Got Wisdom?

13th Sunday after Pentecost, 8/23/15
Proverbs 9:1-6


Got Wisdom?
I. Your Lord desires to impart divine wisdom.
II. Live it!


At first, the advertising executives at Goodby Silverstein & Partners were not impressed to say the least. They deemed the phrase to be lazy and not even grammatically correct. But they were wrong. It was a huge success—an ad campaign that ran for 20 consecutive years.

To which advertising phrase am I referring? It’s “got milk?” Over the span of two decades milk producers used this phrase in a variety of situations to tout the wisdom of drinking milk. Celebrity faces with milk on their uppers lips graced the pages of magazines and our TV screens. The phrase was so recognized that it spawned take-offs such as “got blood?” for a horror movie, among others.

“Got milk?” was an invitation for you and me to enjoy milk’s benefits.

We have another invitation before us this morning, a much more important one. In this morning’s gospel, we once again heard Jesus refer to himself as the Bread of Life and he implores everyone to feed on him and receive eternal life. If you think about it, there’s no more important thing in all the world for you to do. Of all the things we spend our time and effort trying to accomplish, only feeding yourself on Jesus as the Bread of Life has eternal benefits.

In this morning’s reading from Proverbs, the Lord presents us with an opportunity to obtain real wisdom. He portrays it as a banquet and your name is on the invitation list. Got wisdom? Let’s spend a few minutes seeing what his wisdom is all about.

Part I.

To be honest, I don’t know how much this invitation to obtain real wisdom appeals to you. After all, how much do we prize wisdom? We admire entertainers, athletes, musicians, authors. But do we admire a person who is truly wise? In fact, would you even be able to name the person you consider to be the wisest individual you know?

The human author of these inspired words was truly wise. When the Lord offered to bestow on young King Solomon anything he wanted, Solomon wisely asked for wisdom and God granted it. In fact, he was known throughout that part of the world for his tremendous wisdom. Important people travelled great lengths just to listen to Solomon’s wisdom.

But later in life Solomon admitted how meaningless his wisdom was. He wrote, “I applied myself to the understanding of wisdom, but I learned that this, too, is a chasing after the wind. For with much wisdom comes much sorrow; the more knowledge, the more grief.” (Eccl. 1:17-18). Sounds pretty pathetic, doesn’t it? Isn’t wisdom a good thing? Indeed it is. God was pleased when Solomon asked for it and his wisdom was a divine blessing.

So why was Solomon so disillusioned with wisdom? Because he realized that all the wisdom in the world means nothing without divine wisdom, and that’s the wisdom that’s before us this morning.

Got wisdom? Jesus invites you to receive it. Listen once again to the words of our text, “[Wisdom] has sent out her maids, and she calls from the highest point in the city. ‘Let all who are simple come in here!’ She says to those who lack judgment, ‘Come, eat my food and drink the wine I have mixed.’” There’s one strange detail in those words. The invitation to obtain wisdom doesn’t arrive via mail, email, text or phone call. It’s loudly proclaimed from the highest point in the city. Why? Because the invitation isn’t exclusive; it’s all inclusive. The Lord desires to share divine wisdom with anyone and everyone.

That invitation isn’t to some boring seminar or tedious class. The Lord portrays it as a banquet. “[Wisdom] has prepared her meat and mixed her wine; she has also set her table.” Eating meat for the common person in Bible times was a rarity. It was expensive and labor intensive—from butchering to finally placing it on the table fully prepared. Wine was mixed with spices to enhance its taste. The table was set. There’s the hint of elegance in this description. Who could refuse such an invitation? Only a fool would!

So, just what is this divine wisdom that Jesus wants to impart to everyone, to you and me in particular? Well, consider how Jesus used references in other parts of the Bible to banquets and feasts. They depicted life in his kingdom. He used them to describe life with him in heaven. It would be rude, wouldn’t it, for someone to invite you to a feast and then expect you to do all the work? So take note of the banquet before us this morning and the other references to banquets and feasts in God’s word. They’re always complete and ready for the attendees to enjoy. The saving truth is that you and I do nothing to enjoy life in God’s kingdom now or eternal life in his heavenly kingdom. That’s something our loving Lord does for us completely. Feeding on Jesus the Bread of Life isn’t really something we do; it’s what our God does for us. Saving wisdom is centered on Jesus as your Savior from sin.

So, got wisdom? Your Lord desires to impart divine wisdom.

Being in the dark mentally can be haunting. What you don’t know can hurt you. For instance, it would be nice to know if the pink slip from your employer is coming and when. What’s more, while you are employed, there can be this constant uneasiness, a habitual looking over your shoulder, to see if someone is about to replace you. Or how about this one? Whether you’re young or old, a lack of confidence in a relationship with someone else is often due to what you don’t know. There seems to be something missing, something that doesn’t add up. Not knowing gnaws at you. That’s just the way life is.

But it doesn’t have to be that way in your spiritual life. It won’t if you take your seat at your Lord’s banquet. Do you want to know what your Lord thinks of you? He can’t stand what’s naturally in your heart—the misplaced priorities, the lack of devotion to him, your constant running in life’s rat race because of your desire for more. And then there’s the unholy thoughts about someone else, sinful spite, and the quest for vengeance. In fact, if it weren’t for our Lord pointing these things out to us, we’d think we’re fine just the way we are. But he imparts his divine wisdom to us. He informs us of who we are—daily violators of his holy law. But he doesn’t stop with that wisdom. He then imparts whom he has made us—his redeemed children of God, washed by the blood of the Lamb of God, members of his holy kingdom by our baptisms, empowered by those baptisms to conduct our lives as his children, children of God with faith in Jesus burning in our now holy hearts, destined not for life without him but for life with him. Got wisdom? You certainly do. Divine wisdom about your Savior and eternal life, imparted to you by your Lord himself.

Part II.

This actually happened. A Florida teenager filmed himself driving, as he put it, “like an idiot.” Guess what? He got into a serious car accident. Not real bright. It gets worse. While in the hospital recovering from his injuries, he uploaded the video to YouTube. The local police department found it and used it to build a case against him. What was he thinking?

If only you and I were immune to such foolishness. If only we were always wise. If only we followed the divine wisdom which our Lord desires to impart to us. But the truth is that our past is littered with foolishness. Sin never brings God’s blessings, but time and time again we decided that a particular sin would be a good idea and we got burned.

Listen to the final verse of our text, “Leave your simple ways and you will live; walk in the way of understanding.” Spiritually speaking, our world has things upside down. And that shouldn’t surprise us; after all, it’s a sinful world that wants nothing to do with Christ. That means our world has good and evil completely confused. “Partying” is sinful indulgence. “Friends with benefits” is shameless immorality. “Getting ahead in life” is often an excuse for lying, cheating and stealing. But that’s what the world calls good. And don’t you dare try to stake a stance on God’s word! The world will label you narrow-minded and hateful. So we’re tempted to bend to the world. But the Lord who imparts divine wisdom urges you, “Leave your simple ways.”

“And then walk in the way of understanding.” We sang these words last Sunday, “I want to walk as a child of the light.” To do that, we need to drink deeply from the fountain of God’s truth. We need to bring our Savior and his word into every facet of our lives. We need to implore the Holy Spirit to shine the light of his truth in our dark hearts so that we can take his truths and apply them consistently in our lives. That’s wisdom.

Got wisdom? You certainly do. So live it!

I think it was Hillary Clinton who once said, “It takes a village to raise a child.” I don’t have an opinion on that.

But I do on this. It’s takes a whole congregation of God’s people to live according God’s wisdom. When you try to go it alone, you will inevitably fail. That’s why we gather as God’s people at least once a week. We’re here to confess our failures to live in God’s wisdom in the past and to receive the assurance of his forgiveness and his power in our lives. We’re here to feed our souls on the Bread of Life. We gather to study his word so that we can more keenly know good from evil. We’re here to encourage one another. We’re here to help one another. We’re here to guide one another. Don’t go it alone!

Got wisdom? It’s right here. Soak it up and live it! Amen.