Proverbs 8:1 Doth not wisdom cry? and understanding put forth her voice?
2 She standeth in the top of high places, by the way in the places of the paths.
3 She crieth at the gates, at the entry of the city, at the coming in at the doors.
4 Unto you, O men, I call; and my voice is to the sons of man.
5 O ye simple, understand wisdom: and, ye fools, be ye of an understanding heart.
We are all born as lost sinners. God gives every human being a conscience. In that conscience every person knows the basics about God. No one is born saved. However, there is a curiosity about spiritual matters. Many people take that curiosity and they either join some cult or some false religious group or start another false religious group. A few listen to the work of the Holy Spirit, Who is at work in the heart and life of every lost person to convince them of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. He does not indwell the lost. He works from the outside to show them the need to repent toward God and be saved. As mentioned, most people want to shut Him out. Thus they pursue some pseudo religion that temporarily soothes their guilty conscience.
God tells us that wisdom is crying. Crying not in the sense of weeping in pain, but crying in the sense of making Itself known. No one has an excuse for pursuing lies. Wisdom is there for those who will humble themselves and be saved. Understanding is also making herself known. One of the selling features of the perversions is that the King James Bible is too hard to understand and the perversions are all trying to make God’s Word more understandable. Of course they are lying, but most people are willing to accept the lie because it is easier.
In verse 2 we see that wisdom and understanding are in the top of high places and by the way in the places of the paths. In Regina there is a mosque that has installed loudspeakers on its roof so that the Muslims can blast their lies across a large portion of the city every week. They did not put those speakers on the ground. They put them on the roof so that the sound would carry with less interference.
Wisdom and understanding are readily available. Again, every person has a conscience. God is also keeping evil at bay so that there are still some true churches in Canada, and elsewhere so that people can go and hear the truth. There are also other places where people can hear the Word of God.
Rather than going to some secular concert, the wise person will attend a true church.
Wisdom is also crying in the gates. Wisdom is right there where people are entering into the city. It is making itself available.
Notice again that wisdom is crying out primarily to the men and to the sons of man. Men need to know the truth. Too often we find that the woman is more interested in truth than the man. The mother takes the children to the church while the father either sits at home or goes off to the golf course or some other distraction.
A real man heeds the call of wisdom. It takes a real man to get saved. The world loves to ridicule the true Christian. Most men do not want to be exposed in that way. They do not mind getting tattoos or piercings or weird hair cuts, etc. They do not want to identify with the Lord Jesus Christ. However, a real man is willing to humble himself and be saved and then grow in the Lord.
The simple person is the naive, open minded person. The simple person is willing to indulge himself in all kinds of worthless talk. There are websites you can go to where you can listen to someone who wants you to think he is so spiritual because he has done the research so that you don’t have to.
Recently Dolly Parton died. She was 80 years old and any true born again Christian knows she was not a saved woman. A saved woman does not dress like a harlot and try to lure in men. Yet there are supposed Christian sites that waste their time and the time of those who bother to click on them to talk about her life.
We don’t need to know just how evil Mrs. Parton was. We sorrow that she wasted 80 years and ended up lost for all eternity. Others have also wasted their time stuck on her music and her ideals. There are thousands like her. We already noted in the last chapter where their end is. We don’t need to waste our time studying those types of people. God tells us all we need to know about them.
There are those who will put another check mark for why they should hate me because I speak the truth. Years ago there was a man that I did not know, but he would pick up the local paper every week and read my article just so he could hate me more. The good news is that in every article I used Scripture and eventually that man came to the church I was pastoring, and he got saved. I did not know he was hating on me. It did not stop me from doing what God called me to do. Times were different then. The local newspaper would call me up if I was late getting my article in. They wanted them there. Now, they screen any article you put in and they will try to edit out Bible verses if they can.
It is a different world. The world still needs the truth, but it is getting harder all the time. God refers to the simple men as fools. The opposite of being a wise man is to be a fool. The fool rejects God. He imagines his own god and is quite proud of his invention. He tries to pass on his foolishness to whoever will waste their time with him. That is not profitable, but it is quite common.
Be sure you are listening to the cry of wisdom and understanding. Build your life on truth. You will never be sorry.
Pastor Bartel