I’ve never really been into Proverbs.
It’s a Bible book I’ve not spent much time in, and didn’t really have a desire to (shocked face emoji). Part of the issue was that I genuinely didn’t understand most of the verses in it. They all seemed to be arbitrarily specific – and I could never see any flow in the chapters. And more than that, I found it tiring. The verse after verse of ‘good things to do’ that often left me feeling very aware of how far short I fall.
But since lockdown started, each week I’ve been reading a chapter of Proverbs with a group of women from my church (not my suggestion of book!) over Zoom. And my discomfort has started to change. Week after week, the same themes kept repeating – like musical phrases in a longer piece that keep cropping up. And each time the theme repeated you would recognise it but would hear a new note – or a new harmony – adding to what you had heard before. As we became more familiar with the music, we started to enjoy it more.
Here are a few of the repeated tunes that we heard the sage sing:
Listen to wisdom!
Where I had previously felt Proverbs was a stick to beat me with, I kept hearing the writer repeat this big idea: ‘you aren’t wise, so listen’. What a relief! Here was no expectation that I was already expert at doing what the sage was saying – instead, he says ‘keep listening – you need this!’
‘The beginning of wisdom is this: get wisdom, and whatever you get, get insight.’ (4:7). The dominant theme seems to be: ‘be worried if you think you don’t have anything to learn’ – ‘the way of a fool is right in his own eyes’ (12:15). And knowing that you need to grow and to learn isn’t a sign of ignorance – but of wisdom ‘…but a wise man listens to advice’. Reading these chapters in the height of the global pandemic helped me to keep my priorities right. Whatever else was going on around me, I needed to keep listening to Jesus. Here are some more motifs that kept me going:
Family
Proverbs also showed me that I also need to keep listening to those God has put in my life to help me to learn: in particular (intake of breath) my parents! In a culture that almost deifies the young, it was quite sobering to be reminded that being independent from my parent’s advice isn’t a sign of maturity, but a sign of being foolish: ‘a fool despises his father’s instruction’…’a foolish man despises his mother’ (15:5, 20). But for me as a relatively new parent it was also a reminder of my responsibility to love my children by teaching them – not just by feeding, clothing and cuddling them.
Speech
Another repeating melody – and the one that was extremely practical, was about wise speech. This was particularly close to home because if being stuck inside with my husband and twin three-year-olds during lockdown has taught me one thing, it’s that I often don’t say the right thing. ‘There is one whose rash words are like sword thrusts, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.’ (12:18) ‘A fool’s lips walk into a fight…’ (18:6). I’ve rarely as frequently found verses in a book of the Bible where I’ve felt: ‘That’s me!’ And so the practical, down to earth warnings were so helpful to me.
Sex
For the women I was reading Proverbs with, we quickly realised we couldn’t avoid the subject of sex if we were going to honestly study the book. In particular, the first several chapters keep returning to the theme. I was really hoping that it was just a metaphor for our relationship with God but the fact was inescapable: it was often just about plain old sex. Because of course – sex is never just ‘plain old.’
The warnings against adultery are brutal, but they are out-done in technicolour by the encouragement to sex in marriage: ‘Rejoice in the wife of your youth…let her breasts fill you at all times with delight’ (5:19) (blushing face emoji. Honestly, how do people write without using emojis?) The application for us was clear – RUN from adultery – don’t even go near it, but also – don’t hold back on sex with your spouse (monkey hiding eyes emoji).
Fear God
If there was one theme that the book kept coming back to more than any other it was this: fear God.
‘The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.’ (9:10)
Reading Proverbs like a ‘to do’ list is to completely misunderstand it. Above all, Proverbs has shown me more about the Holy One – the Lord Jesus, who is wisdom himself (1 Corinthians 1:24) whose patience, self-control, generosity, obedience and faithfulness shone through the descriptions of ‘the righteous man’. I will never be Him – but He is mine, and I’m gifted his righteousness because of his death and resurrection (2 Corinthians 5:21).
Another lockdown book for me has been the Chronicles of Narnia. I started reading them with my girls in the first week of lockdown, and we’re now going through them for the second time. In Prince Caspian, C.S. Lewis writes ‘Aslan had stopped and turned and stood facing them, looking so majestic that they felt as glad as anyone can who feels afraid, and as afraid as anyone can who feels glad.’ What a beautiful description of the fear of the Lord.
I’ve had the same experience as I’ve come face to face with the Holy One, the Lord Jesus, as I’ve read Proverbs; as glad as I can feel whilst being afraid, but only as afraid as anyone who feels glad. The weight I had felt before of knowing that I was falling short, now feels like the starting gun to remind me to run to Jesus: ‘The name of the Lord is a strong tower, the righteous man runs into it and is safe.’ (18:10).
