fly fishing
Good Morning, God. Here I am — with my thought for the morning. It’s the difference between expert advice and tradition. Expert advice is something people have proven scientifically SHOULD work. Tradition is what HAS BEEN WORKING.
What brought that thought to mind was listening to the book The Age of the Unthinkable by Joshua Cooper Ramo. I heard how in the 1950s the conservation experts figured out mathematically how many fish could be harvested from a given site — only to have their formulae result in massive fishery collapses.
Apparently, they had failed to take into account a lot of variables — variables they were unaware of. Say for example, the fact that more fishermen with a smaller limit meant more foot traffic, more litter, poorer drainage and thus less moss for the fish that were food for the target fish.
Yes, God, everything IS connected to everything else. And it would be a good idea for us to cultivate more humility and less expert certainty. Or, perhaps, also to be more aware of expert advances so we can prepare? This book talks about how in traditional war the goal was killing enough of the enemy to “win”. Whereas now the innovative idea in war is to analyze the enemies complete system — looking for maximum “effect” points to attack.
It comes to me that if the Devil wanted to “take out” good people the most effective way to do it would be to encourage them into doing more and more “Good Deeds” until they reached the point of collapse and descended in to a more noticeable sin — affairs, embezzlement, etc.
ONE WHOLE DAY A WEEK RESTING? It worked really well for the traditional Jews for many many hundreds of years. Might even have accounted for why people persecuted them so badly. People who believed YOU COMMANDED THEM TO REST! Not to work? Enjoy their spouse and familly? Wow! Now THAT is EXPERT ADVICE That HAS WORKED! The best kind of tradition.
So, You are saying there are experts and then there is THE EXPERT? Ahaaa, God. Help me HEAR YOU AND RESPOND WITH TRUST! You say I might also think of that as “obedience”? Yeah, You know I don’t like that word. Help me, here, to hear.
Story teller,
A Moment with God 
Leave a comment