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On June 28, 2023 By In Discipleship, Men, Wisdom, Women

Toxic Friendships

“The satisfied soul tramples the honeycomb but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet.”

~Proverbs 27.7

“Toxic” is a word that is overused and often misused in cultural conversations—any discomfort in any relationship, whether casual or intimate, may be characterized as toxic. You said something with which I disagree and hurt my feelings, so I now characterize you and my relationship with you as toxic. Toxic masculinity is all the rage for any male who demonstrates any traits of masculinity at all. If you want to shut down any meaningful, intellectual, and logical debate, label your interlocuter “toxic.” This is as bad as being a “racist” or “abusive,” also overused and misused.

The reaction may be that there is no such thing as a toxic relationship. However, the abuse of a word doesn’t negate its legitimacy. Some relationships are toxic, and Solomon warns his son about toxic companions.

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On June 22, 2023 By In Discipleship, Men, Theology, Wisdom, Women

Influencers

“Whoever walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of fools will suffer evil.”

~Proverbs 13.20

Though “influencer” has been practically coined in recent years with the rise of social media’s vast number of personalities, the concept is nothing new. We have always had these types in marketing or the latest gurus who gain popularity by promising the good life to those who buy what they are selling, follow their teaching, or, most of the time, both. Influencers, as we now understand them, are celebrities, real or perceived experts, popular social media personalities, and content creators who can separate you from your money and/or change how you think and act. From the Kardashians to Jordan Peterson, influencers affect our lives. They may not affect our lives directly, but they indirectly shape our lives by shaping the culture.

Influencers have always been around. Other people influence our thinking and affections from the time we are born until the time we die. Whether parents, peers, or potentates, our hearts are shaped by our relationships. This is why we must be vigilant in guarding our hearts by guarding our friendships.

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On June 15, 2023 By In Culture, Discipleship, Men, Theology, Wisdom, Women

Why Friends?

“A man who isolates himself seeks his own desire; he quarrels against all wise judgment.”

~Proverbs 18.1

We need friends. Whether same-sex comradery or the intimacy of marriage, we need to know and be known by others.

Friendships at every level have faced challenges in every age of history. Twenty-first century Western culture is no different. Though the challenges take different forms, genuine friendships are threatened by a number of cultural factors. The way we understand friendships is changing rapidly. We are more connected with people and less relational. We are friends with hundreds or thousands but with few or any in particular. Technology changes the way we relate. The telegraph gave us information about people thousands of miles away with whom we had no connection and contributed to desensitizing us. (See Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves To Death.) The blessing of air conditioning holed us up in our homes and made it uncomfortable to visit with neighbors. Television became a source of entertainment and information tempted us not to interact with the people in our homes.

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On June 8, 2023 By In Theology, Wisdom

Sovereign Wisdom

All of us, to one degree or another, fear the loss of control. We want things to go the way we want them to go. We want to control what is around us so that we can be free from anxiety, and the only way we can be free from anxiety is if everything around us is operating as we think it ought to work.

One temptation that we face when studying Proverbs is thinking that if we master its principles, precepts, and commands, achieving wisdom, we will have the control that we crave. Our wisdom can be used as a lever to get every desired result. If we rightly order our speech, we will persuade others irresistibly to conform to our way of seeing things. If we do what is right, work hard, and work honestly, everything will fall into place. If we are wise husbands and wives, our marriages will be trouble-free. If we parent wisely, our children will move uninterruptedly to perfect maturity. Wisdom is the key to absolute control over everything in my life. If I don’t have absolute control, then I must strive for more wisdom so that I may have absolute control.

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On June 1, 2023 By In Discipleship, Wisdom

Backsliding

“The backslider in heart is filled with his ways and a good man with his.”

~Proverbs 14.14

It’s really no big deal. A lingering fantasy. A cherished secret hidden from your spouse. A lack of hunger for what is good but an increasing appetite for that which God forbids. Decreased vigilance in guarding your heart, allowing your eyes and ears to let the enemies through the gates. It all begins small … dullness, apathy, refusal to fight, and the appeal of the forbidden. “This compromise won’t hurt,” you think to yourself. You deserve a rest from the fight. You have been patient up to this point and still don’t have the life you want. You need relief from the stress.

Apostasy, rejection of the faith, doesn’t begin with one giant leap off a cliff. Solomon describes this person as “one who turns in his heart” or, as it is popularly translated, “the backslider in heart” (Pr 14.14). Turning from the faith begins with the affections of the heart; a man is a “backslider in heart” before he is a backslider in deed. The sequence is well-summarized by Ralph Waldo Emerson: “Sow a thought and you reap an action; sow an act and you reap a habit; sow a habit and you reap a character; sow a character and you reap a destiny.” The seeds you plant and cultivate in your heart, good or bad, will bear fruit in the future. You will reap what you sow.

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On May 25, 2023 By In Counseling/Piety, Theology, Wisdom

The Medicine of Joy

“A joyful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.”

~Proverbs 17.22

Antidepressant medications are being prescribed at alarmingly high rates. Approximately 1 in 8 American adults over the age of 18 were on antidepressants in 2018. Of those, more than twice as many women than men were taking them. Twenty-three percent of women in their forties and fifties take antidepressants, a higher percentage than any other group (by age or sex). Since 2020 and all the events surrounding COVID, those numbers have increased. Whether people are dealing with genuine medical conditions or trying to eliminate the occasional blues, it is evident that we are looking for answers to deal with depression, whether mild or severe.

Depression has no singular cause and no one cure. It may stem from a traumatic event such as a debilitating illness, a hormonal imbalance, or being an overly sensitive snowflake who can’t handle someone disagreeing with you. Cures will vary with the causes. You may need to work through the grief process with good biblical counseling, gaining and submitting to a proper perspective. Medical help may be needed to deal with thyroid, adrenal, reproductive organ imbalances, or other organ deficiencies. You may need to learn how to have thicker skin. There are many sources and ways to address depression, depending on the person and his situation.

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On May 11, 2023 By In Discipleship, Theology, Wisdom

Judging Motives

“A plan in a man’s heart is like deep water, but a man of understanding will draw it out.”

~Proverbs 20.5

“You can’t judge my motives because you don’t know my heart.” You might hear this if you ever make a judgment call on someone’s actions. There is this idea that there is no way we can know someone else’s heart and, therefore, can’t judge their motives. Doesn’t Jeremiah say under the inspiration of the Spirit, “The heart is deceitful above all things and mortally ill; who can know it?” Doesn’t he expect the answer, “No one can know it”? Yes, he expects that answer. None of us relying on our wisdom can discern our own hearts, much less the hearts of others. When the source of our discernment is wisdom is our experience and thinking divorced from God’s revelation, then, no, we can’t understand our own hearts or the hearts of others. We are self-deceived and constantly seek to justify ourselves by rationalizing our motives while impugning the motives of others. So, with this wisdom, we can know nothing true about our hearts or the hearts of others.

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On May 9, 2023 By In Discipleship, Family and Children, Wisdom, Women

Letters To Young Women: Sexual Agency

Dear Young Lady,

King Solomon writes the book of Proverbs to his son, the prince. The king-in-waiting needs wisdom, the ability to see how the world is supposed to be combined with skills to put the world in proper order. This was the original man’s responsibility as well. Unlike the original man, Solomon’s son will have battles with sin that complicate and intensify the challenges that the first man faced.

While much of Solomon’s reign reflected the meaning of his name, “peace,” kings must always be prepared for battle. Because kings such as Solomon’s father, David, were great warriors, you might think that Solomon would spend a great deal of time instructing in the art of war, such as Sun Tzu teaches. Armies from other lands were constantly threatening the country’s integrity, and the king’s responsibility was to lead the armies in protecting the homeland. For example, we might expect battlefield strategies to take down the Philistines as David did. Solomon touches on that here and there, but that is not a significant focus. He prepares his son for battle, but it is a different sort of battle, a battle which, in some respects, is much more strenuous than a fight with a Philistine giant. This battle is with himself as he fights off the power of a woman. Solomon lost this battle. 1Kings 11.1-3 says that Solomon gave his heart in love to many foreign women who turned his heart from Yahweh. Whether he wrote his proverbial instructions before or after he repented in his later life, I do not know. But Solomon was obviously well acquainted with the power of women.

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On May 4, 2023 By In Culture, Discipleship, Men, Wisdom, Women

Generational Warfare

“The glory of young men is their strength, but the majesty of old men is their gray hair.”

~Proverbs 20.29

There are different glories for different bodies. When speaking of the resurrection of our bodies, Paul says that not all flesh is the same. There is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of animals, another of fish, and another of birds. There are celestial bodies and terrestrial bodies, each with its own glory. Different glories exist within each of those categories. Sun, moon, and stars all have glory, but each has its particular glory, even down to each star differing from other stars (1Cor 15.39-40). Each body has its particular function and, therefore, its own glory within the great tapestry of God’s creation.

Glory is not only particular to different kinds of bodies that will never be the same but is also true of the same body at different stages of life. There is a glory when you are young and a glory when you are old, as Solomon says in Proverbs 20.29. The young man’s glory is his strength. The older man’s glory is in his gray hair (when found in righteousness; Pr 16.31).

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On April 27, 2023 By In Discipleship, Theology, Wisdom

Cross Wisdom

“If God is all-powerful and all-good, how is the existence of evil possible? Either God is not all-powerful and, therefore, can do nothing about the evil, or if God is all-powerful, then he is not all-good.” This has been the “gotcha” question for many unbelievers through the centuries. There are answers to this question, but unbelievers who ask this are rarely satisfied with them. The issue is not so much a “purely theological” or “purely philosophical” dilemma. The issue is personal and moral as much as it is dogmatic. If I were to believe in a god, he must be a god who is all-powerful and uses that power to allow me to live my life without negative consequences. I want a god who frees me from all suffering no matter how I live. Some unbelievers may be more sympathetic to the sufferings of others, angry with the God they don’t believe in because he allows innocent people to suffer horribly. If they were God, they would arrange the events of history much differently.

What is God’s answer to this wisdom? The cross. The all-powerful and all-good God who created and sustains the world took on the flesh of man in the Person of his Son to absorb his own wrath against the sin of man and reconcile the world to himself.

Who in his right mind would believe such a message? This is insanity! An all-powerful, all-good God would find ways to avoid pain for himself and me. The word of the cross is a stumbling block to the postmodernist and foolishness to the modernist.

The rebuttals against the cross reveal not that God exists as an eternal dilemma but that unbelievers are insane. Those who scoff at the message of the cross are reality deniers. God is the Creator and sustainer of reality, and if our thoughts don’t align with his, then we are the ones with backward thinking.

Paul engages this battle of wisdom with the Corinthians in his opening salvo in his first letter. God reveals his wisdom in the cross of Christ. Period. To understand this wisdom, you must submit your mind and heart to God’s wisdom. No worldly wisdom will reason itself to God. The world cannot know God through its own wisdom (1Cor 1.21). We mistakenly believe that if man is educated adequately, he will be convinced. Think about it. No one can actually believe that the existence of logic, the ability to communicate coherently, and love can come from utter randomness. That is insanity. People must be able to understand that. Right? Nope. They refuse to see it, and you can’t convince them if they are committed to worldly wisdom. To people such as this, the cross will never make sense.

“But what about those philosophers who reason their way up to a higher power?” Paul would answer, “Did that higher power die on the cross for you? If not, it is an idol and no god at all.” “What about the scientists who give proof of an intelligent designer?” Well, they might have some good things to say, but is this intelligent designer the one who dies on a cross? If he is not, he is an idol. “What about the religious professional who believes that we are all going to the same god, just climbing up different sides of the mountain?” Well, there are serious conflicts between all of these various stories. The crux of the conflict is that all other religions of the world don’t have a God of the cross. “What about the person who believes in spirituality?” If his spirituality doesn’t include the fact that the Spirit proceeds from a crucified God, then his spirituality is worldly wisdom and futile. He still doesn’t understand the world because he refuses to submit to the wisdom of God.

Why does the cross make sense? Paul answers that question when he says, “It pleased God” to use this “moronic” proclamation of the cross to save those who believe (1Cor 1.21). God determined in himself that the cross is the way the world is put in order and moves toward its purpose. Whether or not the cross satisfies the wisdom of man doesn’t matter. Man doesn’t get a vote. His opinion and pleasure don’t determine the purpose of creation, especially since he is a part of it and has his purpose defined by his Creator.

Therefore, man’s fundamental calling is to submit to the wisdom of God by embracing the message of the cross and then living out this cruciform wisdom. Cruciform wisdom patterns its life according to the self-giving love revealed by God through the cross. Worldly wisdom trains you to look out for yourself, using and stepping on people to exalt yourself. Cruciform teaches you that exaltation comes through humbling yourself and serving others. Worldly wisdom trains you to indulge yourself in the name of liberty. Cruciform wisdom teaches you to deny your impulses for the joy set before you. Worldly wisdom teaches you to take vengeance on others, holding on to bitterness and unforgiveness until your sense of justice is satisfied. Cruciform wisdom teaches you to forgive even as God has forgiven you for Christ’s sake.

The world will think you are crazy, but you are the sane one.

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