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Mining the Treasures of the Book of Proverbs
Worship, then wisdom. David, then Solomon. In the bible, after the
Psalms we have the book of Proverbs. This tells me that as we live
lives of worship, we find ourselves better able to access the wisdom of
God, especially the wisdom of the book of Proverbs.
The problem
with the Book of Proverbs is this: the treasures don't yield themselves
to a superficial glace. Let's face it, a large number of Proverbs seem
to be stating the obvious. Like Proverbs 14:5, for example.
"A
truthful witness does not deceive, but a false witness pours out lies."
(NIV)
Reading that makes me want to say "Duh! Tell me something I can't
figure out already using some common sense!"
But if you want more
of the Book of Proverbs to come alive to you, you've got to deeply
engage with it, to ask yourself questions about what it says and how it
all links together. Let me show you an example.
Proverbs 14:1 (NIV) - The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down.
Let's
stop to think about this verse. Does the 'house' in this passage refer
to an actual brick-cement-and-mortar building? Unlikely, since women
don't usually build or tear down those (we have construction workers
and demolition teams for that). So, this passage will refer to the
family. A wise woman builds her family, a foolish one tears hers down.
Now
here's the crux: what could possibly make a woman do things that tear
down her family? And what kind of actions would tear down a family,
sunder the relationships and leave it in tatters? Once you draw up even
a small list of actions that destroy a family, start to imagine what
emotional state a foolish woman would be in to engage in such behavior.
Any deep insights yet? If not, let's move on to another one.
Proverbs 15:1 (NIV) - A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.
I know this sounds very obvious. But here's my next question: why would someone give a harsh word that stirs up anger?
To
backtrack a bit, this verse is really applicable in an argument. Let's
say the conversation may start normally, but someone says something
that offends you. And at that point you have to make a decision: gentle
or harsh?
In real life it's not as simple as that, of course.
Why? Because the other person may have subconsciously decided to lose
their temper, and want YOU to lose yours too. (They don't want to be
miserable alone, so they want you to join them in their misery) So
they'll give you a harsh word to your gentle answer. What are you going
to do then? Gentle or harsh?
Ok, let's take a quick perspective
jump over to the other side. How does the person using the harsh word
justify speaking harshly? Recognize that oftentimes they feel they are
speaking the truth and you are refusing to listen to it, so they think
its ok for them to speak harshly to get the point across (or that you
give them no choice, they HAVE to be nasty with you, for your own good).
And
when you can give a gentle answer, they can see that you're in control
of yourself. That can lead to two results; either they'll be sobered by
that and try to bring themselves under control also, or they will be
ashamed by that and want to drag you down to their level. So they turn
up the hostility even more in the hope of provoking you further.
Proverbs 27:3 (NIV) - Stone is heavy and sand a burden, but provocation by a fool is heavier than both.
So what are you going to do then? Are you going to stay or leave the situation?
Proverbs 27:12 (NIV) - The prudent see danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and suffer for it.
At
this point you are in danger of losing your own temper and saying and
doing foolish things. If someone is determined to make you lose your
temper it is very difficult to keep it, especially while the
provocation continues. I highly recommend leaving the scene.
Don't
get me wrong, I am not against anger. I believe anger is a precious
gift from God, to give us energy to take action when our boundaries are
being violated. The problem comes when the anger is becomes a reflex
action, we snap into anger (and not thinking) when things go wrong or
when people continually provoke us. This is why the Bible says:
Proverbs
22:24-25 (NIV) - Do not make friends with a hot-tempered man, do not
associate with one easily angered, or you may learn his ways and get
yourself ensnared.
And you'll see from this whether it is
wise to continue associating with such a person. But when would you
have no choice, you're stuck with such a person?
Proverbs 21:9 (NIV) - Better to live on a corner of the roof than share a house with a quarrelsome wife.
Let's
start putting the pieces together. A quarrelsome wife often infects her
husband with the same quarrelsome spirit. This is very hard to avoid,
since the husband is face-to-face with her everyday, and his attempts
at giving gentle replies to turn aside anger are repulsed. It's very
easy to just think it's no point, and he just swings to the other
extreme and gets as quarrelsome as she is. In fact, out of frustration
he may even decide to go one-up on her. (And then of course the wife
starts seeing herself as the innocent victim).
This, my dear
siblings-in-Christ, is the beginning of a toxic environment, one that
may easily end up with both the spouses going physically violent on
each other, since they have already started being verbally violent.
Now, think about the kids. In such an environment, what are they
learning about resolving conflict, relating with people of the opposite
sex and how to behave when they are angry?
Could this be one of
the ways a foolish woman tears down her house? If you really want to
know, you'll have to read through the book of Proverbs and pay
attention to how often folly and being bad-tempered and quarrelsome are
spoken of together.
Then if you examine the whole process again
you learn to recognize the symptoms of a person (male or female) who
can go quarrelsome on you when things go wrong. And do so even before
they actually quarrel with you in the first place. How much peace and
freedom from strife will knowing that bring to your life? Is it worth
the effort to mine the book of Proverbs for its treasures?
Do you
start to see the reason why the Proverbs are oftentimes stating the
obvious? Because when we are in the really negative situations in life,
we often find it hard to see the obvious...
And all this is just
simply on the topic of quarrelsome people in general (and wives in
particular). If you want more to ponder, try this: what kind of person
would regularly flop at Proverbs 18:13? How does such a person think?
What are his or her assumptions? How would they behave? What are the
ways they could have ended up that way? How can they get themselves out
of that behavior pattern?
"Wow, JJ, that's a lot of work. Are you sure we have to go through all this?"
What
I shared above is ONE example of how I engage with the book of
Proverbs. There are of course other ways of doing it that I am sure
will give results too. What I do know for certain is that you MUST be
prepared to mine the depths of this book to get the full benefits of
the wisdom God has hidden inside.
Proverbs 25:2 (NIV) - It is the glory of God to conceal a matter; to search out a matter is the glory of kings.
Well,
my follow King-in-Christ, I suggest you take out your spiritual shovel,
open up to the Book of Proverbs and start digging. And if you come up
with anything interesting, contact me and let me know!
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