Focal passages: Ecclesiastes 2:12-17; 7:23-39
As a kid, I loved to learn but also recognized that more knowledge could lead to more opportunities. As I’ve grown older, applying knowledge in a way that is wise has become even more important.
Wisdom is a characteristic for which King Solomon is known.
Yet, as one of the wisest men in history, he considers wisdom, on its own, to be void.
In Ecclesiastes 2:16, Solomon compares those who are wise to those who are foolish. “For there is no more remembrance of the wise than of the fool forever, since all that now is will be forgotten in the days to come. And how does a wise man die? As the fool!” Without Christ, the wise, like the foolish, will perish.
Knowledge and wisdom are gifts from our Father, but He has also created us with finite minds.
King Solomon confesses that, even as a wise man, there is much wisdom and knowledge he doesn’t have. “All this I have proved by wisdom. I said, ‘I shall be wise’; but it was far from me. As for that which is far off and exceedingly deep, who can find it out? I applied my heart to know, to search and seek out wisdom and the reason of things, to know the wickedness of folly, even of foolishness and madness.”
We know God to be the only one who has all knowledge and wisdom. Solomon understood that God gives wisdom to those who please Him and live righteously (Ecclesiastes 7:23-29). As Christians, we receive the Holy Spirit when we trust in Jesus as our Savior, making it possible for us to please God and follow Him.
Ephesians 3:19 puts it this way, “… to know Christ’s love that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” The love of Christ is beyond our understanding, but it has the power to change our lives, and the lives of others, forever.