For those who find me find life and receive favor from the Lord. But those who fail to find me harm themselves; all who hate me love death.
These are the last two verses of a long speech given by Lady Wisdom (:4-36). She has explained who she is (:6-21), where she’s been (:22-31) and what she could do for any of us who want her help (:4-5, 32-36).
Here she makes it clear that, while she is there and willing to help, we must want it and take the first step. “Those who find me” will benefit. They will “find life and receive favor from the LORD.”
“Life” and “favor from the LORD” sound like a pretty good place to be. Lady Wisdom says we can have it, if we will seek it.
But, the opposite is also true, if anyone “fail to find” Lady Wisdom they will only “harm themselves.” Admittedly, I suppose it’s possible that someone might try to find Wisdom but fail…yet, my guess is that they weren’t looking for real Wisdom, just wanted what they wanted.
At some point we simply must stop trying to run our own program! Most of us have enough experience to know that an unwillingness to go after God’s Wisdom, will cost us. In fact, if we don’t embrace Wisdom and all she has for us it could even kill us (“love death”)!
God has the most wonderful plan for each of our lives. We can access it all by accepting Wisdom as she really is – that is, learning to see life from God’s point of view (our definition of wisdom).