Proverbs 1, we've been, as you know, we've been
trying to teach and preach what Christ preached on that road
to Emmaus to his, those two disciples. Remember he began in the books
of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms, all the scriptures
it says, he expounded unto them the things concerning himself.
Because the Scriptures, and this will be similar to the next message,
we're going to see where Christ said in John 5, they are they
which testify of me. He says Moses wrote of me. That's the next message. Same
message. It's the words of Christ and
the salvation that's in Christ. Proverbs is the next book. We've
gone all the way up through the Psalms and then from Genesis
to the Psalm. Now Proverbs is next. Proverb
means a wise and weighty saying that is full of matter, weighty,
full of truth. It's the marrow, it's the sum,
it's the substance of any subject. Proverbs are full of these weighty
sayings. There are over 900 proverbs in
our Bible, but Solomon wrote 3,000. And we have nine hundred of them.
And a thousand and five songs, or psalms. And in the Proverbs it speaks,
and just these, we're just going to look at the first seven verses. But in the Proverbs it speaks
a great deal of wisdom, knowledge, understanding, these things. Colossians 2 verse 3 says, In
Christ are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. So, these are the Proverbs concerning
Christ. Yea, they are the Proverbs of
Him. Solomon was the wisest man to
ever live. Right? We know that. He asked
the Lord. to give him wisdom, and the Lord
gave him wisdom more than any before him or after him, except
Christ, who is wisdom. Where did Solomon get this wisdom?
From Christ, who is wisdom. He taught him. So, the Proverbs
speak of him, of Christ, and they're really his words. Solomon
just took dictation. All the prophets, they just spake
as they were moved. The Lord said to John in the
last book of the Bible, write this down. And he said the same
thing to all his prophets and apostles. All right, look at
verse 1. It begins, The Proverbs of Solomon. The Proverbs of Solomon, son
of David, king of Israel. As said, Solomon was the wisest
man to ever live. His name means, and he represents
Christ, he himself represents Christ. We've seen that. But
Solomon's name means peaceful. Peaceful. David, his name means
loving, or lovely, or the beloved. So Solomon is the son of the
beloved. But Solomon's name means peaceful. All the time of Solomon's
reign, 40 years, there were no wars, ever. No battles fought,
ever. Since every man dwelt safely
under his own vine and victory. And that's Christ, isn't it?
Christ came. He said to his disciples, to
his disciples, mind you, because there's no peace for the wicked. But Christ made peace for His
people by the blood of His crop. In John 14, He said, Peace I
leave with you. He made peace with God. He made
our peace with God. We don't make our peace with
God. That's what false religion says to people. You make your
peace with God. You can't do it. Christ alone, His blood. He said, peace I leave with you,
and my peace I give unto you. Not as the world giveth. They
say peace, peace, when there is no peace. Our Lord said there
are going to be wars and rumors of war. But His people in Isaiah
40, He said, you tell them, you comfort them, you give them peace,
tell them, the warfare is accomplished. And He won the battle for our
souls. Like David, David fought all
those, David from the time he was 16, we think he was about
16 or 17 when he faced Goliath, who's a picture of Satan. And by himself, he defeated that
adversary of Israel. From the time he was 16 till
he died at 70, he was fighting battles all his life. And then
when Solomon, the son of David came, peace. Why? David fought all the battles.
What a picture. that both David and Solomon are,
but I got to go on. It's just the first line. As said, the son of David means,
David means lovely. Christ is the altogether lovely
one. Did you read that quote by Brooks? He's lovely. He's always lovely. I love that. All right. Solomon's going to
tell us concerning the name of God. When the Queen of Sheba
came to prove Solomon with her heart, she thought they were
hard questions. But she came and he told her.
He told her things you should be asking. Says he told her all
the word. Didn't answer. Says he told her.
You need to be asking then. And it says she came to prove
him with these hard questions. And it says there in First Kings
10 that she came to hear of him concerning
the name of the Lord. That's the first thing he said.
That everything that Solomon said was concerning the name
of the Lord, who God is. All of these proverbs, if it's
wisdom, it has to be concerning Christ. Right? If it's knowledge,
it has to be concerning Christ, whom to know is to have eternal
life. Okay? That's what verse 2 began. These proverbs are to know wisdom
and instruction, to perceive the words of understanding, to
know wisdom, justice, judgment, which is understanding, equity
or justice. Our Lord said in his prayer to
the Father in John 17 3, do you want to know what eternal life
is? Or rather who? You want to know what it is to
have eternal life, to be saved? Our Lord told us in John 17,
3. He said, this is life eternal, that they may know Thee, the
only true God, which means there are many conceptions of God,
but they're not their thoughts. There's one true God, as He's
revealed in this book. the only true God and Jesus Christ
whom he had sent that has sent because no man know what the
father but the son and he to whom the son will reveal no one
seen God no one's heard from God. The Son hath forgotten Him. Christ came. God was manifest
in the flesh. The only way you can know God
is by knowing Jesus Christ. Because he that hath seen Him,
heard Him, believes Him, believes God. Knows God. So to know. To know. It says in verse 2,
to perceive the words of understanding. Look at Proverbs 8. I love this. Oh, I love this. Don't you love
this? Proverbs 4, 5, Proverbs 8 are wisdom speaking. It's Christ speaking. Proverbs
8, look at this, verse 8. All the words of my mouth are
in righteousness. Everything Christ said was right,
true. The words of God. Not the words
of man, the words of God. He said the words that I speak,
as of the Father. They're all in righteousness.
There's nothing forward, wreathed, corrupt or perverse in them.
It's all pure and holy and righteous and just. It's the truth. The
whole truth. And nothing but the truth. Look
at verse 9. I love it. They're all plain
to him that understand it. In other words, if God has given
you an understanding, It's all plain. Very plain. But not until he gives you an
understanding of these words. Okay? And Christ is the understanding. Look at verse 14. Counsel is
mine, sound wisdom I am understanding. And we quote 1 John 5 20 all
the time, don't we? I love it. You need to know it.
We know that the Son of God has come and given us an understanding,
that we may know Him that is true, and we're in Him that is
true, even in His Son, the Lord. This is eternal life. This is
a true God and eternal life. Christ, that man who walked this
earth, is the one that made it. That man who walked this earth
now sits on the circle of it, and reigns and rules over it,
and everything and everyone is in his almighty hands. He's God. And everything he said is absolute
truth. Do you believe him? Paul wrote what Christ said,
the wisdom of this world is foolishness. Did it? Hath not God made foolish
the wisdom of this world? Because if it doesn't start with
God, if it doesn't start with Christ
and doesn't end with Him, it's foolishness. It's the wisdom
of man. The wisdom of man. It'll come
to naught. It says to perceive the words of understanding. Let me just... I have so many
scriptures to read to you, but I will not make you turn to all
of them. But listen to this. In John 8, 43, he said, Solomon
said, to perceive words of understanding. He's standing, our Lord is standing
before a group of people. He's talking. He says, why do
you not understand my speech? Because you cannot hear my word. He said, he that is of God, heareth
God's word. He said, you're not of God, therefore
you hear them not. You don't understand. But do
you understand? Here's the thing I want us to
marvel at. Here's the thing I want us to be so thankful and grateful
for. And not leave here without praise
in our hearts and coming out of our lips. He's given you an
understanding. He's hid these things from the
wise and prudent and revealed them unto babes. Whose babes? His babes. His little children. They understand. What? That Christ
is all. I mean, that's not just doctrine. That's not just a slogan. That's
the truth. They know it is. Ask any question
concerning anything. The answer is Jesus Christ. Creation,
Jesus Christ, He made it. Providence, Jesus Christ, He
worked all things up to the counsel of His will, for His glory. Salvation, it's completely Jesus
Christ. So, what about everything that's
happening in the world? He's doing it. Everything. Like Joseph, remember? Whatever's
done there, He's the doer of it. But hath not God made foolish
the wisdom of this world? All right, look at our text. It says, To know wisdom. That's
Christ. He's the wisdom of God and what? The power of God. All power. What's he saying?
All power is given unto me and where? Somebody say it. Heaven. Heaven? Who has all power
in heaven? God. See, he thought it not robbery
to be... All power is given unto me in
heaven and where? Earth. All power. There's no power but of him. Nobody can do anything unless
he allows it or does it. Do you believe that? The world
says that's foolishness. Our Lord came and He healed many
blind, deaf, dumb, lame, raised the dead. He did only what God
can do. And all that's a type of man.
How man is by nature. He's blind. He can't see the
hand of God. He's deaf. He cannot hear these
words unless the Lord opens ears. He can't do it. He will not thank
God, he will not praise God, he will not even, the only way
he'll use God's name is to cuss with, unless God, unless he's
born of God, a new creature, a brand new creature that man
had nothing to do with. You had nothing to do with your
first birth and you have nothing to do if you're born again, nothing
to do with it. Not your will, not your choice, not your decision,
not some preacher begging you and bringing you down. It's God
giving birth to you miraculously through this Word and showing
you, giving you an understanding. All of a sudden, your eyes are
open to see this Word for what it is. Perishing to see yourself
for what you are. Nothing. To see Christ for what
He is. Everything. Your only hope. Wisdom. To see this world, for the foolish
to study it, and see all the wisdom and the knowledge and
the understanding, unfathomable. I said it. I always have trouble
with that word. Unfathomable. The depths of it. You can't plummet. The heights of it. You can't
reach it. The width of it. The breadth of it. The length
of it. You can never attain to it. Not a fraction of it. It's
like putting your feet in the ocean. You'll never plow the
depths of it. You know there are depths in
the ocean deeper than Mount Everest? Unseen depths, which are a picture
of the depth of this book, which is Jesus Christ. The Proverbs. I thought about going through
the Proverbs, but I thought, we need a hundred years. We can't get past verse two.
Seriously, wisdom, justice, righteousness, which is righteousness. What
does 1 Corinthians 1 30 say? Everybody in here should know
that. See, all of God's people know. He's given them an understanding.
God has given them an understanding. That of God, He has made unto
you wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. That according
as it is written, let he that gloryeth, let him glory in the
Lord Jesus Christ. No flesh is going to glory in
His presence. Not for anything you know, anything you are, anything
you have, anything you've ever done. Everybody in glory say
it. We're here because of Him. 100%
because of Him. Wisdom. Power. Christ is the wisdom of God.
The power of God. Justice. Judgment. Judgment. Isaiah 40 is going to have you
turn there. Judgment. That means understanding. Judgment. It says when he comes
in Isaiah 40, he's going to give judgment to Gentiles. Judgment to the Gentile. Who
are the Gentile? That's us. We all came from,
everybody in the South came from Ireland or Scotland. You're talking
about some heathen. Celtic, Druids, they thought
they were wise. We're Druids. We worship, you
know, we run naked in battle and, you know, signs and crosses
and all this. You're a fool. You're a blooming
idiot. It's like that, you know, we
talked about asylum, the church being asylum, where Christ is
found. That's all of us. We're that
gathering demoniac. We're a bunch of idiots until
Christ saves us and clothes us and puts us in our right mind
and sits us down at his feet with our mouths shut and hearing
his voice. Yeah, this is an asylum for those
who are once insane. The world's insane. They're fighting
against God. They're fighting against the
Creator. They're not acknowledging their Creator. They're not thankful.
They don't even like Romans 1. They don't like to retain God
in their knowledge. God's not in all their thoughts. They have
lots of thoughts. God's not in any of them. What a fool. The fool has said, no, God. You
can't understand anything apart from God. So, and here's the,
look at verse 4, verse 4. It says to give subtlety to the
simple. That says simple by nature. Simple
means easily fooled. Simple means easily beguiled.
Somebody can trick you. Simple means easily impressed
or influenced. Man is easily influenced and
fooled and impressed by the least little thing. And the God of
this world, 2 Corinthians 11, turn there. The God of this world
hath blinded men's mind lest they should believe the truth.
Why? Because God lets him do it. Because God tells him to. Right? Satan can't do anything
unless God lets him. Oh, when people first hear this,
they think, this is a strange God you have. Yeah, the truth
is strange. 2 Corinthians 11 talks about
subtlety, gives subtlety to the simple. 2 Corinthians 11. Now, two of the smartest human
beings to ever live were Adam and Eve, right? There's probably
never been human beings like them, except Christ is over and
above them. It says in verse 3, 2 Corinthians
11, 3, I fear, lest by any means, as a serpent beguiled Eve through
his subtlety, that your mind should be corrupted from the
simplicity that is in Christ. Simplicity. Subtlety. Satan is subtle. Crafty. Wiles of the devil. spiritual
wickedness in high places, and no human being is a match for
him. Adam and Eve were not. Eve wasn't. Adam purposely, willfully
disobeyed. Hmm, I don't understand that.
But he did. But Satan subtly deceived the
woman. And in his subtlety and his craftiness
and his wild today, he has deceived a world of people. Paul wrote
to Timothy that he holds captive men. He holds them captive. And maybe perventure, God will
relieve them from that captivity, rescue them. But the subtlety
of Satan is he uses so many things, but what he uses chiefly is the
sight of the eyes and the hearing of the ear. Say, look, look,
there it is, look. And the world, look, well, there
it is. Or listen to what? What the world is saying. What's
going on? Man, look what's going on. Look what's going on. Listen
to what's going on. Listen to it. Make your judgment
according to it. Our Lord said, I don't judge
by the sight or the ear. My judgment is true. We walk
by faith, not by sight. The things that are seen are
temporal and deceptive. The God of this world takes the
things of this world And shows you, says, look, here's peace,
here's happiness, here's joy, here's all this world's about,
this stuff. Look. And everybody falls for
it. Everybody falls for it. Christ comes and shows us
unseen things. Reality. Christ comes and tells
us of an unseen kingdom. The subtlety of Satan, he fools
so many. And Paul said the simplicity
that is in Christ, what does that mean? The truth is anything
but simple. The truth is profound, and nobody
can understand it, not the wisest person on earth. By searching,
you cannot find out God. But simplicity means singleness. Complex is the many things involved,
right? Simple, complex. I didn't take chemistry, and
I know that much. And I don't need chemistry. I
need this chemistry. Complex means many things go
together to make up something. Simple means one thing. Christ said, I am the way. Way of what? Name something.
The way of God. The way of understanding. The
way of peace. The way of joy. The way of happiness. The way
of forgiveness. I am the truth. There are not
many truths. One truth. The truth of who God
is. The truth of what man is. The
truth of salvation. The truth. The truth of this
book. You want to understand anything
in this book? Jesus Christ is the truth. The whole truth. and the life. He that hath the
Son hath the life. One way. One truth. Single. One
way. One Lord. One Lord. One faith. One hope of your calling. What's that? That Jesus Christ
calls you. Everybody with Him are called.
Chosen. He chose them. Y'all know that. One. One. Simplicity. Single. Okay? But all religion,
oh, they think they're smart. Oh, they go into all this stuff. All right, go on. It says, To
give subtlety to the simple, to the young man knowledge and
discretion, verse 4, a wise man will hear and will increase learning. A man of understanding shall
attain unto wise counsel. A wise man will hear, as we already
said. We won't hear anything until
he gives us ears to hear. But a fool won't hear at all. Won't hear at all. Romans 1,
it sounds like Proverbs. Proverbs 1, if you keep reading
it, it says, I've called and you didn't answer. You refused.
So, he says, you're going to cry and call on me. I'm not going
to answer you. He says, I'm going to laugh. God says it. I'm going to mock. In Proverbs
1. Romans 1 says, when they knew
God and didn't glorify him as God, neither were thankful, became
vain in their imagination, their foolish heart was darkened. For
professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. Change the
glory of God, glorifies the creature rather than the creator. Things
like birds, beasts. So God gave them up. Gave them
over. God gave them undeviled affection.
It went on to say they didn't like to think about God. God
gave them over to a reprobate mind. That means a mind void
of judgment. No matter how many degrees behind
their name, if they don't know God, don't know Christ, they're
a fool. A mind void of real judgment
and understanding. I'll prove it. I'll prove it. Catholic God made foolish. And
he said in 2 Thessalonians 2, he said, they didn't receive
the love of the truth, so I'll send them strong delusions, not
to believe a lie. And that's what man believes. Years ago on the cover of Time
Magazine and on a huge whole page or two of Wall Street Journal
was an article with a picture of a rock. I discovered on Mars. Now these are smart people, okay. And it showed a picture of a
rock, and there was this little tube on this rock that looked
like a mud-dobber tube. You know, you've seen mud-dobber
tubes. That's what it looked like. Nothing in it, but there's
this tube. Life on Mars! So for seven years,
they studied that rock. No telling how many billions
of dollars were spent, given by the government, to study that
rock. Now you and I know Christ is
the rock. Okay, seven years later, they
can't prove it, so on the back page of the Wall Street Journal,
seven years later, about an article about one inch by one inch said,
science has concluded, no life on Mars. They're looking into black holes.
That's exactly what man is looking into. Black holes. Oh, aren't we smart? Christ is
the light. Light came into the world, but
men love darkness rather than light. We'd rather look into
little black holes. 900 Proverbs, any one of which is full of infinite
wisdom. Are men looking at it? No. We'll
listen to Confucius. We'll listen to Buddha. We'll
listen to Krishna, whoever, whatever he is. I did. I used to do that. Sit cross-legged
and gaze at my navel and think about Krishna. What an idiot. What a blooming idiot. Huh? That's the truth. And I'm saying
all that, not for you to laugh, but to marvel that I'm standing
here in front of you. Marvel at God's grace that you're
sitting here believing what the world calls foolishness. The
world says, this is foolishness. This is not God's book. That's
not God on this earth. That's not the only truth there
is. Our hope is in man. Our hope is in the wisdom of
man. That man's going to pull us out of this hole. That's what
the whole world believes, don't they? And that's what you believed
at one time. Do you believe that now? You
think it's a pack of foolishness, don't you? And you think like
David, how could I have been so foolish? because of the mercy of God.
The sovereign electing grace and mercy of God chose you to
give you understanding. Opened your blind eyes. Opened
your deaf ears. You hear every word in this book. And you believe it. That's what
Paul said. Acts 14 said, The way they call
heresy, that's what I believe. I believe all things written
in the law and the prophets and the psalms. I don't believe hardly
anything a man says. Like David said, all men are
liars. You can't trust anybody. Who can you trust? Christ is
called the faithful witness. In Revelation 1, He's the faithful
witness. He'll tell us the truth. That's
what the woman at the well said. When the Messiah's come, He'll
tell us the whole thing. Christ said, I'm here. For you. I'm here for you. I
already came for you. Who? Who'd He come for? Why'd He do that? Why'd He reveal Himself to them?
Well, because they know. I'm just poor and wretched and
miserable and blind and naked. What I know now, I know by the
grace of God. Isaiah 55, it says here in Proverbs
1, 5, a wise man will hear. Isaiah 55 says, Here in your
soul shall live. Hear and your soul shall live.
And men won't hear. But God. It opens our ears. And verse 6 says, To understand
the proverb and the interpretation, the words of the wise and their
dark sayings. Oh, man. The depth of it. You know, it says in verse 6,
eloquence, to understand a proverb, and the eloquent speech, interpretation
of the words of the wise. Eloquence is not what you think
it is. Eloquence is not using words nobody can understand.
No, no, no. Our Lord used one and two syllable words. Do you
understand me? Now, it's eloquence to be able
to take infinite truth that no one can understand and put it
in short and concise meaning to where the common man can understand.
That's eloquence, taking profound things and making them understandable.
But he was so eloquent. And here's proof of man's blindness
that the Pharisees, the scribes, the doctors, the lawyers who
had all of this, you know, they prided themselves in their knowledge
of Scripture and their understanding. They didn't understand a thing
he was saying. He'd tell a simple story, simple parable, and they
didn't understand what he was saying. Because he hid it from
them. But the poor, the common people
heard him gladly. Why? He gave them, he received
the love of the truth. They heard him. They sat and
listened to him like little children, hanging on his every word. How about you? Let me close with
verse 7. It says, The fear of the Lord. Now this is the first, the very
first proverb. See that? See the little backward
P, the beginning of the paragraph? And this is the very first proverb
in the proverb. What is the very first proverb? The fear of the Lord is the beginning
of knowledge. That's where you start. That's
the first thing God does when He opens your eyes and ears and
understanding, to know that I am God. You're God. Your breath is in
my hands. And everything about you, your
eternal destiny, is up to me. Christ said, I have... Alright,
that's Proverbs 1, 7. Who wrote this book? God did. Look at Revelation 1 with me. Look at it. When I see these things,
like right now, I'm at a loss for words. Proverbs 1, verse
7, says, The fear of the Lord. Nobody fears Jesus. Nobody fears
Jesus. The Jesus men are talking about
is outside of your heart. He won't see Him. He can't come
to you unless you let Him. He can't do anything unless you
let Him. That's not the Lord Jesus. When you come to know
God, a true God, and a true Christ, you'll see he's Lord. Verse 7,
Revelation 1, verse 7, Behold, he cometh with clouds. Who? The Lord Jesus Christ. And every eye shall see him,
they also which pierced him, and all kindreds of the earth
shall wail because of him, even so. Amen. Fear the Lord. Fear the Lord. John said in verse
10, I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day and heard a great
voice. And men don't hear, John didn't.
Verse 12, I turned, keep reading with me, this is marvelous, it
gets, it ends wonderfully. I turned to see the voice that
spake with me, and being turned I saw, what? Light. The light
of what? One like the Son of Man. The
light of the knowledge of the glory of God. You couldn't paint
a picture of Christ as He is. All these pictures are graven
images. They don't even resemble him
like a candle to the sun. Well, John, when I saw him, verse
17, when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. That's fear. He gives his fear. It's the beginning
of wisdom, saving wisdom. He gives his fear of the Lord.
Holy God, holy, holy, holy. Like Isaiah said, woe is unto
me. When he saw the Lord, and he
fell down, and like Isaiah, it says, the Lord laid his right
hand upon me, verse 17, saying unto me, fear not. I am. The fear of the Lord. Who is
Lord? Jesus Christ. What does that
mean? It's God. Not in theory, not a figurehead,
an actuality. So the beginning of wisdom, Proverbs
1, is the fear of the Lord. The beginning and the end, he
says, Christ is Lord. He's the beginning
and He's the end. Do you understand? Do you love
the truth? Do you love what you just heard?
Bless you. How blessed you are.