Episode Details

Prayer

I praise you, Lord, righteous and holy is your name. Your word is faithful, and you are altogether trustworthy. As I open and read your word this morning, please fill my heart with zeal and love for you. Let me not forget your word, and may I delight in the way of your law. Please give me understanding that I may live. With my whole heart I cry, O Lord, cause me to keep your word. I call to you, please save me, that I may observe your testimonies. I rise before the dawn and cry for your help, and I hope in your word and promises. Hear my voice, O Lord, according to your steadfast love. Protect me, God, I trust in you. Have mercy upon me for my sin, according to the greatness of your compassion, and lead me in the way everlasting. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.

Reading

Proverbs 1:7-9.

“Hear, my son, your father's instruction,and forsake not your mother's teaching,for they are a graceful garland for your headand pendants for your neck.”

Meditation

Verse eight seems to be making another assumption: that one has godly parents. “Hear, my son, your father’s instruction, and forsake not your mother’s teaching.” This can’t mean that if our fathers instruct us in sin, that we are called to follow such teaching, can it? It certainly raises the question. What do if those in authority over us are unbelievers or sinful? What if you’ve got ungodly or foolish elders in the church? What if you’ve got an ungodly or foolish husband or wife? What if you’ve got a godless, foolish government in power in your country? What do we do with that?

Well let me say first off that the fact that your parents and those over you are sinful does not mean that you shouldn’t be teachable under them. Look at the man God used to write these very words – King Solomon. Imagine if your dad was Solomon… “Well dad, you married hundreds of women and become an idol worshipper – why should I listen to what you’ve got to say?” And yet there it is – God used Solomon to write the Book of Proverbs! And Solomon didn’t have a flawless dad either. His mother was an adulteress and his father was both a murderer and an adulterer. He seemingly had every good reason not to listen to his parents either! The fact is, if you were going to refuse to be teachable because those over you are sinful, you just wouldn’t be teachable at all, because everyone is sinful, and everyone has significant glaring sinful weaknesses. So those in authority over you will be sinful, flawed, weak people – there’s no question about that. How then do you be teachable under sinful overseers? Well let me lay out a series of guidelines for how to do that – whether they be parents, elders, or someone else.

Be ye doers of the word…

The first guidelines is to begin with the foundational truth that God appointed your overseers. Whoever it is that is over you in your life, God providentially gave them to you for a specific reason. Be it your parents, your spouse, your elders, or your government, God is working in and through these sinful people for the advancement and good of your soul, and for his own glory. There is a time for conscientiously going against those in authority over you, and we’ll get to that, but you should start with the acknowledgement that God has placed you under specific people in your life for his specific purposes. In the words of one pastor – even the sin of others have been ordained to have a sanctifying influence on you. God works through means, and his means are sinful, fallen people. So then, do not rebel against them thoughtlessly, or out of anger or bitterness, it’s never the right approach.

Here is a second guideline for how to be teachable under your overseers: listen to them! If nothing else, you can’t reject the oversight of others unless you have devoted yourself to giving them a fair hearing. Tha