There’s hope that anything can change. But first you must get wisdom.
Hear, O sons, a father’s instruction,
And be attentive, that you may gain insight,
For I give you good precepts;
Do not forsake my teaching.
When I was a son with my father,
Tender, the only one in the sight of my mother,
He taught me
And said to me,
“Let your heart hold fast my words;
Keep my commandments, and live” (Prov 4:1-4).
We can tell Solomon wants to get our attention because the first verse says, “be attentive,” and because it begins with “Hear, O sons,” rather than the usual “Hear, my son” (Prov 1:8). Would you like to get unstuck? Pay attention to what comes next.
After Solomon exhorts the reader to hear his instruction, he backs up the exhortation with a bit of autobiography. We’re transported back to the days when little Shlomo sat by the hearth and heard his father David talk about life. The most memorable advice was this: Hold on to my words (Prov 4:4) and get wisdom (Prov 4:5). This little story is noteworthy for at least two reasons.
1. It shows that the reason Solomon asked God for wisdom (1 Kings 3:5-9) was because Papa David told him to.
It’s easy to think Solomon’s request came out of nowhere, as though he had a flash of genius that just happened to coincide with the night when God made him the offer of a lifetime. No, instead, as we learn here, David had trained Solomon to do whatever it might take to get wisdom. Solomon was ready to ask God for it. Like Solomon, we must be taught to love and seek wisdom; it doesn’t happen naturally. Wisdom is an acquired taste, cultivated by people who have good examples to follow.
2. It implies that, if we want to inspire others to love wisdom, we must live it out and pass it on, just as David did for Solomon.
I’m not saying that David was perfect. He influenced his son both for good (loving wisdom) and ill (loving too many women). Solomon’s chief memory, however, was of his father’s quest for wisdom. It inspired him deeply.
To influence others, we, too, must quest for wisdom. Love for wisdom is infectious, not contagious. In other words, it doesn’t catch very easily; it requires close personal contact to be transmitted. For instance, parents ought to practice what they preach; they should be both open to learning and quick to ask forgiveness when they sin against their children. Leaders ought to tell tasteful stories about themselves to illustrate key ideas; people generally won’t get the point until they can see how it has personally affected the teacher. To save us, God didn’t hand over a philosophy or rulebook. He became a man and stood in our place, showing us in the process how to live wisely.
The first step to getting unstuck is to find good models who inspire you with hope and point you to Jesus as your wisdom. If you are a leader of any sort, your words will never be enough; you must visibly demonstrate the wisdom you seek to impart.
This post was first published in 2013 and is part of a series walking through Proverbs 1-9.
