Proverbs 9:7-10
7 Whoever corrects a scoffer gets himself abuse, and he who reproves a wicked man incurs injury. 8 Do not reprove a scoffer, or he will hate you; reprove a wise man, and he will love you. 9 Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser; teach a righteous man, and he will increase in learning. 10 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.
Do you love to be corrected? I confess that my flesh says "no!" to this question. It is common to try hard to avoid being reproved, to try to keep our dark side secret so others think highly of us. But according to this passage in Proverbs I am then not wise. This seems at first to be a strange way of measuring wisdom, but actually it gets at the heart of wisdom: humility. We need to step back and look at ourselves from God's perspective. We generally try to avoid correction because we want others to like us. But God knows all the dark secrets of our life, and still loves us. What He wants is for us to grow and mature. For that to happen, we have to humble ourselves and admit the need for maturity, which means accepting correction. The rebuking is not a statement of our final worth, it is a means of spurring us onward to improvement. To be wise, we must grow, and to grow we must admit our inadequacies.
God, help me to accept correction.
7 Whoever corrects a scoffer gets himself abuse, and he who reproves a wicked man incurs injury. 8 Do not reprove a scoffer, or he will hate you; reprove a wise man, and he will love you. 9 Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser; teach a righteous man, and he will increase in learning. 10 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.
Do you love to be corrected? I confess that my flesh says "no!" to this question. It is common to try hard to avoid being reproved, to try to keep our dark side secret so others think highly of us. But according to this passage in Proverbs I am then not wise. This seems at first to be a strange way of measuring wisdom, but actually it gets at the heart of wisdom: humility. We need to step back and look at ourselves from God's perspective. We generally try to avoid correction because we want others to like us. But God knows all the dark secrets of our life, and still loves us. What He wants is for us to grow and mature. For that to happen, we have to humble ourselves and admit the need for maturity, which means accepting correction. The rebuking is not a statement of our final worth, it is a means of spurring us onward to improvement. To be wise, we must grow, and to grow we must admit our inadequacies.
God, help me to accept correction.