Morning on a stony road outside a walled hill town: a father and his teenage son walk away from the viewer, the father’s head turned to the boy as he talks, a small stone gateway far ahead.

The father’s talks

Proverbs 1

Someone is already teaching you how to live. Do you know who?

33 verses≈ 4 min1 personBSB

Images are artistic interpretations.

Tap any post to go deeper

In this chapter

Where we are

1–7The father's talksWhy the book exists, then a father to his sonChapter 1
8–9Wisdom callsHer house and Folly's
10–22:16Solomon's sayingsTwo lines at a time
22:17–24The sayings of the wiseThirty sayings, and a few more
25–29Hezekiah's collectionMore of Solomon, copied out later
30AgurNumbered sayings from a weary man
31LemuelA mother's words, and the noble wife

The Beginning of Knowledge

Evening in a courtyard of David’s house: King Solomon sits speaking to a ring of attentive young men and elders, a musician tuning a small lyre and a scribe with his reed pen poised over a blank sheet.

These are the proverbs of Solomon son of David,

king of Israel,

Tap to go deeper: meaning, history and related Scripture

for gaining wisdom and discipline,

for comprehending words of insight,

and for receiving instruction in wise living

and in righteousness, justice, and equity.

To impart prudence to the simple

and knowledge and discretion to the young,

let the wise listen and gain instruction,

and the discerning acquire wise counsel

by understanding the proverbs and parables,

the sayings and riddles of the wise.

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.

Proverbs 1:7

The Enticement of Sin

Listen, my son, to your father’s instruction,

and do not forsake the teaching of your mother.

For they are a garland of grace on your head

and a pendant around your neck.

Reflect

Who taught you?

Whose voice taught you most about how to live? What did they hand you?

My son, if sinners entice you,

do not yield to them.

The sinners

my son, do not walk the road with them

or set foot upon their path.

For their feet run to evil,

and they are swift to shed blood.

How futile it is to spread the net

where any bird can see it!

But they lie in wait for their own blood;

they ambush their own lives.

Such is the fate of all who are greedy,

whose unjust gain takes the lives of its possessors.

Question

Quick question

A one-line saying, dropped into the middle of the warning.

Why is the net in verse 17 a warning?

Wisdom Calls Aloud

Midday in the open square inside a town gate: people pass, a donkey carries sacks, a man haggles, and a stone step in the middle of it all stands empty.

Wisdom calls out in the street,

she lifts her voice in the square;

in the main concourse she cries aloud,

at the city gates she makes her speech:

Wisdom

How long will scoffers delight in their scorn

and fools hate knowledge?

If you had repented at my rebuke,

then surely I would have poured out my spirit on you;

I would have made my words known to you.

Because you refused my call,

and no one took my outstretched hand,

because you neglected all my counsel,

and wanted none of my correction,

Wisdom

A great thunderstorm breaks over the Judean hills at dusk: forked lightning strikes a far ridge, sheets of rain and hail slant down, and wind bends the oaks on a slope, under one smooth, heavy canopy of dark cloud.

in turn I will mock your calamity;

I will sneer when terror strikes you,

when your dread comes like a storm,

and your destruction like a whirlwind,

when distress and anguish overwhelm you.

0:12

Narrated by Bob Souer · BSB audio, public domain

Wisdom

Then they will call on me, but I will not answer;

they will earnestly seek me, but will not find me.

Wisdom

For they hated knowledge

and chose not to fear the LORD.

They accepted none of my counsel;

they despised all my reproof.

So they will eat the fruit of their own way,

and be filled with their own devices.

For the waywardness of the simple will slay them,

and the complacency of fools will destroy them.

Wisdom

Wisdom

But whoever listens to me will dwell in safety,

secure from the fear of evil.”

Two voices

Whiteboard

Both voices call in public. Only one tells you where the road ends.

Pray

A teachable heart

Ask to hear the voice that loves you, even when it rebukes. Pray for anyone being drawn in by easy gain today. Ask for a teachable heart, while the hand is still held out.

You’ve experienced

Proverbs 1

0 of 31 chapters read

A verse to carry with you

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.

Proverbs 1:7

or swipe left