Exceptions

Many people are familiar with the Book of Proverbs. Proverbs belongs to a genre of the Bible called wisdom literature. And wisdom literature isn’t meant to be read as a collection of absolute promises. Instead, it presents principles — observations about how life generally works. If you do certain things, certain outcomes become more likely. But they aren’t guarantees.

There are exceptions.

As a society, we’re not very fond of exceptions.

Someone might say, “If you’re Republican, you’re patriotic.” But that doesn’t mean people who aren’t Republican aren’t patriotic. Or someone might say, “If you’re a Christian, you vote Republican.” That’s not true either. There are many Democrats who believe in God. In fact, there are Democratic senators and members of Congress who are also ministers.

Those are exceptions.

We don’t like exceptions because they aren’t easy to classify. We prefer neat categories and clear rules. Exceptions make life more complicated.

So maybe the better question isn’t how to eliminate exceptions.

The better question is: How do we deal with them?

Where in your life have you been treating a principle like a promise and what would change if you let the exceptions stay?