THE FEAR OF THE LORD IS THE BEGINNING OF WISDOM
September 17, 2006 - PENTECOST 15 - Proverbs 9:8-12
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Dearest Fellow-Redeemed and Saints in the Lord:
No one likes to be called a dummy or considered stupid. The fact is our society places a high value on education in our day and age. People spend hundreds and thousands of dollars that they might get an advanced degree and be educated. Yet, you and I know that no matter how much book learning one gets or how many degrees a person has, that does not mean that person has any wisdom. That is what our text talks to us about this morning. We are going to the step beyond book learning and a mere education. We are going to the step beyond just knowing God. We are going to study the wisdom and knowledge of salvation that God provides to us through his word. Those are familiar words in our text that say: "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom."
Later on Paul wrote to the congregation at Ephesus, which we have been reading through in our Scripture Lessons. Paul encouraged them, because they were just beginning in the Christian faith. They were just beginning to know God and being educated in the basis of salvation. God wanted these believers to continue to grow in their wisdom. Ephesians 1 says: "I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better" (Ephesians 1:16,17). That was Paul’s prayer. This is our prayer this morning as we once again discover God’s wisdom for our lives this morning. We pray that God our Savior will give us wisdom and revelation so that we may know him better. We will to use that familiar phrase from our text, verse 10:
"THE FEAR OF THE LORD IS THE BEGINNING OF WISDOM" as our theme. We will study the facts that:
I. To know the Lord is to fear him, and realizing
II. this fear is truly the beginning.
I. TO KNOW THE LORD IS TO FEAR HIM
Chapter 9 of the book of Proverbs is actually a concluding chapter of the first nine chapters of Proverbs. From chapter one to chapter nine the writer writes about wisdom and the importance of knowing God. The fact is he makes wisdom seem so important that there is nothing more valuable on earth. There is nothing more important than a person having wisdom. The wisdom, of course, is the knowledge of God. We are going to talk about that. He makes wisdom out to be a person. As he comes into chapter 8, he says: "Wisdom has built a house and she invites people to come in and live."
Then we come to chapter 9 where he starts to show a difference between those who are wise and those who are not. Verse 8: "Do not rebuke a mocker or he will hate you; rebuke a wise man and he will love you." Quite a bit of difference. The mocker hates the instruction and wisdom of God. The wise man, the one who knows God, loves God’s instruction and wants more. Why is it that the mocker hates God’s instruction? The mocker in reality has set himself as God, and he says to himself, "Who needs any other advice? Who needs God? I am more important than God." Verse 7, which comes right before our text says it even stronger: "Whoever corrects a mocker invites insult; whoever rebukes a wicked man incurs abuse." The mocker has no use for God and his word. We use the term unbeliever for the word "mocker, one who mocks God." No wonder the writer says, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding." The mocker has no knowledge of the Holy One or the divine things of God. How sad that is because God makes it very simple. He makes it so simple that even you and I can understand and believe God’s divine message of salvation.
At the end of our text is an interesting verse: "If you are a mocker, you alone will suffer." It reminds us of that saying: "When you laugh, the whole world laughs with you; and when you cry, you cry alone." This may have been taken from this verse: "The mocker suffers alone." In their own self-pity and their own rejection of God they are going to suffer punishment and condemnation and eternal punishment because of their rejection of God. They can’t blame anyone else but themselves, the mocker that despises God’s wisdom. The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.
Are there mockers today? Are there those who reject God’s Word today? Sure, maybe even more so than during the time of Christ or the Apostle Paul or Solomon and the people of the Old Testament. Maybe there is even more because our society does so highly value education. This wisdom of man very often stands directly opposed to the wisdom of God. We don’t have to go too far out into this world to find people who don’t have any use at all for God’s word. It is an old, dusty book. It is too strict and its laws are too burdensome. It is outdated. That is the attitude of this world. That is the feeling of the worldly educator who has put himself in the place of God. They mock God and his word. This is no different from the time of Solomon to the time of today. The amazing part is that we know God’s word as truth. We know this simply because of God’s grace.
The message is simple. Paul says in Corinthians: "For we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God" (1 Corinthians 1:23,24). Christ crucified: He lived, he died and rose again so that we would live forever. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. By God’s grace he has called us out of darkness, and he has put faith into our hearts. That faith believes these words: "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." To fear the Lord is to know him.
To know the Lord is to fear him. But we know when we talk about education, learning and wisdom, it has a starting point; and then we continue to grow in our Christian faith. We can’t with our own reason or strength find God or work our way into heaven. God finds us, chooses us, and calls us out of darkness. Then God gives us the blessed opportunity and the privilege to hear God’s Word and to continue to walk on that narrow path right into heaven itself. He gives us the power, the opportunity, the privilege and responsibility to add to the basic building blocks of the foundation of our faith--wisdom. It is exactly as Paul prayed: "I pray that you grow in the wisdom and knowledge of God." The Psalm writer adds: "Teach me your way, O LORD, and I will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name" (Psalm 86:11). The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. We think back to the very beginning of when we had to be responsible for our faith--in confirmation class. In the first commandment, "You shall have no other Gods." Luther says, "What does this mean? We should fear, love and trust in God above all things." The Psalm writer says, "Give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name." Help me to love and trust in you above all things. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
We realize, too, when we talk about the fear of the Lord, there are two aspects to it, aren’t there? Very often we think of fear as being scared of something. Yes, that is in the background when it says the fear the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Those who mock God and reject him are going to see on the Last Day, once and for all, the terror that God can bring. Jesus will return as the Righteous Judge. When he returns as the Righteous Judge, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. There will be those who mock him, those who are unbelievers, cast out of the kingdom of God. There will be terror. That is the fear of the Lord. But we also know the other aspect that the fear of the Lord is the love that comes from the awe and respect that God has done everything for us. You and I don’t deserve to be saved. We are no different than anyone else. We heard in our Gospel lesson that what comes out of the heart is a long list: Murder, theft, adultery, slander, and profanity. That is in our evil hearts, but God has saved us. He has sent his Son to pay for our sins. Now the difference between those who mock God and us, is the fact that God’s grace has saved us. Faith is a most awesome gift of God. Each and every day we ought to wake up and realize we fear, love and trust in God above all things, because of everything he has done for us. Peter wrote to the believers: "Since you call on a Father who judges each man’s work impartially, live your lives as strangers here in reverent fear" (1 Peter 1:17). A neat phrase: "Strangers here in reverent fear." We are just passing through until we get to heaven. We have the chance to honor, respect and fear God above all things until we get to heaven. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
To know the Lord is to fear him. This is only the beginning, isn’t it? We have more than just the building block of our faith. That is what the writer says here. He says there is blessing upon blessing for the believer. Because if there is a beginning, it means there will be an end. In between is everything else. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
II. THIS FEAR IS TRULY THE BEGINNING
In verse 9: "Instruct a wise man and he will be wiser still; teach a righteous man and he will add to his learning." These believers added to their learning when they listened to God’s Word. You have to remember in the Old Testament times they didn’t have the opportunity to take Bibles home with them and sit down and study them. They had to come to the temple and have someone open up the vault where the scroll was kept. Then they had to have someone bring out the scroll and lay it out and read it. They only got to hear God’s word. So it was quite a process for the Old Testament believers to study God’s word. Yet, the Lord says to them because of the joy of their salvation, they were going to add to their learning. They were going to be wiser still. They are going to start with the basic building blocks of faith and then they will add and learn. It is only the beginning.
He talks about a blessing in verse 11: "For through me your days will be many, and years will be added to your life." We might to think that the believer is going to live a long life. We know that is not always true. We do know that for the believer, because he knows that God is in control of all things, life is more of a joy and certainly a blessing to live here on earth. No matter the fears or the terrors, the heartaches or the sorrows, the problems or trials and tribulations people might face, the believer knows God works all things for his good. So his years are blessed. The days and years are many in that sense of God’s divine favor and blessing upon them. But there is another sense concerning length, too, isn’t there? It is the end. The believer begins with the basic foundation of faith and at the end he goes to heaven; and he knows that. There the Lord has added to his years and the days of his life eternity. Sure, some believers end with a short life here on earth; but in heaven eternity is forever. That awaits the wise ones who love the Lord’s instruction.
At the end of our text it says: "If you are wise, your wisdom will reward you." He says, "When you know God, you fear him. You begin to love him, and your wisdom rewards you." Isn’t that true in our life? Sure, each one of us can look back to last week or last month or five or ten years ago, and see difficult times that we may have had to face. Yet, today we know, believe, and confess that we are still held in the hand of God’s love. To know God is to fear him is at the very beginning of the wisdom of God. Now as we began our life of faith, we learned about creation, sin, mankind’s fall and ruining of a perfect world. We also learned about Christ’s sacrifice. We add to that God’s wisdom. We are all now in the middle part of our lives between that beginning and the end. Each one of us in our station of our life add to God’s wisdom whenever we hear God’s word, whenever we read God’s word and whenever we study God’s word. So we grow in our faith.
Listen to Job: "And he said to man, ’The fear of the Lord--that is wisdom, and to shun evil is understanding’" (Job 28:28). He quotes Proverbs. The fear of the Lord – that is wisdom. Then Job adds to growing in wisdom. For when the believer turns away from evil, that is understanding. We grow from the wisdom of God to understanding God a little bit more clearly each day of our lives. We grow in our Christian faith. When we look back, we see one, five or ten years ago we probably did sins and didn’t resist temptation that we would not commit today. We assign early sins our youthful indiscretions as Scripture calls it. "Don’t remember the sins of my youth." Now that we have grown and increased in the knowledge of salvation, we are able to shun evil as Job says. We are able to resist temptation, because God has strengthened our faith with the wisdom and the power of God’s Word.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. In the original it is put differently than the modern translations. The Hebrew language says, "The beginning of wisdom is to fear the Lord." This word order reminds us that we all have a beginning in our Christian faith, and we all continue. We began with God’s grace, and we continue with God’s power and strength to grow in God’s wisdom. It is just as Paul wrote to Timothy: "From infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus" (2 Timothy 3:15). Some of us may have had a lot of book learning and others not so much book learning. In the end all of it is just book learning. It makes us wise for our worldly work and lives. If we had to be able to speak well, we have to be wise in English. If we have to know how to figure well, we have to be wise in math. We have to know things of this world, wise in science, wise in history; but what does God’s word remind us of here? "God’s word makes us wise for salvation." The beginning of wisdom is to fear the Lord, and this is just the beginning. We can and will continue to grow in the wisdom of salvation as we grow in our Christian faith.
What is the result then of God’s wisdom? God’s wisdom is not like man’s wisdom. Man’s wisdom says, "You know this and do this so that you might get ahead in this world. You know this and do this so that you might take care of yourself. You know this and do this for ’me’ so that the world might respect me." God’s wisdom says, "Love God above all things and we love your neighbor as yourself." Listen to this passage from James: "But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere" (James 3:17). The wisdom comes from God. See the difference now? If you reread our Gospel lesson, the Lord says to the scribes and Pharisees: "You come near with your lips, but your hearts are far from me. From that wicked heart comes all those bad things, but there is a cure--the wisdom from heaven." James gives us this of wisdom from heaven. It is a list that we might want to save and each day practice one item from that list: peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere. This is God’s wisdom that begins with faith and grows with these fruits of faith. That is how we grow. Wisdom is only the beginning. Understanding God’s will for our lives and understanding God’s grace for the world is the middle part of our living today. Our time of grace is the middle until we see God face to face.
The beginning of wisdom is to fear the Lord; or as the translations put it, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Every day of God’s grace here on earth, we have just begun to begin to understand bit-by-bit God’s great love for us. Because of that, we fear the Lord. We stand in reverent awe and respect for what he has done for us and does for us and will do for us even though out of our hearts come evil thoughts. Still God forgives us. To know the Lord is to fear him, to love him above all things. This is only the beginning. Each day we grow in God’s grace and wisdom.
The educated world misses the point. The message of the cross is foolishness, but for you and me and every believer, by God’s grace, it is the power of God and the wisdom of God. Isaiah, inspired by the Lord wrote: "He will be the sure foundation for your times, a rich store of salvation and wisdom and knowledge; the fear of the LORD is the key to this treasure" (Isaiah 33:6). Isaiah writes, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. The fear of the Lord is the key to this storehouse of knowledge and wisdom and salvation. This is a treasure that God has stored up for each one of us. This is God’s treasure that we can open here on earth and enjoy and God’s treasure that also awaits each and every one of us--eternal life. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. God’s word is the only key to God’s divine knowledge and salvation and wisdom. Amen. Pastor Timm O. Meyer
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Pentecost 15 readings: DANIEL 4:1-2, 6-8; EPHESIANS 6:10-20; MARK 7:1-8, 14, 15, 21-23
