Wisdom and Tact



Rand’s Reflections

August 28, 2011

Wisdom and Tact

Daniel found himself living in a foreign land not by his own choice. He was serving a despotic king that had destroyed his own people. When it seemed that God's favor had finally brought some sense of rest to his life circumstances, Daniel found his life in jeopardy for something he was not aware of. The king had a troubling dream, and he had the outrageous expectation that one the magicians, enchanters, sorcerers and astrologers in his land should be able to reveal his dream and interpret it at the same time. Pleading for mercy, they said that what the king expected of them was impossible for them to do. In a rage, the king ordered all the wise men in Babylon, and Daniel discovered this dilemma when an executioner came to take his life.

The Bible tells us in Daniel 2 that he spoke to this commander with “wisdom and tact,” and then Daniel went to the King and asked for more time. Daniel had confidence that God could reveal the king's dream and give the interpretation. He asks his friends to pray. God is faithful to reveal it. Daniel gives the interpretation of the dream to king Nebuchadnezzar. The dream speaks of future kingdoms that would rise and fall in the generations to come, but one day God would raise up an eternal kingdom that would be established not by human effort but by heavenly intervention. When the king hears his dream repeated and interpreted, he repents, fall prostrate before Daniel, and proclaims, “Surely, you God is the God of gods and the Lord of kinds and the revealer of mysteries, for you were able to reveal this mystery.”

I learn so much from Daniel's response in the face of this raging crisis. In whatever challenge I am facing at home or at work, I want to respond with “wisdom and tact.” I want to have the confidence that I am ultimately serving God. I am not a victim to my circumstances. I want to stand in faith and believe that God can do the impossible. I want to seek him in prayer with others around me. Above all of my temporal circumstances, I want to trust in the sovereignty of God. I want to have the eternal perspective that God sets up kingdom and deposes them, and the eternal kingdom that he has set up from the “rock cut out of the mountain” is the one that supersedes any kingdom of the earth.

Today, let your heart be confident in God's ability to transcend whatever circumstantial challenges you are facing. Believe that God can do the impossible. Trust in the eternal King and Kingdom that was revealed in advance to Daniel and that has now been revealed to us in Jesus the Christ. Turn your heart to God and ask God for the grace to respond to the world with “wisdom and tact.”

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