Monday, December 14, 2009

Sight can never see enough

I remember being a little girl, probably about ten years old, reading my Bible and seeing that Solomon was the wisest person who ever existed and would have the most wisdom of anyone ever, and I got jealous. I knew the Bible was truth- so I was quite frustrated that God had to state that so absolutely. But tonight I began reading through what used to be my favorite book of the bible (it's a weird one)- Ecclesiastes.
I realized that I have nowhere near the wisdom of Solomon but a lot of his mistakes in common. For example, read this part of Ecclesiastes 2

1I thought in my heart, "Come now, I will test you with pleasure to find out what is good." But that also proved to be meaningless. 2 "Laughter," I said, "is foolish. And what does pleasure accomplish?" 3 I tried cheering myself with wine, and embracing folly—my mind still guiding me with wisdom. I wanted to see what was worthwhile for men to do under heaven during the few days of their lives.

Not too many verses after Solomon says "what then do I gain by being wise?" I remember asking this when I was younger. I thought it differently - I thought "I have a right to cry or to throw a temper tantrum, etc because that is what a normal child would do right now - it is okay to be mad because that is what is expected." Even though I knew it was wrong to be mad at receiving punishment I deserved I figured most kids my age were not thinking about it like that so no one knew I had. I knew what was right and wrong, but I felt I had nothing to gain by showing that wisdom.

And recently, well, kind of always I have thought in my heart "Come now, I will test you with pleasure to find out what is good". I like testing things, stretching the limits, sometimes this gets me into trouble. But it does help me totally understand Solomon, except on the wine part. At times I have tried to embrace folly, to lose myself in it, but somehow my head, my logic always stays with me and guides me. At times I hate it, I just want to stop over-analyzing things and go with the flow. How can I do something wrong and at the same time tell myself "this is wrong, you need to stop"? That is the Wisdom God has given to guide me, I have a feeling that, just like Solomon, I will find out that many (most) (actually everything in life but one) is meaningless. I'm learning it - I don't know how long Solomon took on this process, but so far I've spent nineteen years on it. I pray that I listen to God's guidance more attentively and watch where he leads me so I won't have to go through Solomon's whole ordeal.

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