True wisdom

For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent (1 Cor. 1:18,19)

I am a lecturer at a University. One day my colleague — a practicing psychologist, — told me: “All the people who come to me have a desire to become happy, and only a few want to be wise. But only wisdom can make people happy”.

The Bible tells us that there are two kinds of wisdom: wisdom of men (that is worldly wisdom) and the wisdom of God. Wisdom of men is based on the following principles: if you don’t care about yourself no one is going to care about you; if anyone does evil to you — you should answer with evil; the end justifies the means; I can do good if it meets my interest. Once, having a lecture, I mentioned that we need to observe the law and one student remarked: “Nikolay Anatol’yevich, what are you talking about? We should have a realistic view of the matter”. I answered: “Yes, we have a full country of realists, but we don’t have a good life, including the rich. And it’s interesting — Why?”

We can see the results of this wisdom of men for ourselves: substantial percentage of the population live in poverty (though we deceive one another and answer evil to evil); we all suffer because of the corruption and bad governors (though we criticize them and even curse them almost every day); more than 50% of marriages fall apart (though people live in civil marriages for a couple of years, trying to figure out that the partner is a suitable one); many people are not assured of their future (though trust themselves only, make storages and visit fortune-tellers). We can go on this list for hours. Where the people are godless — governors are helpless, councils have no results, people are irreconcilable, morals and manners are low, crimes are countless and the perspectives are without hope.

Even taking into the consideration what I’ve just said, nonbelievers very often call believers to be foolish people. From the modern society point of view a believer is really called to act foolishly. For example, the words from Matthew 5:38-44 are considered by many people, even some believers as an action program for an insane man.

And now I have a question to you. You are given a choice: to live one day in hardships, and then live in happiness and don’t have a need for all your life, or to live as you want just one day and to spend the rest of your life in need, sufferings, humiliation and in the rubbish heap. What would you choose?

“The first option, for sure, - certainly will be your answer. – But who can offer it to me?”

God gives you this choice! Just one day — that’s what our earthly life is. But the rest of the life — is eternity. What do you choose?