Walk in Wisdom

1 Corinthians 2:5

So that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God.

One wealthy media mogul commented not too long ago that “Christians are losers.” What he probably meant was that all of the Christians he had come in contact with had been less successful than he had been. Then again, he might have known a Christian or two who had failed to live up to what he intuitively knew a Christian should be. Frankly, you’d think that God would do everything possible to enhance the reputation of His saints. However, when you read the Bible, God included details about His people that you and I would have edited out. He pulled the skeletons out of the closet of some of His choicest servants. He recorded their failures, often with more detail than their successes.

God could have left the flawless history of Abraham intact. Did we need to know that Abraham lied about his wife being his sister in order to save his own skin—not once, but twice?! And then we learned that his son Isaac would inherit the same problem of not telling the truth—too much information? And what about King David? We would have liked to hear only that David was a man after God’s own heart, he courageously killed Goliath, served as Israel’s greatest king, and prepared Solomon to build the great temple. Did God really have to tell us of David’s adultery and murderous cover-up . . . and then throw in the account about his utter failure as a father to Absalom?

Why scuff the polish on the shoes of our greatest saints? The answer is equally straightforward: God wants to communicate that He uses undeserving, foolish, sinful, faithless, and even incompetent people to accomplish His work in the world . . . which leaves room for you and me. He’s also letting us know that failures aren’t fatal. Where sin abounds, grace abounds even more. If you’ve failed in your past you’re in good company. Get on your knees and confess your sin, and then get back up on your feet and live for Christ.