Please remain standing for the reading of God's word from Proverbs 3, verses 1 through 12. This is God's word. My son, do not forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments for length of days and years of life and peace. They will add to you. Let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you. Bind them around your neck. Write them on the tablet of your heart so you will find favor and good success in the sight of God and man. Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding in all your ways. Acknowledge him and he will make straight your paths. Be not wise in your own eyes. Fear the Lord and turn away from evil. It will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to your bones. Honor the Lord with your wealth and with the firstfruits of all your produce. Then your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will be bursting with wine. My son, do not despise the Lord's discipline or be weary of his reproof. For the Lord reproves him whom he loves as a father, the son in whom he delights. Amen. The grass withers and the flower fades. But the word of our God will stand forever. Amen. Please be seated. Father in heaven, we now thank you for this your word that's been read in the presence of your people and whom you promised to attend with the power of your Holy Spirit as we and now your people give our attention to this your word. Would you grant to us wisdom? Would you grant to us a vision of whom you call the wisdom of God, even Christ himself? This we ask in Jesus name. Amen. We began last week a series in Proverbs chapter 3 verses 1 to 12 to begin the new year 2022. It's good to see some of you that I haven't gotten a chance to see yet over the course of this year. Happy new year to you. Delighted to be able to enter into this text of scripture as we look with anticipation and expectation of how the Lord will grant to us the wisdom we need for the year ahead. Now, we said last week when we read Proverbs 3, 1 through 12, and we looked at these verses together, we said that each of these verses are one half of a couplet. Verses 1 and 2, verses 3 and 4, verses 5 and 6, and so forth, are couplets teaching us very specific paths that we are to walk in In fact, we used that metaphor last week to describe wisdom, that wisdom in the Bible is regularly referred to as a path. And we noticed that that language was even used there in verses five and six in the text, the section that you probably know quite well from Proverbs 3, trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, but in all your ways, paths. Acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight. And we asked the question last week, noting that wisdom is like a path. If it is a path, what can we say about it? What can we say about its nature? What can we say about wisdom if the metaphor of path is a faithful description of it? And we said we could say three things. We could say that it provides direction. It provides direction because that's the nature of what a path does, is it provides direction. It shows you where it is you should go and it shows you where you shouldn't go. That's one of the purposes of a path. But it also requires discipline. We said it requires discipline because you have to walk it. A path is not just something you can study. It's not just something you can know about or look at. It's something that must be walked. Wisdom must be walked out. It requires discipline. But we said thirdly, we can say about wisdom that it leads to a destination. A path goes somewhere. By its very nature, you anticipate and expect a path to move you as you follow it from one location to another. No one gets on a path and says, I hope this doesn't go anywhere. Everyone gets on a path anticipating that it will take us somewhere. Now, each of the couplets actually give us direction and lead us to a destination and inculcate or have us ask the question of what discipline do we need to incorporate in our life to walk this path? Let me give you an example of this. Verse one reads this way. My son, do not forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments. That's the direction. That's the path that you are to walk on. Don't forget my teaching. Let your heart keep my commandments. A negative instruction and a positive one. Meant to be parallel with one another. Here's the direction. Here's the path you need to walk. Where's this path going to take me? Verse two, for length of days and years of life and peace, it will add to you. That's where this path goes. If you follow it, it's gonna lead you to this direction. Now, one of the questions that arises within that couplet is the question of, okay, so I need to walk the path of not forgetting teaching. and walk the path of keeping the commandments in my heart. That's what I need to do. And so as you think through, OK, that's the path I need to walk. The question that should come to your mind is, how do I do that? Because I'm forgetful and I'm disobedient and I'm never going to make it to a long life full of peace. if walking that path is up to me alone. So a discipline is required. There's something I'm gonna have to incorporate to walk that path in order to get to that destination. Now the same thing happens here in verses three and four. Notice, let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you, bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. There's your path. This is what you're supposed to do. And this is what you walk in. Where's it going to lead? Verse four. So you will find favor and good success in the sight of God and man. Notice the destination. And so then the question becomes. How do I bind these things around my neck, this steadfast love and faithfulness? How do I inscribe these things on my heart? There's going to be some kind of discipline that's going to be incorporated in there. Do you see that? Do you see that structure? Now, each of the couplets do that, which I think kind of helps you get some insight into the structure of Proverbs chapter 3. And what I want to do today is within that knowledge of direction, destination, requiring discipline to get there, I want to look at the first four verses, so those first two couplets, weaving them together today as we're sitting in this text for five weeks and ask three questions of that section. I want to ask the question, how do we know which path to walk? If wisdom is a path, how do we know which path to walk? Because there are many paths. There are many paths in the world. How do we know which one to walk? Secondly, who do we need to walk the path with us? We don't need to walk alone. Who do we need to walk the path with us? And thirdly, what will sustain us along the way? What will sustain us along the way? Because it's a long journey. All right, so how do we know which path to take? Who is it that needs to walk this path with us? And how will we be sustained in the long journey of this path? Now I just wanna go ahead and give you the answers to all this. All right, what is the path that we need to take? And the path spoken of here in Proverbs 3 is the word of God. It's the word of God. Who do we need to walk the path with? The church. the people of God. And how will we be sustained along the way? By the love of God. All right. So the word of God, the people of God and the love of God. Those are the three things that they teach us right here in verses one, three, four of Proverbs chapter three. Now, I want to start with the word of God. Notice the language here. Solomon tells us really that the gateway of the pathway of wisdom is the word. Notice he says, my son, do not forget my teaching. And then he says, but let your heart keep my commands. Now, this is very common in the Proverbs where one statement is negative. Don't forget this. Here's how I want you to remember it. Here's the positive instruction. Let your heart keep my commands. Now in that structure, Proverbs is actually telling us that teaching and commands are parallel to the same thing. And that actually makes great sense because the word teaching is actually the word Torah. It's the Old Testament Hebrew word for law, so for commands. And we know that this law that's in view is the foundation stories, commands, principles of the whole of the scriptures that were given to the people of Israel. The first five books of the Old Testament, Genesis to Deuteronomy, were referred to as the law or the Torah. They were the foundation stones of the path of redemption that the whole of Scripture is presenting to us. And he's saying, don't forget the commands of God, don't forget my teaching, the Torah, have in view the whole of what it is that I have revealed to you. In fact, scholars as they have studied the Bible Look at those first five books and some have argued that every known doctrine in the scriptures is found in seed form within those first five books of the Old Testament. The Torah really is a true law or foundation that we are to walk in. And so we must walk in the word of God. Now here's what's interesting. Most of you in this room, many of you have walked to the Lord for many years and you're saying to yourself, that's not an earth shattering realization. Like I have known that for many years that I need to walk in the path of the word of God. Got that, check, let's move on. Not so fast. We're thinking about wisdom, not simply duty or knowledge. We're thinking about wisdom, not simply duty or knowledge. That's different. Notice the way Solomon even puts it. In the second half there of verse one, be sure that you're keeping the commandments in your heart. He's not talking about mere knowledge, mere information or the content. Be sure that you have memorized large swaths of the Torah. That's not exactly the point of wisdom here in Proverbs chapter three. He is desirous of you actually treasuring that Torah in such a way that it is kept as the very centerpiece of your life. That's what he means by the language of heart. Now where do I get this treasure piece? Well that language of keep is very interesting. Notice he doesn't say I want you to obey the commands. He could say that. Certainly entailed in the language that he's given to us here. But instead he uses the word keep. It literally means guard. I want you to guard the commands in your heart. I want you to treasure them in such a way that you won't let anything from the world get in there and route the commands of God and the followership that you're called to in God. You're going to treasure him more then every other thing that's going to be offered to you in the world. So I want you to be on guard in your heart and put, as it were, soldiers in full armament around that heart, being sure that the word is treasured to such a degree that you will follow and not be led astray by the things of the world. That's the imagery. In fact, I couldn't help but think of walking into St. Peter's Basilica a few years ago when I was in Rome and being just awestruck by the cathedral, but then immediately turning to my right and looking into the right chapel, the transept over to the right, because I knew Michelangelo's Piata was there. And I knew that I wanted to see it. And I wanted to see it pretty quickly. And there was a crowd of people there. And inside of that chapel was this marvelous sculpture by Michelangelo. And outside that sculpture, because this is Eastern Europe, of course, There is guards and those guards have a little show of force called AK-47s that they have strapped across their front to say, don't try to get in here to do any damage. Don't try to get in here to steal something or take something. There's a treasure in this chapel. And we're going to do whatever it is that we can to protect it. Now that sense of guardianship of the treasure of Michelangelo's sculpture in St. Peter's Basilica is something of the picture of the posture of heart that Solomon is calling us here to Proverbs 3 that we do with regards to holding the word of God at the very center of our being. That's how vigilant we are. He's wanting us to have that kind of wisdom. a deep treasuring of the word of God. So it's not just that you know the word of God, it's not that you've read the word of God, it's not that you just got that truth down. This is really the practical question. When you were anxious this week, which was an indicator that you were probably believing something more than the promises of the word, did you run to the word to recalibrate your heart to bring you to the peace of the gospel? Or did you just stress out about it? Or did you run to a bunch of other people and just get advice? Did you turn to every other broken cistern in the world for water? Or did you go to the living well? That's what Solomon is asking. When you fell into depression this week, became discouraged and upset, when you were trapped in shame and loathing because you fell into that sin again, that you said you would never do again, Did you just recommit? Did you just cover your tracks? Did you just mutter a prayer into your breath? Did you just get mad and leave the place? What did you do? Or did you run to the Word of God to be recalibrated by the strength and the power of the gospel? That's the question of the text. Is there a Godward instinct within you that when you're in those moments that you move to the Word? And I think that's where the conviction comes, isn't it? That's where the conviction comes, because we actually don't run to the Word, and that instinct is not formed within us, which tells us that we're actually not treasuring the Word. We're actually not guarding it in our heart. It's not the prized possession that we're not letting other things get in and usurp and overtake. We're actually letting those things. And so the question is, how could that instinct be formed within us? How could we get there? Well, that really, I think, brings us to point two, the church, the people of God. Because I want you to notice how the word comes. It's very interesting. Derek Gibner makes a wonderful note in this. He says in his commentary on Proverbs that the word Torah, when it is used without qualification, the word law, teaching in this passage, when it's used without qualifications, always with reference to the divine law, the word of God. But in this context, it actually is qualified. Notice it's not just the teaching. Notice how it's spoken. It's my teaching. My son, do not forget my teaching. It's a father that's actually speaking to a son. That's the structural context of Proverbs chapter three. And then notice, I want you to keep my commands. It's personal and it's possessive. Now, what's going on here? Well, I want to assure you that Solomon is in no way subjectifying the universal and absolute truths of the Word of God. He's not doing what some of us do in the modern age, and we go, you know, I have my truth, you have your truth, and never the truth shall meet. You know, right? He's not doing that. He's not falling into that category. No, Solomon is actually telling us how to grow in wisdom. And interestingly, he's telling us we need, this is important, more than the Word of God. Now it's not because there's something lacking in the Word of God. In fact, what he's telling us is showing us to appropriate the Word of God in a very particular way. He's telling us that we need the Word of God in relationships. My teaching. My commands. We need fathers. We need mothers, we need people who will personally press in the Word of God and apply it into our lives specifically in the ways that we need it. We need people who are further along in the path to come into our lives with the Word of God and to explain it, apply it. tailor it specifically to the needs, to the context of where it is we are on the path. Now you can understand this. when you think about how growth and development happens in your own knowledge of the Word of God. Maybe some of you memorized a Bible verse at the age of four. It was a Bible verse that taught you about God's sovereignty, that He's in control of everything. And you were so delighted when you memorized that. Mom and Dad were very excited. And so you went about your way. But then you turn 14 and you You didn't make the grade on the test that you took, that you studied all night for and worked really hard and thought you were totally prepared. And the questions were different. You got tripped up and you ended up not getting the grade that you wanted. And now that Bible verse that God's in control of all things comes home to you differently. You're older. You're at a different turning place in the path. And you've got to now consider, what does it mean when God brings hard things into my life? Now you're 24 and you've just proposed and she said no or she said yes. And you have to come to terms with God's providence in your life in a whole new way. And now you're 44 and you've been diagnosed with a disease that many would say is premature to your age. And yet you know God is in control. You've known God is in control since you're four. But it's different when you're 44. The truth of the scripture hasn't changed, has it? But the impact of that scripture has drastically changed. The meaningfulness of that scripture has radically changed. And it's caused both upheaval and affirmation in your own life as you're walking along the path. The development of the knowledge of the word of God is what actually brings real wisdom into our lives. The depth is what is taking place. You're not learning new things, you're learning the old things newly. They're being applied in your life in a radically different way. You're having to come back to the foundations. And you know what you need in those moments? People. People who are further down the path. People have said I've been there. I was there 20 years ago. I've been at that juncture. I've learned some things. Listen to my teaching. Listen to my commands. Let me tell you about this. Right parents experience this all the time when you're raising and training your children. It's like sometimes you want to tell them something and you know that if you tell them, they're not going to get it. And when you say to yourself, it's gonna take some time. I remember someone telling me when I was about 20 years old, faithful brother in the Lord who discipled me for a couple of years, he said to me, you know, I want to tell you something, but I think it'll take you 10 years to get it. I was offended by that, which just tells you I wasn't very far along the path. This is why when we get older, sometimes we look back, whether it's our parents, or our coaches, or our teachers, and we think, oh, they were so difficult, they were terrible, they were mean, they were doing all these unkind things, just making sure that we didn't have any fun. And then we get to 44, and we go, I'm really thankful for those people. What happened? Did their teaching change? No, you changed. You changed. Wisdom was found. Deepening wisdom. And how did that come? Through relationship. Through relationship. If you look in your life, times of growth and renewal, almost always it's come in the midst of a trial, a crisis, around a point of truth in relationship to a person. Almost always. Almost always a new relationship around the truth, a trial. That's where God does often his best work in the midst of our lives. What the scripture is actually teaching us is that we need to be in submission to the authority of those who are further along the path to help us to speak into our lives. And also those of us who are further along the path and almost all of us in this room are further along than somebody. We should take up the mantle and the responsibility to actually speak into the lives of those who really could use the wisdom of someone who's a little further down the path. This is what the body of Christ is. You know what Solomon is saying? He's saying you need the church. He says you can't be a wise person alone with your Bible. You're gonna need other people. You're gonna need the church, and he's given that to you. What a kind and gracious God. We see the path, it's the word of God. We see who we're to travel with. It's the church, it's the people of God. But notice also, how do we sustain this over the course of our time together as we journey? And no surprise, this is the love of God, right? This is what he tells us here. Let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you. Bind them around your neck. Write them on the tablet of your heart. Now the ancients believed there was a very close relationship between wisdom and love. It actually makes a lot of sense even in the context of Proverbs chapter 3 because we have a father that's speaking to a son. We can appropriate it to a daughter. A father is speaking to a son or a daughter. The assumption of the relationship is love. Right? The assumption of the relationship is familial love. It's in the context of family. The ancients understood that wisdom and love actually go together. In fact, the word philosophy, which we tend to associate with an intellectualism or a class or Plato and Aristotle very specifically, but the word itself means lover of wisdom. Lover of wisdom. Notice, not knower of wisdom. But the word means lover of wisdom. The Greeks are in some ways even associating the fact that wisdom comes through affection. That the things that you really know and the wisdom that you really gain comes through that which you love. Esther Meek wrote a fascinating book called Loving to Know a few years ago. Where she argues that biblical knowledge, true biblical knowledge is inextricably tied to love. that is through love, particularly God's love, that we are made wise. And this makes sense when we look to 1 Corinthians 1, a passage that deals with wisdom. Paul tells us that the wisdom of God is foolishness to the world. Christ is foolishness to the world. The cross is foolishness to the world. But to those who are being saved, who are those? Those who have received God's love. What is the cross? It's wisdom. It's the opposite of foolishness to those who have received the love of God, to those who have embraced the love of God, to those who are being saved. It is the wisdom, it is the power of God. You see an interplay of wisdom and love even in the scripture. And so far we've seen that wisdom is founded, of course, on the word of God, that we need people to walk with the church in that. But can you imagine if we just had the word of God And we had people, authority is actually in view, father to son, and we didn't have love. But we would see what we sometimes see on the news. Abusive churches, legalism, grown amok. People who are conformed into a type of religion, but has no love of Christ or gospel at its center. You see, there's no wisdom in that. There's conformity bending one's behavior to a standard, but there's not transformation. Softness and new heart regenerated and transformed by love. Those are radically different things. Solomon says, let not steadfast love and faithfulness leave you. Love is absolutely critical to wisdom. And notice the way that he puts it. Don't let them leave you. They're gonna try. That's the feel of the text. It'll just escape, you'll forget it. We're being encouraged today in the knowledge and the wisdom of God. casting our mind and our gaze towards the love of God. But you know, it's gonna be very, very hard to maintain a sense of the love of God, a commitment to that love, a receptive spirit toward that love throughout the course of this afternoon, for instance. Solomon is saying, don't let these things forsake you. They're on the run. You'll lose sight of the love of God. You'll lose it, and it'll be on the chase. You're gonna need to bind it around your neck. You're gonna need to inscribe it on your heart. He's given us a picture of a necklace. Some of you in this room may have a cross necklace around your neck. It's close to your heart. It's a reminder of the love of God for you. It's a tangible way of remembering and hopefully calling to awareness and attention, even throughout your day and throughout your life, of the sacrifice of what Christ has done for you and the call to take up the cross daily and to follow Him. It can renew you, if you're attentive to it, in the love of God. It's the idea of the binding around the neck, or the inscribing on the heart. Isn't it interesting that where this language of steadfast love and faithfulness really comes to fore in the scripture, where it comes out in great display, is in Exodus chapter 34. And you know what's happening there? God is inscribing the Ten Commandments on stone tablets. Again, the second edition. The first edition got ruined, you might remember. The second edition of the Ten Commandments are being inscribed, and Moses is on Mount Sinai. And God comes down in a cloud and we're told that he proclaims his name. Think of this, God himself preaching a sermon on his name. And the sermon that he preaches is that I am a God that's full of mercy, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. The very same thing that we read here in this text. God is saying these things are my name. They're my very essence. The character of who I am is bound up in these things. I am a God who loves and in my love is so committed. It will never fail. I will always sustain it. It will be maintained even in the midst of your consistent failure to maintain of love for me. I will maintain my love for you. Let not my steadfast love and faithfulness be lost on you. Bind them, do all that you possibly can to weave the sense of my love and the depth of my committed love to be the foundation and the baseline of your identity in life. So that increasingly you're actually saying, who I am is the beloved. Take a moment to evaluate how you answer the question, who are you? When people ask about you, what's the lead? What are the things that stand out to you? What are the things that you're not going to tell them? What are the things that you're gonna want to tell them? But then ask yourself spiritually what's most true about you. Do you know what's most true about you, believer in Christ? You are the beloved. His steadfast love and faithfulness has pursued you. that grace has been on the chase after you from the very beginning, and there is nothing that you can do to separate yourself from the love of God in Christ Jesus. You are the beloved. Now, how is that the pathway to wisdom? It could be the pathway to laziness. For some of us, we've fallen into this trap. We've said, well, if God is going to hold me fast even when I'm not holding fast, then as Paul puts it in his letters, why not sin so that grace may abound? That's the language of Romans. If I can't undo what is so steadfast and faithful in him, what's it up to me to have to do anything? And of course you know Paul's response, may it never be, he says. Because Paul is saying the person who's actually entertaining that reality is a person who's still in the flesh, not really in the spirit. A person who is operating out of the old man, a person who's not operating in the motivations and desires of the spirit, the new creature that we are in Christ. Because the new creature of who we are in Christ finds that when we have experienced and know the love of God at the depth of our being, and our identity is wrapped around the reality of being the beloved, that we are a people that are described here in this text, who have favor with God, who are at peace. And can then, as he says here, have success in the sight of God and man. We are ready to do what it is that God has called us to do. It invigorates us. The grace of God becomes an energy. It becomes a strength. It becomes a motivation. It becomes a wisdom. The wisdom not just to know about it, look at it and put it on the shelf and say, isn't that pretty? but the wisdom that actually takes it in in such a way that it transforms us where we begin to say, in the way that I have been loved by Christ, so shall I love by his grace. In the way that Christ has sacrificed for me, so shall I sacrifice. The energy and the strength that comes from loving the law, of treasuring his commands. You see, the person who's had the heart change looks at the commands and they no longer just see guilt. because now they see what's been paid for. Oh yeah, I fell short of that, but Jesus has wiped that clean. That law is not binding on me in guilt anymore. It now to me has become, as David puts it in the Psalms, it's like honey to me. I love this law. I delight this law because when I see it, I see what Christ has fulfilled. And I see that in Christ is what I may now walk in by grace. I want to only become more like him. I want to become like the one who's loved me so well. See, that's the spirit of grace. That's the treasuring of the commands of God in the heart of the individual. And you know what happens in that point? Did you see it? Joy. Don't you know it? Peace. Where does most of our foolishness come from? It comes from not believing in the love of God for us. Think about when you make the hasty decisions, when you're anxious and frustrated, and you're operating from deficit in your own mind and heart. Or when you're walking through life trying to earn love, trying to gain approval, you wind up looking like a fool and doing stupid things. That's what makes us a fool. It's thinking that we will actually find the love and acceptance our hearts are looking for outside of the context of who Christ is and what he's done. But in Christ, if you knew that there was an irrevocable, unfailing love that is yours right now in Christ Jesus, that will not in any way, way or form be removed from you, the peace and the restfulness that comes from such a position of heart actually begins to grant you wisdom. Think about it this way, I was struggling the other day, I was at a meeting that was coming, and I was like, I don't know what to say, I don't know what the situation is, it's gonna be really difficult. I was like, okay, I can say that, that's true, there's three or four things, I'm writing a mini-sermon in my head, and I could feel the anxiety that was there. And what was the anxiety? I can tell you what the anxiety was. I didn't wanna look like a fool in this meeting. I didn't want the person leaving that meeting and saying, oh, that wasn't helpful. I'm never going back to him again. It was ridiculous. He should find another line of work. What am I worried about? Approval. Acceptance. Being thought of someone as wise. Not being wise. Being thought of someone as wise. What am I not sensing? The fullness and the acceptance of the love of God for me in Christ Jesus. That even if I'm a miserable failure in the midst of this and don't know what to say, I can actually confess that. It's not the end of the world. And you know what we can do, and I know we can do? We can pray. That's probably better than anything I'm gonna do anyway. But to get there, what would I need to know? The love of God. And what would arise out of that love? Wisdom. Wisdom. I was complicating it from working in the deficit of my own soul. But the moment the love of God begins to dawn on me and the truths of his word begin to refresh my soul, I can work from abundance, from the fullness of steadfast love and faithfulness. Do you know they are in verse four? So you will find favor and good success in the sight of God and man. Again, what an amazing promise. We're gonna circle back on a couple of those phrases as we go to verses five through eight next week together. But the one thing I want you to see is that language of finding favor in the sight of God and man. Do you know there's only two places in the scripture that that language is used? other than the one right here in Proverbs 3. One is in 1 Samuel 2, spoken of Samuel himself, Hannah's child, who was devoted entirely to God. He was one in contradistinction from Eli's sons, who were living in wickedness. He was one that was growing in wisdom and favor with God and with man. And do you know who else? Of course you do. Jesus Christ. In Luke chapter 2, when he's in the temple at the age of 12, he's a young man who should be being discipled by fathers in the faith, but instead is discipling fathers in the faith. And we're told that as they quiz him and they're amazed at his answers, that Jesus grew year by year in wisdom and in stature. both in the sight of God and in man. Do you know what this text is actually telling us by citing this reality fulfilled in the person of Christ? Well, it's telling us that really we're talking about Jesus this whole time. Do you know he was the only son that's not forgotten his father's teaching? He's the only one. He's the only one who has kept the commandments in his heart. None of us have, none of us will. He's the only one that never let steadfast love and faithfulness forsaken, but in fact motivated him the entirety of his life. He had them bound around his neck, he had them inscribed on his heart, and he's the only one that ultimately found the kind of favor, full acceptance, with His Father, even now in heaviness. He's at the right hand of the Father, ruling and reigning on high. Perfectly accepted, He's found favor with the Lord, and He's found success. His mission, He tells us, at the end of the cross, as He's giving up His own spirit in saving for Himself a people, He says, it is finished. He has completed the mission. He's been successful. And one day when He returns, right now, in the sight of God, we already see it, but in the sight of man, everyone's gonna know that he is the one worthy to be worshiped. Everyone's going to know every knee is going to bow and every tongue is going to confess that Jesus is Lord. And you know what's going to happen in that moment? A lot of light bulbs are going to go off. A lot of wisdom. Wisdom of both the haunting kind and the joyous. Depending on the heart of the one who sees it. Do you see, wisdom is always found in the one who is called the wisdom of God. That is Jesus, your Savior. If we're going to grow in wisdom in 2022, It's not just going to merely be the discipline of effort or the Herculean efforts to be sure that we do everything just right and perfect. It means that when we fail, we've got quick recourse to the one who didn't. And who shows us a steadfast love and faithfulness by forgiving us. When you're successful this year, how will you remain humble? Only if you know that it's by the power of God and the grace of God that he's accomplished it in and through you. And when you fail this year, how will you not fall into despair? Only if you know that God upholds you by his righteous right hand, which is Christ himself. That's the wisdom of God, you see. That no matter what comes your way, if you're in Christ, the steadfast love and faithfulness remains. Let's help each other in this. Because you know what's gonna happen, this is gonna leak out of you and me, like in an hour. We're gonna need to stir each other up by way of reminder. Don't walk alone. Who is it that you need to saddle up close to this year? Identify where is it that your wisdom is weak. Identify where you might be a little further along the path and could really be used in the life of some people around you. And do that with integrity and without pride, knowing it's all a gift of God's grace. Stewardship for you to deploy for His purposes. Let's walk in wisdom this year. Let's stay close to Christ together. Father in heaven, would you help us see and behold the glory of who Christ is and find in Him a resting place? A peaceful place and find in him a path and the joy of walking in it. The energy and strength that comes from knowing that we're loved and nothing can change that. Lord, today in the measure needed, would you please, by grace, portion out your instruction to each of us, your saints, as we seek to walk by faith this year and always. And would you grant to us even now the wisdom that is Christ? And would we walk together until we see him face to face? Hear this prayer and answer it in Jesus name. Amen.