Wisdom & Foolishness

SCRIPTURE: 1 Cor. 3:19NIV For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s sight. As it is written: “He catches the wise in their craftiness.”

THOUGHT: There is a big chasm between wisdom and craftiness. Craftiness, by implication, involves devious intent. Synonyms include cunning, slyness, shrewdness, and guile. It may be intelligent, yes. It might look “sexy” in our workplace or social media friend groups. But craftiness has an end; it stops short of true wisdom. It’s not the way God works, and it is not what we so desperately need to be ready to speak out into our culture. By contrast, wisdom has synonyms like understanding, insight, and perception. Sounds a lot like discernment, doesn’t it? It’s so much larger than craftiness, so much more encompassing. And so completely impossible.

That’s why we don’t get it on our own. We tap into the Spirit of the living God. We study what God says rather than just trusting the power of our own intellect. Spiritual truths are spiritually discerned. “The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit (1 Cor. 2:14 NIV).”

PRAYER: We can try to apply our human wisdom and cunning to the problems we face, Lord, but it will look like foolishness to you unless we ask, seek and knock for your kind of wisdom. We understand that spiritual wisdom will make us look foolish to the world, but please fill us with it anyway.