Wisdom Wednesday – Avoidance

For wisdom will enter your heart,
    and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul.
 
Discretion will protect you,
    and understanding will guard you.
 
Wisdom will save you from the ways of wicked men,
    from men whose words are perverse…

— Proverbs 2: 10-12

Are there practical benefits to having wisdom? It depends on who you are and what you are looking for in life.

I do not like pain. I avoid it as much as possible. For this reason, I avoid taking unnecessary risks. I think everyone else should think the same way. I cannot fathom a point of view that embraces pain.

Some years ago in the course of my job, I met a young man who seemed impervious to pain. During the few weeks, I knew him I learned that he had an affection for high-risk sports. He would regale me with stories of the adventures he’d had and then tell me what it had cost him in broken bones. I am pretty sure he had broken almost every bone in his body at least once.

God makes us all different, and many people like action. The sense of motion imparts a feeling of being alive. I get it. I understand. I do. These people are just different than me. Yet there are some kinds of pain that all of us avoid.

People fear the pain of loneliness. We don’t like being rejected or ignored. Nobody wants to be depressed. Nobody wants to be a punching bag for someone else. Abuse, whether verbal or physical, is a kind of pain.

When we turn to God for wisdom, we discover that we are never alone. When we apply God’s wisdom to our daily lives, it is called “discretion.” When we use God’s wisdom as a tool for figuring out how to avoid pain, it is called “understanding.”

Application: Ask God for wisdom. Then, apply it in your daily life.

Food For Thought: How would more wisdom help you in your life?