We have found that wisdom cannot come from any human source. Universities cannot teach it; technical, theological, or law schools cannot impart it.
The majority of people in our favored land are failures. Only about three percent of the men who go into business for themselves succeed. Seventy-five percent of marriages are failures. Only a few who have had the privilege of college and university educations make a real success of life.
This fact bothered me. I wondered why it was. Then this new unveiling of the Word came, and I saw that the difficulty lay in this: they had education, they had training, and they had opportunity, but they did not know how to use the knowledge they had, or how to take advantage of the opportunity when it came, or how to fit themselves into life so they would win.
Teachers of psychoanalysis have done much to awaken thought, but they have not arrived at the real solution. Our psychologists have done able work, but in a large measure, it has been theoretical and has lacked the one thing that could put men over.
It is not enough to have a large fund of knowledge; we must know how to utilize it.
A manufacturer may have millions of dollars’ worth of goods stored in his warehouses, but unless someone has the wisdom to know how to dispose of it, it will bankrupt the manufacturer.
We have men and women who have stored up vast amounts of knowledge, just as that man has stored up his merchandise. Unless you learn how to use that stored-up knowledge, no matter what it may be worth, unless there is someone who can teach you to utilize it, you will die a failure.
We have multitudes of people who are unable to support themselves. What is the matter? It is not a lack of knowledge, but a lack of wisdom.
We are going to call wisdom “the ability to make latent, accumulated knowledge worthwhile.”
Since I became exercised over this problem of knowing how to use ability, talents, and acquired knowledge, I have been asking myself this question: from what source is this ability to acquire and utilize abilities?
Andrew Carnegie came here as an immigrant, but he was able to give to the world hundreds of millions of dollars. John D. Rockefeller started in poverty and the whole world knows of his achievements. Why did he achieve and why did he win? He had wisdom. He was able to think through on his problems. While others acted emotionally, he acted wisely.
From where did that wisdom or ability to use men, circumstances, and knowledge come?
It is in the spirit of man. Man is a spirit being. He is in God’s class. He is in Satan’s class. Satan is a spirit, as God and man are spirits.
Only man’s spirit can contact God. He cannot contact God through his senses or his intellect.
Wisdom is a product of the spirit of man.
In previous chapters of this book, we have shown that there are two kinds of wisdom: one emanates primarily and basically from God, and the other belongs to the god of this world, Satan. Do not forget that Satan can also contact man’s spirit.
Wisdom, or the ability to use knowledge, must come from God or from Satan.
Wisdom does not come from reasoning; love does not come from reasoning; and joy does not come from reasoning, nor does hope, faith, or courage. They are utterly independent of the reasoning faculties. They are often superior to reason.
As we go further into the study of the spirit of man, we see that all real poetry is the child of man’s spirit. He will write poetry beyond reason, beyond anything which he has ever learned or anything with which he is associated. It will come bursting into his mind until it has gained the mastery.
The same is true of art. A great painting is not the work of reason, but it is the work of the spirit of man.
The architect sees his vision and dream. The great novelist is taken captive by his spirit. Inventions and creations of man are born of the spirit.
That brings us to this problem: how can we utilize this unseen, untouched force that is the very center of our being?
Developing Your Spirit Life
The secret of developing your spirit life should be learned by every thinking man. He should make it his business to know how to develop his spirit nature so that he can get the most out of it.
Behind this study lies the fact that we who are children of God have received into our spirits the nature and life of God. This has changed our very beings. It has linked us up with God, has linked us up with wisdom, life, and love. It has linked us up with the mightiest forces of the universe.
Jesus said, “I am the vine, ye are the branches” (John 15:5).
Jesus is wisdom; we are a branch of wisdom. Jesus is life; we are a branch of life. Jesus is the unveiling of love; we are a branch of love.
Love is the mightiest force in the human heart, whether it be natural human love, or the new kind of love that Jesus brought to the world.
God is love, and as we walk in love, think in love, and live in love, we become one with Him in His love life.
We are where we can draw on His omnipotence, His ability, His strength, His health, and yes, His very life.
It is of the first importance that the child of God knows what he is. Until we recognize what we really are in Christ, we will not know the riches that belong to us and the abilities that are ours.
Can you imagine the limitlessness of an actual walk, a daily life, with the great Father God?
Can you estimate what it would mean to have an open, fresh, sweet fellowship with Him daily, so that you could meet Him on terms of utter equality, as lovers meet each other?
Such lovers haven’t a single thing hidden from the object of their affection. They have abandoned themselves to love.
Can you imagine what it would mean to you if you could abandon yourself to Christ as Christ has abandoned Himself to you? Then you could understand what it would mean to be united with Him in resurrection life.
You could understand what it would mean for you to be so utterly one with Him that His victory over the adversary was your victory; thus, you would not have any combat with the enemy because the enemy has already been defeated as far as you and Christ are concerned.
You could understand 1 Corinthians 1:30, “But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.”
That comprehends the completed, finished work of Christ for us.
God is made wisdom in Christ to us. This means that the wisdom and ability of God is imparted to us in Christ. We have access to it.
The illustration of the vine and the branches perfectly illustrates this. We are the branch, a part of the vine, Jesus. The vine furnishes all the life that comes up out of the ground through the roots, but the branches bear all the fruit and have the leaves and blossoms. The vine and the branch are united; they are one.
Do you see how utterly one they are? The believer is united with Christ in the same way. It is a union of life in life, of love in love, of nature in nature. You are utterly one with Him. All that He is, is yours. All that you are is His.
Jesus promised the Spirit’s cooperation with us in our earthly walk.
And I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever; even the Spirit of truth; whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you. (John 14:16–17)
He is called the Comforter, the Paraclete, and the Guide. He is called “the Spirit of truth.” Truth, here, is reality.
Physical things are real to our senses. I can touch the chair and the table. I can see the book lying in my lap. I can hear the voice of my secretary. I can feel, I can see, I can hear, I can taste, and I can smell. These are all avenues through which knowledge comes to my brain. They are all real to me.
Jesus said, “I am going to send you the Spirit of reality. He is going to unveil spiritual realities to you so that they will become as tangible and real to you as material things. He is with you now, but a little later, He is going to be in you.”
That was fulfilled on the day of Pentecost. He came into them. From that day, this Spirit became the teacher and the guide to lead us into reality.
But the Comforter, even the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said unto you. (John 14:26 ASV)
This new teacher is going to teach us the things of the spirit.
We know the things of the senses. They are as an open book before us. We can learn all we need to know about them. But the things of the spirit are not so real to us, so He is going to reveal Himself to us.
But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me. (John 15:26)
Jesus is the unveiling of the Father and spiritual realities. He says that this unseen person is coming to unveil to us the things that made Jesus what He was in His earth walk.
John 16:13 says, “Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth” or reality. This is really thrilling. Someone is coming who is to live in the bodies of men, who can guide them into the reality of spiritual things.
He is going to make spiritual things as real to our spirits as physical things are real to our senses.
He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you. (John 16:14)
All that belonged to Jesus in the spiritual realm now is to be communicated to our spirits by this unseen person who is coming.
What a mighty thing it is. He says, “All things that the Father hath are mine: therefore said I, that he shall take of mine, and shall shew it unto you” (John 16:15).
We have not grown in spirit enough yet to appreciate much of the realities of spiritual things. You can understand now what faith means. Faith has to do with the unseen realities. I act upon this written Word, and the unseen things become real in my spirit.
Jesus told us to love one another as He has loved us. (See John 13:34–35.) Then we learn:
He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him. (John 14:21)
It is not going to be a manifestation that the eye can feast upon, or the hands can touch. It is going to be a spiritual unveiling, a manifestation of the very heart-life of Jesus to us.
Jesus is going to be revealed to us in the Word. As you read the Word, your heart will burn and thrill within you. Then you will be able to use the name of Jesus.
He said, “Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you” (John 16:23).
I have seen the manifestation of the Father’s presence many times. I have laid hands on the sick, in the name of Jesus, and those pains have gone and the diseases have simply ceased to be. It was the Spirit manifesting the reality of the words of Jesus.
My words are a part of me, just as God’s words are a part of Him. The Word has been made real by my using it.
If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him. (John 14:23)
If we live in the Word, and keep His Word, we will act on it. If Jesus and the Father made their home with us, that would be the very climax of love’s unveiling. It would be the end of poverty and want. “My God shall supply all your need” (Philippians 4:19). He is living here with me now, living in my house, just as the Spirit has been living in my body.
After Jesus used Peter’s boat to speak to the multitude, He paid Peter.
When he stopped speaking, he said to Simon, “Push out to the deep water and lower your nets for a take.” Simon replied, “Master, we worked all night and got nothing! However, I will lower the nets at your command.” And when they did so, they enclosed a huge shoal of fish, so that their nets began to break. (Luke 5:4–7 MOFF)
If He would do that for Peter for the use of his boat, He will meet your needs as well. If He lives with you, it will be the end of sickness, turmoil, quarrelling, and bitterness. There will be no divorces in homes like that. Children will not be failures, for they will be living in constant contact with the Savior.
Notice that Jesus said the Holy Spirit would be with us and in us. (See John 14:17.) If the Holy Spirit makes His home in you, and you give Him right-of-way and treat Him as you would treat an honored guest, your house will never be filled with sickness and disease.
Isn’t this beautiful? You can have God actually living in your home, in your body.
Know ye not that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit? (1 Corinthians 6:19 ASV)
That is divine cooperation with our spirits. A man who has God in him will have wisdom. At every crisis of his day’s work, he has the One inside who knows all. He learns the secret of leaning back upon the One inside.
In order to develop wisdom, as it should be developed, it is going to be necessary that we have quiet hours of meditation in the Word.
After the death of Moses, the Lord told Joshua:
This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success. (Joshua 1:8)
To have good success, or deal wisely, is the thing we want. This is the thing that will make knowledge valuable.
This is the thing that will make executives of men.
This is the thing that will make a home like heaven. The husband and wife will have wisdom to live with each other as they rear their children.
Foolish mothers and fathers, foolish young men and women, who throw their lives away by contracting habits that will hinder them in their progress, are robbing themselves of joy in the future. The thing they most need is wisdom.
Do you think if that mother had wisdom, she would nurse a babe with a cigarette in her mouth? Do you think if that father had wisdom, he would come home drunk to a wife and baby? No! It is lack of wisdom that causes men and women to do the things they are now doing.
We might suggest a hundred ways in which we act unwisely. Do you think a man would buy property that will be a burden to him as long as he lives, if he had wisdom? No! The wise man saves his money and buys carefully. Why? Because there is something inside of him to guide him.
Can you see the value of this? It comes to our hearts as a challenge.
Do you want to cultivate this wisdom? It comes by meditation in the Word. Then your way will become prosperous. Then you will act wisely.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom. (Colossians 3:16)
Meditate on the first eight or ten chapters of Proverbs, and you will see the vast place that wisdom holds. Then you will turn with excitement of soul to the Pauline revelation to find the secret of this wisdom of which God is speaking through Solomon.
If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. (John 15:7)
The words of Christ are wisdom. You may commit them to memory, but that is not abiding in them. To abide in them means the Word has gained the authority over you, so you are living and walking in its wisdom. You are learning not only to obey it, but to fellowship with it. You become a partaker of the Word.
A man goes into a country and becomes a part of it. You go into the Word, and the Word becomes a part of you, and you become a part of the Word.
You learn to associate in your heart life with the Man of Galilee, to associate your life with His Word so that you and His Word become one.
Jesus is saying, “If you live in Me and My words gain the supremacy in you, then you can ask anything you will and it belongs to you.” Why? Because you are praying His prayer, and you are living His life. “It is no longer I that live, but Christ liveth in me” (Galatians 2:20 ASV). The works that I am doing are His works. The words that I am preaching are His words. The deeds that I am doing are His deeds.
He said, “Greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father” (John 14:12). What does He mean? He means that He is going to become so utterly one with us and we so utterly one with Him that we will have His ability, His wisdom, His authority invested in His own name, and the great, mighty Holy Spirit who raised Him from the dead dwelling in us, energizing us.
No wonder we will do His works. We could not help but do His works. He and I have become one. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.
Then there grows up between your heart and His heart a familiarity, an utter fellowship, just as between lovers.
The woman opens her heart to the man, the man opens his very life to her. The two lives flow into one life, and there is a new life. There is only one life now.
Christ has opened His life and you have opened your life. Your two lives flow into one. It is like two streams flowing down the mountainside. In the valley, they join into one.
You learn to act on His Word in your daily life.
Analyze this truth:
Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths. (Proverbs 3:5–6)
Trust in Jehovah with your whole being. Stop leaning on your own understanding. You have found somebody who is wise. You are resting in Him. His ability has become your ability. His love has become your love. His strength has become your strength, and by His stripes, you have found a perfect healing for spirit, soul, and body.
You walk in the fullness of this wonderful heavenly union. His Word has become a part of you. You live in it.
When you need money you just remember His Word: ‘‘My God shall supply all your need” (Philippians 4:19). You look up with thankfulness and say, “Father, I thank You for meeting my financial needs.”
You need physical strength for some hard duty. You remember that He said He was the strength of your life.
You need wisdom and you remember, “Jehovah is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?” (Psalm 27:1 ASV). Light means wisdom. Salvation means deliverance. He is my wisdom and my deliverance. I am not afraid of anything now.
The wonder and beauty of this life! This is where He and you are so tied up with each other, so utterly one with each other, that His wisdom becomes yours.
First Corinthians 1:30 says, “But of him are ye in Christ Jesus.” We are in Him; of His own will, He brought us forth. We are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus.
Christ was made unto us wisdom from God. He is made unto us God’s wisdom. He is made unto us God’s righteousness, God’s sanctification, and redemption.
We are not common folk. This lifts us out of the commonplace into the super realm. You are the real supermen and superwomen. You have gone outside of the realm of the senses, outside the realm of sense knowledge, and you have passed over into the realm of God, the spirit realm.
Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us. (Ephesians 3:20)
God’s ability is at work within you. You have grace given to you, according to the measure of the gift of Christ, so that the very ability and grace of God is yours. You will come to know the love of Christ, which surpasses all knowledge and sense evidence. You will be filled to all the fullness of God.
John 1:16 says, “Of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace.” You have entered into His fullness, into His life. You have found the unsearchable riches of Christ. You are seated with Him at His right hand.
You died with Him; you were buried with Him. You have been raised with Him, and now you are seated with Him. You are one with Him.
You and He have found yourselves blended in each other’s life. You abandon your heart life to Him.
Perhaps there will be no test as great, but no reward as rich.
You dare trust Him with your heart. I know men and women who can trust Him with their finances, with their children, with their loved ones, and with their bodies, but when it comes to trusting Him with their hearts, they balk.
If you want His wisdom, the fullness of His grace, you want to be able to say, “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters” (Psalm 23:1–2). Then trust Him with your heart.
You then can say, “He has restored my soul to perfect fellowship with Himself. He has renewed my mind. He has led me out of the bondage of fear and doubt, out of the counsel of the senses and the realm of the senses. I have come to know that my heart is safer with Him than with anyone else. I love because He loves in me and through me. I have yielded my heart life to His lordship.”
Lying behind this entire program is the Lord of love, the Lord of the Word. You recognize His lordship. You abandon yourself to His lordship. It is the lordship of love, the lordship of wisdom. It is a lover who lords over you. Oh, what a heaven it is!
You are not afraid to love Him. You are not afraid to trust Him. You are not afraid to abandon yourself utterly to the sway of His love and of His life.
Your mind has been renewed in knowledge after the image of Him. You are coming to know His priceless will.
As this lordship unveils itself and you enter into the sweetness of it, there comes the last thing of which I want to speak to you: a renewed mind.
You see life from a different angle. You have a heart filled with love, with an utter abandonment to His Word, for His Word is wisdom. You recognize His indwelling presence. You have become God-inside-minded. You have become wisdom-minded.
Love and wisdom are the greatest needs of men. You have them. You have possessed them. What is the result?
You are resting in His love, in His protection and care. Fear no longer dominates you. You stand in the fullness of His marvelous life, a victor. You are resting while others are laboring, crying, and praying in agony of failure.
You have moved out into the realm of success.
You are resting in His rest, living in His quietness.
He sat down and you are seated with Him.
You and He now are in the sweetest companionship and fellowship.
This is success.
Christ Made Unto Us Wisdom
Redemption is in the realm of the spirit. It is supernatural. It is beyond human reason to understand without revelation knowledge to assist it.
When the Word tells us that Christ was made unto us wisdom, we understand that He was made unto us wisdom as He was made unto us righteousness, so that we are righteous in the Father’s presence.
His redemption is made unto us, so that we stand before the Father perfectly free from Satan and his works. Christ is made unto us sanctification, so that we are God’s separated ones.
By our accepting Christ as Savior and crowning Him as the Lord of our lives, we are separated from the world’s dominion and the things of the world.
When we accept Christ as Savior and confess Him as our Lord, this automatically makes Jesus our wisdom. We learn this as our minds are renewed through the Word. It becomes a natural thing for us to trust in this new kind of wisdom.
This wisdom of God was never enjoyed by natural man except on special occasions.
God gave wisdom to Solomon. He gave wisdom to Joshua. It was a special act of grace. But today, He is made wisdom to every member of the body of Christ.
Every recreated man or woman legally is a partaker of this wisdom. They may never know it and never use it, just as many have received righteousness and have never utilized the benefits from it, but this does not nullify the fact of our having wisdom.
This is the heart of it: every new creation has the legal right to this wisdom. It belongs to him. He can use it whenever the need arises.
How can that wisdom be available? Through the Word. You meditate on the Word, actually live in the Word, and the Word will come to life for you and in you. This means that the Word is acted out in your daily life. You do the things that the Word tells you to do. You live in the Word and meditate in the Word.
You get so that you think in the Word. Your life is blended now with the Logos, this living Word.
This Word contains the wisdom of God. It is the wisdom of God. It tells you what to do at every crisis.
The Spirit will make real to you what you should do. This means a God-dominated thought life, a God-dominated physical life. You will go, you will come, and you will speak as the Spirit gives you utterance. There is no limit to your ability.
He imparts wisdom to those who yield themselves to His lordship, just as God is love and God is light.
Light is wisdom. To walk in love means to walk in wisdom. If we walk in love, there will be no more jangling, bitterness, or unkindness; for this kind of wisdom is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without doubtfulness or partiality.
It is without hypocrisy. It bears the fruit of righteousness. It leads in the paths of peace.
Can’t you see that the fruit of wisdom will make our lives beautiful and Jesus-like? The fruit of wisdom is the fruit of love, for Christ is made unto us wisdom and love.
You can see there will be no bitterness, no jealousy, no hatred, no slander, and no selfish taking advantage of others, but each one filled with this wisdom will walk in the highest realm of the love life.
You understand that the Holy Spirit came to give to man God’s ability. He could not give man God’s ability under the first covenant because they were natural men, but now the recreated man may have God’s ability.
God’s very life is in him. The Holy Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead is in him.
God’s nature is love and God’s love always walks in wisdom. Every step outside of love is a step in darkness and selfishness.
Wisdom, after all, is the new kind of love dominating us, for love breaks no laws; love commits no crimes. Love therefore is the fulfillment of the heart-dream of the Father for man.
James tells us how to get wisdom. The epistle of James was written to sense-knowledge believers. There had to be a message especially for them.
Peter tells us that the believer is already healed. (See 1 Peter 2:24.)
James tells the sense-ruled believer how to get his healing. (See James 5:14–15.) He is talking to those who are walking by sight, by feeling, by what they hear. They are walking in the realm of the senses. They have to have the elders come and pray for them. They must hear the elders’ prayer. They must feel the elders’ hands upon their brow, then they believe.
If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord. A double minded man is unstable in all his ways. (James 1:5–8)
You can see that he is not talking to a believer who has entered into his inheritance. This does not match up with Ephesians 1:3: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in the heavenly places in Christ.”
There we see the believer who has entered into all his privileges, walking in all the fullness of the wisdom of Christ.
This one to whom James refers is walking in sense knowledge. His faith ebbs and flows. The babe in Christ is not overlooked. He is yet carnal; that is, he is ruled by the senses, he walks as a common man. The world’s pleasures have to satisfy him; he has not yet reached a place where he is satisfied with the Lord. In great grace, the Lord says to him, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God.”
I would that all could understand this. Wisdom belongs to the believer. It is not a problem of faith. It is one who is living as though he were out of Christ who lacks wisdom; having no sense of righteousness, no sense of his relationship, he is driven now by his great need to pray for wisdom. He is trying to exercise faith for this wisdom. He does not know that all that Christ did and is today belongs to him. What belongs to him requires no faith to enjoy.
Not knowing that the riches of grace are his and that he is blessed with every spiritual blessing in Christ, he comes in his simplicity of ignorance and prays for faith.
We always need faith when we pray for something that does not belong to us and we are not sure of getting it, but we do not need faith for a thing that we already possess, something that already belongs to us.
Let the babe still pray for faith, but you who are mature do not need to, for Jesus is your faith. He was made unto you faith.
It is so important that the heart grasp this clearly, for wisdom belongs to you as much as Jesus belongs to you, as much as His intercession belongs to you.
Jesus’s intercession belongs to you. He ever lives to make intercession for you. It is not a problem of your faith; it is a problem of your acting on the Word and enjoying the privileges that belong to you.
As long as you pray for faith, it indicates that the thing you are praying for does not belong to you, and you are trying to make God give you something that is not yours. But all that Christ is, is yours. All He did is yours. All He will do tomorrow is yours. It is not a problem of faith.
John 1:16 says, “Of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace.”
You have received of His fullness. Whether or not you have enjoyed what you have received is not the problem. It is yours. It is set to your account. It is more than that: it is in you.
The problem that confronts you is learning to take your place as a son or daughter and enjoying the fullness of the riches of His grace. It all belongs to you!
Some People Who Lacked Wisdom
In Genesis 25:29–34 is a story of a foolish young man, Esau, an heir to the Abrahamic blood covenant. He was a thoughtless, careless type of individual who cared more for a meal or a physical pleasure than he did for eternal things.
In a fit of despondency, he sold his birthright for a single meal. The food was red lentil pottage. It was called edom, meaning red, and that name was given to him, a name of derision, a name that indicated his folly…Edom.
He is a type of those who, today, sell their birthright of success and usefulness for a little physical pleasure. They have ability, they have knowledge, but they seem to be unable to use their ability and knowledge wisely.
They do not have the wisdom to use knowledge.
The story of Samson, the superman, in Judges 13–16, reveals to us another example. There was no man in his class. He had physical strength, he had knowledge, but he lacked the one thing that puts men over the top: wisdom.
He was a superman. He was in the first covenant with all its possibilities. The ability of God was at his disposal.
He had God’s protection and God’s blessing upon him.
He dared to take advantage of his covenant rights and became the strongest man the world ever knew. But withal, he was a failure.
Samson’s name might have gone down through the ages as the outstanding product of the Abrahamic covenant, but he was a failure. He committed suicide in order to get revenge upon his captors.
Look at him, the blind hero in captivity. God’s leader for that age, a captive!
How many men are like that today? Satan has blinded them; their spiritual eyes are put out, and they seem to have no wisdom to know the right thing to do.
Esau failed. History might have read, “The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Esau,” but he lacked wisdom.
Ahithophel, prime minister of Israel under David, was the wisest man of his age, but he lacked wisdom at the crisis, and then in shame and discomfiture, he committed suicide. (See 2 Samuel 17:23.)
How Daniel’s wisdom shines out through the dark pages of human history. While Israel was in captivity, Daniel sought God and found wisdom. (See the book of Daniel.)
Wisdom comes from God. Only God can give the kind of wisdom of which we speak.
There are three kinds of wisdom: natural human wisdom, satanic wisdom, and divine wisdom.
The name of Judas Iscariot could have come ringing down through the ages as one of the great leaders of the apostolic band, but he lacked wisdom. He sold Jesus for thirty pieces of silver. (See Matthew 26:15.) Those pieces of silver that he could hold in his hand seemed greater to him than the privilege of being a companion of John, Peter, James, and the others.
How differently history would read had Judas possessed wisdom.
Jesus gives us some pictures of the unwise.
Luke 12:16–21 tells the story of a rich man who had marvelous ability. He must have had great knowledge. He had accumulated great wealth for himself. But instead of going to God and getting the plan for his life, he plays the fool.
Matthew 7:26–27 is the story of a foolish man who built his house upon the sand.
All down through the ages, we have had these foolish men. Wisdom belonged to them and they could have claimed it.
You who read this book can have God’s wisdom in every crisis of your life.
You can be known as a wise man or a wise woman, or you can foolishly build your house upon the sand, so that when the storm comes and beats down upon it, all your life’s struggles and efforts go down with a crash!
Matthew 25:1–13 gives us the story of the unwise virgins. These virgins are not the church, but her bridesmaids. The unwise virgins didn’t have oil in their lamps. They didn’t invite the Spirit to guide them in life. They had the wisdom of the world, but they did not seek wisdom of God. They were foolish. They had every opportunity, but they didn’t take advantage of it.
In Revelation 3:14–22 is a picture of the unwise church. This is the period in which we are living now. The church could just as well govern the morality of our nation.
If the Church were awake, there would be no taverns or bars to damn and blight our young men and women.
If the church had wisdom, the wave of lawlessness and crime would end.
Jesus was made unto the church wisdom, but she has gloried in her sense knowledge. She has laughed at the wisdom of God, and she is paying an awful price for it.
The church is suffering today for the lack of wisdom.