Walking with the Wise #1: The Beginning of Wisdom

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.” —Proverbs 1:7

When I was young, if you wanted to know some sort of fact, you had to go to the bookshelf, find the appropriate encyclopedia (if you had them), and then flip the pages until you found the answer. But even then, the encyclopedia may not have given the answer you were looking for. Today, one need only go to Google, type in the said question and you will have thousands of answers in milliseconds. With the expansion of the Internet, we have the world at our fingertips and can access information about anything and at any time. The question is: what do we do with all of that knowledge? Knowledge means nothing if we don’t know what to do with it. This is where wisdom comes in.

Wisdom enables us to rightly utilize knowledge. Wisdom is the practical application of knowledge, applying criteria that enable us to judge, discern, and respond to situations in the best way possible. And for the Christian, the foundation of both knowledge and wisdom must begin with God. It is the fear of the LORD that is the beginning of knowledge. But what does that mean? Are we really supposed to “fear” God? Or does that mean reverence Him? Actually, it means both. We are to “fear” God. Like C.S. Lewis said in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, “He is not a tame lion.” God has the ability to kill us in a moment. He is the Creator; we are the creation. He is the eternal Spirit; we are temporal flesh. He is the unchanging one; we are subject to emotions, experiences, and environment. He is the one who holds the universe in the palm of His hand. He is the one who created the universe and everything in it. He is the bedrock of knowledge. Without God, there is nothing. Without Him we are like fools wandering in an art gallery, believing that there was no artist behind the beautiful paintings before us; or like idiots on a plane, who say that flying is impossible. Attempting to remove God from knowledge is like a man sitting on a branch with a saw who continues to cut away, not realizing that the very branch he cuts will result in his own death.

God is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction. Like Maria in The Sound of Music, we must “start at the very beginning, a very good place to start.” And for us, the beginning is God. He must be the one who determines and directs all knowledge and wisdom; anything else is foolish and destructive.

Do you have the fear of the LORD? Are you living life with God as the bedrock and foundation? If not, then you are a fool, and eternity will prove that fact. You need to repent and ask God to give you a fear of Himself. If you do have a healthy fear of the Lord, then walk in wisdom. Don’t look to the so-called standards of this world to find out how to live. Go to God’s Word and seek to apply it to every aspect of your life, in order that you might live a life blessed by Him. Walk in wisdom and you will grow in wisdom—and God will become more precious to you than anything this world could ever offer. Amen.