Ten of the first 11 verses of Proverbs 26 deal with the nature of a fool and demonstrate that there is nothing but ruin in everything he does… then verse 12 shows us something worse. When a man is wise in his own eyes, he establishes a pattern in which he alone is his final authority. He yields to no man, he consults with no man, he seeks no council and will take no advice. This man's life becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy of destruction, usually leaving a trail of ruin and devastation in his wake. Others may look to him and find hope in his word, for he is often convincing… charismatic… compelling; he may carry them in his orbit, might drag them along in the path of his trajectory but the final destination is nowhere that anyone wants to go. For while this ultimate fool, this man wise in his own eyes, just might succeed in the stuff of this life; in the end of it all he has no hope… for this set of character traits is particularly set against seeking and finding the mercy of God. There must be humility in us to seek after Christ. For to cry "mercy" requires an admission that you have been foolish, you have been wrong, you have been unwise… and that is something that a man who is wise in his own eyes can NEVER do! The real danger though, is that this trait is present in ALL of us to one degree or another, in some fashion, we ALL believe in our own wisdom, our own opinions, our own ideas, our own desires. This is the root of sin, and it is the inheritance of every single man, woman and child who has ever lived, with the exception of Jesus Christ. Our only hope of avoiding the wrath of a Holy God is to lay hold of the righteousness that He offers us in Jesus. And our only path to do THAT is to let go of our agendas, our ideas, our preferences, our pretended "wisdom" and align ourselves with what God tells us in His word. There ALONE is true wisdom found, there ALONE is peace with God possible, there ALONE do we learn what we need to know in order to have life everlasting. My precious child, this world is filled with people who base their whole lives on the expedient of their own thinking, the truth of their own imaginations, the evidence of their own opinion… I beseech you by the mercies of Christ, do not be one of them. Instead of defending your "wisdom", confess your foolishness, repent of your sins, and find mercy in the blood of Jesus, shed for the forgiveness of sin!