Proverbs 23:12 — Wise Saying #12

READ THIS: Proverbs 23:12, Wise Saying #12

12 Apply your heart to instruction and your ears to words of knowledge.

WHAT’S THIS MEAN, ANYWAY?

Let's get practical. How exactly do we apply our hearts to instruction AND our ears to words of knowledge?

Let's start with our hearts. Have you ever really put your heart into something? I think I really put my heart into my friends sometimes. If they have a bad day, I have a less good day. If they are excited for something, I am excited for that. It's a neat way to go about caring for people (side note: it can go too far, but that's a different blog). The main point is, putting my heart into them meant that I had a reaction to them. If we want to put our heart into instruction, then we need to have a reaction to instruction. The only way we can react to instruction is if we seek it out to begin with. I wouldn't know how my friends were feeling if I didn't ask first. 

That leads us directly to our ears! When I ask my friends how they're doing, I try to listen well. Applying our ears to words of knowledge means that we need to strain our ears to hear all that we need to hear. When my friends would say, "I'm fine," I needed to apply my ears to the words they used and the tone. "I'm fine," can mean a WHOLE lot of things. When there are words of knowledge (aka smart advice or good wisdom) then we need to listen to all the parts of it, both the words themselves and what those words mean to us specifically. 

So, in short, we need to seek out instruction, listen to it, and figure out how to react. We don't need to accept every single criticism, but we do need to weigh it out and decide if it should change something that we are doing. 

THINK ABOUT IT:

1. Which part of applying your heart/ears to instruction/knowledge is hardest for you? The seeking it out, listening to it, or reacting appropriately to it?

2. When is a time that you reacted to instruction and it helped you out a lot?
 
TRY THIS:

Ask one of your friends or parents or coworkers for feedback on something TODAY. Seek, listen, react!

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