The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.
Proverbs 1:7

My kids do not get in trouble for saying stupid in my home, even though that same word landed me in hot water plenty of times growing up. To be fair to my parents, my use of the word stupid was usually to summarize the very existence of a sibling. My bad.

But I do not have a problem with the word stupid itself. Sure, using it can be the expression of a meanspirited, judgmental heart. But it can also be evidence of a discerning, wise heart. In fact, identifying stupidity is an essential tool of wisdom. “Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge, but he who hates reproof is stupid” (Prov 12:1). There it is in Scripture. The ability to recognize something stupid as stupid is pretty important in a culture like ours.

Stupidity is the inability to understand how things work in the real world. To put that in the more explicitly covenantal language of Scripture, it is the refusal to acknowledge that the world works according to the good design of God, who is himself the majestic source of all goodness. In short, stupidity prefers to seek the good in the world apart from its source, resulting in a person misusing the good in ways that do not correspond to reality as God made it.

Stupidity is not really about the intelligence of someone’s brain but rather the affections of someone’s heart. But stupidity is being attracted to good without God, while wisdom is being attracted to good from God. The voices that surround us in culture will present one type of good or another. So, this is a vital insight for parents training a child to live wisely in any culture. I want my children to be able to spot stupid.

The War on Wisdom is a Thousand Battles of Opposing Loves

The war on wisdom in our culture is a war of attractions as much as it is a war of ideas. It is a war of who has the right to call something true or false, good or bad, smart or stupid. The truth claims of any culture are not stripped-down logical statements meant for merely rational analysis. No, truth claims always come decorated. They are presented as attractive.

The wisdom literature of Scripture, particularly the Book of Proverbs, conveys this. One of the main metaphors of Proverbs is an ongoing contrast between two ladies. Lady Folly and Lady Wisdom are personifications of two kinds of beauty. Both are lively and attractive. Both seek out young men, calling to them with strong voices in the bustle of daily life. “Wisdom cries aloud in the street, in the markets she raises her voice” (Prov 1:20). But so does Lady Folly, for “she is loud and wayward; her feet do not stay at home; now in the street, now in the market, and at every corner she lies in wait” (Prov 7:11–12).

Welcome to life in the streets and marketplaces. Welcome to life in any culture. Culture is a collective understanding of what is beautiful and normal versus what is ugly and odd. Culture is a cacophony of voices testifying to what is true or false, what is reliable or ridiculous. These two ladies comprise an extended metaphor for how young people living in this world will have opposing voices calling to them constantly, each beckoning them to a differing outlook on what is beautiful and true.

Both ladies present themselves to be loved. Lady Wisdom says, “I love those who love me, and those who seek me diligently find me” (Prov 8:17). But Lady Folly beckons similarly, “Come, let us take our fill of love till morning; let us delight ourselves with love” (Prov 7:18). Both of these ladies present themselves attractively. They give a vision for what is desirable and good.

One invites them to true beauty, the other to false beauty. One offers life that ends up being truly life; the other offers life that ends up being truly death. One invites them into reality as God designed it, the other into a fantasy contrary to God’s design.

The trouble is, how can young people tell the difference? This is every culture’s war on wisdom. And if we are honest with ourselves and realistic about our children, we will admit that it is a war within our own hearts, too. Our hearts tend to love opposing things—some wise and some foolish. We feel divided in our love. Inside each of our hearts is a standing disagreement about what is beautiful.

Culture Often Presents Foolishness as Attractive and Wisdom as Repulsive

The cultural war around us is a fight for who gets to convince you of what is beautiful. When this war hits close to home, we are painfully reminded that this war is not theoretical. It is not two unseen clouds of ideas warring with one another somewhere over California. It is not some closed-door meeting between rival philosophies somewhere in New York City to divide up territories. No, the culture war is a marketplace of voices making claims about what is true and beautiful and, therefore, what is stupid and ugly. And these voices speak directly to us to our children.

Lady Folly is pretty crafty in how she expresses foolishness through the countless voices that make up any culture. Her voice has a pull and a push to it. She makes foolishness alluring and wisdom repulsive.

Folly uses her voice to pull your heart toward foolishness. “For the lips of a forbidden woman drip honey, and her speech is smoother than oil” (Prov 5:3). In the ancient world, you do not get sweeter than honey, and you do not get softer than oil. Lady Folly uses her voice to seek out the simple, using a number of tactics to attract them—flattering them with attention (7:14–15), promising them pleasure (7:16–18), and assuring them of privacy (7:19–20). The simple go along, their affections being warped and diminished so they can see only foolishness as beautiful.

Folly uses her voice to push your heart away from wisdom, too. She makes wisdom seem repulsive, even stupid. “How long will scoffers delight in their scoffing and fools hate knowledge?” (Prov 1:22). Those charmed by Lady Folly will be repulsed by what God calls beautiful. They will hate knowledge, not choose the fear of the Lord, have nothing to do with wise counsel, and despise wisdom’s reproof (1:29–31). Those who listen to her see foolishness as beautiful and true and, therefore, find wisdom ugly and stupid.

Scripture Presents Wisdom as Attractive and Foolishness as Repulsive

Scripture never presents the contrast between folly and wisdom as a contrast of pleasure and pain, as if foolishness makes for a fun life and righteousness makes for a boring life. No, it is a contrast of pleasures. Wisdom is presented again and again not as the unfortunate price of being righteous before God but rather as the means of gaining true joy and pleasure. Wisdom’s voice also has a pull and a push to it.

Wisdom uses her voice to pull your heart toward beauty. In fact, wisdom is presented as the means of gaining personal beauty and honor like a garland for your head and pendants for your neck (Prov 1:9), as hidden treasures of silver and gold (2:4–5), as pleasing to the soul (2:10), adding length of days and peacefulness to life (3:1–2). Power and enduring wealth are with her alone (8:15–21). In fact, “She is more precious than jewels, and nothing you desire can compare with her” (3:15). Lady Wisdom is rich and beautiful, able to deliver on the promise of attraction.

Wisdom also uses her voice to push your heart away from foolishness. She tells it like it is about Lady Folly: She is ugly and repulsive. Though her lips are sweet like honey and her words are smooth like oil, she has got a knife. Instead of leading a person to life, she leads him to death (Prov 5:3–6). She is a merciless stranger who does not give but only takes. She will not bring moans of pleasure but groans of pain. She brings catastrophe and ruin (5:7–14). In the end, following one’s attraction to foolishness will cost a person his life (7:23).

Attraction is a Kind of Promise. Whose Promise Will You Trust?

Why does Scripture use two ladies calling out as a metaphor for this battle? Their voice is their most powerful instrument of attraction. They both speak promises. Lady Folly promises her kind of beauty. Lady Wisdom promises hers. Attraction is really a kind of promise.

The question for every person living before God in any culture is simply this: Whose promise will you trust?

This is how it has always been for people living in the world. Adam and Eve had the choice to believe what God said about the beauty of life in God’s world or to believe what the Evil One said about the same topic (Gen 1:28–3:24). Adam and Eve threw the world into tumult and decay by believing the wrong promise. Our children throw their lives into tumult and decay by doing the same. Just like their parents. All the way back. In any culture, in any age, this is the question—which promise of goodness is reliable?

Parents should teach children to distinguish between whether the voice they are hearing is Wisdom or Folly calling out to them. Here is a tool. As they listen to the countless voices around them—friendships at school or online, influencers on social media, advice in magazines, stories in shows and movies—they can ask a simple set of questions.

What promise is this voice attracting me to?
And does it sound more like wisdom or of folly?

Here are a few examples of different voices calling out in our culture. The brain rot of endless scrolling on social media promises distraction, making genuine rest seem dull. The latest outrage on this political issue promises the self-satisfaction of being right, making the virtue of real service to others seem unnecessary. The latest health crazes promise new levels of well-being, making regular old discipline seem ineffective. Male podcasters having explicit conversations or female influencers selling sexualized content promise pleasure or wealth or relational desirability, making modesty and sincerity seem lame and lonely. All these voices have a pull and a push. They pull by making different forms of foolishness seem attractive. They push by making different forms of righteousness seem stupid.

With so many strong voices bouncing around our headspace, what hope is there?

Wisdom is Not Earned but Given.

A voice that preceded every culture still calls out. And that voice is stronger than the cacophony of all the rest. Wisdom says, “The Lord possessed me at the beginning of his work, the first of his acts of old. Ages ago I was set up, at the first, before the beginning of the earth” (Prov 8:22–23).

Wisdom is no lady. Lady Wisdom is only a literary device to make a larger point: God alone is wise, and he still uses his voice to call out to the children of man. And when God calls, we are changed. This is the gospel. Because of God’s act upon us, our hearts are transformed to love wisdom. And we find out that wisdom is not a what, but a Who. “And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption” (1 Cor 1:30).

Culture will always fail our children. We too will often fail our children. But God never will. This helps us remain painfully aware that it’s not our training that helps children earn wisdom. No, wisdom is given to them when God regenerates their hearts.

So, we labor, and we pray, but we find that God works in our children more skillfully than we ever could. He calls out to them in his Word. So, put them under the Word constantly at home and at church. But God also calls out to them in his providence, arranging their lives with a clever push and pull. He will pull them to wisdom by showing them the joy of living life on his terms. And he will push them away from foolishness by exposing them to just how stupid it is to live life on the world’s terms.

A wise Father knows how to teach them the difference.