Wisdom & Doing Life Well

Luke: Live from a pub in Birmingham, this is Bible After Hours. Good to see everybody and I'm Luke Olly. I helped to set this podcast up. We're now actually just jumping into season two. So if you haven't heard us before, then I do encourage you all to go and check out season one. Season two is in a different venue. We are now coming live from the Black Horse in Northfield and we are videoing it as well, which is all very exciting. We'll see how that one goes. Watch out this space. We set this up really just to explore the Bible. We want to just see what it's all about and look at is it actually relevant to today's modern life? Lots of people have read it, clearly, over the years, thousands of years even. And clearly it's made some impact to their lives. So let's see if it can do the same for us. And it's made an impact to Western civilization. So let's explore how that all sort of has shaped us as a society as well. And I thought we'd do it all with some mates in a pub because Why not? Why not? We have Pete next to me as usual in Dictionary Corner. Good evening, Pete. Hi, Luke. It's great to be here. Exciting, isn't it? Exciting. Last season we had an exclusive. You know this? So one of our guest speakers in last season was with us first on Bible After Hours. A few weeks later was on BBC TV Breakfast promoting her book. So the moral of the story is we get the exclusives first. They start with us, then they're on TV and the BBC a few weeks later. Just saying. Yeah, just the heady heights. And if you haven't checked all of those series one episodes out, you can see us on BibleAfterHours.com and you can find us on all the social medias. So do like and subscribe and do all of that kind of stuff. So we're excited that we've got all of that up and going now. And yeah, last season we finished off with community and belonging with Kathryn and Lauren. And in fact, that finished off not in a pub because it was absolutely roasting and my house happened to have air con. So we decanted from the pub and went into my house for some air con and ice creams. And it was a good fun, different atmosphere than tonight, it's fair to say, but it was a great episode, all about how to build relationships, how to be known and valued and understood. And then we looked at some top tips for people struggling to build relationships. So do check that one out if you haven't already listened to it. And of course you can come and be part of our community. We have the next one recording in October. Dates will be on the website. So if you're actually around in the Midlands or Birmingham, come and join us and say hello. We'd love to see you in person. Right, so firstly, Pete, we need our house rules. Which we always say at beginning of an episode. we have three house rules for our podcast. The first one is know yourself. We all have come with our ideas, our preconceptions, with our backgrounds, with our hang ups. And we want to try and come with an open mind and listen to each other's opinion. The second rule is that none of us knows it all and we can all learn together. And the third one is don't shoot the messenger. We want to have some fun. Brilliant. Is everybody happy with the house rules? Yeah. Excellent. If you are not, then please leave now. Don't all leave though, because there's a good number of you, but not tons. Right, so today is the topic of wisdom. Pete, do you feel wise right now? I'm not particularly wise at some times. Sometimes I'm like, no, maybe not. Tonight, how would you rate yourself as a one to ten on the wisdom side of things? I mean, I think you're quite a wise man in general. I'm going to put you down as sort of a good seven. That's nice. One of those things where you don't want to kind of say, I'm really, really wise in my own eyes, because there's a proverb about that that says don't... Yeah, I think so. So I probably shouldn't rate myself. That's a bit awkward. I'm going to put you down as a seven. I was really interested in the Bible as a teenager, which is kind of weird, I guess. Most teenagers are interested in lots of other things. But I found particularly wisdom being of something of really interest. And I remember as a teenager sort of reading through very different books in the Bible. So I'm trying to work out how do you do life well, right? Because yeah, I think that's kind of important to kind of get your head around, right? And as early as possible, ideally, so that you don't make a whole lot of ridiculous mistakes and then have to sort of learn on the job kind of thing. So I'm hoping tonight we can maybe explore how that all sort of works out in the Bible. And yeah, for me, I remember one thing, particularly from Proverbs, actually, around the fear of God. is the beginning of wisdom. So maybe we can talk a little bit around what that means in a bit as well. But that's just stuck with me. I remember as a teenager maybe a little bit too scared of God, possibly, I don't know. I don't know, maybe it's a thing to be little bit apprehensive of something that can be so powerful. Right, so first thing that we're going to do though, we have asked the audience a question, as we usually do. So Pete, could you go through what the question was and what the answers were? Yeah, so the question was, where do you go? for guidance and advice. And there were five options. The options were, do you go to your parents for advice? Do you go to books for advice? Do you go to your local vicar or church leader for advice? Do you go to friends for advice? Or do you go to AI, chat GPT or copilot or something for advice? Okay, yeah. Right, so I guess what was the lowest of the list? The lowest of the list was AI chat sheet BT. That was the lowest of the five. That surprised me actually. I think that probably reflects... I don't want make any... Well... Cynicism about AI getting things wrong? The age of the audience possibly. Maybe... I know. Because I think anybody sort of under the age of 18, I reckon that's top. I reckon. But we are in a pub to be fair, so... It's probably good that we have people over that age here. OK, what's next? bought in fourth place was parents. that's quite harsh. dear. Okay. All right. The next was in third place was your local church leader. Okay, that's probably sort of scoring slightly higher than I thought it might to be fair, because I just thought that people would be discounting that almost immediately and chat GPT knows everything, right? Yeah. Second place was books. And then quite a long way ahead was friends. Not the TV show, but actual friends. Yeah. Okay. Interesting. The TV show has some wisdom in the mix as well sometimes. Sometimes, yeah. Great. Friends, right. Okay. Well, good. Guess that feels like a sensible answer. We're talking to church leaders today. We are. So we'll see how they feel about coming middle of the table. Yeah. I mean, I think that's a fair showing, but we can maybe hopefully get them high up the list the next time. Well, actually, I thought there's a psalm that I thought I'd quickly just run through, which is Psalm 119, and just a very brief part of it, 105 to 112. I'm not going to read all of that. But part of it says, your word is a lamp to guide me and a light for my path. So clearly the authors of Psalms thought that the book of the Bible, in fact, Psalms was written before most of the book of the Bible was written, right? even just the early books of the Bible, the person who wrote the Psalms felt that there was such wisdom in there, contained within there, that it was well worth, as a guide to them and as a light for their path, so well worth a read. So I think we were going to dive into the Bible. You're okay with that, Yeah, we are. Excellent. Okay, so first, as it's a theme of wisdom, and we've already said there's quite a lot of wisdom in the Bible, I feel like we're not going to be able to cover off It's all tonight. That's possibly too much of a big ass. But what other sort good books in the Bible that have maybe more wisdom than most? Yeah, there are some bits of the Bible that have lots and lots of wisdom. So in the New Testament, the letter of James has some real strong wisdom sections of vice about keeping your mouth shut. There are bits where Jesus gives some teachings, some of that's very much wisdom teaching. And in the middle of the Bible, there are some bits of Proverbs. is a book that's full of wisdom. Ecclesiastes is full of wisdom. The book of Job is about suffering. And we're going to focus on the Proverbs today, the book of Proverbs. Proverbs. So there is whole chunk of books that are called the wisdom literature. Yeah. Which ones are those ones? Ecclesiastes, Job, possibly some of songs get attached into it as well. OK. And a few books that not in the Bible that are similar sort of literature. OK. And Proverbs. And Proverbs, yes. In there as well. Probably one of the biggest books in reality. So we're going to have look at Proverbs. Okay, so what is Proverbs, the book of Proverbs? Who wrote it? When was it written? Why was it written? Why should it be in the Bible? Give me a little bit of a rundown. Yes, and I'll try and keep this short. You've asked a few questions that are double you questions. So the first one is, what is the book of Proverbs? It is a collection of different sayings. There are several main types of things. The first of nine chapters take the form of instruction. So there'll be something that says, do this, and this is the reason why. So chapter one, verse eight says, listen, my son, to your father's instructions. And do not forsake your mother's teaching. This will be a garland to grace your head and a chain to adorn your neck. And then it goes on to explain why, to a bigger chunk. And you get a few chapters of that. Then you get into the very, very short little proverbs that are just one saying often with two parts. And they're often very short, very catchy, very memorable. And a bit like the Proverbs we have in our society today, we say things like, look before you leap. Too many cooks spoil the broth. And the Bible has these little sayings and there are kind of three main types. this is where I get fancy with the words a little bit. So the first type is antithetic parallelism, which is where you get a proverb with two halves that say the opposite. For example, Proverbs 16 verse 8 says, better a little with righteousness than much gain with injustice. Yes, they're opposites. Second type is synonymous parallelism, where you get two halves that say pretty much the same thing. So Proverbs 16 verse 13 says, the king takes pleasure in honest lips. They value a man who speaks the truth. Saying the same thing twice. Sometimes you get development in the second half. aggressive parallelism. The Proverbs 16 verse 5 says, Lord detests all the proud of heart. Be sure of this, they will not go unpunished. And as we get into lots of Proverbs later on in the podcast, you'll hear this pattern of very short sayings with two halves. That's what they are. You asked when were they written? Well, Proverbs mostly were spoken first. This is from a time when most people couldn't read and couldn't write. Things were passed on by word of mouth. and the best ones were remembered, often because they were poetic. Things like look before you leap in English is alliteration. Some of these proverbs were catchy and they were collected together. Proverbs is like a collection of collections of which have been gathered and put together, often attributed to different people. Quite a lot of the proverbs, we don't actually know who wrote them. A bit like our English proverbs, who was the first person to say look before you leap? We don't really know. Who said prevention is better than cure? We don't really know. And it doesn't really matter because you can still apply it to your life. A proverb often has no context until you start to apply it to your life. You give it the context. You give it the meaning. That's a bit of what's going on. And then there some other random bits that are stuck in there as well. Like the last chapter of Proverbs is an acrostic poem, which means the first verse begins with Aleph, the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet. The second verse is Baith, the second letter of the Hebrew alphabet. then the third letter, Gimel, Daleth, and on it goes through the 20th letter of the Hebrew alphabet. You don't pick that up though with when it's... You don't realise what it's translated, but it's cleverly poetic. So they knew about acrostic poems back in those days. They did. I always thought for whatever reason, I don't know why, that Proverbs had Solomon involved somewhere. This is that really wise king that ruled over the Israelites for a bit. Solomon is associated with wisdom. There's a story from the Master of God of Wisdom. Curiously, Solomon didn't always do wise things. Sure. So often people will talk about connecting proverbs with Solomon. Some of it, there's the sayings of Agur and there's the sayings of King Lemuel at the end. Some of it's anonymous. But it doesn't need to be written by Solomon. And some of it does appear to be written slightly later than his time, but more collected and passed on by word of mouth. We're just knocking around that sort of same time There's no harm in associating it with a person. We don't really know. It doesn't really matter that much who wrote them, not really. Yeah, okay. All right. Fair enough. That's a very brief run through of proverbs. think good work, Pete. Well done. think he deserves a round of applause for Very thorough, good work, addiction in corner. Lots of good words. I'm never going to remember, but I'll try and come back to them in a bit. Right. You'll hear it because some of the proverbs, the second part sort of punches you. and it either gives you a bit of a slap or sometimes it makes you laugh and I think you'll hear that in what's coming up. Okay. I look forward to listening to some of these as we go along then. Right. I think it's time that we introduce our guests for the evening. We have the amazing Andrew and Rosie. Thank you so much for coming along. Thank you for having us. Thank you for having us. Great to be here. Yeah. So I've been talking about this podcast for a little while and Andrew, I think, was quite enthusiastic about the idea. wanting to come along but kept some ghost in me. Hey, busy life. We've got a date. We've worked on all the dates for a year. They were very busy for a year but we've pinned them down and we got them and actually for an amazing topic so I'm really pleased we've been able to get you guys here. Thank you. I would put you guys... So in the list of, you one to five, I think I'd put you pretty near the top, possibly above friends as far as people I would go to for wisdom. Very kind. Keep on track, keep on track. might undo that tonight, you never know. I've built these guys up, but I've known them for about 20 years and there's been lots of good stuff that I've seen over the years from these guys. So it's brilliant to have you along. What is it you guys actually do then day to day? Well, so we have the privilege of leading a church. So we have a couple of jobs. I'll say about one job. We lead a local church here in Birmingham and it's a church got different kind of congregations, types in different parts of the city. So we're the team leaders there and we work with fantastic people just living out the Christian faith day to day, week by week. That's what we do with part of our lives. And the other part of our life, we help to lead the denomination that our church is part of. So we, yeah, we look after lots of churches all around the country and we love it. great stuff. And you guys kind of, you know each other some way. How are you connected? We've been married. Right. 32 years. And we have two grown up daughters. Yes. And two wonderful sons-in-law. Cool. The whole package. Maybe we talk about a little bit about that as well. I'd like some advice around how to look after my own kids at somewhere along the way. Right. So we're here to talk about proverbs and wisdom. So I guess the first thought that I'd get, be good to get from you is What immediately comes to mind when I say, you let's talk about wisdom and provosts. You know, what's your history with it? it a particular theme or thought that comes through immediately? on, Andrew, you first. I think the idea of wisdom is probably, for me, the idea of navigating life skillfully. Life is complex. People are complex. Crushes come. And the thought of making some decisions today that I won't regret tomorrow. I think that's... That's probably the big idea of wisdom that comes to mind for me. for me personally, I had a background where I grew up in a family that had Christian faith. And I used to go along to church environments. the first time I opened the Bible for myself in terms of exploring, is this book relevant? How do I make sense of it? I knew some of the story of Jesus that's in the New Testament. But the bit that I engaged with was the Proverbs, because it was quite sandbite short. I had probably had a very short attention span, didn't like reading very much as a kid. And actually there was some stuff in there that I could take bite-sized things that I felt spoke to life and spoke to me. And so that was my first engagement with the Bible was actually reading bits of the Proverbs. And so that's why I feel privileged to be here tonight thinking about it because it's taken me full circle. Because I don't know, maybe if you're new to faith or exploring it, to where do I start? How do I make sense of it? mean, starting with Jesus is a pretty good start. But for me, actually, Proverbs and some of the short pithy, this is really boom directly to my story was part of what helped me make sense of the Bible, make sense of faith, I suppose. Rosie, the wisdom literature part of your faith journey at all? I was probably a bit more methodical than Andrew and I probably started by starting at the beginning of the Bible and working my way through. Yes, of course. But I kind of fell in love with the Proverbs when I did a devotional by Tim Keller. So that gave you a little bit of Proverbs to read every day. it's probably just a wonderful book. It's so diverse. It addresses so many different parts of our lives and society and the wisdom stuff. So I absolutely love that. And then the other thing that you might not know about me is that I play the violin in an orchestra. the wisdom book, the wisdom contained in the book of Job has been set to music. by Vaughan Williams. is quite a journey. is definitely a journey and it was formed into a beautiful, absolutely stunning orchestral piece. And I played that as part of an orchestra that I belonged to and again fell in love with the book of Job and the content there and the things that God was trying to say to us through it. So if you've never listened to Job by Vaughan Williams, I fully recommend that. great. Beautiful. Yeah, we love recommendations. you go. Okay, so you both engaged with these things in your own special ways, guess, as we all have, guess, in some ways. they... Top question really in my mind is, know, these were written, as Peter's already said, like thousands of years ago, in a very different culture, right? So, this is... We're sort of reading them and I guess some of them might feel like kind of relevant, but surely this is not as a book still relevant to us now, right? Well, do you know what I think it is? Because I think that deep down human beings haven't actually changed that much in all of those years. You know, we still battle with pride or envy or we still say things that we shouldn't say and Proverbs speaks to that. We still, we need to know things about work. We need to address the subject of suffering. We want to talk about sex and family life and parenting and the book of Proverbs addresses all of these things and actually I think those questions have remained the same through the millennia. Human beings are human beings and we haven't changed that much. Okay, that's fair enough. So, nothing stands out as being completely jarring to our modern culture, think? Or are there some things that we have to take with a little I you can read bits of the proverbs and they're quite written in maybe an agricultural context or they're written in a time and place where the details, they sound a little bit foreign to our ears. But if you go... okay what's the principle that's portrayed there and then you can very very easily kind of think there's some eternal moral or kind of wisdom principle that can just be applied to today for us. I think that's probably one of the things that you might do. Certainly there's a random proverb like don't move an ancient boundary stone that was set up by your ancestors. You think well I don't come across many boundary stones set up by my ancestors but it was the idea that you could have a of a slightly corrupt approach to your border of your property. You can just shift your boundary stone, do a bit of a land grab. And it's just, is there a principle that you're trying to get away with something in secret that will benefit you, but it's not the right thing to do. So the principle may be act with integrity. Don't try and bend the rules to favor you. Although we're not going to be shifting boundary stones because that's not how it works. You've got land titles for property. And it's just- if I move my fence. I think my neighbour might get Well there you go. So the principle is I don't want to try and get away with like getting another couple of feet of garden because I want, but it's not just about property. It's like that principle of can I get away with something that's going to benefit me but it's going to damage somebody else. That's probably the principle. So I think you've got to probably come with a lens to recognise there could be some stuff here that is initially at first reading a little bit like how do I take that but sit with it bit longer and say are there some principles here that have got this reach into my story and to our culture and our moment. And I think very often you can find that. And sometimes looking at the Bible in a couple of different translations can help with that process of making sense of that. mean, that might be a dictionary corner type thing to help us with that. But that's sometimes a way that you can help connect the wisdom and say, how might that show up today in what I'm facing? okay. One of the things I guess I mentioned earlier, and my in a modern context sound a little weird is that fear of God, which is mentioned a few times in the Proverbs. And nowadays we kind of see God as a, or Christianity is quite a happy, clappy kind of scenario, maybe you shouldn't be loving everybody and so on and so forth. So how does that fear of God, well, firstly, how is it referenced? Maybe we could, Pete, I don't know if you've got, could pull up that quote, one of those verses so we can hear it. But also, what does it actually mean by the fear of God? Go on, Pete, have you got that one? Yes, so this is Proverbs chapter 9 verse 10, which says, fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. For through me, your days will be many and your years will be added to your life. If you are wise, your wisdom will reward you. If you're a mocker, you alone will suffer. OK, that starts very much at fear of God is the root for wisdom, of, root one. And as a teenager, that probably, you know, it's kind of frames the whole Bible where if you don't do what's in the Bible, then you better watch out, right? Is that what it's meaning? Well, I think it's probably about ultimate reverence and respect. Where is your point of reference for life? There's another bit that doesn't, it's not quite the fear of the Lord verse that you just referenced there but there's a bit in Proverbs chapter 3 verses 5 and it's taking that idea of fear to the next step to say how does this show up and it says this, plus in the Lord with all of your heart and lean not on your own understanding in all your ways submit to him or acknowledge him and then he will direct your path don't be wise in your own eyes fear the Lord and shun evil so it's a similar themes there and I think it's trying to lean into where is your and source of authority. What is the epicenter of the thing that's going to influence you? So for example, you're doing life, you've got a bunch of life choices around finances, relationship, temptation, whatever it might be. Is it in that moment going to be simply my family of origin that's going to be the thing that will just instinctively shape my choices? Or is it going to be my peer group? Or is it going to be what I see on social media? Or is it going to be my my initial emotional response that's going to be what takes my next step or is the ultimate point of reference in that moment when I have a life choice in whatever domain it might be. Am I pausing enough to go, I want God to shape my best choice and response right now and I'm allowing my respect for him to slow my instinct that I actually try and make a decision that would please God, that is actually aligned with the stuff that he's captured for me in advance that is laced with love and it's trying to help me navigate that moment well. Because I could have a dysfunctional background or a great background. I could have great friends or bad friends. I could have a good response emotionally or a bad response. But there's something that's stable that God's trying to capture in the wisdom literature. So that in those moments, whatever my back story is, that my responses can be shaped by him. So the fear of the Lord is about saying, I'm going to recognize that my instincts could be all over the place, but you've probably got some principles and some love and some wisdom for me that might help me navigate that. I think that's what it's getting at. And that's what I think maybe that Proverbs three thing is trying to expand a little bit in people's imagination. I just add, I think really the fear of the Lord, like the word fear, it's not like a scary fear. I think it's more referring to like a reverence and a reverence for God. And it's basically saying that wisdom doesn't begin with Me knowing and thinking I've got it all together wisdom begins with me being humble and recognizing that actually I don't have the answer for everything I'm not the center of the universe and and the wisdom piece comes in and lots of the Proverbs by recognizing there is a moral shape to life which God has formed and so Fear of the Lord. It's not like I'm I'm scared of him. I'm fearful of him It's more like a you know, I I trust that he's got a better plan for my life than maybe I could figure out on my own. Fair enough. Okay. Well, that's good to clear up then. Got that right? Yeah, well, I hope so. It'd be good. So, Pete's done a good job of going through what Proverbs is as far as when it was written and that's structured to it and what's contained. let's actually explore the types of themes that I sort of put across in the book because there's a lot of... I don't know how many there are. Maybe we could Google that at some point how many proverbs there actually are. But there's quite a lot of them. But they do kind of come in sort of different types of themes. Is that right, Rosie? Yeah, definitely. Yeah, definitely. I think there are... I've got about six different themes that I've kind of pulled out when I've read the proverbs recently. things like it's about character over cleverness. So it's not about me being super clever. It's about integrity and humility and self-control and faithfulness and teachability more than me being impressive. So that would be one thing, character over cleverness. Then there's lots of stuff in the Proverbs about our words having power. It says, for example, in Proverbs 18 and verse 21, death and life are in the power of the tongue. So speech can heal or speech can harm, and how we listen and how we restrain ourselves is actually marks of wisdom. So that would be a second thing. Then there's loads of stuff about work and money and generosity. So like diligence is valued, but so is justice and so is contentment and so is care for the poor. So it says things like lazy hands make for poverty, but diligent hands bring wealth. So work and money and generosity. there's a very practical thing, isn't it? It's very practical. Absolutely. you work hard, you are more likely to be successful. Absolutely. Yeah. And if you what's that? What's that word that proverb you like about? about being a sluggard Proverbs chapter 6, go to the ant you sluggard, consider its ways and be wise. You know don't know what sort of chapter friends are going you sluggard but it's it's commending industry. mean just kind of jumping in here. think it's important to clock that the Proverbs isn't like these cast iron promises that you can simply say it says it there therefore it always pans out that way. I think it's probably principles that the patterns of life Normally show up this way if you apply this stuff consistently, so I don't think it's simplistic boom every single situation that pans out that way but Principles and patterns you get pattern recognition and if you actually consistently try and live within these wisdom kind of Stuff then it then it's almost like principles that tend to show up as opposed to cast-iron promises that can be a bit too Simplistically applied, but I think the the direction of travel and sorry. Well, I am I I like to listen to podcasts about investing, how to invest. One of those days I might actually have some money to invest. And then they talk about all these different principles about how to invest. as with all of these, if you're out of it about investment, in the fine print it always says, you could lose all your money. There's no guarantee of the outcome. However, if you invest in these sort of ways, then you are more likely to be successful. And I guess in some ways it's like if you invest in your life, in these manners you are more likely to be successful in the ways that would like to be. You're massively changing the Changing the odds, right? Right, yeah, you're going to be happy, you're to be in good relationships, so on and so forth. on, Rosie, carry on. A couple more kind of groupings. So there's loads of stuff about relationships, about wisdom, about choosing good companions, about handling conflict really well, about being loyal, about avoiding gossip. It says walk with the wise and become wise. That's in Proverbs chapter 13 and verse 20. Then there's loads of stuff about justice, about wisdom not being about being successful privately, including how to deal honestly and being concerned for people with less power in life. And then lastly, there's a whole section of stuff about limits and mystery. We find that particularly in the books of Ecclesiastes and Job, that actually it's saying that living in a particular way doesn't necessarily guarantee an easy life. We can't control everything and faith sometimes means like living faithfully amidst... questions that are unanswered. I reckon there's no easy route to any of this. I don't think there's an easy route. I think we just have to faithfully hold on to the truth. Put one foot in front of another sometimes. Even more we don't get the answer that we want. that's okay. Yeah, which is very helpful in those times that are difficult because times that are difficult do usually come around. If you've got no sort of anchor to rest on then that's... I think in times of pressure and difficulty we're probably more prone to making choices that could damage us even in those because our bearings are thrown and so I think life happens, stuff happens and often that can expose, it just can really strain us and then that's not always when we make our best responses and so what gives me the compass to navigate through those moments and I think that's what, I think God Fundamentally, God is love and God is for us and he's trying to capture in proverbs things that will help us if we, you know, that thing of submitting to God and trying to not just go our own way, but trying to come his way. I think that's the heart behind it. It's like a dad trying to talk to a son and saying, okay, keep on track, son. That's what I want for you or a mother talking to a daughter. Yeah. Brilliant. Well, in a minute, we're going to ask the audience what their favourite proverbs are during the break. But I think let's start off with what I'm going to give you guys first dibs on any favorite proverbs that you might have. So do you any come immediately to mind? Rosie, how about you? Well, one of my favorites is guard your heart above all else for it's the wellspring of life. And I think that just talks about making sure that stuff doesn't take root in your heart that's not healthy. It's about being emotionally intelligent, if you like, knowing the things that are going to trigger you, knowing the things that are going to upset you and just being able to deal with those things before they bubble out inappropriately. Brilliant. Yeah, that's a great, great one to kick off with. Andrew, can you beat that? I can't beat it, but I can compliment it. Proverbs 13, 20. I just love this one. Walk with the wise and become wise for a companion of fool. A companion of fool suffers harm. And I think it's that invitation to I suppose a posture of humility to recognize that there are people in your life, maybe a life stage ahead or peers that have got life skills, wisdom to impart and pick your friends wisely because actually who you choose to get counsel from can massively impact your life. We've had this thing where we've tried to clock people in a different life stage or maybe in a you know, different cultural background or different part of the country who just seem to be doing the things that we feel drawn to. We'd love to be you know, have a good marriage, be good parents and they seem to be a step ahead and they seem to be embodying qualities that we're not quite there yet but they're further on and so I think intentionally seeking out those people and saying hey if you were in our life stage what would you do? whole hanging out with wise people and then it kind of can rub off by osmosis because you've just been humble enough to seek those people out so that one. Yeah. Hey a companion of fools suffers harm but what would the wise and become wise? That's my favourite. There we go. Hopefully the people listening to this podcast can feel like they've got this wisdom just rubbing off. Don't know about that but let's see. I want to hear from I want to hear from the crowd here tonight. You've got a favourite proverb. We will do all of that after break. okay. Right, so thank you very much guys and we will see you in a little while. Welcome back to Bible After Hours. we've had a bit of a break and in that break our audience have been listing some of their own favourite Proverbs and we have a list of them in front of us. And there's some crackers, it's fair to say. Pete, have you chosen a particular one or two that caught your attention? From the ones that people have submitted? Yeah. Well, let's read through what people have submitted as their favourite Proverbs. So someone has put a Proverbs 27 verse 15 which says in this translation, nagging spouse is like the drip, drip, drip of a leaky faucet. You can't turn it off and you can't get away from it. wow. Hopefully there's no married couples in the audience who's trying to get a jab at each other here. It's a well-known one and often, yeah. Someone has put a reference to another proverb which is quite similar. really? Which is I think it's 25 verse 24 which says and this is one of those proverbs that you might you're allowed to possibly smile at it says better to live on the corner of the roof than to share a house with a quarrelsome wife. There's a of a theme going on here isn't there? Someone has picked these verses on purpose I think. someone had a row with their spouse before they came out. Yeah quite possibly right. I mean, but it's fair comment. think you don't want to live in a house where you're the person and that is just having to go at you the whole time, right? I mean, that's that was I reckon cavemen were having the same problem. You know, they just don't want to share the same space as the person who's nagging at them the whole time. It transcends all generations. think I think it's interesting because one of the questions that has been asked, we're going to come back to later on is about how does the Bible speak to me in my situation? when it doesn't seem to say anything that relates to me or my situation is very different to the Bible. And what you've done there, Luke, is you've actually you've looked at some of the principles from that perhaps patriarchal context and said, do I kind of, you know, how do I apply this? And you've instantly taken it as a spouse rather than just wife. And actually principles there of, you know, it's difficult when you're living in a relationship where things are hard. and what can you do about that in a way that is wise moving forwards. And so there are some principles there, perhaps be careful who you marry if you choose to marry, think about it, don't dive in there on your own behaviour. And reflect on your behaviour as well. I the nagging person? So there is a bit of a skill of application and interpretation to the Bible passage there. We've got another one here. And there is of course the challenge of that of is nagging the best translation of that. of that Hebrew word. of the verses, some Bible translations have got it as quarrelsome, some say a wife of contention. There are different ways of translating it. We'd need to go back and do some digging with a bit more scholarly academic approach to what the best translation is there. But either way it's not that complementary. No, it's not that complementary, but I think contentious is, you know, sometimes we need someone to kind of nag us and put us in the right direction, whereas quarrelling sounds worse, doesn't it, I think? Definitely. I like this one somebody said as a door turns on its hinges so a sluggard turns on his bed. That's sluggard again coming in. It says on his bed as well. And I think that's one of the places where having a not inclusive translation that refers to the man as a sluggard is something that we should definitely appreciate. Is there a feminine version of a sluggard? I think not. Fair enough. Yeah, never needed for translation for that one. Brilliant, well there's some good ones there. think that is that most of them there? Observe people who are good at their work. Skilled workers are always in demand and admired. They don't take a back seat to anyone. Proverbs 22, 29 from the Message Translation. Wow! That's a cracker that is, isn't it? yeah, So I thought maybe we could make up our own proverb. You know, I'd be good to have a go at that. So before the start of the podcast, asked everybody to have a little think about. their own potential proverb they could come up with from their own life experiences. So on that basis, I'm going to kick it off as it's only fair. So I like mountain biking. It's a firm favourite of mine. Not particularly good at it and have only sort of really learned the processes as I've gone. And so off the back of that, I would say my proverb is something like, my child breaks on a bike. I your friend. You must learn when to go faster and when to break, otherwise you'll end up on your ass. There was a chance for a play on words there, wasn't there, with a different spelling of break. Learn to break or you will break You'll be broken indeed. I think that might get included in the casual English Bible. I think it's a modern classic in the making there. Rosie, do you have one? Well, I've got two actually, if you'll permit me. I came back to the fact that I like to play my violin. So I came up with wisdom knows not only what notes to play, but when to play it. Because I thought that could actually go back to my speech examples of not knowing just what to say, but when it's the right time to say it, or when it's the right time to be quiet. My other one was as a harsh bow can spoil a beautiful violin, so careless words can spoil a good conversation. There you are. Beat that Andrew, beat that. I feel a little bit intimidated. I had a go, I was thinking about some of the proverbs that are like in wider culture and so I remember Stephen Covey, wrote a book, Seven Habits of Unlustful People and he did a few in there that were like sharpen the saw, in other words, do some self care before you take on a task because you might be more effective. He talked about the win-win language. And I've seen that win-win language used in trying to get a win-win in a negotiation. But it's often people try and move towards that. But you then sort of fudge the thing that needs to be dealt with sometimes, and you don't actually confront the issue. And so I thought, get to the win, but don't be a wimp. In other words, don't avoid the thing that needs to be confronted in a situation. You're still trying to get a positive result, but don't do that at the expense of addressing some of the things that need to be addressed, either in you, in the other person, or in the situation. It's not profound, it's not like these guys. It's very good, so don't avoid the hard stuff. Yeah, basically. But still try and get a positive result, but without avoidance. Right, great. Well, as you guys briefly mentioned at the beginning, you guys have got two daughters. Now fully grown adults. Well done. Congratulations for getting them that far. Thank you. I'm still working on that. I've got three kids that are still sort of, you know, bringing them up to adulthood. And what I thought would be good to start off with is how can you... Can you take any wisdom from the Proverbs as a sort of a guidance for a young adult making their way into the big wide world? What would you sort of say or summarize from Proverbs as a starter for 10 for them in that new life that they've got? So Rosie, have you got any thoughts on I actually love this question because I think that there is so much wisdom in this book of Proverbs for people that are just starting out. We absolutely loved parenting teenagers and I feel like... during our kids' teenage years, we were able to pull out loads of biblical wisdom for them as they started out on their adult life. So again, I've kind of pulled out five different things that I think I would want to say. If my daughters were just leaving home now, I would be saying these five things. Firstly, I would be saying, if you want to be wise, it's less about getting every single decision right along the way. And it's more about becoming the kind of person who can make those good decisions over time. So it's okay to not get everything right first time, but it's more important to become the kind of person who learns how to make good decisions. And that kind of goes back to Andrew's ones about like walking with the wise and becoming wise. surround yourself with people who can help you make good decisions. And just on that one, I think the proverbs talks a lot about apply your heart to understanding, reflect on this. It's like it's an invitation to be reflective in light. which is both applying your heart to what you've experienced, also what you've seen others experience. So I think we can sometimes avoid certain moments of pain or trauma if we block how maybe others have handled moments, or we can also upskill ourselves in terms of having a wise route through by observing closely. So I think that thing about becoming a person who's making more wise decisions is it doesn't happen unintentionally. So reflection, consideration, being curious and humble are things that probably increase the probability of some good decisions showing up. Yeah, and so off the back of that one, one of the things that Proverbs repeatedly does is it commends humility and teachability. listening before you assume that you know the answers, seeking wise counsel, actually being willing to change your mind, not assuming you've got it all right first time. And that actually matters enormously at the beginning of adult life when As we all know, confidence can sometimes exceed experience. And so there's a proverb that says, plans fail when you don't take wise advice, which kind of nails the point, doesn't it? Plans fail when you don't take wise advice. And then the third thing I kind of pulled out was a proverb says that a gentle answer can turn away anger and that words have the power of life and death. So in a world of instant messaging, social media, Facebook, Instagram, quick reactions, YouTube, learning when to speak, when to listen, when to post, when not to, when not to send a message, when not to fire something off at the end of an evening when you're tired or you've had too many to drink. It's a practical form of wisdom. So learning when to speak, learning how to handle social media, really, really important. The prophet has got a lot to say about that. Fourthly, integrity, mass is about integrity. doing what you say you're going to do, being honest when nobody's watching, resisting the temptation to take shortcuts because Proverbs says things like, whoever walks in integrity walks securely, but people who take crooked paths will be found out. It's that in chapter 10 and verse 9. The Proverbs, it doesn't promise that integrity is always the quickest route to success, but it does argue for building a life that's full of integrity that you can actually stand on and build. putting in good foundations of truth and trust and truthfulness. I think I've got another one. I think in terms of the financial space, I think there can be quite a despair around young adults and economic future just because the world feels pretty bleak sometimes. But I think there's some helpful proverbs. One of the ones that I like is this honest money windows away, but whoever gains money little by little makes it grow and you were talking about investing earlier. I think some principles whether you look at Martin Lewis we look at like a rebel finance that podcast that's a pretty big traction or other stuff in the financial wisdom space there's nothing that's there that you won't find the Book of Proverbs there's actually long-term really yeah most of it is around live within financial margin don't get the lifestyle inflation and so I think one of the one of the spaces where we can show up is actually what does If my budget or my income is really small or growing a little bit, how do I live with some financial margin? Try and get that as a principle. Because if you cast your mind back to how you managed to survive as a student with the income there, get your first job, it's easy to let lifestyle match the level of income. Try and go, what does financial wisdom look like? Because little decisions that people start to show up with in their late teens, 20s can really compound effect in a positive way or negative way over 10, 15, 20 years. That'd be another domain that I think is a wisdom space. The proverb says a lot. doesn't say you're gonna get rich quick, say that at all, but it does say there are some things that you could have in your lifestyle choices that could really damage your stability or your financial future. Some of it is industry, working hard, valuing work, but there's a lot specifically about money and resources and how use them well. Great, Rosie, list those again that you've done so far. I've one more that we haven't mentioned. Yeah, go The last one was that, have you ever noticed that the people that you hang out with kind of shape what you consider to be normal? So if you hang out with really grumpy people, you can become a bit grumpy yourself. Or if you hang out with people that are really cynical about marriage or relationships, then you can very easily become cynical about those things yourself. Well, one of the things that Proverbs says is walk with the wise and become wise. And I think I'd say to young people who are leaving home right now, that choosing your friends and choosing the communities that you hang out with are one of the most important and consequential choices that young adults can make. So choose friends that want to be good and kind and courageous rather than cynical, drunk, or any other negative thing that you can think of. Because the people that we hang out with, influence the way that we think. They influence our attitudes, they influence our opinions, and ultimately they influence the choices that we make. So that would be my fifth thing. Give me the five again then, just sort of reference. are, it's not about getting every decision right, but it's about becoming the kind of person that makes good decisions. It's about being humble and teachable, knowing when to speak and when to fire off stuff on social media, being integrous, and choosing your community well. Yeah, great. I wonder if your daughters are listening to this now and going, why didn't they? You can tell me this stuff somewhere. I think I'll be saying those are exactly the things that mum and dad said. Get them on a podcast. might say it's all can invite them on a podcast. Yeah, well, absolutely. The invite is there laid down. There you go, Beth and Esther, you've got an invite. But I wonder the, so like what does the proverb say to, you know, modern society I think has a different set of values that they often put forward as the sort of important things like individualism and doing the things that make you feel that is right, right? And then sort of being a success and yes, putting value into money and to position and to relationships and sex and, know, having the odd gossip in here and that kind of stuff, that all sort of feels like quite a what society nowadays is saying these are positive things to do. I mean, from what I've heard so far, Proverbs has a very different slant on that, but Andrew, is there more we can say about that? Well, I think there is a different story, like, being portrayed in the Book of Proverbs. think some of those things, they feel very normal, kind of what a lot of people are doing, but what does that do when it becomes embedded in your life? What does that do three, five, ten years down the line, basically? And I think the... Proverbs, it's interesting, some of the stuff that's there is the illustration of a dad talking to a son. It's not like a person talking through a crowded room. It's like this up close and personal, I've got a vested interest in you over time becoming the best you can be. And so there's no other kind of agenda other than the father speaking to a son because he wants his son to pan out well over time. I think sometimes when we read the book of Proverbs, I think that the way to think it is it's like maybe God, our Father, is trying to get through to us as sons and daughters in his family. That's the invitation, because he wants us to live the life that he's called us to live, basically. So I think it's counter-cultural, and it's sometimes jars, but I think it's in the same way that you literally see in the first bits anyway, a father talking to a son, trying to give them life advice so that it saves some pain. I think ultimately it's God inviting us into a relationship where he wants us to live a life that he's designed for us. And it's not pain free, but it's navigating it in the best way possible with him resourcing us and supporting us. But even though that could be counter-cultural to a lot of the things that we might think are instinctive or even very prevalent in our animals. Very tough. moving on in the same theme really. So we've talked about proverbs that you might sort of tell your children as they're growing up. But are there proverbs that you yourselves have valued above others? in the way that you live your own lives that you would say, know, these are the sort of things that I really see. I'm assuming all the things you've just said would be in that list, but are there particular things that stand out as like, we definitely try and live our lives by these particular things. Rosie, how about you? I think for me, the proverbs around speech are probably the most important ones because when I was, well, when we first got together, I wasn't as good as at taming the tongue. I am right now and I used to dig myself into all kinds of holes get myself in all manner of manner of trouble right I had bruised shins a few times from Andrew kicking me under the table and I was launching out on a Path I shouldn't be talking about and he'd be like he wants to save me the pain Yeah, but I've learned which is tricky when you're you're both church leaders, right? that yeah, it's a bit tricky. You've got this pain I've learned over the years actually the power of our tongue and the power of aiming our tongue and and being very careful by very careful what we say and so some of my favorite problems will be around speech it'd be things like the soothing tongue is a tree of life but a perverse tongue crushes the spirit or a gentle answer turns away wrath you know if we if we learn to speak gently if we learn to speak kindly if we learn to not gossip hold confidence is it builds relationships it might lower the temperature when conversation gets a little bit heated. There's tremendous power to do good, to soothe, to heal, also to do negative things with our tongues. It's such a powerful part of the body and the proverb speaks massively into that. So does the Book of James actually. But proverbs particularly is full of really powerful the proverb you were just looking at bit earlier about power of life death? Is that on your screen? It's here somewhere, I think it's another proverb. tongue has the power of life and death. It's a bit like the proverb in James that is similar about a whole ship is steered by a little tiny rudder. And I think, think recognizing that that's one of those spaces where we've tried to not just keep away from the negative, destructive, gossip, unkind stuff, that will be the emission of damaging, dysfunctional crank stuff, but then stepping into the presence of using our speech to... to empower, to bless, to strengthen. I think there's a place that if you're privileged to be in a friendship or relationship or a parent, you have a unique space to speak value and encouragement and a good future over those that you're in close proximity with. You can do that as a parent in a natural family. But also, if you have any position of power in a workplace or a church environment or in a family or in any other space, you still have that power to let those words not only It's not just the admission, I'm not going to do negative stuff, but I'm going to move towards being a person of encouragement. And that's just powerful that you can see someone's story change by the way you're showing up and using your words wisely. But that's probably a space that we found really bad. And even things like there's a proverb that says answering before listening is folly. It's all about interpersonal relationships. It's about listening well and not jumping in thinking that you know the answer before you've heard the other person. Yeah, it's amazing how... These are so relevant really. think we talked about that this is like thousands of years old, but in reality humans, as you say, haven't changed. And the way they interact and talk to each other hasn't really changed. We've all got online, we've all got how we can social media and all that kind of stuff now, but it just enhances the same things that have always gone on for long time. Is there anything else, Andrew, that you sort of try and steer your life through, particularly with the Proverbs, any other? I think there's some themes in the Proverbs around generosity. which I think applies to money, but I think it's a posture. It's a sort of a posture to try and say, I'm going to be generous with compliments, encouragement, with the spaces that we're responsible for, with our home, with our time. I think that theme seems to flow through. A generous person is himself blessed. He refreshes others, will himself be refreshed. And so that's been something we've tried to let characterize how we do life, how we do relationships, being generous, how we describe a person. kindness but also any resource that we have which is our power to say something, the resource we have, our bank balance, our home. I think that's a posture that we've never regretted a generous decision. Because I think it often opens things up in a person's I mean Jesus in the New Testament said it's more blessed to give than receive and I think there's a joy that you can try to live a generous life. Any resource you have, time, energy, money, resource, home, know, compliments, all of that. All of that stuff is a resource you can be generous with and that's something that's kind of a theme that we're trying to learn and make sense of. Throughout our marriage, right? Yeah, trying to make sense of that. Yeah, right. Well, you mentioned Jesus and I think a Bible podcast is not a Bible podcast unless Jesus is mentioned at least a few times. is there a... Do we should be looking at the Proverbs in a different way? Obviously, the Proverbs were written before Jesus was around, right? So, he maybe references some of the Proverbs as well, but... Do we look at the Proverbs in any different way, having the lens of the New Testament now, or is it just pretty much as is? That's a great question. I think one way you could read the Proverbs is it's just a bunch of self-help, try harder type stuff. And that isn't the heart of it. I think the invitation of the Proverbs is to try and show a bit of a spotlight on this is God trying to give wisdom for life. But our ability to fully live that invitation to go a different path is not just about self-effort and just trying harder. There is something about our lives needing to, that one that I mentioned, trust in the Lord with all your heart, in the Proverbs 3, submit to God in all your ways or direct your path. That submitting is probably recognized the path for us is lived out as we say yes to Jesus. so Bible talks about Jesus being the wisdom of God. And actually when you see how Jesus interacts with people, how dealt with those in authority, the poor, how he dealt with temptation and people, he's the embodiment of God's wisdom, planet Earth in a person. And we're called to follow him. And so I think it's principles and it's standbites and it's all the other stuff we've spoken about, but it ultimately points to the opportunity for a relationship. and Jesus embodies the wisdom of God. So I think that's those two things come together, is the embodiment. I think I wouldn't want someone to come away with sound bites and try harder, that would feel like we've missed something. There's good stuff that you could take whether you're a person of faith or not that could really enrich your life in the book of Proverbs, but I think the invitation is to that relational dynamic that's there, particularly mentioned in the first few chapters, the ultimate invitation is to relationship with God and us. and give us new life. Okay, that's very good point. Well, I think we're going to finish off with one last question. So we've talked about advice and you give to your children and the things the way that you've lived. I wonder, you've obviously spent a long time guiding people through your roles as church pastors and you've seen hundreds, if not thousands of people go through your doors and... live life well and maybe not quite so well. Have you seen particularly any people live through proverbs very well? you picked up particularly, these guys have it amazingly, that we can maybe hear about that as well? That'd be great. I'll give a couple. think for me, they talk about when you talk about best to get this compound effect that over time things kind of grow in your favour. It's like what If you have a pension, the idea is you save a little bit and then over time that kind of compound interest, it grows, becomes a big figure. I think little choices have a compound interest effect. They sort of show up over time. And I think the spaces where we've seen particularly who've embodied wisdom, in a couple of areas it would be particularly in the interpersonal space, relational skills, contained restraint with speech, using speech to be powerful and bless other people. interpersonal stuff, what you might call soft skills, I think I've seen people walk that way of wisdom and their soft skills or their interpersonal handling people, complexity, different situations well, that often becomes a bit of a differentiator in the workplace. So I've seen plenty of people who've just become more wise and their ability to show up well, deal with complexity, do that honoring in a helpful way. that often are qualities that get seen and valued and promoted in the workplace. So very often we've seen people have very senior roles in different spaces and that's been one of the expressions of wisdom. I'm not saying if you don't get promoted you're not wise, so don't hear me say that, but I've definitely seen an accelerator in terms of wisdom showing up in interpersonal stuff, complexity, people skills, that's definitely one space. Yeah and we've seen the opposite as well, you know, we've seen people that have made poor choices. And for example, there's a lot of stuff in the book of Proverbs about faithfulness to your spouse. And we've really sadly seen some examples where that hasn't been the case and it's just caused hurt and pain, which is exactly what it says it's going to do in the book of Proverbs. So, you know, we've seen people who've lived out through small choices, this cumulative effect of living a life focused on God and his design. And we've seen the other side of that coin as well, which is Just maybe I finish with an illustration, you know in the athletic realm We're really comfortable with the idea of sacrifice and pain in certain domains of life to be able to you know An athlete has no problem embracing Restraint and sacrifice and discipline to achieve a personal best. Yep And I think some of what the Proverbs is is saying your instinct might be to you know do X Y and Z but but don't go that route because the personal best and the way that God wants you to live life is by embracing restraint discipline and a path that isn't instinctive every time, but that choice over time will allow you to live God's best for you in the same way that an athlete embraces sacrifice, self-control, cost, because they know that's the route to get to what they're meant to do in life. And I think there are parallels there in the book of Proverbs. that make sense? Yeah, yeah, definitely. Well, we've done a rapid tour. all the way through Proverbs and all of your vast experience in this space and life experience but that's been hugely sort of informative so thank you so much for joining us and Pete thanks as always mate it's been good it's been good. Do want some references? we've had some... on, go for it. The proverb about the tongue having the power of life and death is Proverbs 18 verse 21. The proverb about answer before you listen... that's folly is Proverbs 18 verse 13. The question about Jesus and the Proverbs, there's a few places where he kind of echoes, relates things using the same ideas, but there are Proverbs that are quoted in the New Testament like Proverbs 3 verse 33 says God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble and that's quoted in James chapter 4 verse 6 and in 1 Peter chapter 5 verse 5 which is quoted twice that proverb in the New Testament including in 1 Peter which is a great book for quoting the Old Testament in some people's opinions. But yeah, there's just some references to support some of those. Thanks for that Pete. Well, if you are interested in this topic, I would recommend going to church. It's a good place to start. Or check out an alpha as well if you've never come across this sort of stuff before. So yeah, there we go. I'm going to finish off, usually I finish off with a prayer, but I thought I'd finish off with a verse. Pete, you mentioned James. Can I lobby one thing? Go on, yeah, Andrew. I listen to I hope other people enjoy this one. I listen to podcasts, generosity podcasts, and there's a chap called Gary Grant who started the chain of toy shops. He became a Christian and actually for him, as he became a Christian, the book that he connected with most, the book of Proverbs, just business leader, busy guy, he just found there was some helpful stuff in there. he talked about how reading the Proverbs as his first start in this newfound faith or inquiry about faith helped him just have some doable ways of taking some of God's wisdom and applying it. And he tells his story about business over a 20 year period. But if you're interested, you can just search Gary Grant, entertain their podcast. You'll find some great stuff out. Thanks for the heads up on that one. Brilliant. We'll finish off with James one verse five, which says, but if any of you lack wisdom, you should pray to God who will give it to you because God gives generously and graciously to all. There you are, that's a good place to start. If you feel like you lack wisdom, pray and read the Proverbs and then we can go on from there. Well, we're going to move into a Q &A, but for those who are listening online, this is where we'll draw a line on the thing. So thank you very much for your time and attention everybody.

Proverbs 16:8 Proverbs 16:13 Proverbs 16:5 Proverbs 9:10 Proverbs 3:5 Proverbs 6 · chapter mention Proverbs 13 · chapter mention Proverbs 27:15 Proverbs 18:21 Proverbs 18:13 Proverbs 3:33 James 4:6 1 Peter 5:5