The favorite month is upon us. The first of December means we only have thirty more opportunities to wake up in 2014. As we say goodbye to the year we are forced to embrace the onslaught of a heavy winter and negotiate the cultural confusion of a wealthy people holding a post-Christian worldview while attempting to celebrate Christmas. The ragged getting frenzy has begun, and our people find themselves in a hurry to purchase gifts for loved ones to celebrate the Advent of the ultimate Gift while generally disregarding Him.
Tragically Christmas showcases the irony of our time in stark relief: we want “Christmas spirit” and good will toward men without a thriving personal relationship with God empowered by the Holy Spirit that makes each one the recipient of God’s good will. Forsaking our spiritual birthright we try to supplement with cheer and mirth because we reject the Source of joy and peace. We need wisdom to negotiate a landscape where the reigning perspective on the one hand seeks the most comfortable life as the highest moral good and on the other hand sentimentally proclaims “it is better to give than to receive.” We might ask, “What’s wrong with it?” and we would be starting from the wrong direction. The oversight is not in an errant addition but a catastrophic deletion. The question we need to ask is “Where is God in it?”
As usual I propose a baseline way of relating to God in one key word: obedience. I am firmly convinced, based on the massive preponderance of commands and binding instructions in the Bible, that God, Who Himself is love, has a perfect plan for maximum human flourishing, for our experience of His gracious gifts of peace and joy. This plan is something like a game, in that it has rules which define legitimate function on the field and without which play is impossible. Of course God’s plan for human flourishing is very different from a mere game because every choice matters, and the consequences of success and failure or eternal.
Please allow me to stitch together my plan for December: We need wisdom to negotiate a spiritual wasteland which has marginalized the personal basis for real morality and, really, all existence. We need to join with the rest of the civilization to celebrate our Savior’s birth, equipped to share real joy with those around us who may have occasion to question the strangely ubiquitous merriment in the name of Christ. More than anything we need to worship our loving Creator as He wants to be worshiped. Discernment, a wise answer, and real worship point to real wisdom: the skill of living your life in God’s presence and for His pleasure. Therefore the theme for the season is God’s commands in the Bible that we obtain wisdom.
Like our recent study of prayer, in which God everywhere commands that we talk to Him, we very frequently find His loving directive in the Text for us to get wisdom. God commands our blessing and our good by commanding that we become wise. We are to participate in His program of human flourishing by taking advantage of the blessings He offers. God telling us to listen to His instruction and become wise is like a command to cash a billion dollar check we’ve unexpectedly received in the mail. Let’s agree not to starve while there’s a feast spread before us. I will begin with a father’s loving command for his son to acquire wisdom in Proverbs 1:8.
8Hear, my son, your father’s instruction And do not forsake your mother’s teaching;
9Indeed, they are a graceful wreath to your head And ornaments about your neck.
Staying On Task
Verse 8 very elegantly and beautifully explains the summary duty of childhood. As time flies and opportunities to learn come and go, we sometimes forget that the day is coming when school will be out. The time to gain the wisdom of our parents’ instruction is when we’re young because adulthood is a multi-decade test of how well we did in mom and dad’s schoolhouse. Time will show that the wisdom we have acquired from our parents will benefit us and those who depend on us. Tragically, time will also demonstrate the folly that never really got addressed. The teaching and instruction to which Solomon refers is the Deuteronomy 6 training of children to fear and love the Lord. This is real wisdom in Proverbs 1:7 and 9:10. In New Testament language, our Lord calls this making disciples of His (Mt 28:19-20).
For Mom and Dad, the application of v8 is a high expectation that you yourselves have gained the necessary spiritual maturity to disciple your children. Maybe you are there and maybe you are not, but if you find yourself responsible for the training of children—that means you are a parent—you are responsible regardless of your capability or maturity. There is nothing like the necessity of duty to help us arrange our lives and resources around mature objectives.
For the beloved child of Christian parents, the application is clear: you really need to humble yourself and be teachable enough to recognize that whatever your parents have to teach you is God’s gift for your good. Of course Solomon’s words are directed towards his son, and v9 presents the motivation of desirable consequences to the attentive and obedient child. That young man or woman with the humility to learn from his father and mother can anticipate that the instruction itself will bring them wealth and blessing. The figure of speech evokes a universally sought-after picture that the disciplined student will have his lessons for symbols of wealth and prestige for others to observe. The wealth of his heart will be visible as if he were wearing it for all to see and admire. Other parents will be obliged to praise God for such visible encouragement as the son becomes an example to all who see him. Peer pressure directing one’s associates towards wisdom may be rare, but it can happen.
As we approach Christmas, everyone generally agrees it is a time for the kids. As boxes multiply under the tree, and we exercise restraint in the getting of the “perfect” gifts for our children, we should remember that every day is Christmas, and the gift of real wisdom is ours to give them abundantly all the time. The wealthy wasteland of post-Christian ease will be filled with wonderful and expensive gifts—all the shiny and flashy things their hearts may desire—but nothing like the enduring and life-blessing wealth of real wisdom. If we love them, we will teach them to love God.
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