Sermon on Proverbs 4:10-23, 14th Sunday after Trinity (1 Yr Lectionary), "Two Paths"

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. In several different places in the Bible, God contrasts two different paths. One is the way of the righteous, the other is the way of the wicked. One leads to freedom and life, the other, to slavery and ultimately death. Proverbs 4 is a father to son life lesson talk, from Solomon to his son. There are two different paths, and he urges him to stay on the right path, and avoid the path of the wicked. Over and over in the Bible, this theme of two paths reappears. God grant that we stay on the path to life and righteousness.

First, let’s consider the path to AVOID. “Do not enter the path of the wicked, and do not walk in the way of the evil. Avoid it; do not go on it; turn away from it and pass on.” It can be sad, humorous or even tragic, when certain “Do Not Enter!” signs in life go ignored. Ignore a “Do Not Enter” sign in a hospital, and you might end up where you’re not supposed to be—but ignore a “Do Not Enter” sign on a busy expressway, and it might be a fatal wrong turn. God has, for our safety, put up many warning signs: “DO NOT ENTER”. God warns us to turn away and pass on from the path of the wicked, or the way of evil.. However tempting, however curious, or however much we think we can flirt with danger and get away with it—God says “PASS ON.” “TURN AWAY.”

The consequences for going down the wrong path, the path of the wicked, or the way of evil, can be sudden and dramatic, like a head-on collision—or they can be slow and tortuous to unfold. They can be easy to recognize, or not. Sometimes, it even seems like the wicked get off scot-free with no consequences. So we can’t necessarily depend on bad consequences to always prove to us that we should avoid turning down the wrong path. Instead, we should take God’s Word at its face value—listening to the “Thou shalt nots” and observing the “Do not enter” signs, without tempting God to prove it to us by consequences.

He goes on to describe the “way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know over what they stumble.” Walking that dark path of turning away from God, walking in wickedness, evil, and disobedience is a place of blindness and injury, stumbling. We can’t see where we are going and don’t understand why we are tripping and falling. Adam and Eve found that way and that darkness awfully quick when they ignored God’s warnings and ate the fruit in the garden. Their knowledge of God was immediately darkened and their sense of shame deep. Because it is a path of darkness and no understanding, when we fall on that path, we don’t know why. Sin just pulls us down further—it doesn’t give us any reason to understand why we are falling, why we or others are hurting. Sin is lonely and disorienting.

Sin is impulsive and compulsive. We keep hurtling toward self-destruction and injury to ourselves and others, blindly, and without knowledge. That is the other way the Proverb describes the way of the wicked: “they cannot sleep unless they have done wrong; they are robbed of sleep unless they have made someone stumble. For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence.” If we make evildoers our friends, we’ll always be restless, hungry, and thirsty for wrongdoing. That’s what I mean about sin being impulsive and compulsive. Maybe it began as a foolish impulse, but it becomes a negative, repetitive, compulsive habit. We keep doing the wrong that we hate and don’t want to do. It sucks the joy and the peacefulness out of life and fills us with jealousy and cruelty. Do we need more proof why God has put up the “DO NOT ENTER” signs?

Sadly, we’ve all stumbled down the way of evil. No one, by their own efforts, has walked a pure life according to the way of wisdom, and the paths of uprightness—that superior path that leads to life. Instead, we’ve all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We’ve ignored God’s good warnings and headed, against His command, down the path to harm and destruction. Some have travelled further, some have been stopped short by the intervention of God and others—some have hit rock bottom. But wherever we are at, the only sane message is God’s ever urgent call: “turn away!” This marvelous word of “repentance” means that God has a U-turn plan for every one of us who has headed down the way of evil. Turn back to God! It’s not under our strength, but the strength of the Holy Spirit, that we break that impulsivity and compulsion to sin, and turn around to God.

If you look through the Psalms, and search for the phrase “my feet”, you’ll find a wonderful collection of verses that say things like this: Psalm 17:5 “My steps have held fast to your paths; my feet have not slipped.” Psalm 18:33 “He made my feet like the feet of a deer and set me secure on the heights.” Psalm 18:36 “You gave a wide place for my steps under me, and my feet did not slip.”  Psalm 40:2 (ESV) “He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure.” Psalm 56:13 “For you have delivered my soul from death, yes, my feet from falling, that I may walk before God in the light of life.” Psalm 119:105 “ Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” These verses help us to understand the wonderful Gospel truth that gets our feet back on that solid ground. God is the One who keeps our feet steady and secure, who rescues us from death and the pit, and sets our feet on the rock, to keep us from slipping or falling, and shines His Word as Light on our path. Let’s go to that higher road, our feet set there by God.

Proverbs 4 says: “Hear my son, and accept my words, that the years of your life may be many. I have taught you the way of wisdom; I have led you in the paths of uprightness.” Long life is the likely blessing for those who hear and receive God’s Word. Is it always that way? No, but life tends toward greater blessing and success, when we follow God’s path, the ways of uprightness. But what is it like to walk on this path? If the path of sin was dark and filled with hidden obstacles and stumbling, the path of uprightness: “When you walk, your step will not be hampered, and if you run, you will not stumble.” Like those Psalm verses echo, God keeps our feet on the steady path, and keeps us from stumbling. Jesus used the same language in John 11:9-10, “If anyone walks in the day, he does not stumble, because he sees the light of this world. But if anyone walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.”

When Jesus talks about the “light is not in him”, He’s not referring to a candle, lamp, or flashlight—He’s talking about God’s light. And how do we have God’s Light in us, to keep us from stumbling? How do we get the Light of the World to shine down and light up our path? Jesus said it in John 8:12, “I am the Light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” Again, the picture of the path, walking after Jesus—He is the Light! And, by the way, He is the WAY too! John 14:6, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life” Jesus said, and “no one comes to the Father except through me.” When we believe in Jesus, He is our Light. He is also our wisdom and our instruction, to again borrow the language of our reading. All this walking on the right path is simply walking in Jesus.

Proverbs 4:18 says: “The path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, which shines brighter and brighter until full day.” In prophecy, Jesus is described as the Sun of righteousness, that will rise with healing on its wings (Malachi 4:2). In the New Testament, Jesus is called the “bright Morning Star.” And as we just heard from John, Jesus is the Light of the World. Brighter and brighter Jesus shines on our path. The more we walk on His Way, the more clearly we see, the further back the shades of darkness fade away. Instead of “DO NOT ENTER” signs on His path—now, all signs invite us forward, keep going, stay on the path! Run the race, finish the course, keep your eyes fixed on Jesus! And saints and angels cheer us on, and fellow Christians running alongside, help to pick us up when we fall, just as well help one another. Brighter and brighter is the path in Jesus.

            Proverbs ends with this repeated advice, father to son: Proverbs 4:20–23 “My son, be attentive to my words; incline your ear to my sayings. ²¹ Let them not escape from your sight; keep them within your heart. ²² For they are life to those who find them, and healing to all their flesh. ²³ Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.” Note again that the person who stays on this path, benefits by a listening ear, ready to hear God’s Word, God’s instruction. The person who stays on this path benefits from eyes trained to pay attention to this instruction, and they benefit from a heart that stores this knowledge up inside, and doesn’t let it slip away. That’s the posture of faith. That’s how a believer faces God—listening, watching, trusting in our heart—and what does God do? He gives life and healing. From our heart will flow springs of life. I seem to remember another passage like this, in the Gospel of John—yes, two of them. Jesus says in John 4, to a woman who is just beginning to know Him, He says, “whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” Springs of water in the heart—Jesus gives this fountain, and it wells up to eternal life. And what is the source of this water? John 7, Jesus says, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.”

            Jesus is the Living Water. He is Wisdom, He is the Path, He is the Light that shines on the path, and He is the Life that God gives to us. Two paths were set before us, one of stumbling, darkness and injury, the path of evil and sin. We were rescued from that path. Now our feet are set back on solid ground, walking on Him, the Rock, where our feet do not stumble or slip, but follow Jesus on the Way to blessedness and life. Lord, day by day, I pray that you put my feet back on your higher path, that you walk before me, behind me, beside me, and within me, to keep your Word in my heart, in my ears, and before my eyes. Light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death, and let my footsteps never waver from you. Lord, let me always follow where you lead, in Jesus’ name, Amen.

Sermon Talking Points

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1.      Read Proverbs 4:10-23. What is the difference between the two paths described here? Look at John 11:9-10; 8:12. How does Jesus use the same language to describe following Him?

2.      Jesus is not only “light for our path” (John 8:12), but also according to 1 Corinthians 1:30, the “wisdom from God.” In what ways does Wisdom direct us toward the good, and away from evil? (give examples of wise or foolish choices).

3.      Without wisdom we stumble in the dark (Prov. 4:19; John 11:9-10). Stumbling in the dark is a metaphor for how sin hurts us. In real examples, how does sin hurt us or others?

4.      What are the positive blessings of walking in the way of righteousness? Proverbs 4:10, 12, 22-23. How does the Way of righteousness contain “the springs of life?” Prov. 4:23; John 4:13-14; 7:37-38.