Should we pray for the Mariners? That was so painful. It was like, other than the pitching, defense, and hitting, it was a very good game. It was so terrible. I know they’re on at 10:00 a.m. At first, I felt bad. And then I thought, “If they lose, I just am glad I’m not gonna be watching, ‘cause I just can’t bear that.” We start into Proverbs officially today. Where we’ve been, to say it briefly – we’re gonna cover a lot of ground today. The notes are on the back table. They’re also on the website, if you wanna double-check what I’m doing. And at the end of the rows there are some Bibles. If you don’t have a Bible, just let somebody in your row know and they’ll grab one for you. They’re under the last chair at the end of each row.

Where we have come thus far is, a few weeks ago we looked at the cultural and creation mandate from Genesis 1 and 2. That God has made us for a purpose, and that purpose is to love him and to be in intimate relationship with him, and to build a culture by his love and his grace and his truth that glorifies him. Last week, we looked at the issue of the heart, one of the great themes in Proverbs. And we spent a lot of time dissecting what Proverbs 4:23 means, “To guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of your life.” That our lives individually, and our lives corporately, that comprise our culture, come out of the human heart. This week we will look at what happens when God gives you a new heart, is that a few things are possible, and not the least of which is our themes today; which is a fear of God that leads to wisdom.

So, God has to give us a new heart, a heart that respects him, a heart that reverences him, so that then he can impart wisdom to us. And that changes us and it changes our lives. And so, if you would, follow with me. We’ll read Proverbs 1, verses 1 through 7. This is really our theme, and the substance of what we’ll be dealing with this morning. Proverbs 1, this is the prologue and the introduction to the great book of Proverbs. I’ll wait for you to get there. It says, “The Proverbs of Solomon, the son of David, the King of Israel. For attaining wisdom and discipline; for understanding words of insight; for acquiring a disciplined and prudent life; doing what is right, just and fair. For giving prudence to the simple, knowledge and discretion to the young. Let the wise listen and add to their learning, and let the discerning get guidance. For the understanding of proverbs and parables, the sayings and riddles of the wise.” And then here is – here’s our theme for today. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, or wisdom,” some of your translations will say, “but fools despise wisdom and discipline.”

We’re gonna start where verse 7 starts, and that is all of these things that are promised to you in Proverbs 1 through 6 only come as a result of Proverbs 7. So, we’ll work backwards today, and we have to talk about the fear of God. This is one of the mega-themes, again, like the heart, that comes throughout all of Proverbs. And it comes throughout all of the scriptures. What happens is that we need not just believe in God. That is not enough. James tells us that even the demons believe in God, and they shutter. That demons have a fear of God, but not a worshipful fear of him. That fear is the right response to the creation to its creator. That we are built with an intrinsic need to fear God. And many of us in our rebellion and our hard-heartedness fail to do that. So, that has to be the theme for us today.

When we talk about God, though, they talk about God here in Proverbs, or Solomon does, as “Lord.” And that is tremendously important. What Proverbs is beginning is by stating that there are really paradoxes, and there are conflicts between us and God; and that, if you will, it’s almost as if there were scales; that if we have a very high view of God – of man, of ourselves, of human wisdom and culture, we will have a corresponding very low view of God and scripture. And just the opposite is also true. Conversely, if we have a high view of God, and a high view of God’s authority, and a high view of God’s word, we will have an increasingly lower view of human wisdom, and human opinion, and human desire.

And I’m telling you that because that is – that is necessary to sort that out, first premise, in your mind. The person who has a low view of God, Proverbs says, “Is a fool, and there is no fear of God in their eyes.” Like Romans says. In addition, those who have a high fear of God and a high reverence and respect for God, they tend to have a far lesser opinion of things like sociology, philosophy, psychology, politics, and the like. Not saying that all of those things are bankrupt or evil necessarily, but that God’s opinion and God’s word rides over everything else, and it has authority. And when God speaks, God speaks authoritatively on all things that he speaks toward. And so we have to get right in our mind first. That not do we just need to be spiritual people who believe in a God, or even people who believe in the right God, but people who view God with fear because they recognize him as Lord.

And when the image of Lord it conjures up in your imagination really is the Biblical picture of what it should mean. A Lord is someone who owns a piece of real estate, literally. They’re a land-owner. And that is their kingdom. That is their property. That is their domain. Everything there is under their authority and jurisdiction. The people who live there are supposed to be their servants and to obey them. The – the Lord is supposed to be one with character and nobility and respect. You’re supposed to honor and revere that king, and if you don’t there are grave consequences. And the king holds a sword in his had to wage war against his enemies. And so, you never wanna make yourself out to be the enemy of the Lord, because you will fall at the sword of justice. And that’s the whole picture that the Bible gives of God as “Lord.”

It is a concept that begins in the opening pages of scripture and goes until the very end, and it’s also attributed to the Lord Jesus Christ. And when we call Jesus “Lord,” that’s what we’re talking about. That’s why, in the early church, calling Jesus “Lord” was really a declaration of war, because the Roman emperor did not appreciate the fact that we had a higher view of Jesus than we did the king. And so this issue of reverence for Jesus was that he was Lord, that he is king of kings, and he is Lord of what? He’s Lord of Lords, scripture says. And so, Jesus is the Lord. And when we’re speaking about fearing God as Lord, we are speaking about the same thing that Proverbs is talking of. So, every time it says “Lord,” feel free to import “Jesus,” if you like. Biblically, you have complete freedom to do that. What it means to fear God is a very complicated matter. Fearing God includes reverence, respect, awe, majesty, wonder. It also includes terror.

We see in Philippians 2:12, I think it is, where we’re told to work out our salvation, “with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in us to will and to do, according to his good pleasure.” That even the children of God are supposed to approach God with fear. And it is not a fear of terror, but it is a fear of trembling; that there should be a reverence there; that there should be a healthy and holy respect for God in his person, and his works, and his words, and his ways. We also see this with Isaiah; one of the classic portrayals of the fear of the Lord in the Old Testament. Isaiah is a Godly young prophet, and he comes into the very presence of God in Isaiah 6, and he says, “Woe to me, I have come undone. I’m a man of unclean lips, and I come from a people of unclean lips. And my eyes have seen the Lord.” When he sees – and it says – it tells us in John that what he sees is Jesus Christ seated on his throne.

And so, when Isaiah sees the – the picture of Jesus Christ as Lord, seating on his throne in the heavenlies, he says he’s undone. He’s completely devastated. He’s overcome. This issue of fear and trembling comes upon him. You see this throughout the scriptures, that every time someone comes into the presence of God, they either fall on their face if they are his children, to worship him; if they are his enemies, they fall on their back as though they were dead. And that’s what happens. People cannot stand in the presence of God. You see this even with people who don’t know God still fear God. In the exodus narrative in chapter 1, Pharaoh tells the midwives that when the Hebrew children are born to put them to death. But it says that the non-Hebrew women, the women who weren’t Christians if you will, they still feared God. And so they wouldn’t put the children to death.

You see the same thing in Jonah 1, where the sailors whom Jonah is riding with are told to throw him into the sea. And they refuse to throw him into the sea because they fear his God. You will see this among people who don’t even know God. They may be a little bit superstitious around you if they find out that you’re a Christian. I get all kinds of great perks by virtue of being a pastor. Because people – if I need a – let’s say I need to get on an airline flight and it’s booked. I tell them I’m a pastor. They say, “Oh, well, I’ll get you on, because I don’t want to make your God mad.” And it’s not that they love my God, or worship my God. They just don’t wanna mess with him, and they’re gonna cover their bases just in case. So, that works to my advantage very frequently. I use that a lot.

This reverence, though, and this fear for God – that may be a sin. We’ll talk about that in the next sermon. This reverence and fear for God, though, I tell you this, is very, very, very important. I can’t survey the human heart. I don’t know, but I hope you would agree with me that one of the things that troubles me most about Christianity as it is practiced today in the western world is, it seems like there’s a very high view of people and their opinions, and a very low view of God and his word; and that there is not a lot of teaching on the fear of God. What we are continually told about is not the fear of God, but what? God’s – God’s love. And what we have done, 1 John 4 tells us that, “God is love.” But we have done is we have reversed that. We’ve said that, basically, love is God. We have forgotten that all things proceed from God; that loves proceeds from God as well.
And we have, instead, defined love, and then we have imported that into God. And so we create for ourselves what the scriptures would call an idolatry. We conjecture a picture of God that does not correspond with reality, but it’s a smaller, lesser, less frightening, less terrifying, less powerful, less angry God. Because then, this helps us feel better about ourselves. And that’s not the point of God. I had it this week – I’ll tell you a story. It’s bugged me all week. I was teaching at a pastor’s conference this last week, and I got into the fact that the gospel needs to be preached because the Bible says that the gospel needs to be preached. And I had a pastor argue with me incessantly and say, “No, we do not need to preach the gospel, because everyone is going to heaven. God is not mad. God is not angry. God does not judge. No one is going to hell. There’s no reason to preach to them. That’s just a waste of time. You’re trying to scare them.”

I thought, “You’re right. I am trying to scare them.” In the same way that if I knew that tomorrow something absolutely tragic was going to happen to you, and there was a way to prevent that, I would warn you and I would tell you to fear that consequence, and to alter your lives accordingly; because I care. But it’s very popular in our day to create a picture of God that does not correspond with scripture. And Proverbs says that’s because fools despise wisdom, knowledge and discipline. And so, it is very tempting for all of us to have a very cursory, light reading of scripture; and then to come-up with a concept of God that fits what we were looking for; and then to put Jesus’ name on that; and then to worship it. And Proverbs says, if you do that, you have no fear of God. You may have kept all of the Biblical language. “I believe in God. I have faith. I’m a Christian.” But you may have emptied it of all of its meaning. And you may have imported into that your own concepts.

And God has made us in his image and likeness, and for some reason we feel inclined to return the favor. And we create him in our image and likeness, so that we’re more comfortable with him. We’re gonna talk very seriously today about who God is. First thing I want you to see is that there is a cause and effect between your concept of God and your life. If you don’t believe this, go to a religion – go to a country where the primary religion believes in karma. See what happens to people who are poor, or who are suffering. Nothing happens to those people. It is because a view of God leads to a view of human life, leads to a human life. That your concept of God involves everything else that you practically live. It’s first principle. That’s why it says, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”

Rightly understanding God leads to wisdom in all areas of life. Wisdom begins with a right understanding of God, as does folly. Fools despise wisdom and discipline. And so, as we talk about this, I want you to see this continuing theme throughout Proverbs is this principle of sowing and reaping. That what you begin with ends up reaping a harvest for your life. And your concept of God is the same way. What you sow as a concept of God is reaped as a style of living. And so, there are negative effects to not fearing the Lord. Proverbs speaks about them. I’ll just read a few for you. Proverbs 1:29-31. These are all in your notes. “Since they hated knowledge,” – let’s talk about that for a sec. I wasn’t planning on doing that.

How can you hate God’s knowledge? Practically, what do you have to do to hate God’s knowledge? Just don’t read the scriptures. That’s it. It’s very simple. Some of you say, “Well, I hate – I don’t – I’m not very good. I don’t really read the scriptures ever.” Well, that’s ‘cause you hate knowledge. The reason that most people don’t read scripture is not because they don’t understand what it says, but because they do understand what it says and they don’t like it. Mark Twain said, “Well,” – he said, “It’s not the parts of the Bible that I don’t understand that trouble me, it’s the part that I do understand that really trouble me.” And sometimes, if you are in sin, or you’re in rebellion, or if you’ve put-together a world or a concept of God that you like and you don’t wanna disrupt it, if you hate knowledge, you will not surround yourself with anyone who will give you any information that contradicts what you’ve already concluded.

And so, you will refuse to read scripture, you will refuse to go to church, you’ll refuse to go to Bible study, you’ll refuse to gather with other Christians, because you do not want any knowledge coming in that contradicts your own decisions that you’ve already committed yourselves to. And it says, “Fools despise knowledge.” Because, you have to begin with knowledge before you can get to wisdom. That’s what we talked about a few weeks ago. You have to know who God is and know what God says so that you can not merely listen to the word and so deceive yourselves, James says, but you can do what it says. And that’s wisdom. So, you have to begin with knowledge so that you can get wisdom. If you never get knowledge, you’ll never have any wisdom. If you don’t know who God is, you won’t know how to live.

And it says that fools hate knowledge, and as a result, they have no wisdom. “So, since they hated knowledge and did not choose to fear the Lord, since they would not accept my advice, and my spurned my rebuke,” – I’ll talk about this real quickly, too. Knowledge comes like a slap in the face. Any of you read the Bible and been offended, or been troubled, or been bothered, or been concerned? You should be. You should be troubled. I can remember the first time I read the scriptures. I read the New Testament in about a week and a half, two weeks in college. And I was absolutely offended. And I thought, “I can’t believe that people worship this god who says these things about us. It seems like he has a very high view of himself and a very low view of me, and that really offends me.” I was looking for something that had a very high view of me and a very low view of God. And the more I read the worse it got.

This is not what I was looking for. God surprised me. Lady wisdom, in Proverbs, always comes. And it says that she first rebukes you, and if you heed her rebuke then she will give you treasures of wisdom and knowledge. What that means is, at first, we have to push you and see if you’re wise or a fool. How do we know if you’re wise or foolish? If you’re wise, you’ll say, “Well, open the Bible. Tell me what it says. If I get my feelings hurt, I guess that’s the way it goes.” Fools say, “Well, I don’t like that,” and they completely ignore what God has to say. They don’t like being offended. They don’t like being disrupted. They don’t like having their feelings hurt. But he says, “Because they spurned my advice, and they didn’t pay any attention to my rebuke, there’s going to be a consequence for that.”

I’ll read it again. “Since they hated knowledge and did not choose to fear the Lord; since they would not accept my advice and spurned my rebuke, they will eat the fruit of their ways and be filled with the fruit of their wicked schemes.” If you hate knowledge, and you hate wisdom, and you hate God, your life will reflect that. And there’s a lot of people who are saying, “Well, I would like to have a different life.” Okay, fine. Then you need to know who God is, and you need to begin with knowledge about God. You need to open the scriptures, and you need to learn something. They say, “No. I want effects without causes. I want sowing without reaping. I want a harvest without ever putting any knowledge in the ground.”

Proverbs 14:16, “A wise man fears the Lord and shuns evil, but a fool is hot-headed and reckless.” If you don’t fear God, what you will do, you will become very hot-headed and very reckless; temper, anger, seeking your own justice, your own vindication. Proverbs 23:17, “Do not let your heart envy sinners, but always be zealous for the Lord.” If you don’t fear God, you’ll spend a lot of time by yourself thinking about all of the wicked things that people do and wondering how you could join them. And lastly, “Fear of man will prove to be a snare.” What ultimately happens is this: If you don’t fear God you will fear someone, and usually it’s a person. You will have someone who their opinion of you dictates your life. Their understanding of you, their judgments upon you will dictate your life. I had that this week when I was arguing with another pastor at a conference.

I argued with pastors all week. It was one of the most annoying weeks of my whole life. And I argued with this pastor about God’s judgment. Does God judge sin? At the end of the age will there be any consequence for sin? And he says, “No.” He says, “No, hell will be empty.” I said, “Not the way you preach. It’ll be full.” And then we went at it for a while. And I kept quoting scripture. I said, “Well, Daniel 12:1 and 2 says that, ‘Multitudes asleep in the dust of the earth, at the end of the age, they will arise; some to everlasting joy, some to everlasting contempt.’” What’s that? That’s everlasting. That doesn’t mean they go to hell for 15 minutes, and then they get a get-out-of-hell card. Hebrews 9:27, “Appointed once for man to die, then for judgment.” And he started quoting to me, not scripture, he started quoting authors and films and bands. You need to know, that’s the world we live in.

And I told him, I said, “Fools despise wisdom and knowledge.” “You calling me a fool?” “Yes.” “Jesus says you’re not supposed to call anyone a fool. That’s a very dangerous thing.” I said, “If the shoe fits.” We live in a day where God and his word is very low, but we fear men. And I’ll tell you what happens. If you do not believe in the cannon of scripture, you will develop your own cannon. You will say – if I ask you, “Why are you doing that? And why is that right?” You will say, “Well, Kierkegaard says, or Nietzsche says, or Freud says, my counselor says, Oprah says, my two buddies say, my mom and dad says – “. You will find a cannon. You will amass for yourself an authoritative body that speaks to vindicate and justify you. That is the quintessence of the fear of man. You’re afraid of what men and women think of you. You are afraid of men and women’s opinions. And you have a very high view of people, and a very low view of God. And Proverbs says that is no place to begin with wisdom.

To begin with wisdom is to think lowly of ourselves, and to think highly of our God. That that brings us into a sobriety, and a reverence, and a respect for God. The affects of fearing the Lord are also clear in Proverbs. There’s a lot of other things that could be said in scripture, but I’ll just deal with Proverbs today. Proverbs 2:5 tells us to understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. Have you ever dealt with someone to where you keep talking about Christian things but you – you realize that really you have a completely different understanding of God? Have you had that experience? They say, “You’re a Christian, and I’m a Christian, so we agree on who God is.” Okay, you may be a Christian, that’s true. I’m not – I’m not going to judge. I’m not God. But, we may have really different definitions of what we mean by God. And it’s totally likely in our day and age.

And so, what we must begin with is a fear of God, because a fear of God, he says, leads to a knowledge of God. Some people believe in God but they have no fear of him, so they really don’t understand who he is. I’m not saying that necessarily they are not saved of their sins. God judges. I don’t know. But it is possible to believe in God and because of a lack of fear and reverence for him there is really no clear understanding of who he is. I got into that – I’ll just tell you all my bad pastor stories. I got into that with another guy this week. He says, “God doesn’t know the future.” That’s a very popular thinking in our day. I said, “God does know the future.” I says – I said, “Did Jesus die for all my sins?” He said, “Yeah.” And I said, “When did he die for them?” He said, “2,000 years ago.” I said, “How could he die for my sins if he didn’t know what I’d done?” He says, “I don’t know. I just know that God doesn’t know the future.” I said, “Well, how do you know that?” I am the alpha and the omega, make known the beginning and the end.

See, he believes in God, but he doesn’t fear God. He doesn’t think that God has any control of human history. And that’s a different understanding of God. Because he doesn’t fear God he doesn’t have good knowledge of God. He was a more teachable guy. We talked for a while. Fear of God leads to a knowledge of God, and that leads to wisdom. You have to respect God. And you think about this. We respect people, don’t we? You think about it. Who do you respect the most? Who is it that, if you were in their presence, you would deal with them reverently, respectfully; your eyes would be at the ground, and you would spend a lot more time listening than speaking? We all should have at least a short list of those kind of people. And this issue is, “Well, what about God?” When we come into God’s presence or we come into God’s word, we should be quiet. We should be still. We should listen. Our eyes should be the ground. There should be respect.

But, because of this low view of God, it’s like God is buddy and pal and chum. All of the sudden God’s one of our drinking buddies, or he’s the point guard on our recreational basketball team. I love that bumper-sticker: God is my co-pilot. Which is the lowest view of God. I drive, and he fumbles with the map. That’s weird. The fear of God leads to a knowledge of God. Proverbs 16:6, “Through the fear of the Lord a man avoids evil.” One of the great things about fearing God is that, all of the sudden, you’re a little scared to sin. You should be a little scared to sin. You walk away from evil.

It says, “To fear the Lord,” Proverbs 8:13, “is to hate evil. What you’ll find is that someone who begins to fear the Lord gets really worked-up about sin. It bothers them tremendously; their own sin included. They’re not just playing plank/speck issues with the world, just talking about everybody else’s sin. Their own sin and evil bothers them greatly. All of the sudden they get very intense. They get very focused. They get very passionate about evil. That can only happen if you fear God. “The fear of the Lord adds length to life, but the years of the wicked are cut short.” People who fear the Lord, Proverbs says, live longer. Doesn’t that make sense? If you walk with wisdom and you avoid evil, you will live longer, and you’ll have better quality of life.

“He who fears the Lord has a secure fortress for his children. It will be a refuge.” Your kids have a better life, and your grandkids have a better life if you fear the Lord, because you build a life that is filled with wisdom, and is a fortress, and is guarded by your God. And it’s a wonderful place for your family. “The fear of the Lord is a fountain of life, turning a man from the snares of death.” It’ll keep you from dying before your time, and it is this ever-flowing fountain that just sort of blesses and replenishes and nourishes your whole life. That’s the fear of the Lord. The fear of the Lord teaches a man wisdom and humility comes before honor. If you fear God, those are honorable people. And the reason we honor them is because of their humility.

Again, they have a very high view of God and very low view of themselves. That’s humility. And as a result of that, we honor them, because they have wisdom. That comes out of a fear of God. It says, “The fear of the Lord leads to life. And humility and the fear of the Lord bring wealth, honor and life.” We’re gonna get into more specific issues of money. I do believe that people who fear God should make more money than people who don’t. Makes sense, right? If you shun evil, if you work hard, if you fear God, and if you work and act Biblically, someone should give you a raise and a promotion. And you should save your money rather than waste it all on your sin and your folly. “That wisdom knows how to obtain money, and wisdom knows how to invest money, and wisdom knows how to spend money.” Why? Because of a respect for God. Because the first thing that you find is that you realize that everything belongs to God, and so you’re very careful with how you spend your money.

All your time belongs to God, so you’re very careful with how you use your time. All your energy is God’s, so you’re very careful on how you expend your days. All of your speech is God’s, and so you’re very careful with how you disseminate your words. This fear and reverence for God brings you to this understanding that life and wealth and honor and health and language and friendship and everything belongs to God. And so, you invest it very carefully, very wisely. You don’t waste your days. You don’t waste your time. You don’t waste your life, because you fear God. You respect him. You have a reverence and an awe for God, and there’s a little bit of trembling as you handle his things. What I wanna talk about now – that’s the fear of the Lord. That’s the benefits of the fear of the Lord. And that is the downside to those who don’t fear the Lord. My question now is going to be: Why should we fear God?

I’m gonna give you some pictures from scripture. First thing we find out about God is that God is the un-caused cause; that God doesn’t need anything; that God doesn’t need anyone. And that God creates. And how does God create everything? He speaks it into existence. Now, you’re dealing with a God who has unbelievable power. You and I try to build something, it takes a lot of time. That’s why we struggle with creation as a theology. How could God have done all this in an instant? When you’re that big, it’s not a job. It’s a hobby.

God speaks and everything comes into existence, just by virtue of his word. God doesn’t need to begin with anything other than his will. And he creates matter, time, space, energy, darkness, light, life. God just speaks and life comes into being. That is – that is an enormous God. And then we find as well, that God makes us in his image and likeness. And immediately, in Genesis 3, in this great garden that God has built, a dragon comes. You ever wonder why little boys love stories about slaying dragons? Big boys, too? It’s because it’s Biblical. They’re made in the image and likeness of God. “That old serpent,” Revelation says, “the devil, the deceiver comes to Adam and Eve in the garden.” How did he get there? Well, he had declared war in heaven, and he had gotten kicked out, according to Isaiah and Ezekiel.

That there was an angel that God had made who did not want to have a high view of God and a low view of angels. He wanted to have a very high view of angels and a very low view of God. God would not permit that. God is very zealous for his glory. God is very zealous for his things. And so God would not share his kingdom or his glory with this created angel, and so there was a war in heaven and Satan was cast out. That dragon, as well, scripture says, as a third of the heavenly host; angels who became demons. And they came down to hassle with us. They show-up in Genesis 3, and they pick a fight with Adam and Eve. And Adam and Eve lose, because Adam and Eve sin, and they decide to have a very high view of Satan and a very low view of God. And they have a very high view of their own reasoning and interpretation of scripture, and a very low view of God and his word.

So, what happens then is that a war breaks out on this planet as well. That God shows up, and he declares that there will be division, separation, enmity between this Godly line and this ungodly line; between these people who know God and love him, and these people who do not. And there is this cosmic war that happens. It began in heaven. It spilled down into the garden of Eden, and it continues until this very day. And the picture there is that God is a Lord, and that creation is his dominion. This is his kingdom. And that Satan is his enemy. And that Jesus is coming, according to Genesis 3:15, to crush the head of the serpent; to declare war. And you see this at the end of Revelation. That ultimately Jesus does show up with a sword and he slays the dragon. That’s the picture of the Lord. The other pictures you see of the Lord is this great, noble, mighty warrior king with a sword in his hand who declares war against his enemies of Satan, sin and death. You see, it doesn’t take long for this God to become very perturbed with his creation. By Genesis 6, you see that the inclination of man’s heart is nothing but wickedness all the time, that it pains the Lord. And so what does God do to the earth?

He floods the whole earth. He floods it. Other than Noah and his family, God kills everyone on the planet. Can you believe that? God kills everyone. Sometimes what we do is, we get into these huge scientific debates about, “Was it possible to have a flood? Was there a real flood? How many animals got on the ark?” That’s not the main point of the story. The main point of the story is, God was angry, and God flooded the earth. And everybody died. Because God is zealous for his glory, and God will not share his glory, and God will not share his dominion. And so, you’re either a friend of God or an enemy of God. And if you’re an enemy of God, not only does he take the sword in his hand and come against the beast, he comes against the rest of us who have sided with that dragon.

You should fear God. You see that it continues. There is a town, a couple towns: Sodom and Gomorrah. They are towns, according to Jude, that were filled with sexual perversion. Right? Just like Seattle and San Francisco and Vegas. Filled with sexual perversion. And what does God do to Sodom and Gomorrah, because they are sexually perverse cities? He rains down burning sulfur from heaven, and he kills the people. And God tells one woman not to look back, and she looks back, and what happens? She turns into a pillar of salt. It doesn’t take long. You’re just in the first book of the Bible, and you come to the conclusion that this is not a God that you wanna pick a fight with. This is not a God you wanna mess with.

We may have images in scripture of Jesus being a sheep, and God being a really nice guy; wears a sweater like Mr. Rogers and sits on a throne and sings songs to his kids. But, you start to read the scripture and you get this picture of God to where, this is not a God you wanna fool with. This is not a God you wanna test. This is not a God you wanna call into the ring. You see this in the next book of the Bible, in the book of Exodus. Pharaoh’s heart becomes hard. They’re oppressing God’s people. They’ve held them in slavery for upwards of 400 years. And what does God do to the Egyptians? Plagues. Hail. Locusts. Sores on their skin. Their water turns to blood. Ultimately, his final crushing blow, he takes the first-born male child in every home that is not committed to him and he kills the sons. Can you image if tonight – how many of you men are first-born males in your home? Tonight, God kills – I am as well – God kills us all. We’re all dead. And every one of us who has a son that is first-born, they all die, too. And if our fathers are first-born – God just kills the firstborn sons.

You continue, and you see this throughout scripture. And some of you in your mind right now are saying, “Yeah, but that’s all the Old Testament. That’s what God used to do. The Old Testament’s about this mean, vindictive God. The New Testament is about this really loving, nice God named Jesus.” Can you think of any Christians in the New Testament who died, that God kills them? Ananias and Sapphira, Acts 5. It says that they sell a piece of property. They had promised to tithe it to God’s work. They bring it. They lay it at the feet of Peter. I think it was first the husband, then the wife, if memory serves me correct. And they lied about it. They kept some back. They thought, “Oh, that’s a lot of money. We got a better deal than we were thinking. Praise the Lord. We’ll get a little percentage for ourselves.” They put it in their pocket. Not a big deal. Right?
They bring it in, and God strikes one of them dead. They haul the body away. Then the spouse comes in and they ask the spouse, “Are you giving all that God said?” “Sure.” Didn’t know that their spouse was laying in a ditch somewhere behind the meeting hall. And then that spouse drops dead as well. And it says that great what seized the whole church, in Acts 5:11? Great fear. That’s an understatement. Can you imagine if today we passed the plate, and everybody who didn’t give enough died? Right? You got the plate, and then the person, like, fell on the ground. You were getting ready to pass it, and then you thought, “I better put some more in there just in case.” Great fear seized the whole church. I promise you, that was the best offering of the year at that church.

If – if people start dying because they don’t tithe? You say, “What it the world?” That is a little scary, right? When you walk into church the next Sunday, you’re sort of like, “I’m gonna sit in the back. You know, just – I’m gonna get close to the exit, ‘cause I don’t know what’s gonna happen. If God starts killing people I’m gonna make a run for it.” Very, very, very, high view of God came into that church. There had previously been a very, very high view of man. “Well, you know, we sort of – you know, it’s our money. We do what we please.” You know, you tell a little lie, no big deal. [Makes clapping noise] Dead! Whoa! Good glory.

How about the Corinthian church? They were taking communion in an unworthy manner. Scripture says that they were getting drunk at communion. It’s the first sign of a severe alcohol problem. And what does God do to some of those who are taking communion inappropriately? He says that they are – “They are drinking judgment upon themselves,” 1Corinthians 11, “and that is why some of them have died.” Can you imagine at communion today – we’re gonna take communion. I want you to think about that. I want you to think about whether or not when you put the bread in the wine and you put it in your mouth if you’re gonna die. Just think about that. Then, when you go home, you will fear God. You will be a little afraid. You’ll be careful. Can you imagine that? If on your way to communion today you had to step over all your dead brothers and sisters?

You would confess your sins before you got to me. You’d say, “Is there anything else I gotta – I gotta do inventory. God, I’m just gonna pray a blanket prayer now. Forgive me for everything, just in case I forgot.” Some people say, “Okay, well, that’s the Old Testament. That’s the church, but not Jesus.” I had a guy tell me that this week. He says, “Jesus doesn’t judge anybody. Jesus loves everybody.” The issue is, “Well, Jesus loves everybody as he loves them, not as we define love.” Can you think of anything a little fearful that Jesus said? Did Jesus tell us to fear God? Did Jesus ever tell us to fear God? Luke 6:12, what does he say? 11 and 12. He says, “Don’t just fear those who can kill you.” We do fear those people, right? It’s why we have locks on our doors, locks on our cars. It’s why some of you have guns and dogs. It’s why I do. There are certain people that we should fear because what? They will do us great harm. They will hurt us. They will kill us. And so, what do we do? We worry about them. So, it’s Luke 12:4 and 5 tells us that Jesus said, “Don’t just fear those who can kill the body, fear the one who can kill the body and do what? Throw it into hell.”
And then Jesus says it again, just in case we missed it. He says what? “Fear him.” Jesus says, “There’s God, and God could just pull his sword out and kill you, and pick you up and throw you into hell. Be scared of him.” Jesus? Nice, gentle Jesus? Jesus, meek and humble? Jesus, my cosmic buddy? Jesus my co-pilot? Yes, Jesus said to fear God. He’ll kill you and throw you into hell. Fear him. It says in Isaiah that, “Jesus came with wisdom and knowledge, and the fear of the Lord was upon him.” Jesus feared the Father. I’ll read this to you. I want you just to hear what Revelation says. Just listen.

“I looked and there before me was the lamb,” that’s Jesus, “standing on Mount Zion. And with him, 144,000 who had his name and his father’s name written on their foreheads. And I heard a sound from heaven like a roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder. The sound I heard was that like of harpists playing their harps, and were singing.” Here we are. It’s a beautiful picture. We’re all singing songs. “They sang a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and the elders. No one could learn the song except the 144,000 who had been redeemed from the earth. These are those who did not defile themselves with women, for them kept themselves pure. They follow the lamb where ever he goes. They were purchased from among men and offered as a first-fruits to God and the lamb, and no lie was found in their mouths, and they are blameless.” Sounds beautiful, doesn’t it? Sounds – oh, these people who love the Lord were all given harps. Jesus teaches them new songs. We’re all sitting there in robes of white. Sort of this angelic picture where we’re sitting on the clouds strumming harps, singing songs, loving God. Very beautiful. What else is going on?

You know you’re gonna get set-up here. “Then I saw another angel flying in mid-air, and he had the eternal gospel to proclaim to those who live on the earth; to every nation, tribe, language and people. He said in a loud voice – “ here is what God wants, “Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of his judgment has come. Worship him who made the heavens. He is creator. The earth and the sea and the springs of water. A second angel followed and said, ‘Fallen is Babylon the great, which has made all the nations drink in the maddening wine of our adulteries.’ A third angel followed them and said in a loud voice, ‘If anyone worships the beast and his image and receives his mark on the forehead or the hand,” and, no, we don’t know what that is, no matter what you’ve read, “he too will drink of the wine of God’s fury, which has been poured full-strength into the cup of his wrath. He will be tormented with burning sulfur,” like Sodom and Gomorrah, “in the presence of the holy angels and of the lamb.” Let me stop there.

Hell is not a place where God is absent. Hell is a place where God is present, but God’s grace is absent. I got into this argument, again, with this pastor this week. If you’re gonna preach on the fear of the Lord, you know you’re gonna run into one fool and argue. And he said, “No, Jesus doesn’t have anything to do with hell. Hell is where everybody goes who doesn’t know God. And it’s far away from God, and there’s nothing good there.” No. Does Satan rule and reign in hell and torment and punish people according to their deeds and misdeeds? No. Because Satan himself will be getting tormented and punished for his misdeeds in hell. It’s not like there’s heaven and God’s in charge, and there’s hell and Satan’s in charge.
There’s heaven and hell, and God’s in charge. And so, those people who are being blessed in heaven are being blessed by God. Those people who are being tormented in hell are being tormented by God. It says that, “They will be punished in the presence of the lamb and his angels.” That Jesus, who will pat me on the head and say, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” is not going to do that for everyone. The Jesus who forgives you of your sin and loves you and ushers you into his presence is not going to do that for everyone. In the presence of the lamb and his angels. We’ll keep reading. How long does this last?

“And the smoke from their torment rises forever and ever. There is no rest, day or night, for those who worship the beast and his image, or for anyone who receives the mark of his name.” What you’ll notice is, these are not atheists. These are people who did worship. These are people who are spiritual. These are people who believe there is a God. They have just elevated some concept of God above the real God, and now God is going to correct their folly. “This calls for patient endurance on the part of the saints who obey God’s command and remain faithful to Jesus. Then I heard a voice from heaven say, ‘Right, blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.’ ‘Yes,’ says the Spirit – the Holy Spirit. ‘They will rest from their labor for their deeds will follow them.’” Let me ask you this: When you sin, who are you sinning against? God.

When the Bible says that you will be saved, who are you saved from? I want you to – I really want you to think about this. You are saved from whom? God. Are we saved from sin? Yes. Are we saved from death? Yes. Are we saved from Satan? Yes. Ultimately, who are we saved from? God. That God is judge, and God sits on a throne, and God knows you and I; deeds and misdeeds, attitudes, thoughts and actions of the heart. Revelation tells us here in chapter 14 to fear him. Some of you in your minds now are saying, “He’s just trying to scare me.” Yes. You should, because I want you to have wisdom and discipline and knowledge and life and joy and a refuge for your kids. And you will not find those things in hell. I’ll read a little bit more.

“I looked and there before me was a white cloud, and the seat on the cloud was one like the son of man,” That’s Jesus, taken out of Daniel 7:13, “with a crown of gold on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand.” Anybody know what a sickle is? Any farmers in the room? Every good horror film has got a sickle. So does the book of Revelation. “Then, another angel came out of the temple and called in a loud voice to he who was sitting on the cloud, ‘Take your sickle and reap, because the time to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is ripe.’” What kind of harvest is this? “So he who was seated on the cloud swung his sickle over the earth and the earth was harvested. Another angel came out of the temple in heaven, and he too had a sharp sickle. Still another angel who was in charge of the fire came from the altar and called in a loud voice to him who had the sharp sickle, ‘Take your sharp sickle and gather the cluster of grapes from the earth’s vine, because its grapes are ripe.’ The angel swung his sickle on the earth, gathered its grapes, and threw them into the great wine-press of God’s wrath. They were trampled in the wine-press outside the city, and blood flowed out of the press rising as high as a horse’s bridle for a distance of 180 miles.”
Here’s the picture, friends. A sickle is taken to declare war against God’s enemies at the end of the age. That God has this enormous wine-press, right? If you’ve ever seen ancient wine-making, there’s an enormous press. The grapes are thrown in, and people stomp on the grapes, and then all of the juice flows out of the bottom. What is in this great wine-press of God’s fury? His enemies. And what is flowing out of the bottom? Their blood. How high is it? About as high as the bridle on a good sized horse. Well, how far does this go? For 180 miles. And who does this? Well, this would be Jesus.

Do you understand my first principle, that if you misunderstand God you misunderstand everything? If you have no fear of God, you hate knowledge. And immediately, your first instinct for some of you, is to find a way to crate this into something else. “I don’t like that. There has to be another answer. I will read commentaries until I find someone that gives me something else.” But from Genesis to Revelation what you will see is this: God who is the Lord, who is zealous for his kingdom, who is zealous for his glory, who conquers and defeats his enemies. Ask you another weird question. Not only we are safe from God, but why does God save us? If you have a very high view of man, you will say, “Because God loves us and because we are great people and we have great potential.” If you have a very high view of God, you’ll say, “God saves us because God is zealous for his glory, and apparently us being saved gives him glory.”

I wanna talk about that for a minute. Let me ask you this other question. Think about this. We’re gonna deal with some knowledge this morning. I want this to steep in your soul. Who killed Jesus? Who killed Jesus? Everyone participated, didn’t they? Acts 4 says the Romans and the Greeks and the Jews. I think it’s Acts 4:27 says they all conspired to kill Christ. But ultimately, according to Isaiah, it says it was – I think it’s in 53:10, “It was the Lord’s will to crush him,” Jesus, “so the Father crushed the Son.” It was the Lord’s will to crush him, and to cause him to suffer. Who killed Jesus? The Father. The Father ultimately is responsible for the death of the son. Let me ask you this. If God hates our sin so much; if God hates our rebellion and our folly and our wickedness and our idolatry to such a degree that he will kill God the Son, shouldn’t we fear him?

Again, with this foolish pastor I argued with this week, that was my question to him. He says, “God doesn’t punish anyone. God doesn’t kill anyone. God doesn’t cause anyone to suffer.” Well, he did Jesus. If the Father will do that to the Son, why in the world should I think that I am an exception? What is my claim to getting off? Jesus gets killed, crushed, buried, dead and gone. And I think that God will just wink at me? If God is willing to kill the Son, God is certainly not going to respect me. If Jesus, who was perfect and tempted in every way as I am, yet without sin, was killed brutally; lashed, beaten, whipped, crucified, crown of thorns, beard plucked out, sword through his side, mocked, spat upon, and thrown in a grave – if that happens to God, am I really going to be foolish enough to despise knowledge and say, “Well, God will never do that to me.” If God does that to God, God will most certainly have no problem doing that to us who have deserved it. Would you agree with me that there is a very low view of God, and as a result of that there is a corresponding lack of reverence and respect and fear of God?

What happens in this view is that God does not give commands, God gives suggestions. God does not take into account human sin. God just sort of accepts it, ‘cause it’s just – everybody does it. That’s the way it is. What happens is, all of the sudden God and his word become very light, and people in their pride become very heavy. God becomes very low. We become very high. God becomes very small. We become very big. There is no humility. There’s no fear of God. There’s no wisdom. We despise knowledge. If we hear anything to the contrary, we just sort of ignore it.

Does God hate? That’s my next question. Does God hate? God does hate. It says in Psalm 5:5, that you are the Lord who hates all those who do evil. Now, who has done evil? Everyone. God hates. Have you – for those of you who have been Christians for a while, have you heard much about the God who hates? Not a popular subject is it? We – we – we really appreciate those things about the God who loves, because that makes us feel better. But the God who hates, that is not a popular topic. I challenge you to go to any Christian book store and say, “Where is your section on the God who hates?” “We don’t have any of those. We have a big section over here on the God who loves.” And there is this myth in our head that love and hatred are opposites. They’re not, are they? Love and hatred are friends. I love my wife, and so I hate anyone who would seek to do something terrible to her. I love my kids, and so I hate anyone who would seek to do something terrible to them. If you love, you must hate.

Here are some things from Proverbs that God hates. Proverbs 8:36, “Whoever fails to find me harms himself.” If you don’t fear God, you’re gonna hurt yourself. “And all who hate me love death.” People who hate God love death. Proverbs 8:13, “To fear the Lord is to hate evil.” God says, “I hate pride, and arrogance, evil behavior, and perverse speech.” God hates those things. Proverbs 13:5, “The righteous hate what is false, but the wicked bring shame and disgrace.” Proverbs 6:16-19, “There are six things,” – we’re gonna do a whole series on this – “There are six things the Lord hates.” Here’s a list; seven things that are detestable to him: Haughty eyes, that’s pride; A lying tongue; Hands that shed innocent blood; A heart that devises wicked schemes; Feet that are quick to rush into evil; A false witness who pours-out lies; And a man who stirs-up dissention among brothers. God hates. We could do a lot of work on what God hates. Proverbs gives us a simple list of the things that God hates.

The reason I tell you this is because if God hates things, and God has enemies, and God judges and crushes enemies, that’s a God you should fear. You should be careful with that God. You wanna make sure you’re not one of those enemies doing things that he hates, seeking out his justice. Do you think God hates you? Do you think he hates you? If you don’t fear God, you despise knowledge of God. You’ve made yourself out to be an enemy of God. You’re rebelling against God. Does God hate you? You should tread carefully. You should tread very carefully. I am not God. I do not judge the human heart. But I will tell you this. The God in the Bible, I would not play with him. I would not play with that God. My biggest fear for you is not that you will be an atheist, but that you will create a picture of God that accommodates what you want. And you will collect verses to back that up. And you will build your own system of knowledge.

And you will worship an idol, and you will call it Jesus; a God who has no power; a God who has no authority; a God who has no justice; a God who has no strength; a God who sort of winks at evil; a God who is just like us. And the thing that I fear, I fear for those people who don’t fear God. If you don’t fear God, I fear for you. ‘Cause I hate you? No, ‘cause I care. I don’t want anyone in this room sitting in the wine-press of God’s fury at the end of the age. And the reason that we are able to escape that sort of fate is because that God also loves. That’s true. And see, if I begin with the love of God, and then I go to the justice of God and the wrath of God, do you see where it’s very backwards? If I just tell you, “God loves you. God loves you. God loves you. God loves you. And by the way, he judges sin.” You say, “Oh, my sin must not be that big of a deal.” But if I say, “God is just and holy and righteous and strong and powerful, and kills his enemies and sheds their blood. And he loves you.” You go, “Oh, thank God. Thank God.”

Now the love of God means something, doesn’t it? When your enemy loves you, that means something. Here’s what God loves, according to Proverbs. Proverbs 3:11-12, “My son, do not despise the Lord’s discipline, and do not resent his rebuke.” And if you feel like the Lord disciplines you, or occasionally rebukes you, you should, every time you read the scriptures – it says, “Don’t despise that, because the Lord disciplines those he loves as a father the son he delights in.” Well, that’s good news. How many of you have a great father that you really respect? Some of you do. If you have a great father who you really love and respect and honor, and your father comes to discipline you or to rebuke you, you should not hate or despise him. You should know that that same father who is at this moment pressing you toward obedience does so because he hates sin, and he loves you, and he does not want you to be doing something that he hates. It’s love.

God is that same way. Hebrews quotes this same verse, that God disciplines the sons that he loves. What that means is this: If you feel right now like you’re getting disciplined and you’re rebuked, what does that mean? That God loves you and he wants you to come to him as a father. So don’t despise that. You can’t say, “Well, I hate that. I don’t like that picture of God. I don’t like that way God deals with me. I don’t like to be disciplined. I don’t like to be rebuked.” That’s despising him. He says, “Trust me like a loving father, and come to me as an obedient child.” Proverbs 8:17 says, “I love those who love me, and those who seek me find me.” Proverbs 8:21, “I walk in the way of the righteous along the paths of justice, bestowing wealth on those who love me and making their treasuries full.”

How about this one? Proverbs 12:1, “Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge.” How hard is it for you to really develop a good understanding of scripture, and a good understanding of God. Is that work? It’s work, isn’t it? It takes time. It takes discipline. You’re not going to, in 15 minutes, pick-up the Bible, flip to your favorite part, read a few verses, and then have knowledge. It is going to take a lot of on-going, continual study, prayer, reflection, and learning to have any knowledge. Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge. Here’s the example I’d give you: What do you have to do to grow weeds? Nothing. You wanna tend a garden that has fruitful harvest? You’re gonna have to pull weeds every single day. You take a week or two off, you’re right back to where you started. It’s the same with the human heart. Every day you have got to pull weeds. You have got to prune. You have got to see that things are tended to. If you love that kind of discipline it’s because you love the fruit of knowledge.

People who wanna have a low view of God and a high view of themselves, people who want to not fear God, people who hate knowledge, people who hate wisdom, people who hate discipline, what do they have to do? Nothing; but you reap what you sow. And if you reap nothing, it’s because you’ve sowed nothing. If you love discipline it’s because you love knowledge. But he who hates correction is? I just love Proverbs. He’s stupid. You say, “Well, I’ve been studying, and I have this figured out.” Well, you need to correct your thinking on this. So the scripture says this, “Let me correct your understanding.” “Oh, I don’t wanna be corrected.” Why? “I’m stupid.” And we would never say that, but Proverbs does. As you become disciplined, and as you gain knowledge, do you see where you also need correction?

Now let me ask you this practically: Where does that correction come from? It’s probably going to come from brothers and sisters in Christ. If you sit in your room all by yourself and read your Bible, you will gain knowledge, but you won’t have it correct. You say, “Well, I don’t know why I should go to Bible study. I don’t know why I should have Christian friends. I don’t know why I should come to church.” Part of it is to give you knowledge, part of it is if you have knowledge to help you correct it. You’ll have a greater insight of God, and a greater knowledge, that has been corrected through friendship with people who love and know God. “The Lord detests the ways of the wicked, but he loves those who pursue righteousness. And through love and faithfulness, sin is atoned for.” That’s Jesus dying for us.

Proverbs says this: Fear God. Why? Because God hates, and God loves. My question to you is this: Do you love what God loves, and do you hate what God hates? If you do, there is a good chance that you fear the Lord, and you have wisdom and knowledge. If you hate some of the things that the Lord loves, and you love some of the things that the Lord hates, there is a problem in your understanding and fear of the Lord. You guys tell me right now, what does God love? Just what comes to mind Biblically? What does God love? God the Father loves the Son. We should love the Son. We should love what God loves. What else? God loves wisdom and knowledge, so we should love wisdom and knowledge. And wisdom and knowledge are hidden where? Colossians, “In Christ. In him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”

Here’s the key: You and I should not pursue righteousness, holiness, obedience. We should not pursue wisdom and knowledge. We should pursue Christ. And in Christ is hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. It’s cause and effect. It’s reaping and sowing again. In Jesus is everything. We could pursue all these things, or we could pursue Jesus. And as we pursue him, the effects are everything else. What else does the Father love? Humility. What else does the Father love? Obedience that comes out of love. Jesus says, “You love me? You’ll obey my commands.” The fear of God is big enough to include love.
What else? What’s that? That’s quiet, I couldn’t hear. The meek. You said it so quietly I couldn’t hear it. That’s beautiful. Do you see where a fear of the Lord is a change in the human heart, and a change in the understanding of God, and a change in the understanding of ourselves; so that what starts to happen is we love God, and we fear God, and we respect God. We take God seriously, not lightly. He’s heavy. That’s the whole concept of holiness. Holiness is a weightiness. God is heavy. You can’t make him light. And then what happens then is we fear God. We start to naturally love what God loves, and we start to naturally hate what God hates.

I’ll close in Proverbs 1. Here’s what happens. Here’s the effects. Okay? All I have talked to you about today is the fear of the Lord. One thing. Now, the fear of the Lord, though, has hidden in it a lot of treasures for you and me to mine. The fear of the Lord will change us and our lives and our culture and our families and our world, but we have to begin with a fear of a Lord. So, we’ll start in chapter 1:1. We’ll go back to where we started. The Proverbs – okay, let me – let me say this. Let’s do a little work here. A proverb is not a promise. As we get into Proverbs and you’re reading Proverbs, remember this: A proverb is not a promise. A proverb is an axiom or a truism. Alright? I’ll give you a proverb or an axiom from our culture, “Look both ways before you cross the street, so you won’t get hit by a car.” Okay, that’s an axiom. That’s a truism. Is that a promise? Some of you have looked both ways and gotten hit by a car, cause it’s not a promise, it’s a truism.

What it means is there’s a cause and effect relationship. If you do things this way, usually this is what happens. And so, in the same way, Proverbs are truisms; they’re axioms; they’re – they’re principles that are usually true, but they’re not guaranteed, fool-proof promises. Some parents have struggled with this. There’s one that says, “Train-up a child in the way they should go, and when they grow old they won’t depart from it.” And then, you raise a child in a Christian home, and then one of them – maybe you’ve got four obedient kids and one’s a total hellion. You know, a midget devil, eight years old, running around just creating havoc. You say, “Well, what happened?” Well, it’s an axiom. It’s a principle. It’s a truism, but it’s not a guaranteed promise. So, the Proverbs of Solomon – who’s Solomon? Solomon, by the way, didn’t write all the Proverbs. He wrote many. It tells in scripture that he wrote a total of 3,000 proverbs. He collected these along with the sayings of the wise, and a king, and a few other things.

Was Solomon a man who had wisdom? He was. He asked God for one thing. God gave him wisdom. Did Solomon fear the Lord? He didn’t, did he? He took for himself 700 wives and 300 concubines. Now, a guy with 700 wives – I still have not put together why he needs girlfriends. Many of those women did not worship the same God. They stole his heart from God. And the Bible at least alludes to the fact that, potentially, he was worshipping false gods; potentially participating in religions that even had child sacrifice. It’s – it’s a great irony that God gives wisdom to a man, and that man becomes proud because of his wisdom. And that leads to folly. And he no longer fears the Lord. I think Ecclesiastes is his book of repentance. He wrote three books of the Bible: Song of Solomon, Ecclesiastes, and Proverbs.
He is the son of David. His mamma was Bathsheba. You think he would’ve learned from that lesson. We’re gonna deal with this in Proverbs, how children should learn from the examples of their parents, positive and negative. Solomon came into the world because his dad murdered somebody and took his wife. Solomon did the same thing throughout the course of his life. He was the king of Israel. Here are the purpose of Proverbs: For attaining wisdom. If you fear God, here’s what comes: Wisdom and discipline and understanding words of insight. The Hebrew word there is “Discernment.” “If you fear God and you study his word,” – here we’re talking specifically about Proverbs, but I’d make that a principle that opens-up wider. If you fear God and study the scriptures, here’s what happens: You grow wise, you have discipline. What that means is you not only know what to do, but you do it. And you don’t do it occasionally, you do it habitually. It becomes just part of your DNA. It becomes part of your life.

And then, the consequence is that you have discernment. You’re able to look at things and figure out error, righteousness and folly, and wisdom and humility, and pride. You’ll be able to sort those things out. “For acquiring a disciplined and prudent life doing what is right and just and fair.” This will change your life. If you read scripture with a fear of God, then what happens is your life changes. You start being fair and doing what is right, and being prudent in all of your affairs. Because, as you fear God, like I said, you’re gonna tread carefully. You’re going to be prudent. You’re not going to be reckless and disobedient. You’re going to be very careful with your time and your money and your words and your family and your sexuality and your food and your alcohol, and all these other things we’re gonna get into. You’re gonna be prudent and discerning.

“For giving prudence to the simple.” Some of you here are very naïve, and very impressionable. You believe things. You get those e-mails from your friends, and you think that they’re true. Have any of you ever met someone who is really naïve, sort of gullible? That’s the word here. You say, “Well, what hope is it for them?” Well, if they fear God, God will start to give them wisdom. So, here’s the beautiful thing. You don’t have to be a genius to have wisdom. Some of the wisest people I know have the least amount of education. We live in a culture where it has misunderstood knowledge for wisdom. Knowledge means I have a lot of facts. Wisdom means I fear God, and I live in fear of God. And the issue is: You do not have to be a genius to have wisdom. You need to have a fear of God.

What that means is, simple, naïve, gullible people, people who are not going to win any Nobel Prize, they can still have wisdom. Isn’t that nice? Have you ever met somebody that was really simple, kind of naïve? Not going to teach at a university anytime soon? But, as you spoke to them you realized they feared God, and they had a lot of really important things to say, and you could learn a lot from them; because God had given them wisdom, and they feared him. To me that’s really good news. That means that we do not all have to have PhD’s and be geniuses to walk in fear of the Lord, and have wisdom. Some of us can be simple, regular folks who are wise. And knowledge and discretion to the young. What you’ll find in Proverbs is that Proverbs is written for little kids. And here’s why.
If you want to have knowledge and wisdom, when should you begin? You should begin when you’re little. The problem we have now, my mom is an attendance secretary at a public high school, and she says it’s unbelievable. She says that most of the teachers will not send any of their children to that school that they teach at, because they’re fearful for their children’s lives. And the issue is: Why – why don’t these kids have any discipline? Why don’t they have any discernment? Why don’t they have any wisdom? Why won’t they learn anything? Well, ‘cause they don’t fear God. Why don’t they fear God? Because from the time that they came out of their mother’s womb they were trained in a particular way of thinking. Right? You train a child in the way they should go, and when they grow old they will not depart from it. That’s positive and negative. That’s good and bad.

If you get someone out of the womb and you give them a very high view of themselves, and very low view of God, and you let that steep for a while, when they hit 17 or 18 they’re dangerous. And so, wisdom has to come when you’re little. Now, God in his grace may, for some of us, treat us like children and begin with us where we are even though we’re adults. But the best thing to do is to start when kids are little and get wisdom and a fear of God in them when they’re tiny. And then they have a high view of God and a low view of themselves, and they walk with humility. And then, when they hit 16, 17 or 18 we don’t have to put them on day-time talk-shows and talk about their terrible behavior. And so Proverbs are for the kids.

And one of the things I love about Proverbs, kids can memorize proverbs because they’re short, pithy statements, and most of them are antithetical in nature. Wise, foolish, fear of God, no fear of God, love, hate, evil, good – it’s all these parallels. And so I would tell you – how many of you are parents? Okay, here’s the deal. Teach your kids Proverbs. Teach them Proverbs about picking friends and fearing God, and walking in – teach them Proverbs. And – and sow these seeds of knowledge and wisdom in their soul when they’re little, so that as you’re sowing that, that you’ll reap wisdom, and fear of God, and knowledge when they’re older. So, it’s for the kids, for giving prudence to the simple, knowledge and discretion to the young. “Let the wise listen and add to their learning, and let the discerning get guidance.”

Do we have anybody here who’s been a Christian for more than 30 years? One, two – anybody more than 40? 50? Do I hear 50? 60? Okay, you’ll get there eventually. Okay, some of you have been Christians for a long time. The oldest in the room is somebody who’s known the Lord for 50 years. And I won’t put him on the spot, but what Proverbs guarantees is that if you’re wise and you’ve feared the Lord for a long time, and God has given you a lot of wisdom and knowledge, there’s still more to be had. Isn’t that good news? So, Proverbs is a really good book for little, tiny kids, and people who have loved the Lord for 80 years. That’s great news. I can’t think about – I can’t conceptualize anything that will give you this: Simple people made wise, little kids given understanding, people who are wise continuing in that vein. Proverbs guarantees that wisdom is something that starts when you’re little and it continues forever, because God is infinite.
And it is not that there are a sum total of things that can be known about God and will exhaust them. If God is infinite, when we get to heaven I believe we will spend eternity learning more and more about God as he reveals himself; that we are never done with God, because God is a bottomless well. We never hit the bottom. So he says, “For those who are wise and are discerning,” and some of you may be. Some of you are. Some of you that you do love God, and you have walked with him, and God has taught you a lot. The good news in Proverbs is, there’s more to be had. “And for understanding proverbs and parables and sayings and riddles of the wise,” that’s the interpretation and understanding of scripture.

And here, we’ll close where we begin, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.” All of this comes out of a deep reverence and respect for God. “But fools despise wisdom and discipline.” My final question: Do you fear God, or are you a fool? I’m going to press you into those categories, ‘cause that’s what Proverbs does. You either fear God, and that’s the beginning of wisdom, or you don’t, and that’s the beginning of folly. Here’s what I want you to do this week: I want you to begin to pray and ask the Holy Spirit to convict you if there is any portion of your heart that God does not yet have you fearing him rightly. And I want you to start there with a sobriety, and a sober-mindedness, and a humility, to pick-up Proverbs and to read them with a fear and a reverence and a respect for God.

At this point in our service we always respond. We respond with communion, remembering Jesus’ body and blood, shed for our sin. We respond with an offering, which if you’re not a Christian, or you’re a visitor, don’t give. And we respond with our life. We go forth, after we sing and celebrate, to ask God to teach us to fear him, and to learn how to walk with him wisely. If we’re naïve, we become wise. If we’re simple, we become wise. If we’re young, we become wise. If we’re old, we become wiser still.

Father God, thanks for a chance to study your word. Lord God, I confess for me it’s a hard, heavy word. And Lord God, I confess to you that this week I was terribly convicted of places where I had taken your grace very lightly; where I’d sort of winked at my sin and excused myself, and stacked-up my good deeds against my bad deeds and played this little game in my head. Lord God, thank you that you have spoken to us as a father does his children, to correct and to discipline. Lord God, I pray that you would give us all a health and reverent fear of you; that as we look at the cross and we see that you take our sin very seriously, and that our sin was placed on Jesus, and that you crushed and killed him in our place. Lord God, please cause us to have a deep respect for you, a very high view of you, and a very low view of ourselves. Lord God, may you fill us with wisdom and knowledge so that we may have a mighty fortress for our kids; that we may have prudence and discretion and discernment; that we may have long life; that we may have health and joy; that we may have all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge that are hidden in Christ. Lord God, we love you. Please keep us in your word, so that we could understand what is in there, by your spirit. Lord God, please keep it ever fresh, so that we may continually be brought to a place of humility and insight, which makes us strong. We love you, and we thank you, and we glorify you in Christ’s name; Amen.