ResponsiveReiding

“There is gold and abundance of costly stones, but the lips of knowledge are a precious jewel.” (Proverbs 20:15, ESV)

When I was in my 20’s and still living with my parents, our house was robbed in the middle of the night as we slept. By God’s grace, no one was harmed. We woke to find the kitchen ransacked, my Mother’s purse missing, frozen food from the refrigerator gone, and my overcoat. What other rooms they may have visited as we remained unaware in slumber only the thieves and the Lord know. Fingerprints revealed two intruders. In fact, those same two would rob us again and take far more – including much of my clothing. The way this impacts you emotionally is quite difficult to explain in full.

One thing in my own response to it surprised me quite a bit. In realizing my coat was gone – a nice coat at that, I really began to pine when I realized that what was in my coat pocket was missing with it – and that was a small, beautifully bound pocket Bible which our Church had given me upon my High School graduation.

I will freely admit that much of my sadness was sentimental. I was so grateful to have received this fine gift several years earlier. As a bit of a bibliophile, I was also sad that I had lost a very finely crafted Bible. The leather was supple, the paper fine and the entire construction elegant. And there was finally the fact that this was my daily Bible. I carried it almost everywhere and certainly every day to work. I had read it through a number of times. It was my friend. I used it more than my study Bible for it was my everyday reading Bible. It was more than a friend, it was an intimate companion. And it was gone.

The surprise to me was how much more emotional I was over having lost the Bible than my coat, the fact we had been so criminally violated or even what danger we might have been in. That Bible was what I wanted to recover if at all possible. And by God’s good grace, it was recovered along with my Mother’s emptied purse in a dumpster across town. The Bible had suffered tragically in the ordeal and was not fit to be used anymore, but I remember the relief I experienced when it was returned.

I learned a great lesson through that experience about how to value things which has been with me ever since. I do not know that I would have listed that Bible as so valuable without experiencing the way in which it was removed from me. And the issue of what I value and why has been one which visits my thoughts often to this very day.

And so I might ask you reader – what are the things you value, and why? And more importantly, have you set store by the wonder of the incalculable riches of the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ? There is enough silver. There is enough gold, but there can never be enough knowledge of the One “in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.” (Colossians 2:3, ESV)

This is wealth. This is riches of the rarest and most inestimable worth. Do not let the business of life, the distractions of the Word and the misdirections of the Enemy rob you of weighing them rightly. Of marveling at them regularly. Of musing over them, delighting in them and satisfying your soul that you are wealthier than if all the richest men of all the ages with their collective treasures laid them at your feet. For they will all perish. And only Christ in all of His glory will remain.

“Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!” (Romans 11:33, ESV)

The lips of knowledge brought you the Gospel by which you received the forgiveness of sins eternal life, and the promise of ruling and reigning with Christ for ever and ever. You are obscenely rich in Him. Glory in it.

“Unequal weights and unequal measures are both alike an abomination to the Lord.” (Proverbs 20:10, ESV)

Dishonesty comes many different ways. Placing more weight upon our own works and words and character than is right, or measuring others with a less than objective eye. Either one is an abomination. How precious is our Savior who never deals with us in this fashion.

“Even a child makes himself known by his acts, by whether his conduct is pure and upright.” (Proverbs 20:11, ESV)

One of the joys of being a grandparent, is getting reacquainted with what being young is like. My wife has been quick to remind me of how transparent little ones are with their feelings. You see it on their faces instantly with no filtering. If they like it – joy is unmistakable. If they don’t, disappointment or dislike are equally immediately visible. They act on it in a moment – not trying to mask the way we adults have learned so well. Christ never hides either His pleasure or displeasure. He is open and transparent with us in His Word at all times. He is Truth.

Secondly, people can SAY anything: It is what we DO which is the measure of who we are. Professions of love, loyalty, willingness to serve etc., are only as weighty as the air needed to express them. Loving, remaining loyal, serving – these are the things signified by the words. Without them, the words are worthless. Worse – they promise what they do not deliver – they lie.

How grateful I am that “God so loved the world”, culminated in “that He gave His only Son”. The mere sentiment of love, as real as it may be, saves no one – even when it is God who loves. It is love acting that sends Jesus to the Cross. And love responding that does not merely assent to the facts – but believes, and is saved.

So too with repentance. To repent is more than mere remorse, though it is certainly no less. One repents when the desire is changed. When the opinion that the sin indulged in can no longer be justified on any basis. When the sinful thing we desire is seen as what we want freedom from, instead of wishing we were free to do it. When every fall is identified as leaving the path toward Heaven, rather than trying to take a path other than holiness, and still imagining we can get there.

Do not tell me you love me – love me.

Do not say “I repent” – walk the other way.

Do not say “I believe” – trust Him, and cast yourself fully on His promises in Christ.

Anything else – is faithless, powerless, human religion.

“The hearing ear and the seeing eye, the Lord has made them both.” (Proverbs 20:12, ESV)

So use them both! One Wag said that God gave us two ears and only one mouth because we ought to listen twice as much as we speak.” I don’t know that that is EXACTLY what God had in mind when He designed us that way, but He DID give us ears with which to hear, and eyes with which to see.

If it is true (and it is) as Scripture records that “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Luke 6:45) then a connection here is unavoidable. Isn’t is obvious that the reason why our mouths are so filled with vitriol, complaint, bitterness, backbiting, dishonesty, doubt and woe – is because we have our eyes and ears feeding our hearts and minds more of self and the world than the beauties and wonders of God? So as our technologically oriented friends would tell us, it is a case of “garbage in, garbage out.”

Now it seems all too evident, that the Writer of our Proverb here is after us to consider something most wonderful. That we have been given faculties uniquely designed by God, to fill us with wonder, joy, admiration, awe, beauty, truth and transcendence. In other words dear Saint, your eyes have been set in your head so that you may bear witness to the wonders of God. What a glorious gift!

To each of us, has been given the capacity to behold God in the most amazing display of His creativity and wonder. Have you looked up at the sky lately and had your breath taken away by the blue expanse? Have you glanced at some mountains, a garden of flowers, stand of trees, the ocean or some other great body of water and marveled at what He has wrought? Step outside this very evening and drink in the limitless universe spread out before you in that velvet, star-studded canopy we call “space” and see the hand of God placing each one in their place. What power! What majesty! What genius! God has made your eyes – are you seeing Him?

Then again, this Lord’s Day, as you enter the holy duty and privilege of worship, do your ears hear the lofty descriptions of His attributes and goodness and grace as the Body of Christ lifts His praises on high in song and prayer and the Word read and preached and taught? Listen to that little baby squeal with delight when tossed by her father. The chorus of praise that makes you hear of Christ’s atoning death again. The staid, calm assurance of saints whispering their needs into the ears of their Heavenly Father. God has made your ears – are you hearing Him?

I pray it is so.

“The sluggard does not plow in the autumn; he will seek at harvest and have nothing.” (Proverbs 20:4, ESV)

Many are those who put little or no effort into their own spiritual progress, who nevertheless assume somehow they should still make progress. Little or no Bible study, little or no prayer, neglect of public worship and the Lord’s Supper, and then shock and grief over being weak and bound under their sins. I blush to think of the times that has been me.

Spiritual life is like natural life in this way: One can get older without maturing. If merely fed, but never taught to walk, talk, feed or dress themselves, nothing less than something truly horrible results. Something so far less than the human being is meant to be. And since the grand glory that Christ has saved us for is to bear His image, we need to be thoughtful in that regard.

This is not law, it is privilege. High privilege. For what greater gift can the Heavenly Father bestow upon any but that we might be most like His Son of any creatures in all His universe? It is astounding! It is beyond blessed, it is startlingly glorious beyond our dreams. Is it much then to take up thoughtful participation in this glory?

Beloved, Christ does not seek slaves to rules and regulations but slaves to love. Slaves to high and wonderful blessings and bestowals. Slaves to joy and hope and wonder. Slaves to being so filled with the wonder of what He has planned for us, that we give ourselves to it every moment of every day in the ever increasing experience of it even now.

It has often been said that those who aim at nothing, hit it. Let us not be those who aim at nothing in growing in Christ – but study to take on the privileges of the high office to which He has called us and for which He has redeemed us from our sins.

Having been plucked from the very pit of Hell, will we now balk to rejoice at learning the ways of the household of the King as His own beloved children?

Father!  Seize my heart in full! Till I long for nothing more than all you have promised.

“The purpose in a man’s heart is like deep water, but a man of understanding will draw it out.” (Proverbs 20:5, ESV)

Wise people seek to understand more clearly their own motives and desires. They do not become blind servants of their inward inclinations, but seek to see what’s really there – why they think and do as they do – that they might serve God in the inward man as well as in the outward actions.

It is incumbent upon us to seek out the knowledge of our own motivations. To live without examining our own hearts and minds is to fail to grow in true sanctification. A man of understanding seeks to know why he does what he does – so as to serve God with truth in the inward parts.

But know this as well child of God, as you go about this business, while by the illumination of the Spirit and the lens of the Word – great defilements will be uncovered – so will this wonder of reality: Every good thing you are prompted to do, is evidence that the Spirit of God is at work in you – perfecting His own. “for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” (Philippians 2:13, ESV)

Oh what a great Savior He is who has bought us for Himself!