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SERMON
SECOND
PRESBYTERIAN
CHURCH
460 East Main Street
Lexington, Kentucky 40507
Wisdom and Foolishness:
Being Careful How We Live
1 Kings 3:5-14, Ephesians 5:15-20
August 16, 2015
Rev. Erin Rouse
It is interesting that most of the lectionary passages for this Sunday, the 20th Sunday
in Ordinary time, are about wisdom, that quality that enables one to have good judgment,
discernment. . . that ability to cut through the mustard and see what really is. Perhaps the
lectionary committee knew that some of us may be struggling to get up and back into school
this past week and that we may need a little extra encouragement over the weekend about the
gaining of wisdom!
In his classic book, “The Divine Conspiracy,” Dallas Willard shares a few thoughts
about the learning of “good judgment,” and of moral character in higher education in
America. . .Willard tells of Robert Coles, a professor at Harvard, who wrote about an
encounter with one of his students.
This student was a young woman of “a Midwestern, working class background” who
cleaned student rooms to help pay her way through Harvard. Again and again, she reported
to Coles, that people who were in classes with her treated her ungraciously because of her
lower economic position, without simple courtesy and respect, often rude and sometimes
crude to her. She was repeatedly propositioned for sex by one young student in particular,
as she went about her work. He was a man with whom she had had two ‘moral reasoning’
courses, in which he excelled and received the highest of grades.”
This pattern of treatment led her, eventually, to quit her job and leave school – and to
something like an exit interview with Professor Coles. After going over, not only the
behavior of her fellow students, but also a long list of highly educated people who
perpetrated other atrocities, she said, “I’ve been taking all these philosophy courses, and we
talk about what’s true, what’s important, what’s GOOD. Well, how do you teach people to
BE good? What’s the point of KNOWING good, if you don’t keep trying to BECOME a
good person?”
Interestingly, Coles had no answer for this young woman and was, generally,
dumbfounded by the treatment these supposedly learned young men had given her. They had
all the intellect and moral teaching in the world. But, they failed, truly, to understand. . . to
know on the deepest level how to put that moral reasoning into practice. They lacked the
wisdom – the good judgment – that ideally this learning should have helped them gain.
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How to live. . .how to live wisely, with wisdom, is not something that one can assume
to know because of a college or advanced degree or some other accolade – even from the
best institutions in the world. Ideas, those that take root and grow into powerful influences
in our culture (such as many of those we are living “under” today), are not always what is
wisdom. Wisdom it seems – the famous wisdom of Solomon that we read about today – is
elusive. . . and I would even venture to say is dying in the culture in which we live.
In the midst of working on this sermon, and actually reading and writing about what I
just shared with you, I walked out in the hall one morning here at church to get a cup of
coffee and several members, interestingly, were having a conversation about a similar
concern here in Fayette County schools. . . where children are being taught to answer
questions on a test but are not able to apply what they are being tested about, to their lives.
Now, today is not a critique of Harvard or of higher ed. . . or even of our schools here
(Sorry that’s not going to get any of you out of going to school!). But, what it IS meant to
point out is that there is a vast difference in intellect and wisdom. . . in “smarts” and good
judgment, in knowledge and what is truly right or just. One can be as smart as they come,
but we see that one can be severely lacking when it comes to being wise – when it comes to
putting what we know into practice – when it comes to living wisely, carefully (with care), as
Ephesians admonishes us to do.
One comment I read this week sort of sums up what I’m talking about by saying –
“Intelligence is knowing a tomato is a fruit. . .wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad!”1
We Christians have the gift of knowing that Jesus is Wisdom embodied. In 1
Corinthians 1, Paul says, “. . .to those who are the called. . . Christ is the power of God and
the wisdom of God. . .” Jesus’ wisdom is displayed over and over again in scripture in his
encounters with individuals – with those trying to trick him as well as with those who were
his friends. His wisdom is displayed through the amazing stories and parables he told and
the truths they taught. . .and through the upside down way he still teaches us about what is
truly wise. . .
Last Sunday, Dan shared about King David and his friendship with Jonathan. . . This
Sunday, we hear about David’s son, Solomon (the one, interestingly, who was the product of
David’s encounter with Bathsheba), Solomon who was – of all the Old Testament characters
– known for his wisdom. Shortly after his father and mother arrange for him to become
king, and shortly after his father dies, Solomon has a dream. And in the dream Solomon
encounters God.
It is in dreams where several important characters in the Bible, encounter God. .
.which tells us that we, too, can encounter God in this perhaps more mysterious way. And in
Solomon’s dream of today, as he is preparing to be king, God offers Solomon whatever he
wants. And Solomon asks God for wisdom…for “an understanding mind. . .” or as some
translations say, a “wise heart,” for the ability to discern between good and evil.
We are given an example of his wisdom in the following story in Kings in which two
women claim the same baby. And when Solomon says, (excuse the gruesome details of the
time) “cut the child in half and give half to each,” Solomon (in his wisdom) counts on the
real mother, who is willing to give the baby up to see it live. He knows she is the real mother
and she gets her baby back. . .
1
www.pulpitfiction.us
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Some say because Solomon asks for wisdom – he is already wise. . . I wonder, if we
were given the chance to ask God for anything – would we ask the same. . .for good
judgment. . .for the ability to discern between good and evil. . .for the ability to know how to
deal wisely and justly with the people in our lives?
Although Solomon eventually falls from grace (like his father and, quite frankly, like
we all do), there is something pretty humble in him that he knows to ask for such a gift.
We, too, can ask God for wisdom – not so we can rule over others in some way, but
so that we can serve God better. Part of our call as Christians is “to be wise,” not foolish, so
that we know how to live well in our crazy world – a good world. . . but one that our
Ephesians passage reminds us also contains plenty of evil.
For Ephesians, wisdom means having the ability to discern between good and evil.
We all think we know what that looks like, don’t we. But do we really? Do we always see
things as they are? Or do we see them as we want to? Are we willing to examine what our
sometimes short sightedness may cause to happen down the road? Do we look, simply, for
easy answers?
Ephesians tells us that we are to “make the most of our time” in this world. Don’t
spend it drunk (or really what that implies is in worthless endeavors). . . but do something
with what we have been given. . . Be active. . . Change what can be changed. Ephesians also
says that the way of wisdom is to be filled with the Holy Spirit, worshiping and praising God,
“singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. . .” or perhaps more metaphorically
speaking, “singing our lives.”
One of the best ways I know to practice much of what we have just discussed. . . (and
if you think about it to put into practice Ephesians’ advice). . .to be able to ask for wisdom on
a daily basis, to be able to live a life that discerns between what is good and what is not, and
to be able thus, to go and live worshipfully, joyfully, wisely, singing and praising God
through such a life - is by praying (and living out) a simple prayer. It is called the serenity
prayer. . . Maybe you know it – the short and more common version goes like this. . .
“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to
change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. . .” The long version
continues from there. . . “Living one day at a time, accepting hardships as the pathway to
peace, taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; trusting that He will
make all things right if I surrender to His will; that I may be reasonably happy in this life and
supremely happy with Him forever in the next.”
Some here probably know that prayer well, and that it was written by theologian
Reinhold Niebuhr. . . Although some claim that Niebuhr wasn’t the first to say it, Neibuhr
himself says that it may have been “spooking around for years, even centuries, but I don’t
think so. I honestly do believe that I wrote it myself.”2
Neihbuhr’s thoughts, while full of depth and expounded upon in volumes of
theological works, ARE expressed in the lines of the serenity prayer. In arguing for his
authorship, one past acquaintance writes, “The famous prayer succinctly captures the tension
at the heart of his ethics, which to the consternation of his critics of both the left and the right
combined a realistic view of human nature (“serenity to accept the things that cannot be
changed”) with an idealistic commitment to social justice (“courage to change the things that
should be changed”) in a situation of profound moral ambiguity requiring humility and
2
http://www.aa.org/assets/en_US/smf-129_en.pdf
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discernment (“the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other”). This ethical framework
underlies his classic work Moral Man and Immoral Society.”3
Niebuhr answers our student’s concern at the very start of this message. . . the one
expressed to her professor at Harvard. . . about being good. . .about doing good. . . for
Niebuhr knew that humanity could not “be good” on its own. And thus, the most profound
part of his prayer is when we pray it, we pray to the One who makes all things possible.
Many know that this prayer has been utilized by scores of folks in AA and other 12
step programs. When Niebuhr’s daughter, Elisabeth Sifton, was asked what she would say
to a room of AA members about her father’s famous words. . .she said, “I'd tell them that
they're a step ahead of most everyone else, since they have acknowledged the need for daily,
patient, modest work in building a good life--not everyone else has.”4 She also acknowledged
that the prayer is wise – it has a wisdom all its own.
Some say that next to the Lord’s Prayer, the serenity prayer is the most well-known of
prayers. And it was named as one of the top 10 quotes of the last century.
One of my seminary professors, Jan Linn, wrote a book titled Living Inside Out:
Learning How to Pray the Serenity Prayer. In it he challenges us “to let [the prayer] mold
and shape our lives. . .” to “work it.” His basic premise is that in this prayer (and its wisdom)
there is power to live life in a new way, from the inside-out, from a position in which we
know God is in control. And in that there is great freedom, purpose, meaning for life – both
individually and corporately.
In the first part – praying for the grace to accept with serenity that which can not be
changed – doesn’t mean that we give up. It means we live with peace, with a calmness, in
the midst of the vast stuff over which we have no control. And in so doing, we can more
serenely work our way perhaps into a solution.
“The courage to change the things we can” is illustrated perhaps by those saints of
our time today who step out and do what they can to change our world, perhaps with great
courage. Maybe Solomon had this courage. . . For us, today, oftentimes, we may know what
it is we need to do in a situation. We just lack the courage to do it. Courage enables us “to
encounter difficulties and danger with firmness, without fear,” or at least to be able “to do
what needs to be done” 5 in the face of such fear, knowing that we do not do it alone.
In the last part of the prayer, the “clincher,” we ask for “the wisdom to know the
difference,” - the wisdom to live life knowing what we can change and what we can’t,
knowing what to do about difficult situations, estranged friendships, tough people, new roads
to travel, when to travel them. . .The wisdom to figure out what our purposes are. . what God
has in store for us – the ability to discern good from that which is truly not.
Linn says that wisdom comes from good ol’common sense, from good ol’ fashioned
trial and error, and of course from God. . . which is why we are called to ask God for it – to
pray for it. . .He also reminds us that waiting while we discern is part and parcel of wisdom. .
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Although there are a variety of ways to say it (and we will close with Niebuhr’s
original words) perhaps Erma Bombeck sums it up best. . . “God grant me the serenity to
3
Robert H. King, '60 BDiv, '65 PhD Yale Alumni magazine July/August 2008
4
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/03/the-serenity-prayer_n_1473196.html
Linn Living Inside Out, 42.
5Jan
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accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to keep
my mouth shut when I don’t know the difference!”6
So, people of God, let us live wisely. . . for the days are full of all kinds of challenges.
. . Discern what is good from that which is not. Call on the name of the Lord so to do. . .
Pray the serenity prayer. . . and may God grant us all the grace to accept with serenity things
we cannot change; courage to change things that should be changed; and wisdom to
distinguish the one from the other. . . and may the peace of Christ be with you. . .
6
http://www.aa.org/assets/en_US/smf-129_en.pdf