WWUTT 1294 Introduction to Proverbs (Proverbs 1:1)

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Proverbs 1 .7 says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction.

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We love God's wisdom that is given to us in the Scriptures, especially His Word in Proverbs when we understand the text.

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This is when we understand the text studying God's Word to reach all the riches of full assurance in Christ.

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Thank you for subscribing and if this has ministered to you, please let others know about our program. Here once again is

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Pastor Gabe Hughes. Thank you Becky and greetings everyone. I apologize for how weak my voice is.

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I am very congested. I decided to work in the garage yesterday and my allergies just exploded.

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Smart thing to do would have been to record the podcast before I did that. But anyway, pray that I'm able to clear up in the next day or two.

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You won't have to hear all the other stuff that comes with this congestion like sneezing, coughing and blowing my nose a lot.

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I will edit all of that out of the lesson that we are doing today. You're welcome.

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We are in Proverbs. We're starting a brand new study in an Old Testament book and Proverbs is where we are.

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Having finished up the Psalms, it will not take us as long to get through Proverbs as it took us to go through the

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Psalms. And we're going to do kind of an introduction to Proverbs today. But I think as a beginning,

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I'm going to read through the whole first chapter. This is Proverbs chapter 1, all 33 verses.

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The Proverbs of Solomon, son of David, king of Israel. To know wisdom and instruction, to understand words of insight, to receive instruction in wise dealing, in righteousness, justice and equity.

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To give prudence to the simple, knowledge and discretion to the youth. Let the wise hear and increase in learning, and the one who understands obtain guidance.

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To understand a proverb and a saying, the words of the wise and their riddles.

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The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, fools despise wisdom and instruction.

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Hear my son your father's instruction and forsake not your mother's teaching, for they are a graceful garland for your head and pendants for your neck.

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My son, if sinners entice you, do not consent. If they say come with us, let us lie in wait for blood.

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Let us ambush the innocent without reason. Like Sheol, let us swallow them alive and whole like those who go down to the pit.

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We shall find all precious goods. We shall fill our houses with plunder. Throw in your lot among us, we will all have one purse.

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My son, do not walk in the way with them. Hold back your foot from their paths.

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For their feet run to evil and they make haste to shed blood. For in vain is a net spread in the sight of any bird.

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But these men lie in wait for their own blood. They set an ambush for their own lives.

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Such are the ways of everyone who is greedy for unjust gain. It takes away the life of its possessors.

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Wisdom cries aloud in the street. In the markets, she raises her voice.

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At the head of the noisy streets, she cries out. At the entrance of the city gates, she speaks.

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How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple? How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge?

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If you turn at my reproof, behold, I will pour out my spirit to you.

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I will make my words known to you. Because I have called and you refuse to listen, have stretched out my hand and no one has heeded, because you have ignored all my counsel and would have none of my reproof,

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I also will laugh at your calamity. I will mock when terror strikes you, when terror strikes you like a storm and your calamity comes like a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you.

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Then they will call upon me, but I will not answer. They will seek me diligently, but will not find me, because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the

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Lord, would have none of my counsel and despised all my reproof. Therefore they shall eat the fruit of their way and have their fill of their own devices.

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For the simple are killed by their turning away and the complacency of fools destroys them.

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But whoever listens to me will dwell secure and will be at ease without dread of disaster."

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The first seven verses of Proverbs here really sets up our thesis. It kind of sets the tone of what this whole book is about.

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It's to know wisdom and instruction. And you have verse seven that says, "'The fear of the

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Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction.'" And that's a theme that you're gonna see continually throughout

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Proverbs. It's that contrast between the wise and the fools, the simple and those who desire knowledge.

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And knowledge and wisdom take work. It's not something that just comes automatically. It's not like, hey, if you just keep yourself from evil and you desire to do what is good, then knowledge and wisdom will come automatically.

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They take study and it takes analysis. It takes listening to somebody else.

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It takes being a student and obeying the teacher. It takes humility to really learn wisdom and knowledge.

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And you can have a whole lot of knowledge and not have wisdom. You can have knowledge and not be humble. For as the

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Apostle Paul said to the Corinthians, "'Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.'"

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So if we just store up knowledge, that can make us very prideful. Wisdom is that way in which we apply the knowledge.

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So you have the knowledge. You could just be a big library, just full of all the stuff, but it doesn't really have any application to you.

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Wisdom, therefore, provides the application. How do we live our lives in a way that is pleasing unto the

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Lord? And Proverbs really demonstrates that. Of course, you have these words that are delivered to a covenant people of God, speaking specifically to Israel.

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But we, of course, who are in Christ are covenant people of God. So there's application in this for every believer.

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As far as a message of salvation goes, you can't really lay out a doctrine of justification from the book of Proverbs.

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Fearing the Lord is certainly necessary for the believer, but Proverbs is more on the sanctification side than the justification side.

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So as a believer, as someone who loves God and desires to live life in such a way that is pleasing unto the

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Lord, that's where Proverbs is a big help. And here are some of the themes that you find throughout

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Proverbs. It speaks to being diligent, to working hard, avoiding laziness.

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There are Proverbs about friendship. There are Proverbs about loving others and doing justice and building each other up.

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You have Proverbs about how we conduct ourselves in our speech, speaking in such a way that can avoid conflict, that solves problems, that gives a sweet, encouraging word to somebody else, that is honoring

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God with our tongues. You even have Proverbs about marriage. Finding a wife is a good thing.

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You have Proverbs about being a good husband or being a good wife. Of course, the most famous passage in the

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Bible about being a godly wife is found right at the very end. It's the way Proverbs closes in Proverbs 31.

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You have Proverbs about raising up children in a godly way. So like, for example, if you go to Ephesians 6, where it says, fathers, train up your children in the instruction and discipline of the

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Lord. How do you do that? I mean, of course, training and instruction of the Lord, teach your kids the 10 commandments, teach them the gospel, you know, stuff like that.

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Of course, that's very important. But then you also have some practical applications found in Proverbs.

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The whole saying that we get, spare the rod, spoil the child.

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Have you ever heard that before? Well, that actually comes from Proverbs. It's kind of a simplification of a passage that you have in Proverbs.

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But the instruction to spank your children in guiding them to a proper way, showing them what is wrong and what is right.

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That instruction comes from Proverbs. You have instructions on how to keep peace with one another, even domestic peace, not just peace within your home, peace with your neighbors, peace within a nation.

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There are instructions here about national dealings. A king would be very, very wise.

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Any sort of leader or government official or somebody that has to make decisions for a lot of people, they can receive a lot of wisdom from Proverbs.

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You even have Proverbs about good manners. I'm a Southern boy at heart. I was born in South Carolina.

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We're currently in the process of moving to Texas. So I'm kind of getting back to the South again.

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And manners were a big deal in the South. I remember how much of an emphasis that my mom and dad put on having good manners.

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And we're teaching our children that same thing. It's kind of offensive in our culture now to say things like, yes, ma 'am and yes, sir.

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In a culture that is saying, you got to know what a person's pronouns are. Ask them what their pronouns, that's just the depravity of our culture, being given over to a debased mind.

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We don't even know what a man and a woman are anymore. And so saying yes, ma 'am and yes, sir can be offensive even in our culture.

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But I'm teaching my kids that you honor the Lord first. We are to speak in such a way that gives honor to God.

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And we find instructions regarding that even in Proverbs. In our home, as I'm raising up my children in the training instruction of the

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Lord, as my wife is doing the same, we actually have Proverbs around the house. There are various Proverbs that are written down on pieces of paper and they're all over our home.

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There was a certain Proverb that for a while there, my wife was teaching the kids every morning. And we have such wonderful passages that we use on a pretty regular basis, even within Christendom in the church that come from Proverbs, like Proverbs 3, 5, and 6.

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Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge him and he will make straight your paths.

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Now, even though I said that Proverbs doesn't really provide for us a doctrine of justification, nevertheless, we do have passages about eternity that's even here in Proverbs.

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And that wasn't so terribly common throughout the Old Testament. Certainly in the wisdom literature, it is there, including

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Job, Psalms, and Proverbs. By the way, Proverbs is part of the wisdom literature.

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I could have said that up front. In an introduction to the book of Proverbs, you wanna know what literature genre it fits into.

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Well, this is wisdom literature. And overall, the book of Proverbs teaches us that godliness is of value in every way.

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It teaches us how to live in a godly way. Now, you find that in other parts of the

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Bible as well, but certainly in the book of Proverbs. It is in Christ that we find all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

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Paul said that exactly in Colossians 2, 3. And to the Corinthians, he said, 1

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Corinthians 1, 24, to those who are called, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God.

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The book of Proverbs is the word of God. In fact, it's even the word of Christ. So we come to know living in a

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Christ -like way, even through Proverbs. 1 John 2, 5 says, whoever keeps his word in him, truly the love of God is perfected.

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By this, we may know that we are in him. Whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.

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And don't you think that Jesus would have walked even in his earthly ministry according to Proverbs?

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Yes, because they are his Proverbs. And that Jesus was even the wisest man who ever lived.

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Solomon was the wisest king there ever was until King Jesus showed up,

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God himself in human flesh. And then there was one that came who was even wiser than Solomon, that is

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Christ. And these are the words that came to Solomon from the Lord as we read in the book of Proverbs, the very word of God.

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Now, the date of the writing of the book of Proverbs, that's a little bit tricky. Solomon was in between 900 and 1000

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BC is when he lived, succeeding his father, David. And as we saw here, right at the beginning of Proverbs, the majority of these

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Proverbs are gonna be from Solomon. Just like most of the Psalms are from David, most of the

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Proverbs are from Solomon, but we have some other authors in there as well. You have the

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Oracles from Agur, you've got Lemuel. There is a group called the

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Wise, and there's also Proverbs that were copied by Hezekiah's men, that's written down at the start of chapter 25.

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The book of Proverbs, the way that we have it now, like as you read the book of Proverbs, how would all of these

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Proverbs have been compiled, especially considering that they were written by different men at different times?

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It was compiled probably during the time of Hezekiah. That seems like the most likely occasion in which these

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Proverbs would have been put together. There are skeptics and critics who wanna say that Proverbs was written much later, like when the

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Israelites were more under the influence of Persian and then later Greek thought, because it's the

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Persians and the Greeks that are considered to be the influencers in philosophy in about 500

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BC or somewhere in there. But Solomon's Proverbs preceded any of the major world philosophies that we consider in the realm of philosophy today.

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But Solomon was far before that. So even before guys like Confucius and Aristotle and Socrates and all of these famous names that we know from before Christ, even before they showed up,

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Solomon was giving Proverbs and it was the envy of the world over.

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There were kings and queens from everywhere in the world that would come to Israel to see how grand a place this was, the major highway that Israel was on.

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It was a significant trade route. So a lot of people came through there trading goods and Israel got very, very rich as a result of that in the time of David and especially in the time of Solomon.

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But in addition to the wealth was Solomon's wisdom. And there were many, many leaders from many different nationalities, ethnicities, kingdoms, empires, and so on that would come to the empire of Israel to hear and meet

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Solomon and hear him speak. His wisdom was legendary. And the Proverbs that we have that are written down here in the book of Proverbs supersede any other kind of wisdom in any other genre of literature in any other part of the globe.

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In 1 Kings chapter four, we read there about Solomon's wisdom. It says in 1

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Kings 4 .29, God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding beyond measure and breadth of mind like the sand on the seashore so that Solomon's wisdom surpassed the wisdom of all the people of the

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East and all the wisdom of Egypt. For he was wiser than all other men, wiser than Ethan the

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Ezra height and Heman and Kalkal and Darda, the sons of Mahal, and his fame was in the surrounding nations.

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He also spoke 3000 Proverbs and his songs were 1005.

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Where are all of these Proverbs and songs? Because they're obviously not in Psalms and Proverbs.

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Well, they would have been lost to the exile. There likely were compiled writings that existed during the reign of the

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Israelite and Judean kings through what we have as first and second Kings and first and second

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Chronicles. But then after the exile, a majority of those works would have been lost. The book of Proverbs as we have it here, once again was compiled sometime around the time of Hezekiah and this one single book was easier to keep track of than it was all the other writings that were probably spread out.

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So that's why we don't have record of all of the things that Solomon said, but it's very common throughout antiquity to hear legends of Solomon's teaching even beyond what we have in the

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Old Testament. It says in first Kings 433, Solomon spoke of trees from the cedar that is in Lebanon to the hyssop that grows out of the wall.

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He spoke of beasts and birds and reptiles and fish and people of all nations came to hear the wisdom of Solomon and from all the kings of the earth who had heard of his wisdom.

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And this was how far the fame of the word of God had gone out through the world, which he did through Solomon.

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Now, let me conclude here as we're finishing up our introduction to the book of Proverbs.

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Let's finish up with some main themes and like a good Baptist, I'm going to practice some alliteration here.

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So all of my themes begin with the letter C. Number one, comparison.

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We see a lot of comparison in Proverbs. In fact, it's very common for any kind of proverb to use comparison, even in many

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English proverbs. Like for example, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. That's not about how to catch birds.

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That proverb is about how it's better to have something and hold onto it than to let it go thinking that something better is going to come along.

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Or you have the statement, you can lead a horse to water but you cannot make him drink.

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That doesn't have anything to do with ranching. It's about how you can tell a person the truth but you can't make them believe it, right?

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So just like we have that in many English proverbs, we also see it throughout these proverbs here in the

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Old Testament. A common theme is comparison. Number two, contrast. We're regularly contrasting two different things.

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Probably the most common contrast in Proverbs is between the wise and the fool.

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So a wise man does this, a fool does this. And of course you want to be like the wise man, you don't want to be like the fool.

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Number three, context. Yes, there is context in Proverbs.

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Oftentimes you'll read Proverbs and think that there is no context. It's just every verse is a new proverb.

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But there is a context here. You heard the proverb or you heard the context obviously in chapter one.

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Once you get past chapter 10, establishing the context is a little bit more difficult but it's definitely there.

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And we'll talk about that as we get to some of those, what seem like one off Proverbs and we'll try to establish the context that's there when we get there.

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The fourth theme in Proverbs is concreteness. This is applicable to all people everywhere.

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Even though we're going to see some themes here that are cultural, I got another C word in there.

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Even though we'll see some things that are cultural and probably specific to the time period, you would think, well, that makes sense 3 ,000 years ago.

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I don't know that we would have worded it the same way now. But even though there's a time and a place in which these things are said, it's still universal wisdom.

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It can be applied to any people in any place because of course it is the wisdom of God. So that's the concreteness that you see throughout the book of Proverbs.

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Number five is contradictions. Now this is actually something I really love about Proverbs that the wise man is not afraid of a seeming contradiction.

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It looks like a contradiction, but it's really not. It's taking wisdom and applying it in what is the opposite circumstance.

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So the most common contradiction that we see in Proverbs 26, four and five is this one.

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Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest you be like him yourself. And then verse five, answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes.

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Well, is that not a contradiction? So answer not a fool according to his folly, but then it says answer a fool according to his folly.

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Well, the wise man is not gonna sit here and put those two Proverbs side by side and be like totally dumb to the fact that he just contradicted himself.

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There's a reason for the contradiction. The contradiction has wonderful application when it is said both ways.

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And again, I love that this is in Proverbs. It forces you to think, and it also shows the boldness by which these truths are being conveyed.

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The wise man, or especially God, does not have any problem with saying two things that look like he's contradicting himself because he has that much confidence in himself.

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There's no need to assume a contradiction. So that was number five. The last thing here, the last theme in the book of Proverbs is consequences.

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There are consequences for stupid behavior. And the verse that I use the most often to convey this is

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Proverbs 12, one, whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is stupid.

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If you hate correction, you become dumb. You are not wise. You are not knowledgeable.

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You are ignorant and prone to sin and foolishness and deception and being led astray and a whole other manner of evils that will lead to you perishing.

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So we understand wisdom and instruction because it is by the wisdom of God that we gain life.

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It is knowing Christ, the knowledge of Christ, the wisdom of Christ that you have salvation.

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Knowing Jesus is your salvation. And so God means for us to be a thinking people, to know him truly, but you can only understand these spiritual truths by spiritual means with the

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Holy Spirit of God in your heart. So let's pray for the Spirit of God as we embark on this study of the book of Proverbs.

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And we'll come back again to Proverbs 1 next week. Heavenly father, we thank you for the salvation that we have in Christ.

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And now being justified by your grace, I pray that in our sanctification, you give us wisdom, you give us knowledge and that we understand how to properly apply that knowledge, that it may be a benefit to others, that we show love and kindness to others, but most especially that we would fear the

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Lord and desire to walk in your ways. May we see a wise instruction given to us as to how we should live unto

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God in our daily and practical living. And that we not be afraid of what it is that we're going to read here, but we run to it with eagerness because we desire to be like our savior, whose words are written down for us here and even in the book of Proverbs.

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We thank you for your grace continually upon us daily and teach us to walk in your ways.

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In Jesus name we pray, amen. For more about our ministry, visit us online at www .utt