March 2, 2019 -- Proverbs 2:1-15 -- No easy believism
/ My son, if you receive my words
and treasure up my commandments with you,
2 making your ear attentive to wisdom
and inclining your heart to understanding;
3 yes, if you call out for insight
and raise your voice for understanding,
4 if you seek it like silver
and search for it as for hidden treasures,
5 then you will understand the fear of the Lord
and find the knowledge of God.
6 For the Lord gives wisdom;
from his mouth come knowledge and understanding;
7 he stores up sound wisdom for the upright;
he is a shield to those who walk in integrity,
8 guarding the paths of justice
and watching over the way of his saints.
9 Then you will understand righteousness and justice
and equity, every good path;
10 for wisdom will come into your heart,
and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul;
11 discretion will watch over you,
understanding will guard you,
12 delivering you from the way of evil,
from men of perverted speech,
13 who forsake the paths of uprightness
to walk in the ways of darkness,
14 who rejoice in doing evil
and delight in the perverseness of evil,
15 men whose paths are crooked,
and who are devious in their ways.
Proverbs 2 ESV
Notice the hard work it takes to gain wisdom. One must receive wisdom from an experienced believer in Jesus Christ. One must treasure up wisdom (which is contrary to the ways of the world). It takes great intentionality to make the ear attentive to wisdom, and it is hard-ground-bone-breaking work to soften the sin-gripped heart so that you will be seeking understanding. Notice the writer is telling the seeker: cry out for it, seek it like seeking silver, search it out. This is all active language.
One of my “guilty pleasures” is watching those weight loss shows. A very overweight person is given the chance of a lifetime to lose the weight. A personal trainer comes to help. A nutritionist gets involved. The family members are told to chuck all the junk food. The trainer pusher the person further than he’d ever thought he could go. The trainer helps the woman overcome the mental barriers that she’d set up. It is a great illustration of the overweight Christian. It is a harsh, but true portrayal of the one considering seeking God. We are lazy. We want to pray and instantly get what we prayed for. We want it all with no effort. I include myself in this brutal assessment!
My New Year’s resolution was/is to lose a pound a week and memorize one verse of scripture a day (reviewing the six memorized verses each Sunday in order to cement these verses to memory). There is no personal trainer. The trainer has not thrown out all junk food in the home. No host of the “Help Richard memorize Scripture and lose weight show” has gone to family and friends and said: “Stop placing temptations in his path”. I realize there is no easy path to achieving my New Year’s goals. Stil, they are worthy goals. I am currently not doing well in these goals. However, it is worth redoubling my efforts and pressing on. But if you see me, please encourage me!
In the same way, as we recognize our spiritual failings in searching out the highest, most important goal ever: to know Jesus Christ and the power of His resurrection—it is worth redoubling our efforts. The spiritual goal is not just to have us escape the fires of hell. The goal of knowing Jesus Christ means we find in Him a shield to guard our integrity. In Jesus Christ we find fullness of life, exactly as God created us to live it. By the Word and Holy Spirit, we are protected from the ways of cheating, of compromise—all of which are the pathway straight to the fires of damnation and hell. Hell is reserved for those who know God but live like He doesn’t exit. Romans 1 tells us every single person knows God—the creation declares His glory and His eternal attributes. No one has any excuse before God.
Knowing Jesus Christ does not mean we will never fail. It means we examine our lives against the mirror of His excellencies and grace and admit our failures to Him. We know our failures have been punished on His Person at the cross. So we search for His strength as we press on to know Him better. It is our growing desire to obey Him truly and love Him more fully. It is Jesus Himself Who is prompting us to seek Him. C.S. Lewis described God as: the hound of heaven chasing down the most reluctant convert.
Today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts.
Tomorrow is Sunday. Plan on going to a Bible-believing church. Find a friend to go with you. If you know a person whose faith you admire, get to church with her or ask to join him. Be prepared to struggle and wrestle for what is true and excellent. Anything worth having is worth fighting for. Know this: God has sparked in you this desire to know Him. How can I be sure? You have read this far. Do no doubt He will give you the tools you need and the strength to push through any obstacle.
God of Heaven—You are worth all the best efforts we can muster! You are excellent beyond all our imagining. You are greater than any picture we’ve ever had of Who You Are. We admit to feeling the pin-pricks of conscience. We know the promptings that irritate our hearts and spoil our comfortable sinfulness. Thank You that You will not leave us in the pig-slop of our sins and shame. Thank You for pushing us, giving to us the Personal Trainer called the Spirit of Holiness Who hounds us and chases us and encourages us to achieve the greatest goal ever: knowing Jesus Christ. Today, God of Kindness, if we hear You knocking on the door of our hearts, help us to respond to You. Let the seeker find. Let the sinner confess. May the lazy Christian get up and act in the way of wisdom. And let all of us, tomorrow in worship, welcome each one in Jesus’ glorious Name. Amen.
