2025 Book Review: Proverbs: Learning to Live Wisely

 

This was a new-to-me Bible study series that the class I signed up to take this past semester was using.  I've  always wanted to do an in-depth study on Proverbs and this class appealed to me. Several of my hiking friends attend the class so I was encouraged to join.  The instructor of the class is awesome and works for our church part time. The  class was every Monday morning from 9:30-11 AM. Tomorrow is the last class and I finished the book this past week. 

SUMMARY OF STUDY

There are 10 lessons (chapters) and each one contains various proverbs linked to the title of the chapter. 

I liked that there is an Intro section titled Getting the Most out of Proverbs. This includes suggestions for individual study and then a section for group studies/discussions. 

The chapters were as follows:

1. The Choice (Proverbs 9)
2. The Simple (Proverbs 7)
3. Avoiding the Fool (Prov 13:19; 17:12; 18:2; 20:3; 26:11)
4. Finding Wisdom (Prov 13:10, 20; 14:12; 15:12; 21:30;25:12)
5. Bad Words (Prov 6:12-14; 16:30; 17:4; 18:8; 26:23; 29:5)
6. Good Words (Prov. 10:19; 15:23; 16:24; 17:10; 24:26; 25: 11-12)
7. The Sluggard (Prob 6:6-8; 13:4; 15:19; 22:13; 24:30-34; 26: 14-16)
8. Wealth and Poverty (Prov 10:4,15,22; 13:8; 18:11,23; 19:4; 21:6; 30:8-9)
9. Giving (Prov 14:21,31; 19:6,17; 21: 13)
10. Planning the Future (Prov 11:3; 14:12; 15:22; 16:9; 21:5,31; 27:1)

In the back of the book are Leader Notes and then Answers.  I didn't care for the fact that the book included answers  to certain questions as I personally like to think about each proverb my self and look up in various commentaries, the meaning, historical or cultural context.  I never turned to the back to look up answers. The point of the class for me personally was to learn and grow without reading answers given by an author. For a new Believer, or someone who doesn't like to look up commentary, I guess this is a good tool...for the person to test themselves. Many of the questions were self-reflective or subjective. 

Each chapter had an Individual Discussion question (for you to personally answer and not necessarily share with the group) along with a Group Discussion question.  there were also about 10-12 short questions based on each specific proverb for that chapter. I really enjoyed the questions. 

This was an excellent study and not too much work.  I highly recommend it. 

In my opinion, this study is appropriate for ages 14 and older. 

On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the highest, I rate this a 9.