What does a wise man look like?
The wise man seeks good counsel and honors authority…
“The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, But a wise man is he who listens to counsel” (Prov. 12:15, NASB 1995).
This week, we continued our study of the wise person with our students. Previously, we covered what fearing the LORD meant: to be held in terror because of our sin in contrast to God’s holy presence, and that amid our terror, God initiates the relationship with us and responds to our fear by commanding us to not be afraid and take heart.
Because God removes our fear, we can now sit under His lordship and devote ourselves to learning about who He is. We know that God is wise, and we can define wisdom in a few ways: an attribute of God; a moral quality instead of an intellectual endeavor; shrewd; prudent; a means to reaching LIFE! So, we must ask ourselves, how do we become wise when the opposing characteristic is foolishness?
One of the marks of a wise person that we covered is that the wise man seeks good counsel! Like the Proverb above, the Scriptures time and again call for good counsel. In fact, Proverbs 15:22 tells us that “Without consultation, plans are frustrated” (cf. Prov. 11:14; 13:10; 13:20). One thing we did not cover with our students was the Hebrew use of the term, “counsel.” That word is עֵצָה (etsah) and is used throughout the Hebrew Bible as everything from giving advice, planning, political consultation, instruction, etc. In essence, it is the advice of an external source that is skilled in understanding and able to offer guidance for particular events and situations as the best means to an end. Foolish people are “right in their own eyes” and see no need for counsel, but the wise man understands the benefit of the more experienced and learned.
We also brought into the discussion that wisdom exists within authority. We are called to obey authority (cf. Ex. 20:12; 1 Timothy 5:1-3), and we understand that ALL authority is “established by God” (Rom. 13:1). What we often miss, however, is that authority oftentimes is counsel that God has graciously provided. These can be our parents, elders in the church, teachers, governing officials, etc. God calls us to honor them because in this authority, we do find protection, but we also find vision and clarity. Sometimes, it can be hard to see, but I wanted our students to understand this idea of the umbrella of authority.
We know that we use an umbrella to keep the elements from making contact with us. The rain, the UV rays, whatever it may be. It protects us and keeps us from absorbing those things. This can be anything spiritual or physical; financial gain or foolish loss; sin and its consequences; peaceful living and so much more. But it doesn’t just keep us from absorbing the impact of these things, either. The umbrella allows us to maintain our field of vision in a downpour. If we were to remove the umbrella, our field of vision would become drastically reduced. Our God is kind enough to place these structures in our lives, because if we had it our way before Christ transformed us, we would all throw that umbrella in the garbage and embrace the chaos.
Lastly, we looked at King Rehoboam’s foolishness in 1 Kings 12 where he rejected the counsel of the elders and opted to inform the people of Israel that he would make the burdens imposed upon them even more difficult. The consequence of rejecting this wise counsel from the elders to lighten the burden and choosing the young mens’ advice was twofold: 1) it led to rebellion and war in the kingdom, resulting in 10 tribes splitting off to the north (Israel) and the rest remaining in the south (Judah); 2) the northern tribes, led by Jeroboam, began practicing idolatry and exiling those in the priestly line from their presence. While Rehoboam later repented, and God blessed Judah because of the repentance, the damage had been done, and many souls were led astray to a violation of God’s law and a violation of His own Being.
I was also reading the account of Bathsheba and David this week when I remembered Nathan’s rebuke of David for, very clearly, foolishly not listening to the counsel of the Lord. In his rebuke, Nathan spoke to David saying. “Thus says the Lord God of Israel … ‘the sword shall never depart from your house’” (2 Sam. 12:7, 10). While David and Solomon were kings of a united Israel, they never did escape from times of war and strife, both domestically and foreign. Rehoboam, unfortunately, felt the great weight of foolish counsel and never saw peace in the land. Not only was there rebellion and a split in the kingdom, but there also continued fighting and warring.
May we all be reminded of these events as clear contrasts to the principles of Scripture and wisdom. My prayer for our students, our church, myself, and all in God’s adopted family is that we would be like the wise man who considers and listens to good counsel, and honors authority in the process, especially when that counsel does not offer us the outcome we thought was best.
