No-one likes appearing as a fool do they? As a child, I remember most of the pictures of fools were court jesters with their funny pointy hats and bells jingling whenever they bounced around. I don’t know what comes to mind when you think of a person being ‘a fool’?
In our teenage years something seems to happen to the carefree child who loved showing off or just having a go at trying something new. Or the more sensitive child with a bit of encouragement takes on bravery and courage.
It seems as we head into puberty; into taking on responsibilities; into the abyss that is adulthood, we become aware of our foolishness. We begin to judge what is a fool because being a fool seems to be the worst crime you can commit.
With that being said we love the tv programmes that depict the stupidity of others. You can even earn money from sharing your own stupidity and foolishness to the general public, if you are willing to bear the ridicule.
Deep down most of us like to depict ourselves as being wise, as being all together sorted without fault. This enables us to consider ourselves better than ‘those fools’. We grow in judgement of what is cool and what is uncool to do; or look; or be, there seems something not quite right with the fool!
However, the bible gives us a different perspective, the bible addresses the skew of our human view of life and others.
Why?
Because God alone is judge, God along defines who is wise and who is a fool. If we’re honest we can’t even judge our own hearts because they deceive us, we become convinced that we are wise, it’s the rest of ‘them’ that are the problem.
The whole of Proverbs declares the wisdom of God, it declares to us that wisdom in of itself is found only in God. It is God who is wise and mankind (everyone) who are foolish.
What is wisdom? To fear the LORD, in other words to trust that he knows what he is doing and believe he is who he says he is. As we’ve thought through before, the LORD is God the Father, God the Son (Jesus) and God the Holy Spirit working together for the benefit of their created humanity and universe.
What is foolishness? To think that you can go it alone, that you alone have the solution for your own life, and you alone have the right to judge others.
Let us journey together through the pages of Proverbs and uncover the wisdom of He who created us, He who loves us beyond measure, He who wants to share his wisdom with us.
Living His Word 