1My son, do not forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments; 2For length of days and years of life and peace they will add to you. 3Do not let kindness and truth leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart. 4So you will find favor and good repute in the sight of God and man.
A father teaching his son—Solomon continues using this construct to convey his teaching about wisdom. The best time to learn wisdom is in one’s youth when the mind is still malleable, before it gets set in its ways. Learning wisdom is not a one-and-done deal but instead requires consistent reminders and constant rehearsing. Any parent knows the importance of consistency in training a child. The same is true for learning wisdom at any age.
First is the memory (“do not forget my teaching”), then comes the heart (“let your heart keep my commandments”). With repetition and consistency, wisdom shapes our entire life outlook. It moves from being intellectually embraced as cognitive information to becoming engraved, embedded, internalized, infused in our character. We begin to possess it, to take ownership of it. Our worldview is transformed as we see differently from people who do not learn wisdom. We see, instinctively as it were, through clearer lenses. We take wisdom to heart.
Our text asserts that wisdom has the net effect of lengthening our lives in practical ways. The person whose lifestyle is to obey road signs, like “Slow down, curve ahead,” will have a longer life than those who routinely ignore such warnings. That makes sense.
Beyond such obvious applications, a wise person thinks in increasingly nuanced ways that seem like nonsense to the rejector of wisdom. For example, in verse 3, we read that wisdom includes embracing kindness and truth. The fool scoffs at words like this; they make no sense in the real world. However, the wise person reads them as essential to life. A fool may think selfishness and harshness will get him further in life, but wisdom teaches us that kindness is far more powerful and effective as a baseline for life’s interactions. Deception, distortion, or delusion will limit a person’s life, but “kindness and truth” make his way smoother. In the ultimate sense, though, they put us in good standing with God and with our fellow humans.
Lord, I choose to embrace the wisdom of living by kindness and speaking the truth to others because that is what You value in me.
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