HUMILITY

'...wisdom, which is almost always another name for humility...'
Marilynne Robinson, 'Imagination and Community' in When I Was a Child I Read Books, p.27.

WISDOM

'...contemplative knowledge...'
Mariano Magrassi, Praying the Bible, p.74.

WISDOM & DISCERNMENT

'Wisdom is a prerequisite to discernment. Discernment is wisdom in action.'

Tim Challies, The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment, p.57.

WISDOM

'Wisdom is more than merely attaining or collecting facts. A person may have a great deal of knowledge and may be a master of trivia but still not have wisdom, for there is a moral and ethical dimension to wisdom. Wisdom is not an end in itself, but a means to moudling human behaviour in a way that pleases God...Wisdom allows us to pursue what is good in life, not as judged by our standards but as judged by the Creator. Wisdom allows us to see what is important to God, what values he gives us for our own benefits, and it allows him to teach us how we can pursue them. Wisdom allows us to rightly use knowledge, it allows us to be discerning. Said otherwise, wisdom is knowledge rightly understood.'

Tim Challies, The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment, p.56.

WISDOM

'Wisdom is something you live. You don't show wisdom by demonstrating what you know. You reveal wisdom by the way you think, desire, choose, act, react, speak, and respond to the situations and relationships around you.'

Paul David Tripp, Broken-Down House, p.92.

WISDOM

'Wise people are not wise because they are prophets who see the future. Wise people are not wise because they can look into men's hearts and discern their thoughts and motives. Wise people are not wise because they are better at learning from experience. Wise people are not those who have been bleesed with superior intellect.

Wise people are those who treasure the lamp of God's Word, seeking out and crying out for the light of truth. In other words, wise people are simply prepared people - biblically prepared and equipped for whatever might come along. People become wise when by God's grace they are humble enough to accept how unprepared they actually are in themselves. Sacrificing the false god of their own independence, they run to the one place where actual certainty can be found. Then they are able to live hopefully, productively, and courageously. Then they are prepared for whatever comes along - not because they saw it coming, but because they have been students of the Word of God. They don't know more about the future than anyone else does. But God, through the wisdom of the Bible, has made them ready for it.'

Paul David Tripp, Broken-Down House, p.84.

WISDOM

'Wisdom consists partly in not pretending any more, in discarding artiface.'

Julian Barnes, Nothing to be Frightened of, p.198.