10 Dead flies will cause even a bottle of perfume to stink! Yes, a small mistake can outweigh much wisdom and honor. 2 A wise man’s heart leads him to do right, and a fool’s heart leads him to do evil. 3 You can identify a fool just by the way he walks down the street!
4 If the boss is angry with you, don’t quit! A quiet spirit will quiet his bad temper.
5 There is another evil I have seen as I have watched the world go by, a sad situation concerning kings and rulers: 6 For I have seen foolish men given great authority and rich men not given their rightful place of dignity! 7 I have even seen servants riding, while princes walk like servants!
Ecclesiastes 10:1-7, The Living Bible
Flip flops are those cheap rubber sandles with a divider between the toes. I think they got their name from the sound they make as you walk along. “Flip flop” can also refer to things being turned upside down and so resulting in the opposite of what was intended. The Teacher is still comparing wisdom and foolishness but showing how a little foolishness can flip flop a situation and overturn a wise plan. Beautiful perfume stinks because of dead flies. The perfume’s value is turned upside down. Today the Teacher adds verse 6 and remembers meeting a foolish man having authority while the rich man who has demonstrated his ability to handle money, is not honored. A servant rides a horse and a prince walks. That is a flip flop from what we would expect.
I suspect sometimes we think of a foolish person as a stupid person and a wise person as someone who is smart. But biblically these words are not related to IQ, intelligence. In verse 2 the Teacher defines wisdom as the person who follows what is right, what is revealed by God, and the fool chooses to follow evil, not following God’s leading, perhaps following the person’s own foolish desires. I suspect we all recognize the scenario. I know I shouldn’t eat that cake because of diabetes or weight but I convince myself I’ll exercise later or get back on the diet tomorrow. That is my sink hole but the decisions we make can be far more devastating and flip flop our lives. I think of those dating choices to be popular. Then we might be tempted to fudge on income tax returns but get called in to the IRS. Ooops. Those white lies which might seem innocent can bring disaster.
So what helps us be wise? What helps us to choose wise alternatives? Partly we have to ask ourselves if we are growing in our knowledge of God’s will or do we like to listen to others tell us what they think. Wise friends are always something to be valued. And then let me add the African proverb we learned on first arriving in Kenya, “Haraka, haraka, haina baraka.” Hurry, hurry has. no blessing. Lord, guard us from the tyranny of the urgent and help us to take a deep breath, sit back and choose your way as we make decisions today.
On the Way to Wonder 