The Force of Wisdom
INTRODUCTION
One cannot spend much time in the Book of Proverbs without discovering the great value God places on wisdom. Nor can we read very far in the section of the Bible we think of as Wisdom Literature without coming to understand that wisdom is not something mystical which is revealed only to certain gifted individuals. The wisdom of the Bible is not only intensely practical, it has a moral quality. No wise man continues in sin against God. The wise person humbles himself before God, seeks His will for his life, and commits himself to holiness.
In the great Wisdom Chapter of Job, chapter 28, we are told that fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Various passages in Proverbs affirm this. The wisdom of which both Job and Solomon speak is a wisdom that has its source in God. It is import for us to seek, and find wisdom, but we will never do that unless we start at the source. If we desire wisdom, we need to understand the wisdom of God. If you were to try to write a paper on the wisdom of God, where would you start?
I think we would have to start at the beginning.
I. THE WISDOM OF GOD IS MANIFESTED IN CREATION, 3:19.
A. By His Wisdom He Founded the Heavens and the Earth, 3:19-20.
"The LORD by wisdom founded the earth, By understanding He established the heavens. By His knowledge the deeps were broken up And the skies drip with dew.”
1. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth (Gen. 1:1).
2. The six days of Creation make many statements about the Creator.
a. He is omnipotent - all powerful.
b. He is omniscient - all knowing.
c. He is omnipresent - everywhere present at the same time.
d. He is the Sustainer.
e. He is Sovereign over all He created.
f. From the foundation of the world, He is the Redeemer.
B. If You Would Know the Wisdom of God, Study Genesis.
1. Genesis is the foundation upon which the rest of the Bible rests.
a. If you do not have a Creator you cannot have a Judge.
b. If you do not have Genesis 3 you do not need John 3.
c. If you do not have a Fall you do not need a Savior.
2. Genesis is Scripture, not science.
a. However, Scripture will not ultimately be judged by science.
b. Science will be judged by Scripture - or the God of Scripture.
c. Scientists will be judged by Scripture.
If there is one thing I am convinced of at this point, it is that there are no evolutionists in either Heaven or hell. Now, Charles Darwin knows the truth about Creation; the Huxleys know the truth.
Carl Sagan and Stephen J. Gould now know the truth about creation and the Creator. Now they know that the universe is not all there is, ever was, or ever shall be. Empirical science may have reigned supreme in their little sphere for a number of years, but now they know the truth.
C. Today, Many Legitimate Scientists Embrace Special Creation.
1. Henry Morris is the father of the modern Creation science movement.
a. Henry Morris is the Hydrologist who founded the Institute for Creation Research.
b. He has probably led more scientists to see the truth than any other individual.
Dimetri Kuznetsov, at age 32, was one of the two most highly decorated young scientists in the old Soviet Union. By that time he has already earned an M.D. degree, as well as doctorates in molecular biology and bio-chemistry (or something like that). He was on the faculty of the largest evolutionary university in the world, the University of Moscow. Somehow, Dimetri Kuznetsov came into possession of Henry Morris’ book, The Biblical Basis for Modern Science, and his life has never been the same. After going to each of his three disciplines, he concluded that available evidence supports special creation, and not evolution.
Kuznetzov began setting up debates at the University of Moscow, and taught special creation for six years before he became a Christian. When California Secretary of Education Bill Honig sought to deny the Institute for Creation Research (ICR) a license for their graduate school, Dimetri sent an open letter to Honig and a copy to the LA Times. He also sent a copy to ICR, where Morris had it published in, I believe in Acts and Facts. In his letter he stated that there was more academic freedom in the Soviet Union than in California - and he would be willing to supply proof of that statement if requested. It was not requested, and his letter was not published in the LA Times.
Dr. Stephen Austin is a former evolutionist who was also influenced by Henry Morris. Austin has spend a number of years studying and comparing the conditions in Spirit Lake and the surrounding area after the eruption of Mount St. Helens to the condition which might have existed following the Flood. He is absolutely convinced that the Genesis account of Creation has greater scientific support than evolution.
Dr. Dwayne Gish, of the ICR graduate school, has probably debated more evolutionists than any other Creation scientist. The Paleontologist takes on the heavy weights of evolution, and he has been so effective that many leading evolutionists refuse to debate him. He stresses that of all the billions of fossils known to scientists today no one has ever found an intermediate stage fossil. Morris and Gish have been the best one-two punch in the fight for Creation for decades. Many scientists have been influenced by their work - and a few preachers and Bible professors.
Dr. Jan Mercer is a Creationist who taught biology under a department head who was an evolutionist for years. She has traveled all over the world, met with the leading Creation scientists in the world, and taken students on many trips, including one to the Galapagos Island. Dr. Mercer went to see the footprints of the dinosaur and the human being that were found in the same layer, side by side.
2. Following the Scopes Trial, America rejected special creation in favor of evolution.
3. Our Christian colleges and universities began teaching theistic evolution.
4. Sadly, many pastors embraced one compromise theory or another.
I have often wondered why so many Christian leaders were so quick to jump on the bandwagon after the Scopes Trial in 1925 - or at least, after the media got through with the trial. Francis Shaeffer insisted that America entered the post-Christian era of her history in 1935 (England in 1895), and there is no question that academia’s mad rush to embrace evolution was a factor. The next thing that has really amazed me is that when Henry Morris, Dwayne Gish, and others began presenting evidence for Creation, many preachers were among the first to attack them as right-wing fundamentalists. Is it not interesting that there are no left-wing extremists?
The simple fact is that these preachers were taught evolution at school, with a special emphasis on the claim that evolution is science and Creation is religion. They wanted to be faithful to the Bible, but they did not want to appear either ignorant or too narrow, so they sought a compromise, and so doing they brought Creation and evolution into an unholy wedlock.
There have been three basic world-views since Adam: Theism, Humanism, and New Age Movements. Charles Darwin and his disciples actively sought to move mankind from theism to atheistic evolutionary Humanism. They had millions of converts during the Twentieth Century. Toward the end of the Twentieth Century New Age religious movements began to inject humanistic concepts and values with a spiritual dimension. Many people rejected post-Darwinian atheistic evolutionary Humanism for pre-Darwinian evolutionary pantheism. Sadly, many church leaders interpreted the polls showing a renewed interest in God to be a sign that Christianity was wining the battle against Humanism, when in reality, what we witnessed was a shift from Humanism to New Age religious beliefs.
The Gap theory and the Day/Age theory offered an answer to many who wanted to be both Ascientific” and scriptural. The interesting thing is that both serious Creationists and scientists have rejected any compromise - they agree that you must choose either Creation or evolution. The compromise would never work.
When Southern Baptists studied Genesis 1-12 in the Winter Bible Conference of 2001, many who led those conferences had never made a serious study of the evidence for Creation. I have a feeling that many Christian leaders were afraid to be seen with Creation science literature. I canceled my subscription to The National Geographic some twenty years ago, and subscribed to a publication that subscribed to special Creation.
Some eighteen years ago I was sitting in a sauna in Jackson, Mississippi with two students, one of whom was several years older than the other. The older man was majoring in biology in one of the strongest Christian Colleges in America. At one point, he declared - with great conviction - "Evolution has been proved!” I said, AIf there is one thing evolution has never been, it’s proved. That is why they still call it a theory.”
D. Creation Puts the Wisdom of God on Display.
1. One does not have to study the universe long to see that there is a design behind it.
2. A design requires a designer - in this case, the Designer.
Astro-physicists tell us there are fifty billion stars in the Milky Way Galaxy, and there for every star in our galaxy there is another galaxy. It is absolutely amazing that it has not all exploded - or imploded. What keeps all these heavenly bodies that are spinning, tilting, and revolving and incredible speeds from crashing into each other? They are moving as they were created to move by their Designer.
To observe the universe is to observe the wisdom of God. On the other hand, to reject what He clearly revealed is very foolish.
II. IT IS FOOLISH TO REJECT WHAT GOD REVEALS ABOUT CREATION.
A. Various Psalms Declare the Glory of God Through His Creation.
"The heavens are telling of the glory of God; And their expanse is declaring the work of His hands. Day to day pours forth speech, And night to night reveals knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words; Their voice is not heard. Their line has gone out through all the earth” (Psalm 19:1ff, NASB - Emphasis added).
B. Paul Warns of the Danger in Rejecting the Witness of Creation.
"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four‑footed animals and crawling creatures” (Rom. 1:19-23, NASB - Emphasis added).
C. Both Evolution and Creation Depend Upon Faith.
1. You cannot prove evolution scientifically.
I am sorry, but the fact that a scientist embraces evolution does not make it scientific proof. The simple fact is that for something to be proved scientifically a scientist must be able to set up a laboratory model and run experiments which he can study. These experiments must be repeated time and again to be sure he will get the same results each time. What the scientist must do is study the evidence that speak of origins, and then at some point accept that evidence by faith. It is a belief system.
Millions of dollars are spent each year in an effort to disprove special Creation. Tax payers spend something like one hundred million dollars on SETI (Search for Extra-terrestrial Intelligence) before private funding took over. They sent a rocket into outer space, and as it passed the orbit of the most distant planet they turned on a radio signal to see if they can attract “intelligent life” our there somewhere. This would be amusing if it were not so costly, and so foolish. Consider this:
1) Assuming there is life “out there somewhere”, how do we know it is “intelligent?”
2) How do we know they would be friendly?
3) If the are not friendly, do we really want to attract their attention.
4) If they are so intelligent, why not let them spend their tax payers’ money and find us?
I had just finished preaching at a local radio station and stepped out into the lobby when the owner told me he would like to ask me a question. He asked, “What would you say if someone told you that one of these space probes they found intelligent life in outer space, and when they asked those 'beings’, they had a completely different story of God and Creation from ours?”
I said, “You don’t have to go into outer space to find people who worship a different god, or people who have a different explanation of Creation. They are everywhere.”
2. I simply do not have enough faith to believe in evolution.
3. You cannot prove Creation scientifically.
4. I believe the available evidence supports special Creation.
D. Consider Some of the Things Evolutionists Are Not Telling Us.
1. They don’t tell you Lucy was no lady (Lucy was an extinct monkey).
2. They don’t tell you Peking Man was a hoax.
3. They don’t tell you Nebraska man was an extinct pig - that proved not even to be extinct.
4. They don’t tell you there are “old” layers on top of “young” layers in the Grand Canyon.
5. They don’t tell you about the petrified hammer handle.
6. They don’t tell you about the gold chain found inside a piece of coal.
7. They don’t tell you that all baby whales would have drowned if the mechanism which prevents their drowning while nursing had not been complete during the first generation.
8. They don’t tell you that the first time Adam got a scratch he would have bled to death if he had had to wait for the blood clotting process to evolve.
9. They don’t dare tell you that the woodpecker would not have survived the first wood- pecking if he had had to wait for his skull to evolve to the point that it would absorb the shock.
10. They don’t dare tell you what would have happened to the woodpecker’s tongue the first time he pecked a tree if the protection had not been perfected in the first woodpecker.
11. They don’t tell you why those petrified forests show trees in a vertical position, but there are no petrified stumps under them (They floated upright, became waterlogged, sank, were covered by silt, and pressure and time caused them to become petrified.).
12. They don’t tell you that evolutionist Sir Fred Hoyle demonstrated that the science of probability proves that evolution is absolutely impossible.
13. They don’t tell you that the human race would have become extinct in the first generation If both the male and female failed to Aevolve” at the same rate.
III. THE WISDOM OF GOD IS PROCLAIMED BOTH BEFORE US AND WITHING US.
A. It Is Proclaimed Before Us.
1. The heavens declare the glory of God (Ps. 19:1).
2. "His understanding is inscrutable” (Isaiah 40:28-31).
"Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Everlasting God, the LORD, the Creator of the ends of the earth Does not become weary or tired. His understanding is inscrutable. “He gives strength to the weary, And to him who lacks might He increases power. Though youths grow weary and tired, And vigorous young men stumble badly, Yet those who wait for the LORD Will gain new strength; They will mount up with wings like eagles, They will run and not get tired, They will walk and not become weary.”
B. The Glory of God Is Proclaimed Within Us.
1. The Lord reveals Himself within each person.
“Because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them” (Rom. 1:19).
2. The folly of false religion is not in its ignorance but in its iniquity (Rom. 1).
C. The Self Revelation of God Has a Redemptive Purpose.
1. The Wisdom of God is seen in His salvation.
a. It would not take much of a god to come up with salvation by works.
b. Salvation by grace, through faith, testifies to the wisdom of God.
c. All people must come to the Lord on the same basis.
d. Only at the foot of the Cross is the ground truly level.
e. A works based salvation may make sense to the world.
A Jewish rabbi obviously thought he had made a point when he challenged a Christian: “We believe you have to work for what you get; you trust what someone else did for you two thousand years ago.” You know what? He is exactly right. However, he did not understand the truth of his statement. No one in Heaven will be patting himself on the back for earning this great blessing. The only One who will ever be praised will be Jesus Christ. To God be the glory!
f. Grace is compatible only with faith, never with works.
2. The one thing everyone must do to be saved is the only thing anyone can do.
a. We must repent.
b. We must trust Jesus Christ.
CONCLUSION
Do you really want to know the wisdom of God. Then know Jesus Christ. Jesus was the agent of Creation (John 1:2ff). He is the wisdom of God’s redemptive purpose. Furthermore, God does not leave that discovery to chance. He prepared the world for His Messiah. He sent His only begotten Son to this earth to suffer, bleed, and die for your sins and mine. He raised Him from the dead and received Him back into glory where He sits at the right hand of the Father, making intercession for our sins, awaiting His promised return.
Whether you believe this or not speaks volumes about what you think about the wisdom of God. It also speaks volumes about your wisdom. Those who reject God, the Creator, Sustainer, and Redeemer will spend eternity in hell - and my dear friend, every born-again believer, including your father, mother, sister, brother, or spouse, will say AAmen!” There is no place in Heaven for those who say Ano” to Jesus. But those who trust Him will spend eternity in His presence. Why not make the wise decision right now?