Honest About Our Understanding

I just finished watching The Unit, a fictional drama on the Army's Delta Force operatives, and Sergeant Major Jonas Blane is my current standard for manliness. Not only does he come up with the right quote for the situation, all without ever having a book in sight, but he seems to be able to apply his knowledge to come up with the perfect plan for the most pressure-packed situation.

An episode in the show's fourth and final season put this capacity to the test. Our team of heroes was actually in the air on the way to a crisis without a plan in place for how to handle it. Jonas leaned his head back, closes his eyes, and opens them with an announcement that he has an inspiration. Not taking his own wisdom too seriously, he says before delving into the plan, You know what inspiration is? A momentary cessation of stupidity."

Deputy Communications Director Sam Seaborn on my usual favorite show The West Wing also works in a high-pressure hothouse of self-sufficiency, but he is equally candid about human limitations. When accused of playing dumb, admits he IS dumb. Confesses Sam, " Most of the time, I'm playing smart."

Surely the Bible has a higher evaluation of human understanding. It's the person who believes there is no God, the believer quotes Psalm 14:1 proudly, who believes in his heart there is no God. After we move into theism, we get some kind of a bump in our status, right? Perhaps Jonas's evaluation that sensations of stupidity are only momentary is closer to the biblical Truth that we are in our prideful moments. The same Psalm 14 text we quote for our Spiritual Discernment merit badge before people goes on to say over the next two verses, "There is none who does good." The Lord's search for anyone with understanding reveals we have all turned aside. Our sensations of stupidity are exceptional and momentary, indeed.

Looking at our record, and the human record, honestly, we arrive at Proverbs 3:5 with less of a begrudging protest when it advises, "Trust the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding." We are not, as it turns out, being deprived of something that has served us all that well. If we kept an objective account, as Jonas does, of how often our understanding fails us, our prayers for help would be more passionate. Correspondingly, our scolding of self or others when understanding's limits are revealed, again, would be less bitter and loud. We have, after all, been here before, and we will be here again. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. As the Christian group 4Him intones in "The Basics of Life," "I'm not playing playground games. I'm not reading Dick and Jane. And I don't need a pass walk the halls. I graduated in my faith and I've still barely pushed the gate that opens to the one true know it all."

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