If you have been foolish in exalting yourself or
if you have plotted evil,
put your hand on your mouth.

Proverbs 30:32

Closing in on the finish line for this 31 Days adventure into the Fool’s Box and I am exhausted! In a good way! It’s like when you finish a day of yard work or garden work. You know you’re gonna be sore the next day and your sweaty and dirty, but proud (in a good way) of the work you’ve been able to accomplish. This is especially true of us old folks! 

So, it has been for me in studying what God says about fools, not just in Proverbs but our search has taken us throughout the Scriptures. There’s been digging around the Bible and searching commentaries and checking out Hebrew words and definitions. All things I enjoy doing and I am thankful for God’s guidance and teaching in all of it. But, emotionally, it has been taxing. I didn’t realize just how ignorant I was about fools and folly and foolishness. Nor did I fully understand God’s no-nonsense approach to fools and their foolishness. 

Now I know and so do you if you have hung with me these 31 Days. We are without excuse!

It is basically a zero-tolerance policy on God’s part when it comes to fools and foolish thoughts, words and behavior. The reason being God did not design us to be fools. God designed us with an amazing capacity for wisdom and understanding and knowledge and discernment and so much more! Even in our fallen state in these mortal bodies, God has given us the framework of our astounding minds, a refined emotional facility and an intricate physical body. 

I am not speaking of those who are born with mental limitations or because of injury  and sickness to the brain, find themselves not as capable mentally as the average person. In fact, if you actually know someone who fits this description, you know they are amazing! They engage every part of their being every day to the best of their ability. How many of us can say that? I know I can’t. There are so many areas in my life that I am just down right lazy compared to my ancestors just 100 years ago! The “modern” society I have grown up with fosters laziness, indifference and giving up.

That is not how God made me! I’ve chosen to live within those types of frameworks for much of my life. It’s not that I haven’t accomplished anything or that I haven’t contributed to my family, etc… But, can I say that I have lived up to my full potential for God’s glory? Oh, how I wish I could, but I can’t. I could teach a master class on taking the path of least resistance. Not proud of that. 65-year-old me cannot go back and undo those less than stellar seasons of my life and thankfully God is full of compassion; the Great Restorer, Who has never given on up on me even when I’ve been foolish. 

I knew when I embarked on these 31 Days in Proverbs studies that I should not stay the same as I was back on the first of January. But, I did not think it was going to be about being foolish. God knew and His lessons in these 31 Days have been hard, intense, but so very needed!  PTL!

Satan and my own negative self-talk want me to stay and wallow is these unpleasant revelations about myself. But that is NOT God! So! Onward! I hope you will join me with anticipation of how God is going to move in our lives and increase the scope and impact of our circles as we journey through the next 31 Days. 

Hebrew 12:1

Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us;