Elder’s Corner: True Wisdom

Today, I would like to share with you some thoughts about Wisdom. As a Spanish teacher, I usually start a class by saying: Buenos dias (Good morning), or Buenas tardes (Good afternoon), or Buenas noches (Good evening)! Then I refer to the date. In those two simple statements, there is a lot of information: days of the week, months of the year, and numbers just from an introduction.

Today, thanks to God, we’re living another day of the week and another month of the year. Like I said in the beginning, this devotional is about wisdom. David, Solomon, Job and many books of the Bible extensively mention this topic. And it is something that every person believes that they have. Yet it is something that all can benefit from having more of.  But, at the same time, wisdom is not the same as information.

In Job 28:12, Job asked, “Where can wisdom be found?” In verse 13 he answered himself, “Because man doesn’t know its value, nor is it found in the land of the living.” To me this means that true wisdom is very scarce among men, back then and now.

In verses 1-11, Job says that man knows where to find precious metals and how to produce bread from the earth.  But where is the place where wisdom can be found or where does it come from? Verse 14 says, “The deep and ocean say it’s not in me.” Humans with our knowledge, technology and understanding have been able to obtain many things in many areas. Mining the very depth of the oceans and earth, we have found all kinds of products such as gold, diamonds, and oil. Lately, we have studied what happens in other planets and already we have landed on the moon many times. We “know how” to do many things because God gave us knowledge.

Verses 26-28 say God knows what wisdom is and used wisdom when He created the earth.  In other word He possesses, He uses, He is wisdom! God also invites man to have wisdom (Pro. 4:7-8)! We think that being savvy is God’s wisdom, but they are not the same.

From the beginning, man has tried to get wisdom but has failed. Genesis 3:6 says that Adam and Eve try to find it. Did they?   One thing they did, and we through them, find for sure, was many problems with wisdom, because they followed Satan’s advice about how to find it. By disobeying God, instead they found pain and death.

We think that being savvy is wisdom, but it is not. True wisdom is to fear, love and respect God (Job 28:28). This wisdom is more precious than the finest jewels and more valuable than any amount of money (Job 28:17). We all need to know that a wise person according to God is one who knows what wisdom is, finds wisdom, practices it, and keeps it!

—Enrique