MTP19 Wisdom Has You Covered

Wisdom is for life not just for reading in a book called Proverbs.  It’s all well and good to get stirred and inspired by words on a page, but there’s something inspiring when it comes alive in the human experience.  Take for example …

Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offence. (Proverbs 19:11)

Can you imagine taking delight in overlooking an offence.  Literally something happened and it’s as though you’re saying ‘what offence?’  The relationship remains strong and it’s as though the love that enriches and warms the way things goes between you burns as hot if not hotter than it did previously.  What kind of wisdom is that?

Funnily enough it’s the kind of wisdom Jesus would mention during his teaching on the mount where he says that people who bless those who despitefully use them can be called a son because they are just like their Father.  Don’t take His Word for it (of course take His Word for it, but you’ll see what I mean) check Him on the cross.  The glory of the cross is that where death was meant to rule overlooking offence overcame – Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.

That doesn’t mean much to those in the privileged position of thinking all is well with their life and there is nothing wrong.  It’s different, for those however who know that their life is a mess some of it self-inflicted through various offensive decisions.  For those who have offended much in word, thought and deed to look to the cross and hear those words that taste of His glory expressed in His forgiveness it is sweeter than anything ever tasted in life.  It is all the sweeter because we know we did not deserve it, yet it is given – that’s right, voluntarily offered – for us to take and embrace and understand the One who gave it.

From that perspective, the wisdom becoming flesh works not just on the Cross, but empowers us to see it work in our relationship.  Sure there is the worldly wisdom that may seek swift retribution, or believes there is merit to holding onto grudges and offences caused against us, reminding us of the hurt inflicted and the right we have to hold on it whether remorse has been offered or not.  Yet even these distractions cannot ever hope to cause a mark when we look to the cross and that wisdom expressed.

The truth is that when you realise how glorious God saw it to overlook the offence not just of our sinful actions but our sinful attitude and desire for His Name’s Sake through the sacrifice of His Son, then any other response than living out that wisdom shows a slightly misunderstanding of what has happened.

Here’s an example of how it works in the daily grind.

For a long time I held this brother responsible for a number of devastating actions that affected some of the people I loved dearly.  He was guilty of those charges.  He had acted in arrogant and obnoxious ways that didn’t liberate others to experience the liberating life of Jesus Christ but rather saw a harsh, strict, stubborn kind of God.  There was no remorse.  My people were heavily affected.  I thought I was over it when I left him.  My life moved on and I did other things and would leave it at that.

I wasn’t over it.  I would see him and those feelings of anger, hurt and betrayal would rise to the surface.  Not being an openly aggressive fellow it would come out through cynical and sarcastic remarks.  Look how glib and clever I was putting down the brother that caused so much harm to me and those I loved so dearly.

When God took me down a road of discovering more of Him it highlighted more of me and the unresolved issues of bitterness that still bore a heavy part of my life.  When it came to this man the way he highlighted it was so effective that I was forced with some crucial decisions to make.  Let me be clear, those decisions were not instantaneous ones that immediately led to freedom and deliverance.  These were hard roads of travelling through reflecting on who He is and what He has done through Jesus Christ and how to share that with this brother or how I would be blocking that which I’ve received.

The sense of liberation that I experienced the more I chose to overlook, the more I saw how much Jesus overlooked in me and how it was His glory to do so.  How it was His glory to show wisdom in allowing me to experience love and freedom in now being able to look at the same brother who incited such bitter feelings in me, now evoke such feelings of gratitude, love and compassion not in a haughty manner, but a soft one that considered he and I in the same boat – two men in need of having our offences overlooked and finding them done in Jesus.

This wisdom is profound and takes a lifetime to begin to get and immerse and live – but therein lies the fun of lifelong commitment to that kind of merciful, liberating, life-giving, wisdom.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd