“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.” Proverbs 9:10 (ESV)
A favourite book of mine of the Bible, for a variety of reasons, is Proverbs. I can get lost in the structure of these short statements of wisdom. Seeing the difference between knowledge, understanding, and wisdom was significant for me.
As an example, I know about leading. Knowing comes from books, podcasts, principles, and others. I understood leadership better through experience, both healthy and unhealthy. Finally, I grow as a leader by combining knowledge and understanding and integrating the healthy thing to be and do as a leader.
No matter the topic, I used to think doing this is what made one wise or foolish, but in believing this, I missed Proverbs’ heart. Proverbs 9:10 says the starting point, THE BEGINNING OF WISDOM, IS FOUND IN THE FEAR OF THE LORD. Hold on now. The origin of wisdom is not what I know or experience but who I fear. What is this all about?
Well, according to Proverbs, wisdom is not an invisible force. Instead, it is found in the character of God. Wise and foolish are not simply defined as such by their decisions alone. They are characterized by who people follow and who we trust to be the ultimate truth about life.
Jesus said this about Himself in John 14:6. “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” Look at the words and life of Jesus and guess what you find, everywhere He went, everything He said was precisely who He was—He is our Way, Truth, and Life.
In her book Confronting Christianity, I love how Rebecca McLaughlin plays being wise and foolish by defining Jesus, “If Jesus is the Bread of Life; loss of Jesus means starving. If Jesus is the Light of the World, the loss of Jesus means darkness. If Jesus is the Good Shepherd, the loss of Jesus means wandering alone and lost. If Jesus is the resurrection and the life, the loss of Jesus is eternal death. And if Jesus is the Lamb of God, sacrificed for our sins, loss of Jesus means paying that price for ourselves.”
So, the fear of the Lord means living with a healthy respect for how God defines good and evil. Therefore, wisdom is learning to flourish within the boundary of how God defines life to be best lived.
The beginning of wisdom starts not with knowledge or understanding, as important as those two things are in all of our lives. No, wisdom begins with living into living how God, through His Word, evident most transparent in the person of Jesus, defines good and evil.
Wisdom is some try, but it is much more trust.
Wisdom is some learning, but it is much more love.
Wisdom is trusting the way of Jesus, the truth of Jesus, and the life of Jesus enough to follow, to root one’s life in the unchanging love of God. The opposite of wisdom is to be a fool, not just when we do or say foolish things, which sometimes we are all prone to do or say. Foolish is when we choose to define good and evil for ourselves. When we cross the boundary of what God has designated, that leads to our flourishing. Some of the most brilliant people are competing for the trophy to be the King of Fools.
When I understood that Proverbs is much more about authority than merely dispensing clever statements, as it says, this is indeed the beginning of wisdom.
My prayer for you today is to reflect. As you do, look at everything you have said or done in the past season. This is helpful. But invite the Holy Spirit, whose name is Wisdom, to show you not just what you said or did but genuinely who you are following. How do you define what is good and what might be evil? Because how you answer this question determines whether or not we are wise or foolish.
