Joseph Prince - God's Wisdom Sharpens Your Mind
This is an excerpt from: Healing And Restoration For Your Mind
Ask God for wisdom. Such was Solomon. When his father, David, the one who killed Goliath, who became king later on, he died. Solomon, his son, ascended the throne. And he said to God, you know, one night he had a dream, and he was in a place called Gibeon, where the tabernacle of Moses was. And he had a dream that night, and the Lord appeared to him in a dream, and God says, "Ask what I shall give you". He says, "God, I don't ask for much. I just ask for four numbers. Let them all come out this week, just four numbers and no more, right"?
I've said before, if you ask for numbers, actually, what you after for the four numbers? Money. Why do you want the money? "Uh, money will give me more vacations, I can, stop work". Why do you want all that? "So that I can rest, so that I can travel, so that I can have quality of life, so that I can have peace in my later years". What if God says, "I can help you bypass Go. No need to collect $200. From here I take you straight to length of days, health, riches, honor, peace". How about that? So, anyway, come back to Solomon. He didn't ask for phone numbers. He asked God for this. It says, "'Therefore gift Your servant an understanding heart to judge Your people that I may discern between good and evil. For who is able to judge this great people of Yours?' And the speech pleased the Lord, that Solomon had asked this thing".
So, God was very pleased. You ask God for wisdom today, you will please the same God. He's the same yesterday, today, and forever, amen. He asked God for wisdom, and what did God answer him? "God said to him: 'Because you have asked this thing, and have not asked long life for yourself, you have not asked riches for yourself'", actually, wisdom brings all these things, right? But he didn't ask for all these things, "'But you have asked the life...nor did you ask for the life of your enemies, but you have asked for yourself understanding to discern justice, behold, I have done according to your words; see, I have given you a wise and understanding heart, so that there has not been anyone like you before you, nor shall any after you arise anyone like you,'" okay? "'And I've also given you what you have not asked,'" watch this. "'I have given you what you have not asked.'" He asked God for wisdom, God gave him, what? "'I have given you what you have not asked: both riches and honor.'"
What is that? The left hand, right? You ask God for wisdom, you get everything. But for Solomon, he asked God for wisdom, God says, "I have given you what you have not asked: riches and honor". That's the left hand, but what about the right hand? Health, length of days. God says, "'If you walk in all My ways, to keep My statutes and My commandments,'" by the way, that riches and honor is like, "'There shall not be anyone like you among the kings all your days.'" Until today he is the richest man that ever lived. Yes, he's richer than Elon Musk, all right? Considering inflation and all that, you will find that he is a trillion-trillionaire over. And God says, "'If you walk in My ways to keep My statutes and My commandments, as your father David walked, then I will lengthen your days.'"
However, if you study the life of Solomon, he didn't live long. He died young. Now, I'll tell you this. Later on he turned away from God. That tells us wisdom is not an it, it is a he. As you come to the Lord, you spend more time with him, you're spending more time with wisdom. Wisdom is a person, amen. Later on he left the Lord. Notice what God said, all right? "I gave you the left hand, riches and honor, but for the right hand you must keep my commandments". Back then they were under the law, they were under the Ten Commandments. But we are under grace. Jesus fulfilled it all for us. It's like Jesus took your exam and gave you an A+. Jesus took your exam, gave you the A+, all right? That is a very simple way of trying to tell you that Jesus did it all and gave it to you.
So, Jesus is known as the Son of my right hand. So, you and I today have the right hand, the blessing, amen. Jesus is the Son of the right hand, hallelujah, so we have both, amen. And then the Bible says, "Solomon awoke; and indeed it had been a dream. And he came to Jerusalem and stood before the ark of the covenant of the LORD". I want to tell you something. This is one result that you know you'll receive wisdom, how? He was sleeping. All this transaction happened while he was sleeping. He asked God for the wisdom, he woke, he woke up. Now, he was in the place called Mount Gideon. It is still there in Israel today. And Mount Gideon is where the tabernacle of Moses is, the structure, the trappings of religion, okay? But no ark of the covenant. The ark is the picture of our Lord Jesus Christ. The oblong box, all right, overlaid with gold. Gold speaks of Jesus' deity, he is God. The wood inside speaks of Jesus' humanity, amen. Covered with a lid, God's mercy seat, that's the work of Jesus at the cross, because there the blood is placed, and then God forgives the people.
So, it's a picture of Jesus Christ. Notice that where he was, there was a structure, outward structure, the outward trappings of religion, we can call it that way. But it's this, when you have wisdom, it's that... I'm not after religion, I'm after reality. I'm after Jesus, amen. He woke up, and he cherished the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ. Wise men still seek him, amen. Praise the Lord. That's the first thing that happened when he received wisdom, amen. Now, let's look at this prayer. What did he pray? He prayed, "Therefore give to Your servant an understanding heart," and in the Hebrew it is a hearing heart. In the Greek, there is a Greek version of the Old Testament, just to let you know, it's called the Septuagint. If you read the Greek, the Greek says cardia, cardia means heart, akouo, akouo means listen. Again, same thing as Hebrew, amen, a heart that hears. All right, "That I may discern between good and evil".
Now, in the Septuagint, in the Greek version of this portion, you know what discern is? Suniemi. This boy, before he received wisdom, he asked God for suniemi, that branch of wisdom to discern between good and evil. Like I said, people can see the thing, but they can't discern it. Somethings sound good, look good, taste good, promise good, no good. Yeah, some contracts come like that. Some offers come like that. Many of them come like that. They won't tell you the other side. Some guys will come to you, very charming, oozing charm, you know, look like, body like Pastor Lawrence, funny like Pastor Mark, makes you laugh and all that, he charms you and all that, but something inside your spirit, he cannot stop that from flowing, the suniemi. You cannot put two and two together. God gives you that inward wisdom to know, something wrong with this guy. Later on you found out he is a scammer. He has conned many, many other ladies, amen. Not Pastor Lawrence, not Pastor Mark, amen. So, you know, many-a-times you can't tell by your eyes and your ears, you tell by your spirit. Discern, it's called discernment, say discernment. All right, praise the Lord.
Now, can I say something? Back in the time of Adam, Adam named all the animals, right? Coming back to the memory part that God wants you all to have. I wanna pray for you all to have that. If you all don't want when I pray, afterwards, right, don't raise your hand, don't receive. God will not force you to receive. Every gift of God is received. He needs your consent. Even being saved, if Jesus died on the cross for all our sins, how come the whole worlds is not saved? 'Cause not everyone wants it. Not everyone believes it. And God cannot save you beyond your consent. Actually, in a way we are coming every Sunday, we are showing God, we consent to be loved. We consent to be healed. "Lord, I consent to be blessed in 2023," amen.
But think about it. He didn't have a smartphone. And there are hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of species of animals in the world. God brought them all to him, he could name them one by one, one by one he named them. Whatever he named them, there was a name, then come back to the first one, he didn't say, "Oh...You sound a bit like... Marco". Pastor Mark and I everywhere... sorry, Mark. It's like, you know, it's not like that. He's able to remember all the names back and forth, he can remember them. That was the magnificence of man's mind in the beginning before he fell. Jesus when he was growing up, all right, didn't have a Bible. Does that shock you? And by the way, if you said, "Pastor, Jesus is God, what, in human flesh," yeah, but he grew up as a man. Listen carefully, he is God, blessed be the eternal truth forevermore, amen, he is God. But when he came, he came and became a man.
All right, he didn't function as a God, you understand that? He came to be the prototype. As Adam was the prototype of the first man, the first man is a prototype of man, Jesus came to be the second Adam, another prototype of a human race called New Creation. So, he grew in wisdom, and when he was 12 years old, he was in the temple, and the Pharisees and the scribes and the doctors of the law were the surrounding this young 12 year old boy, and the Bible said they were astounded at his understanding and answers. And then his mother and father came, said, "Let's go". And he went with them. Let's follow the story. "He went down with them and came to Nazareth, was subject to them, but His mother kept all these things in her heart. And Jesus increased".
See, God doesn't increase, but man increases, so as a man he increased in wisdom and stature, in favor with God and men. So, all the Bible knowledge he had in his hometown, Nazareth, every Shabbat, every Sabbath day they would all as a community go to the local church, like, their local synagogue. And the only one that had the scroll, the Bible, only the Old Testament, was the synagogue. The synagogue had the whole scroll, but houses don't have the scroll. It was too expensive for them to have, all right? So, imagine, every Sabbath Jesus is listening and listening. All that he learned, amen, and he memorized and stored is just by hearing. He didn't have, like Adam, a smartphone to record down. Then later when he grew up at 30 years old, he was tempted by the devil in the wilderness.
Like Adam, the first man, was tempted when everything was good around him, everything was luscious and beautiful, everything was brilliant for man, everything was saying, "It's for you, your benefit," yet he sinned. Jesus was tempted by the devil in the wilderness, like, a desert place. And when everything outside seems to say, "Everything is against you," yet he obeyed, the second man obeyed, amen. Now, watch. The devil came. "If you are the Son of God, turn these stones to bread". Jesus says, "It is written, man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God". There was no hesitation, nothing. He knew the Word of God.
Now, imagine some of us, the devil come. "You know, if you are a Christian, you are a new creation. Do this or do that, all right, do this". And then you say, "It is written, something like this, devil. You do not always live on bread. Sometimes you must eat rice. Or something like that, lah". I mean, Jesus quoted word for word, amen. His mind is amazing, and the Bible says that today he gives us his mind. Confess, I have the mind of Christ. Paul also lived during a time that there's no recording and there's no, like, emails, or no planner to jot down, all right, to remind you, and there's no smartphones, right? Yet he prophesied over Timothy some prophecies, and many years after that he reminded Timothy. He says to Timothy, he says to Timothy, "This charge I commit to you, son Timothy, according to the prophecies previously made concerning you, that by them you may wage the good warfare".
Remember the prophecies I spoke to you when I laid my hands on you. Remind yourself constantly of the prophecies, amen, that by these prophecies, you will fight a good warfare against the devil, amen. Can you imagine then Paul received another email from a distance? "Can you tell me again the prophecies? Because I forgot, lah". You can't imagine that, right? Those, in that time, they were amazing. Such simple sentence, but when you meditate on it, you think to yourself they had amazing memories. And then we try to memorize by reading, you know, or listening to courses on memory and all that. And they say that to memorize things, all right, memorize people's names and all that, make it as absurd as possible. Actually, I don't want to introduce myself to you. You probably make me as absurd as possible to help remember, right?
That's how you remember things, make things as absurd as possible so it can help you remember. Can you imagine that approach to God's Word? You memorize God's Word and make it as absurd as possible so you can remember? No, this is, again, the natural way. I'm not knocking it, I'm just saying it's the natural way, not God's way. "What is God's way, Pastor Prince"? Meditate. Meditate on God's Word. Take a verse, chew on it the whole day, amen. As you drive to work, chew on it, chew on it. They are life to those who find them, mm. Health to all, yes, from top to my toes. I just made it absurd, didn't I? And you memorize. No evil shall befall you. With long life will I satisfy you. Happy is the man who finds wisdom. Let your friends all run the rat race. You win the race, number one rat. Don't get into the rat race. Let God bring you to where he wants you to be, and his supply will be there, the favor will be there. And best of all, you come smelling good, looking good, no stress. That is God's way, amen. Let this be the year, 2023. Let this be the year.