Proverbs 1:20 Commentary and Bible Study

‘Wisdom cries without;’ wisdom speaks, to some extent through creation, but chiefly through the word of God. Wisdom shouts, lifts up its voice loudly and pleadingly. Hypercalvinists only speak wisdom in the confines of a church, but Christ sent the gospel into all the earth.The Hebrew for wisdom is plural, i.e. the best wisdom – spiritual discernment, an understanding of the gospel, and a call from God to the new life. She cries without, not in the secret place but in a place where all can hear. God speaks to all of us in some way, but when we are unconverted we may have pangs of conscience, but we silence them, suppress them, because we are determined to carry on following our lusts. She utters her voice in the streets, in the crowded passages of life, in the market place, because she wants to be heard and cares about the ignorant and knows that what she has is what they desperately need. In the market place people argue together. Acts tells us that in Athens Paul disputed in the market daily with them that met with him (Acts 17:17). Even what we hear here may bring an awareness of God which sometimes does not begin to speak to us till later in life. When Christ was asked about his message by the high priest he answered, ‘I spake openly to the world; I ever taught in the synagogue, and in the temple, whither the Jews always resort; and in secret have I said nothing. Why askest thou me? ask them which heard me, what I have said unto them: behold, they know what I said’ (John 18:20-21). Equally, God sends his angel, ‘having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people’ (Revelation 14:6).