Warning Signs

ONE NIGHT A FEW MONTHS AGO, my flight home from a speaking event arrived late. Once in my car, tired and eager to get home, I spotted what I assumed to be a new shortcut to the airport exit. I made a quick decision to try it, and a split second later, headlights flashed in my eyes as a car headed straight toward me. By God’s grace, I was able to turn around just in time. All the way home, I thanked the Lord for my sovereign rescue.

When I returned from my next trip, Bob was in town to pick me up. As we approached the new road, I spotted an impossible-to-miss “Wrong Way” sign right where I’d turned before. I now have a new appreciation for warning signs! The major interstate running through the middle of our large city is being updated, with confusing new entrances and exits being added regularly, but, thankfully, warning signs seem to be everywhere.

Warning signs are also all over the Bible. Why? So we can avoid a head-on crash into life-altering, messy consequences: broken marriages, estranged friendships, tarnished reputations, foolish choices, financial setbacks, and more. Bob and I were not reared in homes where the Bible was read, but we didn’t want that to be true of our home. When our children were young and life was less complicated, we determined to read from Psalms and Proverbs every day at breakfast. Labeled the “Wisdom Book,” Proverbs has thirty-one chapters, one for each day of most months.

Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived and the author of Proverbs, described his collected sayings this way: “Their purpose is to teach people to live disciplined and successful lives, to help them do what is right, just, and fair. These proverbs will give insight to the simple, knowledge and discernment to the young” (Proverbs 1:3-4, NLT). Wise warnings about the consequences of our actions, words, and thoughts are packed into each chapter. Although Bob and I must wait until heaven to comprehend the full impact of reading the warning signs from Proverbs to our children day after day, year after year, we’ve had a few glimpses of their influence.

When one of our daughters was in college, a cute football player expressed interest in meeting her. A few days later, she saw him at a school event she attended with girlfriends. When she witnessed him lose his temper and punch a fellow student, she immediately called to tell me that a giant neon warning sign had flashed in her mind: “Do not associate with a man given to anger; or go with a hot-tempered man” (Proverbs 22:24). As she relayed the incident, I whispered, “Thank You, Lord!” My competitive daughter memorized more proverbs than her siblings in order to earn “Daddy’s Dollars” for special privileges, but the long-term worth of knowing the warning signs is priceless.

Bob regularly emphasized the warning signs concerning friendships, including this one: “Walk with the wise and become wise; associate with fools and get in trouble” (Proverbs 13:20, NLT). One son struggled to apply this proverb with a particular friend, but he had heard this warning countless times and eventually made the hard choice to back away. I’m especially thankful for Bob’s wisdom to emphasize this verse because sadly, a few years later, the young man died from a drug overdose.

Recently I found my old Bible and opened it to Proverbs. The pages were coffee stained, littered with notes, and partially ripped from the binding. As Bob and I read Proverbs to instruct our kids, this book of countercultural wisdom also warned, convicted, and encouraged me. There are warnings about anger, gossip, greed, boasting, and jealousy, as well as teaching on finances, friendships, purity, self-control, speech, and manners. Character qualities such as kindness, diligence, and compassion are also highlighted. Proverbs provided a full curriculum on wise living, but our family’s life-impacting takeaway was the tragic warning that Solomon, the wisest man who ever lived, failed to apply God-given wisdom to his own life, and the consequences were grave.

REFLECTION

For the next month, read a chapter from Proverbs each day, and determine to heed the wise warnings. Choose a favorite warning verse to memorize and apply. Type it in your phone or write it on a note card, share it with a family member, or text it to a friend. You may not earn “Daddy’s Dollars,” but biblical warning signs have great value (see Proverbs 2). As Proverbs 16:16 says, “How much better it is to get wisdom than gold!”