I'm continuing on this morning, if you would go to Proverbs chapter four, Proverbs chapter four,
I'm continuing on this morning with the series we started last week, The Wells of Wellness.
And if you remember last week, I just kind of introduced this concept,
the bit we looked at the biblical use of these analogies of wells,
how the Bible often uses that analogy and I can re-preach all of that.
But it's a biblical analogy, it's one that I'm going to use,
it's one that I use in my personal life. Really, I'm just kind of sharing something that
in this series is something that I kind of just do for myself to kind of help
with organizing my life and learning how to just basically live life.
You know, you need to have an approach as to how you're going to live your life.
We don't want to just move through life without any kind of a plan,
without any kind of a structure, just kind of let things happen.
Obviously, we need to plan and we need to, you know, make priorities in our lives.
And this is a good way to just kind of help prioritize things for myself.
And again, this is something you can personalize for yourself, take what you can from it.
But again, it's this idea that there's different wells in our lives that we need to be digging.
If you remember last week, I mentioned that we'll be covering five wells, right?
The well of wisdom, the well of well-being, the well of welcome,
the well of work and the well of wonder. We'll get to all those over the next several weeks.
But this week, I'm going to be speaking specifically about the well of wisdom
and also kind of introduce the idea of how you dig that well.
And really how you dig that well is with specific shovels, with specific shovels.
So if there's a well that you want to dig,
then you're going to need a particular shovel to dig that well.
You know, even in the real world, you know, if you're going to think,
well, any shovel will do, that's not the case.
If you're going to do some, you know, depending on what kind of digging you're going to be doing,
you need to pick out the appropriate shovel.
You say, I thought all shovels were made equal.
They're not. All shovels are alike.
They're not. Some shovels have different tasks that they're better suited for.
You know, if you're trying to dig, you want the spade.
If maybe you're kind of flattening out and clearing up stuff on the surface,
you're probably going to want a flat shovel.
So if you don't get anything else out of the sermon tonight,
you got that or this morning, you got that.
But the analogy again is that as we begin to dig in these different wells,
you know, figuratively speaking in our lives,
there are going to be specific things that are going to help us dig that well deeper.
And when we're talking about the well of wisdom,
obviously there's specific tools that we can use or specific practices or sources or shovels
that we should be bringing into our lives and making sure a part of our lives
in order to help deepen that well.
And really, I'm starting with the well of wisdom.
I don't know that the rest of these wells are any particular order of priority.
Obviously, as we go through life, some things take more precedent over other things.
You know, maybe work becomes more of an important well that you need to spend time on
at a certain season in your life than other wells.
But wisdom, I believe, is always going to be the primary well
that we need to make sure we're always digging in.
We don't want to slack on this.
We want to make sure that this is a well that we dig deeply in our lives.
I had you go to Proverbs and we're going to be in Proverbs and Psalms all morning.
I should have had you gone to Ecclesiastes.
I know I'm kind of fumbling a little bit right out of the gate here,
but we'll pick up steam.
We'll recover.
If you go over to Ecclesiastes chapter number 10, Ecclesiastes chapter number 10,
just as means of introduction, I want to emphasize, again, the importance of wisdom in our lives.
You know, this is something that we never want to lose sight of.
In fact, when it comes to digging all these other wells in our lives
and getting better and deepening these other areas in our lives,
we're going to need wisdom in knowing how to do that.
We know we need wisdom.
We need knowledge.
We need understanding so that we can more effectively dig in these other wells.
OK, the Bible says there in Ecclesiastes chapter 10, verse 10,
if the iron be blunt and he do not wet the edge, then he must put two more strength, right?
So it's talking about the iron specifically speaking about an axe, right?
If you don't wet that edge, you know, wetting it, meaning like on a whetstone,
if you don't sharpen that iron, you're going to have to put more strength.
You're going to have to put more effort into following that tree.
You know, if you got the wrong shovel,
you're going to have to put more strength into digging a specific well.
You know, if you go ahead and ignore the advice I just gave you a few minutes ago
and think you're going to take a flat shovel and go dig eight feet into the ground or whatever,
you're going to have to put a lot more strength into that
if you just listen to what I said and got in a spade, right?
So write that down because you never know.
But it's a principle again that if we don't have wisdom in our lives,
you know, we're going to have to we might still be able to accomplish certain things,
but not as effectively, not as efficiently, not as thoroughly as if we had wisdom.
So that's why the well of wisdom is really the most important one.
You need to make sure that you're using wisdom in your life,
having knowledge, having discretion.
Notice how the verse ends here.
If the iron be blunt and you do not wet the edge,
if he doesn't take the time to put an edge on it to find wisdom,
then he must put to more strength.
He's going to be expending more strength than he needs to.
But wisdom is profitable to direct.
What's the profit of wisdom?
Is that it's more profitable to direct.
It's going to help fall that tree more quickly.
It's going to dig deeper more quickly because it's you wetting that edge.
So again, wisdom is what's profitable.
A lot of times people want to neglect wisdom because it's profitability is an immediate.
We don't always see the immediate benefits of being in church.
We don't always see the immediate benefits
of reading our Bibles and praying and meditating upon the word of God,
memorizing the word of God,
maybe even putting into practice the things that we've learned from the Bible,
those wise things we ought to be doing.
We don't always see the immediate profitability out of that.
But you know what?
The Bible does say that wisdom is profitable.
You know, we don't always see the prophets,
the prophet of, you know, raising our children,
the nurture and admonition of the Lord.
You know, we don't see the long-term benefits that are going to come
not only into our lives, but the lives of our children.
That's something that you have to just trust God in and use wisdom day in and day out
to do what you're supposed to do when it comes to that area of child-rearing.
Of course, that applies to any area.
That's just one example.
So go back to Proverbs chapter number four, Proverbs chapter number four.
We need to have this well of wisdom dug in our lives before really you dig any other well.
Obviously, we need to be doing other things all the time.
But this is something we need to in our lives,
make sure that we are daily digging this well with these specific shovels.
Notice again the emphasis that the Bible puts on wisdom.
And there's so many verses on this.
Anytime you talk about wisdom, you're going to be in the book of Proverbs.
It's just it's a book that talks about it at length.
But and more so than we're going to cover this morning.
Anyone who's reading through Proverbs, if you ever read through it,
the next time you read through it, look out for that.
You'll notice how much wisdom just comes up repeatedly in the book of Proverbs,
because it's so important.
Again, this is why we're putting this well first,
because it is our primary need, the need for wisdom in our lives.
Look at Proverbs chapter four, verse five.
Get wisdom, get understanding, forget it not,
neither decline from the words of my mouth.
So again, the Bible here is saying get wisdom, get understanding.
That's a command.
You know, it's not saying, hey, you know, if it's convenient for you,
but something you feel like doing, you know, you might want to pursue wisdom.
You might want to pursue understanding.
He's saying, no, you need to get these things.
A lot of times we think about in life, what are the things we want to acquire?
What are the things that we want to have for ourselves?
Well, the Bible says you should get wisdom and get understanding.
These are things that we should pursue in our lives.
Again, why?
Because they are profitable for us.
OK, look at verse six, forsake or not, and she shall preserve thee.
Love her and she shall keep thee.
Right.
It's something that's going to preserve and keep you if you get wisdom.
It's something that's going to profit you.
And if you remember last week when I started this series,
one of the things I pointed out was that often the Christian life,
we put a lot of emphasis on the Lord and other people.
Right.
That acronym, Joy, Jesus, Others, You.
And as much as I believe that and adhere to that,
let's not forget the why in that equation.
You are important and there are things that you need for yourself.
And you can't be all those things that you need to be for other people.
You can't be all those things that you need to be for Jesus.
If you don't get wisdom.
Right.
It's going to profit you and others.
Get wisdom, get understanding, forget it not,
neither decline from the words of my mouth.
So we get a clue here.
Where is wisdom to be found?
Where do we get understanding?
From the words of his mouth, from the word of God.
Right.
For sake or not, she shall preserve thee, love her and she shall keep thee.
Verse seven, wisdom is the principal thing.
It's the primary thing.
It's the most important thing is wisdom.
That's what we need to have in our lives.
Therefore, get it.
You know, if somebody said, Hey, this is the most important thing you need.
You should.
You would obviously think that you're going to go get that.
But that's not always the case.
You know, a lot of times people are told, Hey, this is very important.
This is what you need to do.
And they neglect doing it.
They put it off.
So he's pointing out here in verse seven.
It's the principal thing.
Therefore, get it.
It's not going to.
And that tells us it's not something that's just going to come to us naturally.
It's not something we're not just going to wake up one morning and have wisdom.
It's something we have to pursue.
Okay.
Exalt her and she shall promote thee.
She shall bring thee to honor.
When thou dost embrace her, she shall give to thine head an ornament of grace and a crown
of glory shall she deliver to thee.
So wisdom profits us immensely.
It's our greatest need.
Okay.
Now, if you would go back to Psalm 110, Psalm 110, making sure I got the right.
111.
Sorry.
111.
It's 111 verse 10.
That's where I got mixed up there.
Okay.
Psalm 111 verse 10.
It says there in Psalm 111 verse 10, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
So again, without having put a lot of, you know, or at least bringing to the surface,
the many different places in the scripture where wisdom is emphasized and we are commanded
and encouraged and exhorted to seek wisdom without going, you know, without going a lot
into that, you know, Proverbs chapter four makes it pretty evident that we need to get
wisdom.
We might then ask ourselves, you know, well, how do we get wisdom?
Hey, that's great.
You're you've convinced me that wisdom is important.
How do I get that?
Well, you know, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
And that's a phrase that you find throughout scripture many, many times.
You'll see the fear of the Lord, the fear of the Lord.
And obviously that's where it starts.
That's why it says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
Like if we don't have the fear of God in our lives, then we are foolish people.
Okay.
We can't even begin to have more wisdom without having the fear of God.
Okay.
And let me say this about the fear of the Lord.
You know, this is something that a lot of people have without even really knowing it.
Okay.
Because the fear of the Lord, really, that's kind of, you know, if you're thinking about
digging a well, you know, if you're going to just kind of break through the surface,
you know, kind of get the sod out of the way so you can really get some some serious digging
done and really dig down deep and find that well and find that water.
You know, the fear of the Lord is kind of like that sod.
You know, that's kind of, you know, the scoops you take right off the surface.
It's a surface scoop, right?
Fearing God.
Because think about how many people kind of already do this naturally.
You know, what would be an example of fearing the Lord?
Well, look at the continuing on here in verse 10.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
A good understanding have all they that do his commandments.
And when you think about the commandments, you might think of things like thou shall
not kill, thou shall not steal, thou shall not bear false witness, honor thy father and
thy mother, right?
You think of kind of these big moral commandments that kind of everybody knows.
You know, a lot of people out there, they understand even these just basic things about,
hey, this is how you should treat people.
This is you shouldn't do this.
You should do that.
They understand these kind of these basic principles of fearing the Lord.
But look, we as God's people, we want to dig deeper than that.
Because you hear that all the time.
You know, evidence of this, of the fact that, you know, people kind of already understand
this in general is the fact that when you go soul winning, you knock on someone's door
and you ask me how they're going to go to heaven.
What are they a lot of times say?
I'm a good person.
We ask them, what do you got to do to get there?
Keep the commandments.
A lot of people have this basic understanding of fearing God.
Obviously, they're wrong.
Those aren't the things that are going to earn you heaven because heaven cannot be earned.
It's a gift.
It's, you know, the love of God that gives us, you know, the salvation.
But again, it's just a point.
It's just a proof that, you know, people understand this.
They already kind of have this knowledge.
Well, be a good person.
Keep the commandments.
They have a basic, you know, fear of God, even if they're not going to call it that.
OK, they're afraid of what would happen to them if they broke these basic commandments.
That's not what we want for our lives.
I mean, obviously, we want that.
You know, I'm not saying let's not worry about not doing those things, but we want to dig
a little deeper than that.
So how do I know I have wisdom?
Well, you know, I haven't killed anybody and I haven't committed adultery and I haven't stolen.
And, you know, I've kept, you know, the big 10, you know, as best as I can.
You know, well, that's great.
But, you know, that's the beginning of wisdom, that fear, that just kind of surface understanding.
That's just the beginning.
You know, we as God's people, we want to dig down deep and we're going to do that through
these specific shovels that I'll talk about here in a minute.
So we have this just, you know, this idea of people who just keep the general morality
of the commandments.
That's a beginning, right?
Even beyond that, you know, say, well, how do we dig a little bit deeper?
Well, we might dig a little deeper when we have kind of some general adherence to just
our Christian duties, right?
Those are things that are going to help dig that well a little bit deeper, right?
The Bible says to behold the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom and to depart from evil is
understanding.
You know, as we start to depart from evil, we have that fear of God.
We start to get sin out of our lives.
We start to live a more godly and righteous life through the power of the Holy Ghost,
through Christ.
You know, as we start to walk with the Lord, you know, obviously that departing from evil,
that is another level of wisdom that's digging down a little bit deeper, right?
I stopped, you know, doing this sin.
I stopped doing that sin.
I stopped going here and hanging out with these people.
I stopped, you know, doing things that displease God, right?
That's again, that fear of the Lord digging us a little deeper down into that well, making
us wiser, okay?
We want to dig a little deeper than that too, don't we?
If you would, go over to Psalm 19, Psalm chapter 19.
And you know, the specific shovels that I'm going to introduce this morning are nothing
new.
In fact, it's nothing you haven't heard me preach several times over from this pulpit,
but it's things that need to be emphasized in our lives because these are the things
that we tend to let slip.
These are the things that if we're not careful to maintain them, we will stop doing them.
And as a result, we will not be as wise as we could be.
In fact, we might even lose some of the wisdom that we have if we don't take these specific
shovels to help us dig a little deeper, okay?
So what's one of the first tools that you should go and pull out of the shed when you're
going to dig this well of wisdom?
It's Bible reading.
Oh, here we go again with the Bible reading, right?
But Bible reading cannot be overemphasized enough because it's one of the most surefire
ways to help you dig that well deeper than a lot of other people, okay?
Obviously, you know, just some general adherence to the moral law that everybody understands.
That's the fear of the Lord.
That's the beginning of wisdom.
A lot of people have that.
A lot of people have managed to dig, you know, down into that black dirt, you know, six or
eight inches, right, but they're not getting down into the sand, the clay, and the rock
where the digging gets a little bit harder, okay?
That's what we want to do.
You know, living a decent moral life isn't really that deep of a life, is it?
It's not the wisest thing, okay?
Even beyond that, you know, we get saved.
Maybe we start going to church, right?
You start showing up, hey, that's a little bit deeper.
You know, we're going to learn some things that's going to help us dig that well that
some of these Christian duties, that's a great, you know, tool to get out once or twice a
week or maybe even three times, depending on how far down you want to dig, right?
But, you know, that, again, is only going to get you so far, right?
What are you going to do daily?
What are you going to do every day?
What tool can you get out and do some daily digging with?
What specific shovel can you dig this well of wisdom with a little bit deeper?
It's Bible reading, and it's very important.
The Bible says in 2 Timothy 3, I'll just remind us again, and that from a child that has known
the holy scriptures, which are able to make the wise unto salvation through faith, which
is in Christ Jesus.
So the Bible tells us that the holy scriptures are able to make us wise, not only unto faith,
you know, unto salvation in Christ Jesus, but also even beyond that.
You know, all of the, there's so much wisdom in this book.
The Bible touches every area of our life.
The Bible talks about how to raise our families.
The Bible talks about how to conduct ourselves.
It talks about the things that we should even think about, the things that should come
out of our mouth, the things that we meditate upon.
It talks about every single area of our life.
The Bible touches on it, every single area.
So if we want to be wiser in life in general, then we should probably know what the Bible
says.
We should get out this shovel and use it and daily be found in it, digging that well deeper
and digging that well deeper day in and day out.
Look at Psalms 19 verse 7.
The law of the Lord is perfect.
Converting the soul, the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple.
Making a simple person wise.
What's that sound like?
Somebody is getting some depth to their wisdom.
Someone is digging that well of wisdom deeper.
What makes the wise simple?
It's the testimony of the Lord.
What is the testimony of the Lord?
It's the Bible.
That's the specific shovel.
Again, it's not a new one, right?
But if we could look into a lot of Christians' spiritual shed this morning, we would find
this tool in a corner overgrown with cobwebs and maybe there's some other things in front
of it.
You ever have that tool shed that you maybe only pull out?
There's that one tool that's back there you only use once in a great while.
And throughout the year, everything else just kind of gets cluttered in front of it.
And then you got to pull it out there and the shed's too small and you're banging things
around and it's a mess.
That's not what you want to have happen with the tool of Bible reading.
That should be right there.
You should just be able to slide that shed door open and grab it without even stepping
in and pull it out.
Maybe it'll just be sitting there right next to that hole.
Don't even bother putting it away.
Just going to stake it in the ground.
I'm going to pick it up right where I left off tomorrow.
That's where this tool needs to be.
And that's why I'm taking the time to emphasize it.
Because again, wisdom is the principle thing.
This is what we need to get.
How are we going to get it?
Reading our Bibles.
See, that sounds so simple.
It is, yet it's profound.
And yet it's one of the main things that are neglected the most is our Bible reading.
And if we don't have it, we're not going to dig that well as deep as we could.
In fact, we'll see here that that well can actually begin to backfill.
A part of Bible reading just helps us kind of keep the dirt out that's falling back in.
Look at Psalm 19 verse 8.
The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart.
The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes.
So again, these are things that benefit us.
You know, we want to be wise.
At least we should want to.
We don't want to live our lives as simpletons, right?
We don't want to be simple people, simple and understanding.
We want to have wisdom about these, about life, about the Bible, about God, about how to live.
Okay.
It's the testimony that's going to do that.
We want to rejoice, right?
I want rejoicing in my life.
You know, I want to come to church and hear those songs sung and just, you know, feel
drawn closer to God.
I want to hear those words that are sung and just be able to, you know, identify with that
and just have that speak to me.
Right?
Well, if you read your Bible and you know things about God and you know the truth about the Lord,
you know, you're going to rejoice.
You're going to have more rejoicing in your life.
Doesn't everybody want that?
I mean, who would say if I offered you rejoicing, hey,
here's something to be joyful about.
How many of us would say, oh, no, thanks.
I'd rather just wallow in my misery.
I'd rather just be, you know, downtrodden.
I'd rather just be, you know, just depressed and discontent.
No, we want to be people who rejoice.
Well, it's the statutes of the Lord that are going to help us with that.
Living them out.
Not, you know, how are you going to know what to do?
How are you going to know how to live that out?
By being in the word of God, by reading it.
The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes, right?
And the idea of enlightening, you know, making us wise,
giving us that brightness in our countenance.
And again, it's this idea that, you know, as we begin to dig,
you know, we begin to see the benefit.
You know, if there's some buried treasure in the earth,
you dig far enough down, it's a lot of hard work.
But as soon as you hear that shovel, you know, hit that unfamiliar,
you hear that thunk, right?
It's like, oh, what was that?
I think we were there, right?
And you start getting excited again, right?
But the way down to that treasure, the way down in that well,
that's where a lot of hard work takes place.
And I didn't point it out in Psalm 111, but I'll point out here,
I'll just read it to you.
But it says there, you know, it's the beginning of the fear of the Lord.
It's the beginning of the wisdom.
A good understanding of all they that do His commandments,
His praise endureth forever.
There's this natural progression there.
And it begins with fear, the fear of the Lord, right?
That's where we start.
But then we have a good understanding if we do His commandments.
So we go from fearing God to doing His commandments.
And then where does it end?
His praise endureth forever.
If we want to rejoice and have praise, well, you have to start with fear.
If you want to rejoice and have praise,
then you have to start doing the commandments.
You know, one thing follows the other.
You know, a lot of times people just want to have all the joy
and rejoicing and praise at the beginning.
That's not how it works.
Starts with fear.
Then it begins and it's followed up with doing the commandments,
keeping the statutes, which can only be known and understood by reading them,
by getting in the Word of God, pulling out that shovel and doing that daily digging.
Another specific shovel that will help you dig this well of wisdom in your life
beyond Bible reading is Bible memorization or meditation.
And I know meditation today has had this, you know, kind of a negative connotation,
but, you know, basically it's just a ruminating or thinking upon the Word of God.
It's not a Baptist cuss word to use to say meditate.
Okay, it's in the Bible.
You know, Isaac meditated in the field at dusk
when his wife was brought to him, if you remember the story.
He was out in the field meditating, right?
Some of you single guys are thinking, hmm, maybe that's a wall to find her.
I'm just going to go sit out at a field.
That's not the point of that story.
Okay, go back and read that, all right?
I'm going to clarify that, right?
But anyway, but again, he was meditating, right?
So, you know, this idea of meditating, memorizing, thinking upon the Word of God,
not just, you know, when we're reading it,
but actually taking it with us out of, you know, the prayer closet,
taking it with us out of, you know, our room, wherever we're doing our reading,
taking it with us throughout the day and not only thinking upon the things of God,
you know, those brief moments when we're, you know, reading the Bible.
Obviously, we need those things, right?
But, you know, we should be people who meditate and memorize scripture.
If you would go to Psalms 119, Psalms 119.
We should think about the things that we've learned.
We should think about the things that we've been instructed in.
We should think about the things that we've read in the Bible.
Psalms 119, verse 97.
This is a good way to dig that well deeper, okay?
You know, maybe you've learned the fear of the Lord.
Maybe you've learned to do his commandments.
Maybe you've learned to even do your faithful to your daily Bible reading.
You know what?
You've probably gotten a level of depth in this well
that a lot of other people don't have just through those three things.
You want to go a little deeper though.
Maybe it's time to start thinking about memorizing.
Maybe it's time to start thinking about meditating upon the Word of God throughout the day, okay?
And this is especially helpful if you're trying to break through something, okay?
Think about, again, the analogy of you're digging that hole.
You're digging down that well.
You run into a boulder.
You run into a large rock, right?
That can be very discouraging, okay?
You got to dig around it.
You got to pry it up.
You know, sometimes as we're trying to become wiser in our lives,
you know, we might run into struggles.
We might run into things that we have a hard time with.
You know, this is where memorization and meditation of the Word of God is going to help us, okay?
When we know the verse that's going to help us get through that temptation.
When we know the verse that's going to help us
through that discouragement or that distraction or whatever it is,
you know, that's the thing that we need in our lives to dig beyond that rock.
That's going to help us break through into that
and get to that next depth in our lives of wisdom.
Look at Psalm 119 verse 97.
Oh, how love I thy law.
It is my meditation all the day.
I mean, all day.
Come on, David.
All day.
That's what he said.
It's my meditation all the day.
I'm always thinking and ruminating upon the Word of God.
Well, you know, that's just for David.
You know, that's just for the preacher.
That's just for the pastor.
No, it's for all of us, you know, and honestly,
I mean, it's something I practiced, you know, long before I was in ministry.
You know, it's something, you know, it's real simple to just take,
you know, five minutes out of your day at some point.
And maybe it's just one verse that you're going to think about that week.
You know, if you just memorized one verse, just one a week would be simple, right?
Just write it on that three by five card, stick it in the pocket, you know,
maybe put it next to your wallet, next to your phone, next to your car keys.
So every time you reach in there, it's like, oh, well, yeah, that verse.
And now on your drive home from work, your drive to work,
while you're running that errand, whatever, you've pulled those car keys out,
you've looked at that card, and now instead of turning on the radio
and listening to a bunch of nonsense on the radio,
or, you know, just thinking about, you know, some whatever, whatever vain thing that,
you know, we so often get caught up in thinking about, you know,
instead we can look, think about that verse and what meditate upon the word of God.
And by the time we get to where we're going, you know, our spirit has changed.
We maybe we have a deeper understanding out of something out of the word of God.
You know, I don't know how many times I sat down to memorize a passage out of the word of God,
something I've read, you know, multiple times, many times over, and it's like,
how did I never notice that before? Or some new level of understanding comes out simply
because I was just going through it in my mind, thinking about the verse,
going through the words, memorizing it. It's a very profound practice.
It will lead to a deeper well of wisdom in your life.
You will have more wisdom if you memorize these verses.
If you memorize specific verses that might help you with the sin,
maybe some doctrinal verses, you know, people who memorize those things,
people who memorize those things, they're able to recall them and bring them up,
and it helps guide them through life.
Some people will memorize specific verses as a kind of guide to them.
I think that's a great thing to do.
Maybe they'll try to put like a theme to their life or a theme to a season of their life,
and they'll pull a verse out and say, hey, this is a verse that's going to help me
in this season of my life.
People who do that probably have a little bit of a deeper walk
than somebody who's just keeping some basic commandments.
Somebody who's just, you know, going to church.
Maybe even somebody who's doing some, you know, faithful, dutiful Bible reading.
You know, the person who's memorizing and thinking about and meditating,
you know, they have that deep, that well of wisdom is a little bit deeper, right?
That's what we want to do.
That's a specific shovel, Bible memorization, Bible reading.
The last one we'll look at is the shovel, the specific shovel of,
you know, maybe understanding things about creation, okay?
And I mean that very broadly, okay?
I don't, I can't overemphasize enough Bible reading, the word of God, reading it, memorizing
it, obviously that is where we need to, that's where the bulk of our digging is going to be done.
That's the main shovel, right?
Those shovels, reading, memorizing, those are going to be the most effective things.
But, you know, another thing I would hope was simply to just maybe get the knowledge
and understanding of things that, you know, from outside the Bible even.
And this is an important thing because I think sometimes people develop this attitude that if
it's not, if it's not from the King James Bible then I can't, you know,
it can't profit me anything.
That's not true, okay?
Obviously we have to have wisdom and discernment, that's why we should be in the Bible to
be able to kind of, you know, eat the meat and spit out the bones of what the world has to offer.
But the world has some meat to offer.
And if you would go over to Proverbs chapter 25, Proverbs chapter 25.
This is a verse I think about often because, you know, I listen to other sources
outside of scripture.
I even listen to other people outside of Christendom, you know?
Oh, I can't believe you'd say, I can't believe you'd listen to somebody, you know,
who maybe isn't a new IFB preacher or an IFB preacher or a Baptist.
And obviously, look, there's a lot of error that's out there in the world, but, you know,
there's a lot of people out there that know what they're talking about.
People that have devoted themselves to a field of study, who have spent their entire lives
studying and researching and experimenting.
They have a level of understanding that I don't have.
You know, there's this great quote that I am reminded of often.
It's, and it's one that a brother Hiles said a long time ago.
And it was, I don't, and I might be getting it a little off, but basically what he said
was, I don't know everything.
Therefore, all men are my teachers.
I don't know everything.
Now, I know that comes as a shock to you guys that I don't know everything.
But, you know, if you have the right attitude, if you understand that you don't know everything,
that means you can learn anything from probably anybody.
Well, not anything, but you can learn something from anybody, right?
I'm sure everybody in this room knows something that I don't know, you know, whatever it might
be, you know, and it might be that it's something that would profit me in my own life, okay?
So that's why I'm not adverse to, you know, looking at other sources in areas of like,
you know, biology, right?
Think about when it comes to health, right?
You know, I'm not a great source for wisdom and understanding when it comes to the topic
of health.
You know, I am one who is in the process of learning those things, all right?
We will preach the well of well-being, but, you know, that's going to be a struggle, all
right?
But we're going to get through it, right?
But, you know, I'm not, I'm probably going to go draw from other sources, and I'm not
going to, and if I look at their credentials, I'm not going to be looking for, you know,
are they KJV only, right?
I just want to know, do they know what they're talking about?
You know, because then they have something to share with me.
Look at Proverbs 25, verse 1.
These also are, these are also Proverbs of Solomon, which the men of Hezekiah king of
Judah copied out.
It is the glory of God to conceal a thing, but the honor of kings is to search out a
matter.
You know, God covers a thing, but it's our honor to search out a matter.
You know, there's some things are concealed, you know, it's our privilege to be able, in
this life, to be able to reveal things to ourselves.
And I think this is a lot, I think about this a lot when you think about things like math
and science and biology and all these different areas of life where, you know, the Bible
doesn't specifically tell us, you know, the structure of the atom or, you know, it doesn't
tell us about how human biology works.
That's something that God has, in a sense, concealed.
And maybe I'm kind of, you know, using this verse beyond its primary application, you
know, primary application, but God conceals these things.
You know, it's our privilege to be able to search these things out, to come to an understanding
of mathematics and have deeper knowledge in these, you know, the area of sciences and
things like that.
I'm not adverse to that.
We don't want to be people who, you know, go through this life ignorant of, you know,
other things.
Obviously, again, the Bible reading it, memorizing it, that's the primary thing.
If we don't have that, we don't have nothing.
Okay, but that's just a place we can start.
That's going to help us dig that well a little bit deeper.
But what if we began to understand and get some wisdom in these other areas?
You know, a great example of this is the concept of this series.
You know, the idea of wells, right, and specific shovels and daily digging, you know, the
idea of dividing up life into these different areas that we need to focus on.
That's not something I came up with.
I got that from somebody else.
And it wasn't a Bible believer.
In fact, far from it.
You know, you say, who was it?
It doesn't matter.
And it's not anybody, you know, bad.
I wouldn't feel ashamed recommending him from the pulpit.
I'm just not going to do it.
Okay.
You can come ask me afterwards.
All right.
But, you know, I got that idea from somebody else.
I just took that concept and personalized it to myself.
And now I'm sharing it with you.
Okay.
So that's a great example of that.
You know, and we can find biblical principles to back it up.
But, you know, going out there and finding out other things, getting a little wiser in
these other areas, there are things that are going to help us.
You know, another thing that I think about often is, you know, a lot of the advancements
that have been made in neuroscience.
Okay.
And obviously, you know, I have a very shallow understanding of neurological functions and
things like that.
But today you can listen to people who, these professors and others who are sharing this
knowledge on YouTube and other places and podcasts where they're breaking it down and
making it very simple and sharing it with the general public.
Where if you actually took those things, took the time to dig and took the time to listen,
there's things that would profit you in your life, right?
That would make you a wiser person to understand how, you know, the hormones in our brains
work and how we can do different things to make sure we're keeping these things in balance.
That's all very important.
And look, there's so many other areas we could talk about, right?
All I'm trying to get across this morning is increase your understanding of creation.
It will make you a wiser person.
Understand the biology of the human body.
Understand how your mind works.
Understand things about creation itself, right?
Remember, God put Adam in the garden to dress and to keep it.
You know, I think there was a lot of liberty there, and I think Adam probably did a lot
of learning.
You know, he's naming all the animals right now.
He's probably learning about what plants come into season when, and he's probably learning
how to prune this one and trim that one.
Like he's putting in this wild garden that's overgrown saying, now you keep it, you dress
it, you learn about it.
You know, we're kind of in that proverbial garden, so to speak.
Still, we're still in that creation and God has left it up to us to kind of be able to
learn about what he has made to understand it, interpret it, and apply it in our own
lives, okay?
And I'm just using this, again, this is another specific shovel that will help us become wiser
people, dig that well a little bit deeper.
And I think it's an important one because there's this kind of this sentiment in Baptist
churches where they're kind of, they kind of almost glorify being ignorant of the things
of the world.
You know, I remember hearing the old IFB guys, you know, brag about how they couldn't turn
on a computer.
And it's like, no wonder your churches are dying on the vine, no wonder you're not having
the influence you can if you're proud about the fact that you don't know how the interweb
works.
It's like, well, you know, I know there's a lot of evils out there, but it's also an
incredibly powerful tool that we could use to get our message across.
Why would we want to be ignorant about that?
You know, that's just one example.
We don't want to glorify ignorance and stupidity.
I don't think that's what God has intended.
He's saying, hey, it's your glory.
It's your honor to search out a matter.
Adam, you go dress and keep the garden.
You want to be wiser?
Learn about how the world works.
You want to be wiser?
Learn about the creation that God has made.
Okay, so we need to dig this well of wisdom a little deeper by these things.
These basic, I just gave you three tools this morning, the Bible reading, the meditation,
the memorization, and increase your understanding of creation.
And that's a very broad topic, obviously, in and of itself.
And I do believe those are in order of priority.
And obviously, prayer is a big one, too.
That's one I'm kind of not covering, but let me throw that in there, because that's
also incredibly important.
If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, which giveth unto all men liberally,
and it shall be given him.
Asking, praying for, seeking wisdom from God is something we should be doing.
Pray that prayer.
Pray and ask God for wisdom, and then get in the Bible where it's to be found, and he
will give it to you.
So now you've got the tools.
We're talking about the specific well.
We've got a few tools we can use to dig.
Now, how are you going to use these tools?
By digging daily.
Dig daily.
These are tools that need to be done daily.
Prayer, Bible reading, memorization, these are things we should be working on daily.
Go to Proverbs chapter 16.
We'll wrap up there, Proverbs chapter number 16.
I'll read you from Proverbs 1.
It says, to know wisdom and instruction, to perceive the words of understanding, to
receive the instruction of wisdom, justice, and judgment, and equity, to give subtlety
to the simple, to the young man, knowledge, and discretion.
A wise man will hear and will increase learning.
Look, if you're somebody who is wise, you will hear and you will increase in learning.
You will seek it out, and a man of understanding shall attain unto wise counsels.
If we want to have this well of wisdom and knowledge and understanding dug deeper in
our lives, we're going to have to increase our learning.
We're going to have to increase our knowledge of the word of God, increase our knowledge
of the world around us, and we need to attain unto wise counsels.
Find people that know something we don't and learn from them.
And of course, again, let me just in closing emphasize again, we find it wisdom is to be
found in God.
The greatest source of wisdom in our lives is the Lord.
His word, praying to him, meditating, memorizing, reading the Bible.
That is where it needs to be found.
The Bible says in Colossians 2, in Christ are all the hid treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
In Christ are all the hid treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
And let me point out the fact they're hidden.
They're hidden.
There are things that have to be sought out.
There are things that have to be pursued.
There are things that have to be attained unto.
They have to be discovered.
We have to go to these sources and find them.
If you want to dig this well deeper, you're going to have to go and get the shovel out
and put forth the effort to get it.
And let me just close by emphasizing again the need for it.
How much the Bible emphasizes the need for wisdom in our lives.
To dig this well and make it, you know, the primary well that we dig.
Proverbs 16 verse 16.
How much it is, is it to get wisdom than gold?
How much better is it to get wisdom than gold?
It sounds like a question, but it ends with an exclamation point.
He's not asking us.
He's telling us.
It's better to get wisdom than gold.
You know, if I had a choice between being a wise person or a wealthy person,
I would choose wisdom.
One, because wisdom gives me the knowledge and ability to become wealthy.
You know, if I have some smarts and I understand some biblical principles
about even finances and things like that, I can become a wealthier person.
But if one is at the expense of the other, it's wisdom every time.
Because, you know, gold and wealth is something that's fleeting.
It's something that's not going to profit us.
In fact, the Bible says they that will be rich fall into temptation and into a snare.
And to many foolish and hurtful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition.
For the love of money is the root of all evil.
If we just make our lives about pursuing things and stuff and money and wealth,
it's going to pierce us through and it's going to bring sorrow into our lives.
So you can see again why he's emphasizing wisdom,
that it's better than wealth, it's better than gold.
And to get understanding rather to be chosen than silver.
It's better to get wisdom.
If church and work are going to come into a conflict,
I'm going to choose church.
And I have.
And I believe in that.
I believe that if I got a job, if there was a job offered to me
that was going to take me out of church, I'd pass on that job.
That's something I believe personally for myself.
Because one, I believe it's a sin to not be in church.
But two, I'm going to miss out on a lot of learning.
I'm going to miss out on a lot of wisdom.
Just going and trying to make some more silver and make some more gold,
especially when there's other ways to make that same silver and that same gold
that aren't going to cost me wisdom and understanding and knowledge.
We want to dig these holes as deep as we can and we need to dig them daily.
Right.
That's the closing point.
Talked about, you know, hey, use these specific shovels, Bible reading, memorization,
you know, expand your knowledge of the world and creation in general to,
you know, find something that interests you.
It'll make you wiser.
But do it daily.
Because, you know, as I alluded to earlier, this illustration that holes can be become backfilled.
Anyone has dug a deep hole.
And believe me, I've dug some deep ones.
I mean, I'm talking I've been in holes that are 30, 40 feet deep, putting pipe into the ground.
And you're digging in sand.
You got to you don't dig like this.
You dig like this because if you dig like this, it all caves in.
And it's the same way in our lives.
We need to be daily digging because of the fact that in our lives that, you know,
there's always collapses.
There's always cave-ins.
You know, we'll read something, we'll understand it, and then we'll forget about it.
You know, something covers up something we knew once before.
It backfills.
That knowledge that we had goes, you know, it gets covered over.
You got to get that shovel back out, that shovel of Bible reading, memorization,
and keep that thing uncovered and continually digging and going deeper.
You know, and if you leave a hole alone long enough, it's going to become overgrown.
You know, if we went out and dug a hole somewhere and then just left it,
didn't shore it up, didn't put anything in there, you know, the monsoons are going to come.
It's going to erode it.
It's going to be caved back in.
It's going to fall back in and it's going to be overgrown.
And no one would even know a hole was dug there.
And the same thing can happen in our lives.
If we're not daily digging, if we're not using these specific shovels to do this daily digging
in these wells, it will become backfilled, it will become overgrown, and it'll be like
we never even knew these things to begin with.
We'll forget them, okay?
So keep digging in this well.
Make it the primary one you dig in.
Use these specific shovels.
You say, how deep down do I need to go?
Look, when it comes to wisdom, you can't go deep enough.
You know, the well of wisdom can only be too shallow, okay?
But we should not allow that to happen.
We should do that by digging in this well daily using these specific shovels.
Let's go ahead and close in a word of prayer.