The young Christian mother wept as she spoke of her divorce. With a hopeless gesture, she cried, "Why do I always have 20-20 vision - hindsight! Now I know that everything was wrong - my attitude, what I said, what I did. Why didn't God give me wisdom when I prayed?"
HOW many of us remember with tears the things we should have done and how we should have have done them? Do we wonder why we did not see things then as we do now? Naturally, as we follow Christ, His Spirit does impart grace and wisdom for the battles of life. Yet too many of God's children confess a lack of wisdom. Too many tears are shed in retrospection.
In James 3, the author describes two kinds of wisdom. He tells us that wisdom from above is, first of all, pure. God's wisdom cannot come to a sinful heart. Sin causes us to make decisions that bring hurt and failure.
Wisdom from above is also peaceable. "For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice" (verse 16). How can wise decisions be made when there is contention and strife in the heart? God comes to hearts that wait until they are quiet enough to hear His still, small voice.
James further describes this wisdom as "submissive" - "It allows discussion and is willing to yield" (verse 17, TLB). A know-it-all attitude obstructs God's wisdom.
If we, as people in His presence, are to face the challenges of life in a troubled world, we need the genuine wisdom from above.
Helen Constance
"If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without fining fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt (JAMES 1:5-6a)."
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