Matthew 25.1-13
What makes someone wise?
We all know people who are perhaps NOT so wise, but probably most of us also know someone who we really respect and who does have a lot of wisdom. Someone who simply seems to naturally have this something, giving weight and value to what they say. They have this something. Something that adds up to wisdom. So my question for you this morning is, what is that thing? What is wisdom? What makes someone wise?
The parable Jesus tells this morning is one of the tricker ones, I think. It is urging us to be prepared for something - the coming of the kingdom of heaven. But what that quite means is unclear (the second coming, our own death, encounters and events in our lives where God’s love is manifested?). Nevertheless, preparedness is important. But then this parable also begs the question, what does it mean to be prepared? This has clearly changed over the centuries - the early Christians thought that Jesus’ return was so imminent, they sold everything and lived believing each day could probably be their last. Most of us don’t think that way any longer, so our idea of being prepared will have changed. We have lost that immediate sense of urgency and expectation. But nevertheless, we must be ready. And what that looks like requires some wisdom.
Having just had our annual meeting, and today being commitment Sunday, we are asking ourselves the questions, ‘what do we value?’, and ‘what do we want to endure?’. What is it about this faith and this place that we love?
Now if the answer is that you just love the goldfish snacks at coffee hour, and that’s what brings you here week after week, then perhaps you need to seek a little more wisdom! But perhaps the things you value and want to endure are linked to the wisdom of God, wisdom of the Spirit. Perhaps what you want to pass on to future generations is something of the wonder and mystery of faith.
So here’s a confession for you. It’s several years since I found my first grey hair, and I will admit that on discovering it, I pulled it out. As if that would stop the inevitable process! Perhaps I’m not alone in doing that, but I’ve now got far too many for that sort of thing, and am instead hoping that I’ll just look super cool with grey hair. And of course, grey hair in the Bible is a badge of wisdom, a sign of gathered experience and knowledge. So I am getting wiser! But I wonder, on a scale of zero to five, how wise you might say that you are - zero being totally daft, and five being the wisest of sages. How wise are you? I’d give myself perhaps 2.5...
But wisdom is something we should be seeking, always wanting more of it, always trying to cultivate it. And what is it, according to the Bible?
The Bible talks an awful lot about wisdom, and Psalms and Proverbs in particular have a great deal to say about it. We learn that Wisdom was with God at creation, that wisdom is woven through the fabric of the world. We also learn that ‘the fear of God is the beginning of wisdom’. Not fear as in being afraid, but fear as in awe and wonder. To know God is to know wisdom.
Other things that we learn about wisdom are:
Wisdom is with the humble
Wisdom is with those who take advice
Wisdom is much better than gold
To get wisdom is to love oneself
The wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy.
That’s quite the list!
These things should shape us, as individuals and as a church, as we plan for the next year, and for the years to come. A desire for wisdom guides our decisions and actions, and helps us to be prepared in a changing world. And it’s not easy! But the first step along the road is to desire wisdom, to seek it, to value it.
This is scary, because it requires change. Just like the first grey hairs appearing can be scary because it signals change, but we gain more and more over time, hopefully we are gaining wisdom as we journey through life. And as we grow in wisdom we should expect to see changes in ourselves. Our generosity of spirit should broaden and deepen. Our priorities will change, the things we want to spend our time doing, the things we want to support with our resources, the things we champion to others and encourage our loved ones to join us in. How we prepare for the future will be shaped by wisdom.
So for this coming year, as we begin this journey all over again, let’s make this our prayer. Let’s join together in seeking wisdom. Most of us, or even all of us, will never reach the giddy heights of scoring 5 out of 5, but we can all turn to and rely on the wisdom of God, which passes all understanding.
Amen.
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