"Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is knowing not to put it in the fruit salad"
The gap between Science and Faith is the gap between Knowledge and Wisdom.
This is significant on multiple levels for the Outlier.
First is the obvious: we can reconcile being logical within the paradigm of faith because reason and faith are not opposites.
Secondly, on a meta level we can understand how knowledge without wisdom is dangerous. Knowledge puffs up, seems to be the height of human ability, but it is the showy but weaker sister to Wisdom.
For myself, there are a few inventions that I have conceived that will never be spoken, written, or brought to any fruition, even in whispered tones to a trusted friend, because they involve too much destruction, would be tools of war and death. I have taken to heart the warning to others that Oppenheimer thought during the Trinity Bomb test: "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds". During that time, of course, the Germans were working on atomic weaponry as well, and one can consider the moral implications of not using the biggest hammer one can invent, but I am not in the defense industry, so those ideas will remain dusty and unused.
I digress...
The third significance for we Outliers, though, to glean is that this means that our vast knowledge, our super-human mental capabilities, are still secondary to wisdom, which is open to all who ask God, even to the dullest, but earnest, follower of Christ. The child with wisdom is worth greater honor than the genius without it.
So we might be the smartest person in the room but we might not at all be the wisest. It is helpful, in light of such monumental abilities, to use this to humble ourselves--not to denigrate or ignore the talent the Lord chose to bestow, but rather to keep our ability from being a stumbling block for more that He has for us. And, frankly, to keep us from being jerks.
No comments:
Post a Comment