• The Pursuit of Wisdom Brings Security

  • 1 My son, if you will receive my words And treasure my commandments within you,
  • 2 Make your ear attentive to wisdom; Incline your heart to understanding.
  • 3 For if you cry out for insight, And raise your voice for understanding;
  • 4 If you seek her as silver And search for her as for hidden treasures;
  • 5 Then you will understand the fear of the Lord, And discover the knowledge of God.
  • 6 For the Lord gives wisdom; From His mouth come knowledge and understanding.
  • 7 He stores up sound wisdom for the upright; He is a shield to those who walk in integrity,
  • 8 Guarding the paths of justice, And He watches over the way of His godly ones.
  • 9 Then you will discern righteousness, justice, And integrity, and every good path.
  • 10 For wisdom will enter your heart, And knowledge will be delightful to your soul;
  • 11 Discretion will watch over you, Understanding will guard you,
  • 12 To rescue you from the way of evil, From a person who speaks perverse things;
  • 13 From those who leave the paths of uprightness To walk in the ways of darkness;
  • 14 Who delight in doing evil And rejoice in the perversity of evil;
  • 15 Whose paths are crooked, And who are devious in their ways;
  • 16 To rescue you from the strange woman, From the foreign woman who flatters with her words,
  • 17 Who leaves the companion of her youth And forgets the covenant of her God;
  • 18 For her house sinks down to death, And her tracks lead to the dead;
  • 19 None who go to her return, Nor do they reach the paths of life.
  • 20 So you will walk in the way of good people And keep to the paths of the righteous.
  • 21 For the upright will live in the land, And the blameless will remain in it;
  • 22 But the wicked will be eliminated from the land, And the treacherous will be torn away from it.