Fear Falls Short

“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.” (Pr 9:10 AV)

In looking at the underlined phrase above, commentators seem to be split as to what the holy is.  Most take it to be the LORD.  However, there are others who site the word ‘holy’ as an adjective and not a noun.  Is it things?  Is it people?  Is it the LORD?  If we look back at the first part of the verse, the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.  Without changing the subject of the statement, I would have to concur ‘the holy’ here is God Himself.  Taking this proverb as a whole we learn, for the saint to grow in wisdom, it begins and not ends with the fear of God.  Reverencing and respecting Him as the sole authority and source of all wisdom is the beginning of the process.  However, wisdom needs more than fear and respect.  For wisdom to mature, there must be an intimate knowledge of God and how or why He acts.  The saint that desires wisdom needs to be a student and follower of the LORD.  He needs to know God before he can walk after God.

To say my siblings and I feared our father would be an understatement.  My dad ran a tight ship.  He had to.  There were eleven of us.  Nothing got by him.  We don’t know how he did it.  He probably had a network of intelligence workers canvassing the town, checking on his children so he could keep them in line.  He knew everything and corrected us rather sternly.  We definitely feared him.  However, for wisdom to take root, there must be more than fear.  If fear is the only motivator, then as soon as the source of that fear is removed, then wisdom wanes.  Herein is where my father took pains to go beyond fear.  He uses scouting and camping as his major tool in that toolbox.  He spent time with his children in the context of camping, life skills, leadership skills, and character building.  Between the eleven of us, he couldn’t spend as much time as he wanted, but the time he did spend was valuable.  Those intimate conversations we will remember for a lifetime.  The Saturdays we would spend one-on-one might not have been too many, but each was deeply impressive.  The rides in his truck may have been few and far between, but having a one-on-one conversation with dad, even if it was a brief fifteen-minute ride, does more to build respect and admiration than fear ever could produce.  The two days we spent as he interviewed for GE will never be forgotten.  The older I got, the more I realized just how little I knew my father.  What made him tic explained the worth of his values.  Assigning a personal value to truths is what makes them stick.

This is no less the truth with the LORD.  If knowledge of the Holy does not accompany the fear of the LORD, then over time wisdom will be lost.  I have seen this time and again.  Wise people who have wonderful ethics but do not walk with God will eventually abandon the principles upon which they built their life.  The happened is recent past as I saw time and again those who feared the LORD in their youth abandon that fear and make some very foolish decisions.  Decisions that ruined other people, greatly harm churches, and needlessly harmed the ministry of the man of God.  Fear of the LORD is the foundation of all other knowledge.  It starts there.  But it starts there and does not end there.  Knowing why the LORD commands some things and not others goes a long way in retaining the biblical principles He desires us to learn.  Knowing that He loves us and love is that motivation for all He requires, again, goes a long way in retaining the truth He reveals.  Some obey the LORD merely out of fear.  That is good.  But it is not the best.  Knowledge of the Holy is the cement that makes truth stick.