Starting Now: College Is Hard. This Can Help.Sample

Freedom 

What did you think college would be like? Maybe you imagined…

No curfew.
No one asking where you’re going or where you’ve been.
No one telling you to clean your room.
No getting grounded, yelled at, or lectured.

Perhaps that’s life for you already, but if not, that’s what’s coming. Soon, if not now, you’ll have control over your decisions. In that, you have much in common with King Solomon. (Okay, maybe you’re not the king, you don’t have a palace and heaps of gold, and no one’s telling you you’re messing up. But you do have freedom. So let’s go with that.)

It’s from this place of freedom and control that Solomon identified the most important thing to chase, the thing we need most: wisdom. Why? Because wisdom protects. 

Growing up royal, Solomon understood something you may be learning. Freedom is tricky. Although kings had the freedom to do what they wanted, they didn’t always make decisions in the best interests of their country—or for themselves—long-term. They, and their people, paid a price for unwise decisions. That’s what wisdom is all about: knowing what’s good for you, and those around you, both now and later. It’s the key to mature decision-making as an adult.

When you were a kid, you may have had a single criteria for making decisions: Will I get in trouble? Not a bad question. But when you have freedom to make any choice you want, when you become a mature adult, you need a better standard than that. You need a better question. And that question is: Is it wise? 

Solomon spent his life discovering and writing answers to that question because he knew he’d face countless situations with complicated circumstances and heavy outcomes. 

Chances are, Solomon understood something else about freedom: it isn’t guaranteed, even for kings. Decisions we make with freedom now will almost always determine how much freedom we have later. Wisdom, as Solomon said, protects. And in many cases, wisdom protects freedom. When you develop the ability to make wise decisions, you’ll find yourself with more opportunity, more choices, and even more control over your life than you have now.

• What’s a decision you’re facing for which you know you need wisdom?
• In what areas of life are you making decisions based on avoiding trouble?
• What would it look like for you to chase wisdom in those areas instead of just avoiding getting into trouble?