Since the 8th century, during the last seven days of Advent, leading to the Christmas celebration, the Christian Church has been singing a set of antiphons that were written as introductory prayers for the singing of the Magnificat at Evening Prayer. They are popularly known as “The O Antiphons” and serve as the basis for the well-known hymn, “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel. Each day uses a name for the coming Messiah drawn from the messianic hopes of the First Testament. They proclaim the coming of Christ as the fulfillment of God’s promised salvation.

They say that wisdom comes with age and experience. I wonder.

While I hope that my blunders are fewer and that have learned a few things along the way, I still manage to do some things that in hindsight are pretty dumb. And with age and experience comes the possibility (the probability?) of making mistakes that are more costly, both economically and relationally, and have deeper lasting consequences.

In the O Antiphon for December 17, Christ is called the Wisdom from on high, the one who brings divine knowledge.

Throughout the gospel of John, the gospel writer is nearly obsessed with the theme of Christ as the one who has come so that we might know God. Except contrary to the way western theology has typically been ordered, the truth about God that Christ came to bring is not propositional truth; it is relational truth. God comes to us, dwells with us, takes up residence with us, hangs out with us, so that we might know God in God’s unimaginable, never-ending, limitless love.

Certainly there is a certain practical, utilitarian wisdom that smooths the skids of daily life; it may or may not come with age and experience. The greater Wisdom comes to bring life; that wisdom is rooted not in facts and figures or the school of hard knocks, but in divine love, Love Incarnate. Only when we acknowledge that we cannot know God — and therefore, cannot know real Life — except by God’s grace, God’s invitation, and God’s enlightenment, do we begin to know true wisdom.