Wisdom Is Seeking You

I invite you to open your Bibles to the Book of Proverbs, chapter 1, verses 20 to 21. How many of us know that God speaks? How many of us know that God spoke in the Bible and continues to speak to those who have ears to hear Him? Amen. I ask God that I may be someone who is always listening to His voice, and that you may be as well. Proverbs 1:20 to 21. We are going to observe how God sometimes speaks in a soft, quiet voice, but sometimes God also shouts to us. We are going to look at that.

“Wisdom cries out in the streets; she raises her voice in the squares; she cries out in the chief places of assembly and at the entrances to the city gates; she speaks her reasons.”

Lord, I thank You that Your wisdom is not silent. Thank You, Lord, that Your wisdom is not hidden. Thank You that Your wisdom, Lord, is more than within our reach. I ask You that I may be a wiser man in You, and that we, Your people, may also learn wisdom. Speak to us today; may it be the voice of the Good Shepherd speaking in this place, I ask You in the name of Jesus. Amen.

How many of us know that life is complicated sometimes? Sometimes there are complicated situations. Sometimes they are complicated situations because we go looking for complications and then pay the price. But many times that is not the case; many times there are complications simply because life is complicated. Perhaps you are the father or mother of a teenage child who is somewhat rebellious, or perhaps more than somewhat rebellious, and no matter how much you insist, he goes in the other direction. You do not want to push him away from the ways of the Lord, but neither can you remain silent. What do you do? Perhaps you are a single mother struggling with life’s challenges, paying bills, trying to create a healthy environment for your children in a world that grows uglier and more violent every day. Perhaps you are a couple who married, and both of you came into the marriage with children from previous marriages, and sometimes the two families do not blend so easily. In English it is called a “blended family,” as if it were just so easy for them to come together. It is never like that. There are complications.

Perhaps you are a young adult trying to choose a career and decide what to do with your life. Perhaps you have to choose whom you are going to marry, and you do not want to make a mistake with major decisions. What are you going to do? Perhaps you are a teenager; maybe you’re a teenager and you’re in high school, you’re a teenage girl dating a guy that you love, but he’s pushing the limits. You don’t want to lose him, but you want to keep your principles as a Christian. What are you going to do?

Perhaps you are a teenage boy, a teenager, who is in school, and there are temptations involving drugs and gangs, and there is pressure from every direction. What are you going to do? How are you going to deal with that? There are challenges in life; there are complications. Perhaps you are trying to pay the bills, and there is not enough money for everything you have to pay. Perhaps you receive a difficult diagnosis for a child, for a parent, or for yourself, and you do not know what you are going to do with it. Perhaps the marriage is growing cold, and you do not know how to bring it back to life. Perhaps your boss is a terrible tyrant, and you do not know how to answer him, but you cannot lose your job. There are complications in life—legal situations, financial situations, family situations, problems that seem to have no solution. And sometimes people approach the pastor to ask him for advice. I have bad news and good news. The bad news is that, at least as far as I am concerned, I do not have the answers. The good news is that I know the One who does have the answers, and He is the wisest in the universe.

The Bible says, “Why do you say, Jacob, and speak, O Israel: My way is hidden from Jehovah, and my judgment has passed unnoticed by my God? Have you not known? Have you not heard that the everlasting God is Jehovah, who created the ends of the earth? He does not faint or grow weary, and there is no one who can fathom His understanding. Thank God, He gives strength to the weary and multiplies the strength of the one who has none.”

God is wise. All we have to do is ask. All we have to do is ask for it. The Bible says clearly: if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives abundantly to all without reproach, and it will be given to him.

I know people who—and one of the wisest people I know in this world, as it happens, is our pastor, Roberto—asked God for wisdom when he was a child. I do not know whether you knew that. The Lord answered him by giving him one of the most discerning hearts I have ever known. I do not say that merely to flatter someone, but to celebrate the fact that God hears prayer.

If we seek wisdom, there is a God who wants to give it to you. I have even better news: it is not merely that you have to seek wisdom, or that God invites you to seek wisdom; it is that wisdom is seeking you. Turn with me to the Book of Proverbs 8, and we are going to remain in Proverbs. Proverbs 8:1 to 4.

“Does not wisdom cry out and understanding raise her voice? On the heights beside the road, at the crossroads of the paths, she takes her stand; at the gates, at the entrance to the city, at the entrance through the doors, she cries aloud: O men, I cry out to you; I direct my voice to the sons of men…”

God is crying out wisdom to you. It is up to us to listen to Him, to listen to that voice that is speaking. Wisdom is seeking you, and here is even better news: wisdom is the key to success and happiness in life. That is how it is.

Faith in Christ is the key to your salvation. The fear of Jehovah is the beginning of wisdom—of knowing, “God, You are God and I am not. I have to learn from You”—and from there comes a flow of teaching from above. And wisdom gives you success, happiness, and prosperity in life. It sounds as though I were selling something, but I am not.

Proverbs 3:1. How many of you want to live a long life? I do. That would be good.

“My son, do not forget my law, and let your heart keep my commandments, for they will add length of days and years of life and peace to you.”

How many people here want a good name among others? You want a good reputation; you want people to like you and love you. Look at what the Word says in verse 3:

“…Let mercy and truth never leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart, and you will find favor and a good reputation in the sight of God and men.”

How many of you want good health? Look at this, verse 7:

“…Do not be wise in your own opinion; fear Jehovah and turn away from evil, for it will be medicine to your body and refreshment to your bones.”

How many of you want money? Does anyone want money? Yes, it feels wrong to say it, doesn’t it? Am I allowed to say yes to that? How many of you want money? Enough to pay the bills—you just have to give me a personal offering and, well… No, no. But look at verse 9:

“…Honor Jehovah with your possessions and with the firstfruits of all your produce; and your barns will be filled with abundance, and your vats will overflow with new wine.”

God can bless in that way. There are many things: there is health, there is prosperity, there are riches. How many people here want a peaceful night’s sleep? Perhaps some young mothers would give anything for one night of sleep. Look at what it says in verse 24:

“…When you lie down, you will not be afraid; rather, you will lie down, and your sleep will be pleasant.”

Oh, how wonderful. Wisdom promises all of this. Wisdom is worth more than everything else. If we are going to seek one thing in order to have prosperity, success, and peace, let us seek wisdom, because it works. It works because God’s wisdom is not a trick for quick success. Many books are sold with many tricks for making money quickly, for making everything work out well right away—two or three easy little steps. We Christians know where the formula is, and it is here. It is within our reach, for those of us who seek it. For it is not based on tricks, but on God’s truth. The prosperity and wisdom of God are written into the foundations of creation.

In English I put it this way: it’s woven into the fabric of the universe. I was feeling somewhat poetic this morning: it is interwoven into the mantle of creation. It doesn’t work in Spanish. But that is how it is: all creation bears the footprints of wisdom. They are principles of creation, and they work for the good of those who obey them, while those who resist them harm themselves.

Now, I need to say something quickly first. There are many proverbs that say that if you do good, things will go well for you in life. If you work well, you will earn money; if you live a healthy life, you will not get sick; if you choose a good wife well, you will never have problems. They say many beautiful things that are true, but a person can easily fall into the error of thinking that if I serve God, nothing bad will ever happen to me. That is why another book of wisdom was written, called the Book of Job. A wise man, a just man, an upright man who suffered, not because he did anything to deserve it, but because we live in a complicated world, a fallen world, where there is a devil conversing with the Lord, and sometimes problems will come even when we do what is right. But even amid problems, there is victory and blessing for the person who lives according to wisdom. Amen.

And we are not talking about a lot of schooling, although I love school. I am very geeky; I like reading all these things, but school does not impart wisdom. Someone may never have studied anything and be wiser than everyone else; someone may have a doctorate and be more foolish than everyone else. We are talking about God’s wisdom, wisdom from above, which is based on principles that cannot be violated; they are inviolable. These are laws that are unbreakable. It is like the law of gravity: we all have to obey that law, whether we want to or not, whether we like it or not. We all obey the law of gravity because it is a law greater than we are. That is how it is with the laws of wisdom.

These laws do not break; we break ourselves against them. If we try to violate them, they do not change; we suffer, because they are principles that are real independently of you and me.

I had an interesting conversation with my son this week. One night my wife and I decided on something special: we were going to take him out for ice cream after a school event. And my son ate and ate and ate like a madman—eight years old… That night, his stomach hurt while he was in bed. And there I was, praying, and I was the one who had allowed him to eat that much, so… But I was there, and I said, “Well, son, it is because you ate too much ice cream.” And he asked me a question: “Daddy, why can’t eating ice cream make you feel good and eating chicken and broccoli make you sick? I would prefer it that way, Daddy. Why can’t it?” I said, “Look, I am very sorry—I’m very sorry—but that is how things are, and either you accept it and live well, or you violate it and things will go badly for you.”

It does not depend on your mission or your power—nothing. It is a law. Christian or not, we have to submit to these principles. Just yesterday, I tried a kind of pizza that was new to me, one I had never tried before, called Buffalo Chicken Pizza—buffalo chicken pizza. That sounds interesting. We ordered a Buffalo Chicken Pizza, and mind you, I was doing good that day. I was helping a brother move his things; I was there with a brother; we prayed beforehand—and it did not work. No matter how anointed you may be, Buffalo Chicken Pizza is going to upset your stomach. It does not matter; you are going to suffer. Prayer does not work for that.

The thing is that we Christians think we are so anointed that the rules of wisdom do not apply to us, that we can do whatever we want and things will go well for us. It is true. I asked myself this: why is it that many times even people who are not believers are wiser than I am, wiser than we Christians are? And one problem occurred to me: many times we are so accustomed to the supernatural aspect of life that we neglect the natural aspect of life, which also has God’s wisdom in it. And so, because we are accustomed to God performing miracles, we think we can walk on water like Jesus and God will perform the miracle. That is why we sometimes live dangerously, and God takes care of us. He sends His angels and keeps us from evil, but the angels get tired, I believe, because we make them work too much. And God is saying, “Look, I am paying My angels a lot of overtime because of you, because you are neglecting the laws of wisdom, and I have to save you again and again.”

I was in traffic a few days ago, and there was a car that did not move after the light changed. The person just stayed there, and I saw that the car had many Christian bumper stickers all over it. I saw the car begin to move, but badly, and I said, “Is the brother all right?” So I looked over here to see what was happening. He was sitting there texting in the car. And a brother… but not anyone I know from here, so do not worry. I do not think I see him here. But we think that because we are Christians, because we have the bumper sticker, things will go well for us. The Lord says, “You have to put wisdom into practice.” Perhaps you are going to heaven, but sooner than you should, because these laws do not break. Wisdom, principles, principles, principles.

The word principle means beginnings. They are the first things. They are the most basic laws of life. Honest work. Honest money. Marriage between one man and one woman for life. Process—the fact that things take time. Responsibility—actions have consequences. Prudence, love: love your neighbor as yourself. Integrity: keep your promises in life. Wisdom, basic principles, principles, principles. It works; they are our life. If we listen to God’s principles in every situation in life, things will go well for us.

But the thing is, there are other voices. Proverbs 9:14 says that there is another woman. In the book of Proverbs, we have Woman Wisdom, but there is also Woman Folly, who positions herself:

“…She sits on a chair at the door of her house, on the heights of the city, to call out to those who pass by on the road, to those who go straight along their paths, and she says to anyone who is naive, ‘Come here.’ And to those who lack judgment she says, ‘Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is delicious.’”

I do not know why anyone would steal water, but apparently, according to her, it is sweet if you do.

“…But they do not know that the dead are there, that her guests are in the depths of Sheol.”

All the deceptions about making money quickly by doing evil, and they are not going to punish you because you pay your tithe, so it does not matter that you obtained it dishonestly. The lies of necessity that are there to deceive us.

I have thought a lot about today’s young people, especially young men who can earn thousands of dollars in an afternoon selling drugs, because Satan knows how to bribe people. But how do you earn money according to the Word? According to God’s wisdom, by playing the lottery? Look for the right way to earn money, young man; get yourself a job. “But here I am earning eight dollars an hour while my friend earns a thousand dollars in an afternoon?” In the long run, it is better to be alive ten years from now with money in the bank than to have thousands of dollars and be in prison or dead after a few days.

Which voice are we going to listen to? Let us seek the voice of God, the voice of wisdom, in every practical situation in life. Many times, we make a distinction between spiritual life and life in the world, and we are very spiritual in a church setting, but when we are at work, with friends, on the street, or wherever else, we forget our Christian principles. If they do not know that you are a Christian at your workplace, well, we need to come back to the altar here, because faith must touch every area of life.

And it is here in Proverbs. Let us look at some proverbs that demonstrate how God wants to speak wisdom into the details of life. Proverbs 13:11. Let me tell you a personal testimony. One day this week, I was eating dinner with my children and my wife, and they asked me a question about something or other in the world, and I did not have the answer. I normally make up the answer, but I never fool them; they know. And then they say, “Daddy, why don’t you ask your phone?” Because the phone has all the answers. “Okay, I am going to ask my phone. Phone, what is such and such?”

And while I was asking the question, an offer appeared on the screen: “You have been selected from among all the residents of Norwood to receive a free gift.” I said, “Wow, how interesting. I want a free gift. I like free gifts. This is good.” And my six-year-old daughter said, “Daddy, it’s a scam; don’t believe it.” Then it says, “Which gift do you want?” Well, there is no harm in finding out which gifts they are offering me. An iPhone 6—how nice. I would like an iPhone 6; I need one. My daughter said, “No, don’t do it, don’t do it.” “Okay, I have decided to listen to Miss Wisdom because I know that God is speaking through….” Proverbs 13:11 says:

“Riches gained through vanity dwindle, but whoever gathers with a diligent hand increases them.”

Proverbs 20:21: “Goods acquired hastily at first will not be blessed in the end.”

Why look for quick money? It is better to earn it day by day, working, saving, being generous with God, being prudent, and little by little it grows. It is not very flashy, not very showy. I want to hear a testimony about someone who finds a million dollars under their pillow one day or something like that. I want to hear that. But the truth of life is that it happens little by little. Those here who have lived it know that.

There is a saying in English: “Easy come, easy go.” If it comes to you easily, it leaves you easily—and even faster. Another testimony, Proverbs 23:31–32. These are only a few examples of wisdom. About fifteen years ago in Puerto Rico, I received a scholarship to travel and eat very well, so I was in Puerto Rico with a Cuban friend whose mother is a Cuban pastor. She came to visit us in Puerto Rico and took us to one of those very nice resorts, and we saw the beach and ate. We did not stay there, but we were there, and there was a casino with those machines into which you put a coin and coins come pouring out. My friend and I were walking there with his mother, and we saw someone at one of the machines with coins and coins and coins pouring into a cup, like a shower of money falling and falling, and he swapped one cup for another. The young man and I just stood there watching. His mother quoted Proverbs 23:31–32 to us.

“…Do not look at the wine when it is red, when its color sparkles in the cup. It goes down smoothly, but in the end it bites like a serpent and causes pain like a viper.”

Do not stare at it too long. If you know that it is going to kill you, why stay there looking and looking at it? It is like Eve in the Garden of Eden. God tells her, “You may eat all the fruit except that apple”—although He did not say “apple”—so why stay there looking at the apple, looking at it, looking at it, watching movies about apples, reading books about apples, and dreaming about apples? “I am not going to eat it, but it looks so interesting. I just want to look at it a little.” Why hypnotize yourself with that? Principles of wisdom.

I am choosing almost at random: Proverbs 15:15, one of my favorites. How many people here had a bad day this week, when you were in a bad mood? You got caught in the rain one day, you went in and the boss said something to you, you were in a bad mood, and well, someone has to pay for it—the wife has to pay for it. If the boss treated me badly, well, I am going to treat the family badly. We are in a bad mood, we walk in there, and the Bible says the following:

“…All the days of the afflicted are difficult, but the cheerful heart has a continual feast.”

All the days of the afflicted—but life afflicts me, that rain afflicts me, the boss afflicts me. Maybe that is true, but if you are going to live like a victim, then, as the Word says, you will have difficult days. But if we choose a heart that is grateful to God, it is not that everything is fine, but life becomes a continual feast. Because joy is not on the outside; it is on the inside. Amen.

You can choose joy. You can choose to be grateful. I cannot control the boss, but I can control my attitude toward the boss; and I cannot control the rain, but I can have sunshine inside and make life a continual feast. Wisdom. Principles of life—if I live that way, it is a continual feast. Amen.

There is much more. I am going to choose only a few. Here is an interesting one. Proverbs has much to say about human relationships, about how to handle friendships, marriage, legal situations—a little of everything. Look at 25:17. Very interesting. It says:

“…Keep your foot from your neighbor’s house, lest he grow weary of you and hate you.”

Sometimes we need to ask ourselves whether we are too clingy as friends. “But I love with a good heart.” Yes, but that is too much of you—a little less of you. There are beautiful principles in that: for human relationships to have intimacy between people, they also require a little space sometimes—air, oxygen, room to breathe. Sometimes in marital conflicts, when someone feels… sometimes giving a little space and letting the person breathe a little will make them value you a little more afterward; they will remember that they love you when they miss you. Wisdom. Principles of wisdom.

I do not want to be overly creative, but there it is. One more. There are so many more of these. Proverbs 11:15.

“…Anxiety afflicts the one who guarantees a stranger’s debt, but the one who hates giving guarantees will live securely.”

Financial arrangements—when someone commits too quickly to a person or a situation to which they should not have committed. I remember one day—my wife and I, I do not know whether any of you have tried this while on vacation, but there are hotels that sell what are called timeshares, and if you submit to a sales presentation, they give you a free night at the hotel. Well, we like free things; that is fine. So we endured one of their presentations in exchange for the free night.

One day, we were there at the presentation while they tried to sell us the hotel. If anyone has a timeshare, I am not saying that this is bad; it just came to mind. But they were selling it to us, and you know that salespeople can be very good; they know how to make you feel as though you will die without it. You have to do this. So they were there selling and we were listening: “How interesting.” And they wrote out the numbers. “Wow, if I buy it, I am going to make money. How interesting.” You know what? You can write things with numbers and lie with numbers. I do not know how they do it, but it can be done.

They were there, and we were saying, “How interesting.” Then we decided not to buy, but we left after a long while. The first thing my father said to me—my father is not a churchgoing man yet, although I have great faith, but he is a wise man, a good man with a lot of wisdom—was, when we came out, “You didn’t sign anything, did you?” You did not sign anything, right? Because even though he is not a believer, he knows that anxiety afflicts the one who guarantees a stranger’s debt and that the one who hates giving guarantees lives securely. A quick deal is sometimes a deception. If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is not true. If something sounds too good to be true, it is most likely not true. Do not commit too easily; take your time. If someone is pushing you to make a decision quickly, it means that they do not want you to know what you are committing yourself to. Principles, principles, principles of wisdom.

Because we live in a dangerous world with folly all around us, with a devil who wants to complicate our lives, now more than ever we, the people of God, must be wise—shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves—so that we know how to navigate the situations of life.

Have you ever taken the time to ask God for wisdom for your work, your marriage, raising a child, or dealing with a legal or health situation in the family? God knows the answers. He knows everything. He is the wisest being in the universe, and the Bible demonstrates it. He knows everything about finances. He knows everything about marriage.

You know that there is a book in the Bible that deals with sex. Did you know that? Forgive me; I do not want to say anything bad. The book of the Song of Songs speaks about sex in the context of marriage between a man and a woman, about how it is something healthy, something good; God wants something good in that. The world has distorted and changed it because it is a gift from God, and the devil wants to degrade it. But God wants to be Lord of our lives in the sexual area. He wants to be Lord of our lives in the financial area, in the area of work, with our children, at school—in everything we do, we can say, “Jesus, You are Lord, and You are going to guide me in what I am going to do.”

If we are willing to listen, God is more than willing to teach you. We enroll in the best school in the universe. God becomes my personal tutor, and every life situation becomes an opportunity to learn from Him; it is a conversation, a constant dialogue.

You know, with any experience, a problem, especially a failure, I can complain and blame others, or I can say, “Lord, what can I learn from this?” And the Lord says, “Now we are on the right track.” What are we going to learn from that? When there is a problem, instead of asking, “Why, why, why?” ask, “What for?” “Lord, what do You want to teach me through this?” And God begins to teach and speak to you.

Jesus said in the book of John 14:26—He said, “I have more to tell you, but you cannot bear it right now. But the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and remind you of everything I have told you.” The Holy Spirit speaks to you, speaks to you, and every situation becomes a moment of learning.

I want to share a testimony. I was studying at the university, and I had an assignment to do, an essay I had to write. It was something very difficult for an evil professor who liked giving people bad grades. And there was a knock at the door: “Gregory, it’s prayer night tonight. Do you want to come pray with us?” Now I had a decision to make: what am I going to do? The Bible does not always tell you what to do in situations like that. Sometimes, when this happened to me, I told them, “Well, I cannot pray tonight because God also wants me to study.” But I took a moment to pray: “Lord, what do You want me to do right now?” And I felt that the Lord told me, “I want you to take a risk with Me right now, go pray, and then do your homework.”

Okay, this time I am going to take the plunge. I am going to do something a little crazy, but which I believe has wisdom from You: honor God with your possessions, with the firstfruits of your winepresses. So I tried it. I prayed and sat down at the computer. It was already 11:00. I said, “Uh-oh, what is going to happen to me?” I started slowly, slowly, slowly. It became 1:00, then 2:00 in the morning, and this was an essay that had nothing to do with Christianity; it had to do with the history of the English Empire or something. It had nothing to do with any of that; it was something like that.

But by 1:00 or 2:00 in the morning, it was as if the heavens had opened, and I began to understand what was happening in England in the year 1688, in this situation I had to study, and I began to write. It makes sense; God is giving me wisdom. I said, “Lord, you were there; explain to me what happened.” And I kept writing and writing, and this wicked teacher—perhaps a good man, I don’t know, but a strict teacher whom we hated because we thought he was wicked—gave me my only A+, and I knew… wow, just think: God knows about the history of England in the fifteenth century. How does God know about that? Young people, students, does God know about math? Does God know about that?

Languages—God knows English. Does he know how to speak English, or only Hebrew and Spanish, as we believe here? Maybe he can teach English, Spanish; maybe God can teach you what you need to do. Ask him for wisdom. God opens the heavens; he says, “I want to explain it to you.” If I have that attitude toward any book I read, I am reading it and evaluating it according to God’s principles. I never believe everything in a book, but I evaluate it, and God teaches me. A book of poetry, a book of psychology, a science book, a book about who knows what—God will speak to me if I read critically, thinking about the Word of God and seeking God’s wisdom; God will give it to me. Most of all, I have found that God speaks to me through the counsel of wise people in my life.

There is another proverb that says, “Whoever walks with the wise will become wise.” Show me who you spend time with, and I will tell you who you are. Wisdom rubs off. I choose wise friends and mentors. And I want to learn from them. At this stage of my life, I am especially looking for wise parents because I need wisdom to raise children. So if I see a father and think, “Wow, that man takes good care of his children,” I stick close to him, observe him, and try to learn from him because I know he has something to teach me.

As a pastor, I look to my mentor, Pastor Roberto, and others who are here, and I watch them. At first I imitated them: “What would Roberto do?” Then I try to be like him, and I do not fool anyone, but at least I learn principles—wise people, especially people older than oneself. The Bible says in Proverbs that gray hair is a crown. Older people, grandfathers, grandmothers, people who have already lived, who have already made their mistakes and had their problems and have learned what should and should not be done—why make the same mistakes? We can learn from them. Wisdom.

If we are willing to listen, God is willing to speak to us. I want to be like that. And I thank God because I feel that this church is a church that loves wisdom. I feel that. And I know that some of us can be somewhat critical of our brother and say, “But so-and-so, wise? What church are you in?” But no. I feel that in this church there is a love for wisdom; there is a hunger.

When we offer a class, the class fills up in five minutes; there are not enough classes for the desire and hunger that exist. Today, at this very moment, there are sixty people upstairs finishing a Holy Spirit retreat. There is hunger and thirst for wisdom—wise people, people who want to learn from God. May we be like that; may we be people who say, “Lord, if there is one thing I am going to seek in this world, I will seek first the Kingdom of God and your righteousness, and I will seek from you wisdom for practical life.”

In every situation in life, I will walk with you, and you will show me the way because you are the God of solutions. Some of us are experiencing problems, problems we may have brought upon ourselves through mistakes we made in the past. There is a beautiful song that says, “Yesterday is already gone; I need you today. Today is the day of salvation; today is the day of a new beginning.” You can, and I can, begin this today. I cannot control what I did yesterday; that is already past. But today God wants to speak to me. He will teach me how to deal with this situation, and I will know that it comes from him, and we will see the fruit he produces. Amen.

I invite the musicians to come, and we are going to begin asking God for that. And I invite each person this week to choose a situation in life in which you take a moment and remember to seek for the God of wisdom to speak to you, and the heavens will open, and solutions will come to you. Amen.

Let us stand and pray together. Oh, my Father, I thank you that you are the God of solutions. Thank you, Lord, that no one can fathom your understanding, Lord. Thank you, Father, that you made all creation with wisdom, Lord, and you know what we need to do and how we need to live. Father, I ask you to give your people insight and discernment to see the deceptions of the world around us, to recognize the lies around us, and to enable us to hear the voice of wisdom, submit to it, and watch, Lord, what you are going to do. My God, I ask you for teachable hearts, Father, that we may be good students of yours, that we may learn from you and from the others around us, and that you may lead us on a path of success. I ask that this be from you and that it be real and tangible. I ask you this in the name of Jesus. Amen. Amen.