The Prerequisite for Wisdom: the Fear of the Lord

The Prerequisite for Wisdom:

The Fear of the Lord

Charles S. Waller

Copyright © 2012 by Charles S. Waller.

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ISBN: 978-1-4497-3666-8 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4497-6136-3 (ebook)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012900366

WestBow Press rev. date: 06/12/2012

Contents

List of Abbreviations

introduction

James Offers A Solution

The Counselor’s Objective

The Motivation For Action

Premenience

The Preeminence Of The Will Of God

Cause And Effect

God’s Will

Wisdom, Knowledge And Understanding

Wisdom

Wisdom Defined

PART I      THE FEAR OF THE LORD

The Prerequiste For Wisdom: The Fear Of The Lord

Fear Of The Lord: Defined

The Fear Of The Lord: Its Intentions

Testing

Job And The Fear Of The Lord

The Fear Of The Lord: Its Acquisition

What Does The Fear Of The Lord Produce: Obedience

Keeping His Statues

Obiedence Is To Love And Hate

The Wisdom Of Love

The Wisdom Of Hating

The Action Of Hating

To Hate Evil

Abominations

Things To Hate

Seven Evils

Haughty

Lying Tongue

Shed Innocent Blood

The Heart That Devised Wicked Plans

Feet That Run Rapidly Toward Evil

A False Witness

And One Who Spreads Strife Among Brothers

Life Without The Fear Of The Lord: Foregone Benefits

Vanity Of Vanities! All Is Vanity!

Why Fear The Lord

The Benefits Enumerated

PART II      PRIDE VERSES HUMILITY

Pride Verses Humility

Defining Pride

A Mini-Lesson In Pride

Self-Aware/Self Directed

Humility

A Mini Lesson In Christ’s Humility

Humility In His Life

Pride Verses Humility:

An Attitude, Not An Emotion

The Beatitudes

The Sermon On The Mount

Anger

Adultery

False Vows

Vengeance

Love

Concerning Alms And Prayer

The Lord’s Prayer

The Praise Of Men

Fasting

Wealth

What Is The Purpose Of Your Life?

Summing It Up

Exposing The Attitude

A Second Warning

A Third And Final Warning

The Kingdom

His Righteousness

The King’s Command

PART III      LOVE

Love

What Is Love?

The Perfect Lover

His Extreme Love

The Action Of Love

But The Greatest Of These Is Love

Patience

Kind

Is Not Jealous

Bragging And Arrogance

Act Unbecomingly

Seeking Its Own

Is Not Provoked

Take Into Account A Wrong Suffered

Love Does All Things

Conclusion

Joushua Twenty Four

Commit Yourself To God

A Brief Note On Failure

So Tell It To Me One More Time

PART IV      VERBATIM: A COUNSELING CASE EXHIBITED

I WANT TO GET MY WIFE BACK!      Session One

I WANT TO GET MY WIFE BACK!      Session Two

I WANT TO GET MY WIFE BACK!      Session Three

I WANT TO GET MY WIFE BACK!      Session Four

I WANT TO GET MY WIFE BACK!      Session Five

I WANT TO GET MY WIFE BACK!      Session Six

PART V      HOMEWORK MANUAL:: THE FEAR OF THE LORD

APPENDIX: YARAH

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Endnotes

List of Abbreviations

introduction

Counselees come to counseling for change. That is, they come to get something from the counselor that does not presently exist in their lives. But what they come for, often times, turns out to be a return to the status quo. And thus, effectively, there is no change.

Perhaps a wife has left her husband, the husband has come seeking the remedy to his situation: a way to get my wife back. Another has lost his job, he is destitute and his family is on the brink of leaving him (or they have left him). He wants to know the means by which to get them back, reacquire that good job, the one that gave them everything they wanted. A woman has been single all her life, is in desperate need (as she perceives) of a husband and wants the counselor to show her how to obtain a man; how to make herself worthy before God; worthy in such a way that God will grant her request for a husband. A counselee has a great fear, a constant anxiety; a lack of self-assuredness and wants the counselor to show him/her how to get out from under this burden. A husband and wife are struggling; they can’t seem to get it together. They, individually, ask God to change their partner, make him/her more like themselves, so that peace can be restored to the relationship. A saint is struggling with that sin that so easily besets and wants God to erase his/her desire to sin.

These are but a few of the situations being discussed in counseling sessions in the Church today. But have these people come to Biblical counseling for the right reasons? Is God really interested in a return to the status quo for His saints? And if not, could this be the reason why counseling sessions end with no change? Where lies the problem?

James Offers A Solution

What is the source of quarrels and conflicts among you? Is not the source your pleasures that wage war in your members? (James 4:1).

James identifies, as the source of one’s quarrels and conflicts, your pleasures. In the King James Version of the Bible the word is lust. Perhaps lust is the more familiar term but lust and pleasure are the same word. The Greek word translated as lust is hedone, hay-don-ay’; from handano (to please). It speaks of sensual delight. By implication it speaks of your desires; your lust or desire for sensual pleasure. It’s the word from which we derive the English word hedonism," or living purely for our personal pleasure.

James continues his explanation by next identifying the motivation for the actions that arise from the quarrels and conflicts.

You lust and do not have; so you commit murder. And you are envious and cannot obtain; so you fight and quarrel (James 4:2a).

James instructs that we commit murder because we do not get what we think we should have. And, we fight and quarrel because we are envious and cannot obtain what we think we want. He even states that we make supplication before the Lord and still receive nothing! Why?

You ask and do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures (James 4:3).

James identifies motives, wrong motives, as the reason we fail to receive what we really need to receive. Motives: something (as a need or desire) that causes a person to act. Further, the King James Version says that you ask amiss, but the word being translated in any version of the Bible is kakos, or kak-oce, which means: to have asked badly. It suggests that your asking is diseased, evil, grievous, miserable, sick, and sore. James says that when you fail to receive, you fail because you have asked amiss, or have asked badly, with the wrong motives.

So what is wrong about the motives of these counselees? They have come seeking a self-satisfying end to their issues without understanding the true purpose and direction of the sanctified life. Yet, the Bible is quite clear about how change, sanctification, satisfaction, and real joy are arrived at. The answer is given, even lavished upon us, within the pages of Scripture. The solution, for each and every concern, is within our biblical reach. But this answer comes with a prerequisite, a first cause for everything else. The Bible says,

But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added to you (Matt. 6:33; cf. Prov. 2:4).

Truly, when change fails to take place, it is because the counselee has his or her focus in the wrong direction and their expectations are different from the expectations that God has for them. Look at what Jesus said just before He asked us to seek.

For all these things the Gentiles eagerly seek; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things (Matt. 6:32).

God is perfectly aware of your situation. He knows what you need and what you want. And yet, He does not say to us ask for a return to the status quo. He says: seek, not your comforts, nor your material goods; not what you think is missing, but seek the kingdom and the king’s righteousness, and then all things will be added to you. Take note of how God would have us come to Him:

And whatever you ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son (Jn. 14:13).

The Greek translation for the word ask is aiteo, or ahee-teh’-o. In general, the word simply means: to ask, to make a request of someone. But the word also carries with it the idea that we beg, we call for, crave, or desire. There are many references in the Bible wherein we can see the need to request, but a storehouse of verses come quickly from the book of John. Herein,

If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it (Jn. 14:14).

If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you (Jn. 15:7).

Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full (Jn. 16:24).

So what is the appropriate path to change, sanctification, satisfaction, and real joy? The answer is plain; the Bible says to seek. Seek the Kingdom of God first, and then His righteousness. Having done that, all things will then be added unto to you.

The Counselor’s Objective

In the forth coming report, it is my intention to demonstrate, from the Bible, what the proper attitude is when coming to God for anything; and particularly, per this report, change. How do I ask? And, what is true biblical change (Once I have come under the tutelage of the Holy Spirit)? What steps lead me to the door of sanctification and how might I be assured that Godly change and true holiness will occur in my life. And finally, how might I be sure that what I ask for, and how I ask for it, meets with God’s approval; that is, to His glory!

In order to accomplish this we must first attempt to discover the proper attitude with which to approach God and the motivation that brings about that attitude. Doing so we will learn that the Fear of the Lord is that motivation which sets our attitude aright, and thus we may properly approach the Lord. Of this we must become convinced, because without it, that is, the Fear of the Lord, no significant sanctification takes place.¹ But our ability to live in the Fear of the Lord is often short-lived because of pride, the principal culprit in short-circuiting our growth in the Fear of the Lord. Yet, to our relief, we come to understand that pride is checked by humility, which results in a meek and lowly heart. Thereafter, we begin to practice the Fear of the Lord as we persevere in love. Not the love that the world knows, but agapeo, a self-sacrificing, highly-purposed love. A love that helps us to increase in our Fear of the Lord. And thus, we begin to take Godly actions. We do works that belong to God, but are done in such a way that they become ours. They benefit us, but most importantly, they accrue to God’s glory.

Change in your life, the change sought by God for you, not necessarily in alignment with the change that you had in mind, is found first in a proper attitude towards God, stimulated by the proper motivation, and second in proper actions; the kind that will result in all these things [being] added to you.

The Motivation For Action

When seeking God first, as the scriptures prescribe, the idea is not so much attempting to find God, but rather giving Him first place in everything. The grand idea, to which Matthew 6:33 is pointing, is encapsulated in the word preeminence. We are to give the Lord preeminence in our lives and make everything else second. That says to the counselee that his/her desires are to become secondary. What you want for yourself is to take a back seat to what the Lord wants for you. The apostle Paul puts it this way:

. . . And He died for all, that they who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf (2 Cor. 5:15).

The apostle is saying that no matter what set of circumstances one finds themselves in, our attitude (in this life, that is, the sanctified life of the believer), towards everything is: to no longer live for ourselves, but rather for Him who died and rose again on [our] behalf.²

Premenience

When we live for Him (the Lord) we make Him first in everything. The word used in the Bible (Matt. 6:33) to express the idea of first, first place, or to be first is proton which is the neutral form of protos. It carries with it the idea of being foremost (in time, place, order or importance), setting one or something before everything else. It is used to describe the beginning of something, to identify the best of all things, or first of all. Thus, the idea of giving God first place in all things begins and ends with the idea of making God preeminent in our lives.

And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence (Col. 1:18 KJV).

The Preeminence Of The Will Of God

. . . for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure (Phil. 2:13).

The verse above, in a series of pronouncements, points out that the highest aim of God, His motivation for everything else is: the obtainment of His good pleasure. This expression, His good pleasure, is a combination of the two thoughts. The first word, good, obviously qualifies the condition of the second, pleasure.

The first word, good, is translated from the Greek word eu, or yoo, and explains that something has been done well, as in the expression, well done. This means that the outcome is pleasing and is what is desired; that is, in accord with God’s will. But it also has a moral connotation suggesting that this good is something done with holiness and righteousness attached.

The second word, pleasure, comes from the root word dokeo, or dok-eh’-o, which is understood to entail the act of thinking. It is also understood as something that we think about or take into account, as in taking an accounting of, or a measurement or a quantitative notion. Thus, the pleasure that God enjoys comes as a result of His