Applying the Wisdom of God’s Word

How do you interpret a proverb? How do you apply a proverb as a moral principle to your life? There can be real problems here. Let’s look at Proverbs 26:4: “Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest you also be like him.” So, what’s the precept here of wisdom that we are given? Don’t answer a fool according to his folly, because you’re going to be just like him if you do. All right, we learn that, and I say, “Hey, that makes sense.” Now we go to verse five: “Answer a fool according to his folly, lest he be wise in his own conceit” (Prov. 26:5) Now, here you have two verses of Scripture, back-to-back in consecutive standing, that clearly contradict each other. The first one says, “Don’t answer a fool according to his folly.” The very next verse says, “Answer a fool according to his folly.”

Now, how in the world do you reconcile that? Well, if these two passages were coming to us as moral absolutes, we would have a hopeless contradiction. But they’re not coming to us as apodictic law. They’re coming to us as proverbs—as little gems, little insights, little vignettes of practical wisdom. And you can find many such vignettes of wisdom in the Old Testament that seem on the surface to conflict one with another. And that shouldn’t surprise us because we find the same thing in English-speaking countries with our own proverbial wisdom.

I’m thinking, for example, of two proverbs that are commonplace to our own culture. Think of this one: “Look before you leap.” That’s proverb number one. Proverb number two is, “He who hesitates is lost.” Now what happens if you elevate those little pithy proverbial bits of wisdom and make them moral absolutes? I get myself in a situation that says, “It is morally incumbent upon me to look before I leap,” and then I say, “But the law also requires that if I hesitate, I am lost.” So what do I do? Do I hesitate to take the time necessary to look before I leap, or do I not look before I leap and jump right away? See that clear conflict between the two? Why is it? I think it’s easy, isn’t it?

The point is that there are some earthly human situations where the wise man, if he is going to be prudent, does not jump into things impulsively without seeing where it is that he’s jumping. That if he’s careful, if he’s cautious, if he’s sagacious and wise, he will examine the situation and not act irresponsibly on impulse. He will look before he leaps because he may jump into trouble. On the other hand, there are times in our lives where decisive action is required, where we don’t have time to examine all of the facts. It’s a crisis situation, a matter of urgency. We must act. And the wise man doesn’t have time to hesitate. He must move.

I got to remember an illustration in my own life that’s not one I’m proud of. I was in high school, and I was out cruising the streets in my hometown about three o’clock in the morning, and you were not supposed to be walking around the streets of town at three o’clock in the morning. It was a suburban community, and I had been in an all-night restaurant, and I was just kind of strolling around the town. And I wasn’t doing anything. I wasn’t robbing anybody. I wasn’t into any trouble. But I was where I was not supposed to be at three o’clock in the morning. And all of a sudden, as I was walking up the street, I looked back and I saw headlights of a car coming up. And I thought, “Whoa, what if that’s the police?” Because I know if it’s the police and they catch me walking the streets at three o’clock, they’re going to put me in the car and they’re going to take me home. And my parents are going to say, “What in the world are you doing out at three o’clock in the morning?” So I’m trying to avoid that kind of trouble. The police car drives up the street, and as soon as I see the lights coming, I duck back into the bushes in somebody’s front yard, hoping that I would be able to hide and they wouldn’t see me.

But suddenly, they had picked up my shadow moving into the bushes in their headlights. Suddenly, their floodlight comes on right into the bushes. They hurry up the street and throw the car into halt. And they open the doors, and they start running across the yard. And I take off because now they’re mad. I don’t want to get caught, and so I elect to run from the police. And this is three o’clock in the morning. It’s pitch dark out at night. I am running through people’s yards in a suburban community. I am knocking over garbage cans. Two policemen are running for all they’re worth behind me, closing the gap.

And as I’m running through this neighborhood, I suddenly come to this big row of hedges. And I have no idea what’s on the other side of those hedges, but I know what’s behind me. It’s a policeman breathing down my neck. I’m wearing glasses and everything, and I just take a chance. I didn’t have time. I could not hesitate because if I hesitated, I’m lost. I’m lost to the police. They’re going to get me. But I can’t look before I leap. And I leapt right through the hedges and landed on my face in some little child’s sandbox, right? My glasses are all over the place. I get sand in my hair, sand in my clothes, sand all over me. But fortunately the sandbox saved me from an even rockier landing. I brushed myself off, got up, and ran.

People’s lights were coming on, blinds were coming up, and windows were opening, and I’m making all kind of racket, but I escaped. The police didn’t catch me. Maybe they’ll have an APB out on me from that years ago. But the point is, in that life situation, I had to choose between looking before I leap or hesitating and being lost. So, I just want to be careful here, that as you read the Proverbs, as you read the written literature, look at it for what it is: practical wisdom. Principles that can serve you in your everyday struggles with life. Transcendent wisdom—wisdom that comes from the mind of God. But don’t confuse the Proverbs with moral absolutes. They were never intended to be read that way. They were never set forth for us as the Ten Commandments were. There is a difference in how we interpret those laws, and we need to recognize it.