The title of this week’s message is the name of the theme that we started off with last week under the title ‘What We Need Most’. It should thus be of no surprise that the majority of our Scripture readings in these two teachings come from the Wisdom (Wisdom Literature) category of books in the Old Testament. These teachings of old on Knowledge, Wisdom, and Understanding are so pivotal that there is nothing in the days when Jesus Christ walked the earth and in the days succeeding the advent of the New Covenant Church that derogates from these principles or even nullifies these principles. The main scripture for this week is Proverbs 9:10 NKJV which reads, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, And the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding”. For better understanding of this Scripture we need to get a better understanding of the man behind it – let us explore his background a bit.
The book of Proverbs was written by the son of David and Bathsheba called Solomon. Solomon was a king who ruled over all the people of Judah and Israel [1 Kings 4:1 AMP] and he ruled over all the kingdoms from the Euphrates River in the north to the land of the Philistines and as far as the border of Egypt in the south [1 Kings 4:21]. Solomon was a truly gifted man whom GOD greatly and heavily endowed with Knowledge, Wisdom, and Understanding. “GOD gave Solomon wisdom and very great insight, and a breadth of understanding as measureless as the sand on the seashore. Solomon’s wisdom was greater than the wisdom of all the people of the East, and greater than all the wisdom of Egypt. He was wiser than anyone else” —1 Kings 4:29-31 NIV. As wise a man as he was, Solomon chose an unsophisticated way to describe what true and real wisdom is. He does not go into a technical, philosophical, psychological, intellectual, or theological explanation of it. Solomon states the explanation simply and to the point when he says, ‘the fear of GOD is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of GOD is understanding’.
Now Solomon understood that any wisdom that man may possess is ultimately useless if it does not lead you to GOD. True wisdom is not cerebral, intellectual, or the product of the mind. True wisdom is supernatural, it could never be a construct of any human intellectual capability, it cannot be learned. It is divine and given/gifted by GOD. Even the wisdom of thee Solomon was by no means anything of his own making but it was gifted to him by GOD [1 Kings 3:5, 9-11; 1 Kings 4:29], and the wisdom of Solomon remains legendary to this day. Believers, there is but only one kind of wisdom that leads man to GOD, and that is the fear and the knowledge of the GOD. This is true and real wisdom. Any wisdom that does not lead you and me to GOD the Father, GOD the Son, and GOD the Holy Spirit is ultimately useless when all is said and done. The divine wisdom that is from GOD, like the wisdom gifted to Solomon, is the beginning and the foundation of everything. This is the wisdom that was there in the beginning and is the foundation of life itself.
We see this clearly in Proverbs 8:22-23 AMP where we read that before GOD did anything, HE first established godly wisdom. Wisdom was there in the beginning and in the foundation of life itself. Last week we looked at how, before the Lord made (created) anything, HE first summoned wisdom [Proverbs 3:19-20]. GOD the Father relied on and indeed utilized wisdom before He did, built and established everything that was ever made (created). Man is a product of the Lord’s wisdom. And if man is made with the wisdom of GOD, it simply means that man is nothing without the wisdom from above, that you and I can do nothing and mean nothing without the wisdom that created us. Our lives mean nothing without the wisdom that created us. The sad reality is that some of us believers think that when Solomon says that ‘wisdom is the principal thing’ [Proverbs 4:7], we think that this is just the cherry on top when in truth this is the main ingredient.
We need wisdom to please GOD, to live righteous holy lives, to worship the Lord, to praise Him, to live lives that are worthy of the grace that we have so undeservedly unreservedly been gifted. The will of GOD is for no man to live outside of His wisdom because it is when we try to live without wisdom that we flounder in the dark, we miss the mark, we completely and utterly fail to find the purpose of our lives, and we live our lives by guesswork, by trial and error. Wisdom, the true divine wisdom of GOD, is to pursue the knowledge of the Lord, to know the Lord, to understand the Lord. In Isaiah 43:10 GOD says HE wants us to know, to believe, and to understand HIM. We come to wisdom when we seek and pursue to know, believe and understand GOD. Seeking to know, believe, and understand GOD is the principal thing, it is the ultimate wisdom to pursue, and there is no wisdom above that. We gain no benefit in possessing all the wisdom there is in the world but then ultimately lose our lives for lack of salvation caused by not seeking the Knowledge, Wisdom, and Understanding of GOD.
We have looked at the one side of the coin. The flip side of the coin is that there is no wisdom in the pursuit of the things of the world. Zero wisdom. Zilch. Nada. Nothing. Someone may ask, ‘But how can this be?”, and the answer is that this world and all life on it is temporary. Man was created and meant to live with the Lord forever. So it is pure wisdom to pursue and actively seek out the knowledge of The One whom we are going to spend the entire eternity with. Believe the words that John prophesied in Revelation 21:1-2 when he said, ‘I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away’ and ‘I saw the New Jerusalem, coming from above out of heaven’. In this new eternity, the old world and all the things in it, will no longer exist. It is in the new eternity where you and I will live forever in the presence of GOD. Therefore it is not wise to devote our lives to pursuing things that have zero eternal value. Any time and effort dedicated to seeking worldly carnal things is a display devoid of wisdom.
Scripture says that wisdom is the principal, the fundamental, the first, the genesis, and the most important thing for us—Proverbs 4:7. When we read what Solomon says in Proverbs 4:7 together with Proverbs 1:7 [that ‘the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, the beginning of wisdom’], can you now see how the wisdom of knowing GOD is the very genesis (origin) of life as we know it as believers? For anyone of us, our lives truly begin in earnest at that point where we set our hearts to seek GOD alone and nothing else. If you have not come to that point where you set your heart to seek GOD, your life has not yet begun. GOD is not Lord over that life. The “understanding ” spoken of in Proverbs 4:7 is the knowledge of the Lord. The knowledge of GOD is the divine understanding of GOD. You will begin to understand all things when you begin to pursue the knowledge of GOD. In Jeremiah 9:23-24, GOD tells us that HE does not want man to boast about accumulating earthly intellectual prowess, riches, and treasures, but that anyone who does must rightfully only boast about understanding and knowing the LORD.
Having reverential fear for the Lord (fearing GOD) is the beginning of Knowledge, Wisdom, and Understanding. This trait should walk hand-in-hand with our pursuit of the Knowledge, Wisdom, and Understanding of GOD as believers. We begin to gain wisdom when this pursuit precedes all our other pursuits when it is the primary, ultimate, principal pursuit. To attain wisdom, we must start with GOD, we must sacrifice everything to seek GOD. It is pure foolishness to seek everything else first and only seek GOD last (at the very end) when we are all spent and tired. So then the question to be answered is, “Is there not a wise man amongst us”? GOD says that ‘that wise is the one who knows and understands Me’ [Jeremiah 9:24]. I would imagine that such a man would not be one who claims (and boasts) about his wisdom, but one whose wisdom is attested to by the Lord because wisdom by any worldly standards is foolishness in GOD’s sight [1 Corinthians 3:19], whereas according to the Word of GOD, the wise show their wisdom ‘by their good life and by deeds done in humility that come from wisdom’ [James 3:13].
It is only through knowing GOD that true wisdom comes and true understanding comes [2 Peter 1:3 AMP]. GOD has already given us everything we need for a glorious life of godliness but this comes by truly personally knowing Him. The door that leads to everything that GOD so freely and graciously gives us, the door that leads to everything that we need in this life and in the eternal life, is us knowing HIM. The conclusion derived by Paul is that any wisdom that leads man anywhere other than to Christ Jesus and to GOD, is ultimately useless [Philippians 3:8 ]. All the influence, power, privileges, connections, education, and riches count for naught compared to the invaluable advantage that comes with knowing GOD. GOD has given us the undeserved, unearned, unequaled grace and privilege to get to know HIM firsthand, personally, experientially, and intimately for ourselves which no one can take away from us. This knowing of GOD is the Knowledge that yields Wisdom and Understanding second to none, gifted to us by GOD.
Seeking to know, believe and understand GOD is the principal thing, it is the ultimate wisdom to pursue, there is no wisdom above that. We gain no benefit in possessing all the wisdom there is in the world but then ultimately lose our lives for lack of salvation caused by not seeking the Knowledge, Wisdom and Understanding of GOD.
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