TableTopics, a game every person should own. I played this game last Friday with a few close friends. One person reads the question on the card and everyone else answers. No winners or losers, just conversations. The card read, “Is it possible to live in the moment?” 
My strategy for this game is to say the first thing off the top of my head. Immediately, “Impossible, you can’t live in the moment. You will always be looking behind or ahead.” Over the next ten minutes, each other person refuted the impetuous answer. Many of us can look back to moments we lived in the present. I still have yet to forget that question and what it means to the way I see life.
Often, the wisdom we gain comes in unlikely places. This word conjures up images of carved statues leaning their heads on their hands, large books on a shelf, or a teacher lecturing in an Ivy League classroom.
I started reading the Book of Daniel from the Old Testament this morning. This book chronicles the lives of godly people thrown into a foreign land of Babylon. The writer twice mentions the acumen of wisdom and knowledge (Daniel 1:4, 17). Where do we see the application of wisdom? The young men of this first chapter alter the eating habits of the best and brightest of Babylon. Thoughtfully serving God by following His instructions on eating and tactfully gaining respect among their leaders.
Isn’t that the way wisdom looks in our lives? Rarely, do the moments of receiving and applying wisdom come in prepared and packaged opportunities. Unlikely characterizes this virtue, for example a game of TableTopics or a midst foreign land employing a diet contrary to your culture.
What does this mean? All to often we fail to listen to our life. Though we do not hear the audible voice of God, He often saves His best lessons in the everyday and mundane.
We experience wisdom when….
We rightly assess disappointment of being overlooked and responding with perseverance.
We actually listen to the oft suggestions in conversations instead of dismissing them.
We see the small graces of gratitude as opposed to the momentary frustrating detours.
We take conflicts with others as an opportunity to learn tact as opposed to lashing out at people.
You may find yourself today in receiving and applying wisdom from an unlikely place. These are the moment to step back and listen to your life.
Where have you experienced wisdom in an unlikely place?