Foolish Or Wise Woman...Which Are You

Whether you are a CEO, CFO, or the CH (chief homemaker), to be successful in any capacity takes wisdom and preparation. Let’s take a moment to examine what it means to be a foolish or wise woman…

From the book “Living Your Best Faith”:

Living Your Best Faith is acknowledging what kind of woman you want to be. Women can be summed up in two words, ‘Foolish’ or ‘Wise’.?Our approach, mindset, and lifestyle reveal what type of woman we have sought to be. To understand the reason for this statement we must take a spiritual magnifying glass and examine the parable of the 10 Virgins, 10 oil lamps, a feast, and a bridegroom.

?Matthew 25:1-13- “Then the Kingdom of Heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were???foolish, and five were wise. Those who were foolish, when they took their lamps, took no oil with them,?but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. Now while the bridegroom delayed, they all slumbered and slept. But at midnight there was a cry, ‘Behold! The bridegroom is coming! Come out to meet him!’ Then all those virgins arose, and trimmed their lamps. The foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ But the wise answered, saying, ‘What if there isn’t enough for us and you? You go???rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves.’?While they went away to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the???wedding feast, and the door was shut. Afterward the other virgins also came, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open to us.’ But he answered, ‘Most certainly I tell you, I don’t know you.’?Watch therefore, for you don’t know the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming.”

?Here we see a big-time girl’s night out. This girl’s night out was special, it had purpose and expectation. The purpose was to journey to meet the Bridegroom, and the expectation was to participate in the feast. We see these 10 women embarking on the same journey expecting the same results. Both groups knew that the bridegroom was coming, they also knew that the feast would be taking place, this said these 10 women according to the information given were the same in all respects accept two, their mentality and their preparation. It is here that we see the women differ in a great way.

?“Then the Kingdom of Heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish, and five were wise. Those who were foolish, when they took their lamps, took no oil with them, but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.” Matthew 25:1-4

?Right off the bat we see that one group of women are described as ‘foolish’. Notice the description of these women wasn’t that they made a foolish choice. No, they were described as being foolish. Let’s use that spiritual magnifying glass to examine the word foolish. Foolish is defined by the Oxford Dictionary as: (of a person or action) lacking good sense or judgment; unwise. The Word of God also gives us clear examples of a foolish person:

Psalm 14:1- “The fool says in his heart, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds...”

Proverbs 18:2 – “A fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing his opinion.”

Proverbs 12:15 –“The way of a fool is right in his own eyes…”

Proverbs 18:7- “A fool's mouth is his ruin, and his lips are a snare to his soul.”

Proverbs 10:23- “Doing wrong is like a joke to a fool…”

Matthew 7:26-“And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand.”

Luke 14:28 -For which of you, desiring to build a tower, doesn’t first sit down and count the cost, to see if he has enough to complete it?

?The type of foolish woman described in the parable of Matthew 25:1-4 is more than the woman who makes an occasional poor choice. This is a foolish mindset, mentality, a lifestyle. The foolish woman is a woman with a blatant?disregard for the wisdom, principals, and the commandments of God. The verses that we’ve read above give a clear picture of what a foolish woman looks like. She is a woman who through her words says she loves the Lord but through her actions says there is no God; It’s the woman who only seeks to please herself and her own desires; It’s that woman who is her own worst enemy by being self-destructive; It’s the woman who doesn’t think through the cost of her?decisions; It’s that woman who does ‘Whatever’ to live the lifestyle she desires to live; And it’s the woman who sees herself as nickel slick and everyone else as just a pawn in her schemes. These are just a few examples of a foolish woman.

?The five foolish women in the parable were foolish for all the above reasons and one more, they were satisfied with just getting by on ‘good enough’. See, the fool sets out in her heart to just be good enough not realizing that her ‘good enough’ much like the five foolish women in our parable just doesn’t cut it, and here’s why. Although the five foolish women knew the bridegroom was coming, understood the importance of the evening, and even knew that they needed to be present in order to be admitted to the bridal feast, knowing all of this they still chose to leave on this most incredible journey with ‘just good enough’.

?What’s even more shocking is that both groups set out on the same road, but at no time do we see the foolish women even trying to learn from the wise women so that they too could be prepared for whatever they might encounter while they waited. And hold on to your hat for this one ladies, the scripture says ‘the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps’, so this tells us the foolish women could see that the wise women carried with them additional oil and even then they still decided to remain in their foolishness.?

This is so true for women today. God in His Word tells us how to live life, how to get victory, how to use the power of the Holy Spirit, and even sends truth to us through His Son and many of us still choose to live in our foolishness. The wise women weren’t better or had better opportunity than the foolish women. They only had a wise mindset and lifestyle.?You see, the foolish women were unprepared to meet their purpose. The thing to understand here is that the purpose was coming whether or not the foolish women were prepared to meet it. The spiritual purposes that are sent in our lives when we least expect them are?coming. You know, those God ordained moments, those intersections of truth and revelation of faith are going to happen whether or not we are foolish or wise. The deal is the wise woman prepares for her spiritual purpose and seeks to live her life in a way that keeps her spiritually prepared to meet those?moments.

?Okay ladies, here’s where it gets painful…

?“But at midnight there was a cry, ‘Behold! The bridegroom is coming! Come out to meet him!’ Then all those virgins arose, and trimmed their lamps. The foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’ But the wise answered, saying, ‘What if there isn’t enough for us and you? You go?rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves.’”-Matthew 25:6-9 This is???painful because it reminds us that there will be many who will miss the wedding feast. Those that have lived their lives with a foolish mentality of living for??themselves instead of for Christ, and when the Bridegroom (Jesus) comes they are not ready, and they are locked out of Heaven for all eternity.

There is also something else to be gleaned from looking at the mistakes of the foolish woman. First let’s start by understanding some basic truths about??women, God created us to have a loving, nurturing, helping, influential, problem solving, insightful, gentle, supportive, and quiet nature, it’s part of our womanhood. This womanly nature is not weakness as society would have you think, but instead it is the nature given to us by God. This nature is essential in being good wives and mothers. Okay, okay I understand not all of us are?married or have children, but remember in the original game plan (Adam & Eve) that’s what we were to have been. That said, when sin entered the picture, we began to use our womanly nature improperly. We started to turn love into??obsession, nurturing into fixing, influential into manipulation, problem solving into perfection, supportive into co-dependency, insightful into fear, gentle into overbearing, and a quiet spirit into diva-ness. This is a direct result of using the nature God gave us through our humanness instead of being fueled and?powered by the Holy Spirit.

?When we read Matthew 25:6-9 we see five wise women not getting distracted from their purpose. We’ve gotta understand that in our humanness we fall into the improper nature of our womanhood. It is than that we can be easily distracted and begin to look to ourselves to fix the situation. The fact is, when we read the text we see that it could have been easy for these five wise women to say ‘sure take half of my oil’, not realizing in doing so both sets of women would be locked out of their purpose. But these wise women where wise enough to have good judgement (discernment). They understood that they needed to stay on the path of their purpose. Their purpose being to be ready to meet and dine with the bridegroom when he arrived. Their purpose was not to supply oil to the foolish women. This is key because many times in our lives when life happens it causes us to lose focus of our true purpose and ?concentrate on that which has no eternal value. We can be so distracted by trying to fix things that we lose focus of what our true spiritual purpose is.

SIDE NOTE: In no way am I saying that we shouldn’t do all we can to help others. Helping people is a command by God, “But whoever has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, then closes his heart of compassion against him, how does God’s love remain in him?”- John 3:17, this verse helps us see that helping people is what God calls us to do. However, fixing people was never part of God’s plan for the woman’s life, that’s His job. “I will also give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you. I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh.”- Ezekiel 36:26. "Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. - Philippians 2:4??These verses are clear we are to help others. But understand we help, God fixes. Okay, back to our study devotional.?

?The wise women offered help that wouldn’t deter them from their purpose… “You go rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves.” Living Your Best Faith is an individual choice and responsibility. This means that we can’t be like the foolish women relying on others to prepare us for intimacy with Christ. No, we have to take the bull by the horns understanding that we have to seek Christ for ourselves, and His transformation of our character.

Just as being foolish is a mindset, mentality, a lifestyle, so is being wise:

“But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceful, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy.” - James 3:17

“The fear of Yahweh is the beginning of knowledge...”- Proverbs 1:7

“Therefore watch carefully how you walk, not as unwise, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil...”- Ephesians 5:15-17

“The heart of the discerning gets knowledge. The ear of the wise seeks knowledge.”- Proverbs 18:15

“So teach us to count our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.”- Psalm 90:12

?“Through wisdom a house is built; by understanding it is established; by knowledge the rooms are filled with all rare and beautiful treasure. A wise man has great power; and a knowledgeable man increases strength; for by wise?guidance you wage your war; and victory is in many advisors. Wisdom is too high for a fool. He doesn’t open his mouth in the gate.” - Proverbs 24:3-7

Being wise is using good judgment, using our life experience and spiritual sensibility to walk soundly with Christ.??In other words my sister, as Christ brings us through some stuff, gives us victory, and grows us up, we can choose to trust God to bring our hearts closer to Him and grant us understanding of living a deeper faith through Him.?

?In life we sometimes confuse being smart with being wise, they are absolutely not the same thing. A smart woman is a woman that is considered smart as it relates to the world’s sense of what smart and successful.?But a wise woman is defined as wise through her relationship with Christ Jesus. In plain English this means that when by all accounts her situation and/or circumstance should have caused her to be knocked off her faith foundation, her experience of Who God is, her knowledge of what He can do in her life, having the good judgement to seek Christ in her worst storm, and sensibly getting in the Word of God to give her a blueprint to life causes her to have true wisdom.?The Bible says that God gives us knowledge,?understanding, and wisdom. “For Yahweh gives wisdom. Out of his mouth comes knowledge and understanding” - Proverbs 2:6 Lets us know that when we are?living a life that does not include God and His Word it is impossible to have true wisdom.

?The 10 women in our parable would be considered smart and brave by the world’s standards of today. Here we have 10 Virgins leaving their homes to go out to meet the bridegroom using their own resources to get them through the??evening until the bridegroom arrives. The problem is the foolish group relied on their own wits, what they thought they needed for the evening to get them through and help them prepare to meet the bridegroom. But when the?bridegroom didn’t arrive at the time they thought he should, all their knowledge,?understanding, and smarts didn’t serve them well in that moment. See, these are the women who don’t get their breakthrough when they think they should, they haven’t had their prayers answered in the timeframe they had in their mind, or life just knocks them flat on their butt, it is in those moments that they realize that relying on their own strength, knowledge, understanding, and wisdom doesn’t work. These are the women that think they have to rely on themselves for?everything in their lives.

But the wise group used preparation to be sure that they would have enough resources to keep them and prepare them the meet the bridegroom when He arrived. Our Christian faith is just like these 10 women. When we rely on our own ability to get us through life, to keep us, grow us, and mature our faith until Jesus’ return, we are much like the five foolish women, ill equipped. But when we are setting our foundation, our strength, knowledge, understanding, and spiritual preparation grounded in Christ we will be able to be sustained until the?????bridegroom Jesus returns for His bride the church.

It’s time to bring this whole thing together:

In this parable we can see the night as our walk with Christ

The lamp as our spirit

The oil as God’s Word

The Bridegroom as Jesus

The Wedding Feast as Heaven

and the statement “get your own oil” as Salvation.

“While they went away to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding feast, and the door was shut. Afterward the other virgins also came, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open to us.’ But he answered, ‘Most certainly I tell you, I don’t know you.’ Watch therefore, for you don’t know the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming.” – Matthew 25:10-13

Wow, this is heartbreaking. While these five foolish women were distracted by life, unprepared for their journey, and trying to get it together at the last?????minute, they missed their purpose. They hadn’t prepared to meet the destiny that God had prepared for them. In missing their calling the Bridegroom didn’t even recognize them as part of the Wedding party. For he was looking for the Virgins who were at their appointed place at the appointed time.

Listen ladies, if we are not being wise in filling our lamps completely and just think of ourselves as smart to God’s Word, we are being foolish. We don’t want to miss the bridegroom and get locked out of the feast because of our lack of spiritual oil. The amount of oil we have in our lamps is what will sustain us while we await the Bridegroom. Listen, it is wonderful to be a spiritually smart????woman, knowing the Bible in and out. But a wise woman gets God’s Word deep within her spirit. She fills her spiritual lamp with the oil of God’s Word so that she can be sustained in the darkness until the Bridegroom Jesus comes.

If you are reading this and find yourself saying I’ve never really let God’s Word penetrate my spirit. I’ve been just getting by on ‘good enough’, I’m in the category of the foolish woman, don’t lose heart. God in His goodness does not call any of us to linger in our foolishness, He always gives us a way to become wise…“But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.” - James 1:5

So, here’s the deal, making a foolish choice is something that we all do from time to time, but living a foolish lifestyle is being a foolish woman. And the cure for the foolish woman is God’s Wisdom. Reading the Bible is great but letting the Word of God transform you is how you Live Your Best Faith. "This is the end of the matter. All has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments; for this is the whole duty of man."-Ecclesiastes 12:13??"He has shown you, O man, what is good. What does Yahweh require of you, but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?" - Micah 6:8

Wisdom allows the Christian woman to see her faults and seek Christ to change her thinking, that she may be more and more transformed into Living Her Best Faith.