PsalterMark

Wising Up
One of my favourite films, Magnolia, has the weirdest of trailers where every member of the cast is in the middle of their dysfunctional life and the singer Aimee Mann pops by singing the song Wise Up. They even join in, whether dying in bed, being a confused policeman or in the midst of a breakdown. In different ways they have all crossed the line dictated by wisdom. And Aimee Mann is correct:

But it’s not going to stop.
It’s not going to stop.
It’s not going to stop.
‘Til you wise up.

It turns out that many of them do wise up, through what I understand to be divine intervention. The gospel of Jesus Christ is the Good News of universal divine intervention that really does enable us to wise up. To wise up about ourselves as broken. To wise about those around us as companions in brokenness. To wise up about the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob our creator. To wise up about the Father revealed through the Son by the Spirit as saviour.

Proverbs 4 falls neatly into three sections. Each one opens with an opening refrain:

Verse 1: Listen, my sons . . .
Verse 10: Listen, my son . . .
Verse 20: My son, pay attention . . .

This part of Proverbs is full of episodes that begin my son, or my sons. Like much of the First Testament Proverbs both mirrors its patriarchal culture and yet promotes an egalitarianism beyond its years. On the one hand it is often sons that are exhorted. On the other mothers are given an equal role in instructing and teaching:

Listen, my son, to your father’s instruction
and do not forsake your mother’s teaching.
Proverbs 1:8, NIV

Our first episode, vv.1-9, concerns the need to get wisdom:

Get wisdom, get understanding;
do not forget my words or turn away from them.
Proverbs 4:5, NIV

I am increasingly hopeful that our living in the Information Age is making us all too aware that information, though vital, is not enough in a whole variety of contexts, including our personal decision making, morality, politics and even our salvation. The Age of Information has brought, at least, as many problems as it has solved.

Solomon builds on the massive legacy of the wise who went before him to explains that information, understanding, and wisdom are distinctly different. Any challenge, from running a café to the Climate Emergency, requires information, understanding and wisdom if a good solution is to be found.

There is also a vast difference between wisdom on the printed page and being wise. Proverbs are wisdom but their use can be wise, or it can be foolish. Proverbial wisdom can be ignored, abused, misused, or used. Only the latter is wising up. Let me illustrate the difference between wisdom as a saying and being wise. First with some secular wisdom and then with some biblical wisdom.

Here are two wise sayings.:

Too many cooks spoil the broth.
Many hands make light work.

They sound contradictory but when applied correctly we can wisely discern which applies. For example, when it comes to community events, that involve clearing away when the party is over, it would be unwise to spread the supposed wisdom that:

Too many cooks spoil the broth.

It would be wiser to fix your gaze intently on a potential helper and point out what wisdom has taught us, that in this context:

Many hands make light work.

The book of Proverbs itself has proverbs that contradict one another as texts:

Do not answer a fool according to his folly,
or you yourself will be just like him.

Answer a fool according to his folly,
or he will be wise in his own eyes.
Proverbs 26:4-5, NIV

Each is wisdom but only wise when applied correctly. When are you wasting your breath? The point is that it’s difficult to discern but important to do.

Distinguishing between proverbs as distilled sayings and using them wisely, ensures we don’t make a category mistake. None of us confuses a cat with a dog. But most of us, at some point, have taken a proverb as a promise rather than a proverb.

Left, or Right?
Our second episode, verses 10 to 19, teaches us that there’s rather more going on here than just making good practical decisions. Proverbs can be very practical, but this is secondary to their moral and community dimensions. They are instruction from God. God’s instruction in its various forms is primarily about relationship with him and relationships with others.

Some decisions are morally neutral. Do I wear the new shirt that my daughter chose for me for Father’s Day, or so I wear the more formal one I had planned initially. It did not occur to me dwell on Scripture to make such a choice, although both testaments do have wisdom regarding clothing.

Other decisions are rather obviously moral. Do I commit adultery? We don’t need wisdom to tell us which is the right choice here. But the voice of wisdom will enable us to avoid the first steps towards such a temptation. This is wising up—to make the right small choices so we don’t even face the bigger choice.

Nearly every choice we make can have an ethical dimension and in so doing enable me to walk with God, to follow Christ, to keep in step with the Spirit. Nearly every choice we make can have an ethical dimension and enable quite the opposite. To walk and to not bother to listen to God, to not follow Jesus, to walk out of step with the Spirit.

Look and Listen
Wisdom is intentional. You don’t pray for wisdom at a bar after debating the pros and cons of taking creational drugs for 1-hour with a drug dealer. Before you get to choices that involve temptation, there’s a path of intentionality that should be taken; a step away from the first possibilities of temptation. In my example, true wisdom was needed in the minutes, hours, days and months before the crisis of temptation. And wise instruction from loving parents was needed still earlier.

When we cross the road, we look and listen. When we go about life, we must do the same. Bilbo the Hobbit nails this literally, but we can take it metaphorically:

It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door. You step into the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.

Look and listen to the Bible. Look to good books. Look and listen to those in fellowship with you. Get support from friends, from church, from small groups. And wise up to drawing a line of where not to look.

This requires reflection—there’s nothing passive about real reflection. And remember that the Bible is a compass not a map. Our friends, even Christian friends are not always right in their advice—especially as we are unlikely to offer all the information we have about our journey and choices so far.

Looking and listening is wise, but wisdom is a gift. It is both a general gift to all who fix their eyes on Jesus, and a special gift to some members of God’s church. It is in this sense both a fruit and gift of the Spirit. Wisdom can be granted by the Holy Spirit. But it is wise to give God something to work with in terms of intentionality, devotion, and right choices.