The Prospector
“collect my counsels and guard them with your life. searching for it like a prospector panning for gold, like an adventurer on a treasure hunt.”
In the mid 1800’s people moved west in search of gold. Why? Gold was free. Anybody could get it. But there were people who would pay a high price to have it. These people picked up their families and transplanted themselves to an unknown land for a shot at discovering gold.
Our culture is much like the gold-rush culture when it comes to knowledge. Knowledge and information is all around us. And it’s free to anyone who wants it. It’s easy to pick up a book, watch tv, listen to a message at church and just repeat the information. It’s easy to think we experience life change and we understand it and just move on. We’re rich in knowledge.
God communicates another idea. He is not concerned about how much knowledge we acquire or how much we know or what ideas from other people we can recite. God is all about the DISCOVERY PROCESS. The most important journey in life is the discovery of wisdom. Searching for it like a prospector searching for gold; like an explorer on some far off journey to discover a new land that he has only heard rumors of.
The discovery process is far more important. Archaeologists spend years learning, mapping, digging, sweating, studying - to make one discovery. That discovery is valuable to them because of the journey. It was worth their life’s work.
Communication doesn’t equal life change. Repeating someone else’s knowledge doesn’t lead to a changed heart. Our lives change when we travel to that far off place to search for treasure. When our lives are altered because of the trip. Because it was hard, because it was long, because we sweated a lot and studied for years and… finally… found it!
So… what kind of journey are you on?
What have you discovered so far?
October 11th, 2006 at 7:03 am
For quite some time I’ve said that the statement “knowledge is power” is completely false. The “Application of Knowledge - Wisdom - is power” is a far more accurate statement.
This was a great post.
What kind of journey am I on? I suppose you might say I’m learning that as I go.
What have I discovered so far? Where do I begin? I think more than anything, as I grow older, the more I realize how little I really know. And how much of that I actually apply is far less than I might suspect.
October 12th, 2006 at 7:19 am
WOW! You don’t know how much this post spoke to my heart. Thanks…