Let's take our Bibles and turn to Proverbs, chapter 1, as we listen to another voice in this book of Proverbs. We mentioned that there were three voices through the book, there's the voice of Solomon and other progenitors of wisdom, the speakers of wise and godly things. There is the voice of Dame Folly who opposes the voice of the Father and Mother who are encouraging their young people to follow the ways of wisdom. The third voice is the voice of blade wisdom herself, whom we believe is really the voice of the second person of the Trinity, Jesus Christ is pre-incarnate existence. She speaks three times in direct form in these first nine chapters, presenting herself as a great lady. Wisdom has built her house, she has hewn her seven pillars, she has slaughtered her beast, she has mixed her wine, she also has set her table, she has set out her young women to call from the highest places in the town, whoever is simple, let him turn in here. Dame, who lacks sense, she says, come eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed, leave your simple ways and live and walk in the way of insight. Here lady wisdom is presented as a grand lady who builds a grand house and sends out her young women into the streets and the byways and highways to invite the young people, especially the young men to come to her house and to enjoy the life and the blessings of wisdom. Now she has an emisus, she has an opponent who's known as Dame Folly, she also builds a house in Proverbs chapter 9, the woman Folly is loud, she is seductive and knows nothing. She sits at the door of her house, she takes a seat on the highest places in the town, calling to those who pass by, who are going straight on their way, whoever is simple, let him turn in here. And to him who lacks sense, she says, stolen water, sweet and bread eaten in secret is pleasant. Two voices calling out, overriding and combating sometimes with the voice of the father and mother to their children. One calls young people to a life of wisdom the other, to the ways of Folly and both promise in their house great pleasures. So for the first time in Proverbs, Jesus Christ speaks directly, now he's speaking through Solomon because he speaks through all of scripture, being himself the word made flesh. But here he speaks aloud in chapter 1 verse 20, all by himself without the aid of Solomon. Wisdom cries aloud in the streets, in the market she raises her voice. At the head of the noisy street she cries out, at the entrance of the city gate she speaks. Here is the second discourse, the second speech, what we call the second email to our children Proverbs chapter 1 verses 8 through 19 came from Solomon and his wife about a warning, a warning concerning the Folly of friends who were godless. And here is a second email, one that comes from Jesus Christ offering help to the simple minded. This new character in the story of Proverbs and the narrative that unfolds is in every way, the parallel and equal to Jesus Christ, we'll find out later in scripture that this person called wisdom speaks like a street evangelist, calls people to repentance and faith, offers them eternal life, the gift of the spirit, to transform their nature and make them like God. Everything that lady wisdom claims for herself, later on Jesus Christ incarnate will claim for himself. So we believe that it is the second person of the Trinity, the pre-incarnate son of God, the son of God before he became the son of Mary who was speaking as lady wisdom. A unique person, one commentator says, whose only peer is Jesus Christ. Now some people will say that it's not Jesus Christ, it's the Holy Spirit, but I disagree. Because in the passage we'll read this morning, this person called lady wisdom will promise to give us the spirit as the gift of God, which is what Jesus Christ does. The old Puritan Charles Bridges says, the son of God himself now invites us in all of the plenitude of his divine authority and grace, full of yearning love to sinners. He cries out, not only in the temple, but outside in the streets, in the cheap places of concourse and living, in the openings of the gates. Just as Jesus Christ was a street preacher, so is lady wisdom. And here in Proverbs chapter 1 verses 20 through 33, she gives her first speech and it's to young people. Somebody said last week to me, I hope you don't just speak to young people all through this year of the Proverbs well, primarily Proverbs is written to young people. It is written obviously, secondarily to their parents and pastors and other people, but it is a book written to and for young people. And I don't think we need to ignore that totally. This year is past year in 2012, the pure research center released a report called Puse 2012 American Value Survey, 168 page report given to our government to talk about the moral and spiritual values of our nation. The report concluded that America continues to be one of the most religious nations in the world. 80% of Americans said that they have never doubted the existence of God, never. 76% said that they believe that they will face God on a judgment day, sometime after death or at the end of the world, 76% throughout of every four people. And the same amount of people, 76% said that they believe that prayer is vital to life and that they regularly pray to God for help, but not so with their children, the millennials, those Americans 30 years and younger. Five years ago in 2007, the Pue Research Organization found that 83% of young people never doubted the existence of God, that was higher than the national average. But now, five years later, that has dropped 15%, now 68% of young people believe that God never doubted his existence. So that 15% since five years ago have come to say I have serious doubts that God exists. They are less likely according to recent statistical studies to pray or to believe that God would answer prayer. The religious affiliation of millennials has stayed flat for ten years, listen to this, not religious affiliation, that means joining some church synagogue or congregation of religious people has risen across all the rest of the population, it has remained flat among millennials. The conclusion of the Pue Research Company said, research on generational patterns shows that this is not merely a life cycle effect. The millennial generation is far less religious than other preceding generations when they were the same ages years ago. Secularism and gnosticism and atheism appeared to be on the rise among young people in America. And one of the byproducts of that is the secular student alliance on most campuses. Jesse Gaeliff is the communications director for that organization. He said, for a lot of millennial atheists, they are expecting to find a group when they get to college, and if they don't find one, then they start one. This is completely different than what other generations grew up with. It enables anybody to have open discussions without fear of their parents would find out or what their communities might say. The more safe places we create for young people to discuss their doubts, the more they can inspire questions in others. When it sounds real open-minded and very trendy, but it troubles me. Not that young people have doubts. I mean, when I was in college from 1967 to 1970, you can ask my mother this, it was very fashionable to be an atheist because everybody was, we thought, we pretend like we were too. So we all kind of dropped out of church and pretended we didn't believe in God, and so for the amazing thing is after we graduated, we got married, we had kids, we joined the church and the Republican Party and all became rabid supporters of Ronald Reagan. Now figure that out. I'm not really surprised that young people have questions because you know, I think they need to, in a sense, they need to decide if their grandparents and their parents' religion is going to be their own. What bothers me about this movement is that we are creating safe places, Mr. Ghalif says, where young people can talk to each other without fear of their parents or anyone else over hearing, safe from what? From disagreement, from criticism, that they might be wrong, from truth. And what are they afraid of? Is it wisdom? It seems to be the blind leading to blind or at least the immature leading, the immature, and that is a recipe for spiritual ruin for a generation of youth. Jesus Christ doesn't agree with that. And He said so, beginning in chapter 1, verse 20, wisdom cries aloud in the streets. In the market she raises her voice, at the head of the noisy street she cries out, at the entrance of the city gates she speaks, how long or simple ones will you love being simple? How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge? 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 you and you refuse to listen, have stretch out my hand and no one has heated. 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 and I will not answer. They will seek me diligently but will not find me because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord. Would have none of my counsel and despised all my reproof, therefore they shall eat the fruit of their way and have their fill of their own devices. For the simple ones 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. This little discourse, this speech, this email divides itself into three sections, each one beginning with the word call, where wisdom calls to sinners, where she calls out a denouncement of the ways of fools and calls out a presentation of two ways to live with judgments and rewards according to the way we choose. If there is a call from wisdom to all sinners, to all mankind, Lady Wisdom is not in cast in this book of Proverbs and the typical subservient and quiet role of women in Solomon's era of time. She is a street evangelist. Wisdom cries aloud in the streets and the marketplace she raises her voice. At the head of the noisy street she cries out at the entrance of the city gate she speaks. She's loud in the sense that she's speaking, as I am this morning, she's raising her voice, crying out on behalf of the Lord in the streets where people live and work daily in the marketplaces where they do their commerce and business. At the head of the noisy streets where they listen to street evangelist and political speeches and the musings of the philosophers at the entrance of the city gates where justice is administered. She is out on the streets with the man in daily life in the places of business and living in discourse and government and not merely in the schools of elite philosophers and scholars. How does Lady Wisdom continue to speak to us? Well, the same way she does it throughout this book. She speaks through what we call revelation, something revealed to us from God. The word both in its English word and its Greek original means to unveil what is hidden. To pull back a curtain and show publicly what was once hidden only to God. To expose is another word. The exposition of Scripture is the exposing of what is revealed by God. What Paul calls a wisdom once hidden in God now revealed through Jesus Christ. And how does God speak to us? Well, he speaks to us, folks, in two ways, in general revelation and in special revelation. It's a general revelation because it goes out generally to all people. Everybody in the world has three ways in which God speaks to them in creation. Paul says in Romans 1 that what is true about God has been revealed through what has been created so that men are without excuse. God speaks to the creation. He speaks to the human conscience. Paul says in Romans 2 that men, when they do what is right or what is wrong, they follow the law written in their own hearts. Their conscience as either giving permission or judging them according to the word of God within. We have each one of us a moral compass placed there by God. It is an amazing anthropological fact that we have yet to discover any people, anywhere in the world regardless of how primitive or how sophisticated they may be, who did not in their own moral conduct and in the codes of their culture, codify and reinforce the ten commandments. God speaks to us through creation and the conscience and he speaks to us through culture, which is the corporate conscience of the people, the laws that protect those ten commandments and promote moral decency and truth. We've never found a people who weren't like that. Although we've never found a people who followed the order of creation, the dictates of their conscience or the codes of culture. But nonetheless, God speaks generally to people that way. Now he speaks specifically or especially to people who are elect, to three other sources of revelation, to Christ, the word made flesh, the ultimate picture of what a created man or woman should be like, perfect creation, in perfect God, one in the same speaking to us, through the canon of scripture, that book or group of books in the Bible that inform our conscience and explain the law of God and the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ together. And finally, through the church, through God's new society, his new culture, the culture of the gospel. Each one of us, Paul says, are an epistle. Paul said, you yourself speaking to Christians, are our letter of recommendation written on our heart to be known and read by all mankind. And you show that you are letter from Christ delivered to us, written not with ink, but with the spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on the tablets of the human heart by the finger of God. So whether it's through creation or conscience or culture or Christ, the canon or the church, Lady Wisdom is speaking all the time. David Atkinson says, the first thing that Wisdom wants us to know is that she is a town of the choir, calling aloud at the street corner, making the peel in the public square. This is not the ridiculous figure of a person in rags holding a billboard. So much as the picture of an experienced orator at the speaker's corner, calling to the crowds to take stock of their foolish ways before it is too late. right. She is a brave, passionate woman with something very serious to say. Her is a summons to all mankind to understand and obey and live. And she addresses in particular three specific kinds of people, the simpleton, the scoffer, and the fool. Look if you will at verse 22. How long or simple ones will you love being simple? How long will scoffers delight at their scoffing and fools hate knowledge? By simple ones, she simply means that naïve are the gullible. But they are gullible because they want to be simple-minded. They prefer to be unschooled and they like being unprepared for life. They are in the eve and immature because they don't take learning seriously. Temporal Longland says these are the most teachable of the three groups and may be understood as naïve and immature but they are culpable nonetheless for the simplicity and naivety. They don't like to think and prefer to feel, like to have fun, to go with the flow, and their main concern is always to be one of the crowd. They are not very deep thinkers. They like simplistic answers to complex problems. They make up about 95% of Americans today. This can be a quick answer so I can move on in life and have a good time and be part of whatever the crowd is doing. The second group scoffers are worse. They are often called in the Book of Proverbs muckers. They are hardened in their hearts so that their impiety causes them to ridicule and to sass and deride holy things, spiritual ideas, and people in authority. They are smart Alex, to be honest with you. They always know better than the preacher, the parent, even the Bible, and their favorite statement is let me tell you what I think. So the Paul calls them the debater of this age and Peter says we know that scoffers will come at the end of the time, scoffing, following their own sinful desires and will deny the word of God. These people have a punk attitude. They are looking for ways to show contempt to mock and to look cool. Deep down loved ones, these are angry young people. Disappointed and upset with something and they are trying to let people know that's how they feel. The third person is the most dangerous. Although he has probably the most benign title, he's called throughout the Book of Proverbs the fool. But he hates knowledge and he is diametrically opposed to the fear of the Lord. This is the young man or woman who dishonors his parents without remorse and neglects the church without concern. We'll do the opposite. What the Bible says just to show that he doesn't have to obey. He loves evil, pursues it with vengeance. Wisdom says, the fool has said in his heart there is no God or else he lives like that. This is the person who has an agenda and that is to pull other people away from God for reasons unexplained. If you remember last week, in fact if you look back in chapter 1 and you look at verses 11 through 14, Solomon warns his son not to go with the crowd of people with a gang. Well the members of this gang are these three people. The majority of them are the simple ones who make up the gang. They just want to be included to feel cool. They don't want to ask too many questions or think too deeply. They usually when confronted with their follow say, well you know what's wrong. I mean it's not hurting anybody. Everybody's doing it. The lieutenants in this gang are the muckers. They're deeply disappointed by parents and distrust of the church and they feel let down by God. They're striking back at wisdom and pain and in confusion and they are the ones who recruit for the group come, come along with me and we will throw off their shackles and do whatever we like. And the leader of the group is the fool who never really lets his agenda be openly known because he's not as foolish as we think. He's quite moxie, quite sophisticated and smart when it comes to leading these other young people away from parents and church and God. Remember a couple weeks ago I said that you'll meet seven different men in the book of Proverbs, the wise father, the godly son and five ungodly people will hear three of them. The scoffer, the simpleton and the fool. I couldn't go long without stopping and asking which one of these were you or are you because all of mankind outside of Christ falls into one of these categories. And knowing what your orientation was or is now perhaps will explain why in particular ways and at particular places in the Bible you struggle so much with what the wisdom of the Holy Spirit has to say to you. Jesus Christ lovingly calls out to these three young misguided people and invites them to receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. He says in verse 23, if you turn at my reproof, behold I will pull out my spirit to you. I will make my words known to you. He is consistently throughout the book asking these young people to come and receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Wisdom that is the pre-incarnate Christ knows exactly what he's going to write later to the proverbs and speak through the apostles. And it shall come to pass afterwards that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy your old men shall dream dreams and your young men shall see visions. What Peter said on Pentecost Sunday with the prophet Ezekiel would say when he said I will give them a new heart and a new spirit I will put within them and I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh and I will put my spirit within them and cause them to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules that they might dwell in the land that I gave their fathers and that they shall be my people and I will continue to be their God. Here's the promise of a new life in Christ and the indwelling Holy Spirit for the simpleton and the scoffer and the fool who listens to the reproof and he brews the scolding the warning of lady wisdom but many of them will not and so lady wisdom speaks the second time in her denouncement of their foolish ways verse 24 because I have called and you refuse to listen have stretched out my hand and no one has heated because you 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 Jesus is very matter of fact here because fools and mockers and simpletons ignore his wisdom they are in deep trouble they refuse to listen he says rejected Christ when he stretched out his hand ignored his counsel had nothing to do with his reproof brushed away all the people who spoke wisdom in their life and as a result ruin will come upon them this is what we call in literature poetic justice no pun intended poetic justice is that literary device in which virtue is ultimately rewarded and vice exolently punished often in modern literature by ironic twist of fate ultimately related to the character of one's own conduct and what evil they have done returning on themselves look back in chapter 1 verses 17 18 and 19 it's a it's a forecast of poetic justice for in vain they spread a net in the side of any bird but these men lie and wait for their own blood they said an ambush for their own lives such are the ways of everyone who is greedy for unjust gain it takes away the life of its possessor they set a trap that they get caught in they pursue ways the hurt other people in the process destroy themselves they start out as a gang of ruffians only to take their own lives it kind of boomerangs back on them and here Christ says this is poetic justice you laughed at me and mocked me when I spoke and I will laugh at your calamity and mock you when your terror comes upon you you were unaware of the dangers associated with your godless ways I will act as if I'm unaware of what's happening to you you were fools who ignored my calling and I will ignore you verse 28 then they will call upon me but I will not answer they will seek me diligently but will not find me we say pastor this is not how our god acts our god is the god of grace our god is always there to help them so is wisdom so is Jesus Christ what Jesus is saying here is I would help them if they turned to me but they won't and therefore perhaps the only way to soften them up is to let them experience for a time the consequences of their own foolishness Richard Clifford says wisdom it is important to note does not cause the disaster that comes upon these simple ones wisdom simply withdraws when it does come according to the poetic justice operative in this book wisdom does not answer her clients just as they did not answer her not forever but it appears in the book of Proverbs for a season he lets them drink themselves into sickness ruin themselves by their get rid schemes get pregnant or contract some sexually transmitted disease by their fornication end up in jail because they went in with the wrong ground to the wrong bar on the wrong night and did the wrong things are lonely and sad because they were difficult to be with this is the way of poetic justice but it's not final justice it's not the judgment at the end of time it's a remedial work of god what the person's called a severe mercy the god allows to happen to them because he constantly waits on high to have compassion on them listen to what Isaiah says about wisdom about Jesus Christ about God thus the Lord God says the Holy One of Israel in returning and rest you shall be saved in quietness and in trust shall be your strength but you were unwilling and you said no we were flee on horses therefore I tell you you will run away and you said to me we will ride upon swift steeds therefore those who pursue you will be even swifter a thousand shall flee at the threat of one man and at the threat of five you shall flee till you are left like a flag stand alone on top of a mountain like a pitiful signal on the hill but the Lord longs to be gracious to you and waits on the high to show mercy to you for the Lord is the god of justice how blessed are all those who wait for him for a people shall dwell in Zion in Jerusalem you shall weep no more he will surely be gracious to you at the sound of your cry as soon as the hearers hear it and he answers you and though the Lord will give you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction yet your teacher will not hide himself any more from you but your eyes shall see your teacher and your ear shall hear his words behind you saying this is the way walk he in it do not turn to the right or to the left you see what Isaiah is saying that sometimes when we are stubborn or simplistic or rebellious god lets us get a full dose of what we wanted our independence from him and it's miserable but he does not leave us forever in that misery wisdom continues to speak sometimes folks I know in my life this was true he took some years of failure and pain and shame and prodigal living to open my mind and heart up to all the voices of wisdom surrounding me and speaking to me and that is what wisdom says is God severe mercy this poetic justice that opens us up to the message of Jesus Christ that message he tells us and a third thing is a presentation of two options again he talks about how he's calling out to the people for a third time then they will call upon me and I will not answer they will seek me diligently but will not find me because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord would have none of my counsel and device all my reproof therefore they shall eat the fruit of their own way and have their fill of their own devices for the simpler killed by their own turning away I want you to notice that and I killed by wisdom by God they're killed by their own turning away and the complacency of fools destroys them but whoever listens to me will dwell secured and will be at ease without dread of disaster the tone of verse 28 unsettles us again it looks like God is saying you've reached a point where there is no return but that is not his message the last verse proves that he is saying there are two ways you're oriented towards one but I'm telling you it's the way of your own self destruction but there is another way that I put before you it's a way of life they shall eat the fruit of their way and have the fill of their own devices or they will listen to me and dwell secure and will be at ease without dread of disaster Jesus asked them to consider the ways of life here's his point that every day we are alive listen to me folks this is the whole thrust of this email from Jesus every day you and I are alive I don't know how old we are every day we're taking one step more down an eternal road that will end some day and the further we go down the road of folly the harder it is to turn around and go back and start on the other way but the sooner we begin down the way of wisdom as a young person the way if they easier that is to become the way of life that is natural to us when Jesus talks about these people who will not turn away and he will not respond to them those are the people have gone so far that in their own broken and demented way of thinking they have reached the point of no return because they've decided they will never go back but there are other people who turn to the gospel truth and begin a life of spiritual wisdom and with each step they get deeper into a life with Christ until they come to the conclusion that they will never go back they're going to go on with the Lord regardless of what is involved and each day each one of us is moving in one direction or the other option one is to ignore wisdom and die option two is dawned near to Christ and to live you know what's interesting about the Bible is all the great preachers of the Bible every one of them it seems sets before us these two ways listen to Moses this is his last speech recorded for us as his dying words see I have said before you today life and good both death and evil if you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you today by loving the Lord your God and by walking in his ways and keeping his commandments and his statutes and their jewels then you shall live and multiply and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to possess but if your heart turns away and you will not hear but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them I declare to you this day that you shall surely perish you shall not live long in the land that you are going over to the Jordan to enter and possess Moses says you see this day before I die I said before you life and death good and evil two ways make your choice that's what Elijah said that famous day recalled down fire on the altar of bail on Mount Carmel how long will you go on limping between two different ways if the Lord is God follow him but if bail is God follow him choose you this day which way you will go two ways set before us by the prophet of fire David did the same thing perhaps not as prophetically or as fiery as Elijah and Moses but in his poetry his first song begins this way blessed as the man who walks not in the counts of the wicked nor stands in the way of sinners nor sits in the seat of scoffers but his delight is in the law of the Lord and then his law he will meditate day and night he is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in all of its seasons and his leaf never withers and all that he does he prosperous the wicked are not so they are like chaff which the wind drives away therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous for the Lord knows the way of the righteous but the way of the wicked will perish two different ways to walk in the way of wisdom the way of life or to stand in the way of sinners to sit in the scoffers to delight in breaking God's law the exact three things that wisdom talks about in this chapter even our Lord Jesus Christ offered us these two ways enter the narrow gate for the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction and many are those who find it but the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads life and those who find it are few every time we open God's word every time we come to church every time we go to covenant day school we go to a Bible study we join in our covenant group every time we do that but there are put before us these two ways a life with God or life without him and you know this is God's ultimate justice you get forever what you chose repeatedly today day after day if you choose to move toward Christ deeper into the way of wisdom more in pursuit of God you end up with a blessed life called heaven where you're in God's presence sucked into his joyous community called the Trinity forever it's called heaven if you choose day after day to ignore the voice of Jesus Christ and the prodding of the Holy Spirit and the warnings and threats of God you move closer and closer to a day when your psyche your soul is so warped that you would rather live forever without God than with him and that's called hell and wisdom's job the job of the great evangelist Jesus Christ is present us with these two ways and to tell us three things that God the Father is a God where mercy triumphs over judgment God would say in many places I take no delight in the destruction of wicked but would that the wicked would repent and live it is God who sends his son into the world it is God's revelation and creation and conscience and culture and Christ and the canon of scripture in the church that is constantly reaching out it is God our Father pleading with us to come home before the night falls and it's too late it is Jesus Christ who comes into the world to pay for all of our folly and be the older brother who goes after every single product until he brings them all home it's the Holy Spirit who works on us repeatedly to change our minds and change our hearts change our wills so that we change our choices and live and it is wisdom in the end the triumphs not folly
I want to give you some encouragement today first of all if you or your loved ones your son or your daughter your grandchildren or simple ones or scoffers even fools that doesn't mean you have to stay that way God has given to us what he has not given to animals or to angels the ability to change to change our minds to repent to change our destinies to believe to change the course of our life to pursue the Lord and humble obedience empowered by some divine grace that we don't deserve
you may be a simpleton or a scoffer or even a fool but you don't have to stay that way Paul says to Titus for we ourselves were once foolish disobedient let us stray slaves to various passions and pleasures passing our days in malice and then be hated by others and hating everyone else but when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared he saved us not because of works done righteousness but according to his own mercy therefore if any man is in Christ he is a new creation the old things have passed away behold the new way has come you can change you can change today and I want to also give encouragement to parents and grandparents there are people who probably by this point in the sermon series says this is going to be a living hell for the next year to come in here every Sunday and find out how I blew it as a parent it's not true when do you stop being a mother or a father when you die and when do you stop being a son or a daughter when you die so tell me when is it too late for you to go back to your children or even grandchildren and say you know I didn't do a good job leading you down the way of wisdom because that was foolish myself and when is it too late to reach out to adult children or adult grandchildren and begin to encourage them to come back to the way of the Lord you say oh pastor is too late now only because only because your discouraged and you doubt the power of wisdom and grace wisdom is tougher than you think smarter than you ever imagine and incredibly tenacious you know when God will give up on you when you die and not till then there's a wonderful story in the Old Testament about an old priest named Eli remember that story Bible says he was a terrible father his sons who were priest were so bad that the Israelites said to him would you would you remove your sons we don't want them to be priest over us anymore and finally God said you know because of your sons I'm going to have to just ruin you and your family but then God gave him a second chance called Samuel he sent a little boy into Eli's house so that Eli could prepare him to be a priest remember that story God came one night and said Samuel and Samuel thought it was Eli and he ran to the bedroom and said Eli you call me Eli said you're having dreams son go back to sleep I didn't call anybody what happened a second time and a second time Eli said go back and the third time it happened scripture says in Eli remembered that God was calling Samuel so he said Samuel the next time you hear this voice you say speak Lord for your servant is listening you know why Eli said that because a long time ago in his youth that same voice had come to him one night and called him Eli had not been the faithful priest or the greatest dad but he taught young Samuel how to know and respond to the voice of God and how to be a man of God he finished well he tried with his own sons but they rejected him so he took his grandson and he raised him up to be the greatest judge and all of Israel's history I'm telling you parents it's not too late to go after your children and if they don't respond you go to your little grandchildren who still think you hung the moon they won't think that forever strike while the iron is hot and go to the young people and be honest with them and tell them you know I wasn't the wisest dad but I love you and I want you to come with me on the way it was you'll be amazed over time with persistence and humility how they respond I I'm my friends and believing testimony that this is true I of all the people in this church was a prodigal son there was no reason and no excuse for me to live the way I did as a young man my mother and my sisters here can tell you that they prayed for me relentlessly and I'm sure that my mother worried over me and wept over me on many an evening and then one hot August night wisdom called on my apartment Jesus came to Memphis looking for me we had a long discussion the contents of which I will not divulge to you but that night sitting in an apartment with Jesus Christ everything came together all creation and conscience and culture Christ in the church my family the Bible I knew everything seemed to fit together and I said Lord I'm destroying myself I want to live now what was it forever and Jesus said well you young scoffer that's what I was a scoffer a smart alike can you imagine why don't you come and follow me I have a good life and store for you it can happen when you're 27 a 47 or 77 wisdom is always calling out to simple tons and scoffers and fools saying this is the way walking in it and I will give you eternal life and as long as Jesus Christ continues to speak to us and our children it's not too late never too late to trust and obey amen father we want to thank you that you will not give up on us you continue through the Holy Spirit and through the presence of Jesus Christ his church and his word his creation our own conscience as even the culture at large to speak to us about the way of repentance and faith and wisdom there are simple tons and this congregation this morning and smart Alex like I was people bent on evil foolish things but we are not destined to be this way forever you have planned for us an abundant life you have in store for us a new creation and you are offering us the gift of the Holy Spirit this morning if we would just turn from our folly and embrace you by faith help us this day to trust in Christ receive the gift of the Holy Spirit and begin to be a new creation today now and to turn away and walk in the way that you have determined for us that we might live and live abundantly and we thank you for this in the name of wisdom that is in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and whose name we pray amen