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Writer's pictureImmersed in Christ

What is Wisdom?

by Fr. David M. Knight



Monday, September 23, 2024

Twenty-Fifth Week of the Year

Memorial of Saint Pius of Pietrelcina, Priest

Lectionary 449

Prv 3:27-34/Lk 8:16-18

 

The primary purpose of Proverbs is to teach wisdom. Proverbs 3:5 affirms the joy and strength of total abandonment to him in humility and trust.

 

Trust in the LORD with all your heart, on your own intelligence rely not. In all your ways be mindful of him, and he will make straight your paths. Be not wise in your own eyes, fear the LORD and turn away from evil.

 

The teaching of the entire book is built on the principle that the “fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom” (Proverbs 1:7; 9:10).

 

To understand Fear of the Lord, imagine what fear would be without the emotion of fright. It is perspective. When we appreciate, with awe and wonder, the greatness of God as All Truth, All Good, All Being, we see it as insanity to think that any creature could oppose him, compete with him, or lure us away from him. To appreciate God as All by the gift of Fear of the Lord is to see all else in perspective as nothing. The opposite of Fear of the Lord is Pride, which is the madness of making ourselves—our intelligence, our will—the criterion of truth and goodness.

 

Fear of the Lord is the foundation of Wisdom: the gift of seeing everything in the light (perspective) of the “ultimate end,” which gives us a “taste” for spiritual things (sapientia, wisdom, is from sapor, savor).

 

Proverbs 3:27-34 teaches three attitudes to take toward our neighbor:

 

1.     Refuse no good to one with a claim on it [e.g. the poor] if it is in your power to do it.

2.     Plot no evil against your neighbor who lives at peace with you.

3.     Envy not the lawless man and choose none of his ways.

 

The New Law of Jesus will remove qualifying clauses from the first two.

 

Luke 8:16-18: Christ’s New Law is Christ’s New Light. If he gives it to us, we need to let it shine to others.

 

God creates us from nothing; so, of ourselves we are nothing. Nothing in us can explain or sustain our existence. We can only exist if God is right now choosing to give us existence. If God is giving us existence as humans, able to function as humans, he must see there is something good we can do by using our natural powers. He doesn’t need anything, so he must want us to use our existence to do good to others.

 

If God also shares his divine life (light and love) with us, he must want us to do divine good for others. Or let him do it with us, in us and through us. So we need to share our faith with others in word and action: be aware of it, know it, express it, live by it, renew the earth by it. This is stewardship: managing for others the gifts God is giving to us.


 

Initiative: Use the WIT prayer: “Lord, do this with me, in me, through me.


Reflections brought to you by the Immersed in Christ Ministry




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