Author’s note: The following is from a study I taught last weekend on Godly wisdom. As I go through the book “Decision Making and the Will of God” (reviewed here), I find that the basic view of the book has much wider applications than merely those which the author intended. In this study, I took Dr. Garry Friesen’s ideas one step further, and considered the erroneous Biblical roots of determining “individual will” via circumstances.
Wisdom is the summation of all the characteristics of a man of God. A wise man is going to be dependent on God in prayer, he is going to study the Bible diligently, he will have faith, he will have integrity and he will be a man devoted to Godly love.
A wise man fears the Lord so much that he looks to God and his word for all things pertaining to the Christian existence:
Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom,
And to depart from evil is understanding. (Job 28:28)
It is up to us, however, to search for wisdom in the truth of God’s Word, not by trying to subjectively read our emotions and auger our circumstances.
Biblical Wisdom Applied Correctly
There are many places where wisdom was applied correctly, and circumstances (even supernatural ones) were ignored in favor of it. One impressive example is when Paul and Silas had been imprisoned in Acts 16:25-30:
But at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s chains were loosed. And the keeper of the prison, awaking from sleep and seeing the prison doors open, supposing the prisoners had fled, drew his sword and was about to kill himself. But Paul called with a loud voice, saying, “Do yourself no harm, for we are all here.”
Then he called for a light, ran in, and fell down trembling before Paul and Silas. And he brought them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”
The man and his entire household went on to be saved because Paul used wisdom. How? This is merely surmising, but consider that Paul and Silas were very likely praying that they would be able to escape or leave the prison - that is definitely what I would be praying for. However, when God responded miraculously, Paul waited in the jail and rejected an “open door” because it was wise to prevent the guard from killing himself. In all honesty, he could have left the jail, which was clearly an option. But his wise decision was rewarded with a new convert!
We know this today, and Paul knew it then, that we are called to preach the gospel. We are to value it more than our freedom – so it’s an easy choice between an open jail cell and a person in distress (I know I would have bolted out of the prison, but that is another story). Paul was obviously prepared in wisdom and so he did not have to rely on “reading” his circumstances to make his choice. The truth of the word was hidden is his heart, as it says in Psalm 119:11.
This is the essence of Biblical Wisdom: being prepared in the word.
The Opposite of Biblical Wisdom: Divination
In a broad sense, I would call wisdom’s opposite “mysticism” – a philosophy which rejects free-will, reason and absolute truth and instead relies on fatalism, human experience and subjectivism. The closest thing Biblically is the practice of divination - the attempt to use common objects or signs to auger supernatural direction. We see God’s thoughts on the practice several places, but Ezekiel 13:1-3, 6-7 is one particularly strong passage:
And the word of the LORD came to me, saying, “Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel who prophesy, and say to those who prophesy out of their own heart, ‘Hear the word of the LORD!’”
Thus says the Lord GOD: “Woe to the foolish prophets, who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing!
…They have envisioned futility and false divination, saying, ‘Thus says the LORD!’ But the LORD has not sent them; yet they hope that the word may be confirmed. Have you not seen a futile vision, and have you not spoken false divination? You say, ‘The LORD says,’ but I have not spoken.”
It is important to see here that these diviners were doing so under the pretense of being God’s people. However, they were not being deliberately deceptive, but ignorantly foolish. These prophets were misguided, having reduced God’s wisdom to vain mysticism.
Wisdom Applied Incorrectly
Because the Bible is honest, we have many examples of man’s ignorance in action. Let’s look at a somewhat controversial one in Acts 1:23-26, where the remaining apostles are trying to determine how to fill Judas’ place:
And they proposed two: Joseph called Barsabas, who was surnamed Justus, and Matthias. And they prayed and said, “You, O Lord, who know the hearts of all, show which of these two You have chosen to take part in this ministry and apostleship from which Judas by transgression fell, that he might go to his own place.” And they cast their lots, and the lot fell on Matthias. And he was numbered with the eleven apostles.
The Apostles chose to cast lots to determine next apostle rather than apply wisdom. They were impatient and impulsive, which led them to use mystic methods to make a choice rather than rely on wisdom.
For example, they knew that God promised them the Holy Spirit - Jesus just told them this in their recent memory. They knew that God keeps his promises. Yet they chose, in the moment when it came time to apply wisdom, to instead “read the signs” of divination, and ignored what Jesus had just spoken about the coming of the Holy Spirit. They wouldn’t have had to wait long, as Pentacost was just around the corner.
Anyone who has heard a modern sermon on idolatry knows that idolatry does not require stone statues to exist in today’s society. But do we also realize that lot casting is also a popular method in today’s church for determining wisdom? Just as it was incorrect then, it is incorrect now. Casting lots is, in essence, trying to divine God’s will by circumstances.
For example, in looking for a new job, relying on criteria such as “if this job calls me first, then I’ll know it’s right” or “if the interviewer is wearing a white shirt, God wants me here.” This is modern divination, using time in the first example and a man’s shirt in the second to determine God’s will.
But divination appeals to us because it allows us to cede what God has given us along with free-will – responsibility. Its the same method that legalism employs, where the believer can be immune to critical thinking by following prescribed rules and laws. For the diviner, he can avoid responsibility (and consequences) by claiming that the stars weren’t aligned, the energy was bad, or (the Christian favorite) it wasn’t God’s will.
But we can know God’s will – it is clearly written in the bible. There is nothing magic or mystic about it. God is a God of order, not confusion! Thus, God, in his wisdom, gave us everything that is pertinent for us to know about who He is and how to obey him – in the bible.
Nice article, though I completely disagree about your interpretation of the casting of lots as a bad thing back then (or now, for that matter). The Bible gives us numerous examples of the casting of lots to determine God’s will, and it never says God was unhappy with this. In fact, it implies that He approved, since the lots always found the right person. A good example of this was with Jonah. Frequently throughout the Old Testament, lots were cast “in the presence of the Lord” to find His will. And nowhere does it say that He didn’t bless this process.
Casting lots is a completely impartial way to determine God’s will, whereas circumstances many times can be very subjective. If the disciples had chosen the 12th disciple with influence from their own human wisdom, they could have chosen incorrectly. So they left it COMPLETELY up to God.
You seem a little too quick to claim something as Biblical that the Bible DOES NOT say. Casting lots is one of the more Biblical methods of decision making, and any claim to the contrary ignores the Scriptures.
Another Biblical example of using circumstances to decide a matter is Gideon and the fleece. God blessed that process TWICE, so that circumstantial determinism is always wrong would fly in the face of the Scriptural evidence.
*that* should be “saying that*
Darius, there is no doubt that God permitted lots and other means at specific times in history - I am not ignorant of these vast portions of scripture. However, these were clearly specific application and not meant for broad use - especially when the Church has the full revelation of God and the Holy Spirit.
n.b. vein should be vain [I fixed it. Thanks. - Jew]
My first comment is similar to Darius’s: I don’t feel comfortable speaking too negatively against casting lots because there are many examples of it in scripture and we are never told it was a no-no. On the other hand, I don’t think we can assume from those examples that we are to copy that practice when it comes to deciding each morning which pair of socks to put on.
Somehow this “knowing the will of God” and having God’s wisdom has a lot to do with becoming more Christ-like, internalizing scriptural principles, and having scripture in one’s head to refer to in times of decision (and by “refer to” I include the Holy Spirit bringing to mind). I think all of that is what it means to be a mature believer–knowing scripture and living it out in general, over-arching ways. Then the specific decisions we have to make probably won’t need the throw of the dice or a fleece.
As for “denying circumstances,” good example about Paul in prison. Sometimes there are circumstances–ones that could easily be thought to be from God–but to go that path would be to say to God “I’m only willing to live a milquetoast kind of life for you–please don’t give me anything too hard to do!”
I think the use of signs like fleeces and casting lots is unwise. As Darius pointed out, these methods were used in the Old Testament, and they may even be used today with limited success. However, those in the Old Testament and the disciples prior to the Day of Pentecost had not received the fullness of the Spirit. Jesus said the Holy Spirit would guide us into all truth after he had come (John 16:13). He has since come, and we have a more accurate way of making wise decisions. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of wisdom and revelation. Any decision unnecessarily made apart from his available guidance would of necessity be unwise indeed.
Use of cast lots is probably best left to those decisions that no amount of wisdom will likely help, and where you don’t want to have the appearance of favoritism. It was probably very wise to let the lots pick the 12th disciple, in that there would be no debate on why Matthais made it and Barsabas did not.
Lots are perfectly acceptable in non-spiritual decisions (coin flip to start a game) or to pick between equal options. But using lots to determine God’s will when we have his full counsel and Holy Spirit is not biblical.
Just this morning in my person bible study, this was part of what I read:
Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. (Eph 5:17)
The will of God is not hidden or secret or needing to be determined by lot. God’s will (at least in the terms that Paul is talking about here) is understandable, and we are wise to look to it.