Proverbs 23:23 “Buy truth, and do not sell it; buy wisdom, instruction, and understanding.” This episode talks about how important it is not to rely on ourselves but to rely on God. It also talks about how important truth, wisdom, instruction and understanding are. Music:"Adding the Sun" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Truth, Wisdom, Instruction & Understanding
Proverbs 23:23 “Buy truth, and do not sell it; buy wisdom, instruction, and understanding.”
Well, this is an interesting verse. I wonder how we would sell truth? I wonder why God needs to tell us to buy truth and do not sell it? Then He also says to buy wisdom, instruction and understanding. I was stumped on what this verse meant or what God was trying to tell us with this verse. However, when it is put into context of our prayer group it makes a little more sense to me. During prayer group the leader talked about how sometimes we think about all that we are lacking and we may even ask God what it is that we lack. This is because we are looking to ourselves to gain eternal life. We are looking to see what it is that we can do to get ourselves into heaven.
The leader talked about how we need to trade our self reliance in for reliance on God. There isn’t anything we can do to get ourselves into heaven. We will get into heaven only through God’s grace. After the beginning part of our meeting we also had several words of prophecy that talked about how we are looking for God in all the wrong places. We are looking for Him in places that He does not dwell. He dwells deep within our hearts. He also said that He is there for us, but we are not looking to Him to solve our problems, we are looking to ourselves to solve our problems. He is asking us to turn our problems over to Him instead of trying to solve them on our own.
In this context I can see how God would want us to buy truth, wisdom, instruction and understanding. We need to see the truth that we can’t do anything on our own and yet we can “do all things through Christ who strengthens me” Philippians 4:13. We need to not sell this truth for all the things the world tells us. We need to not sell this truth in order to believe that we can do things on our own. We need to not believe that God is too busy to help us. We need to not believe that God helps others but not us. We need to buy the truth and not sell it for any of these other false truths that the world is trying to sell us.
Next, we need to ask God for Wisdom to know the difference. Wisdom is a gift from the Holy Spirit and according to the Catholic Church wisdom is the first and highest gift of the Holy Spirit. We believe that wisdom leads to an intimate understanding of God’s Word and His commandments. When we develop an intimate understanding of God’s Word and His commandments then we can better live out our faith. I believe this is why the verse above mentions truth and then puts wisdom, instruction and understanding in the same line. I believe wisdom leads to instruction and understanding. God has given us a lot of instruction in the Bible on how He wants us to live.
There is no question as to what He says in the Bible. I think the question comes in when we try to interpret what He says in the Bible. The Bible was written almost 2,000 years ago. Well, the old testament was written long before that I believe. So, reading the bible is not like reading something that was written 10 years ago. Times have changed a lot. Although as I write that I wonder, have they? I mean yes technology has changed a lot, circumstances may have also changed a lot, but have we as people changed a lot? That I am not sure of. I think we tend to struggle with the same basic things as people struggled with back then. The same underlying sins are there, we just have a different spin on them. That is just my opinion.
So, when it comes to reading the Bible, sometimes we can get caught up in the actual words of the Bible or the situation that they are talking about. We can read something and think that it doesn’t pertain to us because our situation is so different than that of the person of the Bible. We can’t really see any connection between how they are living and how we are living. This is why we need wisdom, instruction and understanding. We need wisdom to see how the situations in the Bible relate to our own situation. We need instructions on how we are to live our life right now in this century. We need understanding to know what is meant for us to read literally and what is meant as a story to teach us a lesson.
There are different writing styles in the Bible. There are things that are a historical recount of what happened during that time. However, Jesus also teaches a lot of lessons through parables. There are also stories meant to teach us a lesson. If we have a deeper understanding of God’s work we would know the difference. Wisdom can come in many different ways I think. For instance, we don’t have to gain this understanding all on our own. There are many people who have studied the Bible for years and are happily sharing all they know about it. You can learn from them.
I don’t think anyone gains the wisdom to understand everything all at once. For instance, I don’t think you will go to bed one day and then wake up the next day with all the wisdom you have ever wanted. I think the Holy Spirit opens your mind up to wisdom and then guides you to this wisdom. You may be praying for wisdom and understanding and then you get an email or notice an advertisement for a Bible study in your area. That is the Holy Spirit prompting you to gain the wisdom you are asking for. Or, maybe you hear about a podcast that you hadn’t heard of before. There are several podcasts that have really helped me gain understanding about God’s Word and about the Catholic Religion in general.
If you are looking for additional podcasts some of the ones I have tried are Father Mike Schmitz Bible In A Year Podcast, he also has another one that talks about all things Catholic. The Jeff Cavins Show is a good one. The Big Life Devotional with Pamela Crim is also good. All Things Catholic with Edward Sri, I haven’t listened to this one a lot, but I have heard him talk and he is really good. The Elevation Church with Steven Furtick is good. He is a minister that posts his sermons on this podcast. I have never heard one that I didn’t like. Abiding Together is one that talks about three woman’s journey in their faith. That is also informational. Your Catholic Life Podcast with Jon Leonetti is also a good one. He is someone that loves his Catholic Faith so much and you can just hear it in his voice. And last but not least Exploring My Strange Bible. This one is so good. Each episode is like a mini Bible study. He takes all the stories and goes into a lot more detail so that you understand the Bible stories in a whole new way. You get such a deeper understanding.
I didn’t mean to deviate there, but I do think that understanding the Lord’s Word is an essential part of Wisdom. Not just His word but His instruction as well. This is why I listed all those podcasts. They will definitely help with understanding and wisdom. I know it was a long list. I don’t intend for you to listen to them all, or any of them right now if you plate is full. I have listened to different ones at different times. This is why I am saying the Holy Spirit leads you to the wisdom you need. If you are feeling you need more wisdom or understanding say a quick prayer and ask the Holy Spirit to guide you to the wisdom your seeking. This list of podcasts is listed in the show notes so you can come back at any time and look through it. Remember, rely not on yourselves and what you can do, but what God can do through you.
Dear Heavenly Father I ask that you bless all those listening to this episode today. I ask that you help us to buy truth and not sell it and buy wisdom and instruction and understanding. Lord we ask that you lead us to your wisdom and not the ways of the world. Lord we ask you for instruction and understanding in how to live life the way you want us to. Lord we ask for a supernatural wisdom, a gift from the Holy Spirit, that will help move your word and instruction from our brain to our heart. We're asking for an intimate knowledge of your word and instruction so that we can live it with our actions. We thank you so much for all you do for us Lord you are amazing. We love you Lord and we ask all of this in accordance with your will and in Jesus holy name amen.