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Sermon Illustrations: Wisdom & Understanding

A man said to a pastor that he'd give him $10,000 if he'd say his brother Jim was an angel at his funeral. The pastor agreed. He got up to do the eulogy. "Jim was the most dishonest man in the town. He was foul-mouthed, a drunkard, and a lying cheating gambler. Nobody trusted him. He was always getting into fights, beat his wife and kids and never did anything nice for his family." The man was getting ready to jump up and shoot the pastor, when he said, "But compared to his brother Fred, he was an angel."

Human wisdom: "Albert Einstein remarked in 1932 that 'There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable' Thomas Edison thought alternating current would be a waste of time. Franklin Delano Roosevelt once predicted, when he was Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Navy, that airplanes would never be useful in battle against a fleet of ships. There's nothing like the passage of time to make the world's smartest people look like complete idiots. So let's look at a few more. In 1883 Lord Kelvin, president of the Royal Society and no mean scientist himself, predicted that 'X rays will prove to be a hoax.' When Gary Cooper turned down the Rhett Butler role in Gone With The Wind, he is said to have remarked, 'I'm just glad it will be Clark Gable who's falling flat on his face and not Gary Cooper.' 'Everything that can be invented, has been invented,' announced Charles H. Duell, commissioner of the U.S. Patents Office - in 1899." Time 25-10-04 p 47

I moved in next door to my son, who has trained his dog Wherewolf to fetch his morning newspaper from his driveway. He rewards the dog with a pat on the head and a biscuit. I give Wherewolf a pat on the head and two biscuits. Guess who gets to read the paper first? Reader's Digest July 2007 p 34 (For the sons of this world are more shrewd… Luke 16:8)

We all will have two teachers in life: the teacher of wisdom and the teacher of consequences.¹

A Boston man was entertaining a famous Chinese scholar. Barely giving his friend time to breathe, he rushed him to the subway saying, "If we can just catch this next train, we'll save ourselves three minutes." The scholar looked at him and asked, "And what significant thing will we do with the three minutes we are saving?"

1 Cordeiro, Wayne Attitudes That Attract Success p131