Listen Up

“Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the streets:” (Pr 1:20 AV)

Wisdom is not within.  It is without.  God is the source of all wisdom.  To attempt to make decisions without going to a greater source of ourselves is not going to work.  It struck me this morning that we often turn within to find answers rather than to go to something or someone bigger than Self.  The Spirit also spoke loudly about the crying of wisdom.  Wisdom isn’t a whisper.  Wisdom is a shout.  When Solomon speaks of this comparison, it is somewhere between foolish and silly.  A young man goes down a street and wisdom cries aloud.  On the other corner is a strange woman enticing him to sin.  One against the other.  It is too bad that wisdom has to yell.  One would think that as powerful as wisdom is, it wouldn’t have to shout.  But it does.  What we want to deeply consider is that wisdom is without.  Not within.

I like puzzles.  I have an app on my phone that offers nine different word puzzles.  Most of them I cannot do without help.  One of them is figuring out the top answers to a single question.  Another arranging words according to category.  Still another is finding hidden words.  There are two crossword puzzles.  There are three more puzzles that require unique skills with words.  There is one that is frustrating.  The puzzle starts out with a four-letter word.  Then the answer to the clue requires one letter to be changed.  Then another clue and another single letter is changed.  It is frustrating because most of the clues are cultural.  The clues are about some actor, movie, or non-American reference.  This puzzle is impossible to solve without help.  I have to ask Mr. Google who played what part or the first name of an author of a book I’ve never heard of.  I have to ask my search engine what England would call an item as opposed to America.  There are words in that puzzle that I have never heard of.  Solving these puzzles without help is near to impossible.

Life is far more complicated than a word puzzle.  We would be fools to try to solve all of life’s challenges within the resources of our own mind.  It is a fool's errand.  God has not made us to be an island unto ourselves.  He has provided His word and other people to be that source of wisdom that is screaming for our attention.  We go through life with deaf ears.  And in the process cause undue harm.  Why?  Why don’t we listen to that one source who is yelling with a bullhorn?  Why don’t we stop in our tracks and listen to the voice that is crying without?  Why don’t we let God be God?