Three Popular Pieces Of Wisdom That Are Really Just Dumb

It was the first camping experience for a troop of boy scouts. You can imagine the excitement that filled these pre-teen boys as they trekked into the wilderness to rough it like men. Between pitching tents and starting fires, it wasn’t long before "nature" began to call. Fortunately, they had the guidance of their troop leaders who simply instructed them to do their business off in the woods and to use leaves as toilet paper. So, they did. Unfortunately, those leaves were poison ivy. I’ll let you guess how they found that out.

Advice is a tricky thing. Many are quick to give it. Just as many are quick to accept it. I think it’s a part of human nature to give guidance to others even when we have no idea what we’re talking about. I find myself doing it all the time, only coming to the realization later. Turns out the only requirement for being a professional at something is to know just slightly more than someone else on any given subject.

This begs the question; how do we know who to listen to and who to ignore? What is the litmus test for sound advice? After all, there’s no shortage of bad advice on the internet, you don’t have to look far to find it. (Hopefully just a little further than this blog though 😅 )

THE WORD

“Pay attention and turn your ear to the sayings of the wise; apply your heart to what I teach…”

- Proverbs 22:17

If I were to ask you, "What is the most valuable thing you own?" perhaps your mind would go directly to things in your life that have come with a big price tag; your house, vehicles, smart devices, etc. Or maybe you’re more philosophical and you think of your family, priceless memories you've shared, or perhaps you would say your relationship with Jesus (there’s always one firing off spiritual answers).

However, no one tends to think about how valuable their attention is. There’s a reason companies spend billions of dollars every year on advertising. No one can have your money, your commitment, your heart, or your time until they first have your attention. That’s why it’s called PAYING attention, because you only have so much of it to give and everybody wants it! I’m trying my hardest to keep it right now!

This is why Solomon instructs us throughout the Proverbs to "turn your attention to wisdom." In order to obtain something as valuable as wisdom, it requires something that we possess which is equally as valuable. Who and what we give our attention to impacts every aspect of our lives. The voices we allow in our ears will inevitably direct our feet.

Several weeks ago I preached my final message as a youth pastor to our student ministry. I had the honor of introducing a new series we're doing on Proverbs called TED Talks (our TED stands for True & Essential Directions). My message was called "Wisdom or WiseDUMB" and I thoroughly enjoyed myself!

For my last message as a youth pastor, I chose to dispel three of the most popular messages that seem to be making their way off the Tik Tok feed and into the psyche of the masses today. These are what I believe to be the most damaging (and yet wise-sounding) pieces of bad advice currently dominating our culture:

1. Follow Your Heart

Few statements have been repeated more often in movies, songs, and books than this one. The idea is that life is a madhouse of opportunities and decisions but thankfully we’ve all been given this ultimate tool to navigate what’s right and wrong, good and bad, and even true or false, and that tool is our heart.

But here's the ugly truth: our hearts are the ROOT CAUSE of all the madness.

Jeremiah 17:9 tells us “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” So, not only will our hearts deceive us, they’ll confuse us! I'm sure you can relate. The reality is, most often when people refer to their "heart" they’re really talking about their feelings. Which means the “follow your heart” message essentially equates to “do what you feel.”

Now, just to be clear, I’m a feeler; at least that's what my Myers-Briggs assessment tells me. I come from the Pentecostal camp where feeling and emotion are among our core values (I'm joking... kinda). I believe emotions are an important part of our design and should be validated as well as considered in all aspects of life. However, feelings are horrible leaders.

I once heard someone say “emotions are like kids, they should never be allowed in the driver’s seat, but you also can’t put them in the trunk.” There’s a healthy balance to the role that our feelings play in our decision-making. No one actually needs to be instructed to follow their heart, that comes to us naturally. Everyone is, by default, following their heart, which is why Jesus came to liberate humanity from such captivity. The gospel calls us to STOP following our hearts and start following Jesus. Don’t do what FEELS right, do what IS right! By what standard do we judge what is right? The Word, not our hearts.

So, guard your heart. Surrender your heart. But don’t dare to follow your heart; that only contributes to the madness.

2. Do What Makes You Happy

Doing what you love for a living is a luxury and a privilege that very few in life have. Most people who get up every day doing what they love first learned how to love what they were doing. I think the reason this message can be so damaging is because it assumes a few things about our purpose.

First it assumes that the end goal of life is happiness. That’s a pretty low bar if you ask me. Happiness is an emotion, not a posture. You cannot be a well-rounded person if you seek to only be happy all the time. Solomon said as much when he wrote that there's a season for everything, including weeping. Jesus doubled down when He tells us that we’re blessed when we mourn. Life happens in the tension of extremes. We cannot know the satisfaction of happiness without experiencing the pain in sadness.

This message also assumes that the work we do is for our own benefit. We tend to have a very unhealthy view of work in general. It's not uncommon to hear people talk about the misery of their jobs. We're all guilty. Many are convinced that work is our punishment in life, dating all the way back to Genesis 3 when God disciplined Adam and Eve for their sin. But Adam’s punishment wasn’t labor, it was FRUITLESS labor. In other words, it was work that wouldn’t produce anything.

God gave Adam and Eve work long before the fall. Genesis 2:15 “The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.” Work is not our punishment, it’s our purpose. We’re called to produce, to serve, to be fruitful, even in our labor. It’s what we were built for and how we express glory and honor to God. You have a much greater opportunity to bring glory to God in your day to day job than you do the 30 minutes you sing worship songs on Sunday mornings. I would venture to say that how you work your job is a much sweeter song to the Lord and to those around you.

Your work is not about your happiness, it’s about your usefulness! Learn to love whatever is in front of you and to see it as a service to the Lord. If you can learn to do that, you will always do what makes you happy because you’ve learned to be happy with what you do.

Last one

3. Live Your Truth

The message here is that truth is relative to you. Another way this is often said is “Be true to yourself.” I can’t think of anything that contradicts the message of Christ more. Jesus’ invitation into discipleship BEGAN with this command in Luke 9:23, “If anyone wants to come after me, you must DENY yourself…” In other words, starve the ego.

This means that even in a post-modern world, truth is still objective. It can’t be found within the individual, it must be found outside of the individual. Truth is not a collectible and it’s not customizable. Two contradicting statements, beliefs, or philosophies cannot both be true. There is tension in truth. There are layers to truth. But there is no such thing as individual truth. We admit as much when we still allow judges and juries to rule over court cases and laws to be enforced in our land. Without objective truth, there can be no justice, no righteousness, and no wickedness.

Truth is what unites us as people and defines the reality that God set in order. It does not conform to us, but we must conform to it, which is why Jesus introduces Himself in John 14 as “the way, the truth, and the life.” Your life is governed by your beliefs. BELIEVING what is true means you will BE LIVING what is true. So who or what are you allowing to have the biggest influence in shaping your beliefs?

CONCLUSION

When Proverbs instructs us to turn our ear to the words of the wise, these are the kinds of things we must turn our ears from. The greatest hurdle to obtaining that which IS wise is settling for that which SOUNDS wise. This week, take stock of what your ear is tuned to and make sure that what you're grabbing isn't poison ivy. You'll be thankful in hindsight.