Wisdom and Desire

June 13, 2010 – Graduation Recognition Sunday

Proverbs 3:13-18, 21-26, 4:5-8 and Matthew 13:44:48

Graduate Recognition Sunday …

I guess that means we finally have to admit how smart they are. Not that they need us to tell them. They already knew.

Some are finishing grad school. For others it’s the end of college, high school, trade school or another course of studies. Among their number, we may count at least one valedictorian, and another (I hear), who is equally deserving and perhaps more heroic, for cranking out overdue assignments at the last minute after years of difficult studies and marginal grades to earn a diploma.

Regardless of IQ, GPA, or class rank, they really are bright creatures, all of them capable of complex thought, comprehension, and cognition. (I use big words knowing they’ll understand.)

The transition from innocence to intelligence has been swift. In a few short years, they’ve mastered concepts related to scientific inquiry, mathematical theory, and linguistic ability.

Better yet, they’ve begun to analyze and appreciate the people, places and things around them in new ways, as Mark Twain once did in his own family. He said (and I paraphrase):

"When I was a boy of 14, I couldn’t believe how ignorant my father was. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned …"

So, hooray for our graduates, and their ability to appreciate other’s intelligence as well as their own!

They aren’t perfect, but they’d make worthy citizens of Lake Wobegon, “Where women are strong, men are good looking, and all the children are above average.”

* *

Being smart, however, or even above average, is no substitute for being wise. And strong or good looking only gets you so far. Today’s readings from Proverbs tell us that a successful and prosperous life requires wisdom.

And what is wisdom? Before reading and studying the first nine chapters of Proverbs, I would have said it’s the ability to apply knowledge to concrete events or situations in order to choose and act consistently for the best possible result.

But after reading and working on Proverbs for a while, I’d simplify that. I’d now say that wisdom is how we cope with our desires. It’s the way we learn to pick and choose what we want. Let me be clear about that: Wisdom is not concerned with eliminating desire, but desiring the “right” things.

* *

Christian theology has often been confused about that, and more than a little afraid of desire. So, Roman Catholics take vows of poverty and chastity in an effort to ward off desire. Likewise, the Puritan tradition, from which we have descended, has often been “puritanical” and prudish in regard to both erotic and material desires.

But Proverbs never dismisses or diminishes such urges. It accepts them as part of our humanity, part of our creaturely nature. So it counsels the listener, not to eliminate desire, but to “desire” wisdom “more than silver and gold.”

Like so much advertising today, Proverbs shows us a beautiful woman as the embodiment of what it wants us to desire. Speaking of wisdom, it says, “She is the tree of life to those who lay hold of her.” (Tell me that isn’t erotic!) “… Love her, and she will guard you … She will honor you if you embrace her.”

(Are we sure we want our 15, 18 or 22 year-old sons and daughters reading this stuff?)

Long before Madison Avenue began hawking cars and beer and toothpaste with absolutely perfect specimens of the female half of our species, the author of Proverbs understood that “sex sells.”

Only, in those days, the product was wisdom.

The product, in other words, was and is about shaping our desires appropriately. The difference from then to now is that Madison Ave. wants to make the choice for us. It wants to tell us what to desire. But biblical wisdom is about reclaiming the choice for ourselves … making up our own minds … saying “no” to certain charms and allures, and “yes” to things that really and truly live up to the hype.

That must be why “wisdom” can’t be taught in the classroom or graded on a curve. Developed and increased over time? Yes. But never perfectly achieved.

Wisdom is the desired outcome of every form of education, the byproduct of knowledge, and what we desire more than anything else for today’s graduates, so that they may cope well with the fast-changing realities of our world. But it can’t be granted or bestowed like a diploma. It is tested anew in every situation, and depends on the individual to always keep searching for it.

What Jesus said about the kingdom of heaven is true of wisdom: “It is like treasure buried in the field,” which someone found – and hid! – until all else can be sold and in joy the field is bought. And it is like the one pearl (the one desire) in a world full of pearls and desire, for which a person would surrender everything else to acquire.

Wisdom is not about eliminating desire, but deciding which fish to keep, and which to toss back. It’s about choosing what you really want … really need … and what you can do without.

* *

Consider what happens when there is no prioritizing of desire, and all desires are pursued equally. On a personal economic level, it becomes enormous credit card debt. (Someone did the math, and figured out that if you pay the minimum amount each month on a debt of a few thousand dollars, it’ll take you 230 years to get out of hock.)

On a larger scale, it leads to the rash of home foreclosures, Wall Street excesses, and the bank failures we’ve seen lately.

Ecologically, too, unchecked desire harms the planet, contributing directly (for instance) to the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. BP’s desire for ever-larger profits is at the root of the problem that caused the spill. But also at that root is our own desire for cheap and plentiful energy to power our cars and take us wherever we want.

Why stop there? Every graduate who has a presence on Facebook knows that the website’s privacy policy was recently changed – to help advertisers stimulate consumer desire with products targeted directly to them! Facebook pretends to be in the business of forming social networks for people to be in touch with each other. But really it’s about telling you what you need, altering your buying habits and increasing desire, rather than letting you be wise enough to make your own choices. It exists to make money – at your expense.

That’s just the economic side of the equation. What happens when erotic desire has no limits or guidelines? I’ll give you two words – no, just one. You fill in the other: Tiger …

Again, please understand what I’m saying. It’s not that all desire is bad, whether economic or erotic. But the ability to recognize those desires, keep them in perspective and point them toward a desire for God – that’s the definition of wisdom.

* *

Proverbs knows that when people do that, wisdom abounds and the whole community is blessed. The Apostle Paul knew it too. Writing to the Corinthians, a notably divisive group, he said, “Knowledge puffs up, [but] love builds up” (1 Cor. 8:1). And he adds in 1 Corinthians 13, his famous chapter on love, “If I … understand all mysteries and [have] all knowledge … but do not have love, I am nothing.”

It’s the difference between being smart and being wise. Knowledge by itself contributes to autonomy – the illusion that I’m free to do what I want and think what I wish, because I can make it on my own.

Wisdom, by comparison, recognizes that the good we need is located outside of ourselves – in God, in wisdom itself, and in the people around us. Wisdom and love are not about getting what “I want,” choosing for myself, but seeking and protecting what is good for others.

So I say to you graduates, do not imagine that you have to “have it all” to succeed, or that having it all will actually make you happy. By the same token, do not fall into the trap of believing that vows of poverty and chastity will make God (or your parents) happy. Don’t go for the puritanical prudishness either that the evangelical churches have appropriated for themselves – even as a shocking number of their leaders get caught doing the very things they condemn.

But seek wisdom that considers the neighbor, that builds up the community, and that says “no” to the lesser desires. You’ll be happier for it.

* *

In the end, wisdom is not personified by a beautiful, air-brushed of a woman but by a wounded and bloodied man on the cross – a man whose own desires was to live as fully as any human being in relation to God and others.

Wisdom enabled him to be a holistic, undivided person. And it enables us to be people of passion … people motivated to grow, search, care and enjoy … people captivated by goodness and disgusted by greed … people of all ages and levels of education, who just might be crazy enough to claim the promises, responsibilities and fullness of life that only wisdom can confer.

To the glory of God.