Our new series, Solomon’s Table: Wisdom for Everyday Life, began last night as we talked about the relationship between humility, attention to God’s Word, obedience, and success in life.
Proverbs 3:1-8 could well be an 8 verse summary of the heart of the entire book. That’s where we began the new series. If you missed it, you can have a listen here.
In the fullest theological sense, Wisdom is a personification of God in Proverbs. God calls through wisdom – beckoning his covenant children (the motif of father-son is prevalent), instructing us, appealing to us, exhorting us, warning us, and promising blessings to those who heed the voice of Wisdom.
At the Pivot retreat, we talked about how worship, rightly understood, is both radically intensive and extensive. It is intensive in that God makes a claim upon our whole being, calling us to worship with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. That was the focus of the retreat – striving by God’s grace to live all of life Coram Deo, before the face of God. You can hear those messages online if you missed them.
The book of Proverbs presses its weight on the extensive dimension of worship. It is concerned to push our relationship with God into every other area of life. Thus, it is an eminently practical book. It doesn’t hesitate to test our claims to worshiping God in all of life, in essence, asking us point blank:
“So, you’re a worshiper? Do you manipulate people?
“You’re a worshiper? What does your employer think of you? Are you on time, dependable, honest?”
“You say you’re a worshiper. What does your relationship with others look like? Are your relationships marked by conflict, gossip, and anger?”
“So, you live to glorify God in all things? How do you spend your money?
I believe this study will be a fruitful one for us, giving us the opportunity to talk about things we’ve not covered in any other setting. What does it look like to glorify God by investing wisely and stewarding our money? What does God have to say about my work habits? Does my life look like the progression of the wise, leading to favor with God and man (Prov 3.4) or the progression of the fool, leading to misery, frustration, and repeated experiences of fatherly discipline?
Hope you’ll join us for the rest of the series.
