TEXT: Luke 11:31

SUBJECT: Humanity of Christ #4: Wisdom

This week, we’re looking at the humanity of our Lord Jesus Christ. In the first sermon, I tried to show you from the Bible that our Lord was a Man—and still is. He’s not only a Man, of course, but He is a Man—as fully human as you and I. Being a Man, He entered into all the suffering of Mankind. Job said "Man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward". You and I were thrust into the agonies of human life. You may not like the sullen teeanger’s attitude when he says it, but you can’t argue with what he says: "I didn’t ask to be born". No, he didn’t. Nobody did…

…But the Lord Jesus Christ. Unlike us, He had a choice of entering the world or staying out of it. He could become a man or not. He could join us in our pain and sorrow or stay in heaven where He was loved by everyone.

We ought to love our Lord for choosing to become a Man—and not just any man, but "a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief". Never forget: It is His poverty that made us rich. It was with His stripes that we are healed. "He came down to earth—said the Church Father—"so that we might rise up to heaven".

Have you lost the wonder of John’s Prologue?

God became a Man to reveal Himself to men who could not know Him (as He wants to be known) without the Incarnation.

The easiest way, perhaps, to look at our Lord’s human character is to split it up into separate attributes. Now, kids, attributes are the things that make you you and not someone else. If I hear you saying, "He’s tall and young and thin and blonde", I know you’re not talking about me because tallness, youngness, thinness, and blondeness are not my attributes. They describe someone else, but not me.

In the same way, we can say very definite things about the Lord Jesus Christ. Most scholars think He was a dark and shadowy figure. In fact, the opposite is true: He is the most well-defined Man in the world. In reading the Bible, we know precisely what kind of Man He was and is. We don’t know what He looked like, but we know His character. Because it is seen in His words and works.

Thus far, we’ve looked at two of His charactistics: His generosity and His courage. Now, we’ll come to another and that is His wisdom.

As the Son of God, our Lord is infinitely wise and has always been that way. I’m not sure Proverbs 8 proves it, but it surely hints at the eternal and infinite wisdom of Christ. It says,

If you have the Works of John Flavel, I encourage you to read his sermon on Proverbs 8:30, bearing the title, Christ in His Essential and Primeval Glory. Even if his exegesis is wrong, the sermon is thrilling!

I very much believe in His eternal and infinite Divine wisdom. But that is not the subject of my sermon. I have in mind His human wisdom, the wisdom He received as the Gift of God and improved on by study, prayer, fellowship, and obedience.

This—I think—is the meaning of our text. Our Lord is not contrasting His Divine wisdom to the human wisdom of Solomon. No devout Jew would have objected to that—of course, God is wiser than any man!

No, the comparison is between two men—two kings! One was the richest and most powerful king in the history of Israel. His wisdom was so great that a queen came from the end of the world to hear it. The other King was the poorest and weakest man to ever sit on a throne. Yet His wisdom—though veiled in the accent of a Galilean carpenter—is far greater than Solomon’s in all it’s glory.

What is wisdom?

The word is used often in the Bible and with a wide range of meaning. But for now, I define wisdom as knowledge put to good use. You can have great knowledge and no wisdom. The Corinthians prided themselves on knowing things—a lot of things. But read the Epistles sent to them and you’ll see that the brainy believers in Corinth were mostly fools.

The Lord had great knowledge—there’s no doubt about that! At twelve years old, He amazed the theologians of Israel with His grasp on the Bible. But we set that aside for the moment to concentrate on what He did with His knowledge.

The first peek we have at His wisdom is when He’s twelve years old. At that time, He went with His family to Jerusalem to observe a sacred holiday. When the family packs up and heads home, they find out He’s not with them. They turn around and after three days of looking, they find Him in the Temple "About [His] Father’s business".

He was talking theology with the doctors of the law—and knocking them out with His knowledge. But that’s not what I’m getting at. His great wisdom is seen in the aftermath. Luke says,

How do you balance the devotion you owe to God and the loyalty you owe to human authorities? Do you obey men at the cost of ignoring the claims of heaven? Or, do you obey the Lord by defying human authorities and flouting their commands?

Most of us do one or the other. If our personalities are passive, we go along to get along—and get a bad conscience in the bargain. If our personalities are aggressive, we tend to pose as servants of God and show up parents or teachers or pastors or others who have some say in what we do.

But the little boy Jesus strikes the balance. He leaves no doubt that He’s a servant of God first! He was shocked that His mother—who knew who He was—didn’t know that she and her husband don’t call the shots for their Son. He answers to His Father and only then to His mother and step-father.

Yet this higher loyalty did not make Him a conceited brat in the home. He upset Mary and Joseph—yes He did—but He never defied them. He found a way of combining absolute devotion to God with genuine respect for His parents.

That is more than knowledge; that’s wisdom.

His wisdom was also seen in His teaching. I know a pastor who has million dollars worth of knowledge, but his wisdom isn’t worth a dime. All his sermons are great—if you’re a Doctor of Theology and know five languages. But if you’re an ordinary Christian, you have no idea what he’s talking about most of the time. And that’s the rub: nobody in his church is a Doctor of Theology! He impresses them all, but that’s all he does: impresses them. He doesn’t teach them because they don’t understand him.

But the Lord found ways of explaining the deepest mysteries of the Kingdom in ways fishermen and housewives could understand. This is true of the content and also of the timing.

The disciples had a lot to learn, but He did not cram it down their throats; He taught them "line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little, there a little". When they were not ready to learn, He postponed the lesson. Once He said to His slow-witted students,

This shows great patience of course. Am I the only parent and teacher here who has ever gotten fed up with my kids and students? But patience is toward Himself. Wisdom is toward others. He didn’t blow up or storm out of the room or tell them, "Learn now or else!" No, they needed to learn and He was willing to adapt to their needs and stand by until they were able to learn.

A very smart teacher might have gotten the same lessons into their ears, but the Lord found ways of getting them into their hearts. That’s wisdom!

I’m deeply impressed by the Lord’s wisdom in sharply rebuking His friends without losing them.

When it comes to correcting people who need it, most of us belong on the farm. We’re either chickens or bulls. We say nothing at all, letting our friends get worse and worse or we correct with all the gentleness of Brahma Bull, and thus, lose our friends or discredit the truth they need to hear.

I’m guilty of both. But the Lord wasn’t. He found a way to call Peter, "Satan" and not lose him. He said many hard things to His disciples, but He said them in a way that helped them and didn’t just discourage them or make them mad and sulky.

That’s wisdom at its best. As a Christian, you’ve got to say negative things. But you’ve got to same them at the right time, at the right place, and in the right way. If you think that’s easy, become a pastor and you’ll see it’s not!

You’ve got a hundred people in church with a hundred different personalities. You’ve got the lady with skin like rice paper and the man with a hide thicker than a polar bear! All she needs is a hint; he needs a 2X4 across the face! Gently correct her and she’s goes all to pieces; yell at him and he still can’t hear you.

Great wisdom is needed to rebuke friends, get the message across, and keep them as your friends. Our Lord Jesus Christ had that wisdom. And still does.

The Lord’s wisdom is most on display—not just as an exceptional Man—but as our Mediator.

Man was made in fellowship with God, but through His knowing choice, he fell away from the Lord. And the Fall was so great that he could never make his way back to God. Even if he wanted to. Which He didn’t.

So the Lord Jesus Christ agreed to do for us what we could not do for ourselves. The obstacles were real and serious. We needed three things to be saved: a Prophet to teach us God’s Way, a Priest to cover our sins and satisfy the justice of God, and a King to defend us and lead us to the ways of obedience.

And that is exactly what our Lord Jesus Christ became—a Prophet, Priest, and King. He perfectly fitted Himself to our needs and became the "Only name under heaven whereby we must be saved".

What wisdom we have in the Lord Jesus Christ! Paul wasn’t just filling space when he said of Christ,

The source of His wisdom is God. It is God who gives wisdom, Solomon says; James says the same thing. But the Lord’s wisdom did not—you might say—drop out of the sky.

He met the conditions for wisdom, which are two: the fear of the Lord and prayer. "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom…If any man lacks wisdom, let him ask of God…"

I suspect that we lack wisdom because we don’t fear God; we forget about Him or we forget that He’s awesome and that even Seraphim cannot gaze on His holiness.

We lack wisdom because we’re too lazy or self-satisfied to ask for it. How dear that promise is: "God gives wisdom to all men liberally and does not upbraid them for asking". He got mad at Moses for asking to enter the Promised Land, but He never got mad at anyone for asking to enter the land of wisdom. He’s happy with that request and has promised to grant it—if it’s asked for in faith.

The Lord’s great wisdom builds confidence in Him and His Word. Carnal men laugh at the Bible—so shot through with errors they say. But when all their theories are exploded, the Word of Christ will be intact.

If the Lord Jesus Christ is the storehouse of all wisdom, you should ask for His advice in prayer, look for it in the Bible, and…take it when He gives it to you.

If the Lord was at such pains to get wisdom, then you ought to value it more than you do. Solomon was right:

What effort are you making to gain wisdom? What are you doing without to have it? What are you doing to get it? If we were superhuman, we could read the Bible and watch TV at the same time. But we’re not superhuman and so, we have to choose, not only the good over the evil, but also the better over the good.

Let me close with a little test. According to James 3:13-15, your wisdom is in inverse proportion to your irritability. In other words, the more proud, envious, and hard-to-get-along-with you are, the less wise you are. So how wise are you? I’m not asking how smart you are or how much you know, but how wise are you? I suspect we all need a lot of growth in grace and wisdom!

How thankful we ought to be for the wisdom of our Lord Jesus Christ! God make us so, for Christ’s sake. A