All along in Israel’s history the people would read and study the Book of Proverbs knowing it had special application for the future generation of Believers living through the “last days.”

The first nine chapters of Proverbs actually represent an introduction David writes to his son, Solomon, about wisdom. Before the proverbs are even listed, David advises Solomon about wisdom. The last two chapters give a conclusion. In fact, Proverbs 30:1 and 31:1 are not even proverbs; they’re prophecies warning the reader about when the book will have its specific significance.

“When the proverbs of Solomon begin in Chapter 10:1 and extend to the end of Chapter 29, those proverbs are to express the wisdom of God for a worthy walk of the ‘believing remnant,’ especially in that Fifth Course of Judgment in that time of their captivity; in the time of their suffering and their persecution and their estrangement,” says Jordan.

“They’re going to have to have a worthy walk in the details of their life and remember that, under the law system, the law controlled the details of their life right down to the fine-tuning of things. It’s the minute things they’re going to disassociate themselves entirely from the inroads of the vain, apostate religious system in Israel. They’re going to need keen judgment and insight so as not to be seduced by the satanic policy of evil against the nation—the seductive policy that would deceive the very elect themselves.”

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In a very literal way, the future generation, just as with Believers today, will need to be able to perceive and identify words of understanding from the words of deception and foolishness.

Jordan reasons, “God says to Job in Job 38, ‘Who is this that darkeneth counsel with words without knowledge?’ You see, words without knowledge—words that don’t give understanding—darken your mind. They darken counsel. They darken the ability to know what to do. These proverbs are going to give them words that give them the ability to perceive that.”

When Proverbs says its aim is “to give subtlety to the simple,” the issue of subtlety is the issue of craftiness. “You remember in Genesis 3:1 what it says about the serpent; that ‘he was more subtle than all the beasts of the field’?” says Jordan. “He was a crafty, cagey guy who was hard to catch and easy to be caught by.

“Jesus says to the apostles in the Great Commission, ‘I’m going to send you out as sheep among wolves; be wise as serpents and harmless as a dove.’ You need to have some subtlety. Some craftiness so you can avoid being caught by the snare of the Adversary.

“Now, why would simple people be in danger of being caught in craftiness? In Chapter 14:15, he says ‘the simple believe every word, but the prudent man looketh well to his going.’ And in Proverbs, when it talks about the simple . . . even like we saw when Wisdom called the religious leaders simple, it’s because they just believed every word instead of checking and looking and finding and understanding. They just took their word for it and you can easily be deceived that way.”

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Among Proverbs’ fascinating aspects is how both wisdom and folly are personified as women. When wisdom speaks, for instance, it’s in three different formats.

Jordan explains, “First she speaks in the city; in the streets to the leaders of the nation. Then she withdraws herself and talks in private. She builds herself a house and goes into her own chamber and talks to just the people who are willing to come into her house. And then she sends her emissaries out into the city to invite other people into the house.

“There’s going to come a time in Israel when Wisdom will cry in the streets and do what she does in the latter part of Chapter 1 (beginning in verse 20), which is to talk to the religious leaders of the nation and say, ‘Come and repent because the wrath of God’s coming, and if you don’t get right and hearken to me, the wrath of Almighty God is going to destroy you.’

“When they don’t hearken, Wisdom cries again (in Chapter 8), but this time she’s not out in the streets, she’s gone over and built her a house, and it’s from her house that she cries and invites people, ‘Psst! C’mon over here, I want to talk to you!’ and they go in the house.

“Of course, all of that is exactly what happens in the earthly ministry of Christ. He starts out publicly in the streets calling the nation to repentance. Then, in the middle part of His ministry, about Matthew 11 and 12, He withdraws, and just at the point in Matthew 12 when the Pharisees and Sadducees—the religious leaders—begin to develop a plot to kill Him, He withdraws Himself from them.

“In Matthew 16, Peter says, ‘Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.’ Jesus says, ‘You’re right; don’t tell anybody.’ Isn’t that strange? He goes up on the Mount of Transfiguration with Peter, James and John and is transfigured from them, and they see His kingdom glory and majesty and, as they’re coming down from the mountain, He says, ‘Now you guys have seen it, but don’t tell anybody.’

“Wait a minute! Before, they’d been going around saying, ‘Hey, He’s here! He’s here! Trust him!’ Now He’s saying, ‘Psst! Come over here guys. Let’s regroup.’

“When He does go outside to talk to people, He says, ‘From now on I’m only gonna talk in parables so you guys can’t understand it. People in my house over here, they can understand it.’

“And He says ‘the kingdom’s gonna be taken from you,’ meaning it’s going to be taken from the religious leaders of Israel and given to a nation that brings forth the fruit thereof. He says, ‘Fear not, little flock, it’s your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom,’ and He literally builds within the nation Israel a new nation; within the house of Israel, a new house. A house where wisdom’s gonna live.

“And then, as in Proverbs 1, He sends His spirit down on them and then He sends His emissaries out of that house in the early Acts period to cry once again and to entreat. And in Proverbs 9, they go out and say, ‘Hey, there’s dinner at home. Come and dine. All is ready.’ You have parables in Matthew about the feast and the dinner that’s there, and you have them going out on the highways and in the hinterlands.

“David personifies wisdom as a person, and when it speaks in Israel it’s going to follow this pattern so that when you get over to Matthew, and that generation that Proverbs 30 says is going to show up—there is a generation that does these things—when they show up, John the Baptist identifies them and then you see wisdom cry in the streets, then go into the house, then send out the apostles and the ‘little flock.’

“It’s that prophetic sense that Proverbs 30:1 and 31:1 are talking about; in the day when Wisdom speaks in their midst that this book will come into its own.”

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David gives four purposes the proverbs were collected together to accomplish. The first purpose, which is to know wisdom and instruction, is amplified in Chapter 1: 7-9. The second purpose, to perceive the words of understanding, is amplified in Chapter 1:10 to the end of chapter. The third purpose, to receive guidance in judgment and equity, can be found in Chapter 2. The fourth purpose is “to give subtlety to the simple, to the young man knowledge and discretion.”

“Beginning in Chapter 3, all the way down to the end of Chapter 9, or at least to the end of Chapter 7 (chapters 8 and 9 is a monologue where Wisdom speaks again), you have the focus on that fourth purpose,” says Jordan. “David was the most concerned . . . You know when you give your kids instruction, you got some things you want them to know about. You tell them to do this, this and this, and, ‘This one here, man, we need to talk about!’

“The most demanding one of these things—the one that David wanted Solomon to know the most about—is the one that God through David and Solomon wanted the ‘believing remnant’ in the last days to know the most about. Have subtlety. Have the ability to know and have knowledge and discretion.

“And that’s the reason that all through Chapters 3-7 . . . that’s where that stuff about that ‘strange woman’ comes up. That strange woman, folks, in Revelation 17, is that religious system.

“That apostate religious system that starts back in Genesis and is introduced to the nation Israel through the tribe of Dan and is called Baal worship goes all down through the Bible and becomes the religion of the Antichrist. Part of the seduction is that thing in Revelation 2:14 and 20 where that woman Jezebel seduces the servants of God to commit fornication in the context of religion.

“These proverbs are designed to equip these people to be aware of the problems and these (four purposes) are going to give the ability not to be seduced. You and I today face that same religious system. It doesn’t make any difference what God’s doing, Satan has his religious system out there and it adapts; it doesn’t change what it’s doing, it just adapts its tactics.

“What the Proverbs were going to do for Israel, and what they will do for the believers in Israel, is give them the capacity to stay out of the trap and not step in the snare of the Adversary. That’s what Paul’s epistles do for us. (II Timothy 2:24)

“Satan has a religious system to catch you. In the Dispensation of Grace it’s called legalism. External religious legalism where what’s out there is where you think God’s working and where you’re going to find His revelation—‘What’s out there is the way I know God’s value and esteem for me, so what I need to do is produce stuff out there rather than being strengthened by His Spirit in my inner man and having the identity God gives me inside of me living out through me.’

“Satan uses that hook to snare and Paul says when a Believer’s caught in that, he opposes himself; he lives the opposite of who he really is. He frustrates the grace of god.”