Dogs, Flowers & Wisdom

S - Proverbs 8:1-4, 17, 9:1-6, 10 (NLT): "Listen as wisdom calls out! Hear as understanding raises her voice! 2 She stands on the hilltop and at the crossroads. 3 At the entrance to the city, at the city gates, she cries aloud, 4 “I call to you, to all of you! I am raising my voice to all people. …. 17 “I love all who love me. Those who search for me will surely find me. … Wisdom has built her spacious house with seven pillars. 2 She has prepared a great banquet, mixed the wines, and set the table. 3 She has sent her servants to invite everyone to come. She calls out from the heights overlooking the city. 4 “Come home with me,” she urges the simple. To those without good judgment, she says, 5 “Come, eat my food, and drink the wine I have mixed. 6 Leave your foolish ways behind, and begin to live; learn how to be wise.”… 10 Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Knowledge of the Holy One results in understanding."

O - Wisdom is a lot like flowers and dogs. Flowers unfold their beauty and fragrance in the Queen's garden and the popper's backyard identically. Dogs prance along side of their owners with their canine swagger beside the earth's most powerful and most forgotten citizens. Wisdom calls out to all and has made a place for all to join her and to learn the ways of life and to really live. Like flowers and dogs she does not care about the status, history or net worth one has. All three require certain ongoing responses from those who desire their company and benefits. All three will indiscriminately bless any who so engage them.

A - Planting and watering, feeding and poop scooping, the fear of the Lord and following no matter what are available to me IF I WISH. Like the flowers and the dogs … wisdom is mine for the having but only according to design (Proverbs 15:33). Today while it’s called today my assignment is to respond to wisdom's generous invitation and guaranteed outcome. I will yield all thoughts, decisions and actions to the wholesome dread of displeasing the One who loved me first and most (e.g. the working definition of the fear of the Lord) AND to following (refusing to take the lead or go my own way) no matter where he leads me (Psalm 23) and no matter what I face (Psalm 27).

P - Lord who is wisdom,
Thank you for your unflickering and generous offer to give wisdom to any and to all. I am so very grateful that you are all about today and not so much about yesterday. I am so very grateful that you refuse to be ashamed of us/me even in shameful circumstances. No matter where I've been or what I've done you call me/all to your very self to hope, to heal, to grow, to change, to really live (here and hereafter). Thank you that you have called us all to hold every life, regardless of current condition, in the hope of transformation. I gladly yield to your awesome brilliance, limitless power and extreme goodness. Thank you for the place at the table and in the home of wisdom. Don’t want to leave and won't go it on my own. I choose to follow … thank you for wanting to always walk point.
Staying close,
Steve