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Proverbs 1 New Living Translation
The Purpose of Proverbs
1 These are the proverbs of Solomon, David’s son, king of Israel.
2 Their purpose is to teach people wisdom and discipline,
to help them understand the insights of the wise.
3 Their purpose is to teach people to live disciplined and successful lives,
to help them do what is right, just, and fair.
4 These proverbs will give insight to the simple,
knowledge and discernment to the young.
5 Let the wise listen to these proverbs and become even wiser.
Let those with understanding receive guidance
6 by exploring the meaning in these proverbs and parables,
the words of the wise and their riddles.
7 Fear of the Lord is the foundation of true knowledge,
but fools despise wisdom and discipline.
A Father’s Exhortation: Acquire Wisdom
8 My child,[a] listen when your father corrects you.
Don’t neglect your mother’s instruction.
9 What you learn from them will crown you with grace
and be a chain of honor around your neck.
10 My child, if sinners entice you,
turn your back on them!
11 They may say, “Come and join us.
Let’s hide and kill someone!
Just for fun, let’s ambush the innocent!
12 Let’s swallow them alive, like the grave[b];
let’s swallow them whole, like those who go down to the pit of death.
13 Think of the great things we’ll get!
We’ll fill our houses with all the stuff we take.
14 Come, throw in your lot with us;
we’ll all share the loot.”
15 My child, don’t go along with them!
Stay far away from their paths.
16 They rush to commit evil deeds.
They hurry to commit murder.
17 If a bird sees a trap being set,
it knows to stay away.
18 But these people set an ambush for themselves;
they are trying to get themselves killed.
19 Such is the fate of all who are greedy for money;
it robs them of life.
Wisdom Shouts in the Streets
20 Wisdom shouts in the streets.
She cries out in the public square.
21 She calls to the crowds along the main street,
to those gathered in front of the city gate:
22 “How long, you simpletons,
will you insist on being simpleminded?
How long will you mockers relish your mocking?
How long will you fools hate knowledge?
23 Come and listen to my counsel.
I’ll share my heart with you
and make you wise.
24 “I called you so often, but you wouldn’t come.
I reached out to you, but you paid no attention.
25 You ignored my advice
and rejected the correction I offered.
26 So I will laugh when you are in trouble!
I will mock you when disaster overtakes you—
27 when calamity overtakes you like a storm,
when disaster engulfs you like a cyclone,
and anguish and distress overwhelm you.
28 “When they cry for help, I will not answer.
Though they anxiously search for me, they will not find me.
29 For they hated knowledge
and chose not to fear the Lord.
30 They rejected my advice
and paid no attention when I corrected them.
31 Therefore, they must eat the bitter fruit of living their own way,
choking on their own schemes.
32 For simpletons turn away from me—to death.
Fools are destroyed by their own complacency.
33 But all who listen to me will live in peace,
untroubled by fear of harm.”
The Incomparable Worth of Wisdom
For wisdom is better than rubies; and all the things that may be desired are not to be compared to it. (Proverbs 8:11)
All fathers desire wisdom for their children and Solomon was no exception. This Scripture is from the king to his son. “My son, if thou wilt receive my words, and hide my commandments with thee” (Proverbs 2:1). He wants his son to prosper, and find fulfillment, so he advises, “Son, if you will only listen to your dad, I will show you how.”These are also words for sons and daughters of the King. If you are a child of the King, you believe this counsel is not merely the words of Solomon, but the words of God speaking His wisdom through Solomon. These are wise words to all the “King’s kids.”
Wisdom Is the Product of the Spirit
“To know wisdom and instruction; to perceive the words of understanding; to receive the instruction of wisdom…” (Proverbs 1:2-3a).
There is a teacher and in the case of true wisdom, that instructor is the Holy Spirit of God, Whom the Bible calls “the Spirit of wisdom.”
Genuine wisdom is supernatural. Yet it is important to understand the difference between wisdom and common sense. Common sense is natural. Wisdom is uncommon sense. It originated with God, resides in God, emanates from God, and is given as a gift from God.
The difference between wisdom and knowledge is this:
• Knowledge is needed to pass the test in school, but wisdom is needed to pass the test in life.
• Knowledge is learned; wisdom is given.
• Knowledge comes by looking around; wisdom comes by looking up.
• Knowledge comes by study; wisdom comes by meditation with God.
• Wisdom teaches one how to apply his knowledge.
Wisdom is not synonymous with knowledge nor is it a substitute for knowledge. Rather, it is the product of the Spirit. Some things in life cannot be learned — those must be given. I would never minimize a proper formal education, but there are certain matters no school can teach you. And in a greatersense there are issues about life that can only be learned from God.
Wisdom Is the Presence of the Savior
To know wisdom… (Proverbs 1:2a).
To know wisdom is to know Jesus Christ. And therefore, if you do not have Jesus, you cannot have wisdom. Paul well expressed this inescapable truth: “But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God” (1 Corinthians 1:24). Christ is the wisdom of God. This was the idea John the apostle conveyed when he wrote his Gospel:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God…. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth. (John 1:1,14)
The Greek word translated “Word” was logos. Logos means a thought or a concept or the expression or utterance of that thought. Jesus, the living Word, is God and is therefore the perfect expression and extension of the divine wisdom. Real wisdom is discovered only in a personal relationship with Jesus Christ — the wisdom of God, the Word of God, God Himself.
The Bible notes that the great are not necessarily the wise. “For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness…” (1 Corinthians 1:18a). “For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom [worldly wisdom apart from God] knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching[the thing preached] to save them that believe” (1 Corinthians 1:21).
God is so good and so wise that you will never be able to know Him by human wisdom, human perception, or human understanding. No one has a head start on God. All of the philosophers, theologians, and scientists of history could never discover Him through human wisdom.
And one can never know the wisdom of God until Christ, the living wisdom of God, is in their heart. Even the Old Testament saints were wise only because the Spirit of the Lord Jesus dwelt in them. Jesus pointed out, “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day: and he saw it, and was glad” (John 8:56).
Apart from Christ there is no wisdom. He is made unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. Wisdom commences at conversion, but deepens by discipleship. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalm 111:10a). The moment a person is converted to Christ, the wisdom of God comes into him, and the indwelling Spirit of God begins to teach him the truths of the Lord.
No wonder wisdom is of such infinite worth!
Over and over in Proverbs you hear the words “fear the Lord.” In fact, some of he references are Proverbs 1:7, 29; 2:5; 8:13; 9:10;14:26,27; 15:16 and many more. Below is a sermon by John MacArthur from the Book of Luke on 3 reasons we should fear the Lord.
In today’s lesson John MacArthur talks about faithfully teaching our sons by example and precept. I know that there were times that I read Bible verses to my children about controlling your temper and then they would see me lose mine. I would tell them what the word of God says but I would fail to live it out in my life. I hope to become more faithful so my kids can both see what I say and what I do and they will know that they both match up.
John MacArthur
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I remember hearing Dr. Adrian Rogers say that if he had to do it over again he would read from Proverbs every day to his kids. They turned out to be great kids and they were raised right. Nevertheless, if he had to do it over again he thought a more emphasis on Proverbs is the way to go. That is why I am spending so much time in Proverbs with my kids today.
John MacArthur does a great job on Proverbs and here is a portion of his sermon on Proverbs.
This is Father’s Day and a fitting time to speak to that father that is here in our fellowship in our congregation this morning. As a father myself of four children, these are lessons that I will share with you out of the Word of God that have been very precious to my own heart as well. I don’t get an opportunity very often, nor do I take it, to focus direction on fathers and so I want to do that this morning.
One little boy’s definition of Father’s Day went like this, “Well, it’s just like Mother’s Day only you don’t spend so much.” Well we fathers can concede that. Someone said, “A father is someone who carries pictures where his money used to be.” And the phone company tells us that calls on Father’s Day are not as high in number as calls on Mother’s Day and most of them are collect.
Well Father’s Day is, for those of us who are fathers and who have the privilege of having loving children, a very special time. I know on this particular Father’s Day I’m missing three of mine for the first time that I can recall, they’re all gone but one. It’s still nonetheless a special joy to see what God has wrought in the life of your children and to enjoy some of the sweet fruit of His grace in their lives. Being a father has always been a high priority for me…not only because it was for my father and his father but because of what the Word of God has to say. Unfortunately that high priority role of the father is being systematically attacked and destroyed in our culture.
This particular society in which we live has attacked the male role with such devastating force that I really do believe we have sentenced the next three or four generations to tragic experiences of disastrous proportions because if one thing is clear in Scripture it is this…the sins of the fathers are visited upon the third and the fourth generations. What that means is, where you have wicked men in leadership, where you have a decline in the father’s role, it takes three or four generations to root out the evil that they produce. We are not looking at a situation where because of a sinning father three or four generations of son…of sons will pay the penalty. Not at all. Ezekiel 18 forbids that in advocating individual responsibility. But what we are seeing is that because fathers lead a nation, a wicked generations of fathers will so impact that nation for three or four generations that it takes that long to root out their wicked effect. I believe that the legacy of this generation of fathers is tragedy upon tragedy upon tragedy in the following generations.
In the plan of God, however, that’s not the way it’s supposed to be and certainly in the church we should be following that plan. Whatever may be happening in the society around us, we should be ensuring a righteous generation in the church. We have a responsibility as fathers to our sons particularly…sons who tend to be for the most part more rebellious than daughters because they are the ones given by God leadership roles and capacities. If we will faithfully teach our sons, they will by example and precept lead the women as well. Where you have a plurality in the nation of godly fathers, they will impact the mothers. And where you have godly sons, they will impact the daughters of the next generation. And so the high priority of Scripture then is that fathers teach their sons…and thus raise up a generation of godly leaders.
Because God has ordained this and because God wanted us to be sure that it was followed carefully, God by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit gave a manual for fathers to use on their sons. A basic research book, that book is the book of Proverbs and I want to invite you to turn to it if you will right now and we’re going to be looking at the first ten chapters of Proverbs in a very general sense.
This book is the lesson book on living from which fathers teach their sons. In fact, that is very apparent. If you look at chapter 1 verse 8, “Hear, my son, your father’s instruction. And while at the same time not forsaking your mother’s teaching.” You find again chapter 2 verse 1, “My son, if you will receive my sayings…” Chapter 3 verse 1, “My son, do not forget my teaching.” Chapter 4 verse 1, “Hear, O sons, the instruction of a father…” verse 10, “hear, my son, and accept my sayings.” Verse 20, “My son, give attention to my words.” Chapter 5 verse 1, “My son, give attention to my wisdom.” Chapter 6 verse 1, “My son,” chapter 6 verse 20, “My son, observe the commandment of your father.” Chapter 7 verse 1, “My son, keep my words.”
And so it goes that this entire passage is designed for a father to teach his son. As fathers go, so go nations…so go generations…so goes history. And so God took the principles, the basic principles of spiritual living and packaged them in the 31 chapters that we call Proverbs.
Now a proverb is very simple. It is a principle stated in concise terms. We could say a proverb is wise in content, and concise in form. It is a brief to the point pithy statement for the purpose of instruction…brief to the point that they might be remembered.
What you have in Proverbs then is a compilation of these concise wise statements. This then becomes the basic book of truth that fathers use to teach their children, a book of wisdom. And frankly, if fathers are to raise a generation of godly men who will lead the women to godliness, they must teach the truths that are mandated in this father’s manual.
Frankly, just to depart from that a moment, there’s a lot of instruction available today for fathers to teach their sons, much of it even in a Christian context, that is pretty much trivial. Much of today’s instruction is…to be a friend, listen to your son, go places with your son, take him to a ball game, have fun, follow his interests…etc., etc. What Proverbs has to say is much deeper than that. Teach your son trivial things, you’ll raise a trivial father who will teach his son trivial things. Teach your son deep things, you’ll raise a son who becomes a father who teaches his son deep things.
So the primary duty of a father is not what one little boy said…”The primary duty of my dad is to take out the trash.” The primary duty of a father is not even to bring home the bacon. The primary duty of a father is not to fix what’s broken. The primary of a duty of a father is to teach holy living to his sons…and, of course, to his children as well including the daughters…but primarily the sons.
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FINAL QUESTION: WHAT DOES PROVERBS 3:1 MEAN? “My son, do not forget my teaching.”
The Daily Hatch 