Don’t Be a Fool

To walk according to wisdom, we must first walk circumspectly (Ephesians 5:15a).

Second, we must not be  fools: not as fools . . . Wherefore be ye not unwise (v. 15b, 17a). It seems obvious, but Paul mentions it anyway, that to be wise, we must not act like fools. In disastrous contrast to the Believer who walks carefully and examines everything, there is the “fool” who examines nothing and easily believes most anything. The full idea behind the Greek for fools (asophos) is “without any spiritual wisdom whatsoever, no discernment, no accuracy, no precision, no exactness.” This again challenges today’s lack of knowledge and discernment in the Church. How much unwise teaching there is!

But how interesting it is that Paul is not done dealing with the fool. In verse 17, he says again, Wherefore be ye not unwise. The full meaning of the Greek for unwise (aphron) is “one who can’t think straight or correctly and can’t control his thoughts and attitudes.” As 19^th Century Greek scholar Joseph Thayer defines it, “Without reason . . . senseless, foolish, stupid, without reflection or intelligence, acting rashly.” In Luke 11:40, the Lord Jesus calls the Pharisees “fools” because they thought doing something external would satisfy God. Nothing is more foolish than thinking that a Holy God could be satisfied by any works a man could do.

When we stop and really ponder the growing trends of our day, we find that today’s “fool” can be described in three ways.

First, the fool is concerned about the abstract instead of the absolute. Facts are really not important today. In fact, they get in the way and disrupt unity. After all, it is argued, doctrine divides, love unites. Truth is relative to each person’s point of view. The more abstract, the more “open,” the more broad we are, the more people we will appeal to. This is the height of folly because nothing is absolute, nothing is sure.

Second, the fool is concerned about wants instead of the Word. Most churches being built today, both liberal and evangelical, are not being founded on a ministry of the Word of God, rather upon what people want. To build one of the most famous and largest churches in America, one “pastor” did a survey in the community to ask people what they wanted in a church and then he supplied it, from entertainment to every appealing program imaginable. Where is that method to church building revealed in Scripture? Rather, that approach comes from the popular notion that the Church is to appeal to the “unchurched” and to “seekers.” But where does the New Testament teach that? The answer is: It doesn’t. It’s as simple as that. Scripture alone simply is neither the foundation nor the emphasis.

Third, the fool is concerned about feelings instead of faith. True faith must have an object, and that object must be Christ and his Word. Today, however, feelings drive people’s belief system. Whether they are voting for a political candidate, looking for a church, or accepting a new teaching, it’s all based on feelings. Facts aren’t the issue, faith in what God says in His Word is not the issue, rather how it makes them feel is the issue. It’s not the intellect that rules, rather it’s an impulse that rules. There is great zeal, but nothing real. This has even kicked open the door to the growing frequency of mysticism, which teaches finding God through visions and revelations.

All this reveals a total lack of any spiritual wisdom whatsoever (asophos) and reveals that which is without reason, senseless, without reflection or intelligence (aphron). As we’ll see later, the only way to avoid being foolish is to “[understand] what the will of the Lord is.”