him.
[00:31:14] And he said to me, he said, poof.
[00:31:19] You're supposed to be Wheaton Academy's teacher of the year, and you can't even teach your son how to play cards without getting upset.
[00:31:27] Woo. Sword thrust.
[00:31:31] We were just talking about that. And I was like, yeah, that hurt.
[00:31:35] You know what I did? I kicked him out. Get out.
[00:31:41] But I just remember that. And if we're honest, there are times that we are. We are receive those, and there are times we give those.
[00:31:50] And sometimes if we're not honest, we can just look and be like all those words. We're hurting other people. We're being hurt. Why? Because we need to be wise and restrain what we say.
[00:32:00] Look at the end of 1218. The tongue of the wise brings healing.
[00:32:05] Reckless words wound.
[00:32:08] Wise words heal.
[00:32:12] And if we go through and we talked about, was there ever a chance where someone reconciled with you or said something to you?
[00:32:18] Two healing words are thank you and I'm sorry.
[00:32:24] Words have power. So what do we do with that? The wise person recognizes the value of restraint and thoughtfulness. Be intentional in how you speak.
[00:32:34] And that's written. That's verbal. Just pay attention to your words. What are you saying? Cause they matter more than you probably think they do. Number two, a wise person does not let uncontrolled emotion drive their words.
[00:32:49] As hard as it is, we have to get. We have to be emotionally responsible and composed.
[00:32:56] Sometimes that may mean, you know what? You don't say it. You physically walk away. Like, it's hard to tell you everything that means, but stay emotionally calm. As Proverbs says, have a cool spirit. The last thing is use your words to build up.
[00:33:12] Just like words can wound, words can heal. There are probably people in your life that are waiting for you to say something that can be restorative, not because you've hurt them. But because your words have power, they mean something.
[00:33:27] Never miss an opportunity to give somebody a compliment or an encouragement because you really don't know what they may need.
[00:33:36] Just like for me, that manager thought he saw a 20 year old kid wiping windows. And it was something that really helped frame how I looked at work. You never know.
[00:33:50] The wise person 5 walks with integrity.
[00:33:56] Proverbs 10:9 says, Whoever walks in integrity walks securely, but he who makes his ways crooked will be found out. Proverbs 11:3. The integrity of the upright guides them, but the crookedness of the treacherous destroys them.
[00:34:10] When we use this term integrity, most of us are thinking like ethics, morality, and that is part of it. But there's another part of integrity that has this idea of.
[00:34:25] It's this concept of being consistent, of being dependable. Dr. Henry Cloud, a Christian psychologist, says that integrity is the ability to meet the demands of reality.
[00:34:40] And so when we look at integrity, the wise person's integrity is a security to them. Why?
[00:34:46] Because they don't have to worry about being exposed or found out.
[00:34:51] Like their inside matches their outside.
[00:34:54] They're not saying one thing here and being another person there.
[00:35:00] They're not deceiving people.
[00:35:03] They are who they are. There's an integrity.
[00:35:06] And when we think about being wise, we should be looked at as people who have integrity. Why? Because it shapes us to what is right and what is just.
[00:35:17] So what does this mean? A wise person recognizes integrity is not just an abstract moral value, it's a practical guide for life.
[00:35:26] Integrity influences everything you do.
[00:35:31] There's no way around it. And you can hide for a long time, but eventually who you are comes through. And do you have this congruence between who you are and what you do?
[00:35:44] The wise person knows that integrity is the secure path. Why?
[00:35:49] Because the secure path should be leading us in a direction towards Christ.
[00:35:55] It's what author and pastor Eugene Peterson called a long obedience in the same direction.
[00:36:01] And if we have integrity, we're headed towards being more like Christ.
[00:36:06] So what does all this mean when we look at the way of the wise? These five simple things. And there's a lot more in Proverbs for honest. There's a disconnect between who we are and. And like truly living in wisdom, there are places where we fall far short of that.
[00:36:28] And this disconnect leads us to a place where we have to ask, okay, well, what do we do about it? Like I see in Scripture, this is what the wise person does. What do I need to do?
[00:36:39] Should I, should I despair? Like Should I just be like, oh, I'll never get it?
[00:36:45] I should. I should just stop.
[00:36:47] Hang our heads.
[00:36:50] Should. Should we just do more or try harder? Like, I'm just going to double down. All right, I'm going to read my Bible for X amount. I'm going to. Will you tell me how. How much would, would kind of make up the gap?
[00:37:05] Here's the reality.
[00:37:07] What we need to do when we see this disconnect in our lives is we need to repent of that, acknowledge that, and believe and follow Jesus.
[00:37:15] Why?
[00:37:17] Because Jesus is God's perfect and design, wisdom fully revealed.
[00:37:24] And so when we look at wisdom, we just can't be wise without somebody, God with wisdom, all wisdom, all power, helping us bridge that gap.
[00:37:42] We have to be empowered by the Holy Spirit.
[00:37:45] And so when we look at the way of the wise, the way of the wise really is about following Jesus.
[00:37:52] That's the path.
[00:37:54] And the more we can orient and design and shape our lives to match his, the wiser we will become.
[00:38:03] Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, we thank you for today. We thank you for wisdom, Lord. We thank you for bridging that gap between. Between where we are and where we need to be. Lord. We can only get there through you.
[00:38:18] Thank you for your word and its correction and counsel for us. Help us to be people of integrity. I pray us in your name. Amen.
