“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt,” wryly spoken by Abraham Lincoln (16^th president of the United States, 1861-1865). On the other hand, Woodrow Wilson (28^th president, 1913-1921) encouraged foolish people to out themselves, to be authentic, and to own up to what others suspect to be true: “If a man is a fool, the best thing to do is encourage him to advertise the fact by speaking.”

Scripture echoes this with typical Hebrew irony: “Even a fool, when he keeps silent, is considered wise; when he closes his lips, he is considered prudent” (Prov. 17:28). As so often in the Proverbs, there is an element of, “Yes, this is true, but what about that?” In other words, we should not compound our foolish actions with foolish justifications. Yet, foolish people who try to pass themselves off as wise are entirely disingenuous, duplicitous, disintegrated (lacking integrity), and disassociated with reality. They have developed the skill of packing the most words into meaningless verbiage-exuding, vacuous vomit. Put simply, “The mouth of fools spouts folly” (Prov. 15:2), and “A fool’s mouth is his ruin, and his lips are the snare of his soul” (Prov. 18:7). These sentiments reflect a fuller picture than the famous quote in the movie Forest Gump, “Stupid is as stupid does.” A fool cannot keep his foolishness from creeping into what he says!

The worst part for a fool, though, is that he doesn’t know he is a fool; he thinks he is the smartest person around. The Scriptures teach us: “The way of a fool is right in his own eyes” (Prov. 12:15). The most sobering question for each of us is this, “How do I know that I am not the fool who sees myself as right in my own eyes?” The book of Proverbs gives us an answer: “Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but deceitful are the kisses of an enemy” (Prov. 27:6). The best guard against seeing past our potential self-blindness is to open ourselves to trusted friends who will speak truth into our lives, to help us see past the smoke-screen of self-deception, to identify our shortcomings, distorted self-images, and the lies that we hold to with a false sense of truth. We need each other to discover the truthful self-perception that the apostle Paul writes:

For through the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgment, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith. (Rom. 12:3)

That can be fostered in a community of Christians all striving to grow into Christlikeness. Wouldn’t that be amazing if we could get past our pride and be open to the feedback and accountability of others? I don’t want to be the fool who thinks I am not one.