Proverbs: write them on the
tablet of your heart
May 24, 2015
BMC- Proverbs 3:1-8
Through the Bible in a Year
Introduction: Life Lessons
We all have lessons that we have
learned from our parents or people who are important to us. Often times
they are just simple phrases that stick with us and shape us. Other times they are absorbed through
observations.
Last Sunday evening at the
graduation tea, part of what took place was a number of people doing this for
Michael and Alex as they graduate. Whether in written form in their
booklet or through what was shared verbally, we passed on words of wisdom as
they venture out into the next stage of life.
Some of the lessons shared were
everyday life skills, things like making eye contact when you talk with someone
and repeating a person's name to help you to remember it. Others were reminders
of the importance of faith in our lives and our commitments to that faith.
Many of the things that I have
learned in life came from my parents and those close to me. Early on, my mom was primary in teaching me
faith. She practiced Bible study, she took us to Sunday school and church. And it was with her that I first learned the
Lord’s Prayer.
I remember one day that we were at
the grocery store. I found a small card,
about the size of a base ball card that had a picture of Jesus on one side and
the Lord ’s Prayer on the other. I took
it to her and asked her what it was. She
told me and then each evening we would say the Lord’s Prayer together until I
learned if for myself.
My dad taught me lessons that were
more focused on life skills. He taught
me about budgeting and credit. He taught
me about using tools and thinking things through. It was my dad who taught me was about using a
knife. I can't count how many times he told me never cut toward you. Always cut away from yourself.
Unfortunately, even though we know better, we sometimes don't always follow the
instructions like we should, do we?
This week we will continue to
reflect on the written contributions of King Solomon to the Biblical
text. King Solomon contributed to the Psalms but he also wrote an
extensive collection of proverbs. Within this we read a variety of words
of wisdom that cover topics from finances to gossip and from purity and
righteousness to the demise of the fool.
It seems to me that as we read
through Proverbs in the coming days, much of what we encounter are life
lessons. And Proverbs 3 contains lessons
that are often the ones that are the most well known to us.
Keep My Commandments
Chapter 3 begins with the
admonition from a father to his son to keep these commands. Many times in
the Old Testament, leaders instruct the people to pass on these commands to
their children, but here it is from the voice of a father to his son.
These words of wisdom are being passed down as much of life's wisdom is, from a
parent to a child.
What are some lessons that you have
learned from a parent or someone significant in your life? {Pause}
One of the lessons that I have shared
with Elam is that you should not climb a woodpile because the logs may slip out
from under you and you’ll get hurt. Since
we have a fireplace in the back room, we do have a few piles of wood around the
house. But unfortunately, we do not
always internalize the lessons we are taught until we fail to follow them.
On the Friday night that we were
preparing for the garage sale, Elam was trying to get to something high to show
me. Before I realized it, he had climbed
a wood pile to get to it and unfortunately, one of the logs rolled and he
scraped up his knee pretty badly. In
fact, it was bad enough that we took him to the ER to get it closed up
properly.
Write Them on Your Heart
We also have the instruction to internalize
these truths. We are to bind them around
our necks and write this wisdom on our hearts. These are not words to be
heard and then let go of. This is not merely a collection of wisdom says
to be filed away for future reference. These are words that are to be
internalized and made a part of who we are.
This is true of all of faith and scripture, is it not?
Yet it is interesting for me to
think about this because so often we are quick to say that we are not able to
memorize scripture, which is one of the ways that we internalize it. It’s not something that we are good at. We just don’t have good memories. But perhaps you are like me. Perhaps there are things that you remember
almost without even trying.
Randy Keeler teaches a class at
Bluffton in spiritual disciplines. And
when he teaches that class he often comes to a section on Bible memory. And he begins that lesson by asking the
students to give quotes from movies and name the movie that it is from. He says that inevitably this will go on for
quite some time with quite a range of quotes from various movies.
Then at some point he changes
things up and asks for people to quote passages from scripture and to cite the
references for those passages. And there
are always those who are able to quote a few verses with the reference. But there are more that are snippets of
scripture with no reference and there are never as many Bible quotes as there
are movie quotes.
And certainly there are very good
reasons for this. TV and movies are
multisensory events so they engage the mind differently than reading the Bible
does. And we often watch movies and
shows multiple times creating reinforcement through repetition. Like one of the commercials on when I was a
kid. It was for yo-yos and they were
called radical yo’s. The commercial was
only half the time of most commercials so it always played two times in a row
when it came on. I still remember the
words of the commercial word for word…
“They’re radical, radical, radical
yo’s. Up, down there they go. Right, left, don’t you know? They’re radical,
radical, radical yo’s. {spew, spew, spew}.
They’re radical yo’s from Spectra Star.
An incredibly useful piece of information to have tucked away in my
brain for all these years, isn’t it? But
it highlights that for me, the ability is there. For me, it is about the time, the commitment,
and perhaps the format.
Trust in the Lord
Beyond passing on this wisdom and
internalizing it, we are also encouraged in Proverbs 3 to trust in the Lord
with all of our heart. We are told to look to the Lord for our direction
rather than ourselves and trust that God will lead us in the way that we need
to go. There are many voices that call for our attention. There are
many who would like to direct us, often more for their agenda than our good
truth be told. But we are to trust in the Lord and look to him for
understanding and direction.
My dad wasn’t especially religious
when I was young, but one of the stories that he taught me is one that I’m sure
is familiar to many of you in one form or another. There was a man of great faith in the Lord
who was present for a very bad flood. As
the waters rose, he believed that the Lord would save him. He believed this so strongly that even though
the flood waters were to his knees when a rescue boat offered to take him to
safety, the man refused. He insisted
that the Lord would protect him, that God would save him.
Time went on and the flood waters
continued to rise. Now the water was up
to his waist and another rescue boat came along. Once again, the man was given the offer of
being taken to safety and once again, the man declined saying that the Lord
would protect him. God would save him.
Time went on and the flood waters
continued to rise. Now the water was up
to his neck and a helicopter came to rescue him. Once again, the man was given the offer of
being taken to safety and once again, the man declined saying that the Lord
would protect him. God would save him.
Well time went on and the flood
waters continued to rise. They rose up
above the man’s head and he drowned in the flood waters. When he got to heaven, he went straight to
God and said, “Why didn’t you protect me?
Why didn’t you save me? I trusted
in you. I had faith, but now I am
dead.” To which God replied, “I sent you
two boats and a helicopter.”
We are to trust in God. We are to follow in the path that God directs
us. But so often we miss God’s leading
because we are not seeing what God is placing right before us. We do not realize that it is God who is
acting, which brings me back to the knife.
The Pocket Knife
As I said,
I can’t count the number of times that my Dad has told me not to cut toward
myself. I knew this, and I thought that
I understood it. But I have the scar to
prove that I had not quite learned it yet.
It’s really
pretty silly actually. I had a candle
that was not burning evenly and I decided that I would remove the extra wax on
the one side. I took out my pocket knife
and I began carving away. And with each
cut, I made sure that my hand holding the candle was out of the way; of so I
thought.
As I made
one of the cuts, the wax suddenly broke away and the knife skimmed over my
wrist. No harm done, but I should have
learned from that near miss that I needed to approach things differently. Unfortunately, I did not and I continued to
cut the candle as I had been cutting it.
Not too long after that a similar thing happened. The wax gave way and the knife kept
going. Only this time, the knife cut
into my hand just above my wrist.
I began to
bleed and quickly realized that I was going to need stitches. I got the bleeding under control and then
drove myself to the emergicare to get stitches.
Thankfully, I did not cut deep enough to hit any tendons or muscles so
the damage was minor, but I have a scar to remind me of the lesson.
Holy Spirit Healing
And all of this brings us to this morning,
Pentecost Sunday, the day in which we remember the birth of the church through
the coming of the Holy Spirit. As I read
through Proverbs 3, I found myself making connections to the role of the Holy
Spirit in our lives.
We are to keep God’s commandments and The Holy
Spirit aids us in keeping God’s commandments, bringing them to our minds at the
proper time, discouraging us from breaking them. We are to internalize God’s wisdom within us
and the Holy Spirit is an internal reality within our hearts that brings the
words that we need at the times that we need them. And we are to follow God’s leading as we
trust in God to guide us and the Holy Spirit is a guide who directs our paths.
But for me what seems most significant about the
Holy Spirit this morning is that the Spirit has the power to heal. And this is significant because the reality
is that even when we try our best there are times that we fail. There are also times, for no fault of our own,
that we are wounded. And it is in those
times that what we need is healing. It
is those times that we need the Holy Spirit’s healing power within us.
I knew not to cut toward myself and while I thought
that I was following those instructions, the knife slipped and cut my
hand. Once that happened, there was no
going back, but there was going forward.
I sought the medical treatment that I needed and with time my hand has
healed. There is still a mark of course,
but my hand has healed.
Conclusion: Anointing
Perhaps you have also experienced
injuries of one kind or another in your life and are in need of healing. Perhaps you need additional wisdom in God’s
instructions or to further internalize God’s commands. Or perhaps you need direction and the ability
to trust in God. Whatever your need may
be, during the sharing time; we will offer space for those who desire for
someone to pray with them or to be anointed that they may come and receive. May the Lord bless us as we continue to seek
him more fully.
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