Wisdom - First Synthesis

We've followed all of the scriptural references available in the LDS version of the Bible for our first "Wisdom" passage from the Syntopicon (1 Kings 3:5-14).  From here we will take advantage of the footnoted subjects from the Topical Guide.  Over the next months we will be looking at Dreams; Understanding; Heart; Spiritual Discernment; and Divine Guidance - all of which promise to shed some very interesting side lights on Wisdom.

Before we take our long detour, however, I want to take some time to look over and summarize what I have learned so far.

First, the foundation of wisdom is humility - a sense of one's own lack, an recognition of one's dependence on God, and an acknowledgement of the need to walk with God, in the path God has laid out.  Both Solomon's archetypal gift of wisdom and the wisdom Joseph Smith received as he began the Restoration of the gospel were rooted in a deep recognition on the part of the recipient - "I am but a little child," "how to act I did not know, and unless I could get more wisdom than I then had, I would never know."  Whatever our circumstances, the responsibilities and opportunities available to us in which we might do good or evil, influence and affect others are so much beyond our natural abilities and vision that we all, whether we can see it or not, need the gift of wisdom.  The first step in wisdom is to be able to see that.

Second, wisdom must be desired.  It comes to those who seek God to obtain it.  Both Joseph and Solomon verbally sought the gift from the Lord as a result of a deep inner desire to obtain it.  "if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God" (James 1:5).

Third, the desire for wisdom has a series of potential competitors in the heart of man.  Selfish desires for riches, fame and recognition, power, pleasure and the wants of the flesh can all put the heart of a man in a position where it is not prepared to receive the gift of wisdom.  There can only be one ruling passion in the heart, and it subordinates all others.  The Lord gave Solomon only one request at Gibeon.  He had to decide what one thing to ask for and had to put all other possibilities aside.  Joseph's search for wisdom began to consume his mind and energy - a search marked by "serious reflection and great uneasiness... deep and often poignant feelings."  His "mind at times was deeply excited."  He "often" rolled his doubts and questions around in his mind, which labored "under extreme difficulties."  When he encountered the promise in the epistle of James he "reflected on it again and again."

Those who find themselves hijacked by the search for riches are especially singled out in scripture as being on a path that is in opposition to wisdom (as well as to salvation).  "Seek not for riches but for wisdom."  Like Solomon, we have to choose between them.

Fourth, wisdom includes the following components

• an understanding heart - there are two phrases in Hebrew translated thus: first, a heart that listens; second, a heart that discerns.
• the ability to discern between good and evil
• the ability to judge and decide in those areas and for those people over which we are responsible - the ability to "discern judgment."
• it includes the ability to gain knowledge that accumulates over time

Fifth, the gift of wisdom can be lost.  If the humility and relationship with God that bring the gift are lost, so is the gift.  Solomon was given clear "maintenance instructions" -

• to walk before God in integrity and uprightness
• obey God's personal commandments to him; to "follow" him
• keeping Gods statutes and judgments
• not to go after other Gods to follow or worship them

Sixth, the gift of wisdom does not carry its own safety with it.  Our spiritual security does not rest in the gifts we have been given, whether that gift is wisdom, or revelation or healing or whatever.  Spiritual security and safety (and ultimately the integrity even of our gifts) is dependent on something much deeper, the integrity of our relationship with God - the ultimate source of our gifts. 

Seventh, a key component of maintaining the integrity of our relationship to God is again, Humility.  We often begin to seek wisdom at moments of being "compelled to be humble."  As we gain wisdom it is possible to lose sight of that deep need.  As the Lord responds to our humility and repentance with grace and blessings we have a tendency to lose our willingness to submit ourselves to his direction and guidance.  We no longer desire that God rule us or guide us.  It is not easy to "always retain in remembrance...your own nothingness" to continually "humble yourselves in the depths of humility" (Mosiah 4:12), and continue to remember in the times when we are not in trouble that we are still comparatively "wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked" before God (Revelation 3:17).  Here, Jesus set the ultimate example, submitting his own will and judgment to the Father's in all things.

Eighth, wisdom in its widest and deepest sense includes being wise in our use of our mortality - the sense that Jacob invoked in his exhortation "O be wise; what can I say more."  Here wisdom involves not wasting the day of our probation, not resisting the spirit's enticements, not rebelling against God.  Instead it is wisdom to become as a little child - to have a broken heart and a contrite spirit, to repent, come unto Christ, and take advantage of the atonement, enter in by the gate and continue on the straight and narrow way by cleaving unto God.

Ninth, wisdom (especially viewed in this widest and deepest sense) seems to bring with it a train of blessings - physical needs met in abundance, a "larger heart" - the increase of sympathy and understanding, and peace.