Wordle

Have you played Wordle yet? I figure everyone is either playing it, has played it and moved on, or has at least been aware of everyone posting about it. But if you aren’t online and don’t know it’s a word guessing game where you get 6 attempts to guess a 5 letter word. With each guess it reveals your correctly placed letters with green and out of place letters with yellow and blacks out the letters you used that are not in the word at all.

So as I prepared these thoughts I was still thinking about this morning’s Wordle puzzle. Most of the time I wake up and pull up Wordle to get my brain going. If I really need a jump start I play Nerdle (same concept but with math equations). Both of them are a fun little challenge. I’ve seen people get them correctly on the first try but since that is a completely blind guess most people have to at least use two or three guess if not all of them to discover the word. This morning I used 4 chance but it took several hours of coming back and forth to it.

The reason it took so long, I believe, was that I had in my mind the only way those letters could work. I kept trying combinations that were not close because I just couldn’t make it fit the mold. I wanted the word to be what I was thinking and it seemed my mind was unwilling to come up with other combinations and solutions. It eventually clicked and I discovered the correct letters.

It made me think, however, that there are a lot of things in life that are this way. We get completely locked into one way of thinking and eventually feel stuck. The reality is that most people are never truly stuck, but they have lost the insight to look at other options. That is where the idea of counsel comes from. I believe that most of us have the resources to feel better mentally or emotionally, but we just don’t always know where to go for it.

You see the word “counsel” used in the Scripture and often hear it encouraged in today’s world in the form of mental health therapists. While it is sometimes necessary to go to a trained professional to help you get unstuck, there are certainly other resources—people and things— that can often help you find a much more productive route. The people I’ve often gone to are elders and fellow ministers. If they don’t have the answers I need they at least may know where I can find them. Sometimes I’ve consulted with friends who may have once been in the same rut or ditch that I find myself in. Remember, everything you go through qualifies you to help someone else through it.

Of course, we would be doing a great disservice to the Lord if we didn’t mention the Scripture. God’s Word assures us that it has all things that pertain to life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3). So while it is important to remember that it may not answer all questions specifically, it does address all the concepts that you will face in life. It deals with the various types of temptations broadly (lust of flesh, lust of eyes, and pride of life - 1 John 2:16) and the qualities of growth (Galatians 5:22-23; 2 Peter 1:5-11) and everything in between.

So when you feel stuck make sure that you reach out and find some help. Don’t stay stuck in the rut. God has provided plenty to help us if we will only look.

Ben