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WISDOM AS BLESSINGS - PROVERBS 10:6-10

I want to talk to you today about wisdom as the blessings that we get in our life.

This is a very misunderstood concept. We tend to think of blessings in terms of physical things, assets, material things. I would actually know quite a bit about this. I own a home at the beach in California, I have a doctorate. I rode about 3,000 waves in one of the best spots in the world in the last calendar year. So from the material side, the asset side, people would say that I have lived a blessed life. However, there are a lot of people that live where I live that I don't think have wisdom as blessings. In fact, I think it's the opposite. So let's dig into this. What do we mean when we say wisdom is blessing?

So Proverbs 10:6 says, blessings crown the head of the righteous, the violence overwhelms the mouth of the wicked. So there is a promise here that blessings come to the head of the righteous. Now, what type of blessings are we talking about?

First , I believe that it's talking about joy and peace. And so every time we pray to God and every time we make a conscious decision to follow God, God gets the glory, we get the joy and the peace. Do not make the mistake that most Western material based believers make when it comes to obedience and blessings. I believe scripture teaches that if you're obedient to God, the real treasure of the kingdom is the joy that you feel in your heart, in your life, and the peace that you experience on a daily basis. So that's the incentive to want to live a wise life. We want to have as much joy and as much peace as we can in our hearts and our minds.

Now, the second thing it means is the name of the righteous is used in blessings. This is interesting. Your name, your reputation is actually an asset. And so people will want to be affiliated with you, be drawn to you when they trust your name, when you keep your word, when you're loyal, and when you're able to persevere to a greater degree than most others are able to persevere. So we experience joy and peace, and then we experience the trust that others give us because they trust the life that we've lived. They'll be drawn to the name that you have, your first name, your last name. So very, very exciting.

Third - The Bible also talks about the wise in heart. It says the wise in heart accept commands. Now, what does that mean? It means that the wise person is able to double, triple, 10X their knowledge, their information when, again, they listen twice as much as they speak. They learn from the experiences of others. They take the position of being a student, not a teacher. They take the position of being in process, not having arrived at the final product. So that's very exciting. So we get the blessings. Our name is trusted. We become wise in heart because we're multiplying our experience. We're multiplying our wisdom.

Fourth - And then we're able to walk in integrity. It says whoever walks in integrity walks securely. Now, this word, it means completeness. It means wholeness. It means to be integrated. We get a math term from this. Integer in math is a part. To be integrated means that you have all pieces so that you're complete. So the goal in the process of life is to trust God, to pray to God. We get filled with joy. We get filled with peace, develop a good reputation. We're wise in heart because we listen to the experiences and the input from people who have traveled before us. Then we get a walk integrity. It means that we walk as a complete person. We walk as a whole person, true to the calling that God has for us, true to the person that we want to be as we follow Jesus.

And then lastly, this is interesting. It says whoever winks maliciously causes grief and a chattering fool comes to ruin, Proverbs 10.10. So what does this mean? Well, it means that you've ever had somebody say something, but as they say it, they wink. It means that what they're saying doesn't line up with their intention. And so we want to make sure that what we say is also what is intended in our heart and in our life. And when we do all of this, when we understand the correct blessings, joy and peace, we understand the value of persevering, when we multiply our intellect and wisdom based on the input from others, those who've gone before us, when we walk a straight line and integrity, and when we do everything with the same words and intention, wow, that is a blessed, joyful, peaceful, meaningful life.

Thanks so much for joining me today. Until next time, I hope you have a beautiful day.