How do you find wisdom and why is it so important? Join Alan and Pauly as they dive into Proverbs 3 to explore this question.
Note: Below is a transcription of this Walking Our Talk podcast. Please excuse any grammatical or punctuation flaws, as the transcription is a written version of our fluid conversation.
Pauly [00:00:07] Welcome to walking our talk with Alan and Pauly Heller, join our conversation as we discuss practical ways to apply spiritual principles to your everyday life and help you walk your talk one step at a time.
Alan [00:00:26] Hi, this is Alan Heller, and we are walking our talk, Pauly’s here.
Pauly [00:00:31] Hello.
Alan [00:00:32] And we are talking about Proverbs three today. We’re going to be going just verse by verse through the scripture, talking about wisdom. How do we find wisdom and what is so important about wisdom? So let me read from Proverbs three, starting at verse 13.
Alan [00:00:51] “How blessed is the man who finds wisdom and the man who gains an understanding for its profit is better than the profit of silver and its gain than fine gold. She is more precious than jewels and nothing you desire compares with her long life is in her right hand and in her left hand are riches and honor. Her ways are pleasant ways and all her paths are peace.”.
Alan [00:01:20] I think we’ll stop there and just comment a little bit on how blessed the word blessed means happy and happiness, not just based on circumstances, it’s really joy, but happy are those Jesus or John talked about happy are those who obey my commandments. And when we are walking our talk, we’re trying to walk out what the word says. So he says, how blessed or happy is the man who finds wisdom? And one of the things I found earlier in my Christian walk, what I used to do is just go through a proverb a day one that helped me keep my place because of thirty-one proverbs and thirty days.
Pauly [00:02:09] And so you always knew what day it was.
Alan [00:02:11] Yes. If I didn’t know what day it was, I couldn’t get into Proverbs. So but I just felt like if I could get wisdom, which I was reading in the biblical dictionary, here’s what they say. Wisdom is wiseness skillfulness, whether in an artistic sense, craftsmanship or a moral sense, skills for living correctly. And my definition of wisdom is the practical application of scripture to everyday life that what I spend my life doing in with Walk & Talk is helping people walk out what it is they read in the word and so they can do it. And so if I’m spending time learning wisdom and then I’m going to be able to know how to live life. And he says, how blessed is the man who finds wisdom and the man who gains understanding? And I just think of earlier in Proverbs, it says, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom in the knowledge of the holy is understanding. And so God’s going to give us understanding as we gain wisdom to tell me what. How you relate to that first.
Pauly [00:03:33] Well, as a knowledge person myself, I’m sort of one of those people that collects facts, which always made me good at test-taking because I would remember the facts, I was especially good at multiple choice because I could kind of recognize what the fact was. But knowing the facts, having the knowledge is not the same thing as wisdom. And once when I was getting to know you and we were on a going through campus crusade training and it’s going through and going through the Institute of Biblical Studies and studying Bible and different concepts that we were going to need.
Alan [00:04:29] It’s been four weeks of intensive study all week, like five days a week, studying different classes and stuff to be trained to be on the staff of campus crusade.
Pauly [00:04:40] Right. And I was always better at taking the tests. You know, like, I just I could get A’s in and, you know, high percentage points and all of that stuff. But years later, you would say, oh, remember when…
Alan [00:04:58] I remember when we talked about this in marriage and go, “no”.
Pauly [00:05:03] No, I don’t remember that.
Alan [00:05:04] But I did get ten for ten on the quiz.
Pauly [00:05:07] Right, because not only do you remember, but you start applying what you know to your life very quickly.
Alan [00:05:17] And my spiritual gift has to do with the exhortation and discernment, which is probably why I do counseling. So verse 14 says for its profit is better than the profit of silver and its gain than fine gold. And to me, you know, I spend time with sometimes presidents of companies, people that have two or three houses and boats. And, you know, I mean, you can only live in one at a time. But for some people, it’s all about toys. And, you know, that old saying, yeah, he was the most toys wins in my life. But what this verse is saying, is profit, wisdom’s profit, is even better than gold or silver, and she’s more precious than jewels. And nothing you desire compares with her. We used to sing a song.
Pauly [00:06:12] Right, right. But I really like that that wisdom becomes a she at this point.
Alan [00:06:17] Yes. Is there any reason for that? Well, she’s just so sexy.
Pauly [00:06:23] She’s lovely. Yeah.
Alan [00:06:25] So more precious than jewels. Nothing you desire compares with her. And I think of the verse which says that we’re to seek first the kingdom of God and it’s his righteousness and all the other things will be added unto us. And it also talks about like a newborn babe was to seek long for the pure milk of the word, because that’s where wisdom is really found so long life is in her right hand. And I think of Jesus, is that the right hand of the father? And so even though I’m sure Solomon may not have been thinking about Jesus at this time primary application, but he is at his right hand, in her left hand of riches and honor, her ways are pleasant ways and all her paths are peace. And I didn’t look that up to see if that’s Shalom. But Shalom is the Hebrew word for peace. It’s not just the short-term peace. It’s a life of peace. And only Jesus can give that complete rest and peace.
Alan [00:07:37] And I think of Paul talking in Philippians, you know, pray about everything in everything through prayer and supplication. Make your request made known to God and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding. So I might not even be able to understand it. And it’s that peace if you go back a couple of podcasts ago, you gave your story and you said your first thought after asking the Lord into your life was this must be peace of mind. And for some of us, we’ve learned to be not in peace for so long. We’ve gotten used to it.
Pauly [00:08:21] Right.
Alan [00:08:21] And God can give us that supernatural peace. And so when we’re hurting, when we’re needing rest, he says, “Take my yoke upon you” in Matthew, 11:28-30, “my yoke is easy, my burden is light, and you will find it rest for your soul.” And in some of the most difficult circumstances, we’ve been able to find God’s peace, even though everything around us, and especially for all of us right now in this season of covid, we’re having to seek his peace. Her ways are pleasant ways and all our paths, or she’s a tree of life to those who take hold of her and happy are all who hold her fast. So if we want to be happy, we need to hold wisdom in our hand and hold our fast. The Lord, by wisdom, founded the Earth by understanding, established the heavens, by his knowledge, the deep’s were broken up by son let them not depart from your sight. Keep sound wisdom and discretion. So Solomon’s telling his son, keep these in your heart. You’re going to be able to make wise decisions if you keep these sayings in your heart. So they will be life to your soul. Isn’t that what you found after you asked Jesus into your life? However many years ago?
Pauly [00:09:54] Right, it’s so true. I was engaging in very self-destructive behaviors with the smoking and the drinking and the drugs and self-hatred. And the Lord gave me his wisdom and his life. And it’s just a beautiful difference to let his life be my life.
Alan [00:10:25] Right. So there’ll be life to your soul. I think of John 10:10 that he came to give us life and life abundantly and abundant means more than enough for ourselves. So most of our life these days is given to helping other people because God’s given us so much. So there will be life to your soul and adornment to your neck. So what does that mean to a woman?
Pauly [00:10:52] Yes, we women like their necklaces and their pearls and things, scarves, colorful scarves, things that we drape around our necks to give color to our faces. And it’s an enhancement. And, you know, my father told me after like after I had been a believer for years, he said, you know, Pauly, since you’ve become a Christian, you’ve become more the kind of person I’d like to get to know. And there’s just something different about letting the life of Christ, the love of God, the wisdom of God.
Alan [00:11:43] She talks about being a fragrant aroma to those who want life. It’s life. But to those who are not seeking at the natural man, it’s going to be death. Then you walk in your way securely. I think we take this for granted many times that by wisdom we can walk securely by knowing the Lord, by obeying and walking out this life and your foot will not stumble. And when you lie down, you will not be afraid. When you lie down, your sleep will be sweet. So I think here he’s just talking about one. You know, I think about that fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And when we have Him in our life, there’s very little you know, the song says, to who shall we be afraid of if we have Him and if we have His word, which is truth and our sleep will be sweet.
Alan [00:12:49] Now, this is a little tough for you who has MS you need help with your story. And as I’ve gotten older and I’m thinking more about responsibilities and things, but I think when we concentrate on the Lord and one of the passages of scripture I want to do in future podcast’s in a future broadcast is Colossians three, that my real life is hidden with Christ in God. Set your mind on things, but not on the things here on Earth. And so when I’m setting my mind on things above, I have to choose to do that, though it doesn’t happen automatically. But he says if you have wisdom, you will find sleep to be sweet. And he says he gives to his beloved even and even in their sleep. Do not be afraid of sudden fear, nor of the onslaught of the wicked when it comes for the Lord will be your confidence and will keep your foot from being caught. So the confidence that we have again, I think of Galatians 2:20 that it’s no longer I who live, but it’s Christ who lives in me. The life I now live in the flesh. I live by faith in the son of God who love me and gave himself for me. So you know, we can walk securely. We can have confidence our foot won’t get caught. Ultimately, you know, we may have a bump here and there. There may be things that circumstances that go on in our life you know, the things that we’re going through with this whole covid thing, you know, circumstances have changed everything. And there are things that we can’t do that we wish we could do. But when we seek and have wisdom, we have confidence and our foot won’t be caught doing it.
Pauly [00:14:49] Can I just say something here? I know this is probably pretty obvious to people, but I keep getting this picture of a hiking path and we do a lot of walking on mountain trails here in Phoenix. You don’t have to go very far to find to find a trail to walk on even in here within the city limits. But there are often routes that grow across the path and you have to climb over them or go around rocks.
Alan [00:15:30] And when I’m talking to you, I trip over them.
Pauly [00:15:33] Oh, yeah. Well, I trip a lot. I have a hard time looking ahead and looking down at the same time, or I look down and see that there’s something there. And as soon as I look up, I forget about that thing that’s there and I trip and catch my foot on things. And so, you know, this passage is talking about walking on a path and walking on a certain way. And we’re doing a walking securely and not stumbling. But this isn’t just talking about walking. No, this is talking about the decisions that we make in life and how we move forward in our lives and not getting tripped up along the way. And if we have wisdom, if we find wisdom and we gain understanding and we make our decisions in life based on that understanding and based on that wisdom from God, if we’re willing to wait a minute before we jump in and make a decision about something and just ask God, is this really what you want? And just be willing to wait, then we’re not going to trip up. Then we will be able to sleep at night knowing that we’re making decisions that are based on God’s leading for us.
Alan [00:16:59] That’s good. So in verse thirty-two, it says, For the crooked man is an abomination to the Lord. But he is, but he is intimate with the upright. And I just think that intimacy is something that we crave, that if we are upright and the only way we can be upright is through being justified by the blood of the cross and trusting in the object of our faith, which is the Lord, and realizing that he’s the one that makes us upright. He’s the one that as phrase and theology goes, you know, just as if we haven’t sinned. That’s how Jesus looks at us through the cross of Christ and his payment that he made for us so that we could have life. And so if we are walking upright, he will be intimate with us.
Alan [00:18:00] Another verse talks about if we draw near to him, he will draw near to us. And there are times, you know, where I just I’m not feeling it. You know, I’m going, God, I know I’m supposed to be here, not supposed to read your word, but I really don’t feel a whole bunch here. And he’s going, that’s really not how you walk. You don’t walk, you know, as a little toddler. I mean, I never understood what they meant by toddler till I saw our kids toddling. And I know that’s why they go on toddlers, but they fall down, but they get back up, you know, they keep trying. And as an adult, sometimes we trip, but we don’t just fall down and just go, yeah, I’m not going to get up anymore. You know, even though we know how to walk, even though we’ve walked in wisdom for many years, there are times where we get tripped up. God’s desire to remedy that is just that we confess it and give it to him and then keep walking.
Pauly [00:18:59] Keep moving.
Alan [00:18:59] And some of the most helpful thing things I’ve found in terms of counseling is helping people to see where they’re going and what God says they are rather than who they keep feeling they are, or the shame or the guilt from the past of an incident. And we talk about this in our trust book that you can get at our website, but you know, these things that happened in our past cripple us in the present because we keep looking in the rearview mirror instead of looking.
Pauly [00:19:30] Right, and we stuck get stuck in that spot like, you know, our we’re spinning our wheels and not moving forward.
Alan [00:19:40] So he says in thirty three, the curse of the Lord is on the house of the wicked, but he blesses the dwelling of the righteous. And, of course, Corinthian’s talks about we are the righteousness of God in Christ. And though he scoffs at the scoffers, yet he gives grace to the afflicted, the wise will inherit honor, but fools display dishonor. And so the wise inherit honor. And God says, if you will lift me up and he says, if you lift me up, then I will draw you close. If you come close to me, I will come close to you. It’s a choice that we have not based on feelings, but based on the truth of his word. And his desire is that we walk in wisdom, that we go to his word and be able to walk our talk. That’s why we named this Walk Our Talk. And so I encourage you to look at that Proverbs three and use it for a time that you have with the Lord and, you know, maybe tomorrow and apply the wisdom that he has because you can walk securely and we look forward to seeing you next time with Walking Our Talk.
Pauly [00:21:02] This has been walking our talk with Alan and Pauly Heller, where we put into action those principles, we know from God’s word one step at a time, you can find more help at our website.: walkandtalk.org.