| “FORMULA FOR A GODLY LIFE” Proverbs 3:1-10 Olivet Covenant Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia, PA © Rev. Linda Jaymes, 01/03/10 |
A new year is often a time for new beginnings, a time to wipe the slate clean and incorporate new habits and practices into our
lives. So with that in mind, I want to suggest that we begin this New Year by re-committing ourselves to the Lord and the kind
of life He wants us to live.
Throughout scripture we can find numerous verses that spell out various principles for right living. In fact, it would be
hard to open the Bible to any random page and NOT find at least one piece of advice or godly guidance to follow. For today’s
sermon I have chosen some verses from Proverbs that are full of the kind of wisdom that will help us live godly lives. In fact,
I selected the sermon title, “Formula for a Godly Life,” because these verses contain six very clear and specific precepts that
God expects his people to put into practice in their lives. These six instructions are presented almost in recipe or formula
fashion, leading us to believe that if we follow these precepts carefully we will indeed get the results described.
The first precept is set out in Proverbs 3:1-2, where the writer, King Solomon, says, “My son, do not forget my teaching,
but keep my commands in your heart, for they will prolong your life many years and bring you prosperity.” These verses
speak of the need for us to study God’s teachings and keep those teachings or commandments in our hearts. We are not to
forget them, but that implies more than just having them in our heads. The idea is that we should know them inside and out,
and not just so that we might recall them or even recite them but also that we might follow them. Knowing and remembering
God’s commandments won’t do us any good if we don’t follow them. So this first precept is really about obedience to God’s
commandments. And because God’s commandments are for our own benefit, our obedience should result in prolonged life and
prosperity.
But we need to be careful how we understand the word prosperity. In Hebrew, the word is actually, “shalom,” which we
often translate as “peace” but which is probably better translated as “wholeness.” When translated as “prosperity,” it should be
understood to refer to everything that makes life complete and worth living. In that sense, then, prosperity has less to do with
material things than it does with what is intangible, spiritual and eternal.
Verses 3-4 give us the next two precepts in our formula for a godly life. We are told, “Let love and faithfulness never
leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. Then you will win favor and a good name
in the sight of God and man.” Certainly love and faithfulness should be at the top of any list that describes godliness, and
these characteristics are absolutely necessary in any formula for a godly life. In fact, they are at the heart of God’s own
character, being synonymous with God’s very being. God is love. God is faithful. And as God’s people we are to take on his
character and grow in love and faithfulness day by day. When we extend to others the same kind of love and faithfulness that
God has extended to us in Jesus Christ, people notice. And so does God. When we consistently treat others with God’s brand
of love and faithfulness, which revolves around mercy, forgiveness, compassion and simple kindness, we are building a good
character and name for ourselves and for our God. In turn, we will acquire a reputation that will earn the respect of others and
the favor of God.
The fourth precept is found in verses 5-6, a favorite verse of many Christians: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and
lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.” These
verses remind us that life is complex and confusing, and under our own power and strength and our own limited wisdom and
perspective, we are bound to get lost or go astray. There is no way that we humans can figure life out on our own, and that
was never God’s intent. From where we stand, the view is very limited, and so God’s plan has always been that we should
stay close to Him and be connected to Him through a relationship that is integral to our well-being. We need God’s wisdom and
direction, his eyes and ears and hand to guide us; otherwise we will follow our own ways down blind alleys and dead-end
streets. Unless we acknowledge our need for God and depend on Him to lead and guide us, we will never become everything
He intends for us to be. Life will be a confusing maze in which we are constantly losing direction and struggling to find our
way. We will find ourselves going in circles, wasting precious time and energy trying to reach our goals.
But when we trust in God, and his ways, even when they may not make perfect sense to us, God will guide us through life’
s mazes and keep us going in the right direction and on the path that will best lead us to where He wants us to be. Trust, then,
is the fourth ingredient in the formula for a godly life, and when we trust God in every area of our life, we can rest assured
that we are on the best and straightest path to both godliness and the Kingdom.
The fifth ingredient for a godly life is found in verses 7-8: “Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and shun
evil. This will bring health to your body and nourishment to your bones.” Although the actual word is not mentioned in
these two lines of scripture, the reference here is to humility and knowing our place. If we are going to lead godly lives, we
need to keep a humble view of ourselves and our own importance. Most of all, we need to fear God, to realize that God is on
the throne of heaven; He is King of kings and Lord of lords and we are not on the same level or in the same category with God.
The Almighty God demands and deserves our fear, or in today’s language, our awe, our worship, our respect. When we have
a right reverence for God, and understand our place as his children and servants, we are on the road to true humility.
It is humbling for us to realize how much God loves us, enough to send his only Son to die that we might have eternal life.
It is humbling to realize that through Jesus Christ and his work on the Cross, we receive God’s mercy and forgiveness and a
place in his family. It is humbling to recognize that despite all of our sin and shortcomings, God cares so much for us that He
does not leave us alone in this life, but gives us his Holy Spirit to accompany us and empower us to resist temptation and evil.
It is humbling when the Spirit gives us, from time to time, glimpses and experiences of what the final Kingdom of Heaven will
be like. Those moments may be fleeting, but they are down payments on the perfection and right relationship for which God
created us, and that is humbling too. When we realize our proper place as children of God, and receive his love and forgiveness
and tender care in the safety of his powerful and protective arms, we receive the spiritual nourishment that actually impacts our
physical well-being. So genuine humility results in a godly spirit as well as physical health and strength.
The last part of the formula for a godly life from this section of scripture is found in verses 9-10, and it has to do with the
right use of our wealth and material goods. We are told to, “Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your
crops; then your barns will be filled to overflowing and your vats will brim over with new wine.” This truth can be found
over and over again throughout the scriptures. When we are generous toward God, we experience his overflowing goodness
and blessing toward us. Our lives are filled up with the good things of God. Generosity leads to abundance and fullness.
But there is a caution to be added here, lest we fall into the trap of thinking that these verses are a guarantee of material
prosperity. If that were true, investment counselors would be telling their clients to give sacrificially to God in order to
maximize profits and financial security. So even though it is true that those who trust God with their finances will testify that
God has blessed them financially in return, there is more to it than simply giving God our money so that we can get a blessing
black. Notice that verse 9 begins with the word “honor.” And in that one word is a wealth of hidden meaning that qualifies
everything else these verses tell us. To honor God with our wealth means to be good stewards of all He has given us. It not
only means we are to manage our money and material blessings well, but to manage them with the right attitude and
motivation. The right attitude is thankfulness toward God, and the acknowledgement that everything we have is a gift from
Him. The right motivation is love, the love we have seen and heard and experienced and learned in Jesus Christ—love we want
to give back because our hearts and lives have been transformed by it.
Unless we give with the right attitude and motivation, our gifts may benefit those who receive them, but we will not be
blessed. Giving in order to get something in return is not really giving, but manipulation, and that will never honor God. Yet
true generosity towards God, whether gifts of time, talent or treasure, gifts that come from the heart without any expectations
or strings attached to them, always result in supernatural fullness and blessing. Certainly, generosity is an important part of the
formula for a godly life.
Although this formula for a godly life is not the only formula for godliness in scripture, it is a good one, a sound one, one
that would do us good to follow. Obedience, love, faithfulness, trust, humility and generosity may not exhaust the limits
of godliness, but they are all necessary if we are going to live godly lives, lives that please God, lives that honor God, lives that
reflect the image of God that is meant to be in us. These are all characteristics or qualities that never go out of style. They were
true long before the time of Christ, when Solomon wrote down these proverbs; they were true a thousand years later, when
Jesus walked the earth and demonstrated them in his life, and they were true when the writers of the New Testament recorded
them for posterity. The formula for a godly life hasn’t changed, any more than God has. The formula for godliness in
Solomon’s time is still true today and will remain true tomorrow and forever. Godliness will always consist of actions and
attitudes that honor God, reflect his ways and remind others to look to God for hope and salvation and everything that really
matters in this life and the next.
It is Good News for us that this formula for a godly life is not beyond our reach. In Jesus Christ and by the power of
his Holy Spirit living in us, God is always working in us to help us to be the godly people He calls us to be. Living a godly life
isn’t always easy, but a life of ease is not what scripture teaches us to seek after or strive for. Practicing obedience, love,
faithfulness, trust, humility and generosity is not the formula for an easy life. Nor is it necessarily the formula for a happy
life, a prosperous life, a successful life or even a long life. Experience tells us that life is not quite as simple as Solomon makes it
sound. Sometimes godly people lead difficult lives, or even lives of poverty and failure by this world’s standards, and health
and long life may elude them. But in eternity, none of those things are going to matter much. It’s not the world’s standards
that really count. What will matter in the end is whether we have honored God with a godly life, a life pleasing and meaningful
to God and the establishment of his Kingdom. That is a life that matters both now and forever; that is a life that begins now,
and in Jesus Christ we can trust that a life like that will never end.
Let us pray.
lives. So with that in mind, I want to suggest that we begin this New Year by re-committing ourselves to the Lord and the kind
of life He wants us to live.
Throughout scripture we can find numerous verses that spell out various principles for right living. In fact, it would be
hard to open the Bible to any random page and NOT find at least one piece of advice or godly guidance to follow. For today’s
sermon I have chosen some verses from Proverbs that are full of the kind of wisdom that will help us live godly lives. In fact,
I selected the sermon title, “Formula for a Godly Life,” because these verses contain six very clear and specific precepts that
God expects his people to put into practice in their lives. These six instructions are presented almost in recipe or formula
fashion, leading us to believe that if we follow these precepts carefully we will indeed get the results described.
The first precept is set out in Proverbs 3:1-2, where the writer, King Solomon, says, “My son, do not forget my teaching,
but keep my commands in your heart, for they will prolong your life many years and bring you prosperity.” These verses
speak of the need for us to study God’s teachings and keep those teachings or commandments in our hearts. We are not to
forget them, but that implies more than just having them in our heads. The idea is that we should know them inside and out,
and not just so that we might recall them or even recite them but also that we might follow them. Knowing and remembering
God’s commandments won’t do us any good if we don’t follow them. So this first precept is really about obedience to God’s
commandments. And because God’s commandments are for our own benefit, our obedience should result in prolonged life and
prosperity.
But we need to be careful how we understand the word prosperity. In Hebrew, the word is actually, “shalom,” which we
often translate as “peace” but which is probably better translated as “wholeness.” When translated as “prosperity,” it should be
understood to refer to everything that makes life complete and worth living. In that sense, then, prosperity has less to do with
material things than it does with what is intangible, spiritual and eternal.
Verses 3-4 give us the next two precepts in our formula for a godly life. We are told, “Let love and faithfulness never
leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. Then you will win favor and a good name
in the sight of God and man.” Certainly love and faithfulness should be at the top of any list that describes godliness, and
these characteristics are absolutely necessary in any formula for a godly life. In fact, they are at the heart of God’s own
character, being synonymous with God’s very being. God is love. God is faithful. And as God’s people we are to take on his
character and grow in love and faithfulness day by day. When we extend to others the same kind of love and faithfulness that
God has extended to us in Jesus Christ, people notice. And so does God. When we consistently treat others with God’s brand
of love and faithfulness, which revolves around mercy, forgiveness, compassion and simple kindness, we are building a good
character and name for ourselves and for our God. In turn, we will acquire a reputation that will earn the respect of others and
the favor of God.
The fourth precept is found in verses 5-6, a favorite verse of many Christians: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and
lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.” These
verses remind us that life is complex and confusing, and under our own power and strength and our own limited wisdom and
perspective, we are bound to get lost or go astray. There is no way that we humans can figure life out on our own, and that
was never God’s intent. From where we stand, the view is very limited, and so God’s plan has always been that we should
stay close to Him and be connected to Him through a relationship that is integral to our well-being. We need God’s wisdom and
direction, his eyes and ears and hand to guide us; otherwise we will follow our own ways down blind alleys and dead-end
streets. Unless we acknowledge our need for God and depend on Him to lead and guide us, we will never become everything
He intends for us to be. Life will be a confusing maze in which we are constantly losing direction and struggling to find our
way. We will find ourselves going in circles, wasting precious time and energy trying to reach our goals.
But when we trust in God, and his ways, even when they may not make perfect sense to us, God will guide us through life’
s mazes and keep us going in the right direction and on the path that will best lead us to where He wants us to be. Trust, then,
is the fourth ingredient in the formula for a godly life, and when we trust God in every area of our life, we can rest assured
that we are on the best and straightest path to both godliness and the Kingdom.
The fifth ingredient for a godly life is found in verses 7-8: “Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and shun
evil. This will bring health to your body and nourishment to your bones.” Although the actual word is not mentioned in
these two lines of scripture, the reference here is to humility and knowing our place. If we are going to lead godly lives, we
need to keep a humble view of ourselves and our own importance. Most of all, we need to fear God, to realize that God is on
the throne of heaven; He is King of kings and Lord of lords and we are not on the same level or in the same category with God.
The Almighty God demands and deserves our fear, or in today’s language, our awe, our worship, our respect. When we have
a right reverence for God, and understand our place as his children and servants, we are on the road to true humility.
It is humbling for us to realize how much God loves us, enough to send his only Son to die that we might have eternal life.
It is humbling to realize that through Jesus Christ and his work on the Cross, we receive God’s mercy and forgiveness and a
place in his family. It is humbling to recognize that despite all of our sin and shortcomings, God cares so much for us that He
does not leave us alone in this life, but gives us his Holy Spirit to accompany us and empower us to resist temptation and evil.
It is humbling when the Spirit gives us, from time to time, glimpses and experiences of what the final Kingdom of Heaven will
be like. Those moments may be fleeting, but they are down payments on the perfection and right relationship for which God
created us, and that is humbling too. When we realize our proper place as children of God, and receive his love and forgiveness
and tender care in the safety of his powerful and protective arms, we receive the spiritual nourishment that actually impacts our
physical well-being. So genuine humility results in a godly spirit as well as physical health and strength.
The last part of the formula for a godly life from this section of scripture is found in verses 9-10, and it has to do with the
right use of our wealth and material goods. We are told to, “Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your
crops; then your barns will be filled to overflowing and your vats will brim over with new wine.” This truth can be found
over and over again throughout the scriptures. When we are generous toward God, we experience his overflowing goodness
and blessing toward us. Our lives are filled up with the good things of God. Generosity leads to abundance and fullness.
But there is a caution to be added here, lest we fall into the trap of thinking that these verses are a guarantee of material
prosperity. If that were true, investment counselors would be telling their clients to give sacrificially to God in order to
maximize profits and financial security. So even though it is true that those who trust God with their finances will testify that
God has blessed them financially in return, there is more to it than simply giving God our money so that we can get a blessing
black. Notice that verse 9 begins with the word “honor.” And in that one word is a wealth of hidden meaning that qualifies
everything else these verses tell us. To honor God with our wealth means to be good stewards of all He has given us. It not
only means we are to manage our money and material blessings well, but to manage them with the right attitude and
motivation. The right attitude is thankfulness toward God, and the acknowledgement that everything we have is a gift from
Him. The right motivation is love, the love we have seen and heard and experienced and learned in Jesus Christ—love we want
to give back because our hearts and lives have been transformed by it.
Unless we give with the right attitude and motivation, our gifts may benefit those who receive them, but we will not be
blessed. Giving in order to get something in return is not really giving, but manipulation, and that will never honor God. Yet
true generosity towards God, whether gifts of time, talent or treasure, gifts that come from the heart without any expectations
or strings attached to them, always result in supernatural fullness and blessing. Certainly, generosity is an important part of the
formula for a godly life.
Although this formula for a godly life is not the only formula for godliness in scripture, it is a good one, a sound one, one
that would do us good to follow. Obedience, love, faithfulness, trust, humility and generosity may not exhaust the limits
of godliness, but they are all necessary if we are going to live godly lives, lives that please God, lives that honor God, lives that
reflect the image of God that is meant to be in us. These are all characteristics or qualities that never go out of style. They were
true long before the time of Christ, when Solomon wrote down these proverbs; they were true a thousand years later, when
Jesus walked the earth and demonstrated them in his life, and they were true when the writers of the New Testament recorded
them for posterity. The formula for a godly life hasn’t changed, any more than God has. The formula for godliness in
Solomon’s time is still true today and will remain true tomorrow and forever. Godliness will always consist of actions and
attitudes that honor God, reflect his ways and remind others to look to God for hope and salvation and everything that really
matters in this life and the next.
It is Good News for us that this formula for a godly life is not beyond our reach. In Jesus Christ and by the power of
his Holy Spirit living in us, God is always working in us to help us to be the godly people He calls us to be. Living a godly life
isn’t always easy, but a life of ease is not what scripture teaches us to seek after or strive for. Practicing obedience, love,
faithfulness, trust, humility and generosity is not the formula for an easy life. Nor is it necessarily the formula for a happy
life, a prosperous life, a successful life or even a long life. Experience tells us that life is not quite as simple as Solomon makes it
sound. Sometimes godly people lead difficult lives, or even lives of poverty and failure by this world’s standards, and health
and long life may elude them. But in eternity, none of those things are going to matter much. It’s not the world’s standards
that really count. What will matter in the end is whether we have honored God with a godly life, a life pleasing and meaningful
to God and the establishment of his Kingdom. That is a life that matters both now and forever; that is a life that begins now,
and in Jesus Christ we can trust that a life like that will never end.
Let us pray.
