Wisdom is Calling - Select Chapters from The Path of Wisdom: With Me are Life and Blessing

The Lord expects us to believe in him, to accept his everlasting gospel, and to live in harmony with his terms and conditions.

It is not our province to select and obey those gospel principles which appeal to us and forget the rest. It is not our prerogative to decide that some principles no longer apply to our social and cultural circumstances. He expects us to cleave unto every true principle, to put first in our lives the things of his kingdom, to press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, and to serve him with all our might, mind, and strength. In the language of the scriptures, let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: I often think, and I suppose you do, too, of that great and wonderful discourse—the greatest that was ever preached, so far as we know—which we call the Sermon on the Mount.

That will not come all at once, but line upon line and precept upon precept, example upon example, and even then not as long as we live in this mortal life, for we will have to go even beyond the grave before we reach that perfection and shall be like God. But here we lay the foundation. Here is where we are taught these simple truths of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, in this probationary state, to prepare us for that perfection. It is my duty, it is yours, to be better today than I was yesterday, and for you to be better today than you were yesterday, and better tomorrow than you were today.

Because we are on that road, if we are keeping the commandments of the Lord, we are on that road to perfection, and that can only come through obedience and the desire in our hearts to overcome the world. If a man feels that it is hard for him to pay his tithing , then that is the thing he should do, until he learns to pay his tithing.

If it is the Word of Wisdom, that is what he should do, until he learns to love that commandment. To please [the Lord], we must not only worship him with thanksgiving and praise, but render willing obedience to his commandments. God has given unto us [commandments] that we might grow nearer unto Him and be built up in the faith and strengthened. No commandment, at any time, has He given us, that was not for our comfort and blessing. They are not given merely to please the Lord, but to make us better men and women, and worthy of salvation and exaltation in His kingdom.

If we go into the temple we raise our hands and covenant that we will serve the Lord and observe his commandments and keep ourselves unspotted from the world. If we realize what we are doing then the endowment will be a protection to us all our lives—a protection which a man who does not go to the temple does not have. I have heard my father say that in the hour of trial, in the hour of temptation, he would think of the promises, the covenants that he made in the House of the Lord, and they were a protection to him.

They save us now and they exalt us hereafter, if we will honor them. I know that this protection is given for I, too, have realized it, as have thousands of others who have remembered their obligations. The Lord will give us gifts. He will quicken our minds. He will give us knowledge that will clear up all difficulties and put us in harmony with the commandments that he has given us; he will give us a knowledge that will be so deeply rooted in our souls that it can never be rooted out, if we will just seek for the light and the truth and the understanding that are promised to us and that we can receive if we will only be true and faithful to every covenant and obligation pertaining to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

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Through obedience to those commandments which are set forth in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and by continuance therein, we shall receive immortality , glory, eternal life, and dwell in the presence of God the Father and his Son Jesus Christ, where we shall truly know them. If we will walk in paths of virtue and holiness, the Lord will pour out his blessings upon us to a degree we have never supposed possible.

And we will be peculiar because we will not be like other people who do not live up to these standards. As servants of the Lord, our purpose is to walk in the path he has charted for us. We not only desire to do and say what will please him, but we seek so to live that our lives will be like his.

He himself set the perfect example for us in all things and said to us: More on the NIV. Print Twitter Facebook Email. Click the button below to continue. Step 1 - Create an account or log in to start your free trial.

Three easy steps to start your free trial subscription to Bible Gateway Plus. Create or log in to your Bible Gateway account. Enter your credit card information to ensure uninterrupted service following your free trial. Begin reading God's Word ad-free with instant access to your new online study library. She knows that it pays to advertise. Her methods are no different, and not one whit inferior, to those of the most sophisticated advertising agency. Basically she appeals to the fleshly desires of her victim. She offers him a sumptuous meal and a sexual encounter which matches his wildest fantasies.

Proverbs Chapter 2

She assures him that there is no danger of being caught. She emphasizes momentary, short-lived pleasure, and minimizes long-range consequences. Have you consciously analyzed the advertising on the billboards and television screen lately? Everything from deodorant to dishwashing soap is sold by women who are clad in sensual garb, who appeal to our basest appetites. We are encouraged to satisfy our desires now, and not to wait until later. Madison Avenue and Madam Folly both would have us live today as though there were no tomorrow, offering us short-term thrills at very painful and long-term prices.

Taking these two women, Dame Wisdom and Madam Folly, on face value, there is one lesson we should learn: The priority of sexual purity. Solomon knew that there were few dangers greater than that of sexual impurity. He and the other writers of Proverbs had much to say on this subject. Foreign women were a snare to Samson Judges and to the nation of Israel Numbers Sexual purity is a priority for those who would be godly and wise. Proverbs reminds parents that we should not be prudish about teaching our children candidly the dangers of sexual sin.

Sex is spoken of openly, yet discreetly. If we have reservations about our children learning about sex on the street or in the school, let us be sure that we do as this wise father did, who taught his son about the kind of women who should be sought, as well as those who should be shunned.

I am the father of five daughters. I do not have sons who need this warning. But the teaching of Proverbs is just as relevant to my daughters. The world is reinforcing the model of Madam Folly. The popular movie stars, the glamorous models, the women who advertise--all are those whose moral life is sinful, and whose wiles and flattery are like that of Madam Folly.

Girls are told that they can find approval by flaunting their bodies, by wearing provocative clothing, by putting on sensuous perfumes, by adorning their eyelids, and so on. The godly woman, Dame Wisdom, is not the model our young women are familiar with. The words of chapter 31 have a foreign ring, when we read,. Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain, But a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised Dame Wisdom and Madam Folly are worthy of consideration by every man and woman who desires to be godly.

Women are warned that it is possible for them to contribute to the spiritual downfall of a brother in Christ. Christian women are instructed not be preoccupied with outward adornment, but with inward character I Tim.

1. BibleGateway.
2. From the Life of Joseph Fielding Smith.
3. THE BOOK OF PROVERBS.
4. Significant Spaces;

When Christian women are insensitive about their clothing and their conduct, they can cause a Christian brother to sin by tempting him in thought and action. The Book of Proverbs is required reading for men who desire to be godly and free from immorality. Proverbs exalts wisdom, and it reminds us not only of the danger of Madam Folly, but of the value of a godly wife We are encouraged to find sexual satisfaction in the purity of a marital union 5: And when we find an immoral thought coming to our minds, let us give serious though to what Proverbs informs us is the inevitable end of immorality--shame, dissipation, and death 2: Dame Wisdom and Madam Folly teach us valuable lessons in the area of sex and marriage, but I believe they teach us much more than this.

In addition to providing us with instruction about two kinds of women, they personify the two ways of life--the way of wisdom and the way of folly. I will try to demonstrate five lines of evidence which indicate to the reader of Proverbs that Dame Wisdom and Madam Folly were intended to represent the two ways of life. In chapter 2 Wisdom is said to keep a man from the way of evil v. The way of evil is the way of wicked men vv. The conclusion must be that Dame Wisdom and Madam Folly are not just women; they are the personification of two ways, the way of wisdom and the way of folly.

Dame Wisdom is the kind of women a young man should seek to marry and Madam Folly is the kind of woman with whom a young man should not become involved, but the major thrust of the contrast between the two women is not sex or marriage. Elsewhere in Proverbs the wrong kind of wife is described cf. My point is that the outcome of choosing the one and rejecting the other is not a good or bad marriage, but life or death. This is further evidence that while we can learn much here about the right kind of wife, that is not the primary lesson to be learned.

If Solomon wanted to teach us about women, he would have to describe many more kinds of women than just two. I once heard Bill Gothard remark that in Proverbs it was always the woman who was the aggressor, the seducer. I had the impression at the time that Bill concluded that this is the way it always is in life.

Who God's wisdom is :)

Most of the infidelity I have had the unfortunate experience of observing in Christian and non-Christian marriages has not been initiated by the woman, but rather by the man. I do not think Solomon intended for us to conclude that it is most often the woman that seduces the man.

Rather, I believe Proverbs pictures Madam Folly as the aggressor because she personifies the evil way. While not all women seek to seduce men, Satan is aggressively seeking to draw men away from God and into the evil way. In other words, it is a woman who is the seducer in Proverbs because she, Madam Folly, personifies sin. Anyone who reads Proverbs as wisdom literature recognizes that much of what is said is not be understood literally, but metaphorically. For example, in 9: Few people would insist that we should take this passage literally, in that wisdom really wants to feed men.

Bible Living

The banquet is a figure, a metaphor, illustrating the bounty of what wisdom has to offer and of the universal invitation for men to partake of it. Why then do we feel it is necessary to take the bed of Madam Folly as always literal when we take the banquet figuratively? While we must avoid the bed of Madam Folly, is that all that the way of evil has to offer?