How God Protects His People

Dearly beloved congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, I want to begin this morning’s sermon by pointing out the obvious. This chapter, the second chapter of Proverbs, doesn’t tell you to do anything. It does not contain a single imperative. Compare it for just a moment, if you would, to the next chapter, which issues a blizzard of commands. Now, of course, this chapter does strongly imply that you and I ought to take certain courses of action. But it implies that by making promises, by holding out benefits that of course any normal human being ought to want. In other words, this chapter teaches us by enticing us. It shows us what’s lovely, what’s attractive, what we ought to want, and what wonderful blessings will come when wisdom becomes pleasant to our souls. We have already seen that this chapter envisions the embrace of wisdom as a collaborative divine-human project. With God’s help, and only with God’s help, do we learn how to understand the fear of Yahweh and find the knowledge of God. The result of this is an ethical maturity, a wise walking in every good path. And that wise walking specifically protects you from sin, typified here by the sinful man and the sinful woman. God protects His people, as v. 8 says — but He protects them through their character, which has been formed by His wisdom.