Meet Lady Wisdom: God Revealing Himself through Human Insight

     Who is the wisest person you know? Scripture tells us that wise people think and act in ways that make life work.  They build others up and have a deep, reverential respect for the Lord.  Wise people live out the principle that obedience to His design is what re-creates what was lost when Adam and Eve made that foolish choice in the garden. Might you be a wise person? 

     One of the wisest ladies I knew, lovingly etched the wisdom she had learned from God into my hungry little nine-year-old soul.  Her name was Belle Standridge and her words of wisdom still sing a beautiful song in my life to this day.  Belle was kind enough to offer her big, burly upright piano to me for practice since my family had no instrument at the time.  She would patiently listen to me mangle scales and produce torturous versions of the notes written in my piano books, promising me a special time with her if I endured that endless half-hour of drudgery.  After I had done my duty to my piano teacher, I stayed around to meet, in Belle, my own version of “Lady Wisdom” (Proverbs 1:20-33). Belle had been burned in a kerosene fire as a child and received none of the care that would have reduced the massive keloid scars that contracted her arms and hands into a sort of basket.  How she made such glorious music at her piano with those deformities was absolutely miraculous.  She would twirl her piano stool, sit on it, put me on her lap, and invite me to rest my arms on hers as she played one Gospel hymn after another.  I rode those arms, feeling the nuance of every lick she laid down on those keys, absorbing her technique right through my little-girl muscles.  Not only did she teach me to play in-between and around the notes, she wisely taught me about Jesus through that music.

      When Belle explained how the lyrics of those old hymns connected to Scripture and God’s love for me, God was the One speaking. God was holding me as I sat nestled in the embrace of her scarred arms. God was loving me as I leaned against Belle’s 70-something heartbeat and heard words like “grace,” “forgiveness,” and “love” as she sang.  God’s wisdom came through Belle as she shared God’s plan of salvation while teaching me to play “Amazing Grace” and “Love Lifted Me.”  I remember her saying, “Stephanie, play the words, not the notes.  Play your heart and God’s heart.  Let this piano be your altar and your sanctuary.  Let your hands be instruments of praise.  Someday you will offer your musical gifts in church, so don’t forget to pray before you play.”

    As I matured, Belle shared with me how she became so wise.  She immersed herself in God’s Word, often chewing on a thought from Proverbs like a dog works a delicious bone.  As a result, that precious woman lived each day to please her King of Kings, and to love the people God gave her.  I was blessed to be a recipient of the treasures of wisdom God gave her. 

     All of us can become more insightful if we value wisdom as much as King Solomon (1Kings 3:9-12).  Like Solomon, we are to ask God for His wisdom, which is “pure, peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere” (James 3:17).  Put some skin on this incredible wisdom and we discover Jesus as “the wisdom from God” for us (I Corinthians 1:40).  All the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden in Jesus (Colossians 2:3).  If we accept this, to seek wisdom is to seek Jesus Himself. 

     Belle personified the “Lady Wisdom” we meet in Proverbs 1-9, gently introducing me to the principle that walking in wisdom would keep me out of all sorts of traps and snares (James 3:13-18). I am slowly learning that true wisdom is found in obedience to God’s loving design found in His Word (Hebrews 13:5).  I have also learned my intellect is woefully inadequate to meet the demands of reality, so I must ask God for His Wisdom (James 1:5). At present, I am re-visiting Proverbs to chew on some the same “bones” that nourished my beloved Belle and made her “Lady Wisdom” to me.  

     The next time you dip into the book of Proverbs, take time to read the first nine chapters and get acquainted with the voice of “Lady Wisdom.”  Then you will be ready to read the wisdom of the elders in chapters 10-29.  How amazing that in the book of Proverbs we can see God supercharging human insight with His vast wisdom!  He certainly supercharged Belle.  Might He supercharge you?

Prayer:

Jesus, thank You for being willing to share the treasures of Your mind and heart with me.  Please supercharge my insight, so that my actions reflect the love You brought into the world.  Help me be wise enough to obey You and build others up. Help me stay within Your guardrails so that I also can be a type of “Lady Wisdom” to others.  Amen.