Open Your Life and Pour in Proverbs

I’ve lately enjoyed attacking my bookshelves with intention. My ever-morphing plan to read 5 books every 2 weeks brought me to this awesome book on Proverbs, Living Wisely, by veteran missionary J. Matthew Nance.

Throughout the book, Nance shares personal anecdotes from his time ministering in both South Korea and a creative-access nation, though his many travels elsewhere also spice up his pages. It’s this personal touch that gives the book authenticity and makes it well worth the read.

Living Wisely Book Summary

Nance doesn’t exposit his way through Proverbs, which I appreciated. It’s hard to understand why some commentaries might try, since the book is (generally) a collection of proverbs without a systematic organization. Instead, Nance tackles a host of proverbs thematically, settling on the following structure of chapters:

• Chapter 1: Intro to Proverbs
• Chapter 2: Proverbs about Anger
• Chapter 3: Proverbs about Work
• Chapter 4: Proverbs about Words
• Chapter 5: Proverbs about Life
• Chapter 6: Proverbs about Relationships
• Chapter 7: Proverbs about Sex
• Chapter 8: Proverbs about Money
• Chapter 9: Proverbs about Wisdom

While he encourages his readers to read his book slowly, reading chapters out of order if needed, and to really mull over his words for days or weeks at a time, I don’t like reading that way. I’m much happier taking it all in, then knowing where to go when I need to return to a solid source on a given topic.

What I Took from the Book

Saying that I read the book cover-to-cover is not to say that nothing stood out to me! I certainly needed many of these chapters (well, proverbs) in my own life, and watching how Nance applied Scripture to real needs was eminently helpful. I’ll touch on two favorite topics here.

Anger

I’ve written about my own inclination to anger in the past. Growing up, I had quite a temper, and although I’ve mostly learned to handle it as I’ve aged, I’ve yet to conquer it fully. Certain things will trigger it, especially the way some people drive in Asia. It’s culture shock, which is why I loved this insightful line from Nance:

Better to catch a tiger by the tail than to mess with a missionary in culture shock! (34)

I know that anger is a sin issue, and yet as one who’s “blown his lid” more times than I’d like to admit, I know it’s also chemical. What starts as a flutter of selfishness that should be confessed and abandoned from the outset instead gets fed. It sits and sizzles in the heart, while glands feed it and the stomach roils. Eventually, everything boils over, emotional steam shoots out the ears, and I explode.

And yeah, that can all happen as I sit in Chinese traffic and get cut off for the umpteenth time! Yet over the years, I have eventually learned to catch this sin early—before it morphs into chemical warfare—confess it and hand it off to God. I’ve learned the reality of what Nance writes in this next quote, and I want none of it:

Having pent up anger at others is like your drinking poison and expecting it to kill someone else. (39)

Life

In this section, Nance highlights seven words often repeated in Proverbs that deal with the wisdom Solomon and the other writers hoped to pass on. I must quote them all here, because they are so necessary for anyone hoping to understand Proverbs correctly:

Instruction (Proverbs 1:2) is the leadership of parents in molding a child’s habits and character. Following instruction brings length of days and years of life (Proverbs 3:2).

Understanding (Proverbs 1:2) is the ability to pause and learn the true value of an experience.

Prudence (Proverbs 1:4) is being street smart: intuition that sees the reasons behind the way things are.

Knowledge (Proverbs 1:4) describes specialized skill in a particular ability, such as hunting (Genesis 25:27), sailing (2Chronicles 8:18), and playing music (1Samuel 16:16). Knowledge will be pleasant to your soul (Proverbs 2:10).

Discretion (Proverbs 1:4) is to understand a matter thoroughly and then devise a smart plan. Discretion will guard you (Proverbs 2:11).

Learning (Proverbs 1:5) is the idea of getting a grip on something: to wrap your mind and heart around a thing.

Counsel (Proverbs 1:5) is similar to the verb for steering a ship. To receive council is to have the ship of your life steered in the right direction. (117-118)

One Critique

I was pretty shocked by Nance’s seventh chapter on sex. It’s not so much that he emphasized actual sex with prostitutes as the danger, but that he almost exclusively emphasized sex with prostitutes as the danger. Granted, this was what Solomon often referenced in Proverbs, because back in the day, that was a pretty normal sin; but, Man, am I wrong in thinking that times have changed?

I thought he would take Jesus’ stand on this sin and attack the heart rather than the act—that to “look at a woman with lust is to commit adultery in the heart.” Lust, pornography, sex-chats, lewd images and jokes and conversations—these are what most men struggle with for years before prostitutes ever threaten to enter the picture!

Sleeping with prostitutes are to most men what cooking meth is to most teens. There is a long road of depravity to walk before this becomes an issue that we need to discuss openly as a group. Comment below if you think I’m wrong here!

It’s really hard to tell why Nance avoided discussing these other, far more common issues of sexual temptation. “Living the sheltered life of a missionary” might be part of it, but I doubt it. The man’s a man, Man. He knows temptation like the rest of us, so why not dig into the real struggles, not the fringe sins of yesteryear? I don’t know. As a guy, I was hoping for more from this chapter.

Conclusion

OK, that critique aside, I loved this book. I found it to be a unique but necessary approach to studying the difficult-to-navigate, impossible-to-outline book of Proverbs, and I think Nance’s approach (particularly in writing Chapter 8 directly to his own sons!) was spot-on.

Although his chapters are bit long for “a chapter a day” reading, I think this could be a healthy study-group option for any group that wants to tackle Proverbs but isn’t looking to go verse-by-verse.

However you use it, I think you’ll be thoroughly pleased with Living Wisely…and for that matter with living wisely.

©2025 E.T.