Insight for Today
A Daily Devotional by Pastor Chuck Swindoll

The Benefits of Wisdom

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Wisdom is its own reward. Even so, Solomon predicted that the person seeking divine wisdom will enjoy significant advantages. Today we will consider the benefits of wisdom from within. [Tuesday], the benefits of wisdom from above.

1. Benefits of wisdom from within: further wisdom plus knowledge and understanding

For the LORD gives wisdom;
From His mouth come knowledge and understanding. (v. 6)

We have a significant shortage of what Paul the apostle called “sensibility,” a trait he considered a trademark quality of spiritual maturity. He urged older men to be “sensible” (Titus 2:2). Shortly thereafter, he encouraged younger women to be “sensible” (v. 5). On the heels of that, he then underscored the same trait in young men (v. 6). And then, yet again, he wrote that all of us who have been born again should “live sensibly, righteously, and godly in the present age” (v. 12).

Imagine how many spiritual problems we could avoid by simply living sensibly, by applying divine wisdom to every decision, whether mundane or life altering.

I recall presiding over the marriage of an older bride and groom a number of years ago. Realizing that both might struggle to adjust to married life, I spent three or four counseling sessions with them before the wedding, emphasizing the importance of maintaining balance and guarding against extremes. I even gave them a couple of projects to work on in hopes of helping them cultivate sensible ways to adjust to each other. Only a few months after their wedding, they were back in my study, glaring at each other. She was furious at him for his refusal to “give her more space.”

I suspected that her living alone for so many years might make her more sensitive to sharing her living space and require a lengthy period of adjustment, so I calmly asked what she meant by her need for breathing room. Are you ready? He had taken all the interior doors in their house off their hinges and stacked them in the garage because he “didn’t want either of them to have any secrets.” He also started checking the odometer in her car when he left for work each morning and again upon returning. He followed up with a verbal interrogation at supper: “Where did you go today? What took you eighteen miles from home?”

That did it! Out of spite, she deliberately spent untold hours in her car driving wherever and then relishing his doubt about her fidelity. Both suffered a serious lack of sensibility. Both needed an infusion of wisdom. Not surpisingly, their marriage lasted a very short time.

That’s an extreme example, but you get the point. The internal presence of wisdom, knowledge, and understanding can affect how well things go in life and result in great benefits. Not always, but generally speaking, when we operate from a place of wisdom, life runs smoother—and wisdom will always help us respond well when things don’t go so well.