Sermon: The Faithful Way of Life

The Family as the God-Ordained Channel of Wisdom

If you would open your Bibles to the book of Proverbs, Old Testament, Proverbs chapter 4. We're in our series, Wisdom from Above. We're working through the book of Proverbs. We're in chapter 4 today. Chapter 4, verse 1, hear now the word of the living and the true God.

Hear, O sons, a father's instruction and be attentive that you may gain insight. For I give you good precepts. Do not forsake my teaching. When I was a son with my father, tender, the only one in the sight of my mother, he taught me and said to me, Let your heart hold fast my words.

Keep my commandments and live. Get wisdom. Get insight. Do not forget and do not turn away from the words of my mouth. Do not forsake her and she will keep you. Love her and she will guard you. The beginning of wisdom is this.

Get wisdom. And whatever you get, get insight. Prize her highly and she will exalt you. She will honor you if you embrace her. She will place on your head a graceful garland. She will bestow on you a beautiful crown.

Hear, my son, and accept my words that the years of your life may be many. I've taught you the way of wisdom. I've led you in the paths of uprightness. When you walk, your step will not be hampered. And if you run, you will not stumble.

Keep hold of instruction. Do not let go. Guard her, for she's your life. Do not enter the path of the wicked and do not walk in the way of the evil. Avoid it. Do not go on it. Turn away from it and pass on.

For they cannot sleep unless they've done wrong. They are robbed of sleep unless they have made someone stumble. For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence. But the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, which shines brighter and brighter until full day.

The way of the wicked is like deep darkness. They do not know over what they stumble. My son, be attentive to my words. Incline your ear to my sayings. Let them not escape from your sight. Keep them within your heart for they're life to those who find them and healing to all their flesh.

Keep your heart with vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life. Put away from you crooked speech and put devious talk far from you. Let your eyes look directly forward and your gaze be straight before you.

Ponder the path of your feet. Then all your ways will be sure. Do not swerve to the right or to the left. Turn your foot away from evil. Thus far is the reading of God's holy and inspired word. Let's pray together.

Lord, this is your word. You've spoken. This is your revelation to us. You're the Creator. You're God. We are just creatures. Lord, you know our frame. You know our weaknesses. You know our own brokenness.

And so we ask, God, as your people, we come today as your sheep. Please feed us. Speak by your spirit. Get the teacher, the minister, the pastor out of the way. Let these be the words from above. Your words.

Guide. Teach. Protect. Heal us. Renew us. Be glorified in how you transform us. In Jesus' name, amen. So chapter 4 is actually really interesting to me because chapter 4 is sort of recapitulating, going over again what's already been said in the previous chapters, but it comes with new emphasis, new instruction, more narrow focus in terms of details of the path of the wicked.

But what's interesting here about, as you look in the first number of chapters of the book of Proverbs, is that the Proverbs, the wisdom from above, this skillful wisdom, this skillful divine wisdom, the application of God's truth, God's knowledge, it comes to us in a really unique and I think such a powerful, beautiful way that actually confronts much of what we see out there in the world with the lost and those who don't know Christ.

There's something here in terms of how this is framed as divine wisdom coming from a father to a son. This is coming from the parents to the children. And I think it's so important because, and we're going to get into this a little bit today, what's being said to our world today is that you don't really need the parents.

That order that God created at the beginning of creation, where he makes male and female, they become one. God says, be fruitful and multiply. That first beautiful, glorious order and institution, the world today looks in at that revelation and says, not necessary.

That order, that sphere, that unit is not even really necessary. You don't have to have a father and a mother. You don't have to have the instruction of a parent. Maybe the community, the neighbors, the community will actually take over that responsibility of raising up these image bearers of God.

Maybe we just give them to the public school system where they can be discipled by them. Maybe we should give teachers actually the same authority in a child's life to give them doctrine, to teach them.

We're facing that today because ultimately there's a revolt against the pillars, a revolt against the foundation that God has spoken to us about. I think it's amazing because all of this wisdom, this divine wisdom from God in the book of Proverbs, initially comes to us as the instruction of a father to a son.

It's a powerful thing to think about in terms of how God views this impartation of divine wisdom as it comes first in this glorious place, this sphere, this unit that God had created, the family itself, mother and father, father to son.

And we want to today in Western culture throw off God's own order in every way. Think about it in terms of foundations. What wisdom comes to us as in Scripture is something that comes from father to son, right?

Father to son. Hear my instruction. Be attentive. Incline your ear to it. Don't forget it. Don't swerve off the path. That's where it comes. But we have today to face a total attack on the foundations of the created order itself.

We say no need for that sphere of mother and father and parent to child. No need of that wisdom relationship and that nurturing relationship. As a matter of fact, let's go to that created order where God creates that sphere, that beautiful sphere upon which he builds everything else, and let's attack even more of it.

Let's say that we're not creatures. Let's say that there is no God. Let's say that actually all of us are just cosmic accidents. Let's say that we can do what the deceiver was coming in to say, and that is no good and evil for ourselves.

Determine it for ourselves. We'll be our own little sovereigns in this world. And you know what? This whole thing of God creating male and female, is that really important? What if we could just create ourselves?

What if because we're the sovereigns and there is no creator, creation distinction, there is no God, what if we can be the self-determiners? We will say what gender we are. We'll say what is harmonious sexuality.

We will say because we are the sovereigns. But it's amazing. As wisdom comes, in the first part of the book of divine wisdom, it comes with instruction, and this can't be missed, that comes from a father to a son.

It is a parent relationship of the impartation of God's truth. God creates the family, and then God actually gives the family that role of imparting the knowledge of God to the children and raising them up to point them to divine wisdom and to divinity itself, God himself.

That's where this comes from. That's where it starts. This is the way that God made the world. He made the world in such a way as to have mothers and fathers loving, caring for, raising up image bearers, pointing them to God and giving them God's truth and giving them God's wisdom.

And so much, I want to just say this and move on, so much of what is divine wisdom, skillful application of God's truth. God's truth comes in, and then there's skills to apply it. But so much of it is not simply taught.

It is taught. You can't neglect that. It must be taught. It's taught here, father to son. Here, incline your ear. Don't turn away. It is taught, but a lot of it is actually caught. It's caught. Our children are catching this divine wisdom because they're seeing that life of God, that divine wisdom come from mom and dad into the world, and they're catching it.

They're hearing it, and they're catching it. They're seeing the fruit of it. It is taught, and it is caught. So many children, of course, can have the teaching of divine wisdom and then ultimately despise it.

Why? Because they hear it from mom and dad, but they don't what? See it. They hear it. They don't see it. It looks like pure hypocrisy. This is something you say you believe, dad, but you don't seem to really believe it because you don't actually practice it.

Now, moms and dads are going to fail because we're sinners being sanctified. Amen and hallelujah to that. But in terms of what our children should see from us, the instruction of a father to a son is, of course, verbal, but it's also something that they actually have to see, has to be visualized right in front of them.

And so we need both those things. But notice how this does this. I want to prove it to you and show you from the word. If you're in four right now, just turn back to chapter one. After Proverbs starts in chapter one, verse seven, where it says, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.

Fools despise wisdom and instruction. In chapter one, verse eight, it says this. Hear, my son, your father's instruction, and forsake not your mother's teaching. Well, that's countercultural there, isn't it?

Acknowledging there's a father, acknowledging there's a mother, and somehow they have the duty, the responsibility to actually instruct and to raise up. But that's how divine wisdom comes into the world.

It comes into the world, father, mother, to son, to daughter, to child. So hear, what's the call first? The beginning of wisdom is this. It's the fear of the Lord. Fools despise wisdom and correction.

And so it comes in with a plea. Hear, hear, my son, your father's instruction, and forsake not your mother's teaching. And then there's a promise of blessing. For they are a graceful garland for your head and pendants for your neck.

Chapter two, verse one, it does it again. Here's the start of it. My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you, making your ear attentive to wisdom and inclining your heart.

So you have it already now. We have ear and heart. Listen, incline your ear. Turn your heart to the side. Fall in love with it. Chapter two, verse one, is receive. So you have hear, you have receive. And then chapter three, verses one through two, it says, my son, do not forget my teaching.

Hear, receive, don't forget, don't forget. Don't forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments for length of days and years of life and peace they will add to you. In chapter four, verses one through five, it says, hear, oh sons, a father's instruction and be attentive that you may gain insight.

For I give you good precepts. Do not forsake my teaching. When I was a son with my father, tender, the only one in the sight of my mother, he taught me and said to me, let your heart hold fast my words.

Keep my commandments and live. Get wisdom, get insight. Do not forget and do not turn away from the words of my mouth. That's how it comes into the world. So clearly divine wisdom laid down, with this wisdom from above is coming in first and foremost, father to son relationship, mother to son, mother to child.

That's the way of the world. That's where wisdom is supposed to be imparted. That's where it actually begins. And we live, of course, in a time that wants to throw off God's order and God's commands and says this isn't even necessary.

And you know what's amazing about it is that you see so much in the first four chapters. We've spent so much time here in the first four chapters talking about different paths, the paths of the upright, the path of the wicked, the destination of the wicked, the honor of the upright and the dishonor of the wicked.

We've talked about where those paths lead. There is light and there is darkness. We've seen all of that. And so we can throw this all off. We could say there's no need for creator-creation distinction.

We could say there's no need for that order and that beautiful thing that God has created of mother, father and child. We could say it and we could say we'll go our own way. We'll build our own world our own way.

And the truth is that path is easy. Jesus talks about that. That door is easy to get through and that path is broad. There's plenty of space on it. And yes, there's a lot of people on that with you when you choose that route.

But along the way are the consequences of turning aside from God's own ways. You see that today. There are 18 .4 million children, one in every four children in the United States that are without a biological or a step or an adoptive father at home.

And it's amazing because you could just simply quote Scripture. Hey, if you throw off the mother-father, if you throw off that order and you say, I'll revolt against the foundations of the world that God instituted.

I'll throw it off. And you reject God's wisdom. You have to recognize that Scripture can just simply be quoted. This is the path. This is the destination. Here are the consequences. But you can throw it off and what you're going to see is the actual consequences that are available to anybody, for anybody to see.

These children, one in four, who do not have this order in the home to impart God's wisdom have a four times, four times greater risk of poverty. You don't have the dad in the home. You revolt against God's order.

Well, then you have to reap the consequences. You can reject Scripture and God's wisdom all you want, but you're going to feel it. It's coming for you. You'll feel it. You'll get the consequences and you're seeing them today.

You could just quote Scripture and get these statistics prospectively or you can just read them yourselves and see what's going on in the world today. Because we revolt against God's order, children who have no father in the home, that order is done away with, are more likely to have very serious behavior problems.

There are two times, this I found very interesting, two times greater risk of infant mortality if you take the father out of the home. Homes without fathers have a two times greater risk of infant mortality.

You are far more likely to go to prison without that order, without the father in the home, that father speaking to the son. You are far more likely to commit crime when you have no father speaking to the son saying, hear, incline, receive, treasure up.

Seven times more likely to become pregnant as a teen. Far more likely to face abuse and neglect. Far more likely to abuse drugs and alcohol. Two times more likely to suffer obesity and two times more likely to drop out of school.

We can keep going. You can keep going. But we can go into the inner cities. We can go into the places where there is this epidemic of father-less-ness. No father saying, incline your ear to my teaching, son.

You could go there, see the father-less-ness, and you could see all the consequences. You could see the economic devastation. You could see the poverty. You could see the hunger. You could see the drugs.

You could see the alcohol. You could see the violence. But the amazing thing is this. It's precisely what the Book of Wisdom says. I mean, you could walk into any number of these cities that's been totally destroyed through humanistic thought, secular thinking, unbelieving thought, throwing off God's wisdom.

You could walk into any of these cities and you could read the first five chapters of the Book of Proverbs and say, this is exactly what it said would happen. It's precisely what happens when you try to throw off God's ways, God's truth, and God's wisdom.

Father to son, incline your ear, incline your heart, receive this teaching. Don't turn aside from it. Treasure it up within you. There's the call. Father to son, wisdom son, wisdom daughter. Receive this truth from God.

And this, of course, is thematic throughout the entire Bible. You would expect it to be so because this is a divine revelation. You're going to see that consistency. You know this one. Go to Ephesians, New Testament.

Ephesians chapter 6. This is a famous one. This is like every child's first life verse. Mom and dad make sure this one's buried, right? Ephesians chapter 6, verse 1. It says, Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.

And here's the quotation. Honor your father and mother. What's that from? The Decalogue. The Ten Commandments. Exodus 20, verse 12. And it says this. This is the first commandment with a promise. In other words, it's the first commandment that God gave in the Decalogue that came with the promise of blessing.

And you see it again in the book of Proverbs in those first few chapters. You see exactly that. Here's the promise of life. Here's the promise of blessing. Here's the promise of peace with obedience to the Father's instruction.

It says that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the lands. So this again is thematic. And I just want to speak to the kids in the room right now. This is the benefit of having, by the way, a family-integrated church is I can assume the same things that Paul assumes here in Ephesians 6, and that's that the children are in the room under the hearing of the Word with the parents.

Amen? Yes? Okay. Kids, there is a natural tendency that we have as sinners to revolt against the instruction and the wisdom of our parents. There's a natural tendency. Mom and Dad have been given the duty by God to point you to God, that you would know Him, that you would know His gospel, that you would know His wisdom.

They've been given that duty and instruction, and let's face it, they blow it a lot. Amen, kids? You're all afraid to yell at me. Hey, you can say, Pastor Jeff gave you permission, right? Okay. Look, we all understand your mom and dad are saved by Jesus.

They're not perfect. But the words that they're giving to you are not their words. They're words from God. Obedience to my mother and my father's instruction that is from God is actually obedience to God.

Obeying my mother and my father is actually obeying God. Because God put them in the place to give me His truth, to point me to Him and to give me His wisdom. But there's this natural tendency as sinners that we have to sin against God's law.

Now that happens with husbands too. Husbands not loving their wives the way that they're called to. There's a natural tendency because of our own sin to revolt against that command to love my wife, to treat her as the weaker vessel, to lay my life down for her like Christ lays His life down for the church.

There's a natural tendency with wives to resist the command to submit to your husbands and everything. Amen, ladies? I'm just joking. I'm just going to get all of us. You get my point. All of us, because we're still being sanctified, because we're sinners, we revolt at times with sinful hearts against God's order, against God's ways, against God's wisdom, against God's truth.

Now if you know Christ, your heart is grieved over that. God's spirit convicts you of your sin. You're being formed and renewed into the image of Christ. All of that. But kids, you have to recognize something and be willing to repent of it and put it to death.

When my mother and my father are giving me truth and they're giving me commands that are actually commands that God has given, I have to recognize my own sinful tendency to want to revolt against the authority of mom and dad.

However, what's the promise that God gives to us with our parents when they give wisdom from God and God's instruction? What's the promise? Long life? Blessing? A record of honor? All of that is there from God.

And so we have to recognize that these are God's words and not ours, moms and dads. And so when mom and dad are imparting divine wisdom, recognize that's the way God made the world. You and I come into this world as little ignorant, fallible sinners and God places above us in Christian homes mothers and fathers who love God and impart God's truth, God's way, and God's wisdom.

To obey mom and dad is to obey God when they're giving the very words of God. So recognize that when God's wisdom is coming in, book of Proverbs, it's coming by way of father and mother to child. That's how God gives this course.

It is wisdom from above that comes from mom and dad. And so the call is, receive it, incline your ear, incline your heart, treasure it up, lay hold of this tree of life. That's the call. Now, back to chapter 4.

In chapter 4, you see the command in the first 9 chapters, sorry, 9 verses. The command is the same as was given before. It's the same. It's repeated in a new way. The inclination of your heart, holding fast to these commandments, pursue that wisdom, get the insight.

But look, it says this again. That constant reminder. Do not forget. Verse 5. Don't forget. Because as sinners, we have a tendency to forget. Do not turn aside. Don't turn away from the words of my mouth.

Do not forsake her. There she is again. Personified as a woman. Don't forsake her, and she'll keep you. Love her. She'll guard you. The beginning of wisdom is this. Get wisdom! And whatever you get, get insight.

Prize her highly. She'll exalt you. She'll honor you if you embrace her. And here it is again. Wisdom beautifies us. She will place on your head a graceful garland. She'll bestow on you a beautiful crown.

This isn't stuff that's just practical on the outside. Out there in the world with paths of peace and light and righteousness. It's stuff that actually beautifies you. When you lay hold of this tree of wisdom, this tree of life, God makes you beautiful.

He gives you this legacy of honor. But in chapter 4, verse 10. Come with me here. In chapter 4, verse 10, just to verse 19. Look at this. It says, Hear, my son, and accept my words, that the years of your life may be many.

Hey, where'd you read that? Decalogue. Where'd you read that? Ephesians chapter 6. Where'd you read that? Throughout the book of Proverbs, that promise of if you stay on this path of wisdom, it is life and blessing.

Literally years of life and blessing. I've taught you the way of wisdom. I've led you in it. Here it is. The paths of uprightness. When you walk, your step will not be hampered. And if you run, you will not stumble.

Keep hold of instruction. Do not let it go. Guard her, for she's your life. Do not enter. Here it is. The path of the wicked. And do not walk in the way of the evil. Avoid it. Do not go on it. Turn away from it.

And pass on. For they cannot sleep unless they've done wrong. They're robbed of sleep unless they have made someone stumble. For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence. But the path of the righteous is like the light of day which shines brighter and brighter until full day.

The way of the wicked is like deep darkness. They do not know over what they stumble. Look at how it describes the wicked there. They eat the bread of wickedness. They sustain. Listen. They sustain themselves with wickedness.

Like we eat food. Luke's the worst. If you don't feed Luke at particular times of the day, he becomes the wicked. Just kidding. Cheryl knows. She's smiling right now. Luke is on a very regimented food schedule.

You know when Luke needs to eat because he just starts to sort of like like the robot sort of like loses the power and the energy. You see it in his eyes and everything else. Like he needs food at certain times of the day to sustain him.

You got to get him some protein. Make sure you have some snacks for Luke. Traveling on ministry trips is important. You got to make sure you have the right snacks in his bag and all that stuff because he needs food to sustain him.

But this actually says they eat the bread of wickedness. They sustain themselves with wickedness. That's how they actually carry on. That gives them energy. They sustain themselves with the bread of wickedness.

And look at this. And drink the wine of violence. They are intoxicated by violence. But notice what it says. You've got a path of the upright. The way of the wicked. Scripture does this. It's again, it's a constant theme.

Throughout scripture is the constant theme. You see it in the book of Proverbs. You see it throughout the Psalms. You see it in the teaching of Jesus and the teaching of the apostles. This emphasis upon the path, the way.

What do you want? The path of the way. It's interesting because just in the book of Proverbs, take a look. If you go back to chapter one, move over to chapter one to the left. Chapter one, verses 10 through 15.

Look at how it starts. My son of sinners entice you. Verse 10 of chapter one. Do not consent. If they succumb with us, let us lie in wait for blood. Let us ambush the innocent without reason. Like Sheol, let us swallow them alive and hold like those who go down to the pits.

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. My son, do not walk in the way with them. There it is again. The way with them.

Hold back your foot. Here it is. From their paths. You know, you could look at something like this and you could say, what is this archaic nonsense? These words written thousands of years ago by a bunch of goat herders kicking rocks around in the desert.

Like, who needs these words today? These words actually were very important and true just about, what, two years ago, a year ago, where this whole nation and many cities across the nation was up in flames.

People having their stores broken into. People being violated. People being raped. People being murdered without cause. Literally, people going out into the cities saying, this is our moment. This is our moment where we can actually get a bunch of stuff.

We'll do it together. We'll run into these stores together. We'll collect everything. We'll have one purse together. We'll lie in wait for people without cause. We'll destroy strangers. So you can look at these words and say, all this talk about the path of the wicked, this darkness, all these violence, all these are archaic words.

Archaic words that would have saved a lot of people just two years ago. Just two years ago. These are the words of God. And isn't it amazing? Humanity hasn't changed much in thousands of years. Same problems of sin.

Same inward problems. Same lack of wisdom. You see it. So that was chapter one. Now just look over at chapter two. Again, it was a recapitulation. Going over it again. Chapter two, verse six. For the Lord gives wisdom.

From his mouth come knowledge and understanding. He stores up sound wisdom for the upright. He's a shield to those who walk in integrity. And here it is. Guarding the paths of justice and watching over the way of his saints, you will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good, what?

Path. Look at verse 12. Delivering you from the way of evil, from the men of perverted speech who forsake the paths of uprightness. You're seeing a theme, a divine theme about the way and the path. Chapter three, verse 23.

Then you will walk on your way securely and your foot will not stumble. Chapter six, verse 23. For the commandment is a lamp and the teaching is a light and the reproofs of discipline are the way of life.

Chapter 12, verse 28. In the path of righteousness is life and in its pathway there is no death. So we can keep going with this. But you're seeing this theme in scripture of the path of the wicked, the path of the upright, the way of the wicked, the way of the upright.

You see it everywhere. You can look also, let's go to Psalm. Psalm 119. This one many of you already know. Psalm 119. Let's go ahead and read the whole chapter. Look at all those theology nerds. You knew.

Longest chapter in the Bible. Psalm 119, 105. You already know this. Most of you don't even have to actually go there. Your word is a lamp to my feet and what? And a light to my path. It's everywhere.

It's throughout the Bible. This emphasis upon the path or the way of the upright and the wicked. There is light and there is darkness. And this is interesting because I think this is always relevant. It's always true.

But in the modern age, if you're living in the city or living in town today because of all the amazing advancements that ultimately Christianity and Christian thought has brought into the world by way of science and technology, not many of us have to deal with that deep, deep darkness.

There's always some light somewhere. Lamp posts, lights at home, lights around the neighborhood, lights, street lights, lights in the grocery store parking lot. There's just light always. Even in the darkness of night, there's light all around us.

And so we don't have to deal with this deep darkness very much. I remember a couple of years ago I was bringing my son back from school in Moscow, Idaho. He was coming back down and so Carmen and I went up together.

I drove the U-Haul and it was like a 20-some-odd foot U-Haul and Carmen drove behind me with my son following us in the U-Haul and there was this snowstorm when we were coming back. So we're driving back from Idaho.

We had to go because of the snowstorm to Oregon, back to Idaho again, down through Utah, through Nevada, and then back into Arizona. So the first day we were driving like 14, 15 hours total. And I'm driving this massive truck through a snowstorm in some parts of the drive.

But as we started to get into Utah, it started to get really dark. And interestingly, Utah, if you go to Salt Lake City, like Draper, Sandy, some of the most, Mormons make some amazing neighborhoods and communities, they really are.

Organized, beautiful, and all that. But I think someone forgot to tell the Mormons when they were building Salt Lake City that they might like some lights on the freeway. And so we're coming into Utah, coming into Salt Lake, and this was actually the same time that my daughter Imogen was giving birth to Eve.

So I'm driving in this massive truck and there's a snowstorm in now Salt Lake. It's nighttime and for some reason they forgot to put lights on the road coming from north to south into Salt Lake. The road is completely covered in snow.

I can't see in front of myself. It is pitch darkness outside and there are no lights. Even the lights coming from my truck are not really penetrating. I'm on the phone with my daughter Saylor. She's in the hospital room while my daughter is giving birth.

There's major problems with the birth. They're calling a code blue for Eve and a code blue for Imogen. So it's a horrifying experience where I am in deep darkness driving this massive truck. I cannot see the path in front of me at all and I'm terrified now because something really is going wrong with the birth of my granddaughter.