Understanding God’s Wisdom Through His Word

A few months back at Highland Heights, we went through the Book of Ecclesiastes, and then after another short series we did an overview of Proverbs, Job and Song of Solomon. Those were like book reports – since we only spent one week on each of them. But the purpose of spending the time with the wisdom literature, was to give the hearers an understanding of what God sees. Truly. Although human authors were used, we know that the Holy Spirit moved upon each author to transfer His majestic thoughts onto His men, who in turn wrote what they were led to write. This is only accomplishable by our mighty God and only comprehensible by true believers.

While we know that the world will not accept these truths – hence taking a 4-week break in between the wisdom literature to do a short focus on the apostate church of today (which challenges said truths in an underhanded, heretical way) – the fact remains that we must continue to show God’s people the strength and undeniable truth of the gospel according to God.

And now that we are done with the wisdom literature and have shifted to 6 weeks of studying 6 more parables of Jesus, the question still presents itself to us: Are we truly allowing the Holy Spirit to open our eyes through the Word of God? The only one who can answer that for you is you. You have to hear that question and you must be the one who can reasonably attest to the answer. And if the answer is “no”, then it is the prayer of this pastor and all of the family of God, that you strongly reconsider just how much you are spending time in His Word and how much you are allowing the truth of the Scripture to transform your life. Because after all, God’s truth transforms.

Before I give you some hard facts to consider in this article, I want to pause to share something that I stumbled upon this morning. I was reading a high school friends post about the vaccine (Now, I’m not going to even go down that road right now because that’s not the point – I’m just setting up the proverbial play for you…) He made his point in the social media post about his strong feeling about it. There was some banter back and forth about science and all of that, but one particular comment made me pause and read the rest of the comments in the thread. One person said that we can accept God as Creator and yet rely on the scientific facts of Darwin to reason that he was correct and yet somehow God is still creator.

Okay.

It took all of my might to not comment and launch into a several-paragraph destruction of such a heretical delusion. Yes, I refrained. Well, so far. Not to say that once I’m done writing this entry that I don’t go back and fire off some comments in a loving way – giving a reasonably argument about their explanation being severely flawed. We’ll see.

But for now, I’m going to say this…

When you have a firm understanding about the truth in something, you tend to fight for said truth. You stand up for what you believe, and you certainly don’t plan to back down from your position. Not to say that you can’t (nor shouldn’t) have reasonable discussions and even listen to a counterarguments against your position, albeit the other person is willing to do the same for you. Because after all, this is what classic debate is all about. Heck, sometimes we even change our position about something over time because reasonable argumentation is given enough to sway our belief. But typically, your stance is what it is because you hold firm to what you believe it.

Good on you. But allow me to ask you a question: Are you doing the same thing with the Word of God?

If we proclaim to be a Christian, do we truly hold to the truths found in the Holy Scriptures as inerrant and sufficient? In other words, are you standing up for what you believe is the truth instead of somehow trying to appease the people around you in an unjustifiable effort of just not having confrontation? Because after all, consider the source of your faith – Jesus. Did He avoid confrontation to the naysayers of His time? Absolutely not. And because of His stance, there were many who stood strong in their trust in Him and belief in His teaching because they had found in Him someone who made sense.

Exactly.

In the Book of John, Jesus gives us a parable using sheep as the reference point. And when He does this, He lays out the perfect metaphor for us to review today…

John 10:22 – 28 - At that time the Feast of Dedication took place at Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the colonnade of Solomon. So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.” Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

Jesus wasn’t worried about the masses not “liking” Him in this parable. He was only worried about His “sheep” hearing His words. And when we study the Book of John, we see the direct words of our Lord comforting us that we belong to Him and that we are part of His plan.

To contrast another point: Jesus is the author of our Faith. But, if He asked us to learn from Him and emulate Him, then this righteous stance and “not backing down” mentality (all with love), is a message to us. And this is why we focused on the wisdom literature and why we are focusing on the Parables again now… Because if it isn’t for God’s Word to be shared, then how are we all going to be inspired by it if we aren’t reading it?

Reading through the Wisdom literature and the Parables just gives us a clearer understanding that our Triune God loves us immensely and gives us the Word to read and extract from. The MOST PRACTICAL compilation of “books” ever assembled is the Holy Bible and we must investigate it intently with open eyes and open hearts. This, my friends is what changes us and our flight pattern; our life’s direction. Something that is desperately needed in such a time as this.

We should marvel at God’s grace every time we recall that we have trusted Christ alone for our salvation. And this should take place weekly by attending church and every time we pick up His Word and read it! After all, before the Lord called us, we were dead in sin and had no desire at all to know or serve Him. But by His Spirit our Creator overcame this stubbornness and changed our hearts, enabling us to believe the Gospel. Take time today to thank God for His matchless grace and remember that your deeds contribute nothing to your salvation. But your deeds have EVERYTHING to do with how you share your salvation with others!

#BeTheLight