Author: Steve

We have a steady flow of families, one at at time, living in our parking lot in an RV or trailer they have managed to scrounge up, for about 3 months at a time. An agency in town administers this “parking program,” screening our guests, providing a portable toilet, establishing needed boundaries, and helping the families work toward stable housing.

Over the years, one factor I’ve noted in these families’ success or failure in moving from this situation in a church parking lot to an apartment is how close their ties are to previous acquaintances in even less desirable scenes. One family in particular was constantly dragged into trouble by their connections with friends who abused alcohol and drugs and who had other sorts of difficulties with the law.

Bad influences are a real problem. Chapter 29 of Proverbs focuses particularly on bad influence in high places, the negative impact of a wicked or unwise king. The opposite is also noted, beginning in verse 2, “When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice.” But many verses here display how people can influence each other for the worst.

Verse 3 warns against keeping company with prostitutes. Verse 5 warns about the evil influence of flattering someone. Verse 9 describes the frustration of going to court against the foolish. Verse 12 notes that even those in authority can be swayed by those speaking falsehood. Verse 15 brings the point into the home by recognizing the negative influence neglect can have on a child. And so on.

As I’ve found often in Proverbs, the key to a chapter frequently lies in those verses which mention God, or more specifically, “the Lord,” which in most English versions stands in for the unique Hebrew name for God. So verse 25 tells us, “The fear of others lays a snare, but one who trusts in the Lord is secure.” There is often a trap in basing one’s thoughts and actions on the opinion of others, especially in the midst of bad company, but trust in God and seeking His good influence and opinion is a route to security.

There’s also a lesson here for us all to recognize and take heed regarding how we influence those around us. Giving into a small temptation or speaking flippantly about serious spiritual matters may have only a tiny impact on one’s own soul, but it may have huge consequences for someone who observes or hears what we do or say. Even as we try to avoid or minimize the effect of bad influences on ourselves, let us seek to be good influences on everyone whom our lives touch.

As we come up on Election Day (November 4 this year) for mid-term elections, it is perhaps appropriate that this coming Sunday and the next bring us to a couple chapters in Proverbs that speak a lot about human government. In Proverbs government specifically takes the form of a king, but much of what is said applies to anyone who has a position of leadership in government or in other areas of human life.

The first part of Proverbs 28, down to verse 16, speaks a lot about rulers, especially in relation to responsibility to the poor. There is also an emphasis on “the law,” torah in Hebrew, stating its importance for a well-ordered and righteous life.

All of this is connected with one’s relationship with God in what I take to be a key verse, verse 5, “The evil do not understand justice, but those who seek the Lord understand it completely.” Though the last part of the verse is certainly biblical hyperbole–few of us who claim to seek God would claim a perfect understanding of justice–there is the deep conviction that what is good and right is best understood by those who look ultimately for the Good in God.

The last part of the chapter looks at some of the consequences of choosing what is just and righteous versus the consequences of choosing what is evil. The first part of verse 28 seems particularly relevant to what is happening in Syria and Iraq, “When the wicked prevail, people go into hiding…” As we vote, may we seek God and choose in light of what Scripture teaches about who He is and what He desires for human life. And then maybe we won’t have to go into hiding here anytime soon.

There was disturbing news this morning out of Texas with a second health care worker testing positive for the Ebola virus. Both women had cared for Thomas Eric Duncan, who recently died of Ebola here in the U.S. The worry is heightened by the fact that this second nurse had taken an airline flight from Cleveland to Dallas the day before she came down with symptoms. There’s some reassurance in the information that the virus is not contagious before symptoms appear.

The opening of Proverbs 27 certainly speaks to our current moment, “Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring.” The uncertainty and fear generated by even the small scale spread of a dreaded disease does call us to be humble in our expectations for the future.

Many of us are wondering, like Beth and I did this morning, how to respond to all this. We will take an offering at church Sunday morning to support Medical Teams International, which is sending supplies and supporting personnel in Liberia and other parts of western Africa. But beyond such gifts and prayer for all affected, there doesn’t seem much to do, unless the crisis draws closer to home.

For each of us it’s worth wondering about how we might respond if Ebola appeared in our community. We face broad questions like, “Would we run and hide or would we take risks to help those afflicted?” Actual situations would of course be much more complicated, and trying to decide one’s actions ahead of time seems pretty hopeless and depressing.

I suggest that Proverbs 27 offers a different tactic in response to the uncertainties of this life, including fears about Ebola. Rather than encouraging careful planning for all contingencies, it invites us to value friendship and good character developed in the context of relations between friends. In the language of virtue ethics, it invites us to ask not what we will do if Ebola arrives in our community, but what kind of people we want to be, regardless of the situation facing us.

Proverbs 27:10 begins “Do not forsake your friend…” and goes on to argue that friends who stay nearby in a “calamity” are better even than family that is distant. We might ask ourselves how we can be friends like that, people who do not abandon each other in threatening, difficult times? How can we be faithful friends?

Faithfulness, like many virtues, develops over time, both as one experiences the expectation of friends and family, and as one practices faithfulness in smaller, simpler matters. Thus verse 14 holds up the simple courtesy of restraining one’s voice around neighbors early in the morning. That practice of courtesy and care for the feelings of others shapes a larger form of character that can remain in place when tested.

Interactions between us are perhaps the crucible (see verse 21) in which much of our character is formed. The well-known verse 17, “Iron sharpens iron, and one person sharpens [the wits] of another,” had always meant to me an intellectual sharpening. In my philosophy studies, dialogue and even disagreement sharpened one’s own positions on many subjects. Yet the overall context and the fact that “wits” in Hebrew is literally “face,” means that something larger is in view here. We sharpen the character of each other by how we speak and interact with one another. Verse 19 carries that thought forward by saying, “one human heart reflects another.” We have the capacity to show one another our real character. That is, what you say to me can help me glimpse some of the truth about my own heart and vice versa.

I’ve been in conversation with Mark Alfano, whose book Character as Moral Fiction, argues that the act of “labeling,” telling others that they are virtuous in various ways, can be a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy. Being praised for neatness makes schoolchildren behave more neatly. Verse 21 says that “a person is tested by being praised.” Our first inclination might be that the test is in regard to humility, but perhaps it is also in the willingness to live up to that praise and genuinely and consistently exhibit the virtue being asserted about you.

Which is all to say that it is important to remember that in Christ Jesus we are saved into a community, a “community of character” as Stanley Hauerwas terms it, in which we encourage each other to grow into the character of Christ. Proverbs 27 teaches us that our friendship and interactions are part of that sanctifying process.

As I’ve read and reread Proverbs 25 and 26, I’ve totally failed to accomplish what I’ve done for several chapters now, and find a unifying theme into which I could shoehorn most of the verses or even a large portion of them. Yet these chapters skip from reflections on kingly wisdom to legal tactics to the blessing of good news to relations with one’s neighbor to critiques of the fool to concerns about lying and deceit. Along the way there are repeats of proverbs from previous chapters, as in 25:24 and 26:15. How in the world to pull all that together in a 20-minute sermon for this Sunday? I’m not going to try.

Instead of finding a unifying theme in the content of all these proverbs, I’d like to reflect on the method of expression that recurs over and over here. One commentary just calls it an abundance of “nature similes.” So we have 25:13, “Like the cold of snow in the time of harvest are faithful messengers to those who send them; they refresh the spirit of their masters” and the homely and vivid 26:17, “Like somebody who takes a passing dog by the ears is one who meddles in the quarrel of another.”

But the similes don’t just involve nature, so 25:18, “Like a war club, a sword, or a sharp arrow is one who bears false witness against a neighbor” and 26:23, “Like the glaze covering an earthen vessel are smooth lips with an evil heart.”

What’s going on here is a particularly intense use of analogy as a way to express and make clear various thoughts about human behavior and character. The only mention of God in these two chapters comes at the beginning in 25:2, “It is the glory of God to conceal things, but the glory of kings is to search things out.”

The hiddenness of God is a recurring biblical theme. We don’t see God directly or understand God clearly. Thus much of our language about God, like our language about the mysteries of our own selves, takes the form of analogy. We compare God to something in our experience all the while realizing that God is in many ways not like what we experience. God is our Father, but in many ways unlike a human father. God is our Rock, but very much unlike a literal rock. Even saying God is good forces us to admit that God is beyond our experience of limited and imperfect goodness. So, as Thomas Aquinas argued, much of what we say about God is analogy, an expression of truth about God couched in comparisons with objects and persons we do experience.

Since God is the creator of the world, which a few Scriptures teach us reflects His glory, and human beings are made in God’s image, then we might expect that even our talk about ourselves will need to make use of analogy to get at that which is inexpressible in literal language. We do it all the time, whether we’re talking about an emotion by saying we feel “blue,” or expressing our opinion of a new car by saying it is “cool.”

Someone with a little linguistics or philology training could show how a huge portion of our daily conversation is in fact metaphorical or analogical. Even the word “literal” is an image picturing a word or phrase that conforms exactly to the letters (litera) with which it is written trying to get at the notion of a conformity to actual fact which is contrary to metaphorical or analogical expression.

All this is to say that it is not just the glory of kings, but of all human beings to search out the mysteries of God as they are found in human experience, whether in interactions between neighbors or in trying to discern truth and falsehood. Part of the gift of human language is to employ good analogy to explore and express that divine mystery as we find it all around us and within us.

And as we come to the Lord’s Table this Sunday, we meet yet another metaphor or analogy which we call a Sacrament, because in our participation in this picture of Jesus’ body and blood, we actually receive what is being pictured. We meet our Lord there and move beyond the image into the reality of God. It’s a very good analogy.

Don’t ask for seconds unless it’s offered. I can’t remember being explicitly taught that rule, but it was part of the etiquette I absorbed as a child when we went to visit other people’s homes for dinner. I usually didn’t have anything to worry about because my mother’s friends were often willing to accommodate a growing boy’s appetite with another serving of mashed potatoes or even a second piece of pie for dessert. However, I did grow up with the healthy perspective that there are situations in which it is good to curb one’s appetite and be content with a little less than one might otherwise want to eat.

Much of Proverbs 23 has to do with the self-discipline of moderation in regard to appetites that can lead to excess, appetites for food, sex and alcohol. In addition, verses 13-15 call specifically for the discipline of children, part of which is presumably to learn the very moderation of appetite which is the subject of most of the rest of the chapter.

Moderation or temperance is one of the classic Aristotelian virtues. It’s also a Christian virtue. One of the fruits of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23 is self-control. I Corinthians 9:25 also advises self-control like that of an athlete who tempers bodily intake (the subject is whether certain sorts of food are acceptable for Christians) in order to compete well. Paul seems to lean more toward a counsel of moderation rather than abstention or absolute prohibition, at least in regard to food.

Once again, we find at the center of the chapter a verse which is helpful in discerning the overall spiritual aim here. Verses 17 and 18 say, “Do not let your heart envy sinners, but always continue in the fear of the Lord. Surely there is a future, and your hope will not be cut off.” It is out of respectful fear of God’s perspective on our excesses that we restrain ourselves. And there is no need to envy those who indulge their appetites without restraint, for we have a future and a hope that goes beyond our present desires.

Indeed, the Gospel promise of eternal resurrected life in Christ suggests that we will enjoy the opportunity for every good desire to be completely fulfilled. On one hand, since we look forward to the resurrection of the body, it may be that we will enjoy a blessed state when eating what we find delicious does not produce ill-health, and wine and beer and such may be enjoyed without debilitating intoxication and other consequences. On the other hand, we may find that the pleasure we thought we desired from food, drink and sex was in fact a longing for the pleasures which will be given by being in the presence of the Lord, the experience medieval Christians called the “beatific vision,” a direct vision of the beauty and wonder of God’s own self.

As Psalm 16:11 celebrates, “In your presence there is fullness of joy; in your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” It’s that hope in which we find encouragement to moderate other pleasures for now, as we look toward that fulfilled and perfect enjoyment of all that we desire, found in the Lord’s own self.

Your name could be a factor in how much money you make. A study from TheLadders shows that shorter first names are correlated with salary, the shorter the better. For every additional letter in a name, salaries average about $3,600 less. So your parents may have determined your income level at the time you were born. Use of a shorter nickname (like my own use of Steve rather than Stephen) also appears to correlate with a higher income, though I can’t really give much personal evidence for that correlation.

One might conclude, therefore, that a “good name” is one that will help you get call backs from potential employers and make others feel more comfortable in using it, thus enhancing your earning potential. However, the first verse of Proverbs 22 explicitly disconnects a “good name” from wealth, telling us “A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches.”

Of course, Proverbs is understanding “good name” in a sense totally other than the pragmatic view that what is good is what produces success and profit. We can see pretty easily that Proverbs 22:1 is concerned with reputation or “favor,” as in the second part of the verse, and values it more highly than ability to accumulate wealth.

In fact, much of the chapter has to do with proper attitudes toward wealth, and, as we see in verse 2, the relationship between rich and poor. Strangely enough, in verse 4, qualities which would seem to be part of a good reputation, “humility and fear of the Lord,” have as their reward “riches and honor and life.” But note how in that reward wealth is joined with “honor,” i.e., good reputation, and with “life,” presumably in contrast to early death, poor health, etc. So wealth by itself cannot stand alone as a good choice.

As I preach I will probably be suggesting that other sayings in this chapter offer advice on how to have a good name. I.e., be generous as in verse 9, seek a pure heart and gracious speech as in verse 11, raise your children well, with proper discipline as in verses 6 and 15.

In this chapter we also come to the end of the first large collection of sayings that began in chapter 10, the proverbs or sayings of Solomon. Proverbs 22:17 identifies what follows as “The words of the wise,” suggesting that these next proverbs are from wise people other than Solomon. Several modern translations read verse 20 to say that there are thirty of these sayings of the wise, “thirty things.” However, that translation is based on amending the text because of the twentieth century discovery of a thirty-chapter Egyptian collection of proverbs. The actual Hebrew word is difficult and may mean simply “former things” or confusingly and literally “3-day things.” The King James rendered it “excellent things,” making a connection with Proverbs 8:6.

The TNIV confidently identifies the thirty sayings with subheadings, but there is wide disagreement on such attempts, since any division into thirty of the section of the “sayings of the wise” (Proverbs 22:22 to 24:22) needs to count some proverbs together as one saying and some singly. It’s a doubtful enterprise.

What we can do is see this section of sayings of the wise and the remaining sections of Proverbs as a recapitulation and deepening of what has been learned so far. Several sayings are longer than the typical two-line proverbs we’ve seen so far, and many make application of wisdom to very specific situations like dining with a king.

In the closing verses of chapter 22, we are given a strong reason not to exploit the poor, based on God’s judgment, warned against entanglement with hot-tempered friends, and urged yet again not to “pledge surety,” i.e., not to co-sign on debts of others. Verse 28 adds a new proverbial thought regarding the importance of regard for ancient land rights. And in regard to the theme from the first verse, verse 29 ends the chapter suggesting that those who achieve a good reputation for skilled work will be given elevated employment.

There is lots of technical stuff in the above reflections on Proverbs 22, but perhaps we can still take away a desire to reflect on whether we are living in such a way as to develop a good name among our family, friends and co-workers. Even more, let us consider what sort of reputation we have before God!

Which very successful person do you like better: the one who explains success by saying “I’m just very gifted,” or the one who explains it by saying “I just worked very hard?” According to a recent article in Christianity Today we might want to rethink our initial reaction, which is likely to suppose that the person claiming giftedness is smug and arrogant, while the person citing hard work is self-effacing and humble.

From the Christian perspective, to claim to have what one has as a gift is pure humility. I did not earn this. I don’t deserve it. I’m no better, no more hard-working than anyone else. Everything I have is a gift from God. As the article suggests, our typical perspective flies in the face of this Christian, biblical understanding of gift, saying something like, “For it is by works you have succeeded, not by gifts, so no one can boast,” which turns the message of the Gospel on its head.

I suggest reading the complete article I cited, by Andrew Wilson, but I’d like take the suggestion that success is more a matter of giftedness than hard work as a jumping off point for an initial look at Proverbs 21, wherein we find several reminders that God is the determiner of the outcome of human endeavor. Verse 1 starts it off with “The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord; he turns it wherever he will.”

Now as many readers of this blog might know, I’m a huge believer in human free-will, with no use for either philosophical or theological views which deny it. I also can see clearly a biblical call for human effort to do good, including verses 17 and 25 right here in Proverbs 21, condemning pleasure-seeking and laziness. Yet I find it good to stop and wonder about our culture’s celebration of hard work and a consequent failure to look to God as the author of our blessings.

Notice that verse 3 commends the doing of “justice and righteousness” more than the offering of sacrifice. Which acts cost more, take more effort? A could case could be made that it is sacrifice, which requires money and time, while the simple performance of what is right out of a good character is more the result of being gifted with that character rather than one’s own effort.

Or come at it from the repeated theme of two verses most of us find humorous, 9 and 19. The first of those tells us, “It is better to live in a corner of the housetop than in a house shared with a contentious wife.” Verse 19 repeats the idea but making the location preferred over contentious wife proximity into the wilderness or desert.

One might think these verses about domestic disharmony are there to encourage wives to be less quarrelsome or encourage husbands to do a better job of meeting their needs or working at active listening or some such. But what if we pair them with Proverbs 18:22 and 19:14 and acknowledge that a good wife and the resulting domestic peace is a gift from God? Then we who have a happy and harmonious home life might be less prone to look down on those whose households have more strife. We will be thankful to Lord for the gift, rather than proud of what we’ve accomplished in managing to live well together.

As my title suggests, much of this chapter has to do with less than desirable outcomes of human endeavor. Verses 6 and 7 highlight the bad consequences of deceit and violence. Verse 12 specifically names God as the one who “casts down” the wicked. As I already mentioned, verse 17 talks about the evil result of loving pleasure and drink and rich food too much.

But the call is not simply to work harder, to discipline oneself to be more righteous, or even to be more generous with the poor, though all that sort of effort is commended here and elsewhere in Proverbs. No, the ultimate path to good results, to happiness and a fruitful life, is to acknowledge God. The last two verses 30 and 31, warn us first that no amount of human thought or ingenuity can accomplish what the Lord does not bless to happen, and then finally that though we work very hard at whatever battle we are waging, summoning all the horse-power we can to the task, it is the Lord who gives the victory.

Which is just what the central fact of our faith, the resurrection of our Lord Jesus, should teach us about our efforts. Ultimately what we do and we ourselves will die. That’s when we must rely totally on God’s gift of new life. Let’s learn to rely on the gift now, and then by the Lord’s grace, the results will be good for us.

Modern business practice in our country is almost always guided by the “invisible hand” of 18th century moral philosopher Adam Smith. His notion that a collection of individuals, each acting in self-interest, would together produce a result beneficial to everyone continues to be taught and celebrated among us. A classic statement from his work The Wealth of Nations reads, “It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages.”

One would think that people reading the Bible might have doubts about Smith’s basic principle that consistent practice of self-interest will be mutually beneficial. Scripture paints a picture of human self-interest as frequently and perhaps mostly sinful and destructive. The book of Proverbs shares that general outlook of the rest of the Bible.

In any case, Proverbs 20 has a section (verses 13 to 17) specifically aimed at how we practice business, and I’m going to suggest that we can wrap the rest of the chapter around those verses to shed light on God’s expectations for how we do business. Good business in the Lord’s eyes is not just enlightened self-interest, but a concern for integrity, fairness, honesty and work that honors God as well as making a profit.

Frequent references in this chapter to the role of a king in suppressing human impulse toward dishonesty and wrongdoing suggest that we also ought to see a biblical role for government in regulating business.

There is much else here in Proverbs 20 that can be taken as simply good individual moral advice, from the first verse’s warning about over-indulgence in alcohol to verse 19’s caution against associating with gossips who will betray your secrets. Yet the overall picture is a call to work and to conduct buying and selling in a way which reflects a prior commitment to a moral order that comes from God who oversees the world and human affairs.

And verse 29 offers a little encouragement to those of us whose hair is not the color it used to be, without any artificial alterations. That’s good too.

What makes for a bad friend? Do an Internet search and you will come up with any number of lists of negative characteristics you don’t want to have in your friends. They lie to you. They only care about themselves. They only like you for what you can do for them. They talk about you behind your back. They get you to do things that are bad for you. And on and on.

This coming Sunday I’m going to suggest that looking for the characteristics of bad friends is a window into some of the themes of Proverbs 19. The first specific mention of friendship in the chapter occurs in verse 4, “Wealth brings many friends, but the poor are left friendless.” I’m remembering a family television sitcom episode where a child discovers that spending lunch money to buy candy for other kids produces instant “friends,” but then learns that such friends quickly depart when the “wealth” is gone.

Other facets of bad friends appear across the chapter. Verses 1 and 9 and 22 highlight dishonesty as an unfriendly trait, while verses 2-3 and 19 and 26 perhaps teach us to avoid those who act senselessly without due consideration of consequences.

At least two proverbs here about family, 13 and 26, suggest that those who are a reproach to their own families probably won’t make good friends.

The last few verses, 25-29 carry a strong admonition about “scoffers” or “mockers.” It’s probably good to beware of those who mock others and mock that which is righteous and good. For one thing, it’s likely they will soon be mocking you, a supposed friend.

Once again, near the center of the chapter, we find a focus on our relationship with God. Verses 21 and 23 call us to trust in the Lord’s purpose for us and to find in Him the security we need. So we are returned again to a note which was heard in the last two chapters as well: friendship with God is what we need most.

I’m feeling the pressure. It seems almost impossible to preach this week without talking about the shooting of Michael Brown and the protests occurring in Ferguson, Missouri. In addition, my wife is from St. Louis, so the town and street names are all familiar to her, and the horrible sadness of it all cuts close to the bone. Most of all, I believe my African-American brothers and sisters in Christ would count it another white failure of conscience and nerve to say nothing at such a time. Several on-line voices in our denomination are calling for Christians to speak out together against racial hatred and accompanying violence.

My honest response, however, is that I have no new wisdom to add to the many words being spoken and shouted around Brown’s death. I am acutely aware that I could easily be discounted as a member of the white majority that does not “get” the African-American experience of systematic discrimination, profiling and injustice. I fear saying anything just because I know I do not fully apprehend that pain and its affect on a person.

So the best I can do right now is to quote a few verses from this week’s text, Proverbs 18, and let any application to the situation in Missouri appear as much as possible on its own.

To begin with, in regard to all the many different people who are talking about Michael Brown, the Ferguson police, and racial violence, let me offer verse 2, “A fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing personal opinion.”

A general theme of human use of words pervades Proverbs 18, and the first half of the fourth verse, using a different metaphor from those expressing the same thought in James chapter 3, cautions us about the power of what we say, “The words of the mouth are deep waters.” The second part of the verse offers the more hopeful, “the fountain of wisdom is a gushing stream.”

Not much comment is needed on verse 5, “It is not right to be partial to the guilty, or to subvert the innocent in judgment,” which is followed by three more verses about the bad use of words by fools, telling us they cause strife, bring us to ruin, and yet have a subtly sweet and dangerous attraction for us.

After typical Proverbs warnings against pride and vanity in verses 11 and 12, we read, “If one gives answer before hearing, it is folly and shame.” This verse I’d truly pray to take to heart in regard to events in Ferguson. I know I don’t understand, and the only way I possibly can gain understanding is to do my best to listen well. One suggestion I heard offered to white observers is to read and listen to African-American voices regarding it all. I need to do some more of that. And it might do well to hear verse 17 in the process, “The one who first states a case seems right, until the other comes and cross-examines.”

Regarding the impasse of constant street conflict in Ferguson, verse 19 is discouraging, “An ally offended is stronger than a city; such quarreling is like the bars of a castle.” May God help us when our quarrels lock us up in opposing, impregnable castles of our own opinions.

Verse 21 repeats the theme of the power of speech, both for good and ill, “Death and life are in the power of the the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit.” In other words, those who live by the sword of their mouths, will experience its power, will swallow that sword, “eat their words,” be they good or bad, life or death. We do well to consider what we say before it’s said.

Thank God for the encouragement found in the familiar last verse, 24, maybe best in the NIV, “A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” Christians will hear a reference to the friendship of our Lord in those words, and we might pray their truth both for ourselves and for all the oppressed of the world, whether African-Americans in the heart of America or Christian and Yazidi Iraqis fleeing terrorists. May we and they all find that Friend who sticks closer than a brother coming alongside to speak His gracious words of help and comfort.

Beth and I wrote our own wedding vows. Watching our daughter get married last month brought back memories of our own wedding and the events around it. One story my wife often tells is how we presented our handcrafted vows to the pastor who would perform our wedding. He was a substitute, a retired minister called in just a couple weeks before, because the senior pastor at Beth’s church had moved away.

Rev. Fouth wanted to meet with us beforehand, to get to know us and go over the service. Unfortunately our appointment was in the middle of a St. Louis Cardinals baseball game and his attention was divided between our nuptials and whoever was up to bat on the television in the next room. We handed him our vows and he began to skim through them. Suddenly his head snapped up to focus on us completely, the Cardinals forgotten for a moment. “You’re promising to be each other’s friends?” he asked. Then he continued, “You’re not going to be friends. You’re going to be husband and wife!”

I’ll give poor old Rev. Fouth, who after the wedding confided to my mother that he would much rather do funerals than weddings, the benefit of the doubt. I think he probably meant to say that the closeness and intimacy of marriage goes far beyond mere friendship. But Beth and I would still maintain that friendship is a pretty good thing to have in a home, and the book of Proverbs agrees.

Each week this summer I’ve struggled a little with finding a unifying theme for a chapter of Proverbs and giving an appropriate title to a sermon about that chapter. On a prior run through I had reserved the title “Good Friends” for chapter 19. However, I found myself desperately wanting that title now for chapter 17. So I’m using it now. Then in a couple weeks I’ll jump slightly out the “Good…” framework I’ve been using for these titles and take another run at the theme of friendship from a different direction. Another look at chapter 19 revealed that its references to friendship might be more aptly gathered under the title “Bad Friends.”

The problem, of course, is that every chapter of Proverbs, except 1-9 and 31, resists all attempts to find single unifying themes. These collections of wise sayings are grouped together in much smaller units, and transitions between verses are often by word association rather than by conceptual similarity. Yet there is still some profit in the mental exercise and gymnastics needed to weave two or three dozen disparate proverbs together. Perhaps the very mental effort needed to develop those connections, requiring one to carefully consider the individual proverbs and how they might relate to larger life concerns and theological ideas, is a form of grasping at the wisdom Proverbs means to offer.

In any case, Proverbs 17 calls up for me thoughts of friends and family, and the combination of friendship and family life which is a true blessing. The well-known verse 17, “A friend loves at all times, and [siblings] are born to share adversity,” explicitly makes that connection between family life and friendship and invites us to see the similarities in the love that is shared and to pursue holding them together in our own relationships.

There are also several warnings against strife in this chapter. Conflict is the bane of both friendship and family life. Verses 9 and 14 each offer ways to subvert and turn away from conflict before it gets a foothold, with forgiveness and forbearance of what might appear as insult and with sincere effort not to let quarrels begin.

Verse 1 begins the chapter with one of the frequent “better than” proverbs, “Better is a dry morsel with quiet than a house full of feasting and strife.” That appreciation of the “quiet” which people at peace with each other enjoy is echoed in the last two verses of the chapter, 27 and 28, by an appreciation of the quiet silence of the person who knows when not to speak. And that also is a mark of a true friend and loving family, who know when not to say words that hurt or bring up old wounds or tread on sensitive places in the hearts of others. As we’re told there, such quietness is real wisdom and good friendship.

We had a great plan last Friday. Beth and I would meet our daughter and her newlywed husband, who had been borrowing one of our cars for their honeymoon, at Ikea near the Portland airport. Then we would take them to the airport, retrieve both cars and drive to downtown Portland where we would have some lunch then spend the afternoon at Powells Bookstore.

Unfortunately, Portland traffic changed all that. We lost each other in the process of trying to take the City Center exit, then found ourselves in bumper-to-bumper traffic for 30 minutes until we could exit well south of downtown. By the time we got off at different exits, phoned each other, and reconnected, all we wanted to do was get something to eat and drive home to Eugene. We still encountered horrible traffic for the next 15 miles, which took about an hour to cover. So our afternoon of leisurely book browsing turned into a session of agonizing driving.

It’s common wisdom that plans go awry. My supposed ancestor (another story) Robert Burns penned the famous line, “The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men gang aft agley.” It comes near the end of a poem addressed to a field mouse whose nest he has just turned up with his plow, upsetting the mouse’s expectation that she had created a snug dwelling for the winter.

Dwight Eisenhower, quoting a line he says he learned in the Army, said, “Plans are worthless; planning is everything.” By that he meant that any particular plan is doomed to failure caused by the unexpected, but the process of planning, of wrestling with possible problems and their solutions, helps make us more prepared to deal with the unexpected and to succeed even when our plans go “agley.”

Burns’ poem ends with an expression of his own fear of the future and what it might do to his own plans. Eisenhower is more optimistic in his conviction that we can prepare ourselves for unforeseen events. Yet both men fail to take into account another, more important factor in all human planning. Proverbs 16 teaches us to consider God and His design as we make our plans.

Verse 1 is tantalizingly difficult to decipher, “The plans of the mind belong to mortals, but the answer of the tongue is from the Lord.” The antithesis makes good sense in its focus on human planning, but the thesis that “the answer of the tongue is from the Lord” is hard to decode. Does it imply that God is speaking through human lips? Whatever it means, we can feel that it is in the same spirit as the more clear and better known verse 9, “The human mind plans the way, but the Lord directs the steps.”

In the speech in which Eisenhower made his remark about planning, he especially urged a national reliance on science as the way to wrestle with future problems. Proverbs, on the other hand, is clearly pointing us toward a reliance on God and a recognition of God’s providence at work in the outcome of whatever plans we make. Another well-known English saying is, “Man proposes, God disposes,” apparently taken from The Imitation of Christ, by Thomas a Kempis. That could be the theme of Proverbs 16.

The best known verse in the chapter, verse 18, “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall,” clusters with other verses about the importance of humility. A humble spirit is held up as the wise way to approach planning for the future, with a recognition of our dependence on God and the very likely failure of our plans. So we get another familiar word in verse 25, “Sometimes there is a way that seems to be right, but in the end it is the way to death.”

This chapter in Proverbs is inviting us to proper humility about all our schemes and designs for life. They are in many cases likely to be abrogated by unexpected disasters, and in every case they are completely dependent on God’s favor and concurrence with what we plan. It is foolishness to lay out the course of one’s life with considering what God might do or ask of us.

The last verse of chapter 16 sums all this up well with the image of God’s control over even the seemingly random event of a throw of dice. “The lot is cast into the lap, but the decision is the Lord’s alone.” Without denying human free-will or even genuine chance as a feature of our world, we must constantly acknowledge that God is in control and that His decisions lie behind even the smallest happenings of our lives.

It’s hard to resist the charm of Mr. Micawber in Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield. Micawber is a reckless spendthrift who is constantly in debt, and yet he is kind, warm and constantly cheerful. He’s probably best known for his eternal optimism in the face of poverty, always saying “something will turn up.” Yet the following quotation truly captures his spirit, ““Welcome poverty! Welcome misery, welcome houselessness, welcome hunger, rags, tempest, and beggary! Mutual confidence will sustain us to the end!”

Our Proverbs text for this coming Sunday, Proverbs 15:13-33, seems to have a little of that Micawber spirit in some of its verses. Verse 13 starts it off with “A glad heart makes a cheerful countenance,” noting the effect that inward cheerfulness like Mr. Micawber’s has on one’s outward expression. But verse 15 especially seems to capture his buoyant optimism, “All the days of the poor are hard, but a cheerful heart has a continual feast.”

Through most of the Dickens’ novel one might suppose that Micawber is hardly an exemplar of the virtues promoted by the book of Proverbs. Indeed, he seems very much the fool, carelessly driving his family further into poverty and destitution. Yet at the end of David Copperfield, Micawber displays not just his endless cheerfulness, but moral courage as he stands up to the villain Uriah Heep with the result being his own financial ruin and loss of a profitable position with Heep’s firm.

Thus Micawber could also affirm verse 16, “Better is a little with the fear of the Lord, than great treasure and trouble with it,” as well as verse 27, “Those who are greedy for unjust gain make trouble for their households, but those who hate bribes will live.”

Micawber’s cheerfulness and indeed his family’s final good ending when he makes good in business after being deported to Australia is really only possible in the kind of universe which Proverbs depicts and in which Dickens firmly believed, a world governed by a good God who watches out for the poor and especially for the upright who do good despite their own injury.

As verse 29 says, “The Lord is far from the wicked, but hears the prayer of the righteous.” That confidence in the reality and attention of the Lord to those who fear Him and seek to do what is right is what makes true cheerfulness possible. Despite all our own foolishness there is a good ending, and “something will turn up” for those who love God and endeavor to follow His ways.

Verse 30 ends, “and good news refreshes the body.” The good news that cheers our hearts and puts a smile on our faces is that God is there and that He has come among us in Jesus Christ, to raise up our bodies and one day settle us in the good place He has for us. Let that good news cheer us up today.

If you are reading this, then chances are you spend enough time looking around on-line that you have already encountered one or more collections of photos entitled, “Why Women Live Longer than Men.” These images of guys taking ridiculous risks are quite amusing, but those of us of the male persuasion probably have one or two similar scenarios in our own actual histories.

A suitable word for these pictures and those in them is found at the beginning of our text for this coming Sunday, Proverbs 14:16-35. Verse 16 tells us, “The wise are cautious and turn away from evil, but the fool throws off restraint and is careless.” One aspect of wisdom is certainly the discernment of proper caution.

It’s always difficult to find a unifying theme for any section of more than three or four verses in Proverbs, but I think two verses in the center of the text, 26 and 27, point to an idea that holds together this second half of Proverbs 14. Those two verses repeat a constant theme of the book, the fear of the Lord, and in connection with other verses here offer us the notion of good and proper fear.

In other words, as those stupid guy pictures demonstrate, there are just some things of which we should be afraid. Fear of an absurd balancing act with a mishandled ladder is a good thing. Proverbs helps us see that there are other actions and attitudes of which we ought to have a good and godly fear.

Verse 21 warns against the despising of neighbors and promises happiness for those who are kind to the poor, while verse 31 calls oppression of the poor an insult to God. That would suggest that it’s a good thing to fear mistreatment and neglect of the poor around us.

Verse 22 suggests that making plans to do evil is another error to be avoided, to be feared. Verse 32 promises the overthrow of wickedness, implying that we ought to fear being found on that side of the balance when judgment arrives.

The well-known verse 34, “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people,” is a fine exhortation to corporate caution about widespread attitudes of which it would be good to be duly afraid. We ought to fear living in a nation where unborn children are regularly murdered and where poor children are turned away at the borders.

The last verse of the chapter, 35, invites proper caution regarding a human king’s wrath, but it can easily be seen as a warning against inviting the wrath of God to fall on us by shameful behavior.

Fear, like all human emotions, has a proper and good function. We would be better off if we men let fear keep us from doing stupid stuff quite so often, but all people will be better off if we let good fear of the Lord keep us from wrong. The positive benefit of such fear is, says verse 27, “a fountain of life.”

The new fireworks ordinances here in Eugene sparked some explosive discussion. I clicked on a news article about the number of illegal fireworks citations given this year, then scrolled down to comments by other readers. There I was dismayed to read a nasty give and take between people criticizing fireworks ordinances as destructive of our liberty and the American way of life and others who described those who shoot fireworks on the 4th as drunken, flag-waving Nazis with no regard for safety or their neighbors’ peace. Nowhere to be found was any quiet, reasonable respect for the other parties in the conversation.

The fireworks in that conversation about fireworks is just one tiny sample of the low level of much on-line dialogue. All of it cries out for attention to this week’s text from Proverbs 12:13-28, where all sorts of wrong and imprudent speech is addressed, and where “good talk” is encouraged.

It’s hard to imagine that all the vituperative exchanges found in discussion groups, blogs, Facebook posts, etc. will ultimately do some serious damage, if not through physical attacks then through the marks left on the souls of the participants. To speak insults of a person from another political persuasion or social milieu seems destined to harm both parties. Just prior to our text Proverbs 12:6 says, “The words of the wicked are a deadly ambush.” It’s both the speaker and the hearer who are ambushed. Verse 13 tells us, “The evil are ensnared by the transgression of their lips.”

The pairings of these Proverb texts with the assigned Gospel lesson each week is totally random, since I’m working sequentially, replacing the Old Testament lesson with a Proverbs text each time. However, there’s an enlightening fit between Proverbs 12 and Matthew 13 this time. Jesus’ parable of the sower is all about the different ways people listen to the word of God and is nicely punctuated with 13:19, “Let anyone with ears listen!”

This Proverbs passage teaches us that, as common sense also reveals, listening is an essential part of good speech. Verse 15 declares, “The way of fools seems right to them, but the wise listen to advice.” Those mean on-line dialogues almost always consist of two or more people absolutely convinced they are correct about the matter at hand and absolutely refusing to listen to facts or advice coming from another point of view.

As Jesus declares, the way out of the log jam of bad talk is to listen well, to discern the truth when it is spoken, perhaps by others but most of all when God speaks. Perhaps if we spent more time trying to listen well to the Word of God we would engage in less ill-mannered and harmful talk. Our talk would be the good talk described in these phrases from our text, “the tongue of the wise brings healing,” “truthful lips endure forever,” “those who counsel peace have joy,” and “a good word cheers up [the human heart.]”

May our Lord forgive us all for too much talk and not enough listening, and when it is time to speak, may He give us good words that bring healing, truth, peace, joy and cheer to those who hear us.