The Blessing of Giving - Proverbs 11:24-25 - By God's Design

All right, hey guys. Welcome to all of our locations today.

We're excited to have you. Man, we are a church that lives by this book. All right, and I don't know what tradition you grew up in. The tradition I grew up in, when a pastor said something like, this book is words of life to us, there would be a response in the crowd.

You know what would happen? People would say, ah, hey listen, we live by this book. Okay, we're getting better. Okay, so, no, in all seriousness guys, we live by this book. That's why today is so exciting, because we're starting a brand new sermon series. If you have a copy of scripture, take it out and turn with me to Proverbs chapter two, is where we're going to be today.

I can't wait to get into this new series. We have a companion guide. All right, so everybody can grab this. This is just a quick way to take some notes today. All right, so if you want to take notes, that way you can go to your community group this weekend, and you're ready to be there. You have some thoughts.

You remember some things from the sermon, that idea. They already said this. I'm going to say it again. Guys, regroup is open now. This is the way you get into a community group at Mercy Hill. We are a lecture lab model. Okay, so think about, I mean, that's just a little analogy, but think about like school. We're lecture on the weekend. We're lab during the week.

Discipleship happens when the word is taught weekend, and life is caught. That's what happens during relationships. Okay, so group is not the only way that happens, but it is a major way that it happens, and so I hope you guys will take us up on that. If you're new to group, you got to understand this. Okay, group is not one of those things that when you sign up, the only way to ever get out is to quit or die. Okay, there's a beginning to it, and then there's an end to it, and then we take a break, and then we do it again. Okay, and so and that next time, if it's a good fit, you regroup, and you just sign right back up for your group.

Some people have done that for years, so I just want to make sure you understand there's an on-ramp, there's an off-ramp. I hope you guys will jump in. Group is, you know, listen, if you're only coming on the weekend, you're missing half of what we do.

All right, and so I hope you'll get into a group. All right, guys, I can't wait to get into Proverbs. We're going to spend a few weeks in the book of Proverbs.

Proverbs is all about the design that God has for human life. There is a blueprint. I love the, you know, you can see it right here, the way they're so creative, our team, you know, there's a schematic. You see how all the nuts and bolts go in, and some of you guys are working jobs where this makes a lot of sense, where it's like, hey, I'm trying to take what the blueprint does, and I'm trying to match it up with reality. Well, guys, that's the book of Proverbs. There's a plan. There's a blueprint. There's a picture of what it is supposed to be, and the beautiful thing for us is this, guys, and I know not everybody's a Christian.

We have people that are just checking this out. Every service, every location, I get that, but for those of us who are believers, man, what great solace and cherishing happens in our heart when we realize God did not have to provide the blueprint for life for us, and he did because he's good, and he wants us to flourish. He wants us to flourish. Now, listen, I'm not saying you follow wisdom and everything in your life works out every way that you wanted it to.

That's not the point. The point is there is a generalized theme of God providing instruction so that we would have a flourishing happen. I think about a garden. There are rules to gardening.

There are things that are just true. You've got to plant at a certain time. You've got to water it in a certain way.

It's got to have sunlight. The plants are different distances from each other. Guess what happens?

This is so simple. If you follow the rules of a garden, what happens in the garden? Fruit and flourishing. If you decide, I don't care about the rules of gardening, I'm just going to do it my own way. I'm going to plant too early. I'm not going to worry about water.

The sunlight is not important. If you just decide the rules of gardening don't apply, you know what happens? Well it's not fruit and it's certainly not flourishing, it's failing. And some of us are living with that constant brokenness in our life and some of it is a total disregard for God's design. God has given us a blueprint for every day in every phase of life. Whether you're talking about kids, you're talking about work, you're talking about marriage, relationships, you're talking about how you relate to authority, you're talking about money, you're talking about physical health. Man, he has given us a blueprint for it and I want to argue today that we should value it like crazy and I'm going to try my best over the next eight or nine weeks to make sure that we are just cherishing, valuing, and hopefully getting to the flourishing that comes.

Here's the big idea. God's design is called wisdom and wisdom is extremely valuable. If it is the rules of the garden that create the flourishing of the garden, then the quote rules or design for the human life that creates flourishing in the human life, that would be pretty valuable wouldn't it? If you knew from the one who created everything, hey sexuality is supposed to be this way, hey money is supposed to be this way, the way you relate to leadership this way, how you use your words is supposed to be this way. That'd be very valuable to know in a life that we didn't create but we are sure living in.

All right and so this is what we're going to get into today from the high school student to the retiree, single mom, or CEO. Every one of us can grow in wisdom. We have that opportunity but we won't if we don't value it and treasure it. Here we go, Proverbs chapter two starting in verse one. My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commands within you, so it's receive and treasure verse two, make your ear attended to wisdom and incline your heart to understanding. Receive treasure, hear and incline the heart.

Yes if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures. Now one of the things that I want to say quickly here and then we're going to start breaking this down verse by verse is I think that what we can see here is there's a gaining of wisdom, there's a giving of wisdom, and there's a guarding of wisdom. Okay the first thing I just read this is the gaining of wisdom. Do we want to gain wisdom? You can say it like this, we should seek to gain wisdom. All right the message take is like this, seek to gain it, God will give it, it will guard you. All right so seek to gain it. Now look what he says here, it's really interesting to me in verse one and two.

All right if you receive my words and treasure them. So those are two different things, right? One is to receive, the other is to see it as valuable like a treasure. Then he says in verse two, make your ear attentive to wisdom and incline your heart. Again two different things. I can hear something without inclining my heart to it, right?

I can receive something without treasuring it. The idea here is twofold. We should hear and treasure, we should hear and incline our hearts. There are two parts to wisdom and if we miss this it's going to be very hard in this series, okay? You have to know something to follow it, but you also have to desire it to follow it.

There's two parts. If you know it but you don't desire it, then it doesn't matter. And if you don't know it but you do desire it, then it doesn't matter, right?

There's those two parts of it that we got to make sure we understand. You can say it like this, wisdom is knowing God's design and joyfully committing to follow it. If you don't know it, you can't follow it.

If you don't want to follow it, doesn't matter that you know it, right? It's those two parts and that really is wisdom. Guys, wisdom is different than knowledge. Knowledge is I hear, wisdom is I hear and I incline my heart.

Knowledge is I receive, wisdom is I receive, verse one, and treasure. I'm going to give you guys an illustration. I don't know why this stuck but I used this illustration years ago, okay? And it continues to haunt me because people remember it and they bring it back up.

It's very silly but every time I use it I have to surrender my man card for at least a week, okay? So when I was in high school there was a movie called Save the Last Dance, all right? Some of you have seen that movie?

I don't know, okay? And here's what happens in the movie. There's this kind of maybe upper middle class girl from, I don't know, she's from the south or midwest or something like that and she ends up through life circumstances finding herself smack in the middle of a very tough high school in Chicago, all right? Like an inner city school in Chicago. She's very out of place. She's like a ballerina, she's a dancer, surrendering the man card thing, okay?

And so she's a dancer, ballerina, whatever. She ends up in this school in Chicago and you just tell she's out of place. She walks up to her locker on the very first day, she puts her book bag down, she's messing with her locker, turns around within five seconds, the book bag is gone, all right?

Bad luck, right? Man, she's got to learn. Turns out a good Samaritan in the school, another girl in the school, saw her, could immediately see she's totally out of place, has no idea how to do life in this environment and she's the one, good Samaritan, that took the book bag from her to make a lesson out of it and so the girl walks back up to her with her book bag and she hands her the book bag and she says in this school never put your bag on the floor and then she walks away. Now here's the illustration.

I have no idea why it stuck so much but it hasn't always comes back and I think it's probably right. All right, knowledge is knowing, don't put your bag on the floor. What do you think wisdom is?

Exactly. Wisdom is someone told me this, I've decided to trust them and walk in what they're saying and apply what they have said to my life. Knowledge is knowing about the backpack, wisdom is deciding, man, based on what I know, I'm not going to do that anymore. Now none of us do this perfectly, okay, as believers, I get that, but the heart of a Christian is I don't just want to receive it, I want to treasure it. I don't just want to hear from you, Lord, in your word, I want to incline my heart to what it is that you say.

Look what he says in verse two, make your ear attentive to wisdom and incline your heart to understanding. Yeah, I mean, this is what we're talking about here. It's a desire level, it's a heart level.

I don't just want to know some things. Man, I want to want to walk in those things and I don't do it perfectly. Nobody in here does it perfectly, okay, but what is our heart's desire when we sin?

Are we convicted? It's one of the greatest things that we think about when it comes to heaven is that we're going to lay down struggles and we're going to be who he's called us to be perfectly. I mean, I desire that.

I don't know if you desire that. I think that's the desire of a Christian. Okay, you can say it like this, Christians hear the voice of the Lord through scripture and they incline their hearts to follow him. You know, we got a lot of people that potentially today, okay, we live in sort of this environment in the south. All of our campuses today is fanning from High Point, northeast, you know, we got, you know, right here, regional north.

I think about Clifton campus, I think about right here at the regional campus, y'all, there's a bunch of people over in the overflow room right now that are already over there to make sure we have room and here where a family of five could come and sit down all together. No matter where we are, we live in an environment today where we're listening to this word that many of us could be in a situation where we're sort of trying to do the right thing and trying to live the right life because kind of where we live, everybody's sort of a Christian. You know, I mean, not literally, but I'm just saying, you know, a lot of people have a lot of that Christian influence. You want to know the difference between a sort of Christian and a real Christian?

All right, a blood-bought, I understand who I was before Christ, I've been saved by Christ, Christian at the heart level. Whether they, listen, we all sin, I know that, at the heart level, they desire to desire what God wants from them. They want to want what God has for them. They look forward to a heaven where there is no more sin and we will always choose the right thing. When we sin, it grinds us. Man, it bothers us. I wonder if you're here today, what is at the bottom of your heart?

Are you white knuckling some things? Man, I'm here, I'm trying to do the right thing, but honestly, it's not my desire. It's not the desire of my heart. I pray today would awaken you to wisdom. I want you not just to have this ear, but also the heart that inclines.

Look at what it says in verse three. Yes, if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures. Now, this is what happens, okay?

Here, here, incline, okay? You know, receive and treasure. This is the idea. If that is true of us, then we will go out and seek wisdom as if it is silver, as if it is treasure. It'll be something that we are grabbing for. You could say it like this, y'all, wisdom is treasured before it is acquired. We're not going to go grab for something. We're not going to ask God for something that He's actually going to give us. We're going to get into that, but we're not going to gain wisdom and seek to gain wisdom if we don't treasure it.

I think what the Bible is trying to get us to see here is, man, if there is a God who has created this world and He has given us the blueprint to live in it, what could be more valuable in our life for flourishing than that? You know, we'll go after a lot of stuff, right? People will go after a lot of things. They'll dig for things.

They'll search for things. We have a funny way of telling this. A guy named Tom Howe is a director in our church. He's the director of Sending, and he was involved in a very infamous moment in Greensboro's history, and we got a little miniature documentary here for you guys to see it. Greensboro, North Carolina, a city with a vibrant and compelling history.

Its landscape has been shaped by pivotal events. The city's legacy is well known, yet one memorable night in Greensboro's history remains untold in our history books. On this evening, thousands of women gathered at a baseball game, lured not by the sport, but by the promise of a one-carat diamond ring.

This is the story of that unforgettable night. Our story begins in 2005, after the Grasshoppers moved into their new stadium. Tom Howe, former GM of the Grasshoppers, had a brilliant idea for a promotion that would draw thousands of people to the ballpark that night. My name is Tom Howe.

I lead the Sending team of Mercy Hill Church, and I used to be the general manager of the Greensboro Grasshoppers. The whole nature of Minor League Ball is it's more about the entertainment than the actual game, and so you've got 70 home games a year, and so you've got 70 nights where you can create something amazing, something fun, something that drives people to come out, but also entertains them while they're here. And so all the time, you know, really part of the job is you're coming up with all these crazy ideas.

You know, most of them will never happen because they're so absurd. The diamond dig, absolutely. That's what we called it. And as PTSD for some individuals, it's still the case that when it's brought up, people will sigh or whatever. It brings back memories for sure. Most people thought that it was a unique idea. Obviously our groundskeeper did not like it, was adamant that he did not like it, and stated so to the fact that he would have nothing to do with it. We buried 25 cubic zarconians and one real diamond in the infield, and basically, you know, in essence, let them go at it with a plastic spoon, try to figure out, you know, how to find that diamond.

I think the women, you know, they probably have a good memory. My high school sweetheart told me that if I found the diamond, he would propose to me. Not only did I not find the diamond, but he broke up with me the next day.

Tom Powell ruined my life. And I don't know if we had any specific numeric goal, but I think, I think, I mean, probably 50 women out there with spoons would have been a great thing. And I believe it was right around 30. It could have been more.

I don't know if we ever got an actual count, but I can tell you it was hundreds. One, two, three, go, and everybody runs out and they start digging. And they dug. And they dug. They said it was a dig.

I thought I was getting this. Instead, they gave me this. You should see the dirt under my fingernails after digging so hard after this plastic spoon broke. But that wasn't going to stop me from finding that diamond. You know, we probably could have thought better about plastic spoons.

We probably should have made the investment to go with real spoons because as soon as they were handed a plastic spoon, they were aggressive. And you literally had women out there with their fingers just, just clawing at the dirt. So if you can imagine a brand new playing surface, a brand new infield dirt, and now you have holes probably six inches deep in the infield, all over the infield.

And this went on for a while and it looked like we had moles, whatever. I mean, the field was just, there were so many holes and then a bunch of discarded material. It looked like ant mounds all throughout the infield. I mean, it was, it was not good.

So it was well beyond what we thought would happen. A couple people found some of the cuter zirconias, but no one found the diamond. To the point, it still could be in the infield.

Yeah. I've been banned from the Greensboro Grasshopper Stadium and every other minor league ballpark nationwide. After that dig, I spent months breaking into the stadium at night trying to find that diamond.

I still haven't found it. As the evening drew to a close at the Greensboro Grasshopper Stadium, the infield remained a patchwork of dug up dirt with the diamond ring still buried somewhere beneath. The excitement of the event was undeniable, but despite their enthusiasm, the participants found nothing but dirt and disappointment, leaving us to ponder the wisdom of everyone involved in the Grasshopper's Diamond Dig. Oh man. Well, my favorite line is, Tom Howe ruined my life. Okay, so that was my favorite line. Hey, but I could tell that story or we could decide to do a little creatively today.

I really think, though, that's going to help this thing pop, right? Because here's the deal. Search for it like silver. If you treasure something, you'll dig for it. Here's my question for you today.

Man, what is it in our culture that we see people or maybe what are we buying into? I'm willing to dig in the dirt with my fingernails for it. Is it as valuable? My question is, is it as valuable as the blueprint, the schematic, the plan that God Almighty has for every one of our lives? People will dig for strength and beauty and money and power and the next rung on the corporate ladder and experiences and being thought well of and all of these things. And yet, are we digging for wisdom?

You know, I'm going to ask you a very direct question. One of the ways that we can see how much we value something is how we're willing to go after it. We know that God gives us what we need to do.

Wisdom in his Word. Are we going after it? Are we reading the Word of God? Are we reading it daily? Man, are we studying it? I've told you this before.

Three chapters in the Bible per day will take you through the whole thing in a year. And my question will say, man, I value the Word. I love the Word. Amen to the Word. Are we reading the Word?

Well, here's what we say. Okay, we gain wisdom. All right, God gives wisdom.

Look at verse five. Then you will understand that the fear of the Lord, fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord gives wisdom. From his mouth come knowledge and understanding.

He stores up sound wisdom for the upright. He is a shield to those who walk in integrity, guarding the paths of justice and watching over the way of his saints. Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity. Every good path for wisdom will come into your heart and knowledge will be pleasant for your soul. Y'all, that verse 10, I cherish it today.

Look at what it says. For wisdom will come into your heart and knowledge will be pleasant for your soul. We seek to gain wisdom. God gives wisdom. That's the second G. God gives wisdom.

We seek to gain it and God gives it. You know, generally speaking today, and I always do this when we're talking about proverbs, you have to understand that proverbs generally are not promises. Okay, it's a different genre of literature.

All right, let me, you know, just kind of put it like this. Who's heard the phrase, an apple a day keeps the doctor away? You guys have heard that before? Well, you know that's a lie, right? I mean, I don't know if you've ever tried it.

Eat an apple every day and see if you never have to go to the doctor. Right, but we're like, well, that's not really a lie, right? Because we understand genre. If I say, hey, measure twice cut once doesn't mean that if you always measure twice you will only have to cut once, but generally speaking that is pretty true, right? That's what the genre of proverbs is. Okay, they're not promises. They are generally wise sayings. Proverbs are wise sayings that are generally true and lead to flourishing again generally, but here's what is really cool about what we're talking about today. All right, I always want to couch that with the proverbs because we got to make sure they're not strictly speaking a promise, but you know what? When we're talking about this idea of wisdom and gaining wisdom and God giving wisdom, we actually do have some promises in scripture.

This is not just generally true. Look at another passage with me in James 1. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives generously to all without reproach and it will be given to him.

You know what's awesome about what we're talking about today? If you seek the wisdom of God, he will give it to you. That is both a general truth and a specific promise.

It is specifically true that we will grow. I mean you think about some of these things that it said here verse 5 through 10. From his mouth comes understanding.

He stores up wisdom for the upright. Verse 9, you will understand righteousness, justice, fairness. Verse 10, wisdom will come into your heart. I mean these are things that God is telling you.

Yes, they're generally true, but also when you layer it up with other scripture, they're specific promises that we have. How good news is it today that God will give us wisdom? He will allow us to know some things and apply some things if we will seek it from him. Have you ever faced a situation in your life where you felt like you needed more wisdom than you had? How good news is it that God will give us wisdom? I'll tell you for me, I've told you this before, for me that one of the biggest moments in my life where I realized about two weeks into it that I need so much more wisdom and courage than I have was COVID.

I mean COVID hits. I'm trying to lead our church. Man, our church was awesome. You guys followed us. I really felt like most people in our church tried to switch places with our leadership and put yourself in our shoes and were like, man that's got to be pretty hard. You got a lot of people different opinions about stuff and all that.

You guys did awesome. But I'm going to tell you about two weeks into that whole thing, I started praying every single day, God I need more wisdom than I have and more courage than I have. I don't know if you guys know this, they don't teach a class called global pandemic in seminary. So I was like, man I need more wisdom. Have you ever faced a situation where you needed more wisdom than you had? I don't just need more knowledge, I need more of a heart that is inclined to want God what you want. I don't just want to receive it, I want to treasure it no matter what it means. Man, what's awesome for us in this passage is that God is saying to us, if you seek it, you see it as valuable, you seek to gain it, God will give it to you. And then it says this, it will guard you. Look what it says in verse 11, discretion will watch over you, understanding will guard you. Verse 11, will guard you, delivering you from the evil way for men of perverted speech who forsake the paths of uprightness to walk in the ways of darkness, who rejoice in doing evil and delight in the perverseness of evil, men whose paths are crooked and who are devious in their ways. Now you know this as well as I, but y'all there are two different paths in this life and the Bible talks about this, the book of Proverbs talks about this. Actually if you keep reading in chapter two he starts talking about the forbidden woman. If you've ever wondered about that character in the book of Proverbs, it's the same kind of idea here as the men of perverted speech.

It's just trying to get at this idea. There are generally two paths in life. One is to seek after wisdom and one is to walk headlong into foolishness and that foolishness has an end. Remember the rules of the gardens lead to flourishing and fruit. The rules of foolishness, they lead to destruction and pain. And what he's saying here is if you seek wisdom, gain, if God gives it to you, guess what, something about that whole process of seeking wisdom and God giving it to you, it guards you against that path.

It guards you against the deceitfulness of the perverted speech and the forbidden woman and that path. You know what it's like if you're a sports person? Some people say this, hey the best defense is a good offense. I don't know if you've ever heard that but here's what it means. You can play on your heels all day long or you can get after it.

You can run hard in the right direction or you can kind of stay back. I'm a little fearful. Here's the thing, we live in a world that has got foolishness and craziness all around us. What is our response to that? Is our response, I got to try to build a fortification here so that I never have foolishness come in my life? Or is it saying something a little more like, no no no, it will guard you if you continue in this idea of seeking to gain and God giving, seeking to gain and God giving? So you could say it like this, run hard after wisdom.

That is what will keep you from foolishness. Scott Nearing was a, he was kind of a homestead guy. He was kind of a farmer type guy. He was also a committed atheist and a communist so I don't quote him very much okay but he was kind of a pioneer in the homestead type movement or whatever up in the northeast and he's got a couple of books that were pretty popular in that world and one of the things that he talks about in those books that caught me one day and maybe this will help it pop for you what I'm trying to get at okay, run after, don't be scared of foolishness, run after wisdom okay. I mean you know don't sit back timid, let's run after wisdom. Here's what he said about health all right, he said, practicing health keeps you from infirmity.

I want you to think about that for a moment. It caught me when I read it because he talks about health as a verb, we all talk about it as an adjective. We all talk about it like something we are, he talks about it like something you do.

We talk about it like something you have, he talks about it like something you are active in doing. Practicing health, now what does that mean? Well for him it meant like man they used a bunch of hand tools their whole life and they just worked really hard every single day of their life.

Like when they went to dig a pond on their property, him and his wife dug it with a shovel and a wheelbarrow over seven years. That kind of idea. Practicing health, like practicing that it keeps you from sickness, it's something that you do. I don't know if you guys ever, I'm getting a chance right now, my little nine-year-old boy is playing 10U football for the Northern Nighthawks okay, super fun and they asked me a few weeks ago, I get to be one of the coaches now so I'm pretty much just kind of on the sideline telling all the kids get water stuff like that all right, but I'm having fun with it and he's, but here's what, here's what we you know, and football, and I've coached them from you know since they were this big so I'm kind of in their ear all the time anyway, I'm sure they love that, but the thing is what do we tell kids in football or really any sport, but football is a violent sport right, here's what we tell them. We're saying hey the best way not to get hurt is to go full speed. I know that for every kid in the world that feels so counter-intuitive, but it's absolutely true.

If you got two kids are about to smack each other, if one of them is half stepping and is a little bit scared, that's when one or both of them is going to get hurt. You don't, you don't, not yet you know, you don't guard yourself from injury by kind of hunkering down, you guard yourself by injury by flying around and going as hard as you can and if everybody's running full speed then we're going to have a better chance of nobody really getting seriously injured. Now this is kind of the idea here, practice health, run full speed after wisdom. You can say it like this, practicing wisdom keeps you from foolishness, running after wisdom keeps you from foolishness. All right, we gain, God gives, and that whole system guards us from the foolish path. Let's begin to wrap this up all right, here's the application this weekend, value wisdom and seek after it. You will not seek it if you don't value it. And my prayer today is that we will do what the Bible tells us to do, receive and treasure, here with our heart and here with our ear and incline our heart.

Man, let us go after it, let's value it and go after it. Okay, a few different groups of people today. First group of people I want to try to apply this to is this. Some of us are here, you've been coming around Mercy Hill, maybe you're one of our campuses, maybe you're overflow here, and and you're like look I am so far from what you're talking about when it comes to the wise life. You're coming around, you've gotten around some Christians, you're looking at your past and you're like dude every one of these categories, relational, destruction, sexuality, destruction, financial destruction, temperance, like physical health, understanding boundaries and all that. No, no, no, like man drunkenness, and man I don't know, I'm just something like that's going on in your life.

Okay, if something like that is going on in your life, here's what you are inclined to think. You're not a Christian and here's what you think, I am so far from ever being counted as one who lives this wise life like you're talking about. You think you're miles away, listen to me, you ain't but one prayer away. You think you are miles away, you are one prayer away.

You know why? Because the wise life ultimately from God's perspective is something that has to be given to you. Now we get a chance to live it out, we get a chance to grow every day of our life living it, but whether we are wise or not, whether we walked in God's ways or not, that is something that is given to us.

You know that if you're brand new you got it you got to hear a little bit more of the story, you keep reading in the Bible and here's what you find out. That ultimately because of all of our foolishness and the ways that we don't seek and value wisdom, God eventually sent his son Jesus Christ to this earth to live the ultimately wise life and then he went to the cross and died. Why would God allow him to do that?

Why would he choose that? Well because death as it turns out is the penalty for any foolishness and sin and so Jesus took what we deserved so that he could give us what he deserved. You know what you know what he deserved? He deserved the rewards of the wise life and now in his love for us we call this in theology the great exchange. What was true of him gets to become true of us. If we would admit our sin, believe in what he's done, and call upon him as the Lord of our life, y'all Jesus died for the fool to become wise and I mean ultimately wise.

I mean God looks at you as wise, that he sees no sin, no impurity, no foolishness in you. You can't gain that by trying to get a little better and reading a little more of the Bible next week than you did last week. That's not how you get there. You think you're miles away?

It's probably because you are. All of us were. But we get one shot and that one shot is to pray that God will bring wisdom into our life. That we pray, man God save me.

And then what is true of Christ becomes true of us. And so you're not miles away, you're one prayer away and I pray that you will take that into consideration today. Man I could talk to you, your campus pastor could talk to you, somebody that brought you here would love to talk to you alright.

So do that. Okay second group of people alright. Second group of people and of three. Okay second group of people is you're here today, all of us have been here, every one of us have been where I'm what I'm about what I'm about to say at some point even as a Christian. And what you're thinking is I know I'm a believer but I am not sure I desire wisdom like the Bible is calling me to desire it today.

I feel like I'm seeking some other things man. Like I got some other things in my life that seem like they're glittering and gold and glitz and glamour and I want to go after that and maybe building my own name and maybe this experience I want to have and maybe stepping out of this marriage or maybe I mean there's something in your life that is beckoning to you and what I'm calling you to see today is that these rules are from the good gardener for flourishing in your life. They are from a good father who wants flourishing in your life. You know how you know that? You know how you know that in the deepest part of who you are? Because what kind of love is it that God would send his son to die on a cross that you deserved, that I deserved so that he could bring us back into the family of God.

Man this is what we've got to get in our bones today. God loves us better than any father has loved any child in this room and a good father gives good gifts to their kids. Man they give good wisdom to their kids. Some of us today are like man maybe you're like man I didn't have a good dad, I don't have any kind of example, I never saw anything but his back my whole life.

You know why that hurts you so bad? Because there's an echo of eternity in your heart that tells you what a good father is supposed to be because we have one in heaven. And here's the thing, that father has given us this wisdom.

So you know what you need to do today? Reflect on his goodness to you, reflect on the sacrifice that he gave in Christ and then with that heart of gratitude pray that God will give you more of a desire to follow after his wisdom. And the last thing I would say is this okay, so the first thing I would say is man some of us need to get saved. The second thing is some of us need to rekindle desire by dwelling on who God is and the gospel and repenting and asking God to give us that desire.

Hey the third and final group of people are some people in the room today, myself included, that need a little bit of a wake up call because here's the deal. When I went through this message with our sermon planning team like we do every week at Mercy Hill, one of the biggest dangers that I saw and I think our team saw this too is that for whatever 80% of the room has been in church and you've been in stuff like this and you've listened to preaching before, here's what we would do. We would listen to it, we'd be like oh yeah I agree with all that. Oh yeah yeah yeah that's that's right like wisdom and falling after God and what he wants for you and all that.

I get that. Here's what we would say, we would say I know what God wants but we wouldn't take that next step of wisdom to say but do I desire it. Now okay you got to hang with me here all right. Many times we think it's a knowledge problem and so because we don't have the knowledge problem we don't think there's a problem. We're like well I already know.

No no no it's not just knowledge all right so let me give you an example of this all right. So we um this was this was cool a couple weeks ago I got to take my oldest son and in our in our house birthdays are not a huge deal okay they're like hey have some friends over we'll get some pizza it'll be fun y'all play ball and it's fine except for the 13th birthday. All right 13th birthday is a marked moment. 13th is man you're not a kid anymore you're not an adult but you're somewhere in the middle we want to mark that transition. You're moving out of the house if you're a little plant you're moving out of the house out of the greenhouse out into the actual garden now and there's some things that you got to face and take some risks and we got to you know so I said okay how are we going to mark this moment for my 13 year old son I said man I know what we're doing we're going to go down to Florida and kill an alligator all right and so that's what we did man so we went down to Florida all right Arcadia Florida nothing but hours of uh of cattle fields and citrus trees and we go down to this uh place uh place and we do we get on a gator hunt all right and I get a guide I get a guide to help us all right and so we're at this place guides helping us I get there to the place I and I look up and I'm this is just God's honest truth I look up our guides this young kid awesome guy he did he did great he was super fun but I look up we're on alligator hunt now and this dude ain't got a half a hand okay he's got seriously he's got half a hand and I'm like man and so I tell and listen my life you guys know the term EQ emotional intelligence like what to do in human interaction okay I sometimes I have to rely on Anna sometimes okay I gotta ask her things okay and so I text her I'm like babe I really want to know but do I ask okay and uh we decided you don't ask all right so I didn't ask so we're awesome alligator hunt man we're having a great time man we get this alligator up on the bank I mean it's crazy death roll the whole thing all right and uh and the guy kind of right as we're getting done with sort of done with this he voluntarily says and he says hey man I took a bad bite last uh year and a half ago and he's like you gotta be careful around these things and I was like yeah you know so he he's like I took a bad bite now you guys I'm from Florida okay you guys know all the Florida man memes okay all that stuff like Florida man okay all right um and uh and so at this point I'm like well if Anna was here okay she would help me but he's brought it up now right and so I'm like okay I said man I said dude that's crazy we gotta I said man I'm sorry that happened I was like I saw I saw your hand you know that's that's just horrible to have he he looks up with his hand he goes oh this nah man this was fireworks so I was like okay it was the other arm they got they got bit and I man I know I know that's a weird turn at the end of the sermon okay but I'm trying to make it I'm trying to get something memorable in your mind all right here's the deal all right I gotta bring it okay here's the thing unfortunate fireworks accident right has there ever been a 13 year old boy growing up in all of the south that did not get a speech about fireworks blowing people's hands up I'm gonna tell you right now I mean I did the whole thing as a kid I mean massive m-80s the shooting roman candles at each other I mean we did it all right did everybody did I mean if you're a man in here did somebody at some point not sit you down and be like hey man these things are serious okay I might my guess is that happened actually when it happened when it when all this is going on ap was right there I looked at ap and I was like see man I told you I've been telling you this and yet every single year every single year right there's injuries there's there's destruction people's lives have changed honestly forever here's the deal it's not that we didn't know it's that we didn't want it I wanted something else it's not that I didn't know that now here's where it gets down to the believer okay because some of us are gonna say hey man yeah oh yeah yeah proverbs wisdom this is a good old-fashioned sermon do what God tells you to do and your life will be better I mean this is awesome right this is people we're going back to our roots here that's what many of us are thinking wait a minute no no no you gotta evaluate your own heart you gotta evaluate your life because here's what we do we say oh yeah yeah yeah I know all that stuff okay let me read you a couple of proverbs and let's just talk about what let's just think for a moment am I desiring what God desires and is it evident in my life not yeah yeah yeah out there in my life okay let's just take a little test here proverbs 3 9 and 10 honor the Lord with your wealth and the first fruits of all your produce then your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will be bursting with wine you know how many believers say yeah yeah yeah to wisdom and yet they don't give let's think about this proverbs 18 5 18 I love this verse I go back to it many times because I actually did I met Anna literally when I was 19 it says rejoice in the wife of your youth how many of us are inclining our heart to God's wisdom in all forms of sexual purity or there are things in the darkness that are growing mutant because we're not letting anybody else in and we're keeping those things man there's secrets that we have we yeah yeah yeah to wisdom but then wait a minute what about in our life what about this incline your heart to God by controlling your tongue proverbs 15 1 it is a soft answer that turns away wrath we could go on and on here's why I want to do this and I'm done okay because I think some of us might say yeah yeah because I think some of us might say yeah yeah I love it good good sermon on wisdom what about us what about our life what about your specific situation are there things that come up that we yeah yeah to wisdom and yet the reality is we're not walking in them it's actually not a knowledge thing we know what God wants us to do it's a desire to follow him to trust the good heart of our father in giving us these things man this is an opportunity for us to face reality to repent of some things to say God over this series maybe I got more to learn I'm talking about myself maybe I've got more to learn than maybe I think all right good heart posture for us let's pray father we come before you and we ask right now Lord that you will move in our hearts some for salvation some for a rekindling of the desire for your word and some to face a reality today that we might be on cruise control there's areas of our life that are not aligning do we desire what you desire in Christ's name we pray amen