2019-12-30 “Then shalt thou understand”

Proverbs 2:5  “Then shalt thou understand the fear of the LORD, and find the knowledge of God.

Children of God, from the moment of Spiritual Birth until death, have an unquenchable desire to learn more and more about “the LORD”, His Church, His magnificent works, and His promise of Eternal Life.  Solomon compares this great and perpetual desire to those who have an insatiable hunger for “silver” and hidden “treasures” (Proverbs 2:4).  Solomon lists the keys to understanding “the fear of the LORD” and to finding “the knowledge of God”.  First, “if thou wilt receive my words”; that is, reach out and take what your heart is hungering for by reading the Word of God, going to Church, and listening carefully as the Lord’s ministers preach and teach the Word of God (Proverbs 2:1-3).  Then, “hide” the Biblical “commandments with thee”; that is, spend time worshipfully meditating upon the Word of God, considering and evaluating the Word of God, and praying for understanding of the Word of God (Proverbs 2:1-3).  As we meditate upon the Word of God, we more and more understand that “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction.” (Proverbs 1:7).  In this context, to “fear” “the LORD” is to lovingly know of His Infinite, Sovereign Power and Authority and to know that He alone “hath chosen us in” Christ Jesus our Lord (Ephesians 1:4) and “hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began” (II Timothy 1:9).  To “fear” “the LORD” is to know that He is with us when our troubles are so great that we are “pressed out of measure, above strength”, when life itself becomes an overwhelming burden to us, and when we think that we will simply not make it through our present trouble (II Corinthians 1:8-9).  To “fear” “the LORD” is to know “that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead:  10  Who delivered us from so great a death, and doth deliver: in whom we trust that he will yet deliver us” (II Corinthians 1:9-10).  To “fear” “the LORD” is to know that our Lord has saved us “from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us” (Luke 1:71).  To “understand the fear of the LORD, and find the knowledge of God” is to worshipfully know that, because our Lord sacrificed Himself or us, we can “therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:16) and one blessed and holy day we “shall” here the Lord our “King” “say” to “his sheep”, “Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world” (Matthew 25:32-34)!