Striving for Wisdom

Striving for wisdom in our own efforts is an endeavor that inevitably ends in sorrow.

And I set my heart to know wisdom and to know madness and folly. I perceived that this also is grasping for the wind.

For in much wisdom is much grief,
And he who increases knowledge increases sorrow.

—Ecclesiastes 1:17-18

The wisdom that Solomon had been given was a gracious gift, it was not earned. It was a gift of God to and not at all a result of striving for it. Yet at some point in his life, it seems Solomon must have turned to striving instead of trusting.

Striving for wisdom in our own efforts is an endeavor that inevitably ends in sorrow.

While we certainly ought to apply ourselves to wisdom, turning it into a striving in our own strength will lead to vexation—an aimless grasping for wind. True wisdom cannot be gained apart from Christ, and without Christ there is only eternal grief, sorrow, and emptiness.

Let us return to the humility of Solomon’s early prayer: “I am a little child; I do not know how to go out or come in” (1 Kings 3:7). True wisdom is found in that kind of childlike faith that trusts in God and God alone.

But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption— that, as it is written, “He who glories, let him glory in the LORD.” (1 Corinthians 1:30-31)