Our modern western world is full of advice and help to live a better more successful, perhaps happier life. Self help books have given way to TikTok videos giving “life hacks” that will if followed be just what we need.
Not surprisingly these are not guaranteed and are more than likely to oversell their potential to really make a difference to our lives. The Christian has a far better source of advice and help for our lives in the Bible, which we believe to be God’s inspired Word, full of advice and guidance to enrich and give real meaning to our lives. During July we are going to dip into the book of Proverbs which is a part of what is called the Old Testament Wisdom literature.
Proverbs is introduced to us as “the proverbs of Solomon, son of David, King of Israel: To know Wisdom and instruction…” In addition to Solomon the book has gathered wise sayings from other writers and collectively they provide a rich and meaningful resource of God given advice to help us be good at life.
The purpose of the book is for its readers to know wisdom, personified in the book as Lady Wisdom. The Hebrew word for wisdom refers to the skill of living well in the midst of many situations and challenges of life. This wisdom however is not just an impersonal knowledge its an attribute of God himself. So to be wise is to seek to apply the practical and moral principles that God has created to govern His universe.
Wisdom we will learn is not a gift granted or bestowed to some and not to others, it is a learned skill. The Holy Spirit plays an indispensable and powerful role in a Christian gaining wisdom, but it is a skill we must pay attention to learning and developing. To do otherwise would says Proverbs render us as foolish.
These proverbs need to be understood in relationship to other scriptures and to what we know of the Lord Jesus. The purpose of the proverb is to get us to stop and think and in doing so to reflect on Jesus in whom the Apostle Paul tells us “all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden”