Incline your ear, and hear the words of the wise,
and apply your heart to my knowledge,
for it will be pleasant if you keep them within you,
if all of them are ready on your lips.
That your trust may be in the Lord,
I have made them known to you today, even to you.
Have I not written for you thirty sayings
of counsel and knowledge,
to make you know what is right and true,
that you may give a true answer to those who sent you?Proverbs 22:17-21
What follows in 19-21 gives some idea of the purpose of the Scriptures. In 19 this is indicated as being not merely the acquisition of knowledge, but that trust in the Lord should be deepened and enriched. This is a constant challenge; we can recall an elderly believer of whom it could be said that the words of the AV came tripping - indeed dripping - off his lips, but always there was the desolate feeling that it was like Jack Horner putting in his thumb and pulling out a plum. There was no sense of a deep or deepening fellowship with the Lord. In 20 the emphasis is on guidance and direction. 'Excellent things' in AV is rendered 'thirty sayings' in RSV, which Kidner suggests is the most probable since these 'words of the wise' can be divided into this round number of paragraphs. Either way, however, this idea of guidance by the Word is a critically important one, in the sense of allowing the principles of the Word to be built into one's spiritual make-up so that its teaching becomes 'second nature' to us. In 21 the purpose of the Scriptures is stated as being to strengthen one's grasp of the truth. One thinks of Luke's words in the Prologue to his gospel (1:4): 'the certainty of those things wherein thou hast been instructed'. Certainty by the Word - this is a fruitful thought indeed. Not otherwise can one be a true envoy of Him who sends us forth in the service of the gospel. A man who is not sure of his message will have nothing worthwhile to say, and is very unlikely to be listened to by those to whom he speaks.