Then Jesus explained. John came eating and drinking, and people from the generation-namely the Pharisees and lawyers who refused his baptism-said, “He has a demon<\/em>.” That is, he won’t play by our rules. He won’t play our games. He’s weird and extreme. Jesus, however, came eating and drinking, but that wasn’t good enough either. The people from the generation said, “Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!” Again, He won’t play by our rules. He won’t play our games. He’s not strict enough about what we think is important.<\/p>\n But wisdom is vindicated by all her children. That is, though John and Jesus were different, they both walked in wisdom. They weren’t following the crowd. They weren’t kowtowing to the rules of the present generation. But they pursued and proclaimed wisdom. In the end, they both vindicated and justified wisdom. They showed that wisdom is the victorious path. Granted, some might argue otherwise. After all, they were both executed. But then again, wisdom isn’t leading us to long, healthy lives. Wisdom is leading us to resurrection. And Jesus demonstrated that on the third day.<\/p>\n We must let this guide us. Just this morning, I saw someone respond to a post on Facebook by saying, “The world won’t respect us if we continue doing such and such…” At this point, it doesn’t even matter if what the commenter was rebuking was right or wrong. The argument’s basis was flawed. The world will always complain when we don’t play by the world’s rules. But if we are following God’s wisdom, we will never play by the world’s rules. And they will call out, complaining about us, “We sang a dirge, and you didn’t weep. We played a jig, and you didn’t dance. You won’t play our games. You won’t keep our rules.” But we don’t dance or mourn to the world’s fiddle. We walk by the Lord’s wisdom.<\/p>\n But take comfort in this: when we follow God’s wisdom, it will always end up vindicated and justified. And we will always end up glorified.<\/p>\n Praise the Lord!<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Edwin Crozier In Luke 7:31-35, Jesus spoke out against the people of the generation He was visiting in His incarnation. He said, “To what shall I compare the people of this generation, and what are they like?” (Luke 7:31 ESV). It’s possible He was making a general point about the illustration as a whole.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_seo_schema_type":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[27],"tags":[1267,1934,609],"class_list":["post-97988","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-acceptance","tag-different","tag-worldliness"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":95126,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/do-all-without-grumbling\/","url_meta":{"origin":97988,"position":0},"title":"Do All Without Grumbling","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"April 16, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"by Edwin Crozier Paul has told them to do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but always view others as more significant. Then he told them to always obey, following in Jesus' footsteps. In Philippians 2:14, he wraps up this section with a surprising teaching. \"Do all things without grumbling\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":98758,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-jesus-validated-the-old-testament\/","url_meta":{"origin":97988,"position":1},"title":"How Jesus Validated the Old Testament","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 28, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"by David Gibson Jesus repeatedly validated the authenticity of Old Testament characters and events. Here is just a brief sample: \"Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female . . . ?\" (Matthew 19:4-6 ESV). \"For as were the days of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":83535,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/jesus-and-common-courtesy\/","url_meta":{"origin":97988,"position":2},"title":"Jesus and Common Courtesy","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 23, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Joshua Welch via Biblical Insights, Vol. 14, No. 9, September 2014 At the age of sixteen, George Washington hand-copied a document titled 101 Rules of Civility & Decent Behavior. The document's author was not inspired, but his rules are worth a read or two or three. This is especially\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":16806,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-did-jesus-mean-by-green-wood-and-dry-wood\/","url_meta":{"origin":97988,"position":3},"title":"What did Jesus mean by “green wood” and “dry wood?”","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 10, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I don't believe I understand Luke 23:27-31 at all. It seems this conversation took place while Jesus was actually on His way to the cross. Would you please explain this further? What is the meaning of the 'green wood' and 'dry wood'? Answer: \"A great multitude of the people\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":64646,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/luke-and-the-birth-of-jesus\/","url_meta":{"origin":97988,"position":4},"title":"Luke and the Birth of Jesus","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 15, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"by Doy Moyer Luke's intent to \"compile an account of the things accomplished among us\" as handed down by eyewitnesses begins with the birth of John the Immerser. John's role would be to \"turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God\" by going \"as a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":98594,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/following-jesus\/","url_meta":{"origin":97988,"position":5},"title":"Following Jesus","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"October 19, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"by Edwin Crozier Text: Acts 7 I absolutely love Stephen's example. It seems to me that Stephen is set up in Acts as what it looks like to walk in Jesus' footsteps. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying we all have to be executed in order to be faithful\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97988"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97988\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/playing-300x200.jpg\")
What are the children doing? They call to one another, complaining, “We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not weep<\/em>” (Luke 7:32 ESV). That is, the generation was like little children complaining because the others wouldn’t play their games. The others won’t play by their rules.<\/p>\n