Sermon Notes I Kings 3 On Wisdom August 19

August 19 I Kings 3 We know so much. We have data spilling out in all directions. Pundits will examine that treasure trove of information and apply it to the campaigns and seek hints of the national mood. This year in the campaigns, the offices will do data mining as they try to tailor political messages to ever smaller segments of the population who may be open to certain types of messages or policy positions. I wonder if that has been the desire of new presidents or governors over the years, to ask for wisdom. Solomon shows a public leaders heart by looking for a virtue for the public good, not the things of Aladdin's lamp. In the famous serenity prayer, Niebuhr sees wisdom as discerning the difference between the things we can change and those we cannot. recall that he says that we learn to accept the things we cannot change and the courage to change those we can. I would add that wisdom knows what things we should change and what should be left well enough alone. Solomon is asked to make a decision without any evidence other than two conflicting stories. This awful story has Solomon look into the depths of grief, human nature, and madness. His wisdom lies in being able to discern the truth in two utterly incompatible accounts. Wisdom sees into the fullness of human nature, into the depth of things. Wisdom has insight into the human condition, puts things together, synthesizes. Wisdom can keep both the forest and the trees in sight, or at least it has the ability to realize that in focus on one we are in danger of losing sight of the other.Jesus comes at wisdom from an angle. Jesus seems to realize that we cannot absorb wisdom in a gulp. Yes, his very life embodies wisdom, but his teachings seem more indirect. The stories or pithy saying invite us into the path to insight but do not claim to provide it directly. Even the Sermon on the Mount, constructed as a commentary on the 10 Commandments, has the beatitudes offering striking contrary points of view within a normal context of blessing.Sometimes wisdom reveals something that we sense we knew but it was hidden from our awareness. Alyce McKenzie writes winsomely of our crying need for wisdom in a world deluged with information, data, and computer screens by looking to the Proverbs attributed to Solomon and our vast store of sayings. . She sees wisdom involved in a dance between experience and reflection. It seeks to discern some order amid all the chaos of life. It always points toward the maintenance and enjoyment of life. for me, the kicker is that wisdom material realizes that no standard can encapsulate our experience. Life destabilizes are best attempt to him it in, for life itself is borne on wings of unpredictability, and the eruption of the random. Perhaps that is a wise way to approach wisdom: to seek a stable place amidst the chaos and to seek the signs of the new when things seem old and tired.Data can tell us that we can do something. Wisdom tells us if we should pursue it, if it is worth it.Our eldest daughter and her husband Aren came to visit for a few days. Before they married, I wanted to write Saralyn something along the lines of a teacher at their Indiana alma mater, Scott russell Sanders,as he is a wise man. He writes”Wisdom comes, if it comes at all, not only by the accumulation of experience, but also by the letting go, by the paring away of dross until only essential remain...the world appears to be a vast whirl of bits and pieces. Religion (means) to bind back together, as if things have been scattered and now must be gathered again. I find myself pointing to an elusive energy, a shaping power that flashes forth...I favor spirit.