Solomon is giving us a picture of a choice. A picture of a choice. And here's what I would like us to do. It's Sunday night in the summer. We can have an interactive service here. I would like for us to take Solomon's word picture of a choice in Proverbs chapter 9, and we're actually going to draw a picture of a choice. Now, as you'll quickly find out, we did not come here tonight for the quality of the artwork, alright? You will not be telling your grandchildren about this night because of the quality of the artwork. But I hope because of the approach that we take, that God will take his word and apply it into our hearts, young or old, in a way that is memorable for us. And so let's turn to the Lord in prayer. Let's ask for his help as we consider what his word has to say. Dear Lord, we are so thankful for the opportunity to be here this evening, to take the opportunity to open up your Word, to really roll up the sleeve, our sleeves, and dig in, and understand what Solomon is trying to tell us. All through our life, no matter what we're doing or where we go, we face these forks in the road where we have to choose, and we have to discern between the voice of wisdom and the voice of folly. And Lord, we're thankful for Solomon giving us this word picture that helps us to discern and to know how to discern between wisdom and folly. And Lord, all of us face this every day in our lives, and so I pray that you would take your word, Holy Spirit, would you please take your word and apply it directly into our hearts this evening. so that we can be discerning and following the path of wisdom. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Proverbs chapter 9 starts off by describing for us a woman. Her name is Wisdom. If you look there at the first couple of verses of Proverbs chapter 9, it says this. Wisdom has built her house. She has hewn out its seven pillars. So we have a good idea of what we need to draw first, right? We need to draw Wisdom's house. Wisdom's house is not a normal, average house. Wisdom's house is a house with seven pillars. I want you to go ahead and draw those seven pillars. And I just want you to think about what those seven pillars would represent. If you were to walk up onto a house, and instead of just a normal house with maybe a small little entry or porch, if you were to walk up onto it and you were to see this grand entrance with seven pillars, you would know that you had come to a house of substance. And that's wisdom's house. Wisdom's house is a house of substance. It says there in verse 2 that this lady wisdom has hewn out her seven pillars. I don't know how many of us have ever hewn pillars. Anybody? This weekend, did you hew a pillar? I don't know what it takes to hew a pillar, okay? But to hew out seven pillars sounds like work to me. And yet this woman wisdom has hewn out her seven pillars. In other words, this house of substance, this house of means, has come about because of the ingenuity and industry of this woman wisdom. This isn't a lazy person. This is someone who's up and active. She's a woman of substance. In fact, we can draw her here if you would like. This is where it'll become very clear that tonight is not about the artwork, okay? Here's the lady wisdom. The next verse tells us something else that's really, really important about this. In the next verse, it says this. She has slaughtered her meat. She has mixed her wine. She has also furnished her table. At Wisdom's house is a fully furnished table. And on her table, it says right there, she has furnished her table. She has slaughtered the meat. She has mixed the wine. She has furnished her table. On her table are all, as my grandma would say, all the fixins. All the fixins. I don't know if you had a grandma like mine. My grandma Messler was reared in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. They don't let you grow up in Tuscaloosa, Alabama without learning a couple of things. The first is how to fry a chicken. And my grandma knew how to fry a chicken. The other thing my grandma was good at was pie. In fact, my grandma's love language was pie, I think. In fact, my grandma's family ran a hotel, a small little hotel in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. And it was one of those hotels where everyone boarded together, so you went up to your room, but everyone ate together. And so my grandma was basically raised by the cook at this hotel, and that woman taught my grandma how to cook. And when we showed up at grandma's house when we were kids, my sister can testify to this, we would show up at grandma's house and there would be platters of fried chicken, fried okra, corn fritters, greens, Waldorf salad, peach cobbler. It was all there. You know, when I read this verse about wisdom and her house and how she's prepared all the fixings, that's what I think about. I think about my grandma, laboring, working hard. She would get up early, she would plan the meal, she would prepare everything, and she would work hard, anticipating the arrival of her grandchildren to this feast. And it was always a feast at grandma's house. at dinner we would talk about what we were going to have for breakfast. At breakfast we planned lunch, and at lunch we planned dinner, right? And so on Wisdom's table—I want you to draw it, don't worry about it, we won't post these on the internet, okay? This is going on the internet, by the way, right now. Mine is going out to the wide world, alright? But I want you to prepare a table with all of the fixings, all of the fine things. I'm putting some pie up here, okay? All of the fine things that you can have. Wisdom has prepared this. In other words, as Solomon is talking to us, he's describing this woman wisdom. She has a house of substance. She's a woman of ingenuity and industry, and she has prepared a feast. And this feast is not prepared for her. She has this feast prepared for whoever would come to her house. In Wisdom's house, there is a rich feast of spiritual blessings. But Proverbs chapter 9 is set up in what we call a chiasm. There's a chiastic structure. Chiastic structures are something that's used in literature. They use a lot in Hebrew literature. And basically what a chiasm means is you start your unit of literature with a topic or a theme, and then you end it with a topic or a theme that's either parallel or contrasting. And so Proverbs chapter 9 starts with a woman named Wisdom. But in Proverbs chapter 9, there's another woman. that we have to meet, that we have to encounter, that Solomon is going to present to us. And this is not the woman wisdom. Rather, it is the woman folly. I want you to go down to verse 13, because it's in verse 13 that we meet our second character that we have to draw into our picture of a choice. Not only is there the woman wisdom, but there's also a woman whose name is folly. Verse 13. foolish woman, the woman folly. It says this is clamorous. She is simple and knows nothing. This woman folly is loud. I don't know if you figured out yet that folly is really loud. Foolishness screams. Everywhere we go, everywhere we look, everything we turn on, everything we listen to in this world of ours, wisdom is muted. But folly is loud. Folly is clamorous. In Swahili, we have a proverb. It roughly translates to this. The empty tin can makes the most noise. We had a dog that we named Debetupu, which means empty tin can. That was her nickname. And we named her Empty Tin Can because she was clamorous. She was loud. She barked, but always at nothing. Every time you heard her, you would rush out to see what it was. And it was always exactly nothing that she was barking at. The empty tin can makes the most noise. And that is the woman folly. She's an empty tin can. What does she know? She is simple. Do you read it there, verse 13? She is simple. And what does she know? She knows nothing. She sure is loud. But she knows nothing. We all have had that experience with someone who talked a lot and said nothing. The empty tin can makes the most noise. And we have to be aware and alert to the fact that wisdom's voice, or excuse me, folly's voice is loud in our world. Folly is calling out to us all the time. And we have to be careful because folly sings a song that is attuned to the natural desires of our hearts. The folly that is screaming at us in this world is crafted by our enemy, the devil. The God of this world who is using his darts, his fiery darts, and is shooting those at us through our culture and through our society. And that voice of folly that is so loud, it is appealing to us. Because our adversary has crafted that tune to be appealing to the natural desires of our heart. Folly is loud. She knows nothing. She's an empty tin can. and listen to the description of her house. I want you to read verse 14 on your own, and then if you feel comfortable, just give me some feedback. What do you notice about the description of Folly's house? If we were trying to use Proverbs 9 to draw a picture of Folly's house, what is verse 14 providing for us? What does she have at her house? She has a door. Okay, that's a start. That's a start. It's like those Wile E. Coyote, you know, roadrunner. You know, they would set up just a door right by the edge of the cliff, right? This is the woman, Folly. She's got a door. Let's draw a door there in our picture of a choice. The woman, Folly. And what is she doing? sitting. Isn't that interesting? I don't know, I don't think that Folly spent the day hewing out pillars, or preparing a meal. In fact, if we skip down just a little bit to verse 17, look at Folly's meal. Rather than Wisdom, who has gone out and has slaughtered the meat and, and mixed the wine and furnished the table, look at verse 17. Where does Folly's meal come from? Oh, stolen, isn't it? Too lazy to provide something out of her own substance, her own ingenuity. Stolen water, bread eaten in secret. If we're going to draw Folly, we're going to have to draw her sitting down, lazy, inattentive to the requirements of work. Yeah, you definitely did not come for the art. But there's the woman folly, seated, lazy, no ingenuity. So we're beginning to see right away a contrast between the woman wisdom and the woman folly. Wisdom has a house of substance. It's from her ingenuity and industry. She has a feast waiting for her. And the woman folly sits, lazy, A house that just has a door. But here's the important insight that we need to see out of this text. While these two people are certainly distinct from each other, there's something that they share in common. Both wisdom and folly have someone that they're after. If you look at verse 4, That's back to the part of the woman wisdom. She has furnished her table. And it says in verse 3, she sends out her maidens. She cries out from the highest places of the city. And then read verse 4, whoever is simple, let him turn in here. As for him who lacks understanding, she says to him, look at verse 4, and then jump over, if you will, to verse 16. This is the woman folly. She sits at the door by the high places of the city to call to those who pass by, who go straight on their way. And just compare verse 16 and verse 14. They are word for word the same. Verse 16, whoever is simple, let him turn in here. As for him who lacks understanding, she says to him, both wisdom and folly have a message, and both of them have a message designed for the same person. the traveler, the one who is simple, the one passing through the city, the person who's coming down the road and comes to the fork in the road. We need to draw that person in, the traveler, traveling through the road of life, coming to the fork in the road. And you'll notice there, if you look At Wisdom's part, she sends out her maidens. She cries out in the high places of the city. You'll see that in verse 3. And you also see that phrase, the high places of the city, in verse 14. That phrase repeats twice there. What are the high places of the city? Well, there are two possibilities here. If this is a walled city, the high places of the city would mean the most prominent places of the city. And so if it's a walled city, the most prominent places of the city would be at the city gates. The gate was the place where people gathered. It was the place where the judge sat. It was the place where you conducted business. It was the place where if you had a message for people, you would post it, because everyone had to come through the gates. So if you wanted to get a message out, if it's a walled city, you would send someone to the gates of the city. And that's where wisdom has gone. She has sent out her maidens to the highest places. That's where folly is sitting. She's sitting next to the important places of the city. If it's not a walled city, then the most important place of the city would be that central marketplace. This is still how it works in many places in Kenya. When you go up into the rural villages, they have a market. And they'll have a particular market day, or if it's a bigger place, they might have multiple market days a week. But if you want to get the word out, you gather at the marketplace, you have your announcements and your placards ready to go, you stand there with a megaphone, because that's where you're going to get your message out. And wisdom and folly are both after this traveler, this simple person walking through the marketplace of life. And they have a message. I think this is so important for us to understand about wisdom and folly. Wisdom and folly have an intent. They want us to make a choice. This world is not neutral. This world system crafted by Satan, who's tuned this folly song to be attractive to our hearts, this world is not neutral. This world is after us. To go down the path of folly, there's an intent behind it. That's why we as Christians can't be passive about folly in our world. We can't just take a back seat. We can't just let it come and be undiscerning. But it's also important for us to understand that the voice of wisdom is also not missing in our world today. Wisdom is active. Wisdom has sent out her maiden. She is also crying out. I don't think there's ever been a time in our world's history where more people had access to more of God's Word It's everywhere. All you have to do is have an internet connection and you can access God's Word. You can access powerful Bible study tools for free online. There's never been in the history of the world more access to the Word of God. So what's going on in our world? It isn't that God isn't speaking. It's not that His Word isn't available. It's not that wisdom isn't calling out. It's that the voice of wisdom gets drowned out in this world of cacophonous folly. And that's what's happening here for this traveler as he comes to the marketplace of life. He's got these competing voices. And this is the central dilemma that Solomon's trying to help us with. What do we do? How do we discern the voice of wisdom and the voice of folly? Because if you haven't named this person yet, you need to name him, okay? Who is this traveler coming through the marketplace of life, standing at the fork in the road? It's me. This is you. And by the way, if you don't think it's you, if you don't think you're the simple person, then it's especially you. Yeah, this is us. This is me. Give this traveler a name. Here I am. I'm simple. I don't know what I ought to do. How do I discern the voice of wisdom from the voice of folly? And by the way, it matters that you do this. It matters that you discern this. Because as you stand here at the fork in the road with two paths in front of you and these competing voices, it makes a difference which path you choose. If you choose the path to wisdom's house, you have a rich banquet awaiting you. And by the way, let's not get confused with the health and wealth gospel that's out there. We're not talking about a rich banquet of physical, material blessings, okay? We're not, as disappointing as this is, it's not talking about literal pie, okay? We're talking about the rich spiritual blessings that come when we find our way to wisdom's house. In fact, if you want to have a rich study, take chapter 10 of Proverbs and go all the way to Proverbs 31. Just read those chapters and make a list of the things that are on wisdom's table. When I say that Wisdom has prepared a table with all the fixins, why don't you go through Proverbs 10 to Proverbs 31 and get an idea of what's on the menu? For those who find Wisdom's house. Man, I love that. When I know I'm going to a place to eat, I pull down the menu online, right? I start to plan out what I'm gonna order. I think about it. And listen, you would be richly rewarded if you would go through Proverbs 10 to 31 and just make a list of what is on wisdom's table, what's on her menu, what's awaiting you if you go there. Listen, the blessings of a godly family, the blessings of a relationship with your children, the blessings of the reward of hard work, a good name, a discerning tongue. You just make the list. It's a rich feast waiting. And that's what's waiting at Wisdom's house. But go right to the end of this chapter. Look at the very last verses here. What about those who go to Folly's house? Look at that very last verse. The person who heeds Folly's voice, who walks the road to Folly's house, who opens the door and steps through, what happens? But he does not know. As he steps through that door, he does not know that the dead are there. And that Folly's guests are in the depths, it says, hell. That's the Hebrew word Sheol. They are in the depths of Sheol. They go down to the grave. Their lives are destroyed. And so as we stand here at these places, these forks in the road where we have to discern wisdom and folly, it's important that we get this down because it matters. It's the difference between a rich feast at wisdom's table or life destroyed. in the depths of Sheol. So how do we discern? How do we know the difference? It's right here in the middle of this passage. I mentioned to you this chiastic structure. You put parallel or contrasting elements at the beginning and the end. And then you put the point, the most important point, the way that you discern between these two things, between wisdom and folly, is right in the middle. And it's a verse that I'm sure all of us have heard, that all of us are familiar with. It's one of the most famous verses in all of Proverbs. But I want you to see how it's situated right in the middle of this chapter. It's Proverbs chapter 9 and verse 10. Proverbs chapter 9 and verse 10. This is how you discern between wisdom's voice and folly's voice. Verse 10. The fear of the Lord. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. That Hebrew word, wisdom, is such a rich word. In Hebrew, it's kokma. Just proving that Coke is a wiser choice than Pepsi, okay? Just to settle that age-old discussion. Kokma. It literally means this, skill. Skill. In Scripture, the word kokma is used of, for instance, the artisans of the tabernacle, the people that were gifted to make the furnishings of the temple. They had skill. They had kokma. And here in Proverbs, it's the skill of making choices. Kokma. How do you make skillful choices? The fear of the Lord. Well, what is the fear of the Lord? Well, the next line answers that for us. What is the fear of the Lord? The knowledge of the Holy One. The knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. That word understanding is the ability to discern between two options. So how do we discern between wisdom's voice and folly's voice? The fear of the Lord, which is the knowledge. of the holy, knowing who God is. The fear of the Lord is so important in the Old Testament that it becomes a virtual synonym for Scripture itself. In fact, in Psalm 19, when David uses the word fear of the Lord, when he uses that phrase, the fear of the Lord, he's using in a list of synonyms describing the Word of God. So how do we discern the voice of wisdom from the voice of folly? We, through this book, know who God is. And as we know who God is, we link that knowledge of God into the concrete decisions of life. If you know who God is, when the woman Folly says, stolen water is sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant, you know that that doesn't have the ring of God's truth. In fact, this stolen water and bread eaten in secret within the book of Proverbs is euphemism for immorality, sexual immorality. When you read that, you have God's word and God's truth in your heart. You know that that does not ring true with what you know of who God is. And the book of Proverbs is an intensely practical book. In fact, that's one of the reasons we love it so much. The book of Proverbs just takes this lofty truth and puts it right down on the bottom shelf where we can all reach it, right? And it uses these really vivid word pictures to help us understand that truth. It's approachable. But I want you to understand that practical wisdom of knowing how to choose right from wrong, wisdom from folly, is rooted in who God is. It's the knowledge of God. You know, I've had the chance over the discussions with Pastor Ed Dean, as we've thought about moving forward with the college, just to think about that and what that means, and stepping into leading an educational institution. I didn't, you know, wake up someday with God's call on ministry and say, I'm going to lead an educational institution. But you know, the longer I've thought about that, the more this thought has just rung true in my heart, which is that God is the source of all that is true. In fact, there's no way for us to know what is true apart from God and his revelation. And that can't just be a lofty idea out there. That can't just be something that we assent to intellectually. That has to be the reality of how we live our lives. There is a great, great danger for us who are members of a church that is committed to doctrinal purity, committed to the right doctrine, that we somehow separate that right doctrine. We give ourselves a pat on the back for not getting the answers right on the theology quiz, but there's a missing piece connecting that truth into how we live our life. Here's what I think Solomon would say to us, when we reach those forks in the road, one path leading to wisdom's house, the other path leading to folly's house, when we stand there, how often, standing at these important junctures in life, is it information, truth from God's Word that we know to be true about God? How often is that the deciding factor in what we do in our lives? Can I ask you this evening that penetrating question? When was the last time that you stopped doing something because of something you knew was true about God? When was the last time you did something because you knew something true about God? When was the last time that you were at one of these forks in the road and you were just impressed with the fact that there was a God who was holy, and a God who was present with you, and that knowledge of the holy caused you to fear Him, and so you made an actual, discerning, wise choice, directly rooted out of that knowledge of who God is? The book of Proverbs for the next 22 chapters, chapter 10 all the way through chapter 31, it wants us to make that connection. It wants us to say in all of these practical areas of life, make decisions based on what you know is true about God. Honor Him in your daily life. Know who He is from His word. Because that's how you'll discern the voice of wisdom from the loud and cacophonous voice of folly. I got on an airplane. Been on airplanes longer than I would like this summer. I got an airplane to fly to Denver. Short little, you know, hour flight. Took off from Phoenix. We got to almost Denver. And there was a thunderstorm, they shut down the airport, so they diverted us to Albuquerque. So we sat in the tarmac there in Albuquerque about an hour and a half, and we took off from Albuquerque, and we got to almost Denver. And they shut the airport down again. And so they flew us back to Phoenix. So I've been on an airplane for six hours, and I'm literally right back where I started. So we sat in the tarmac in Phoenix, and we sat there for about an hour and a half, and then we took off, and we got to, this time, actual Denver. And it took me about nine hours. I could have driven, almost. And you know, one of the things I noticed on that, just one of my observations, is on every single, you know, leg of that, I don't think there was a single time, I was in the middle seat, of course. This is where you are when you have a nine-hour flight. I don't think there was a single time when the people on either end of me didn't have headphones in their ears. I don't think there was a single time. It used to be when you get on an airplane, you could have a conversation with people, right? This was like captive territory for sharing the Lord, right? You're gonna be next to this person. You can just get a conversation started. And it's harder and harder because you know what we're doing more and more in our world? We're just drowning out anything meaningful. Man, we've got the world cranked up to ten, and we've got the Word cranked down to one. I don't know how we can hope to hear the voice of wisdom when we've got the world turned up and the Word turned down. And we're going to have to make some deliberate decisions to tune out the world and turn up the Word so that we can know God. And by knowing him, we can discern the voice of wisdom from the voice of folly. Because all of us stand here every day, simple, uninformed, easily deceived. And if we do not discern wisdom's voice, and we step through folly's door, there's a price to pay. But on the other hand, if we can hear God, and we can connect truth about who God is, and we can hear His voice through all the noise of this world, we can make our way to wisdom's house and enjoy what God wants for us, which is a feast of His rich spiritual blessings. Would you bow your heads and close your eyes with me?