Despising Wisdom

In Proverbs 1:7 we read, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction."  The word for fear in this passage is equivalent to having proper respect. It is to fully appreciate that God is not man but rather Creator, just as Thomas Jefferson penned in our Declaration of Independence.

Our nation was not built on the notion that we are are so great that all must give way to us but rather that God is so great and that he has given us the right of self-determination, including the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

That is not to say that we get to have everything we want, every time we want it but that we have the right to pursue it.  Too many think they have the right to demand what they want, believing it only right to get what they demand.

Their are many in Hollywood, the media, in Congress and Democrats from across the nation who feel they have been robbed of their right to have their candidate ascend to the office of president.  But the fact is that while they had the right to pursue that outcome, their is no right to demand it.

We, as humans, are not in charge of the outcomes of life. We can do our best to raise our children right, only be very disappointed. We can save for retirement, only to see it swallowed up in health costs. Non-smokers sometimes get lung cancer, healthy eaters can develop diabetes, college graduates can wind up flipping burgers.

This, to me is the laughable part of the climate change initiative, that we think we can actually determine the climate of the earth. I have no doubt that the earth's climate is changing. There is amble evidence the world has gone through multiple Ice Ages and periods of warming to follow.  Are we to believe that we could cause or prevent these global shifts in climate - really?

Are we to believe that we can actually bring peace to the Middle East when there has bee fighting going on for as long as it has existed?  We can't even bring peace to the streets of Chicago. While you or I can choose not to be prejudiced, can we really wipe out prejudice and bigotry from the land entirely?  Can we really wipe out all diseases?  There is a "Super Bug" that antibiotics are not containing already and cancer cells are morphing to defeat our treatments as I'm writing.

There are thing so out of our control and we are fools to believe otherwise, and even greater fools to not recognize that our only true hope is in God, in his promise of redemption and life in Christ.   Many are fools indeed, refusing to acknowledge The Creator and his power over the creation, thinking themselves "Captain of their own Destiny."  We're not even first mate.

Think about your life and all that has happened.  Have you really been in control?  Think of the state of our union, have we really got things under control?  Consider the world around us, do we have that under control?  Do we really think that we don't need a Savior?

We think we are really wise but the truth is that to think so highly of ourselves is to foolishly despise the wisdom of knowing God and living under his banner.  Rejecting God is to reject his good and  righteous control over our lives and the life he offers.  Jus' Say'n.