Wisdom, Power and Salvation

If you have your Bibles with you, please open them to Proverbs. Proverbs Chapter two. Proverbs Chapter two. I thought it would be November before we get to continue in our series, but as it turns out, everyone was gone today, so you get stuck with me again. Proverbs Chapter two, beginning at verse nine, will continue. We're continuing our series the Gospel according to Proverbs, and really today we get to see why I've titled the series this way. In the first chapter, there is an introduction to wisdom, to the purpose of Proverbs and the wisdom of Proverbs. Here in chapter two, we've seen where the father turns to his son and begins to make this plea. He's teaching his son about the message of wisdom and then calling his son to respond to this message of wisdom. We've seen as we've continued through this series that this is not just about fathers and sons, or parents and children. This is about all of those who have come to a place of wisdom, who turn again to disciples and to teach and to encourage those who have not yet come to that place of wisdom. And today what we'll see is that this is not just about wisdom. This is about salvation. I've tried to make the point again and again and again that the Book of Proverbs is not just about acquiring information so that we can be wise, because wisdom is not just about the act position of information. If you'll remember, we're working from a definition that wisdom is the righteous application of true knowledge, the righteous application of true knowledge, not just the application of knowledge. Amen, you can apply knowledge. A man can take a knife or a scalpel and apply knowledge to kill another man. It's an unrighteous application. Or a man can take a scalpel and apply knowledge to save another man. Both are the application of knowledge. One is the righteous application of knowledge, and the other is the unrighteous application of knowledge. So wisdom is not just applying knowledge. It is the righteous application of knowledge, and it is the righteous application of true knowledge. Not all of the things that we know are true. There are things of which we are most certain, and those things, in some cases are wrong. Talked often about the fact that we have this. We had this this satellite radio, and loved the satellite radio because of some of the programs that we're on, and talked about this at the conference this week, and one of the programs on there, one of the channels on there is was the old time radio, and we would listen to these old radio broadcasts, these old radio dramas, and there are a lot of these radio dramas from the thirties, forties and fifties that became television shows, but they were radio dramas first, and we listened to the radio dramas and the kids would get excited about it. They love it. When we were on a long drive, we'd always do this. And one of the things that was so ironic and funny and not funny was that they also had the old commercials on these old radio dramas. And I'll never forget the first time heard a commercial for a cigarette company and they had a doctor as their spokesperson, a physician, a physician, because physicians back in the day used to recommend that people use cigarettes because they were applying the knowledge that they had, knowledge that turned out to be absolutely wrong. So again, wisdom is not just the application of knowledge. It is the righteous application of knowledge. It is not just the righteous application of knowledge, it is the righteous application of true knowledge. All of those things have to be present in order for us to be considered wise. This is why I've advised against the most common use of proverbs, which is to just run to the proverbs, bring them, kicking and screaming out of their context in order that we can somehow have a better life and be better people because we've found these pearls of wisdom. Those pearls of wisdom can be helpful and can be useful, but they have a greater goal. And today we see that greater goal. As we look at Chapter two, verses nine through fifteen, and look at wisdom and power and salvation beginning of verse nine, then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good path for wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul. Discretion will watch over you, understanding will guard you, delivering you from the way of evil, from men of perverted speech, who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in the ways of darkness, who rejoice in doing evil and delight in the perverseness of evil, Men whose paths are crooked and who are devious in their ways. Here is the picture of the Gospel and the picture of salvation. One of the things that we learn from unwise people is how we ourselves used to be. We don't really understand it until we turn around and see it in another For example, when you look at children, children believe that they can do anything that they see. Children at a certain age absolutely believe that they can swim. Why because they see people swimming. Can you swim? Of course I can swim. All you have to do is this. They see someone riding a bike. Can you ride a bike? Of course I can ride a bike. All you have to do is get on and do your feet like this. Can you drive a car? Certainly I can drive a car. I see Mom and Dad driving the car. All you have to do is get behind the wheel and do this. Ah, the simplistic confidence of children. Amen. That's the way that we look at the Book of Proverbs. We believe that we can be of course I can be wise. All you have to do is take this proverb and take this proverb, and there you go. But the wisdom of Proverbs is not as simple as you think, nor is it like the child. Because the child eventually can learn to swim, can learn to ride a bike. Eventually, the child can learn to drive a car. But you and I can never learn to be the wisdom of Proverbs. The wisdom of proverbs and acquiring the wisdom of proverbs is not about you lacking information. It is about you not being able to get there from here. This is not about you learning how to drive or ride a bike. This is not about you learning how to swim. This is about you learning how to fly or how to breathe underwater. You can't get there from here. Now you can approximate this. We can create planes. But creating a plane and riding in a plane will give you the sensation of flying, but you're not flying. You can put on scuba gear and you can go into the depths of the ocean, and you can stay there for a while, but you are not breathing underwater like a fish. You are merely approximating something. And when we just rip the proverbs out of context and begin to apply them to our lives, we may see a little success. But you're like a person who is riding at a plane who's deceived into thinking you can fly. You can't get there from here. And in this portion of the proverbs, we see the difference. When you look at this in its context, and when you look at all of chapter two, what you see is that there's a pattern here you see if then, or more particularly, you see if if then four, then four. That's the pattern. If if then four, then four sounds like a phone number. Right Look with me in chapter two, beginning of verse one, and you'll see three if clauses we don't get the then until verse five. Look at chapter two, verse one, my son, if you receive my words verse three, Yes, if you call out for insight verse four, if you seek it like silver, if if if, and whenever you see if then you look around for then amen, because it's if then Right now we get to verse five. Then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. But Solomon doesn't just give us if then, he gives us if then four. In other words, if you do this, then you get this. But I don't just want you to know the if and the then. I want you to know the why. And this is essential to understanding the Book of Proverbs and understanding why I talk about the Gospel according to Proverbs. Look again, he says, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. Why verse six four the Lord gives wisdom from his mouth, come knowledge and understanding. He wants to be clear here, this is not just about you son, listening to the proverbs, collecting the proverbs, and then applying the proverbs so that you can be a better business man. Because the proverbs just exist out there in the universe somewhere. There is one who is wise, who is the source of wisdom, and when you find wisdom, you find him, and he is God. That's why. That's why God is the source of wisdom. And that's what we looked at the last time. But he puts an even finer point on it, because there's another then four clause, and that's the one we find today. If verses one, three, four, and then verse five four, verse six, now verse nine, then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good path. This is more the last then right, look at verse five again. Then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. There's the principle. Now he's going to apply the principle. Verse nine. Then you will understand righteousness, justice, equity, and every good path. You seek wisdom, and you're going to find God when you find God. Now, all of a sudden, you've found righteousness. Why verse four for wisdom will come into I'm sorry Verse ten, for wisdom will come into your heart. If then four, then four. Here's his point. If you will listen, if you will seek, if you will treasure, then you find God. Why because God is the source of all true wisdom. But I'm arguing that. Now he goes even a step further, and now he says the reason is because you will not just find God, but you will find salvation. God will save you. This is a wonderful and beautiful picture of the Gospel. This makes it very clear that Proverbs is not just a collection of pieces of information that we use to get what we want, but Proverbs is a picture of the Gospel. The Old Testament doesn't have a completely foreign theology. The Old Testament has the same theology, and in the New Testament we're just further understanding and developing that theology. As one theologian has said, in the Old Testament, it is not as in the New Testament. Rather, it is not as though the furniture has been moved. The furniture has always been in the same place. It's just that in the New Testament the lights are turned on so that you can see it. The picture of salvation was all ways there. The picture of the Gospel was always there. It is not as though in the Old Testament it is do these sacrifices, and these sacrifices will make you righteous. Do these sacrifices, and these sacrifices will take away your sin. Learn these proverbs, and these proverbs will make you wise. And then all of a sudden, in the New Testament there's a different theology. Actually, now you don't need that anymore. You need something else. No, in the New Testament, we don't say, ah, those sacrifices, you know, no, no, no, no no. Those sacrifices pointed to something. They pointed to the person and work of Christ. It was never the blood of bulls, lambs and goats that saved. They only pointed you forward to the lamb of God, who would be sacrificed so that we might be saved when God poured his wrath out on him. In the Old Testament, you were saved by faith in the Savior to come. But now you're saved by the faith in the Savior that has come. Not a different theology. The furniture was always there. It's just that now the lights are on and in the Book of Proverbs. We see here the same thing, this connection between wisdom and power and salvation and the New Testament. It sounds like this Second Timothy three fourteen and fifteen. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it, and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. Did you catch that? Let me read it again again, tewod Timothy three fourteen and fifteen. But as for you, Paul says to Timothy, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed. What is he referring to. He's referring to the Old Testament, knowing from whom you learned it, and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which is what the Old Testament we believe you can't write. It's the Old Testament which are able to make you wise. What part of the Old Testament is that? That's the wisdom literature? What's the height of the wisdom literature? The proverbs able to make you wise for salvation, not just through them, but salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. They make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. That's the purpose of the Book of Proverbs, not just to make you wise full stuff. These sacred writings make you wise and point you to salvation that is found only in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Not only that, but here in this text we see a full Lord picture of the doctrine of salvation, starting with the regenerating power of God. Believe that's what we see there in verse ten. Remember if if, if, then four, then four. Let's look at it one more time. There's three ifs verse one. If you receive my words verse three, if you call out for insight verse four, if you seek it like silver, then there's the then four in verses five and six. Then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. You look for wisdom, and you found God, because the God is the source of all wisdom. Verse six. Four. The Lord gives wisdom from his mouth. Come knowledge and understanding. Now the last then four verses nine and ten. Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity. Every good path will get to that. In a moment. But first I want you to see verse ten, why is it that you have that? For wisdom will come into your heart. For wisdom will come into your heart. Who's the source of wisdom? God, Who's the personification of wisdom? God who is the wise son of Proverbs, God, the son the Lord Jesus Christ is the wise son of Proverbs. And here he says, won't you won't just find wisdom, You won't just know wisdom. Here in the Old Testament, in the Book of Proverbs, he says, wisdom will come into your heart. You will commune with wisdom. Wisdom will enter you. Wisdom will come a part of you. Wisdom will not just be a separate thing from you that you will draw from from time to time when you need it. Wisdom will in dwell you and transform you as it in dwells you. This is a picture of the regenerating power of God in salvation. The God of Wisdom will save you. This is not just a New Testament concept. In Ezekiel, chapter thirty six, Verse twenty six, I will give you a new heart and a new spirit. I will put within you, and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. This is the picture that we see when in Ezekiel he speaks the valley of dry bones, and those dry bones come alive, and those dry bones live, which is a picture of regeneration. It's a picture of being born again. Jeremiah twenty four to seven. I will give them a heart to know that I am the Lord, and they shall be my people, and I will be their God. For they shall return to me with their whole heart. God changing the hearts of his people and calling his people Israel to himself Jeremiah thirty one. Turn there with me, if you will, And there is a picture here of the new Covenant Jeremiah thirty one. Beginning in verse thirty one. Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the House of Israel and the House of Judah. Not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke though I was their husband, declares the Lord. For this is the covenant that I will make with the House of Israel after those days, declares the Lord, I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, know the Lord. For they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin. No more do you see the development here. I'm going to give them a new heart. They will seek me with their new heart. They will know me. With this new heart. I will be their people, and they will be my God. Because of this new heart. There is this new heart, this regeneration, and this new covenant relationship that happens when God invades the heart Luke six point forty three. Jesus answered them, truly, truly, I say to you, unless you are born again, you cannot see the Kingdom of God. This is the picture of regeneration, this new heart that God gives, this removing of our heart of stone. You see the reason that we can't just use the Book of Proverbs without being changed and transformed is because unless we have this new heart, we kind of we cannot even see the wisdom of Proverbs. We cannot comprehend the wisdom of Proverbs. Yes we can approximate it. But when we approximate it, we're sitting in an airplane swearing that we're actually flying. We're riding in a submarine, swearing that we're actually breathing underwater like a fish, and we are not. You can't get there from here. You must be born again. Your heart must be changed. And this wisdom of Proverbs, and the wise God who is the wisdom of Proverbs is the one who invades your heart and changes your heart and exchanges your heart again. This is the terrible problem with legalism and moralism. Legalism and moralism look at the wisdom of Proverbs like a child watching someone swim, or watching someone ride a bike, or watching someone drive a car. And the lost man, dead in his soul, looks at the righteousness of God and the righteousness of Christ and says, I can do that. All I have to do is just try hard enough. I can swim. You just have to do this. I can drive, you just have to do this. I can be righteous just like Jesus. You just have to make this choice and not that choice, and your heart is dead, and you are far from God, and you have absolutely no idea that you can't get there from here. But the adversary would love for you to think that you could. Two verses one through nine. And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the year, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and of the mind. And we're by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. That's who we were. And unless and until you've come to faith in Christ, that's who you are. You are dead and your trespasses, You are dead in your sins. But it's worse than that. You're not just dead. You're a zombie. You think you're alive. You're a dead man walking and people look to you and they tell you, come to Christ and be saved, come to Christ and truly be alive. And you're a dead man who's walking around, who doesn't even know that he's dead, And you swear that you are. Why would I need to be made alive? You say, of course I'm alive. Not only am I alive, I'm enjoying life. But you are not. You are a child of hell and you are headed for destruction, and you don't even know it. You are completely and utterly blind to the fact that you are dead and under the power of the Prince, of the power of the air. You are dead to God. You are dead to righteousness, You are dead to wisdom. You are so dead that you can't even hear the cry of the ones who are saying, come alive. You are so dead that you are sprinting headlong toward the grave, and you don't even realize it. You are so dead that you can't even heed the very words of life unless and until God and his wisdom invades your dead heart. Ah the next words in that passage and Ephesians. But God. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, made us alive together with Christ. This is what God does. God makes us alive. God invades our hearts through his regenerating power. Oh, beloved, not desire for you is that God would make you alive, that he would open your eyes and allow you to see that you are dead in your trespasses and dead in your sins. This is the father's passionate desire for his son and the book of Proverbs, not just that his son would cherry pick some of the proverbs and try to live by them, but that his son, through seeking and desiring wisdom, would find God, and that God would invade his heart and make him alive. Not only the regenerating power of God, but we also see the sanctifying power of God here. We see that in verse nine, then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity and every good path. Then when when when your heart is invaded by wisdom, and then in verse ten, second part of it and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul. Do you see that there is a huge difference between the person who says, I believe there are some wonderful principles and proverbs, and if I will just take those principles and live by them, then I will be wise, then I will be successful, and they use them and you can do that, and you can use them and people do it all the time. There is a huge difference between that and the one who understands righteousness and justice and equity, and the one to whom knowledge is pleasant to your soul, not just something that you use, but something in which you delight. Again in Ezekiel thirty six, I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. This is where righteousness comes through, this sanctifying power of God. Jeremiah thirty one is a picture of the New Covenant. And tewod Corinthians three three Paul picks up on that same theme. And here's what he says. And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink, but with the spirit of the Living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts. There's a beautiful picture here. Jeremiah thirty one alludes to this idea of hearts and tablets. And the tablets here, the tablets on which are written the Ten Commandments, the Decalogue. And we think that law and grace are somehow enemies, but the Bible makes it very clear that they are friends. Amen, they are not enemies. And notice what Paul is saying here. And two Corinthians three to three, you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink, but with the spirit of the Living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts. Here is the Spirit of the Living God writing his law on our hearts. And we delight in the Law of the Lord in the innermost being. We don't just keep it, we delight in it. This is true righteousness and true holiness, delighting in the law of the Lord. This is what John talks about in the Book of First John. Throughout the Book of First John, how we walk in righteousness. The key word in the Book of John is this Greek word parapetato, walking to walk in righteousness. Listen to the way that our confession puts it. Second London Bapst Confession, Chapter thirteen, paragraph one, on sanctification. They who are united to Christ effectually called and regenerated. There's that word I just talked about, the regenerating power of God the first part of this text. And regenerated, having a new heart and new spirit created in them through the virtue of Christ's death and resurrection. Are also farther sanctified really and personally through the same virtue by His word and spirit, dwelling in them, the dominion of the whole body of sin is destroyed, and the several lusts thereof are more and more weakened and mortified, and they more and more quickened and strengthened in all saving graces, to the practice of all true holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord. We will walk in holiness. We do walk in righteousness, and we delight in it. Why because the Spirit of God in dwells us, and he has written his law on our hearts, these new hearts of flesh that we have in exchange for our hearts of stone, as we are made new creatures in Christ Jesus. If any man is in Christ, all things have passed away. Behold, new things have come. And there is this holiness and righteousness. And these two things are nothing alike. There is the one sitting in the plane swearing he's flying. And there is the other, who, by the supernatural work of God, has actually been transformed, has actually been made new, who has the life of God abiding in him, who all of a sudden does not just know the proverbs, but delights in the proverbs, who despises sin and actually walks in righteousness. There's a third picture. Here now just the regenerating power of God and the sanctifying power of God, but the preserving power of God, the keeping power of God. Look at Verses eleven through fifteen. Discretion will watch over you, Understanding will guard you. We see wisdom coming into us, and knowledge being a delight to us. And now discretion is watching over us, and understanding is guarding us. Do you see this verse twelve? What does it do? What do these things do as they come in to us and change us and watch over us and guard us? What do they do? Verse twelve? Delivering you from the way of evil, from men of perverted speech, who forsake the paths of uprightness, to walk in the ways of darkness, who rejoice in doing evil and delight in the perverseness of evil, men whose paths are crooked and who are devious in their ways. Notice the use of the words path and ways over and over again. We have a new path and a new way. We walk in the paths and ways of righteousness. And here are these individuals, and their paths and ways are unrighteous. We are guarded from them, and we are guarded from their ways. We are kept, and we are preserved. God keeps us. God sustains us. And notice the doctrinal picture that we see here. We see this picture of election. Absolutely, this is a very this is a very calvinistic picture of salvation by the way we see here, first of all, this picture of election, and this picture of effectual calling, this picture of regeneration, this picture of God invading our hearts and calling us to himself and making us his own. And then we see this picture of God justifying us and sanctifying us. And now we see this picture of God preserving us. We're not preserving ourselves. God is preserving us, and God is keeping us. God is sustaining us by his power. It is not only grace that saves us. It is grace that keeps us. Amen, it is grace that sustains us. It is not that we're saved by grace and then kept by our own power. No, no, no, no, no no no. Uh ah. Again, I love the quote from John MacArthur here is famous and very succinct quote. If you could lose your salvation, you would, Amen, if you could lose your salvation, you would do you know the height of arrogance. A lot of people think the height of arrogance is believing in the doctrine of election. Ah, how arrogant can you be that you believe that God would choose you? No, you know the height of arrogance. Here's the height of arrogance for me to believe that it is possible for me to lose my salvation, but to also believe that I'm good enough not to help you. If you believe that, how arrogant can you be? I know for a fact that if it were up to me to keep myself saved, I would be doomed. Amen. And anyone who believes that they could be good enough to keep themselves safe is a person who doesn't really know the sinfulness of their own wicked hearts. If you have had the smallest glimpse of the sinfulness of your own wicked heart, you know that if you could lose your salvation, you would. You know that it is only God's grace that keeps you, that you are utterly dependent upon the God of grace to keep you, That it is by grace that you're saved through faith, and that none of yourselves. It is a gift of God, not as a result of works. So that no one may boast you don't save you, God saves you. You don't keep you, God keeps you. Romans eight, verses twenty eight to thirty. And we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good, for those who were called according to His purpose, for those whom he foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of his son in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called. Those whom he called, he also justified. Those whom he justified he also glorified. Do you see there there is a picture of your salvation from beginning to end, from predestination to glorification, and who superintends your salvation from predestination all the way to glorification. By the way, in case you're wondering, predestination that's before you got here. Glorification that's you leave. Amen. So these are two parts of your salvation that you could not have anything to do with. God predestined you, and the one who predestined you called you. The one who called you justified you and sanctified you. And the only reason that you have hope of glorification, glorification that happens in the Age to come. Glorification that happens in heaven. Glorification that happens in the presence of God when you are made new, when your salvation is finally completed. Glorification it happens when you get your new body. Who's the one who glorifies you? Is it you? Is this the way salvation works? God says, I'm gonna predestin you, and I'm gonna call you, and I'm gonna justify you, and I'm gonna sanctify you. And then I'm gonna keep my fingers crossed and hope that I see you in the end when you glorify yourself. As the Apostle Paul would say, may it never be No. No, it is God, God who keeps you. I'm always reminded of a one particular day when I was walking with one of my children in the midst of a storm. And this was in Houston, where you know, we get these tropical storms and sometimes come up, and I mean, it's just just a violent storm, and I'm walking little child's little hand, and the storm came up and we became a little worried, and our pace quickened, and all of a sudden, I feel this little one's hand tightened, you know, And all of a sudden we quicken our pace a little more. And then the skies open up, the rain falls, and the thunder and lightning come. And now all of a sudden, I'm not just holding this little hand anymore, but I picked this little one up, and I picked this little one up and holding onto my neck night, and all of a sudden we get home and it's like close the door. The storm is raging outside, breathing hard, Daddy, Daddy. I was scared, baby. I know you were scared, Daddy. I was holding under you tight, Yes, you were, baby. They didn't know it then, but I knew. I knew that no matter how tight that little one held on to me, they didn't have what it took to stay with me, to keep up with me, or to even hold on in the midst of that storm. The only way they made it is because the bigger hand was holding the smaller hand, and then eventually the bigger arms picked up the smaller body. And although they were holding onto that neck for dear life and doing everything that they could, it was not what they were able to do that got us in from the storm, but it was what I was able to do. You see, saints, you think you're holding on to God, and in your own way you are. But know this, there is a storm raging around you that you are incapable of weathering by your self. I am not suggesting for a moment that you stop holding on. I am just suggesting that you realize that, no matter how ferociously you hold on to God, you can't keep yourself close. The only way we make it home through the storms that are raging all around us is that the God of the universe wraps us in his arms and carries us all the way through. God saves sinners. We do not save ourselves. He saves us through his regenerating power. He saves us through his sanctifying power, and he saves us through his preserving and keeping power. And this is the message of Proverbs. This is the gospel that we see when we read Proverbs. Rightly, Solomon is not saying to his son, I'm going to give you these proverbs. And as I give them to you, you write them down and you hold on to them, because if you use them, then you'll become no, no, no, no no no. Solomon says to his sons, Wisdom stands in the streets, and wisdom preaches, and you listen, you listen to what wisdom preaches. Don't just listen, but you seek it. Don't just seek it, but you treasure it. Why because when you do, you will find God. Why is it important that you find God? Because God is the wise one who saves. Through his regenerating power, he will invade your heart. Through his justifying and sanctifying power, he will transform your heart. And through his preserving and keeping power, he will save you and see you through to the end. Find wisdom, because when you find wisdom, you find God. And when you find God, you find salvation. How dare we look for anything less? Not only in the Book of Proverbs, but anywhere in the Word of God. Let's pray