"Wisdom shouts in the street, she lifts her voice in the square"
This is a bold statement – that the triple-win solution is an open secret. It is shouted to those who have ears to hear. It is available to all. It will just not sound right to the foolish and the wicked.
This proverb tells us that God has not hidden His wisdom, but it is hidden because of our selfishness.
Later in this section we are told of three types of people who do not get the wisdom that is being shouted: those who are simple or naïve, those who are scoffers, and those who are fools. Each has its own way of avoiding or misperceiving the wisdom that God is laying before them.
Naive people refuse to believe or embrace solutions that take a number of steps. It must be instant and one step, or it is rejected as no solution. They want instant solutions to their own complex money problems; their own convoluted relational problems. Wisdom tells them what to do next, but they can't see how that will solve everything immediately so they don’t try it or they try it and refuse to seek out wisdom for the next choice.
Scoffers delight in being critical and contrary. They can find the flaws with any really wise plan. What if this happens? What if that happens? How are you going to handle that or this? They can throw cold water even on that which is brilliantly wise.
Fools are selfish, rebellious, and impulsive people who already have their mind made up about why things happened and how to get out of the difficulty, so they will not listen to the facts of the case. They don't want facts; they have their opinions.
You have to really want wisdom to hear it, receive it, and stick with it until it completes the solution. Wisdom is never hidden but at times it is complicated, doesn't have all the answers, and is open to new ideas and real facts.
Until tomorrow,
Gil Stieglitz