Grace Versus Wisdom

I was recently listening to a preacher explain the dangers of hanging around with bad people by analogy to carrying a snake around with you. You can’t be surprised when it bites you, that’s what snakes do. The implication is that we shouldn’t hang around with unreliable people because they’ll betray us. There is great truth in this wisdom principle. But if Jesus had really practiced it, He would have never left heaven to come get us. And when He was here, He clearly did not practice it, spending time both with sinners and with ungodly religious leaders of His day. So, the grace principle would seem to say, “spend time with the lost sinners of this world and put yourself at risk of being bitten by them out of love for them.” The more I thought about it, the more this pattern seemed to show up: 1. foolish behavior, 2. wise behavior, 3. gracious/divine behavior. So, I’d like to ask you what other examples of this progression we see, where acting as a Christian actually looks wrong from a wisdom perspective.