Monday, March 01, 2010

Proverbs 1

As i mentioned in my previous post I am going to work on a serious of post for my son based around my study of Proverbs. God has given us all the "one-liners" we need to instruct and teach our children in His ways if we are just willing to use them. So I started with Proverbs 1. I don't know how long I will spend in this book. Most people do a Proverb a day. Not sure if that is where this is going yet or not, we will just have to see. As for Proverbs 1.....

I have read through the Proverbs many times and one of my favorite verses of Scripture is Proverbs 1:7, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; Fools despise wisdom and instruction." I think if you had to put a big bow on the book of proverbs this verse is it. Now just a few notes I wrote as I read.

- Prov 1:5 "A wise man will hear and increase in learning, and a man of understanding will acquire wise counsel"

- To have knowledge is to have understanding of information about something. To have wisdom is the ability to apply knowledge to daily life.

- Major Themes of Proverbs 1

* v. 1-10 A call to knowledge and wisdom

* v. 11-19 Evil seeks possessions and destruction

* v. 20-33 Judgment

- Prov 1:31 "So they shall eat of the fruit of their own way and be satisfied with their own devices"

Lesson's to my Son

I decided some weeks ago I had a lot of little tidbits of knowledge and wisdom I wanted to pass down to my son I started formulating a way and manner in which to do so. My dad taught me so much about what it means to be a man that I feel like I need to pass that blessing own to my son(never mind it is a biblical mandate). So when I started thinking about it I could not wrap my mind around a "method" to get this to my boy. Even doing a blog post did come to mind but the manner I was going to go about it was completely different than where I am now.

I had decided I was just going to put out the "one-liners" on the blog with a little bit of information about each one then in a couple of years I would just go to the blog when I had a lesson to teach. Well as so often is the case God had other plans. Yesterday while assembling my new Grill that I got with my Christmas gift card God started to speak to me. As I was thinking about all these little clip of information I wanted to pass down I kept coming back to thoughts of which I considered those of the evil one. Thoughts like "are you living these out?", "How can YOU teach these", and "Why would the boy listen to you?" Because I had cast them out as not my thoughts or God's voice I kept on pondering until this morning....

I rise most days around 5am. It is a time for me to be by myself. I don't have to think if I don't want to, I don't have to read if I don't want to, I can just sit and meditate if that is what I'm feeling, I can watch TV, I can surf the web. It is "me" time. As I walked away from my sleeping wife and warm bed at 5am this morning I was hit figuratively to the floor. God was talking to me yesterday. He was trying to tell me he has already done this series of post for me in the Bible in the book of Proverbs. Why would I re-invent the wheel when the wheel that has been given is PERFECT. So as I walked away I went in to the office grabbed my bible and started with Proverbs 1 this morning. I will in no means learn or pass on everything these snipets of wisdow contain but it is better than trying to make it up on my own.