With all thy getting, get understanding.
“Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding.” — Proverbs 4:7 (KJV)
I’ve been spending some time reflecting on this particular scripture, and there’s one part that keeps jumping out at me.
“With all thy getting, get understanding.”
Not just get understanding. But with ALL thy getting.
To me, that’s a pretty strong suggestion. Almost like God is saying, “Hey, here’s a hint. Whatever else you’re pursuing in life, don’t overlook THIS.”
And the more I think about it, the more I realize just how much weight those few words carry.
We spend our lives trying to acquire things. Money. Education. Opportunities. Relationships. Experiences. Knowledge. And there’s nothing inherently wrong with any of those pursuits.
But how much time do we actually spend trying to understand what we’re acquiring?
Because knowing something and understanding something aren’t necessarily the same thing.
Knowing Isn’t Necessarily Understanding
I’ve always been a curious person. I want to know why things exist, why they function the way they do, and what purpose they serve.
Why do people think the way they do? Why do we have opposing views? Why is something considered right or wrong? Is what I’m being told even valid?
That last question is especially important.
We live in a time when information is literally at our fingertips. As an ’80s baby, I remember when getting information required a little more effort. Now, we can access more information in a few seconds than previous generations could have imagined.
Yet somehow, having access to more information hasn’t necessarily translated into having more understanding.
I see it all the time on social media.
Someone posts a meme, a sensational headline, or an image that may have been manipulated or generated by AI. Before anyone verifies the information, people are already arguing, sharing, and drawing conclusions.
I’ve even seen people comment on an article with something along the lines of, “I ain’t reading all of that.”
Well…how are you going to form an informed opinion about something you’re unwilling to examine?
Now, I’m not suggesting that everyone needs to become an expert on everything. That’s unrealistic.
But I do believe we have a responsibility to be careful with what we claim to know.
You don’t have to know everything. But you should be responsible with what you claim to know.
To me, curiosity opens the door to understanding. It causes us to ask questions, examine details, challenge assumptions, and investigate context.
And sometimes, what we discover is that we didn’t understand nearly as much as we thought we did.
That’s not necessarily a bad thing.
That’s growth.
Knowledge Is Something You Have. Understanding Is Something You Pursue.
Here’s an analogy.
Imagine someone having a million dollars but living as though they’re broke. The money is there. The resources are available. But without understanding how to manage, utilize, or grow those resources, their potential may never be realized.
Now consider someone who understands what they have, how it works, and what they can do with it.
Same million dollars. Different possibilities.
I view knowledge similarly.
You can collect information all day long. Memorize facts. Read books. Earn degrees. Listen to sermons. Watch documentaries.
But if you never examine what you’ve learned, never consider its implications, and never seek to understand how it applies, what are you really doing with it?
At some point, collecting knowledge without pursuing understanding can become a form of intellectual hoarding.
A storehouse full of information that isn’t being used to its potential.
And that’s where the work comes in.
Understanding is actionable. It requires effort.
It’s in the studying. The training. The examination. The conversations. The questions. The experiences.
It’s in the process.
And I think that’s where some people lose interest.
We often want the finished product without going through what it takes to produce it. We want the answer without the investigation. The results without the preparation. The destination without the journey.
But sometimes the journey is where the understanding lives.
Understanding Doesn’t Require Agreement
This is a big one for me.
I can understand someone’s perspective and still vehemently disagree with them.
And you know what?
I think that’s beautiful.
Somewhere along the way, we’ve developed this idea that understanding someone means agreeing with them, approving of their actions, or compromising our own convictions.
I don’t subscribe to that.
Understanding isn’t agreement.
Understanding isn’t endorsement.
And understanding certainly isn’t an excuse for harmful behavior.
It’s simply making an intentional effort to comprehend something beyond our initial perception.
As I’ve gotten older, I’ve found myself reconsidering how I view certain behaviors. Things I once judged harshly began to look different when I learned more about the circumstances surrounding them.
My father, for example, struggled with alcoholism. For a long time, I viewed those struggles primarily through the damage they caused. And that damage was real.
But as I grew older and learned more about the environment, experiences, and challenges that shaped his life, I began to see a more complicated picture.
He wasn’t simply the sum of his worst decisions.
He was a flawed human being.
That understanding didn’t make his choices acceptable. It didn’t erase the consequences. And it certainly didn’t cause me to adopt those behaviors myself.
But it did allow me to extend more compassion.
That’s what understanding can do.
It can change how you see a person without changing your convictions about their actions.
And sometimes, two people can examine the same issue, understand each other’s reasoning, and still arrive at completely different conclusions.
That’s fine.
Agree to disagree.
Not every conversation needs a winner.
And not everyone is interested in understanding, either. I’ve learned that you can’t force someone to pursue something they have no desire to pursue.
If someone is perfectly content with what they believe and has no interest in examining another perspective, that’s their choice.
I’m not about to spend the rest of my day arguing with them. lol.
I’ve got my own understanding to pursue.
You Have to Get This for Yourself
My mother used to tell me something that has stuck with me for years:
“You got to get this for yourself.”
She was referring primarily to my relationship with God.
I grew up being introduced to Christianity through my mother. I knew about God. I knew Scripture. I knew what I had been taught.
But knowing what someone teaches you and developing your own understanding of it are two different experiences.
As I got older, I began studying Scripture for myself. Praying. Asking questions. Having conversations with people who didn’t share my beliefs. Experiencing life, including situations that tested what I believed.
And through those experiences, my convictions began developing deeper roots.
I wasn’t simply relying on what my mother knew about God.
I was developing my own relationship with Him.
I sometimes compare that to renting versus owning a home.
When you’re personally responsible for something, you tend to become more invested in understanding how it works, how to maintain it, and how to care for it.
That’s how I began approaching my faith.
And it changed the way I read Scripture.
For example, Psalm 23 is one of the most familiar passages in the Bible.
“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.”
I’ve known those words for most of my life.
But at some point, I began paying closer attention to the imagery of the shepherd and the sheep.
“He maketh me to lie down in green pastures.”
Think about that for a moment.
The shepherd has led the sheep into green pastures. A place of provision. A place where its needs can be met. And right there, in the midst of that provision, the sheep is able to lie down and rest.
That imagery fascinates me.
The sheep isn’t desperately searching for its next meal. It isn’t wandering around trying to figure out how it’s going to survive. It’s resting in the care of a shepherd who has already led it to what it needs.
And that brings me right back to verse 1.
“I shall not want.”
There’s something powerful about the relationship between provision and contentment. It’s not necessarily about having everything you could ever desire. It’s about being so secure in the Shepherd’s care that you can rest without being consumed by what you lack.
Now, I’d read those verses for years. But when I started examining the imagery, asking why the shepherd would lead the sheep there and what that communicates about God’s care, the passage took on a deeper meaning for me.
That’s what pursuing understanding can do.
It can cause something you’ve known for years to suddenly become something you appreciate on an entirely different level.
And that’s one reason I believe studying Scripture is so important.
Don’t just hear a sermon and assume you’ve fully grasped everything being communicated.
Study it. Examine the context. Consider the historical background. Ask questions.
Look at the game tape!
Acts 17:11 describes the Bereans examining the Scriptures to evaluate what they were being taught.
I love that.
Faith and examination don’t have to be enemies.
And understanding doesn’t always weaken a conviction.
Sometimes it strengthens it.
Before. During. After.
Here’s something I’ve been learning about myself.
I prefer to understand something before I act.
I like having information. I like examining the possibilities. I like knowing what I’m getting into.
But I’ve also discovered that my pursuit of understanding can sometimes become a hindrance.
I can overthink.
I can over-explain.
And occasionally, I can delay taking action because I want to understand everything before making a move.
I call that overstanding. lol.
Sometimes the pursuit of understanding can become so consuming that you never actually do anything with what you’ve learned.
And that’s a problem.
Because understanding doesn’t always come before action.
Sometimes it comes during the process.
And sometimes, unfortunately, it comes afterward.
You make a decision. You take a step. You fail. You discover something you couldn’t have learned by simply reading about it.
Failure provides information that experience alone can reveal.
Now, I’ll admit that I’m much more comfortable with understanding before something happens than I am with understanding afterward.
Nobody enjoys realizing they could have avoided a mistake if they’d known something sooner.
But I’ve learned that all three stages have value.
You can gain understanding before, during, and after an experience.
The important thing is that you remain willing to learn.
And that willingness sometimes requires humility.
I actually enjoy discovering that I was unintentionally wrong about something. Not because I enjoy being wrong, but because correcting that misunderstanding means I’ve learned something I didn’t know before.
I’ll apologize. I’ll acknowledge the mistake. I’ll adjust my thinking.
Why?
Because understanding matters more to me than protecting the appearance of always being right.
And I hope I never lose that.
With All Thy Getting…
The more I reflect on Proverbs 4:7, the more I appreciate the urgency of that instruction.
“With all thy getting, get understanding.”
It’s not a passive statement.
It calls for pursuit.
And I don’t believe that pursuit ever truly ends.
There’s always something else to learn. Another perspective to consider. Another assumption to examine. Another experience that may reveal something we didn’t previously recognize.
Sometimes understanding will change your mind.
Sometimes it will strengthen what you already believe.
Sometimes it will help you show compassion.
Sometimes it will reveal that you were wrong.
And sometimes it will simply help you recognize how much you still don’t know.
That’s okay.
I’m not writing this because I’ve mastered understanding.
I’m writing it because I’ve come to recognize just how valuable the pursuit of it really is.
And I’m still learning.
So here’s my encouragement.
Don’t rush to react.
Don’t rush to judge.
Don’t be so eager to defend what you know that you become unwilling to examine what you don’t.
Ask questions. Investigate. Listen. Experience. Reflect.
And when you gain understanding, do with it what you will.
I’m not even here to give you an entire lesson on wisdom. That’s another essay for another day. lol.
I’m simply encouraging you to pursue understanding.
With all thy getting, get understanding, bro.
Or, as I like to put it…
Get understanding or die trying.
