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Amen. Good morning. I won't introduce myself because I know all of you.

It's good to be back with you again. Good to see so many of you after so long.

Thanks for your commitment to this community and so many of you who have tuned in from afar and

so many of you who have stepped up and served in new ways and continued serving in old ways.

We just praise God for the way he's held us together as one community following Jesus together.

This morning we're going to continue in the book of Proverbs.

If you've been with us, you know we started that a few weeks ago.

The book of Proverbs is a book about wisdom.

Wisdom is skill and the art of living.

It's how we navigate the path that God's given us in this life and it's how we stay on the path.

The beginning of wisdom, its very start, its foundation is the fear of the Lord,

which I've been telling you from one man is an attitude of submission, respect, dependence, and worship.

And as it begins with the fear of the Lord, it continues with a characteristic of humility and teachability.

We start with the fear of the Lord, but if we want to grow in wisdom, we want to continue in wisdom.

We have to be people who are humble, who are willing to learn.

Now, if there's anything we've learned over the last few months,

certainly that the foundations, the things that we rested on in this world are perhaps a little less secure than we thought they were.

The world's maybe a little more fragile than we would have admitted last year or realized.

And sometimes there's disasters that come and some people run towards those disasters and some people run away from them.

If we had known in 2019 what was going to happen in 2020, maybe we would have done certain things differently.

Maybe we would have prepared in a certain way.

Of course, that's true of many aspects in life.

There's a preparation for what's to come.

There's a mitigation of preparing for what might happen in terms of disaster.

And that's what the author of Proverbs is going to tell us about this week.

We're going to look at how do we prepare for what's to come in this life.

How can we be ready when disaster comes?

We're going to hear about a storm.

So our question is, how do we survive?

How do we prepare for the storm that's to come?

It's with that that we're going to turn to Proverbs 1, verse 20.

Proverbs 1:20

I invite you to turn there with me in your Bibles or in your worship guide or your phone.

And as we come to Proverbs 1, remember that this is God's word.

In Proverbs 30, verse 5 tells us that every word of God proves true.

Proverbs 30:5

He is a shield to those who take refuge in him.

And so that's why we read now in chapter 1, starting at verse 20.

Wisdom cries aloud in the street.

In the markets, she raises her voice.

At the head of the noisy streets, she cries out.

At the entrance of the city gates, she speaks.

How long, O simple ones, will you love being simple?

How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge?

Verse 23.

If you turn at my reproof, behold, I will pour out my spirit to you.

I will make my words known to you.

Because I have called and you refused to listen,

have stretched out my hand and no one has heeded,

because you have ignored all my counsel and would have none of my reproof,

I also will laugh at your calamity.

I will mock when terror strikes you,

when terror strikes you like a storm and your calamity comes like a whirlwind,

when distress and anguish come upon you.

Then they will call upon me, but I will not answer.

They will seek me diligently, but will not find me.

Verse 29.

Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord

and would have none of my counsel and despised all my reproof,

therefore they shall eat the fruit of their ways

and have their fill of their own devices.

For the simple are killed by their turning away

and the complacency of fools destroys them.

But whoever listens to me will dwell secure

and will be at ease without dread of disaster.

Father, I invite you to pray with me as we come to this portion of God's word.

Our Father in heaven, we thank you

that you don't leave us alone,

but instead you speak to us by your word.

You, like a good Father, warn us

of things that are going to come in the path of life.

You prepare us for what's to come ahead.

We ask that you would do that this morning,

that you would send your Holy Spirit to encourage us

and stir us up by your word.

And you'd also send him to convict us

that we would have soft and tender hearts,

hearts that are open to you and your wisdom.

We ask that you would do that now

and that you teach us by your word.

We ask these things not because we've earned them

or deserved them,

but because we can ask them in Jesus' name.

Amen.

As I mentioned when I was giving the announcements,

today is June the 14th,

and I'm curious if you remember what happened two years ago

on June the 12th and 13th.

We are right at the two-year anniversary of something.

If you were living in Colorado Springs two years ago,

I can guarantee you, you haven't forgotten about this.

Very beginning of June,

we got hit by one of the worst hailstorms in recent memory.

And you all remember,

that was the first of two hailstorms that summer.

And what I remember about that hailstorm,

first of all,

I didn't really know anything about hail

because I had just moved to Colorado Springs

a year before that,

and hail was just a concept at that point.

But what I remembered about that

was that there was no warning.

No one told us there was going to be a hailstorm that night.

It just happened.

Now, the following hailstorm,

the one that happened, I believe,

in August of that summer,

we had some warning.

And so there was more of a chance to take cover.

Both hailstorms were destructive.

Some people had to have their roofs replaced twice.

It's great for those who had it,

who delayed and only had it replaced the second time.

Well, that highlights something for us

that there are two kinds of storms in this world.

Sometimes there's storms that we know about.

We can see them coming.

And then sometimes there's storms

that just happen without any warning.

I was caught without warning.

My car was outside when the first hailstorm hit.

When the second hailstorm hit,

I had just picked up a rental car

to have my first car worked on.

That's another story.

But there are two kinds of storms, right?

And we face storms in this life.

And in this section of Proverbs,

we're told that calamity can come.

When we don't follow wisdom,

it can happen like a storm.

And the reason that it's compared to a storm

is that it's going to feel in some ways

like something that's unexpected.

It's going to come up in a moment.

That's what we see here in verses 26 and 27.

Wisdom is going to laugh at people

who haven't listened to her

when terror strikes them like a storm.

And calamity comes like a whirlwind.

There's these storms in life, in other words,

that we can live without wisdom.

We can live in foolishness for a certain amount of time

and feel like we're getting away with it.

We can feel like there's not going to be any consequences

and that what we're doing is working

until the moment that the storm finally comes.

There can be a disconnect sometimes

between our present actions

and how it's going to affect us in the future.

And so we're going to look at that storm this morning.

We're going to see a few things.

First, the reality of the storm,

then the characters of the storm,

and then the escape from the storm.

The reality of the storm,

the characters of the storm,

and the escape from the storm.

We've already sort of talked about the reality of the storm.

Wisdom is warning us

that if we ignore her for long enough,

we will face a storm.

In fact, this is true.

We know this intuitively of many areas of life.

For example, if you don't save,

which, by the way, is a major topic

in the book of Proverbs, money.

If you don't save,

say maybe you don't save for retirement,

you don't save in general,

you'll be fine for a while.

You won't feel any consequences for a while.

You might think, this is working great.

There's no reason I need to change my behavior

until one day the storm comes.

One day you need the money.

You don't have the money.

Book of Proverbs talks about alcohol.

You might abuse alcohol for a time.

You might think, this is fine.

It's not affecting me in any big way.

I just have a large supply of ibuprofen in the morning,

and I can keep doing this

until one day the storm comes

and your health finally catches up with you.

It can happen in your work.

The book of Proverbs talks about people

who are lazy, the sluggard.

Maybe you're not doing a great job for a time

and you're on pace with your peers.

You're at the same point in your career,

and then suddenly you wake up one day

and you realize that they've advanced

several levels ahead of you,

and you're still in the same place.

Maybe even worse, you're losing your job.

It can happen in the other way.

Maybe there's overwork,

and you think, I can keep running at this pace.

I'm not facing the consequences yet,

and then one day,

doing too much for too long catches up,

and your heart and your mind

and your body begin to shut down.

This can happen in your relationships as well.

Maybe you do what the Proverbs warns against.

You're foolish with your words and your emotions.

Seems to be working for a time,

and then one day it catches up with you,

and the people that you wanted

and thought were close to you

are all walking away.

There will come a time

when foolishness catches up with us.

There will come a time

when we get what we've wished for.

That's what verse 31 tells us.

Therefore, they shall eat the fruit of their way

and have their fill of their own devices.

There's a time when it's too late

to turn back the clock.

There can come a time

if we ignore wisdom for long enough.

Wisdom will also ignore us.

There's a tragedy that's coming,

and sometimes we can't go back.

There is a real and true storm.

Now, I've talked about this real and true storm

in the sense of physical consequences, right?

Our health and our money and our friendships.

There's also a real storm spiritually.

It's easy to ignore God for a time

and not to face any of the consequences.

You might think,

oh, this is fine.

I'm living my life.

There's these Christians who pay attention to God,

but I am having just as good of a life as they are.

Therefore, I don't understand why it's important

for me to embrace Jesus Christ.

Well, the same thing is true spiritually

that's true of all these examples physically.

We can get away and get along for a time,

and one day the storm is going to come.

Spiritually, when we talk about the storm,

we're talking about the fact that one day

we are going to face God

as the great judge of this world.

It will happen either when we die

or when Jesus Christ returns to the earth

for his church.

And so whether it's in this life

or it's in our relationship with God,

our present actions affect future consequences.

And just because we don't see a storm now

does not mean the storm isn't coming.

And so wisdom cries out to us.

Will we listen in time?

We're told in this passage that

not only does wisdom cry out,

but there's going to come a time

when it will be too late to turn back.

That's what we're told in verse 28.

Then they will call upon me,

but I will not answer.

They will seek me diligently,

but they will not find me.

In other words, wisdom cries out to you

and you don't listen.

One day you will cry out to wisdom

and wisdom won't listen.

There will be a moment

when it's too late to turn back.

And so there's an urgency.

There's an urgency to embracing wisdom,

to embracing the cry,

to change now,

to prepare for the storm

before it's too late

because there will come a moment

when the clock cannot be turned back.

That is the reality of the storm.

If that's the reality of the storm

and wisdom is crying out,

there's of course a variety of ways

to respond,

to answer the call from wisdom.

And that's where we find

the characters of the storm.

We're given three characters here.

In verse 22,

we meet someone called the simple,

we meet the fool,

and the scoffer.

Now the simple person

is someone who doesn't really understand

what we've just talked about.

The simple person doesn't understand

the relationship

between present actions

and future consequences.

The simple person is very naive.

The simple person hasn't committed.

We talked last week about the fact

that there are really only two paths

when it comes to wisdom.

We can embrace the path of wisdom,

and if we don't embrace that path,

we're automatically on the path of foolishness.

There are only two ways to live.

There's only two ways to go.

And so the foolish person

or the simple person

is technically on the foolish path

because they haven't embraced the wise path.

But what's different about the foolish person

from the other two

is that the foolish person,

there's still some hope for them.

They're open.

They're naive.

They're described by some people as gullible,

but there's still some hope for them

to return to the path of wisdom.

And so you'll notice in verse 22,

wisdom actually is only crying out to the simple.

When she mentions scoffers and fools,

she's just commenting on them.

She's not even inviting them.

The fool is someone

who can be invited to do what's right,

has not made that commitment yet,

or the simple is invited to do what's right,

hasn't made the commitment.

So in that sense,

the simple person is a fool,

but there's hope that they might become wise.

Now, when it came to hailstorms,

I was a simple person.

I was not a fool,

at least not yet.

So I was unaware of how hailstorms worked.

I knew them as a theoretical concept.

I didn't realize the danger.

I didn't hear wisdom crying out to me.

My car was on the street

on the night of June 12th, 2018.

The great irony was that

while I typically did not have access

to the garage in the house I was living in,

one of my housemates was out of town

and there was a garage slot open.

However, I didn't take advantage of it.

I was simple.

But I was open to the call to wisdom.

So that night when the hailstorm started,

one of my housemates came

and knocked on my door and woke me up,

told me, your car is on the street

and it's hailing right now.

You need to bring it in.

So this is the call of wisdom

to the simple person, right?

So I ran out, except it was hailing

and it was huge hail.

It was dangerous for people to run out in.

So she gave me her snowboarding helmet

and I had the top of a rubbermaid bin.

It's my shield to guard myself.

And I ran out into the hail.

I got into my car and I started

and I pulled it into the driveway,

into the garage,

and it was already too late.

My car had already been wrecked by hail.

So I was the simple person, right?

And I didn't respond quickly enough.

There's a true urgency.

What we're being taught here,

in part, is that there's not a time

to sit and consider wisdom.

The time to respond to wisdom is now.

The time to respond is now

when it comes to circumstances in our life

and the time to respond now

when it comes to embracing Jesus Christ.

That no one of us knows the day

or the hour that we'll face the Lord.

And there may come a time

where the cry of wisdom is too late.

The cry of wisdom is too late

in our personal lives.

There are some things that happen.

And there are some things

that people in our community do

that we can't just turn the clock back on.

I had comprehensive coverage.

So my car was fixed.

And it cost Geico thousands of dollars.

And it cost me an enormous headache, right?

My housemate could not turn the clock back

on that for me.

The call to the simple

had not happened fast enough.

We also meet the scoffer and the fool.

The fool is worse than the simple

because the fool is not open

in the way the simple is.

The simple can still be pulled

onto the path of wisdom.

The fool is set.

Remember, we've talked about the fact

from Proverbs 12

that the fool is wise in his own eyes.

So the fool is convinced

he knows everything.

So the fool is going to hear the cry.

The fool is going to be confronted

by people and friends and mentors

who describe to him

how foolish his life is,

how the path he's on

is going to lead to destruction.

The fool's not going to listen.

Now, we've met people like this.

I'm sure you have people like this

in your family or your friend group.

Many people come and say,

look, the path that you're on

is not going to end well.

But they're wise in their own eyes, right?

The fool keeps going.

So that's why we see wisdom

is not crying out to the fool.

The scoffer is even worse.

The scoffer's like the fool,

except the scoffer has this

mocking tendency,

makes fun of the wise.

The scoffer's vindictive.

The scoffer's sarcastic and cynical.

The scoffer's the kind of person

that always points out what's wrong

and never sees what's right.

The scoffer takes being wise

in their own eyes to an extreme.

Of course, if you've lived in this world

long enough,

you've met people like this as well.

And the challenge from wisdom

is to the simple.

Turn back before it's too late.

Turn back before it's too late

because there's going to come a time

when things can't be undone.

When this storm comes,

you can't go back in time and redo.

Of course, I would love to go back, right,

and park my car in the garage on June 12th.

That's not an option.

Better to learn the easy way

than the hard way.

Learn in verse 31,

the fool,

if the simple doesn't embrace wisdom,

the simple's going to eat

the fruit of their way

and have their fill of their own devices.

Verse 28,

they're going to call upon wisdom,

but wisdom won't be there to answer.

And so,

the application here for us

is simple.

Listen.

Listen to wisdom

before it's too late.

Listen to wisdom

before it's too late.

We've seen the reality of the storm,

that there are real storms

coming in this life,

physically, materially,

and also spiritually.

We've seen the characters

of the storm,

that there are a variety of ways

to respond

when we're being warned

about the storm.

But there's also

an escape from the storm,

and that's what we see here

in verses 20 through 24.

Wisdom is crying out.

Wisdom isn't doing something

in secret.

Wisdom isn't doing this

in a seminar

that you have to be invited to

and pay money for.

No,

wisdom's crying aloud

in the streets,

verse 20,

in the markets she raises her voice.

Wisdom is not a respecter

of persons.

She's not crying out

only to some classes

and not to others.

She's not crying out

only to rich,

but not to poor.

No,

she's crying out

in public

to everyone.

Anyone and everyone

can have access

to wisdom.

She's loud.

She's urgent.

She's highlighting the fact

that the decision

has to be made,

and all they have to do

is listen.

She's crying out.

She's speaking.

Verse 23,

if you turn at my reproof,

in other words,

if you listen

and do what I've told you to do,

I will make my words

known to you.

I'll speak to you.

Verse 24,

she's called out

and you refuse to what?

Refuse to listen.

I stretch out my hand

and no one has heeded.

In other words,

no one has listened.

Verse 25,

you have ignored

all my counsel.

In other words,

no one listened.

The call of wisdom

is for everyone

and the call of wisdom

is a limited time offer.

And so the time

to act

is now.

The time to listen

is now.

wisdom

doesn't just

cry out

and call.

Wisdom also

makes it easy.

The command here

is not that we

pull ourselves up

by our bootstraps,

not that we go off

on some journey

where we have to

put together

a habit tracker

and make sure

we're setting

a new set,

a new threshold

and bar

that we have to

jump over every day.

wisdom actually

offers to help us

and give us

everything we need.

You know,

there are many

adventures in

Colorado Springs

that if you want

to be successful

and you have no

experience,

you're going to want

to hire a guide.

If you've never

hunted before

and you decide

this is something

I want to get into,

you can hire someone

to help you

and show you the way.

If you want to be

a fly fisher,

you don't know

the right spots

to go to,

you can hire someone

to come with you.

Wisdom here

is telling us

she is there

to be a guide

but we don't

have to hire her.

She's actually free.

We don't have

to hire wisdom.

We don't have

to pay anything.

She offers

her services

to anyone

who's willing

to accept them.

That's what we see

in verse 23.

If you turn

at my reproof,

behold,

I will pour out

my spirit to you.

I will make

my words known

to you.

This is freely

available.

Not only am I

going to be

your guide,

not only am I

going to take you

on the hunting trip,

I'm going to provide

the guns that you need.

I'm bringing

all the food with us.

I'm packing everything.

All you have to do

is get in the car.

That's what wisdom

is offering.

Wisdom is offering

to empower

and enable.

whatever we need,

all we have to do

is listen and accept.

All we have to do

is receive

the correction,

what here is called

reproof.

Verse 23

and 25.

All we have to do

is here

to turn away

from foolishness

and to turn

to wisdom.

If the simple person

teaches us anything,

it's this.

There is no middle ground.

ultimately,

we either choose

to be wise

or we choose

to be foolish.

And so we have to

listen before

it's too late.

We have to heed

wisdom before

it's too late.

If we're people

who have faith

in Jesus Christ,

we heed the call

of wisdom

in all sorts

of areas of life.

We heed the call

of wisdom

in our relationships

before they're destroyed.

We heed

the call of wisdom

when it comes

to the way

we treat food

and drink

before we hurt

ourselves and others.

We heed

the call of wisdom

when it comes

to dealing

with those

who have more power

than us

and those who have

less power.

We heed the call

of wisdom

when it comes

to bringing justice

and loving goodness.

Because God

wants us to walk

well in this world.

He doesn't want

us to face

the disaster

that happens

when we disregard

wisdom.

If you're not

a Christian,

remember that

the beginning

of wisdom,

the beginning

of knowledge

is the fear

of the Lord.

And so before

we embrace

anything else,

we have to embrace

Jesus Christ.

We can't have

wisdom without Him.

And just like

there's a coming storm

in the physical

circumstances

of this life,

there's a coming

destruction

that while things

may seem good now,

there is a time

and a day

when Jesus is going

to return to this earth.

And if we die

before then,

we will also

have to face Him.

And so no matter

how good things

are going now,

we need to be

prepared for that.

And so we do that

as the author

of Proverbs tells us

by receiving

the reproof,

which is a repentance

word,

a turning away

from sin,

repenting of our sins

and turning

to Jesus Christ.

No matter what we do,

we have to remember

the lesson of the simple

and embrace wisdom

now because it is urgent.

embrace wisdom

now because wisdom

provides everything

that we need.

It invites us

to go on a journey

and she supplies

everything that's needed

for the path.

I've been telling you

as we've been going

through the book

of Proverbs

about Matthew 12,

Matthew 12:42

verse 42,

which tells us

that Jesus is greater

than Solomon.

He's the great

wisdom teacher.

He's even greater.

He teaches us more

than what we learn

in the Proverbs.

But that's not

the only aspect

of wisdom

that we see in Jesus.

We're also told

in Colossians 2,

Colossians 2:3

verse 3,

that in Jesus

are hidden

all the treasures

of wisdom and knowledge.

We're told

in 1 Corinthians 1,

1 Corinthians 1:24

verse 24,

that Christ

is the power of God

and the wisdom of God.

In other words,

Jesus doesn't just

teach us wisdom.

He is the full

and final

and greatest embodiment

of God's wisdom.

This woman represents

wisdom,

lady wisdom,

in Proverbs 1.

Jesus is the greatest

fulfillment

and embodiment

of God's wisdom.

That's why we're told

in verse 29,

hating knowledge

means not choosing

the fear of the Lord.

Jesus is the one

who comes

and actually allows us

to have true fear

of the Lord,

not fear of punishment,

but fear of displeasing

the God who offers

us salvation.

And we know

even more

than people

in the Old Testament

about this spirit

that's going to be

poured out in verse 23.

How is it

that we're going

to be given

everything we need

for the journey

of wisdom?

Well, it's because

God is pouring out

his spirit on us

because of Jesus Christ.

He offers us

not worldly wisdom,

not wisdom

we have to create

and build,

but wisdom

that he gives us

through his word

and by his spirit.

And so God

provides everything

needed for wisdom

for those who will

simply hear

and listen

in turn.

God doesn't just

change our hearts.

He gives us

a new and true

desire for wisdom.

And he helps us

to grow in it.

He helps us

through his word.

He helps us

through his spirit

and he helps us

through the community

that he's given us

in one another

in the church

that we would have

what we need

to listen

to wisdom.

wisdom.

So how is it

that we are prepared?

How is it

that we look forward

knowing that we're ready

for the storms

that are to come?

We have to know

that the storm

is real.

We have to choose

not the way

of the simple

but the way

of the wise,

the person who

embraces wisdom

and listens.

That's how we're ready

for what is to come

spiritually

and physically

in this world.

In his book

Deep Survival

Who Lives

Who Dies

and Why

a man named

Lawrence Gonzalez

tells the time

that he spent

at the Vermont

Wilderness

Survival School

with a man

named Mark Morey.

And during that time

in the survival school

they would spend time

walking through

the forest together

and one thing

that Mark taught him

is that he had to

listen to the birds

because the birds

were what he called

the radars

of the forest.

That when the birds

were making noise

it was time to listen

because there was

something going on.

That reminded Lawrence

of another time

when he was hiking

on the U.S.-Mexico border

and it was incredibly

hot outside

it was over 100 degrees

and so he wasn't

thinking very clearly

but he was with

a hiking partner

and this woman

he was hiking with

at one point

put out her hand

and stopped him

on the trail.

He looked up

and what was there

making noise

but a bird

there was a

a blue jay

who was screeching.

He looked up

at the blue jay

that was screeching

and then his guide

pointed him to the ground

and he saw

right in front of them

across the path

a huge rattlesnake

that had just devoured

the little baby

of the blue jay.

the blue jay

was crying out

warning him

of the danger

that was to come

and all he had to do

was listen.

Wisdom

is crying out.

All we have to do

is listen

and live.

I invite you

to pray with me.

Our Father in heaven

we praise you

and we thank you

that you don't let us

stumble

and wander along

but instead

you cry out

with your wisdom.

You invite us

to walk with you

on a journey

that you provide

everything

we need.

We ask that you do this now

that you

if we're simple

that you stir up our hearts

to commit to you

and be wise.

If we're scoffers

you'd soften our hearts

and convict them

of sin

and that if you're foolish

we're foolish

you'd help us to know

that we shouldn't be wise

in our own eyes

but we need to learn

from you.

Ask that you'd encourage us

that you give us

your spirit

that we don't walk

the way of wisdom alone

but it's a place

that we walk with you

as our guide

and our comforter.

We praise you

that we can learn

these things

from your word

together

that we can worship you

with one voice.

So we ask these things

not because we've earned them

or deserve them

but we ask them

in Jesus' name.

Amen.