We’re So Smart

We’re so smart.

No one in our generation or the ones we’ve raised is going to buy snake oil, swamp land or magic beans.

We have Consumer Reports, government studies and Search engines.

We don’t fall for magic. In fact, we line up for shows featuring magicians who expose their tricks because we’re so smart we always know it’s a scam. We invented smoke and mirrors. We are all Penn and tellers.

Our generation was born with a back stage pass. We invented special effects, computer graphics, the green screen, myth busting and reality TV. We wink because we know the models are airbrushed, botoxed and surgically enhanced.

We are skeptics, cynics, agnostics, investigative reporters and we would even put Little Red Riding Hood in an interrogation room – no one’s THAT good – she probably approached the wolf – planned the whole caper – check out Grandma’s insurance policy – we’ve got you now, Missy and whatever you’re carrying in that basket of goodies!

Yeah, we’re so smart. We don’t fall for nothin’.

We’re wise to Puff the Magic Dragon, we know why Lucy’s in the sky with diamonds and we’re not following any yellow brick road because the our government has confiscated the poppy fields for medicinal purposes with our approval.

Don’t bother to yank back the curtain on Oz ‘cause we weren’t coming to see him in the first place. We’ve always known that we had the answers deep within us.

None of our fairy tales have happy endings and if you can’t deal with that, well, that’s all right. We love you, man. What’s true for us might not be true for you. Peace, out.

And in the church, we’re even smarter.

We’ve got the book that holds the secrets, reveals the ending, spells out the future and explains the past. We’ve got prophesies, praise songs and demographic research to bolster our five-year plans for winning the downtown area for Christ. We’re no fools.

We read the Bible in a year, do devotionals in a minute and we’re reinventing church with coffee bars, PayPal and high graphic websites. Our leaders know how to Facebook, blog, twitter and text so we never have to worry that we’re out of touch.

We’re so smart.

We know how to send, spend and trend without falling for the schemes of the evil one. We don’t buy Bibles off the back of a truck. And when we send someone over they know the lingo, the culture, the worldview and the current political vibe. They go prepared to fill bellies and feed souls while respecting the locals and immersing themselves in the water and the people and the Spirit without getting lost themselves. Like the church’s version of Jack Bauer on 24, our people know how to go undercover, deep undercover and penetrate enemy lines all while staying loyal to the home team.

We’re so smart.

You know who else was smart? Joshua and the gang. When the Israelites came out of their forty year wilderness wander, the generation that grew up there knew what was what.

They’d seen the pillar and the fire of God. They’d had manna from heaven and water from rocks. They had the law and they lived with prophets. They’d seen the ground open up and swallow those who rebelled and they buried their disobedient parents before they were allowed to fight their way into the Promised Land. This was a generation that knew a few things.

But in Joshua chapter nine, God records that a bunch of backwoods locals from the hills pull the wool right over the eyes of the leaders of Israel. It wasn’t even a brilliant plan.

What was the downfall of the leaders who were so smart? Joshua 9:14: “The men of Israel sampled their provisions but they did not inquire of the Lord.”

So they are hoodwinked by the Gibeonites. Why? Because they did not inquire of the Lord.

They were so smart.

So it reminded me to remember that our enemy is a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. He was a deceiver from the very beginning. He is the father of lies.

“Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you.” James 4: 7-8b

Smart is good.

Better to be wise.

Best to stay close to the Shepherd and learn what it means to inquire of Him – every time.