The discerning sets his face toward wisdom, but the eyes of a fool are on the ends of the earth. — Proverbs 17:24

This proverb has all kinds of awesome stuff in it.

The imagery talks about the "eyes" and where we "look," but it's not implying physical sight. It's talking about the vision of the spiritual man's mind. Where a godly man sets his mind. The hint to this is found in the adjective "discerning." Discernment is something we do in our minds. It's how we look at things from a spiritual mindset. And the proverb suggests that a man whose mind is set toward "wisdom" gains discernment for all the decisions that come his way.

So now we have to define this word "wisdom" because it's the secret to having discernment.

In the Oxford Dictionary, wisdom is defined as:

"The quality of having experience, knowledge, and good judgment."

Now, this may be a good natural definition, but it's not a good definition for the wisdom in this text. And here is why. The word wisdom here is not a reference to worldly wisdom. It assumes a wisdom only known by a spiritual man. It is something known by a man with a redeemed mind. And the man who has a redeemed mind knows that only God has wisdom, and there is only one way to get it — it's by fearing the Lord. Remember this verse from a previous reading through the book of Proverbs?

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. — Proverbs 9:10

So a man who fears God is wise. He can see, understand, and thus know the tip of wisdom. And this man, with a redeemed mind, understands that his former natural mind and its reasoning were fallen and corrupt. This means that the former man could not have enough "experience and knowledge" to make any "good judgment," as the Oxford Dictionary would suggest. This was because his former mind was depraved, and thus he lacked true discernment.

Thus we see the contrast with the fool in this text. His sight is not set on spiritual wisdom. It's set on worldly wisdom. And thus, he ends up chasing a lot of things to the "ends of the earth." And we can deduce that this man fears the world and not God. The object he fears must be different because it is not God.

You know, I think a lot of our challenges as followers would be resolved by starting each day by setting our minds on fearing the Lord. By fearing God more than fearing the things of the world. You see, we don't need to fear things like inflation, scarcity, war, disease, government, political parties, and presidents. Now people of this world will focus on them, and they will fear them. And they will persuade us to fear them too. And there are some of these concerns that are real. But we fear someone greater — God. And guess what? God fears nothing. And when we start each day with this fear and keep coming back to it when worldly fears arise, we learn spiritual wisdom and see with greater discernment.

ASK THIS: Are you fearing something more than God today? What is it?

DO THIS: Confess it below. And then choose to fear God.

PRAY THIS: God, may I always fear you more than anything in this world.

PLAY THIS: Raise a Hallelujah.

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