Can you think of others?
Could
I get some general agreement that the one that trumps them all is Wisdom?
Wisdom reigns supreme over all these attributes. It is that quality which is
most highly sought.
There are those that think I am
wise. I don’t mean to brag… really. But it makes me wonder, what would people
see in me that they would think that I am wise? Is it the gray hair?
I think gray hair has something
to do with wisdom… but I’ve heard people describe me as “having wisdom beyond
my years” for a long time. What can that mean? I have some theories.
First off, for whatever reason,
I seem to always have had the ability to usually tell people what they want to
hear… so sometimes I think we fool ourselves by mistaking “wisdom” for merely
that which is agreeable. It is easy
for us to admire that which is right along the lines of our own thinking. I
think some people have mistaken my ability to articulate the conclusions to
which they are coming to themselves for wisdom. We tend to think our own ideas
are pretty good.
But I do think that even
“telling people what they want to hear” gets us closer to identifying wisdom.
It seems that wisdom does have something to do with context.
Job
himself alludes to this. In the following chapter (29), Job longs-out-loud, for all of us to hear,
the days when he was regarded as wise.
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29 Job continued his
discourse:
2 “How I long for the
months gone by,
for the days when God
watched over me,
3 when
his lamp shone upon my head
and by his light I walked
through darkness!
4 Oh,
for the days when I was in my prime,
when God’s intimate
friendship blessed my house,
5 when
the Almighty was still with me
and my children were around
me,
6 when
my path was drenched with cream
and the rock poured out for me streams of olive
oil.
7 “When
I went to the gate of the city
and took my seat in the public
square,
8 the
young men saw me and stepped aside
and the old men rose to
their feet;
9 the
chief men refrained from speaking
and covered their mouths
with their hands;
10 the
voices of the nobles were hushed,
and their tongues stuck to the
roof of their mouths.
11 Whoever
heard me spoke well of me,
and those who saw me
commended me,
12 because
I rescued the poor who cried for help,
and the fatherless who had
none to assist him.
13 The
man who was dying blessed me;
I made the widow’s heart
sing.
14 I
put on righteousness as my clothing;
justice was my robe and my
turban.
15 I
was eyes to the blind
and feet to the lame.
16 I
was a father to the needy;
I took up the case of the
stranger.
17 I
broke the fangs of the wicked
and snatched the victims from their teeth.
18 “I
thought, ‘I will die in my own house,
my days as numerous as the
grains of sand.
19 My
roots will reach to the water,
and the dew will lie all
night on my branches.
20 My
glory will remain fresh in me,
the bow ever new in my hand.’
21 “Men
listened to me expectantly,
waiting in silence for my
counsel.
22 After
I had spoken, they spoke no more;
my words fell gently on
their ears.
23 They
waited for me as for showers
and drank in my words as the
spring rain.
24 When
I smiled at them, they scarcely believed it;
the light of my face was
precious to them.f
25 I
chose the way for them and sat as their chief;
I dwelt as a king among his
troops;
I was like one who comforts mourners. [1]
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Wisdom
has everything to do with God’s presence.
His
light.
His
friendship.
His
presence.
Attention
to the poor and fatherless.
Widows.
Righteousness
and Justice were like clothes.
Insight
Help
Just
Respect
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Wisdom
is all of these things we’ve listed… in context.
It is both process and content…
knowledge and the ability to process it… in context.
Wisdom is all these things at
the right place, at the right time, applied well to meet need. It includes both the raw
materials (knowledge) and the ability to use it (thinking). We
have the ability to increase both… right? We can hone our thinking skills…
training ourselves to think more quickly, more critically, more deeply. We can
also pack more knowledge into our heads through our own experiences (street
smarts) and the experiences of others (book smarts). Wisdom is applying our
street smarts, book smarts, perception, and thinking at the right place, the
right way, at the right time.
We need wisdom when we’re faced
with a problem or looking for answers. From chapter 29 in Job, we are wise when
we:
· Help
the poor and fatherless
· Give
hope to the dying and widows
· Aid
a stranger
· Give
good counsel
· Demonstrate
righteousness and justice
This idea that wisdom is
knowledge and thinking in action, that wisdom has a context, is demonstrated
also in the NT passage that Jennifer read today (James 3:13-18). Wisdom is an
action word.
We look to Job and we remember
that Wisdom is rare… not easily obtained (Job 28:1-19). It is like precious
minerals and priceless gems. It takes work, searching, digging. It may take the
help of others. Wisdom doesn’t come easily, but it is worth the work… it is a
noble goal, and wisdom is attainable.
It is important that we don’t
stop here, isn’t it? We certainly wouldn’t want to miss the main point of the
passage.
If wisdom is knowledge and the ability/power
to handle the knowledge… who then has ultimate wisdom? Simple answer… right?
Ultimate wisdom simply must be the property of the All Knowing and All
Powerful.
23 God
understands the way to it and he alone knows where it dwells,
24 for
he views the ends of the earth and sees everything under the heavens.
25 When
he established the force of the wind and measured out the waters,
26 when
he made a decree for the rain and a path for the thunderstorm,
27 then
he looked at wisdom and appraised it; he confirmed it and tested it. [2]
Wisdom is a great treasure; wise
men and women are rightly admired. But the most profound wisdom that we can
ever attain pales in comparison to the Wisdom of God. His knowledge, and
perspective, and power qualifies Him alone as the most wise… so we ought to
listen to what He says about Wisdom… and here it is; here is the point:
28 And he said to man,
‘The
fear of the Lord—that is wisdom, and to shun evil is understanding.’”[3]
Wisdom is the fear of the Lord.
Wisdom, especially the highest kind of wisdom, is only attainable with a divine
element… the fear of the Lord.
Sometimes people stumble on
these words the fear of the Lord. We know that these words mean a great deal
more than be afraid of God, like children are afraid of the dark or the boogie
man.
We could learn something about
what is meant by the fear of the Lord
from those that Bible says operated with the
fear of the Lord:
- Noah,
in preparing the ark, Heb. 11:7.
- Abraham,
tested in the offering of his son Isaac, Gen. 22:12.
- Jacob,
in the vision of the ladder, and the covenant of God, Gen.
28:16, 17; 42:18.
- The
midwives of Egypt,
in refusing to take the lives of the Hebrew children, Ex.
1:17, 21.
- Phinehas,
in turning away the anger of God at the time of the plague, Num.
25:11
- Obadiah,
in sheltering one hundred prophets against the wrath of Jezebel, 1
Kin. 18:3, 4.
- Jehoshaphat,
in proclaiming a feast, when the land was about to be invaded by the
armies of the Ammonites and Moabites, 2 Chr. 20:3.
- Nehemiah,
in his reform of the public administration, Neh. 5:15.
- Hanani,
which qualified him to be ruler over Jerusalem,
Neh. 7:2
- David
wrote Psalms that cherished the fear of the Lord, Psa.
5:7; 119:38.
- Hezekiah,
in his treatment of the prophet Micah, who prophesied evil against Jerusalem,
Jer. 26:19.
- Jonah,
in the storm, Jonah 1:9.
- The
Jews, in obeying the voice of the Lord, Hag. 1:12.
- The women
at the sepulcher, Matt. 28:8.
- Cornelius,
who feared God with all his house, Acts 10:2[4]
Those who fear the Lord are
those who:
· Are
consumed with the thought of Him
· obey
Him
· trust
Him
· look
to Him for visions
· resist
evil
· support
justice and righteousness
· look
to Him instead of circumstances
· worship
· awestruck
The fear of the Lord is living
in the presence of God. It is truly living with a blatant realization that God is real… and since God is real,
everything else must be different. Ultimate wisdom lives under the banner of
God’s reality, and understanding is the polar opposite of evil.
There is another word that we
use all the time that goes along with this sort of fear of the Lord: remember.
Just as Jesus said, “this do in remembrance of me” it is to be more than mere
nostalgia. Jesus is saying, live fully mindful of me. Consume this; live by it…
remember. When Jesus said, “this do in remembrance of me” He could have also
said “do this in the fear of the Lord.”
So
what?
How can we make this practical
for us today?
I don’t think I need to convince
you that the pursuit of wisdom is a worthwhile endeavor. Do I?
First, take this lesson from Job
(and James) that wisdom is an action word. Wisdom is only really wisdom when it
is applied to human need.
Empty knowledge is just that…
empty. Wisdom is richest when it meets needs.
I think I would also like to
remind us all a little bit about how the math works when we are talking about
our work with God.
It
is too easy for us to apply first-grade math to our situations with God.
First-grade math… addition.
Some of me plus some of God =
Godly work.
So…
maybe we’ll figure our part is 70% of the deal and God will make up the 30% to
get it up to 100%. Or… maybe we’re really spiritual and we’ll flip the proportions
so it is less of us and more of God. Whichever way you see it, it all adds up
to 100%. Makes sense… right?
But it doesn’t work this way…
not addition… multiplication.
Work
the numbers… 30/70 may have seemed good when you’re adding… but when you
multiply, it really stinks. The best you can do is 50/50 and that only yields
25%.
What
God requires is 100% X 100%.
All of what we have meeting all
of what He brings.
This is what we need.
So, in pursuit of wisdom, we
should bring the best we have.
Work hard; dig deep. Go to
school, study, read… seek wisdom.
100% of the best you can bring…
all under the fear of the Lord;
acknowledging God 100% and asking Him to bring all we can possibly bear.
I
grow so tired of those who settle so easily for shoddiness and then wrap it up
in spirituality. Remember Christian shoddy is still shoddy. In
my line of work at the University I hear it all the time “all that education
spoils the real ministry.”
I suppose that may be true if
you insist on the first-grade math
model… that if we get smarter it somehow crowds-out God… that we allow a
smaller and smaller piece. But that isn’t how it works, it is multiplication.
We are tools in God’s hand. I
can get a certain amount of work done with crummy tools. I could have written
this sermon by scratching a big flat rock with a little pointy rock. Or I could
have used paper and pencil… or I could have even have dug my old 8086 computer
out of a box and used WordPerfect 1.0… but I’m glad I had my Pentium-Powered
Dell running the latest and greatest software. The best tools help me do my
best work.
Why would we want to be anything
less than the best tools as we place our lives in the hands of our God?
God
is calling us to wisdom… to meet need with good understanding. He calls us to
apply what we know and have learned. And He calls us to subject it all to His
perspective. We bring what we have, realizing that we lack the perspective of
our all knowing God, so we subject it to Him. We bring the best we have, but
know we lack ultimate Wisdom. And by faith we take God up on His promise:
5 If any of you lacks wisdom, he
should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will
be given to him.[5]
Let’s pray this morning for
wisdom.
All that we bring, met by all of
God’s perspective and power.
