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WISDOM AS LONGEVITY - PROVERBS 9:10

Today I want to talk to you about wisdom as longevity. Proverbs 9: 10 says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the fear of the Lord will help you to multiply your days. So what does that mean? Well it means five things.

The first thing is this word multiply. It means that we can become an exponential thinker. So this doesn't have to do with the length of our life. It has to do with the quality and the impact. So there's a correlation if you take God seriously and you follow what he says, you apply it in your life, have a heart of obedience and prayer, God says he'll help us to be more effective and he'll help us to live a higher quality life. We can't control outcomes but we can control how connected we feel to God and how connected we feel to other people. That's the quality of life that we're aiming for, to be connected to God and connected to others versus being disconnected from God and disconnected from others because the Bible says that we're supposed to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and love your neighbor as yourself. So we understand this is the goal and the purpose of life, the two great commandments. Okay so we're gonna be or become exponential in our thinking by allowing our intention and our focus to be in the right direction, to love God and to love people. Then we'll actually multiply our effectiveness.

Secondly - the way that our life is multiplied is in the way that it impacts others and so you will impact others to the degree that you're connected to God and connected to others. Old Testament refers to this idea as sort of the anointing, that intangible quality of God's hand being on your life of him working in you and through you in your life every day because you're connected to him and you're connected to people that he made in a pure beautiful way.

And then the third thing is you'll do much in respect and so what you'll see that is that although life is hard and it's difficult and it's full of trials, you will day over day, week after week, month after month, year after year, you will earn the respect of others. So the quality of your work will be rooted in respect because people will look at the quality of the life that you live and although they may disagree with it on some level, there will be a baseline of respect for who you are as person and the work that you're trying to accomplish and the way in which you're going about the work that you're trying to do.

Okay and the fourth lead, you'll increase greatly. Then your influence will expand and for the right reasons because again you're connected to God and then you're connected to people.

And then the fifth thing is that you'll do much, you'll do much good. And so when we talk about longevity, what we're really saying here is effectiveness. God will help us to be more effective. How about you? But I certainly want to be as effective as I possibly can be my relationship with God, in my relationship with people, in the work that I'm trying to accomplish for Jesus. When you take all of these things into consideration, wow I can become great, I can multiply my effectiveness, I can work and win the respect of others and then that will increase the impact of my life. Those are all tremendous promises that we should hold on to.

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