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Someone Who Knows...

             Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and shun evil. This will bring health to your body and nourishment to your bones. (Proverbs 3:5-8)

 

Let’s return to the issue of wisdom. I’ve said before that wisdom is understanding how the universe works and living in accordance therewith. The problem is that sometimes our understanding of how the universe works is inaccurate. There are things that we think of as normal because we’ve been exposed to them all our lives. What are success and failure? What are love and hatred? What does it mean to be true to yourself, and is it a good thing? Would you be as valuable if you lost your spouse, child, job, sight, an arm, or mind? What constitutes a good life? Answer these honestly then look up what Scripture says.

Other times, while we understand, we don’t have the willpower to live it. We know we shouldn’t eat, drink, smoke, date, sleep with, buy (etc.) that, but here we go again. We see people who end up with the wrong sort of friend (or whatever) and we wonder why they do this to themselves over and over again, but in our own way, we do the same thing. On the other hand, we may end up wondering why we lose friends, can’t find a job, or spend so much of our time being tempted, angry, hurt, overwhelmed, afraid, lonely, jealous, or defeated. The last of these reminds me of the battle for Ai, when God promised Joshua victory, and the Jews were trounced. They drew straws to find the guilty party, and it was someone who didn’t obey God’s directions. King Saul lost his throne because he didn’t obey. Moses was not allowed to enter the promised land because he didn’t obey. Solomon lost the kingdom for his son because he didn’t obey. It doesn’t matter that the disobedience was small or trivial. What matters is that it was rebellion. But we want to excuse ourselves for one reason or another. No one can be that obedient. Well, no one except Jesus, right? But isn’t disobedience or failure not living by the way the universe works? With the way God works?

But what about us? Doesn’t what we want matter? God isn’t in our shoes. He doesn’t understand. But I don’t have to stick a metal knife into an electric socket to understand that it’s a bad idea. I just need to trust someone who understands something about electricity.

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