The most fundamental issue in everybody’s life is this: will you run your own life?  Or will you turn to God and his wisdom.  The reason people DO NOT look to God to govern their decisions, is because they do not REALLY believe God is the answer to life.  They cling to the lie that they still know best. The book of Proverbs is meant to destroy that lie... And to call you to the safety and blessing of God’s wisdom.  

Just look around and you can see that most people’s lives are NOT well ran.  You can look at your own life and see harmful, unwise and foolish things you have done.  How did human beings get so messed up?  The answer is in Genesis. 

God created us to walk with him, and be wise, and experience the happiness that goes with that.  But when Adam sinned we LOST wisdom.  In the language of Proverbs, we became FOOLS. We are no longer safe captains of our own ship.  Augustine said “what am I to myself without you but a guide to my own downfall”.  Left to our own ways we will hurt ourselves and our families and others.  If you don’t really believe that yet, you will continue to plow your way through foolish living! 

Without God’s wisdom to manage our lives we became foolish in our speech, in our work habits, in the way we handle our emotions, in what we do with money, in how we handle our sexuality.  But when we are saved through Christ, God begins the process of making us wise. 1 Corinthians 1:30 “Christ has become for us wisdom from God.”  Paul said to believers “Be careful how you walk, not at fools but as wise… Do not be foolish but understand what the will of the Lord is” Ephesians 5:15,17  Can believers live foolishly?  Well, yes, of course. AND we suffer the consequences of that too!  But we are called out of the foolishness of our OWN will, INTO the wisdom of the Lord’s will.

In proverbs the fool is the one who casts off the wisdom of God.  Prov. 1:7 “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge but fools DESPISE wisdom and discipline.”  The fool doesn't really believe he needs wisdom outside himself. So he acts without God's counsel.  Foolishness is basically just doing life on your own.  On the other hand...

Wisdom is seeking God’s will in EVERY area of your life. So Proverbs addresses our emotions: anger, jealousy, and joy.  It say a lot about money: debt, wealth, and giving. It talks about disciplining children, obeying parents, sexual sin, and sexual enjoyment, diligence and laziness, and how we talk. It speaks about eating and drinking and all kinds of things about our relationships with other people. Whatever is going on in your head or in your life, God has something to say about it! Wisdom is bringing your total person under the safety of God’s will. 

What are some evidences that we are not seeking God’s wisdom?  Well, taking a job, or deciding to move without seeking God’s wisdom and priorities.  Running around with friends without listening to what God says.  Right here in chapter 1 “my son if sinners entice you, do not go with them…. Do not walk in the way with them, hold back your foot from their paths, for their feet run to evil.”  (vs 10,15)

Making decisions about boyfriends, girlfriends, making decisions about sex and marriage without God, making decisions about going to church or choosing a church without considering what the Bible says. Clinging to emotional patterns without submitting them to God. Speaking without self control.  All show failure to listen to God’s wisdom.

Proverbs calls us do ALL of life, God’s way.  This essentially means Jesus is Lord.  God is boss. God is your real authority.  Regardless of your own thoughts, or the way you were brought up, or what your friends say, or what the experts say, you go to God for direction in every matter of life.   

That’s why Proverbs says, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” IE You become a wise person by fearing God enough to honor, respect and obey what he says about life!  That fear causes you to live your life well!  And then reap the benefits of that! 

It is NOT only that there are two ways to run your life.  Foolish and wise, God’s way and your way.  The message of Proverbs is chose God’s way, because calamity, misery and destruction will come upon those who choose against God.  And blessing, happiness and well-being will flow to those who do life God’s way.  

Verse 32 “The waywardness of the simple will kill them; and the complacency of fools will destroy them.”  NIV

Verse 33 “Whoever listens to me will dwell secure and will be at ease, without dread of disaster.”  This message permeates the Proverbs!  13:13 “Whoever despises the word brings destruction on himself, but he who reveres the commandment will be rewarded.”  Verse 14,15 “The teaching of the wise is a fountain of life.”  But “The way of transgressors is hard.”  

God’s laws are the only way things work well! All God’s ways are good and life-giving. To disregard God’s wisdom is to throw sand in your gas tank, or to declare war on yourself.  People think they will get away with breaking God’s laws but instead they break themselves upon God’s unbreakable laws. E Stanley Jones said, “The Kingdom is the only workable way to live.  You do not have to manufacture ways to be happy, you just are happy when you obey the kingdom.” 

Proverbs 3:13-18 says the same thing...

Blessed (or how happy) are those who find wisdom,
those who gain understanding,
14 for she is more profitable than silver
and yields better returns than gold.
15 She is more precious than rubies;
nothing you desire can compare with her.
16 Long life is in her right hand;
in her left hand are riches and honor.
17 Her ways are pleasant ways,
and all her paths are peace.
18 She is a tree of life to those who take hold of her; those who hold her fast will be blessed. 

*As believers in Christ, we emphasize that things are settled in eternity.  Our reward is at the resurrection.  Our big blessings are spiritual and eternal.  But that is NOT to say there are NO consequences in this life!  Not at all! In Proverbs we see drastically different outcomes in this life that accompany both accepting wisdom or ignoring wisdom. 

Proverbs 11:31 “If the righteous is repaid ON EARTH, how much more the wicked and the sinner!”  Practical holiness and practical outcomes in this life, is the focus of Proverbs. For example Proverbs 24:30 “I went past the field of a slacker and by the vineyard of a man lacking judgment. Thorns had grown up everywhere, thistles had covered the ground, and the stone wall was broken down.”  There ARE some spiritual and eternal lessons in that, but the point is that laziness results in stuff falling apart in your life right now.   

Just so there’s no confusion.  This is not teaching a prosperity gospel. Prosperity teaching says that health, riches and success are always guaranteed to all Christians.  And it turns believers attention to seek those things.  Proverbs teaches us to fear the Lord and seek His wisdom. And then shows that doing things God’s wise way generally does result in life being better in many ways.  

EG If a person doesn’t get drunk anymore, and stops stealing, repents of laziness, and is faithful and reliable and works hard, doesn’t pursue get rich quick schemes, is generous and kind, and stops destroying people with his tongue, generally that person’s life will be better off than when they were living in disobedience to God.  

So in Proverbs we find the blessings of emotional health, physical health, longer life, better marriage, better homes, better financial outcomes, better relationships, and more.

Let’s go verse by verse through our scripture for this morning.  

*Verse 20 “Wisdom cries aloud in the street, in the markets she raises her voice; 21 at the head of the noisy streets she cries out; at the entrance of the city gates she speaks.”  *God’s Wisdom is pictured here as a godly woman calling out to you in the middle of all the noise of life.  In the noisy streets, in all the commotion of life she urgently appeals to you to listen to her. 

This is a poetic or literary device, but the clear implication is that God is pleading with us, in the commotion of life, to listen to His wisdom.  There is an old hymn, “Jesus calls us o'er the tumult of our life's wild, restless sea; day by day his voice invites me, saying "Christian, follow me!"  

For those who will listen, God is revealing his wisdom to us!Proverbs 2:1 The Lord gives wisdom; from His mouth come wisdom and understanding.  The basic business of your life is to stop and listen!! 

CS Lewis said, “...the very moment you wake up each morning. All your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals. And the first job each morning consists simply in shoving them all back; in listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting that other larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in. And so on, all day.”

*Wisdom’s first message is 22 “How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple? How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge?” (Simple means open, naive, gullibly following ideas that are not from God. Scoffers belittle and mock righteousness.  You are just being a prude!”  Fools hate God’s rules for life.) 

Wisdom’s question for them is meant to awaken them to their foolish ways of living.  If your wife says “how long are you going to keep driving down the left side of the highway?”, she isn’t really asking you for information. She is trying to wake you up to the danger you are in if you keep driving into oncoming traffic! So wisdom asks, “How long you going to be a fool?  Haven’t you done that long enough?  Haven’t your own ways made you miserable enough yet!!”

Verse 23 “If you turn at my reproof, behold, I will pour out my spirit to you; I will make my words known to you.”  No matter how long you have spurned God, no matter how big a mess you have made of a situation in your life. You can turn to God and he will pour out his spirit of wisdom upon you.  You can always begin a new way of life, blessed, filled with his Spirit, hearing God speak to you and lead you. “I will make my words known to you”.  Don’t you want that!

But if anyone will NOT have God’s wisdom they open their life to disaster.  These verses are the most serious warning of Proverbs.  They are meant to create a fear of ignoring God’s wisdom.  They show what a terrible a place it puts you in, to reject God’s ways.  So here we go. This is not easy to hear. 

24 Because I have called and you refused to listen,
have stretched out my hand and no one has heeded,
25 because you have ignored all my counsel
and would have none of my reproof,
26 I also will laugh at your calamity;

I will mock when terror strikes you,

27 when terror strikes you like a storm
and your calamity comes like a whirlwind,
when distress and anguish come upon you.

Rejecting God’s wisdom invites a storm.  It leads to calamity. Spiritual calamity certainly! But also often, it leads to disasters in the home and marriage and children, and money.  Is this saying that ALL problems in our lives come from poor decisions or ignoring God’s word and his wisdom?  NO!  Jesus said, “In the world you will have tribulation”.  But there are also many miseries and calamities that come from directly from living against God’s wisdom.

Notice the progression.  God calls. The person rejects all God’s counsel.  Calamity comes, and wisdom laughs. Wisdom is not threatened but scoffs at the effort to defy her.  It is the laughter of strength!  It’s like Psalm 2 where God looks at people who say let’s rebel against God!  Let’s throw off his chains and rules. And God laughs. 

William MacDonald commented, This is not a laughter of cruelty or malice but the laughter of how ridiculous it is for a mere man to defy the Omnipotent.

Verse 28 “Then they will call upon me, but I will not answer;

they will seek me diligently but will not find me.”  There is a point when the rebel can no longer get an answer from God.  At some point wisdom and safety becomes unavailable.  The Bible warn us to:

“Seek the Lord while he may be found;
call on him while he is near.
Let the wicked forsake their ways
and the unrighteous their thoughts.
Let them turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them,
and to our God, for he will freely pardon.”  Isaiah 55:6-8

Verse 29 “Because they hated knowledge
and did not choose the fear of the Lord,
30 would have none of my counsel
and despised all my reproof,
31 therefore they shall eat the fruit of their way,
and have their fill of their own devices.”

The third consequence of stubborn, continual rejection God God’s wisdom. “They will eat the fruit of their ways”. We taste, how we have lived.  We experience the results of our ways.  Painful consequences are built into disobedience.

Jeremiah 2:19 “Your wickedness will punish you; your backsliding will rebuke you. Consider then and realize how evil and bitter it is for you when you forsake the LORD your God and have no awe of me,” declares the Lord, the LORD Almighty.  Jeremiah said, “Backsliding Hurts! Sin brings misery and pain into our souls.  And the misery itself should be a deterrent to you heading any further down this path.

Verse 32 “For the simple are killed by their turning away,
and the complacency of fools destroys them;”  The result of living against God is utter disaster.  These warnings are stark and strong.  Their purpose is to create a revulsion in your heart toward going your own way.  They are to make you hate evil.  Despise sin.  And repudiate it. 

Verse 33 “But whoever listens to me will dwell secure
and will be at ease, without dread of disaster.”  The main purpose on this section of Proverbs clearly is warning.  But the final thought is the tremendous upside to listening to God. That brings security, peace, and no fear of disaster. 

AB Simpson: We are putting ourselves in the hands of a loving Father, more (concerned) for our good than we can be.  And only wanting us to be fully submitted to Him, so that he may be more free to bless us.” 

Proverbs 3:21-26

“Keep sound wisdom and discretion, and they will be life for your soul and adornment for your neck.
Then you will walk on your way securely, and your foot will not stumble.
If you lie down, you will not be afraid; when you lie down, your sleep will be sweet.
Do not be afraid of sudden terror or of the ruin of the wicked, when it comes, for the Lord will be your confidence
and will keep your foot from being caught. 

True safety, true prosperity, is found in God’s ways.  Walk in his ways and you will not be afraid.  You will be confident.  You will sleep well at night.  Those who diligently seek God’s wisdom become strong confident secure people. As Proverbs 28:1 says, “The righteous are bold as a lion.”  

So before we get into all the individual proverbs, the two ways are set before us.  And the consequences are clearly spelled out.  If the Word has done it’s work in our hearts, we will fear rejecting God’s wisdom, and we will eagerly pay attention to him.  That is the important groundwork that Proverbs chapter 1 accomplishes in our hearts.  It’s warnings and blessings prepare us to listen to God.