Jordan Peterson is one of the premier intellectuals of our day and a beloved figure among conservative thinkers. He was a professor at the University of Toronto, has Ph.D in clinical psychology, is an author, podcaster, chancellor of a new college, and prominent content provider for the Daily Wire. Back in the 2010’s Peterson shot out of obscurity and into global fame when he publicly opposed Canada’s legislation banning gender discrimination.
Peterson is fascinating to listen to and you certainly can learn a lot from him. I’m a fan of his. But what is interesting is his intense interest in the Bible. His most famous lectures are the lectures he did on Exodus. He has vigorously argued in interviews, in podcasts, in forums with the likes of Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and others, on the merits of the bible’s value to society and people.
Many Christians have claimed Peterson as a Christian, many have said he is close – oh so close. I say he’s neither. In a way, he’s just as far away as Dawkins and others who intensely hate and reject the Bible. Its because while Peterson greatly admires the Bible, he, like others who are hostile to the bible, has a view of the bible that is categorically NOT biblical. He has a psychologized, mythologizing approach. To boil it down I would say it like this: Peterson rejects the idea that the Bible is revelation from God given to man. Instead, believes the Bible is not revelation, but accumulation. In his public dialogue with atheist Sam Harris, when Harris pressed Peterson specifically on his view of the nature of what the Bible is, Peterson explained that it is the accumulation of man’s wisdom over long periods of time, written down in myths, legends and so on. But it is definitely not actual history, it is not the Creator God of the universe speaking to man.
In this way, I believe Christians can make the spiritually adolescent mistake of letting Jordan Peterson, who is not a Christian, shape their faith and their view of the Bible. I say all this as a great fan of Peterson. I’m currently listening to his discussions with a panel of scholars on the Gospels.
I start with Jordan Peterson because Peterson should sit at the feet of Agur. Agur is the author of our passage today, Proverbs 30:1-4. Agur speaks to his buddies. Overarching his words is the idea of his need, and ours, for divine revelation. Peterson believes in man’s need to discover wisdom on his own, and that the Bible is the collection of man’s discovery of wisdom throughout all of history. But Peterson, and anyone else like him, is entirely missing the mark of what the Bible is: it is not discovery, but revelation. It is “Thus sayeth the Lord.” It is “The Spirit of the LORD says…” It is “And God said.” It is not an accident that the very next verse, verse 5, speaks of God’s words, “Every word of God is flawless.”
But here in verses 1-4, Agur expresses the brutishness of man apart from revelation from God – the groping of man in his darkness as he tries to discover God, and wisdom, and meaning apart from revelation. As brilliant as Peterson is, so long as he rejects the Bible as revelation from God – wisdom from God – he is as Agur says, nothing more than a brute, not even a man. Which is a fascinating way of putting it, and we’ll see what he means by that in a moment.
LAMENTS HIS IGNORANCE (1-3)
Look at how keenly Agur feels his ignorance in verses 1-3…..
He confesses his ignorance. He admits he does not have knowledge, wisdom or understanding.
But in his confession you detect his sense of grief over his ignorance. He’s lamenting his sad state of ignorance. Which I ask, “Why is he lamenting? Why is he so down about his ignorance? Isn’t the saying true, ‘Ignorance is bliss?’” I think there is something righteous in his sense of grief. Agur is righteous to be lamenting his ignorance. The reason is because you must value something in order to feel grief over not having it. You must hold dear something to feel the pain of not having it. And Agur values wisdom, understanding, and knowledge of the Holy One, but he admits he does not have it. And it grieves him because he does not have this treasure that he desires.
APPLICATION: A man is twice the fool if he lacks wisdom and then on top of that doesn’t care to get it. He’s three-times the fool if he goes on to mock wisdom. Turn to Proverbs 1:20-33 with me
But Agur’s wisdom is shown in the fact that he confesses his ignorance. Seems paradoxical, doesn’t it? His wisdom is seen in his ignorance in the sense that he shows his desire for understanding while admitting he doesn’t have any. A man will never attain wisdom if he does not first admit he doesn’t have it. You’ll never ask God for wisdom as James 1 says if you don’t admit you need it. You’ll never walk with the wise to grow wise as Proverbs 13 says if you don’t admit you aren’t wise. You’ll never study the Scriptures which are able to make you wise as 2 Timothy 3 says unless you first confess your ignorance. You’ll be what Romans 1 says, “Professing yourself to be wise you’ll become a fool!”
But I love how Agur compares himself to a brute. He says, “I am only a brute, not a man.” Some translations, like the ESV say, “I am too stupid to be a man.” Pretty blunt! There’s not contradiction here, the point is the same: Agur says he does not have the understanding of a man, he is as low as a beast when it comes to knowledge. He is as stupid as cattle or oxen.
What he’s saying is that when men are ignorant of God they are as spiritually and morally as dumb as animals. Man, created by God, is made higher than animals, and is capable of understanding, wisdom, and knowledge far above and beyond what mere animals are capable of. Philosophers throughout history would talk about humans being rational creatures, which distinguished them above irrational animals who only act on their instincts. That is the imago dei in man, the image of God, the capacity for higher intelligence, consciousness, worship, knowledge, moral agency. And the point to really emphasize from Agur is this: man is created capable of moral understanding and wisdom, and is able to know the Creator and walk intelligently, morally with his Creator, and have a fellowship with the Creator on a much higher level than the sparrow, or the cow, or the ant.
You see this in Psalm 32:8-9 also, turn there with me. The point is the same: a man is reduced to a mere brute when he gives up knowing God and living for him. But man enters into his full, God-given glory when he walks with God, knowing God, worshipping God, and following His commands.
APPLICATION: Let yourself feel your own ignorance. On the one hand, embrace that deep sense of “lack,” humbly acknowledging your own deficiency of wisdom. The reason I say that is because it flushes out any sense of dependence you’ve had on your own wisdom and drives you to the One true source of wisdom.
CONFESSES THE CREATOR (4a)
Next we see Agur in a way confesses the Creator. Look at the first half of verse 4, “….”
Agur is describing creation: he mentions the wind, the water, the earth and he also mentions heaven – which is a reference to the physical sky and outer space. I’ll assert this for two reasons. First, the Hebrew word used here is used for the physical sky and universe numerous times throughout the OT. Second, the immediate context of verse 4 is aspects of creation – so Agur’s use of the word heaven would most likely be to the physical universe. I think two points should be seen here.
First, the creation points us to the Creator. “The heavens declare the glory of God” Psalm 19:1 proclaims. And here, the way Agur speaks about creation shows his understanding that there is a Creator of it all. Look again how he isn’t just seeing the heavens, the wind, the water and the earth. He sees the Creator “holding the wind in his hands” and “wrapping the waters up in a cloak” and “establishing the whole earth.” looks at “heaven” and “the wind” and “the waters” and “the ends of the earth.” For Agur, seeing creation made him see the Creator behind it.
Second, no man can be wise without acknowledging God is the Creator. No one will ever be wise who rejects God as the Creator because in the Bible a man’s wisdom is connected with man’s acknowledgement that God is the Creator. For instance, turn to Proverbs 8:22-31 with me…
Romans 1 clearly explains this connection between abandoning the worship of the Creator as a pathway to foolishness. Verse 18-32.
APPLICATION: Creation should create in you a desire to seek the Creator. Look at the intensity of Agur, “Who?” “Who?” Who?” Who?” Four times he asks “Who?” Then he says, “What is His name?!” We’ll get to that.
Here’s my point: You can know things about the Creator by looking at His creation. And you should want to know things about the Creator by looking at his creation. If you just awoke in this world and began to look around, you can see things about this environment we call earth and sky and you can reason from your looking that there must be Someone behind it all and you can reason your way to some understanding of what this Someone is like:
- His POWER to create and cause everything to be,
- His WISDOM to create order and complexity. It must be a mind behind it all because of the intelligence that has gone into how complex and orderly the world is.
- His CARE for us, as our needs are met and we can exist because of creation He has made for us to live in
- He PROVIDES, all we need to exist is provided for us in this world.
- His BEAUTY as things He made appeal to our senses and are not just functional – think of standing on our dunes and looking out over the vast Lake Michigan as the sun sets, or the flowers budding in the spring, or the colors in the fall, or the fresh white blanket of winters snow.
- His FAITHFULNESS/DEPENDABILITY – seasons come and go as always, sun rises and sets as always, stars run in their courses, rivers run, rain falls on our fields….creation is faithful so the Creator must be faithful;
- We could look inward too, at ourselves, and see that we have something inside of us that makes us say “Hey, this is right” or “Hey, that is wrong.” So we could reason that this Someone must be a moral Someone, who made us to be moral, and therefore He is the Source of what is morally right and wrong.
This is all called by theologians, “General Revelation,” or “Natural Revelation.” It just simply means that Creation tells us things about the Creator, just like a painting tells us things about the painter, or the song tells us something about the singer.
And while all those things would all be true to think about this Someone, creation is not sufficient. Creation gets us started towards the Creator, but it cannot get us to the Creator. Creation should create in us a longing for knowing this God more personally. It’s like when Annie was pregnant with our first, Evan. I would watch her stomach and all his movements and I had such an intense longing to see his face. I knew he was there, I could see how he affected her stomach, but I wanted that personal connection with him where I could see him, hold him and know him. But I couldn’t “go” to him, he had to come to me!
That’s the idea here: Agur is saying no one can “get” to God. God must come to us. All we can get is a general idea about Him, but our understanding of this God lacks definition, He’s not personal. And there is almost desperation expressed in Agur’s words over the anonymity of this one who holds the winds in His hands. We might say Agur longed for an Apostle Paul to come into his town and explain to him who this “unknown God” was.
And this is where I think we can see a secondary meaning in the first line of verse 4, “Who has gone up to heaven and come back down?” Jesus rebuked Nicodemus in John 3 when he was too dull to accept what Jesus was teaching him, “I’ve spoken to you of earthly things and you don’t understand, how will you understand if I tell you of heavenly things? No one has ever gone into heaven except the Son of Man – who came from heaven.” Ephesians 4 says about Christ, “Jesus, who descended is the very one who ascended higher than all the heavens, in order to fill the whole universe.”
Agur is using a phrase that is often used in the Bible to express man’s need for revelation from God because man cannot go up into heaven to get knowledge from God. Man can’t leave the earth and go up to heaven and come back to tell about it – or write books like TV preachers who lie and say they went to heaven. No, God must come down from heaven, and reveal Himself, His mind, His purposes, His thoughts to man. Even His name.
THE UNKNOWN NAME (4b)
Finally we see Agur talk about The Unknown Name.” This line from Agur is just staggering. “What is His name and what is the name of His Son? Tell me if you know!” Oh my goodness. Lets look at some things.
First, the Creator’s name is “I AM.” In Exodus God revealed to Moses His name, and said, “I AM WHO I AM.” Its a name that conveys God’s Self-Existence.
Second, the OT tells us the great I AM Creator has a Son. In Psalm 2 God speaks to His Son, “You are my Son; today I have become your Father. Ask of me and I will make the nations your inheritance.” Who is this Son? Daniel 7 describes “One like a son of man, coming on the clouds of heaven, approaching the Ancient of Days, and receiving authority, glory, sovereign power, and having every nation worship Him in an everlasting dominion he rules over. The OT revealed that God has a Son, and the OT gave us a few things to know about this Son, but it never gave us a name. Agur’s question presses heavily, and really does capture the anticipation created by the whole OT: “What is the name of His Son?”
It’s as if Agur is leveling his gaze at us, and looking at us, even through us, and pressing the question on us: What is the name of His Son? Do you know?”
I’ll tell you who He is – He has been called many things in the OT. He is:
- The SEED of the woman (Genesis 3)
- The PROPHET (Deuteronomy 18)
- IMMANUEL (Isaiah 7)
- BRIGHT MORNING STAR
- DESIRE of NATIONS (Haggai 2)
- WONDERFUL (Isa 9)
- COUNSELOR (Isa 9)
- MIGHTY GOD (Isa 9)
- PRINCE of PEACE (Isa 9)
- SHILOH (Gen 49)
- SON of GOD (Ps 2, Pvb 30)
- SON of MAN (Dan 9)
- The BRANCH (Isa 4)
- CORNERSTONE (Psalm 118)
- KING (Zech 9)
- MAN of SORROWS (Isa 53)
- MESSIAH/ANOINTED ONE (Ps 2 and Dan 9)
Think of how much the OT created anticipation for the revelation of this Son of God. You see that anticipation in Simeon the prophet in Luke’s Gospel, who takes the child from Mary and says, “Ah, Lord! My own eyes have now seen the long-awaited consolation of Israel!” Jesus told the disciples in Luke 10:24, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. For I tell you that many prophets and kings wanted to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.” Think about all this anticipation for the Son of God. Maybe we can say it like this: think of how pregnant the OT was with the Son of God. The OT is pregnant with the Son, the NT is the birth of the Son – figuratively and literally!
So let me assert to you that the whole reason I chose this passage is because it is a Christmas passage. So this sermon is uniting, as one sermon, two different series. It is part of the Proverbs series, and, it is beginning a Christmas series. It is a hypostatic sermon! But the reason this passage is a Christmas passage is because it creates anticipation of the Son of God. It makes you intensely curious to know what His name is, and in knowing His name, knowing Him. And what is Christmas but the celebration of this Son of God finally arriving, and His name finally being revealed. Someone tell me, what did the angel say to Joseph and then say to Mary? “You will have a son, and you are to name Him _________.” (JESUS!)
Jesus! Oh that name! It is the name above every name. It is that name that every knee will bow to, and it is that name that every tongue will confess. It is the only name under heaven given to men by which they must be saved. Jesus!