I Hear Voices All the Time

Proverbs 2:6-9 clearly states that the Lord gives wisdom as a gift to his faithful covenant people, and he thereby guards them from the temptations that might destroy them (we will see this later). Commit to the Lord’s wisdom, and you will understand righteousness and the good path (v. 9). We see in Proverbs 2 the same words used to describe multifaceted wisdom in 1:1-7. So pursuing wisdom and receiving it from the Lord will give you what the introduction to Proverbs promised. Again, wisdom is not a high IQ; it’s moral discernment of good and evil. It is the ability to see life from God’s perspective and then to act accordingly.

How does God produce morality in us? Proverbs 2:10 says that wisdom will enter our hearts. For us to walk the path of righteousness and wisdom, we must have the law written on our hearts and experience an inner transformation. That’s the only way we can obey God (see Jer 31; Ezek 36). Proverbs is not teaching tips for behavior modification. That won’t work. You can’t obey the Lord until you know him intimately in a personal relationship and his law is written on your heart. When that happens, discretion will keep a protecting watch over you (v. 11). This is essential to wisdom in daily life. You must listen to the voice of the Lord (vertical relationship) in order to live wisely before others in the world around you (horizontal relationships). He will protect you. That raises the question, What do you need protection from?

Proverbs 2:12-22

Wisdom will save you from the path of evil that leads to death. There are two groups mentioned in verses 12-22—two sets of voices that can pull you toward ruin and death: (1) evil men and (2) an evil woman.

First, wisdom will save you from the men who speak perversely (v. 12). These people, similar to the gang of Proverbs 1:8-19, are rivals to the voice of the father and the voice of God. And as we will see later in Proverbs, there’s a personal being that stands behind these human figures. Like Satan in the garden, these men distort reality and try to get you to follow the distortion. They seduce you. That’s what it means to speak perversely. Perverse speech distorts ultimate reality. The people who are saying this may genuinely believe that what they are saying is right and true and helpful, but it goes against the created order. Their words go against the way things really work. For example, a woman may genuinely think that marriage is just about two people who really love each other instead of a covenant relationship between one man and one woman for a lifetime. But that goes against the natural and God-ordained order of things. A man may think that not being happy with his wife is a legitimate ground for divorce, but that goes against the order of things as established by God. A boy or young man may genuinely think that fooling around with his girlfriend before marriage just helps you know what you like and don’t like, but that goes against the order of things and God’s call to be holy.

Perverse speech calls sin “good” and rejoices in evil. Proverbs 24:24 states, “Whoever says to the guilty, ‘You are innocent’—peoples will curse him, and nations will denounce him.” Justifying someone’s sin or saying that it’s not a sin is perverse speech. For example, it is perverse speech to tell someone their grudge is warranted because the hurt perpetrated against them was very severe. It is not right in the eyes of God. Proverbs 30:20 says, “This is the way of an adulteress: she eats and wipes her mouth and says, ‘I’ve done nothing wrong.’” People can find all kinds of ways to justify their sin as if it’s not wrong. “It’s OK for me to flirt with this woman at work because my wife doesn’t respond to me the way that she should.” With our mouths we justify and rationalize and minimize our sin or the sins of others. Any person who will counsel you in such a way as to justify sin in your life is someone of perverse speech that should be avoided. They are leading you down dark paths, and they rejoice in evil (2:13-14).

Wisdom will deliver you from them. What are the harmful consequences for listening to counsel like that from yourself or someone else? They will take you down the twisted path toward death.

Wisdom will also save you from the “forbidden [or foreign] woman” who is smooth-tongued (v. 16). This is the first time we meet the forbidden woman in Proverbs; she will be a major character in this book. She is the subject of the father’s warning many times. She is clearly presented as Solomon’s competitor for his son’s affection and attention because her “flattering talk” (v. 16) rivals his words (v. 1) and the Lord’s words (v. 6). Her flirtatious words mimic the dad in order to get the son to listen. Who will he listen to?

Here she refers to a literal person with whom the son can commit sexual sin. But later she will be personified as Woman Folly—the rival to Woman Wisdom (Prov 9). Folly will be described in the same way as this woman. They are both flatterers who lure their prey to death (cf. 5:3; 7:14-21; 9:13-17 and 2:18; 7:27; 9:18) (Murphy and Huwiler, Proverbs, 21). If the son begins an affair with this forbidden woman, it will reveal that he has rejected his father, Wisdom, and the Lord. Embracing the human forbidden woman by means of sexual sin reveals that spiritually he is in a relationship with Woman Folly instead of Wisdom (i.e., Jesus). This is not shocking since sexual sin and spiritual sin are tied together throughout the Bible. Already in Proverbs 1:32 rejecting Wisdom is described with the same word as unfaithfulness to the Lord in the prophets. Adultery is the distortion of the most intimate human relationship, and 1 Corinthians 6 reveals that it is also a distortion of the most intimate spiritual relationship. The whole point of Proverbs 1–9 is that if our horizontal relationships are off, our vertical are as well, and vice versa. Solomon knows this full well because he fell for forbidden “foreign” women who led him to idolatry and destroyed his dynasty (1 Kgs 11:1-5). Falling for the forbidden woman would reveal that the son is being led away from the Lord (Wisdom) and is instead embracing Folly.

How does this woman work? She flatters with her words. This is perhaps shocking to some. Most of us think of unfaithfulness as starting with looks, but that’s not the case in Proverbs. Adultery and sexual sin start with flattery. One of the top needs that men have is respect and admiration; so if a woman inflates the male ego, he will usually respond. They are suckers for flattery. This may start in a subtle way that the man doesn’t recognize as unwise. His coworker might lend a sympathetic ear, or she may laugh at his jokes. He may think of their conversations as just “harmless flirting.” Or perhaps he justifies his flirtation with, “I’m not happy at home.” Before long, he starts to look forward to work events that she will be at, or he begins to send secret messages to her on Facebook. Before he knows it he’s cheating on his wife, and it all started with what many looking on would justify as “harmless conversation.” This can happen with women too. Solomon is teaching his son, but if he was teaching his daughter he could warn about forbidden men that flatter with their words to get women to do what they want!

Any sexual activity outside marriage’s covenant commitment before God and witnesses to your heterosexual spouse is sinful, foolish, and deadly. This woman forsakes her husband and the vows she made to her God, and she will lead you to do the same. She violates the covenant law of God, and so would you by your foolish embrace of her. Her house sinks down to death, and those who enter never return to life. This destruction may happen now with the loss of your family, your reputation, or your money in alimony, or it may happen later at judgment. But, mark it down, it will happen. The wages of sexual sin is death with no hope of return. What is the antidote? Proverbs 2 says that it’s a right relationship with God through Wisdom (vertical relationship), and Proverbs 5 says it’s an intimate relationship with your wife (horizontal relationship).

So listen to the father and get wisdom so that you can walk righteous paths that protect you from derailing. The upright—those who are connected to the Lord through Wisdom ( Jesus)—will inhabit the land (i.e., Israel in that context and the new creation for us in Christ). This is a reference to the eternal life with God in the homeland he provides for us. But the wicked—those following after Folly as evidenced by their distorted worldview and sexual sin—will experience the “death” of exile (i.e., Israel’s exile in that context, and ultimately hell for those outside of Christ).

Jesus is not only the Wisdom of Proverbs, but he is also the Son who perfectly listens to his Father, perfectly keeps the covenant, and avoids immorality. However, in the end, Jesus takes the penalty that covenant-breakers like us deserve. He went down into death for sexual sinners like us, but three days later he triumphantly returned to the paths of life! Through his life, death, and resurrection he has defeated all of our enemies. It is not inevitable that they will drag you down to death. He can rescue you from them by empowering you to walk in wisdom. It is not inevitable that they will cause your exile from God forever. Jesus came out of death to inherit the whole earth, and you can be his coheir if you are united to him by faith. If you find yourself giving in to evil, consistently rationalizing your sin, or being enslaved to sexual sin, then circumstances may be revealing to you that you’re not listening to the voice of Wisdom. You have, instead, been seduced by the voice of another. If that’s true, come to Jesus—the Wisdom of God—and follow his leading voice! Listen to him. He has the words that lead to life.