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God gives wisdom using means (WW#17/Prov 1:8-9).
Prayer
O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens. When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what am I that you are mindful of me, that you should care for me? O Lord, please give to me this day your mercy and forgiveness for my sins, and meet with me now in the reading of your word. Crown me anew with the glory and honour of your image renewed in Christ, that I may honour you in the exercise of dominion in all that you have appointed to me. Please help me to submit to and serve you, my Lord and my God. Unless you receive and answer this prayer, I will surely fail and fall. But with you is forgiveness. Have mercy on me, O Lord. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.
Reading
Proverbs 1:7-9.
“fools despise wisdom and instruction.
Hear, my son, your father's instruction,and forsake not your mother's teaching,for they are a graceful garland for your headand pendants for your neck.”
Meditation
Fools are unteachable. What then is the first step in the opposite direction? It is to come to the realisation that God gives wisdom. Verses eight and nine, as you will have noticed, are talking explicitly about the role of parents in instructing their children. Before we consider that, however, we need to see on a more basic level that the instruction of parents is based on an even more important and fundamental principle: that God gives wisdom. Now I say that, in the first place, because even this passage is itself is in the scriptures. Proverbs 1:7-9 literally comes to us from God, as does the book of Proverbs as a whole, which gives wisdom. It is a divinely inspired book. We’ve also seen it in Proverbs 1:7 – the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. The Bible explicitly says that wisdom comes from God in James 1:5.
“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.”
There can be no wise instruction from parents or teachers, unless there is first a receiving of wisdom from God. This is the underlying assumption in verses eight and nine: that God gives wisdom. However, we must also add that God uses means to give wisdom. It is not God’s normal manner to directly speak to us (and if you read passages like Exodus 19 and Isaiah 6, you’ll see that this is a good thing). When sinful people have a direct interaction with God – it’s described in scripture as an overwhelming and terrifying experience. To use the language of Isaiah, we are “undone” in the presence of God. In that sense, it is a mercy that he uses means to give things to us.
Let’s consider a few examples of how this works: God uses fathers and mothers to birth us; he uses food to strengthen us; he uses prophets, apostles, and scripture to speak to us; and… he uses proverbs to give us wisdom. God uses means! Now, zooming in one more step in our passage, what we see in our verses is that God uses the particular means of parents to give us wisdom and instruction. Put simply, one of the things taught by these verses is that God gives us wisdom by our parents.
Before we look more closely at the role of parents in our next few meditations, let me make just one more general observation here, because there is another broad principle at work in our verses. Yes, as we learn here, we should – especially as young people – honour our parents, looking to them for wisdom. But even as adults, God has appointed other people in our lives to whom we ought to submit, and through whom he gives us instruction. The Westminster Larger Catechism opens this up for us very clearly:
“Q. Who are meant by “father” and “mother” in the fifth commandment?
A. By father and mother, in the fifth commandment, are meant, not only natural parents, but all superiors in age and gifts; and especially such as, by God’s ordinance, are over us in place of authority, whether in family, church, or commonwealth.” - Q&A 124.
That answer nicely represents this secondary broader principle of teachability that I’m trying to get at here. It is not only parents to whom we ought to listen, every one of us has people in our lives over us to whom we ought to listen and under whom we ought to be teachable. God gives wisdom using means. He calls us to be teachable under our elders, for example, in 1 Thessalonians 2:11 “For you know how, like a father with his children, we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.” Wives are called to be teachable under their husbands (1 Cor 14:35), likewise the husband who ignores the helpmeet whom God has given him is a fool. The very idea of a helpmeet implies the need for help, and therefore the need to listen. Titus 2:4 speaks of older women teaching younger women, and other kinds of examples could be multiplied. For every one of us, God has put people in our lives to whom he expects us to listen and submit.
Be ye doers of the word…
This is where the rubber hits the road when it comes to being teachable, it is not some vague notion. Teachability is set in the concrete context of our real relationships. When we ask ourselves: “Am I teachable?”, we must examine ourselves and consider how we treat the people who God has put into our lives. Do we actually listen to our parents? Do we look to our elders for guidance – and honour that guidance? Do we listen to our spouses? Do we have an attitude of submissiveness to our government? (Rom 13). We must be teachable, because God uses means. These people, who God places in our lives, are placed there by God, and the way we treat them has a direct correlation with the way we treat God. SDG.
Prayer of Confession & Consecration
Lord, I confess to you, all too often I have been so self-centred and self-willed that I have ignored the advice I have received through the people whom you have given to me. Pride is powerfully active in my heart, and in part I despair of becoming humble and teachable as I need to be. Yet Lord, with you all things are possible. My heart trembles to ask for humility, because the cost may be high. But I do so need this quality of spirit – please help me, Lord. Please make me to be truly humble, that I may fully trust in and rely upon you, may tremble at your word, and may be quick to hear when I receive a word of instruction or direction from those whom you have placed in my life. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.
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By Reformed devotions from all of scripture.Prayer
O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens. When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what am I that you are mindful of me, that you should care for me? O Lord, please give to me this day your mercy and forgiveness for my sins, and meet with me now in the reading of your word. Crown me anew with the glory and honour of your image renewed in Christ, that I may honour you in the exercise of dominion in all that you have appointed to me. Please help me to submit to and serve you, my Lord and my God. Unless you receive and answer this prayer, I will surely fail and fall. But with you is forgiveness. Have mercy on me, O Lord. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.
Reading
Proverbs 1:7-9.
“fools despise wisdom and instruction.
Hear, my son, your father's instruction,and forsake not your mother's teaching,for they are a graceful garland for your headand pendants for your neck.”
Meditation
Fools are unteachable. What then is the first step in the opposite direction? It is to come to the realisation that God gives wisdom. Verses eight and nine, as you will have noticed, are talking explicitly about the role of parents in instructing their children. Before we consider that, however, we need to see on a more basic level that the instruction of parents is based on an even more important and fundamental principle: that God gives wisdom. Now I say that, in the first place, because even this passage is itself is in the scriptures. Proverbs 1:7-9 literally comes to us from God, as does the book of Proverbs as a whole, which gives wisdom. It is a divinely inspired book. We’ve also seen it in Proverbs 1:7 – the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge. The Bible explicitly says that wisdom comes from God in James 1:5.
“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.”
There can be no wise instruction from parents or teachers, unless there is first a receiving of wisdom from God. This is the underlying assumption in verses eight and nine: that God gives wisdom. However, we must also add that God uses means to give wisdom. It is not God’s normal manner to directly speak to us (and if you read passages like Exodus 19 and Isaiah 6, you’ll see that this is a good thing). When sinful people have a direct interaction with God – it’s described in scripture as an overwhelming and terrifying experience. To use the language of Isaiah, we are “undone” in the presence of God. In that sense, it is a mercy that he uses means to give things to us.
Let’s consider a few examples of how this works: God uses fathers and mothers to birth us; he uses food to strengthen us; he uses prophets, apostles, and scripture to speak to us; and… he uses proverbs to give us wisdom. God uses means! Now, zooming in one more step in our passage, what we see in our verses is that God uses the particular means of parents to give us wisdom and instruction. Put simply, one of the things taught by these verses is that God gives us wisdom by our parents.
Before we look more closely at the role of parents in our next few meditations, let me make just one more general observation here, because there is another broad principle at work in our verses. Yes, as we learn here, we should – especially as young people – honour our parents, looking to them for wisdom. But even as adults, God has appointed other people in our lives to whom we ought to submit, and through whom he gives us instruction. The Westminster Larger Catechism opens this up for us very clearly:
“Q. Who are meant by “father” and “mother” in the fifth commandment?
A. By father and mother, in the fifth commandment, are meant, not only natural parents, but all superiors in age and gifts; and especially such as, by God’s ordinance, are over us in place of authority, whether in family, church, or commonwealth.” - Q&A 124.
That answer nicely represents this secondary broader principle of teachability that I’m trying to get at here. It is not only parents to whom we ought to listen, every one of us has people in our lives over us to whom we ought to listen and under whom we ought to be teachable. God gives wisdom using means. He calls us to be teachable under our elders, for example, in 1 Thessalonians 2:11 “For you know how, like a father with his children, we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.” Wives are called to be teachable under their husbands (1 Cor 14:35), likewise the husband who ignores the helpmeet whom God has given him is a fool. The very idea of a helpmeet implies the need for help, and therefore the need to listen. Titus 2:4 speaks of older women teaching younger women, and other kinds of examples could be multiplied. For every one of us, God has put people in our lives to whom he expects us to listen and submit.
Be ye doers of the word…
This is where the rubber hits the road when it comes to being teachable, it is not some vague notion. Teachability is set in the concrete context of our real relationships. When we ask ourselves: “Am I teachable?”, we must examine ourselves and consider how we treat the people who God has put into our lives. Do we actually listen to our parents? Do we look to our elders for guidance – and honour that guidance? Do we listen to our spouses? Do we have an attitude of submissiveness to our government? (Rom 13). We must be teachable, because God uses means. These people, who God places in our lives, are placed there by God, and the way we treat them has a direct correlation with the way we treat God. SDG.
Prayer of Confession & Consecration
Lord, I confess to you, all too often I have been so self-centred and self-willed that I have ignored the advice I have received through the people whom you have given to me. Pride is powerfully active in my heart, and in part I despair of becoming humble and teachable as I need to be. Yet Lord, with you all things are possible. My heart trembles to ask for humility, because the cost may be high. But I do so need this quality of spirit – please help me, Lord. Please make me to be truly humble, that I may fully trust in and rely upon you, may tremble at your word, and may be quick to hear when I receive a word of instruction or direction from those whom you have placed in my life. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.
Get full access to Old things New. at rcbhpastor.substack.com/subscribe