Sunday, August 18, 2024 | Trey Comstock
By Rev. Emily Larsen
I’ll never forget a story that one of my mentors told me when I was going through medical training as an undergrad at Baylor College of Medicine. This particular mentor had been practicing medicine since the very early 1940s. He started his practice by still visiting patients in their homes with a black doctor bag. He was at this point in his career one of the most prestigious physicians in his field. To say that he was one of the foremost experts in his field with certainly the most knowledge and experience could not be overstated. One day, while he and his wife were ice skating, his wife fell and hurt her ankle. The physician quickly bent down to aid his wife and a small crowd gathered to assist them. In the commotion, a young gentleman in his early 20s (so about the age that I was at the time of hearing this story) pushed his way confidently through the crowd and proclaimed with all of the arrogance of youth, “Stand back! I’ll take care of it. Don’t worry! I’m a med student!”
Not knowing that he had inadvertently inserted himself between the ACTUAL medical expert and his wife, the doctor and his wife merely chuckled and decided to let the medical student show off his “expert” skills in assisting with her minor injury and this story later became an excellent anecdote for my mentor to teach his future students about the importance of humility. The lesson learned here is to never assume you’re the expert in the room!
It was Ralph Waldo Emerson who is quoted as saying, “In my walks, every man I meet is my superior in some way, and in that I learn from him.” Emerson was remarking on the fact that everybody knows more about something than everybody else. There will always be more to learn, more wisdom to glean, or somebody with more experience than you. Humility and wisdom, therefore, go hand-in-hand. Remaining open to the knowledge that you don’t know everything, no matter your age or experience, is a mark of true wisdom.
Socrates had a similar revelation when he said “I know that I know nothing.” I remember feeling this way when I first started my higher education journey. I remarked to one of my study partners “the more I learn, the more I realize that I still have to learn.” Gaining wisdom is a life-long journey, one that we should never give up on.
I think this is really at the heart of Solomon’s plea in our scripture reading today. Even though Solomon is very young when he takes over the throne from his father David, when he is offered a gift– any gift– from God, he humbly chooses Wisdom to lead God’s people. There is a lesson to be learned here. Solomon’s attitude of humility before God is truly admirable. You can see that Solomon truly desires to follow God’s laws and become a good leader. He showed a great depth of character for his young age. In spite of his youth, in spite of his inexperience, Solomon becomes the known standard for Wisdom because of this particular encounter with God.
He could have chosen anything for himself-power, wealth, long life, victory over his enemies- and yet, Solomon asks for discernment in order to better lead God’s people. Solomon chose something that would serve the greater good. He, like Socrates, recognized the “I know that I know nothing” part of himself and decided to ask God for the wisdom to overcome it. The Wisdom of Solomon was then something that was divinely granted by God upon his proper response to God’s invitation. We’ll see some more stories of how this wisdom plays out during Solomon’s rule next week.
But as we encounter these scriptures, or any other aspect of our faith journey, one of the things that I love about the United Methodist denomination is that we get to put a large emphasis on REASON when we look at our theology. We can use our intellect. We can use our brains, not just our hearts, as we encounter the divine things of life. John Wesley holds up reason as one of the lenses through which we should study all aspects of our faith life. He was, after all, a professor of logic and philosophy at Oxford University. I used to have a youth director that encouraged us to ask the hard questions and find the hidden truths. He used to tell us “don’t check your brain at the door.” We don’t have to accept our faith blindly just because somebody else told us that it was the truth of the matter. We get to use our logic, our reasoning, our discernment, our intellect, and our God-given wisdom to sort out the truth of our own faith lives. I’ve realized that sometimes, the older we get, the more “set in our ways” we can get. We start to reach what we think is the peak of knowledge and then we stop searching for answers. We stop acquiring wisdom. Solomon went on to fill the book of Proverbs with admonitions to search for wisdom above all else as a great treasure, and to never forsake the wisdom that God grants.
Proverbs 2:6-8
“6For the Lord gives wisdom;
from his mouth come knowledge and understanding;
7he stores up sound wisdom for the upright;
he is a shield to those who walk blamelessly,
8guarding the paths of justice
and preserving the way of his faithful ones.”