Tonight, we're going to be in
the book of Proverbs chapter 3, if you would like to turn
there. Proverbs chapter 3. I want to read two verses in
Proverbs chapter 3, verses 19 and 20, and they use these words,
and this is what I've titled the message, wisdom, understanding,
and knowledge. And they're all referring to
the Lord. They're all referring to the Lord. Wisdom is viewed
by men based on experience. That's why older people are thought
to be more wise. Now, there's always exceptions
to that, isn't there? But that's what people primarily think.
If you're old, that means you're wise. I know some people that
I would say, no, that's not true. But our wisdom, physically speaking,
comes from experience. What you've experienced and the
more experience that you have, theoretically, more than theoretically,
I mean, it's just facts. The more experience that you
have, the wiser you would be. The more things that you've experienced,
the wiser you would be. But spiritual wisdom doesn't
come by what we do. Spiritual wisdom is the gift
of God into eternal life for his people. God's wisdom is infinite,
and ours is limited. God's wisdom is limitless. Our wisdom is of the Earth, earthly.
His is of, his is, well, the word's infinite. You can't measure
it, it's immeasurable. He knows everything all the time.
That's why they call it, that's what the word omnipotent means.
Knows everything all the time, and he's everywhere all the time.
Can you and I grasp that concept of omnipresent? He's everywhere
all the time. I can't wrap my little pea brain around that.
No, only the place I'm at is where I'm standing right now.
And if I move, there I am. The Lord's everywhere, all the
time, omnipresent. He knows everything all the time.
He has all wisdom, all wisdom. If you did have the power of
being omnipotent, being omnipresent, what would you do with your power?
What would you do if you could be everywhere all the time and
know everything all the time? Well, tonight, I want to tell you what
God did. being omnipotent and omnipresent. I want to tell you
about what he did with all the wisdom and all the knowledge
and all the understanding. Let's read our text here, Proverbs
3, 19 and 20. The Lord, by wisdom, hath founded
the earth. By understanding, hath he established
the heavens. By his knowledge, the depths
are broken up and the clouds drop down the dew. You see that
word Lord in verse 19 in capital letters? That's the word Jehovah. That means the self-existing
one, the self-sufficient one. That's who's speaking here. That's
who we're reading about, the Lord. Now somehow along the way,
the lie got started that God needs us. God doesn't need for
anything. Did you know that? He doesn't
need me. He doesn't need you. Oh, he doesn't need anything.
Why would he need something if he owns everything already? Told
his disciples, said, if I was hungry, I wouldn't tell you about
it. Wouldn't tell you. He wouldn't come to us and tell
us he was hungry. He owns it all. He doesn't need
for anything. He doesn't want for anything.
He said, I am the Lord. That is my name. I am the Lord. That is my name. I am the Lord.
I change not. He wants for nothing, he owns
everything, he's the alpha and omega of all things, all things
in time and eternity. He's the beginning and the end
of all things. He's the first and the last.
Scripture tells us in Revelation that he is the one which was,
which is, and which is to come. He's everlasting, he never had
a beginning. We can't understand that because everything around
us has a beginning and has an end. But we believe it by faith,
don't we? He is God, he's other than we
are. Scripture says, by him were all
things made in John chapter one, and without him there was not
anything that was made that was made. He made everything. And
with his infinite, limitless wisdom, he founded the earth. He founded the earth, that's
what it says right here. Verse 19, the Lord by wisdom
hath founded His eternal understanding, He established the heavens. Established,
that means prepared. My margin says the word established
is prepared. He prepared the heavens. Do you
remember when He told the disciples, and I want us to run to the gospel
as fast as I can here, so bear with me just a moment. He told
the disciples, I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go
to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto
myself that where I am there, you may be also. This word right
here established is the word prepared by understanding he
hath prepared the heavens. What did he prepare it for? Prepared
a place for his people, didn't he? Prepared a place for his
people. When he says here that by wisdom,
By wisdom, he founded the earth. Yes, it was this creation that
he made, but are we not of the earth earthly? Are we not in
earthen vessels? He had founded this by his infinite
wisdom. And then he chose someone to
salvation and prepared a place for them in glory. And by his
everlasting knowledge, the depths are broken up. It's the depths
of our sin that was broken up on the cross of Calvary. And
the clouds drop down the dew, what does that mean? That's the
Holy Spirit given to his people. That's the clouds that drop dew.
It's the Lord that condescends to us and we praise, he'll be
seen here tonight. That's the dew that drops on
the Lord's people unto eternal life. The Lord chose by his determinate
eternal counsel to elect a people to bring salvation to whom he
loves, to whom he chose. In Christ, we were seen before
the world ever began. Before the world ever began.
This is the wisdom of God. You and I can't understand that,
but we believe it by faith. Now think about our Lord, what
he did with all of the wisdom. You can't say all the wisdom
that he has. He is wisdom. He's all of it. Without him,
nothing would have been made, nothing would exist. It's all
him. He chose to speak. He chose to speak. Let there
be light. And what happened? There was
light. He chose to make the earth and
all that's there in all the animals and things that the nature that
we enjoy so much chose to make all of that. Why did he do that?
For the purpose of saving his people from their sin. He founded
the earth. He spoke everything into existence
except one thing, man. God formed man out of the dust
of the ground and breathed into his nostrils and man became a
living soul. Man became a living, you and
I are from the dust of the ground. That's the earth, isn't it? That's
the earth. Paul says in 2 Corinthians, for
we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved,
we have a building of God, a house not made with hands, eternal
in the heavens. The Lord made the earth and all that is in
it. Then he made his earthen vessels. He made the creature
with his infinite wisdom, with his knowledge, with his understanding
that we don't have unless he gives it to us. He created everything
for the purpose of dying to save his people from their sins. The most amazing thing that happened
after that was he became the very dust that you and I are
to do so. The very dust that you and I
are. The scripture says that he was robed in the likeness
of sinful flesh and for sin condemned sin in the flesh. He robed himself.
He veiled himself. Think about all the, he left
glory, he left eternity, he came here to time. We can't understand
that. All we know is time, isn't it?
We read about eternity, but I can't wrap my mind around eternity
because everything has a beginning and everything has an end that
we see. He condescended to establish, to
establish heaven, establish the word of the Lord, to establish
the, to fulfill the covenant of grace that we've been hearing
about on Sunday. That's why he came. That was his purpose. He came to this sin-polluted
earth for one purpose, to save his people from their sin, to
honor the Father, to glorify God. to save His chosen creatures. We always, I, me, and you together
collectively, I believe, do agree with me. We always think too
highly of ourself. When the Lord shows us we're sinners and we
see that we're just, we're creatures, we're just, we're no better than
another kind of animal that's out there. We're animals by nature.
I mean, that's what we are. And God chose to save some unto
eternal life. That's amazing. our frailty,
our inability, our how often do you notice yourself feeling
weak, feeling tired, and we have to rest. God don't have to do
that. He became a man and chose to,
and then he had to rest. It's amazing, isn't it? He chose
to do that. He chose to become one of his,
he chose to become robed in flesh to save his people. We can't
understand the condescension that is, high as you can imagine
and to low as you can imagine. It was infinitely more than that. He says he did it for the love
that he had for the father and for his people, he did it. The sovereign king of kings and
lord of lords chose to become a man on the very earth he created. He created it and then became
a man in order to make his chosen men and women the very righteousness
of God in him. How did he do that? Turn with
me to, I told you we're going to look at Isaiah 53 again. Isaiah 53 verse one says, who
hath believed our report and to whom is the arm of the Lord
revealed? I've already told you that, but it wasn't going to
be on the recorded message. So I'll say it again. It's almost
a rhetorical question because the only ones that can believe
the report are the ones to whom the Lord chooses to reveal his
arm. And that's where men get it backwards, isn't it? Who,
I believe the report. Well, did the Lord do that? Or
did you choose to do that? Because if you chose, you didn't,
You ain't believed the report. The report is he's infinite in
wisdom and knowledge and understanding. He's sovereign and successful
in the redemption of his people. Now look at verse 10. Yet it
pleased the Lord to bruise him. He hath put him to grief. When
thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed.
He shall prolong his days and the pleasure of the Lord shall
prosper in his hand. He shall see the travail of his
soul and shall be satisfied. Now look at this next part very
closely. By his knowledge shall my righteous
servant justify many for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore
will I divide him a portion with the great and he shall divide
the spoil with the strong because he hath poured out his soul into
death. He was numbered with the transgressors and he bear the
sin of many and made intercession for the transgressors. What did
the Lord Jesus Christ do with his infinite wisdom? Knowledge
and understanding of the things of God because he was God He
knew what to do brethren He knew what to do to fix us Can't fix
ourself We're broken things born broken. We can't and we can't
fix it every time we do anything to try to fix it It's called
iniquity He knew what to do because He was God. He had the knowledge,
the understanding, and the wisdom that pleased the Father. He knew
what to do to fix you and I. And He did. He did by giving
us a brand new nature like unto Him. In order for us to be saved, He
bore the iniquity, the sin, and the transgression of all of His
chosen people by His wisdom, He bore our iniquity in his body
on the tree. By his knowledge he justified,
isn't that what it just said? By his knowledge shall my righteous
servant justify many. By his knowledge he justified
his people. What did he justify us of? Our sin, gone. He put it away. He put it away. By His understanding, He became
the curse for His people, thereby putting our transgressions away
once and for all. You know, it's amazing to me,
the Lord, the way He's made it, is we confess our sin to Him,
we do. He says, if you confess your
sin, He's faithful and just to forgive you your sin and cleanse
you from all unrighteousness. And the Lord's people, we love
the fact that When we come to the Lord, when we come to the
Lord Jesus Christ with a broken heart, if the Lord caused us
some conviction and we feel guilty and we come to him, what peace
there is when the Lord says, what sin? What sin? There is no sin. It's gone. I've
put it away. That's what he promised. When
he said it is finished, that's what he meant. It's all gone.
All the sin of his people. He did that, he established eternal
redemption for us, purchasing a place in glory, making them
as holy as he is. By his knowledge shall my righteous
servant justify many. Let's go back to Proverbs chapter
three. Natin says, the Lord by wisdom
hath founded the earth. By understanding hath he established
the heavens. By his knowledge, the depths
are broken up and the clouds drop down the dew. He upheld
all things by the word of his power. All things, not one thing
was left undone. He had all wisdom, he had all
understanding, he had all the knowledge and he upheld everything. He upheld to that high standard.
The high standard is God, the holiness of God. He upheld it.
He upheld it. He established his eternal throne
of grace for his people now in heaven. We have a throne of grace
we can approach. That's what the Lord gave to
his people. No more does the law condemn
you and I. No more does justice cry death when we approach it. The law says death. We come closer,
it says death. It doesn't say that anymore to
the Lord's people. Do you know why? There's no sin
any longer. There's no transgression anymore.
There's no iniquity anymore. It's all gone. So when we approach
the law, it doesn't say anything. Justice is satisfied. It's silent. The depths of our sin have been
broken up. That's what he's talking about here when he said by his
knowledge, the depths are broken up. He broke up the deepest stain,
the deepest sin of His people. No matter, and you know this
is true, no matter how bad you think you are, we're actually
a lot worse. We never understand really how sinful we are, because
we are sin by nature. That's what we are. Therefore,
that's what we do as well. But the depths of the sin, He
took them and He placed them upon His cross. He bore them
in His body. to make you and I the righteousness
of God in Him. You and I didn't have the knowledge
to do that. We didn't have the wisdom to do that. We didn't
have the understanding. We didn't have the ability. He did. He
did. And now the due of eternal life
falls graciously on the Lord's people by His Spirit. That do
is life giving. That's water. That's the anytime
you see water that's represents the Word of God, doesn't it represents
his gospel? And how is it delivered? Well,
it's delivered by his preachers, but the Lord's the one that has
to do the work in the heart by the Spirit. Now notice the three things here,
the wisdom, understanding, and knowledge. And that's what I
titled this message. But here, every time you see three, you
can always go back to the Trinity. That's the Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit. They are wisdom, knowledge, and understanding. That's who
they are. That's what they are. They're God. Everything about salvation depended
upon God satisfying God. If God didn't satisfy God, you
and I would have had no hope. Because it's not what we do that
brings about righteousness. What we do is what condemns us.
It's what he did. Everything about salvation was
dependent upon the triune Godhead satisfying God. And he did. He did. We don't have that wisdom,
naturally speaking. We don't have spiritual wisdom.
We're spiritually dead. We're born spiritually dead.
So we don't have any wisdom, if you look at it that way. not
with spiritual things, and we can't do more to get spiritual
wisdom, doesn't work that way, it's the gift of the Lord unto
eternal life. We have no understanding of God
by nature. We do know that there's a God
by nature, but we don't, unless he introduces himself, and he
does that by saying live, first of all, commands us to live,
he breathes the breath of life into us, and then we see him
as God and see what we are, giving repentance and faith, we believe
him, we believe him. We have no knowledge of holiness,
we can't, how are you gonna describe holiness? How can we describe,
we don't know what holiness is as far as in ourself. We know
what the Bible tells us, something that's sacred, something that's
set apart. But when we're talking about holiness, it's that it's
the opposite of us is what it is. It's sinless. It has no sin. That's what holiness is. That's
who God is. He's other than we are in every way. And yet he
chose to come to this earth that he created and die to save you
and I. To save you and I. By his wisdom,
his understanding, his knowledge, he made all things. He made all
things exactly like He wanted it to be, because He's God. In
order for you to be made the righteousness of God in Him,
He condescended and became the sacrifice for His people. He
successfully redeemed His people. He by Himself, we've been going
through Hebrews, as you all know, and that one verse, I just keep
getting hung up on it, when He had by Himself, purged our sins,
he sat down. Hebrews chapter one, verse three,
I believe it is. When he had by himself purged
our sin, he sat down. You can't complicate that. I
can't complicate that. That gives me great hope because
he's the one that did it all. And he sat down, it's finished.
It's finished. He was resurrected because of
our justification. The Lord said, those are my people,
they're justified. And in time, when he chooses
to, he sends his sweet Holy Spirit with the dew, the dew of his
word, breathing life into us. I remember the woman at the well.
The Lord said, if you didn't know who had asked you for water,
you'd have asked of him, and he'd have given to you living
water. She said, Lord, give me this water. I want some of that
living water. He said, you'd never thirst again.
But she still wasn't thinking spiritually. She still wasn't
thinking spiritually, because she thought that it meant she
would literally never thirst again. As soon as he said, well, go
call your husband, she said, well, I have not a husband. The Lord
said, you've rightly so, because you've had five, and the one
you have now is not your own. And she said, oh, I perceive
you're a prophet. Well, here's my righteousness. Here's my religion.
Let me tell you, we worship in this mountain. And you say, you
Jews say that we ought to worship in Jerusalem. Lord said, the
time's coming and now is that you won't worship in that mountain
or Jerusalem. God is a spirit. And they that worship must worship
in spirit and in truth. That's the do, isn't it? That's
the do. That's what he's given to his
people. That's the do. And I love the Lord's response
to her. She said, well, when Messiah
comes, he'll set you and me both straight, basically is what she
was saying to him. But he said these words, and
this is where life was given to this woman. He said, I am. And life was breathed into her. That's what the dew does, is
it brings life by the spirit, doesn't it? By his choice, he awakens us
to eternal life. He births his people by breathing
the breath of life into them, just like he did physically for
Adam. That's exactly what he does spiritually for every one
of his people. He gives the gift of faith. It's not a choice that
we make. It's not a, you know, I wrote a little article. You'll
see it there Sunday in our bulletin, but it starts out by saying,
or maybe it was last Sunday I had it in there. I can't remember
now, but it says that you will not find in the scripture anywhere
where salvation is dependent upon a man doing something. The
scripture was written for the purpose, by God's wisdom, by
God's knowledge, by God's understanding, it was written for the purpose
for him to say, this is what I'm going to do, and then him
doing it, him showing that he did it, and then him saying,
this is what I've done. This is what I've done. And he tells
us who it's for, it's his people, it's his bride, it's his elect.
So I loved you with an everlasting love, therefore I died for you. If the Lord doesn't give us faith,
the gift of grace, we'll never believe, but he does, and you
know what that means? He makes Christ unto us all of our wisdom,
all of our righteousness, all of our sanctification, and all
of our redemption. He makes Christ unto us all of our wisdom, all
of our understanding, all of our knowledge. We don't know
anything like we used to, do we? We just wanna know him. Paul
said that I may know him and the power of his resurrection.
If I know him and the power of his resurrection, I've been made
alive. What's the power of his resurrection? He saved his people
from their sin, therefore he was resurrected. He was resurrected. He is all. Now let's read this
one more time in closing. The Lord by wisdom hath founded
the earth, by understanding he hath established the heavens. He prepared a place for his people,
didn't he? By his knowledge the depths are broken up, all the
sins gone, and the clouds drop down the dew. This is what God
did. The question I ask to begin with
is what would you do if you had all the power he does, you had
all the understanding, you had all the wisdom, you had all the knowledge,
what would we do? It'd be something selfish for
sure. What did he do? God so loved, he gave. Gave his darling son, his only
begotten son, that whosoever I love that it says whosoever
more than if it would have said Caleb Andrew Hickman, because
I might not be the only Caleb Andrew Hickman in the world.
Matter of fact, I guarantee I'm not. It said whosoever. Whosoever. See, he has wisdom.
He says these words. That means you and I qualify.
We're a whosoever. We're a whosoever. That's what
God did with his unlimited power, his infinite wisdom, his eternal
understanding, his everlasting knowledge. He redeemed his people. He redeemed his people successfully. Successfully. He established
the covenant of grace. And then he said, as we heard
Sunday, now your sins and your iniquities, I remember no more.
I remember no more. You know why? Because they're
gone. I can't remember something if
it doesn't exist. That's what he did. With all his wisdom,
his knowledge, and his understanding. Let's pray. Father, bless this
to your purpose. Bless it to our understanding,
if it be thy will. Draw us to you, Lord, we pray.
In Christ's name, amen. In closing,