Prescribing Proverbs
Have you picked up your prescription today?
August 29th, 2021
A Proverb a day keeps Untruth away
Proverbs 1:1-6, ‘These are the wise sayings of Solomon, David’s son, Israel’s king—written down so we’ll know how to live well and right, to understand what life means and where it’s going; a manual for living, for learning what’s right and just and fair; to teach the inexperienced the ropes and give our young people a grasp on reality. There’s something here also for seasoned men and women, still a thing or two for the experienced to learn—fresh wisdom to probe and penetrate, the rhymes and reasons of wise men and women.’ (MSG)
Prescription (RX) Twenty-Nine: Pride Cometh Before a Fall
Proverbs 29:23, ‘Lift yourself up with pride and you will soon be brought low, but a meek and humble spirit will add to your honor.’ (TPT)
Matthew 5:5, ‘Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.’ (NIV)
The universe, and subsequently, our world, is in disagreement with its Creator. I was thinking about it recently—how disappointed I wonder that God is. I bet He had something far different in mind when He dreamt us in to being. Genesis 2:7-9 says, ‘God formed Man out of dirt from the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life. The Man came alive—a living soul! Then God planted a garden in Eden, in the east. He put the Man He had just made in it. God made all kinds of trees grow from the ground, trees beautiful to look at and good to eat. The Tree of Life was in the middle of the garden, also the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.’ (MSG)
I visually picture the entire scene. I believe that God is this beautiful person, so full of kindness and gentleness that He effervesces with life. I think His heart predicts His manner with a wholeness and goodness, and I think He was so excited for mankind, for fellowship and friendship, that He anticipated us much like I do when my grambabies come to visit. I imagine Him rubbing His hands together in celebration as He plants this flowering tree and plucks that weed out of the ground to replace it with blooming bushes. I see Him whisper the depth of darkness away and clap His hands together when He banishes the dark, renewing it with light. I picture this amazing secret garden, so beautiful and complete. Except it is empty. Our God begins to dream, and He sees a glimpse of you and of me, and with a splash of brilliance and a puff of dust and a breath of life, we become. I can conceive His excitement as He begins to plan all of the things He hopes to do with a you and a me, all the places we will go, all the things we will do, all the memories we will make, all the good moments we will share.
But then it happens. Or it doesn’t happen, rather, the way He had envisioned it, and He has to begin again. And so on, down through the ages, your name and mine on His mind, our hurt upon His heart, our cries upon His lips. But, He doesn’t give up. He keeps moving forward. And through it all, we keep coming up brighter and better and more capable. And more proud and less humble and less needy. To where someday all we see is ourselves in His mirror and no shadow of God Eternal; to where we are our provider, not Jehovah Jireh. I was wondering what He thinks when He sees me. When He thinks back on what He purposed and planned when He thought of me.
Then this crazy realization came to me. He still sees what He purposed and planned because He doesn’t look at me through a lens of disappointment and discouragement and despair. He sees me through the lens of His Son Who freely gave Himself for me so that His Father could look upon me with love and not shame. And so I could look back with clarity and not guilt. I am grateful and I am most humbled that the God of the Universe would do all of this for me.
