First Baptist Church: Sermon

Text: Proverbs 2:9-11

Message for January 27, 2002

by Pastor Glenn Layne

First Baptist Church of Temple City, California

Fourth Message in the Series:
A TOUGH-HEARTED FAITH FOR TRYING TIMES

Yes, You Can Beat Depression!
Depressed? Here's the way out: through the Biblical ideal of WISDOM.

Today's the day that we will end the service with an opportunity for you to come to the front and as an act of worship and dedication to the Lord put your Declaration of Intention of giving on the altar. I hope you have thought about and prayed about it over these last few weeks. If you wish, you can also bring in that Declaration over the next few weeks and simply give it to an usher, but, please, the sooner the better.

That your stewardship of resources; there's also your stewardship of relationships. At this time, I'd like to ask the ushers to make sure everyone here has an Invitation Pledge slip. We're pressing to raise our attendance from 313 (our 2001 average) to 350 in 2002. Again, I know that you have been thinking and praying about this. You can deposit that Pledge in the container at the front along with your declaration of intent.

The "Funk" Trap and our "funky" times…

If "awesome" is Mike Zoller's word, then it seems that "funk" is Dale Montgomery's word.

Dale: told us last week how church giving dived after September 11 because of a national funk. (Not only that, but many non-profit organizations.)

Two reasons: fear of a weakened economy and diversion of giving to various attack-related response charities.

Funk: a down mood, a mild state of depression, even a state of paralyzing fear.

Funk: a style of music! Meaning, earthy and unsophisticated. (Grand Funk Railroad)

Add a "y", get "funky":

q Hawkeye Pierce called BJ Hunnicut's moustache "funky" on M*A*S*H*. (Common, untrimmed, not neat.)
q Funky, as in the smell of gym shoes. (A little too earthy!)

Had a teacher (Phys. Ed.-believe it or not!) in college whose name was Funk. (He was the baseball coach, so everyone called him Coach Funk.)

One more definition: From (of course!) Funk and Wagnall's Dictionary:

"Mr. Wagnall's senior partner."

The funky times:

Attack created uncertainty.
Fear.
Anxiety. A national state of funk. Maybe for you too.

When we are uncertain, our instinct is to HOLD IN PLACE.

Unfortunately, we've found that "holding in place" creates its own anxieties.

q Economy.
q Charitable giving.

In the period immediately following the attack, signs of the national "funk":

q "Shoe therapy": Neiman-Marcus sales up 7%.
q Amtrak use went up by 15% (that's a shocker!).
q Las Vegas was hard hit (60% of visitors arrive by air), but Atlantic City boomed as city dwellers wanted to get away.
q Hotels, resorts and spas in the Catskill Mountains packed by New Yorkers seeking a break away from the city.
q Pizza delivery up nationwide by 3%.
q Gym use went up 20%. (Work off anxiety on the treadmill.)
q Blockbuster: Video/DVD rental up 26%.
q 300% increase in applications to the CIA.
q Calls to Psychics up 200%
q More hopeful: Bible sales up 28%.
q Church attendance up 5% (higher in NYC area). (St. Patrick's Cathedral added 6 masses per week) (This has flattened out to almost zero by now, except in NYC area).

Concern: most of these figures are now almost back to "normal." With the war in Afghanistan coming to a much more rapid end than expected, people are craving a "return to normal"-even though bin Ladin is still at large (or at least unaccounted for).

Concern: if we get hit again, do we have the SPIRITUAL resources to make it?

Or will our "funk" redouble to a national depression?

q National interest: I don't want to give the terrorists the victory.
q Kingdom interest: I want to give you the ammunition you need not only to win the current sense of being down, but to prevail in days to come-no matter what comes. Not to be swallowed up by the funk.

To do that, let's

Return to Proverbs…

By the way…

Don Buchannan gave me the lost 32nd chapter of Proverbs last week. Want to hear it? It's very short:

"It rains on the just and the unjust
But it rains more on the just fella
Because the unjust steals the just's umbrella."

Wisdom in Proverbs 1:20-2:8.

Wisdom is the goal of the proverbs (1:2).

What is wisdom?

Wisdom is knowledge applied rightly under the authority of the living God. Wisdom has to do with perspective (seeing things from God's point of view) and it has to do with action (applying truth to real life situations).

Wisdom, as the word is used in the Bible, is that essential ingredient that all people need to have the good life. The good life is one in which God is honored, in which we achieve peace of mind, as well as a genuine sense of satisfaction in our work life, and in our marriage and family life.

In Proverbs 1:20-2:8, Wisdom is described like a woman who cries out on a busy corner in the marketplace. Imagine a Middle Eastern bazaar. Everyone is hawking their goods. People jostle and shout and the place is noisy. In the middle of all this chatter, one clear voice rises up. You have to listen to it, but it's there. One voice offering quality goods at a fair price. That's the voice of wisdom.

And to ignore that voice-which we often hear through our conscience-is to be a fool. The wise and the fool: that's the opposite in the Bible. A fool is not someone with a low IQ, but someone who ignores this wisdom from God.

In Proverbs 2:1-8, the writer says, son, turn yourself to wisdom. Apply yourself to wisdom. If you do, you will not be disappointed.

We get the OUTCOME then in our text:

9Then you will understand what is right and just
and fair--every good path.
10For wisdom will enter your heart,
and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul.
11Discretion will protect you,
and understanding will guard you.

The Heart and Soul of Proverbs 2:10

There are two key terms in the middle verse there:

10For wisdom will enter your heart,
and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul.

The "heart", in the Bible's psychology, is the Grand Central Station of the soul. It's where the mind, will and emotion come together. The heart is the central processor of the person you are on the inside.

When wisdom has the heart, wisdom then goes out to the whole person-the whole soul. It will be pleasant to your soul. God's wisdom brings peace and wholeness to the whole person-it brings "pleasantness" to the soul.

This sounds good, doesn't it? Beats a funk any day.

Wisdom's Effects:

1. You get a grip on what's right (v. 9)

Then you will understand what is right and just and fair-every good path.

q The level of UNDERSTANDING. Wisdom-when we listen to her voice-when we as well seek her-gives us an understanding of the whole, of people, of life, of family, and even of death that far outstrips that of the people around us.
q People aren't born wise and that don't necessarily get wise with age (you know the saying-there's no fool like an old fool?) You need God's wisdom to attain understanding.

2. You have a change of heart and a redirection of soul (v. 10)

For wisdom will enter your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul.

q The level of ATTITUDE TRANSFORMATION. Understanding is not enough. In inner person is changed. I sometimes call this (with apologies to Motown TV show) "soul-training."
q People sometimes come to me and pour out their problems. Many times the real need is not for me-or anyone else-to solve their problem. It's for some them to do some soul training. It's to change the habits of the heart by the training of the soul.

One way to understand the training of the soul is by the story of the lumberjack contest. The young lumberjack challenged the older one to a contest: how many trees can you cut down in a day? He agreed, and at 7 AM sharp, they were off. The young guy whacked down every tree in sight, never stopping for a minute. The older jack stopped for 15 minutes every hour, so the young guy was sure he had him. But at 5 PM, when the trees were counted up, the old guy had felled 1/3 more trees!

"How'd you do it?" the young lumberjack asked.

"Because, when I stopped cutting and sat down, I sharpened my ax."

We sharpen our ax toward wisdom when we learn to still the soul and hear God's gentle voice when we pray. We sharpen our soul on His word. We sharpen our soul in worship and in fellowship-not just cookies after Sunday School, but the real kind of fellowship where we transparently share our lives. Those are some of the ways He works His wisdom into our lives.

q One good thing that came from the attack was that many people realized that their priorities were misplaced-which is one aspect of an untrained soul.
q Flash: at some point in your life, you will, no matter what, be called upon to respond to a 911 kind of stress. Whether you buckle or stand firm in that emergency you are determining each and everyday of your life by whether you are ingesting God's wisdom each day.

3. Your future direction is positively altered (v. 11)

Discretion will protect you and understanding will guard you.

q The level of GUIDANCE
q Again, an issue believers often are curious about is guidance. Here's good news: when wisdom gets into our spiritual blood, it acts like the iron needle in a compass. It naturally points true north.
q The verse says that God's wisdom manifests itself in our lives as protective discretion and as guarding understanding. These both have to do with the future, and are both put in the future tense…will protect…will guard.

OK, let's bring it down out of the realm of theory.

Victory over the Blues: Making It Yours…

1. Choose (Proverbs 1:29)

…the fear of the Lord

Those in turmoil are described in 1:29 as those who did not choose to fear the LORD.

The typical understanding of depression says that it arises from physical conditions (illness, chemical imbalance, actual brain damage) or from a repressed anger. I have seen both, and what I'm talking about today is not depression due to physical causes, but do to our choices.

Depression by choice is when we respond to life's hurts with a sense of hopelessness. We choose to give up. We enthrone King Fear in our hearts. If we act out, then it may be King Revenge, and sometimes, fear and revenge are two sides of the same coin.

You can break this by choosing, as a conscious act, to recognize that there is only room for one king on your throne, and that King's name is Jesus. The fear-the holy reverence of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, says Proverbs 1:7. Choose ultimate reverence to this King and this king alone and you have made the first step.

2. Listen (Proverbs 1:33)

…to the voice of the Lord

In 1:33, wisdom says,

…but whoever listens to me will live in safety
and be at ease, without fear of harm.

Wisdom here is the voice of the Lord-the voice spoken in His word and in our hearts by means of our conscience. The conscience can be corrupted, but generally speaking it whispers to us in what psychologists today call "self-talk." That's that internal dialogue we all carry in our heads right now. (When I'm preaching I hear things like, "You going to fast…that illustration bombed…you mispronounced that word…hey you in row ten pay attention…say that was pretty good…don't get proud…thank you Lord.")

Here's a bold idea: I believe that 90% of depression would go away if we listened to our conscience, and also to the Godward self-talk-which we know as believers has its origin in the indwelling Holy Spirit of God.

Listen to the voice of the Lord!

This leads to a third victory strategy:

3. Cry Out (Proverbs 2:3-4)

…for the voice of the Lord

2…turning your ear to wisdom
and applying your heart to understanding,
3and if you call out for insight
and cry aloud for understanding…

In 1:20-21, we're told that wisdom cries out; now we're told that we need to cry out as well.

If you passionately want God to work in your life-to live in His power and not in your fear and weakness of a "funk"-cry out for Him. James 1:5 says, "If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him." God is not in the business of looking for reasons not to bless you. His attitude is more that of an indulgent parent waiting for a call from their daughter at college. "You need money for books? Tuition? How 'bout some pizza money too?" God wants to give-but to receive we must call.

4. Trust (Proverbs 2:7-8)

…in the protecting power of the Lord

7He holds victory in store for the upright,
he is a shield to those whose walk is blameless,
8for he guards the course of the just
and protects the way of his faithful ones.

I don't believe that it's the will of God that His children limp through life. Want to win in life? To prevail? To have His shield go before you? It comes down to simple faith-to active trust.

Now in the times we are in we have to decide again: will we trust in ourselves or in the Lord and His wisdom that He so freely gives?

Now's the time for you to come to the front and as an act of worship and dedication to the Lord put your Declaration of Intent on the altar. As the music plays, I invite you to come up. Last year, we thought about the Jericho walls as we considered the impossibility to increasing our budget by almost $100,000 over the previous year. It's impossible-just as impossible that a ram's horn, a shofar like this could make those walls fall. But then the impossible happened. The God who knocked down those walls and who provided so abundantly last year is the same this year.

And we're asking you to take the next step: to trust Him for the people you invite to worship this year as we press upward to 350 in worship. You can deposit that Pledge in the container at the front along with your declaration of intent.

It's time to shake off the funk and embrace the wisdom of God. It's time to believe, and attempt great things for God. It's time to press forward toward the prize with faith and joy. It's time!