Seeking Wisdom
Have you ever heard that story in the bible where King Soloman is going to cut the baby in half? This is just because two women claim the baby is theirs... why not give each one half? This terrorized me as a young girl going to the First Baptist Church in Pomona, CA. But when the true mother, not wanting her child dead, gave the child up, I sighed in relief. That was when I realized how wise Soloman was.I wanted to be wise like Soloman. Of course at eight years old I didn't know about James 1:5 "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God," because I had never read the New Testament or any scriptures for that matter. I wanted my own bible and when attending that Baptist church (because their bus came to pick up me and my friends in the neighborhood), the teacher told me she'd give me one if I was baptized. My parents were divorced and my mother, who never attended any church, said, "No, you can't be baptized. Wait until you are old enough to understand what you are doing." She had wisdom. She said if all I wanted was my own bible, she'd buy one for me. However, she never bought one for me. My grandmother, Anne May Gough Eckel Winebrenner died when I was about 17, I inherited hers. Did I read it? I read a few verses she'd underlined and I couldn't understand what it said so I never picked it up to read again. I just cherished the book because it was hers.
When I heard the Joseph Smith story at age 21 during my college years, that quote from James caught my attention. I'd wanted to be wise. I'd also determined that I wanted to belong to the same church as my husband, and Sam Inman was a Morman. The missionaries wisely made me read in the Book of Mormon and pray about it. As I read, I felt that it was true, no matter how weird my intellectual mind said the First Vision Story was. I was taking the lessons during college mid term finals and only a couple weeks before getting married over the Thanksgiving weekend. I wanted to postpone the actual baptism day until I got back from my short honeymoon trip. They were inspired to say the one thing that changed my mind. "What if you were in an accident and died knowing the Church was true and hadn't been baptized?" I'd known a friend in Pasadena that had been in an accident on her honeymoon trip and had died. Wow, saying this was certainly not what a missionary should say, yet it was the exact thing that I needed to hear. I was baptized the Saturday before my wedding and confirmed a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and received the gift of the Holy Ghost.
Parley Pratt is quoted by Orson Pratt as saying, "The gift of the Holy Ghost quickens all the intellectual facilities, increases, enlarges, expands and purifies all the natural passions and affections, and adopts them by the gift of wisdom, to all their lawful use." Orson Pratt goes on to say that in proportion to a person yielding to its influence, it will impart some gift intended to benefit himself and others. These spiritual gifts are distributed among members of the church according to their faithfulness, natural abilities and callings, that everyone might be uplifted, edified, and instructed as well as perfected and saved.
In Proverbs 20:11 it says, "Even a child is known by his doings, whether his work be pure, and whether it be right." Nobody ever told me that. But somehow I wanted to be a good girl and do what was right. I wanted to be like Solomon who said in Proverbs 1:2, " To know wisdom and instruction; to perceive the words of understanding." A wise man listens, hears and will increase in learning. The foolish man interupts with his own prideful comments and exposes his foolishness to all around him. Even a fool is thought wise if he keeps his mouth shut. Well, it has taken me a lifetime of mistakes, failures and opening my mouth, interrupting people who could have taught me so much if only I would have stopped to shut my mouth and really listen.
After receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost I began to understand the teachings and instructions given to me. It took time (yes, over 30 years) to develop a habit of reading the scriptures and pondering them.
The saddest thing I've learned about wisdom is that in general people don't want to take your wise words to heart and learn from them. Gaining wisdom is an individual journey. You can't MAKE someone wise. Wisdom truly is a gift of God and it can't be had unless it is desired and sought after. Even then you must live the commandments of God, and exercise faith to receive this gift. Faithfulness is a drop by drop filling your lamp with oil so that you can give service to others; be a light unto the world and enter into the bridegroom's chambers. I really want to be one of the five wise virgins, not one of the foolish ones.
We choose our own consequences by the decisions we make according to eternal laws put in place before the earth was ever created. Blessings can flow upon us or condemn us or a nation, based on good or unwise choices. What parent would want to give their child a stone when he asks for bread? God our father, wants to bless us. Why not begin as a child and receive knowledge and understanding and be the very best person you are capable of being early in life.
In my opinion, based on experience, I would chose to be baptised into the only true church that has Jesus Christ as its head at the earliest age possible, in order to receive that wonderful gift of the Holy Ghost so as to benefit from other spiritual gifts enabling a person to live a safer, richer, joyful life in this world of terror, sin, sorrow, uncertainty and death.
As Solomon admonishes in Proverbs, "My son, hear the instruction of thy father, and forsake not the law of thy mother." Don't be lead astray. "The fear (respect) of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; but fools despise wisdom and instruction."
"O be not a fool: seek wisdom."
