Pray the Word with David Platt is a resource from radical.net.

Proverbs chapter 8, verse 35 and 36, give us a picture of wisdom personified.

So it's wisdom speaking to us as we're reading this.

And the Bible says, forever finds me, so wisdom speaking, whoever finds me, whoever finds

wisdom finds life and obtains favor from the Lord. But he who fails to find me, injures himself.

All who hate me love death. The picture here could not be clearer. So when we find wisdom,

when we seek wisdom, when we ask for wisdom, that's equated in verse 35 with finding life.

Like all of the abundance God is designed for our life is dependent on us having wisdom.

The opposite of that would be foolishness.

And verse 36 is saying whoever fails to find wisdom, whoever walks in foolishness, injures himself.

And all who hate wisdom, who walk in foolishness love death.

So there's a picture here. If we want life,

then we seek wisdom. If we want death, then we seek foolishness and we ignore wisdom.

And then that phrase, whoever finds wisdom finds life and obtains favor from the Lord.

What a beautiful phrase. Now this is not to be mistaken with this picture of trying to earn God's favor. We know that any favor from God toward us is purely

based on his grace and his mercy. But that's the beauty of this picture of wisdom.

We have a God who is all wise and who has said, if you have wisdom, you have life, and he has said,

ask of me, and I will give it to you. This picture of wisdom saying, find me. It's an invitation to experience God's grace.

And in the process of finding wisdom and walking in wisdom, to experience, to enjoy the favor of God,

to walk in the favor of God. What a powerful picture. So God, we pray, we want this. We want wisdom. Help us. Give us wisdom today, we pray.

And our lives and our families and our work and the church. Lord, to help us to be wise. We seek

you for wisdom. We ask you for wisdom. And we praise you as the all wise god who has promised to give us wisdom when we ask so

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