the truth about us

"Reprove not a scorner, lest he hate thee: rebuke a wise man, and he will love thee. Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be yet wiser: teach a just man, and he will increase in learning. The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding."

Proverbs 9:8-10

It struck me as I read these verses that God, who dares reprove us for our evil ways, has endured a great deal of hatred from the race of beings He created. God has been the reprover of mankind since the day He called Adam and Eve out of hiding to face the consequences for their sin. He dared our scorn, dared our hatred, to tell us the truth about what we have become.

In doing so, He opens the way of wisdom to us. It is not until we begin to fear God that we truly become wise. Those who will listen to God's judgment and accept it as true become like little children who love the One who disciplines them--who grow in His grace, because He does not give up on them no matter how often they continue to fall.

I once read a comment from someone who said they'd tried to read the Bible but didn't care for it because it was too "didactic" (Merriam-Webster: "intended to convey instruction and information as well as pleasure and entertainment"). I had to chuckle at this--of course the Bible is didactic. It is a book of Law and Prophecy. It is a book of judgment and of grace that only has meaning because of judgment. It is a book about sacrifice and the cost of true, redeeming love. It is a book of Truth, stated in a black-and-white way that is out of fashion in our world of relativity and reigning nonsense.

Many today would like to take God's words and make a storybook of them. We would like to impose our own culture and personal feelings on the written wisdom of God so that we needn't learn to fear Him--so that we might come to Him as equals and not as children. If we are honest with the Word, it will not allow us to do this. It will continue to tell us the truth about ourselves. Sometimes it will hurt.

The scorner will plug his ears and sing, refusing to hear. The wise man, Solomon tells us, will love his reprover.

Yes, the Bible tells us the truth about ourselves. But it also tells us something much greater: the truth about God. It reveals the holy to us. If we will believe it, it will tell us of a God who loved those who hated Him to such a degree that He took their judgment upon Himself and suffered to give them freedom--who died to give them life.

If we will come as children, we will find that God is a Father eager to receive us.