I grew up surrounded by adults who were often very smart, but not often very wise.
I saw the difference starkly when my volatile grandfather abruptly sold the home we lived in, the fall I turned 14. With little notice, my grandmother, 3 siblings and I found ourselves unhoused. My older brother and sister finished out the school year living with a nearby family from our church. My grandmother, younger brother and I landed with a couple we had never met before in a town 30 miles away.
They lived in a small frame house on a large country lot, surrounded by woods and hills. Jim worked on the highway, mowing berms in the summer, plowing snow in the winter. Hazel was an aide at a small daycare center.
It took a while for the sense of peace in their home to seep into my shattered heart. I was adjusting to a new school, abruptly cut off from friends, older siblings. Most of our belongings had been given away or put into storage. Yet there was a quiet, and welcome, and calm, in the Wilson's house that somehow counterbalanced the loss that landed us there.
It occurred to me, eating dinner every evening at their kitchen table, that I'd never lived in a household with adults who weren't somehow at war. And I'd never spent time with more than one adult without somehow being hammered with competing opinions.
At the Wilsons, conversation moved slowly, cheerfully. Questions were met with generous good humor. Decisions were made with plenty of space for any options or objections to be weighed.
Some things in their house were givens: everyone did chores. Everyone helped. Everyone spoke with respect and listened with care. But beyond that, there was plenty of room to think, and consider.
Jim and Hazel had never had children. At first I was puzzled by the diverse assortment of young adults, young families, unexpected visitors who would show up at odd times, often unannounced, some staying for dinner, some spending the night on the living room couch, or some just standing in the yard to talk awhile before heading off on their way. I soon learned: these were some of the teens Jim and Hazel had fostered over their decades of marriage. Some had returned to their own families. Some they had adopted. For all, the Wilson's home was an island of calm, peace, healing, wisdom.
Sometime in my teens, I stumbled on James 3:17 and 18. My first thought when I read it was "this is Hazel and Jim. This is who they are. This is why I love them":
But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy. And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace.
(King James Version)
By the time I read that passage the remains of our fragmented family had moved into the top floor of a two family house, just up the street from the small church the Wilsons attended. I saw them every Sunday morning and evening, and often on Wednesday evening for prayer meeting. They were a magnet for me and others. Their presence, the peace that surrounded them, filtered into every meeting they attended. I memorized that passage from James and carried it with me. When smart people I knew dismissed the Christian faith as nonsense, the Wilsons' wisdom was a weighty counter balance.
I've been seeking that kind of wisdom ever since, and watching for people who live it fully. Surrounded as we are by anger, division, judgmental opinions, competitive agendas, we need people like Jim and Hazel.
I'm not big on New Year's resolutions, but sometimes I find it helpful to carry a passage with me and use it as a screen for the swirl around me. So here are a few thoughts for the year ahead:
1. Listen more, argue less.
I've been struck lately at how much conversation feels like an attempt to lure me into argument. I don't have an opinion on everything. I don't want to duel over politics, theology, food, health. We can’t all be experts on every issue that confronts us, but we can take time to listen and learn before we voice opinions. If we haven’t taken time to look a little deeper, hear both sides of the story, understand the pros and cons, maybe we should ask questions and listen rather than repeat accusations that stir our anger but not our understanding.
"Rightness" is a list of dos and don'ts and a competitive duel to have the best answer. Righteousness is very different: a rich blending of justice, truth, compassion, kindness, wise governance, equitable economy. That one work deserves several posts of its own. I attempted one 2012 (Reconciling Righteousness) and again in 2013 (Hungering Far Past "Rightness")
The passage from James is worth memorizing and praying, for ourselves, our families, and for those in leadership in our churches, communities and nation. Pray that our homes and churches would be places of healing for people harmed by division and judgment. Pray that our national and church leaders would be peacemakers, full of mercy and good fruit. Pray that we ourselves would be magnets of grace for those weary of argument, anger and division.
But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy. Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace. (New King James Version)
