Psalm 136
OT Reading: Proverbs 2.1-11
NT Reading: 1 John 2.1-17
My child … my little children. Both our readings tonight take the form of fatherly instruction to the younger members of a community younger if not in years, then at least in the faith. Have you ever fantasised about the day when your children would gather around you to listen attentively and respectfully as you shared with them your pearls of wisdom? It’s a beguiling picture, not least for those of us who are called to preach, but I suspect that, certainly at home, most of us would be better advised to ‘save our breath to cool our porridge’ as the Scots say. Even here in church, where we do expect a sermon, we may bridle a little at the notion of being addressed from the lectern and the pulpit as children. But if we can set aside our natural resistance to the somewhat didactic and paternalistic tone of such passages as these, there is a distillation of wisdom in them that will repay attention.
In the Old Testament the concept of wisdom is similar to the practical skills we all need to go through life successfully. The same word is used of the manual skills of a craftsman, or the navigational skill of a sailor. Wisdom is therefore something which can be acquired with good teaching, steady application and a long apprenticeship. From the outset, two things are required of the student in the school of wisdom. The first is that he or she should listen attentively not just with the ear, but with the heart; and the second requirement is that he or she should really want to learn. Our reading compared this passionate quest for wisdom to the search for silver or hidden treasure. Mining in the ancient world was an arduous, back-breaking and dangerous business. Let me read you a few verses from the book of Job, which use the same poetic imagery of life in the mines to capture the sense of human adventure at the edge of endurance, in the pursuit of wisdom:
‘Surely there is a mine for silver, and a place for gold to be refined. 2Iron is taken out of the earth, and copper is smelted from ore. 3Miners put an end to darkness, and search out to the farthest bound the ore in gloom and deep darkness. 4They open shafts in a valley away from human habitation; they are forgotten by travellers, they sway suspended, remote from people. 5As for the earth, out of it comes bread; but underneath it is turned up as by fire. 6Its stones are the place of sapphires, and its dust contains gold. 7’That path no bird of prey knows, and the falcon’s eye has not seen it. 8The proud wild animals have not trodden it; the lion has not passed over it. 9’They put their hand to the flinty rock, and overturn mountains by the roots. 10They cut out channels in the rocks, and their eyes see every precious thing. 11The sources of the rivers they probe; hidden things they bring to light. 12’But where shall wisdom be found? And where is the place of understanding? Job 28.1-12
Where shall wisdom be found? The book of Job insists that only God knows where to find it, but he has shared the secret with us. He has said to humankind: Truly the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom. Our reading from Proverbs also identifies the fear of the Lord – the awe which we feel in God’s presence – as the root of all wisdom and understanding, and goes on to promise that if we are serious about the search, then wisdom will be God’s gift to us the skill, the ability, the understanding we need to lead the kind of life God wants us to lead. With wisdom in our hearts to guide us and guard us, we will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good path.
Sadly we know that this ideal picture of the good life led by a child of God is as much of a fantasy as the picture of respectful attention to the wise parent with which we started. In our most ardent moments we might want to be like that, but in reality we give up the struggle long before we get there. Most of us simply don’t have the discipline to engage for long enough in such a single-minded quest for wisdom and godly living.
Is John’s advice any easier to follow? We are to live in the light, we are to obey the commandments of Jesus, we are to walk as he walked, and love as he loved. How many more impossible demands are to be made of us by these didactic old men?
The writers of the Old Testament knew that God could and did forgive his people, as he eventually forgave their idolatry in the desert of Sinai after he had rescued them from slavery in Egypt. The faithfulness of his steadfast love for his people demanded no less, as we were reminded by the refrain of tonight’s psalm. But the prophets and teachers of the Old Testament had great difficulty in reconciling this recognition of God’s steadfast love with their equal certainty that he was utterly righteous and could tolerate no evil. How could they bridge the gulf between a holy God and a sinful people? How could they know how far a loving God would be prepared to go to bring about such a reconciliation.
Where John’s prescription for the good life differs from that of Proverbs is in his open recognition of our human frailty, and the remedy to which he directs us. He pleads with us to walk with Jesus in the light, so that we may keep company with him, and stay clear of sin, but he knows and accepts that we will fail. He knows too that if we recognise our failure, and confess our sins, then there is a remedy, there is a way forward, because Jesus, who died for us, will plead our cause. Like the pensioner from Devon who went to prison because she refused to pay the increase in her Council tax bill, we discover that our debt has been paid, and we walk free. With the psalmist we rejoice that ‘his steadfast love endures for ever’, but the narrative to which we respond as Christians is not the demonstration of God’s almighty power in parting the Red Sea and scattering our enemies, but the demonstration of God’s almighty love in dying for us on the cross.
We will stumble again and again, but the challenge is not beyond us after all. And we don’t need to lecture our children. We shall do better to get on with our own lives, and trust them to get on with theirs. If we manage to walk in the light, (well, most of the time), if we have the humility to admit our failures, to pick ourselves up or allow ourselves to be picked up when we have fallen over if we have the grace to seek God’s help as we start again, then the witness of our lives will be more eloquent than anything we could say to them.
My child my little children. As loving parents, we may now and then need to say a word of encouragement, or more rarely a word of admonition, but we can spare them the sermon. If the truth is in us, they will read it better in our lives than on our lips.
Handley Stevens