Biblical Life eMag - Biblical Life College & Seminary

We can conclude that if God is going to build anything‐ the earth, the Tabernacle or a house‐
that He is going to use His pattern of wisdom, understanding, and knowledge. It will start with
wisdom as He defines it in His Torah: obedience to His commandments. Only after obedience
to His commandments can genuine understanding and knowledge come. Wisdom is the
foundation, understanding is the establishment and knowledge is the decor! Knowledge is the
"icing on the cake" or the "finishing touch" to what is built ‐ not the foundation!
If we get our wisdom by obeying God's commandments and receive His genuine wisdom first
before seeking understanding and knowledge, we will get the wisdom that James 3:17
describes as "first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and
good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy."
If we're really honest with ourselves, we'll have to confess that the bulk of our church lives have
not been like this. The reason is twofold: 1) We have stopped obeying the very
commandments needed to get genuine wisdom and 2) We have inverted God's pattern of
wisdom and embraced the Greco‐Roman mindset of knowledge first, then understanding and
wisdom.
If we go back to our house example in Proverbs 24 and compare our Greco‐Roman mindset
with it, we see why it hasn't worked. In God's Kingdom, knowledge is what fills the rooms. But
our Greco‐Roman mindset makes knowledge the foundation! Nobody in their right mind would
put an antique vase or a piece of furniture in the foundation! Yet, that is exactly what we have
done in the theologies, churches, families and lives we've attempted to build with the Greco‐
Roman mindset.
Whether the emphasis has been on storing up knowledge of the Bible to impress their peers, or
staying up to speed with the latest marketing techniques to bring in new "tithing prospects,"
many have sought knowledge first before wisdom (or obedience)! The emphasis on acquiring
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