REAL WISDOM

                We live in a world that tries to be very rational. We believe that we have the ability to explain anything by the use of our reason. But when our reason is based on faulty assumptions, then it becomes irrational. Many people in our world are basing their lives on the assumption that there is no God, or in a faulty understanding of who God is.

                I was watching a British mystery show last night. The central figures in the story were part of the psychology department at a Cambridge University college. One was the professor and the other two were students. They were running experiments to discover why people hold onto the irrational idea of faith in God. The intent of the professor was to demolish people’s irrational idea that they are part of something bigger than themselves. Although this was a TV program, the sentiment portrayed is all too common in our Western world today.  Belief in God is irrational.

                This attack on faith is not new, although it may be dressed up in new clothes. Paul faced the same challenge. In his first letter to the Corinthians, he addressed this issue head on.

    For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: "I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate."

    Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.  Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom,  but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.

    Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things--and the things that are not--to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God--that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: "Let him who boasts boast in the Lord." 1 Corinthians 1:18-31

                Paul makes it clear that God did not design humanity with the capacity to figure Him out on our own. Instead, He placed within us a longing to know Him, and then He revealed Himself to us. It is a totally irrational idea that a created being could figure out the creator. It is a totally irrational idea that our “wisdom” should be greater than God’s wisdom.

                Our faith is not irrational, as some want us to believe. It is a rational response to the evidence that has been given to us through creation, the revealed Word of God, and Jesus Christ. The truly irrational approach is to see the evidence and try to make sense of it without God. All that a godless approach can do is produce hopelessness, fear, cynicism, and fatalism.

    The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

    For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. Romans 1:18-23

                Without God in the picture, we humans will devise all manner of gods to take His place. For some, these false gods take the form of idols. For others, these false gods take the form of philosophies that seek to explain the world without God. But the most common false god is human wisdom and reason. It is the arrogance of humanity that says, I am the master of my world and I bow to no one.

                God has given us a great capacity to think and to reason. Through this endowment, we have discovered many amazing things about the world in which we live, and about ourselves. But when we leave God out of the equation, all of our wisdom becomes foolishness, and leads us in the wrong direction. Real wisdom is accepting the fact that we are not the center of the universe. Real wisdom is realizing that without God this world doesn’t make sense at all.