---
title: 'The Danger of Being Overwise: William B. Sprague on Christian Wisdom and Humility'
type: video
hasMedia: true
requiresPurchase: false
authors:
- 'Jonathan Master'
date: 2026-08-18
collection: 'Dead Presbyterians Society'
subcollection: 'Season 3'
topics:
- 'Character and Conduct of Life'
- 'Christian Liberty'
- 'Personal Piety'
- 'Scripture'
url: https://confessional.org/dead-presbyterians-society/season-3/the-danger-of-being-overwise-william-b-sprague-on-christian-wisdom-and-humility
---

# The Danger of Being Overwise: William B. Sprague on Christian Wisdom and Humility

In this episode of the Dead Presbyterians Society Podcast, we explore William B. Sprague’s sermon “The Danger of Being Overwise.” Drawing from Ecclesiastes 7:16, Sprague warns against the subtle temptation to refine, improve, or go beyond what God has revealed in His Word. True wisdom, he insists, is not found in human innovation or good intentions, but in humble submission to Scripture—believing neither too little nor too much, but exactly what God has spoken.

[Watch](https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/1219243530)

## Transcript

The Bible clearly commands Christians to pursue wisdom, but what does it mean when it also warns us against becoming overly wise? Is it possible that Christians can become too wise for their own good? Greetings from the past. Welcome to Dead Presbyterian Society. I'm Jonathan Master.

I serve as president of Greenville Seminary. What happens when Christians become too wise? Is it even possible for a Christian to become too wise? Not wiser in holiness, not wiser in humility, but quote-unquote wiser than Scripture itself. What happens when sincere believers, convinced they are serving a noble cause, begin quietly adjusting what Christ has commanded? When human reasoning begins to redefine divine institutions? When good intentions begin to reshape obedience? In 1835, one pastor believed he was witnessing exactly this danger unfold before his eyes.

There was a growing movement, it was a popular movement, it was a celebrated movement, and it was beginning to press against one of Christ's own ordinances. Many people saw it as progress, many people saw it as necessary reform, but William Buell Sprague saw something far more serious. What he saw was a church that was becoming wise above that which is written, and his response to this was a warning, and it is a warning that the church still needs to hear and to heed today.

Now to understand why he saw it this way, why this mattered so deeply to him, why he had such urgency, we need to understand the man himself. William B. Sprague was a pastor, was a historian, was a theological thinker. He was shaped by the very disciplined piety in early Princeton, and he was deeply committed to the peace and purity of the Church of Christ.

He labored faithfully in the pulpit for decades, he counseled other ministers, he preserved the memory of America's early preachers through his historical writing, and he urged Christians toward wisdom, but wisdom that was marked not by innovation but by submission to the Word of God. And this is why he preached the sermon that we're going to look at today, which is entitled, The Danger of Being Overwise. Now he was born in 1795 in Andover, Connecticut.

He was educated at Yale College and then Princeton Theological Seminary. Archibald Alexander, Samuel Miller, names that will be familiar to listeners of Dead Presbyterian Society, had a significant influence on his life. He was licensed to preach in 1818, ordained to the ministry in 1819.

He served first in West Springfield, Massachusetts, before accepting a call in 1829 to the Second Presbyterian Church of Albany, New York, and he labored there for around 40 years, nearly 40 years, and during those 40 years he gained a reputation as a careful preacher and a trusted counselor and as a wise pastor. He wrote extensively on pastoral character and ministerial responsibility. His address, Ministerial Fidelity and Prudence in 1834, was a significant statement on judgment, exercising judgment and prudence in the ministry.

He had over 150 of his sermons published and addresses and memoirs and essays. He was best known for his compilation of what was entitled, The Annals of the American Pulpit, nine volumes. It's a collection of biographical sketches of the ministries of early American Protestant clergymen before 1850, a significant historical work, and this is still read and reviewed by historians today.

It's a very significant work that he did. He died on May 7th in 1876. He was buried at Albany Rural Cemetery in Menin's, New York, and his writings continue to serve pastors today.

We'll look at this particular writing in a little more detail. In 1835, a biblical scholar at Andover Theological Seminary in Massachusetts named Dr. Stewart wrote a letter that was published in the American Temperance Intelligencer. This was a publication in the 1830s to advocate for temperance and to promote abstinence from alcohol.

In his letter, Dr. Stewart argued that in support of the temperance cause, fermented wine should be removed from the sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and you can understand the connection there. We shouldn't use wine because he was advocating for total abstinence. Frank knew that he couldn't stay silent after such a declaration.

This might seem to be a small thing, but he considered it a significant thing, not just because of the outcome of it, not just because he was particularly concerned with the use of wine rather than unfermented grape juice, but instead because of the the methodology behind it, the thinking behind it. And so on June 7, 1835, he preached a sermon at Second Presbyterian Church in Albany, and the sermon was titled, The Danger of Being Over Wise. And what he argues there is that there was a general trend in the church of becoming what he calls over wise, and that this letter, while it might seem innocuous, particularly today it might seem innocuous to us, was a clear evidence of that growing tendency.

Godly wisdom, of course, is of extreme importance in the Christian life, and he begins by acknowledging that the Bible commends those who are wise. He opens his sermon with this striking statement, quote, there is no quality which is more frequently commended in the sacred scriptures than wisdom. In First Kings 3, Solomon asks for an understanding mind to govern your people, and the Bible says that it pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this.

And then, of course, throughout the book of Proverbs and Sprague cites this, there are all kinds of places where wisdom is treasured, is prized, is something to be sought after. Proverbs 16, 16, how much better to get wisdom than gold, to get insight rather than silver. Proverbs 4, 5, get wisdom, get understanding, do not forget my words or turn away from them.

Proverbs 4, 6, do not forsake wisdom and she will protect you, love her and she will watch over you. Proverbs 12, fools think their own way is right, but the wise listen to others. Proverbs 3, blessed is the one who finds wisdom.

Wisdom is a blessing, but Sprague says this, in order for it to be a true blessing, it must be gained in the way that God intended. We need to pursue godly wisdom rather than relying on human insight along with it. And Sprague's sermon is from the text in Ecclesiastes 7, a text that has puzzled many people, which says, be not overly righteous and do not make yourself too wise, why should you destroy yourself? And so that's the text for the danger of being over wise.

Sprague begins by saying that Ecclesiastes 7, 16 is not a contradiction, it does not contradict what we read in the Proverbs, it does not contradict the example of Solomon or the many places in which wisdom is enjoined to us. He explains this, it is genuine wisdom which the scripture everywhere enjoins, it is the affectation of wisdom which the wise man in our text so pointedly condemns. The scriptures commend genuine godly wisdom, yet they warn us, quote, be not wise above that which is written, be not so wise to attempt to make things plain, which God in his wisdom has not seen best should be left obscure, or to make things appear absurd, which God has been pleased to reveal as matters of faith.

In other words, we should not try to over explain truths beyond what God has revealed, nor should we disregard something that scripture has given to us simply because we consider it too difficult to understand, or in his words, absurd. Who are we to decide which truths should be retained and which require further explanation? Now, he identifies two ways in which men make themselves over-wise. Here's what he writes, quote, men make themselves over-wise in their manner of treating God's truth and God's institutions.

So we'll begin with how men can become over-wise with respect to God's truth. Here's what he writes, the point of true wisdom is to make our faith the exact counterpart of God's revelations. Let me repeat that, the point of true wisdom is to make our faith the exact counterpart of God's revelations, to believe that and only that which he has revealed either directly or indirectly in the sacred scriptures.

Many people combine God's truth with ways, with truth that they perceive in ways that God never intended. And some even deny the authority of God's word because they can't explain everything. And while others incorporate their own ideas of what must be the case into what God teaches, Sprague says this, in attempting to explain God's truth, they have explained it all away.

They have in a great degree neutralized its influence. You see, this has to do with our attitude towards the Bible, our attitude towards the revealed word of God. He summarizes this danger with a striking statement, quote, it is an error to believe too little and an error to believe too much.

We must believe what God has revealed without presuming upon details he has chosen not to disclose. And then he gives two examples of this, two doctrines that men frequently over-explain or explain away entirely. They can do both, the doctrine of the Trinity and the doctrine of divine and human agency.

Let's begin with the Trinity. Men over-explain or reason away the Trinity, Sprague says. He explains that the scripture has revealed the Trinity, quote, with as much clearness for aught we can see as human language admits, the doctrine of a threefold distinction in the divine nature.

Although our finite minds cannot comprehend this fully, the manner in which these distinctions exist, the persons of the Godhead, God has nevertheless declared this doctrine in the most explicit and unequivocal terms. But people try to explain it away. He calls them rushing into, quote, gross absurdity on the one hand and absolute unbelief on the other.

He gives two examples of this. The first man contemptuously asks, how can one be three or three one? And he trusts in this wisdom and rejects the doctrine of the Trinity as irrational or impossible. And the second man approaches this doctrine and finds it so clear that he not only believes it, but believes far more in respect to it than God has ever revealed.

He tries to speculate in ways that the scripture leaves mysterious. He says that both of these men, both of these groups of interpreters are, quote, wise above what is written. The one in their wisdom blot out the doctrine as an absurdity.

The other in their wisdom receive it, but they strip it in such a degree, a great degree of its awful mysteriousness and its mighty power, and give it to us only in connection with their own vain and conceited speculations. That's the first doctrine. The second doctrine he uses as an example, an illustration of this is divine and human agency.

He explains that, quote, the scripture doctrine on the subject is that man works out his own salvation and that God works within him both to will and to do. An over-wise thinker is not satisfied with this though. Attempts have been made to modify the doctrine, to remove it from scripture or to dismiss the authority of scripture altogether.

Some argue, Sprague says, that man is entirely responsible for his own salvation and that it is absurd to suppose that any divine influence should be brought to bear directly on the human will. Others maintain that man is completely passive in conversion and sanctification, believing that the Holy Ghost not only works, but works alone in the process of fitting him for salvation, particularly with respect to sanctification. Other insists there's no mystery at all, and attempts to explain precisely how divine and human agency operate, claiming to, quote, define the spheres of their respective operation.

This part does this, this part does that. Finally, some conclude that the doctrine itself is an absurdity which human reason was never made to digest. And he says all of these, each position, reflects the same error, dissatisfaction with what scripture plainly teaches.

Rather than submitting to divine revelation, hearing the Word of God and believing it, men attempt to add human reasoning to what God has overtly declared. Remember, he gives two examples of being over-wise. First is divine doctrines and then divine institutions.

And so, what about the institutions? Well, he gives four examples here. He gives two examples with respect to doctrine, four with respect to the institutions of God. The first example that he gives about divine institutions in which men become over-wise is the Sabbath, Christian Sabbath.

He explains the Christian Sabbath in this way. God, in His wisdom, has ordained that one day and seven should be sacred to the purposes of piety and devotion, and has commanded all men to hallow this day by religious observances. God, in His mercy, knows our need for rest, and He's given us one glorious day to set aside our labor to worship God and to focus on the worship of Him.

Yet, men, in their own wisdom, decide that this is unnecessary. Some refuse to acknowledge its existence. Instead of devoting this day for worship, they devote it to business or recreation.

And Sprague observes they, quote, employ its sacred hours in performing plans for accumulating wealth or in yielding to profane and impious merriment. And then he asks this question. If He has instituted the Sabbath, if this is an institution, and they, either by words or actions, decide that the institution is not necessary, or at least that it need not be observed with so much strictness as His commandment enjoins, what better, I ask, is this than assuming to be wise over their maker? Second institution, public worship.

He says that men make themselves over-wise with respect to the institution of public worship. Here's a quote, God has been pleased to ordain that men should assemble for the purposes of devotion and religious instruction, and has commanded that they should not forsake the assembling of themselves together. And for their edification has instituted, in connection with the Sabbath, the preaching of the Word, an ordinance which is evidently designed to be the grand instrument in the world's regeneration.

But, he says, many disregard this. They regard the worship of God's house as a, quote, vain thing. And then some attend, but they lose sight of its purpose, and they look at it as conforming to their needs, and what they think it should be for.

Others believe they can learn more from private sitting under teaching than gathering together under the preaching of God's Word on the Lord's day. Here's what he writes, how flagrantly, how shamefully, do all these classes impugn the wisdom of God by arrogantly setting up their own wisdom in opposition to it. Third, institution of baptism.

He describes it as the command of Christ to the apostles, and through them to all their successors in the ministerial office, was that they should go into all the world baptizing in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. But some question the value of baptism. Sprague argues that surely it will not do for one who acknowledges the divine authority of the scriptures to decide that this institution is of no value, merely because he cannot or does not discern its uses.

In other words, this is a sign given by the Lord. This is an institution of Jesus Christ, and how can it be that some decide that it's not necessary? He notes that in his own day, there exists a, quote, large and highly respected denomination of Christians who acknowledge baptism as a divine ordinance, yet refuse to apply it to children, questioning how an infant might benefit before understanding its meaning. He responds that children born within Christian households receive this covenant sign, and he describes it as, quote, the distinction which they enjoy in consideration of their being born in the bosom of the church, and should still be recognized as a solemn right.

And so, again, baptism is something where he says people become overwise. If we can't understand how this is made effectual, if we can't understand the significance of it, then perhaps we should ignore it altogether. And then the sacrament of the Lord's Supper is the last institution.

And of course, you'll remember that the impetus behind this sermon had to do with the Lord's and particularly the use of wine in communion. This is a sacrament, he says. It's a command of Christ to observe this ordinance.

It's imperatively binding upon all men. Not an individual who has the opportunity of doing it is exempt from the obligation. So, in other words, Christians are commanded to partake of this sacred ordinance.

And so, some, he says, neglect the supper because they say, well, if it doesn't save me, then I don't need to worry about it. And he confronts this attitude directly. But who art thou vain man to oppose thy Redeemer's wisdom and set it not thy Redeemer's authority? And then he says there are others who modify the ordinance to suit their own views.

And now he deals with the exclusion of wine from the Lord's Supper. Many argue, he writes, that the use of wine, even on that occasion, to be sinful, claiming that this change would advance the temperance cause. But what he says is, first of all, he is not at all persuaded that wine is negotiable.

And there are exegetical arguments on both sides. But for Sprague, he says, the master himself has settled it for the obscurest peasant as truly as for the most eminent biblical critic. And no man, no body of men, has the right to call into question the master's decision.

It is to be, he says, the fruit of the vine. And his point is this, that if our logic is, yes, this is what Jesus commanded, but we need to do something different from what Jesus commanded, then that logic is faulty. That is an example, a clear example of being over-wise.

Now, I want to pause here and just say, there are people who would make another argument. They would say that the fruit of the vine is perhaps an ambiguous term. It wouldn't necessarily have to be alcoholic wine.

And in that case, we're obeying what the master commanded. But see, that's not the argument that Sprague is refuting particularly. Although he is not convinced by that argument, I have to say.

He's not convinced by it at all. The argument that he is refuting is the argument that says, yes, Jesus did say use wine, but we need to change that because of the times in which we live. And so, he says, the use of wine in the Lord's Supper must remain because it is plainly commanded in Scripture.

Now, here's the point. Throughout the sermon, he pleads with the church, he pleads with Christians to remember that human wisdom must never sit in judgment upon divine revelation. We are not called to improve or refine or modernize or contextualize what God has instituted.

We are called to receive it with humility and obedience. As Sprague urges, we must, quote, let God's institutions stand in their own simple majesty, though the noblest fabric which man ever built should be prostrate in the dust. In other words, no matter how much you think you have figured out the culture in which you live, you cannot stand in judgment on the Word of God.

See, this is a subtle danger. The greatest danger, Sprague realizes this, is not, generally speaking, open rebellion to God's Word in the church. That can happen, but it's relatively rare and usually it comes after a long period of slight deviations.

What he sees as a great threat is sincere efforts, sincere efforts, that quietly substitute human judgment for divine authority. We may convince ourselves that our motives are noble, perhaps even that these measures are necessary, that our changes serve a greater good, or that we act for the honor of God, but Sprague reminds us that God sees beyond appearances, quote, God will not smile on any effort that goes to impugn his authority, though it be professedly made for the advancement of his honor. That's a profound statement.

Even things that are made professedly for the advancement of the honor of God will not be looked on lightly by the Lord. Even worthy causes with good intentions can be dangerous if they tempt us to reshape what God has clearly taught. So the question is this, where might we be tempted to improve or modify or soften the rough edges of God's institutions in ways that seem wise, seem very wise, but move beyond what scripture has revealed? Are there areas in our Christian lives where sincere motives, sincere motives, subtly replace simple obedience? Do you approach God's Word with humility? If you're a pastor, do you approach your work in God's church with humility, receiving what he has revealed, trusting in him, trusting that he knows best? Or do you approach it with the expectation that it must first satisfy your own understanding and your own read on the context in which you live? See, ultimately, the danger of being over-wise calls us to a posture of humility, a willingness to believe neither too little nor too much, but exactly what God has revealed.

True wisdom, real wisdom, biblical wisdom, doesn't seek to master truth, but to submit to it. He asks us this question, this important question, do we consider ourselves overly wise, or does our wisdom bow before the wisdom of God?