A Word in Season: Two Wise Requests (Proverbs 30:7–9)

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Depending on where you live, this may now be the season for getting.

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Yes, it often masquerades as the season for giving, but too often it becomes the season for demanding, for expecting, for gathering.

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It's the season for feasting. It's the season for discontent for many.

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When adverts and other prompts stir up in our hearts an appetite for more, we tell ourselves that what we've got isn't enough or good enough, perhaps the children are badgering us, that famous pester power, or perhaps we ourselves are thinking that we are getting more or less than we might consider ourselves entitled to.

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In Proverbs chapter 30, a man prays in a way that should put our hearts at rest at such a season.

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His name is Agur, the son of Jaqay. He's not a stupid man, and that's why when he speaks he says, surely

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I am more stupid than any man. He's a humble man. He recognises his own lack of wisdom, because he is not

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God and is not as near to God as he wishes to be. And that's where true wisdom begins for Agur.

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And so when Agur prays, he asks two things that God would give him, and says, deprive me not before I die, remove falsehood and lies far from me, give me neither poverty nor riches, feed me with the food allotted to me, lest I be full and deny you and say who is the

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Lord, or lest I be poor and steal and profane the name of my God.

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Agur is wise enough to fear above all things sin, to hate above all things sin.

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And so when he prays to God, he prays not that he might just be an accumulator, and he doesn't pray that he would just be down in the doldrums and never have anything, any good thing that he might enjoy.

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He prays first of all, remove falsehood or vanity and lies far from me.

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Agur wants to go through this world recognising what is substantial, truly sweet and really lasting.

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So he prays, give me neither poverty nor riches. You might consider that a strange prayer.

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Agur does not want to be abundantly wealthy any more than he wishes to be abundantly poor.

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Rather, he wants what we might think of as his sufficient portion, the food allotted to me.

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Now, why does Agur not pray to be rich? It is not because he doesn't want the care of riches or the envy that often comes with it.

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And why does Agur not want to be poor? Not because he wants to be, doesn't want to be despised or trampled upon.

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Agur wishes to be not rich and not poor because he wishes to not sin.

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And he's conscious that when we become rich, when we're full of good things, there is a temptation to deny

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God and say, who is the Lord? To live out of an imagined self -sufficiency, to think of ourselves as if we have got, have accumulated, have stored up, have been given everything we might want.

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And then without any sense of thankfulness, without any sense of generosity, to rest upon our laurels and to lie upon the good things that we have received.

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On the other hand, if we are poor, we might be tempted to steal. We might resort to some unrighteous means to fill up what is genuinely lacking and in doing so profane the name of our

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God. That is, either live in a way that denies our true profession or even perhaps the sense might be to swear that we've done nothing wrong, to take an oath because we want to avoid the trouble that comes with our crime.

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And so Aga prays a straight and stable course.

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He does not want to be caught up with the vanities and the lies of this world. He doesn't want to be dazzled by the passing pleasures and the passing treasures of this life.

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He desires enough. Yes, we may be feasting. Yes, we may be giving.

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And yes, we may be getting. But if we are wise like Aga, if we are wise enough to know how stupid we are, if we're wise enough to understand that we don't know

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God as we should, then we should pray that we should not be let into falsehood and lies and that the

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Lord would give us neither poverty nor riches, that in all things in these days we may not sin.