C. Kutz-Marks

Finding Wisdom

Pentecost 11, b, Aug. 20, 2006

Ephesians 5:15-20 (Proverbs 9:1-6, 10)

There's a wonderful children's story about Alberic the Wise .  Alberic (let's called him Albert) was a young man who knew nothing of the world other than the little village in which he lived. One day a stranger came to town, an old man with a large sack on his back. Out of curiosity Albert began a conversation with this traveler who told Albert tales of faraway places full of mystery and wonder. For several days after his encounter with this old man, Albert could think only of the larger world that lay outside his village. Eventually, the allure of the unknown proved greater than the comfort of the familiar, so he packed his belongings and set out for these faraway places in search of the wisdom they might offer.

Before long he came to a walled city grander than anything he had ever imagined. This city was renowned for its manufacture of stained glass. Satisfying himself that beauty was the true aim of wisdom, Albert became an apprentice to an old craftsman for whom he worked for two years, doing everything he was asked to do and learning all he could about the art of stained glass making. Finally, the day came for Albert to prove his own skill and show what he had learned. He labored meticulously over his stained glass creation, but alas, the finished product was of inferior quality. He would never be a glassmaker.

Albert moved on from that city to another famous for its stonecutters and masons. "Beauty isn't everything," he thought. "The true measure of wisdom is utility. I'll do something useful." So, again he set about the task of learning a trade, this time as a stonecutter. But his ability at stonecutting was as lacking as his efforts at making stained glass and so he moved on to the next town.

"Usefulness isn't everything," he decided. "Innovation is surely the measure of wisdom. I'll do something original." And soon he arrived at a village where the goldsmiths crafted objects of unsurpassed beauty and elegance. But for Albert, this third attempt only produced a third failure.

And so it went, city after city, try after try, year after year. Still, wisdom and skill eluded Albert. Now old and alone, Albert reached the great, capital city where he stopped to rest with his accumulation of objects and memories. Intrigued by his strangeness, some of the youngsters of the town came up to him and inquired of him where he had been and what he had seen. Albert began to relate to them the stories of his pilgrimage. Each day brought more and more people to hear his tales of faraway places and to marvel at his knowledge. Even the king came to listen and seek advice. So impressed was the king that he moved Albert into a castle and gave him the title of Albert the Wise.

After the novelty and the newness of his recently acquired fame began to fade, Albert began to experience self-doubt. No matter what anyone else said or thought, Albert knew that he was not wise. However, the more he tried to disown his reputation for wisdom, the wiser he was thought to be by the townspeople. Albert grew more and more sad and less at ease with himself.

Finally, to the utter astonishment of everyone, Albert packed up his belongings, gave up his palace, his wealth, his servants and his exalted position among the citizens of the town, and headed out on a journey for an unknown destination.

Albert had discovered the one thing that for him was true wisdom. "It is much better," he said, "to look for what I may never find than to find what I do not really want."

Hopefully, we all, like Albert, are seekers of wisdom. And many of us, like Albert, find what we think is the source of wisdom, only to be disappointed when reality does not measure up to expectations.

So what is wisdom and where does one find it? A clue, but only a clue, is given in chapter 9 of the Book of Proverbs, where Wisdom has been anthropomorphized and hypostatized, when she calls to the passersby:

4"You that are simple, turn in here!" To those without sense she says,"Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed.  Lay aside immaturity, and live, and walk in the way of insight."…. Then 3 verses later….

10  The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.

The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, and the interesting word here is "beginning." The fear (awe, reverence) of God is not the sum total of wisdom, just the beginning, it readies the spirit for the humbling that is clearly essential for faithful living.  But obviously, there is more that God would have us to know, but what is it? And where is it?

This text and several others from Proverbs, Job and elsewhere can leave a person somewhat frustrated. Just when you hope to find a simple one-two-three definition of wisdom, or even better, a Twelve-Step program on how to become wise, you can't find it. It's not there.

I love the way that James Russell Lowell described it in his enchanting poem, “The Parting of the Ways.” A mystical woman spirit is leading the narrator through a great journey…

I would have fled, I would have followed back
That pleasant path we came, but all was changed;
Rocky the way, abrupt, and hard to find;
Yet I toiled on, and, toiling on, I thought,
'That way lies Youth, and Wisdom, and all Good;
For only by unlearning Wisdom comes
And climbing backward to diviner Youth;
What the world teaches profits to the world,
What the soul teaches profits to the soul,
Which then first stands erect with Godward face,
When she lets fall her pack of withered facts,
The gleanings of the outward eye and ear,
And looks and listens with her finer sense;
Nor Truth nor Knowledge cometh from without.'

After long, weary days I stood again
And waited at the Parting of the Ways;

Maybe our next hint should come from the way that both James Russell Lowell and the Bible talk about wisdom… not as an “it” to be obtained, but as a “she” to be adored, to be followed.  In fact, there is a tremendous amount of study and writing today in Christian scholastic circles focusing our attention on Sophia, Wisdom, this most powerful and positive feminine aspect of the Divine nearly buried in our patriarchal past. 

We may be introduced to Wisdom by our church, by our Bible.  But that means nothing at all if we will not be led by Wisdom… if we will not place our faith in that wisdom.  And here is a secret, my friends, when we can spot someone who seems to embody an aspect of wisdom… learn from them, copy them, think like them.

*

For example,  John Killinger tells about one of his former parishioners--a man by the name of Ralph Kelly. Killinger describes him as a tall, handsome, white-headed man--a Purdue graduate, an engineer, a businessman, a counselor, a friend bubbling with energy all the time. Killinger's description of Ralph is a winning one. Do you know the first thing Ralph does when he drops a lead pencil? Pick it up? No. The first thing he does is look up and say, "Thank you. God!"

Then he tries to figure out what he's thankful for. In the case of the lead pencil, he says, "The first thing I think of is that I'm thankful for gravity. If it hadn't been for gravity, my pencil wouldn't have fallen down there where I could get it. It would have gone off up there somewhere, and I would never see it again."

Then he says, "Thank you for graphite. If it weren't for graphite, we wouldn't have lead pencils." Then he's thankful for trees from which we get the wood that makes pencils. And he's thankful for the engineering that makes pencils. And he's thankful for chemical engineering that made possible the eraser that crowns the lead pencils and takes care of the mistakes he makes.

Ralph does that for everything. If he has a flat tire he pulls off to the side of the road and after he says, "Thank you, God," he thinks of the things he's thankful for. Maybe it's because he found a wide place in the road where he had his flat tire and he could pull off without any threat on the highway.

Maybe he's thankful that he got only one flat tire and not 2 or 3. Maybe he's thankful that when he gets out of the car he gives his back a rest and can get a little exercise.

Whatever it is, he looks up and he says, "Thank you, God!" And then he thinks about all the things he's thankful for. He says, "If you can think of one or 2, you're going to feel better. If you can think of 4 or 5, you're doing well."

Now, some of you are going to dismiss Ralph Kelly as an unrealistic Pollyanna, and certainly he has taken a good attitude to a far extreme. But what is the alternative when things foul up as they sometimes do? Raise your blood pressure a few degrees as you curse your luck? Shout and scream and give everyone around you ulcers? Bottle it all up until you have a cardiac arrest? Wouldn't it be better to do as Ralph Kelly does and, as the Apostle Paul suggests in I Thessalonians 5:18: "...give thanks in all things"? You and I would live longer if we did. And we would enjoy life more.

As our Ephesians passage says:

15  Be careful then how you live, not as unwise people but as wise,  making the most of the time, because the days are evil.  So do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is….giving thanks to God at all times and for everything …..

And when we find ourselves in that kind of openness to God… with a heart exuding joy, then you remember the story of Albert and his journey.

 What if Wisdom, unlike knowledge, is not a state of knowing, or a destination at which one finally arrives. Rather, what if Wisdom, like faith, is merely bread for the journey -- a companion for one's pilgrim walk. Maybe wisdom is not something we possess, but something that possesses us, coming as it does at crucial moments of life providing guidance and direction – an unexpected gift delivered by the grace of God.

Instead of you finding Wisdom, for these brief and wondrous moments, when your heart is prepared and readied: Wisdom  finds you.