“Wisdom will save you…”– PROVERBS 2:12 (NIV)

Einstein forgot his own address.
Thomas Edison electrocuted an elephant.
W.B. Yeats was denied a post at Trinity College in Dublin for spelling “professor” wrong on the application.
Virginia Woolf accidentally baked her wedding ring into a pudding.
Ben Franklin nearly killed himself giving an electric shock to a turkey.

The world is full of geniuses who fail to make good decisions. The world is rife with scandals that are generally the result of smart people being dumb. This is us. We’re all that way. The only difference between us and Thomas Edison or Virginia Woolf is that they’re they’re smarter than we are. So, everyone is susceptible to any number of actions that fall far beneath what our intelligence would otherwise dictate.

In retrospect, we’re not in need of greater intelligence. We can see the trail of occasional stupidity that has become more clearly defined as we age. In a time where there  is more information available to us, in speedier forms, than ever before, we need more than intelligence. We need wisdom.

We don’t need Yoda-style aphorisms for a galaxy far, far away. Nor, do we need kindly wizard-ishness fit for Middle Earth. We don’t need crotchety old guys spewing complaints about how great it all used to be. We need practically applied wisdom for our real lives, now. We want to know how to live in this world, today. We have big questions with difficult choices. We live where not everything can be forced into conveniently packaged little boxes with neatly defined categories. We need wisdom to know what to do and how to do it.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be looking at wisdom. This will be a great time to invite people who, like all of us, are looking to apply wisdom to their daily lives in our very real world.

See you Sunday,
Jeff