My son, pay attention to my wisdom; incline your ear to my insight,My son, pay attention to my wisdom. Turn your ear to my understanding,My son, attend unto my wisdom, and bow thine ear to my understanding:My son, attend unto my wisdom; Incline thine ear to my understanding:
4 sermons cite this verse
… successful in life. Again, Solomon's Proverbs are filled with admonitions about our speech. In Proverbs 5 verses 1 and 2, Solomon writes, my son, give attention to my wisdom, incline your ear to my understanding that you may observe discretion and your lips may reserve knowledge. Or jot down Proverbs 10, 14, wise men store up knowledge, but with the mouth of the foolish ruin is at hand. Or Proverbs 18, verse seven, a fool's mouth is his ruin and his lips are the snare of his soul. Proverbs 21, 23, he who guards his mouth and his tongue guards his soul from troubles. Well, what kind of speech are we to guard ourselves against, Solomon? First of all, and jot this down, Solomon says we are to avoid false speech. Have you ever been in the checkout line at a supermarket like I was yesterday, and you're kind of looking at the magazine rack there and see what they have for sale? Every now and then, you'll see a headline on a magazine cover that says, the 10 best dressed women in the world are seven things you ought to do with your money before the year is over. I mean, all these kinds of lists and these editors know the way to grab attention is with a list. There's something about a list that grabs our attention. Well, Solomon has his own list in Proverbs chapter six. It's titled the seven things God hates the most. Now, if you're a Christian and you believe there's a God and you believe he's evaluating your life, that ought to …
… This is parental duty to command. Chapter 5, My Son, verse 1, give attention to My wisdom, incline your ear to My understanding. Chapter 7, again, verse 1, My Son, keep My words and treasure My commandments within you. Keep My commandments and live. And it goes on like that, instruction to be obedient. The parent is in the position of the commander. That is parental responsibility, and children are to obey. Now this is a challenging reality, and there's a good summarization of the challenge of this in Luke chapter 2, and it's related to our Lord. Book 2 and verse 52 says concerning Jesus, He kept increasing in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and men. Now without sin, perfectly righteous, as a man nonetheless, He needed to increase in wisdom. He needed to increase in stature. We needed to increase in favor with God and to increase in favor with man. Now these are the four categories in which children develop. Wisdom is mental, stature is physical, favor with men is social, and favor with God is spiritual. …
… the instruction factor, and learn godly wisdom. Look in Proverbs chapter 5, verses 1 and 2. My son, attend unto my wisdom, and bow thine ear to my understanding, that thou mayest regard discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge. Now, all of this is in the context of sexual purity. We often hear the statement, what you don't know can't hurt you. Very frankly, that's stupid. What you don't know may kill you. AND WE HAVE FAMILIES THAT ARE FAILING PRIMARILY FOR A LACK OF WISDOM, DISCRETION, UNDERSTANDING, AND KNOWLEDGE. AND WHERE, MY DEAR FRIEND, ARE WE GOING TO LEARN? ARE WE GOING TO LEARN AT THE UNIVERSITY FROM THE PROFESSOR OF, UH, SOCIOLOGY WHO TEACHES HUMANISTIC HOGWASH IN THE HALLS OF HIGHER LEARNING? ARE WE GOING TO LEARN FROM THE RANTINGS OF THE BABY BUTCHERS CALLED PLANNED PARENTHOOD? IS THAT WHERE WE'RE GOING TO LEARN? Where are we going to learn? Are we going to learn from the money-grabbing moguls of dirt for profit in Hollywood? Where are we going to learn? …
… wisdom and to how we can walk wisely. He says, My son, give attention to my wisdom. Incline your ear to my understanding. In other words, not just read through it. This is why I say, for example, meditating upon the Word of God. Not just reading through it. He says, give attention to my wisdom. Incline your ear to understanding, which means He is willing to show us in every aspect of our life how to walk wisely, how to make wise decisions, how to make wise choices. And He says, He's willing to do it if I'm willing to incline my ear to understanding. If I'm willing to listen to Him carefully, to what He may be saying in whatever way He may be saying it, then He says, here's what I'm willing to do. Notice this verse. He says, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. That means wisdom, watch this, wisdom begins in your life and mine when we begin to reverence God for who He is. …