Many have commented that when they discuss an issue with me they find wisdom. It is easy on hearing such comments to pride oneself in wisdom, and even allow one’s identity to be formed around this gift. One can start to presume on the need others might have of you.
Some time ago I was in a meeting that demonstrated the opposite. The person who led the meeting seemed to drive things in a direction opposite of wisdom. I found the experience frustrating. When I tried to speak, I was trounced upon. This was clearly the leader’s pet project, and to infringe on it was to invite wrath. I watched in silent frustration as the meeting moved from a positive and hopeful path into what seemed frivolity and scratching at the surface. When I returned home my wife sensed my frustration: I was biting everyone’s head off for the smallest offence. She suggested I ask God why He brought me to frustration. Maybe there was a lesson. I did pray, and I would like to share the lesson.
I came to this passage: Job 38:2 (NIV) “Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge?” So, this wisdom can be something that darkens God’s counsel! There are times when God leaves us in the dark. Then our wisdom can be a distraction. Just because God gives a gift does not mean the gift is always the answer to the need.
Two more angles on the subject came up. The first a sermon about Moses. Here the speaker pointed out Moses had many qualities that might in the opinion of men dismiss him as a leader. Moses however was God’s man. If God chooses, who am I to complain and demand an alternative,. My response must be to walk in prayerful humility. If wisdom indicates where the meeting should have been going, it is not necessarily wrong. In that case my response is one of prayer rather than trying to force the direction of the group or overriding the leader.
The second text was 1 Corinthians 1 and especially v27 -29 (NIV). “But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things and the things that are not – to nullify the things that are, so that no-one may boast before him.”
When I was frustrated, my pride that was getting in the way. In pride I could see the way things were going and it seemed to me the completely the wrong path. The point Paul makes is that God is bigger than the perceptions of people. He takes the stone the builders reject and makes it into the most important, the cap stone! Who am I to presume that I know where this process will end up? Is not God bigger than that?
So, I end up with a choice. I can go with God through prayer, and working with the leader He put over me in this context, or I can continue in frustration, demanding of God that He makes things go the way I think they should go.
adaringfaith 
This post feels like part 1. You have been very open and honest about the lessons you learned from this experience (lessons that I can benefit from too). Is there a flip side though? Maybe its just me but if you are frustrated then its likely others are too and in my place of work I would escalate matters in order to avoid disaster occuring further down the line? Perhaps I have missed the point…
Yes Dave, I understand where you are coming from, and previously I too would have tried to push things towards what I saw as a wise approach. Here however, with the personalities involved that was not going to be an option without serious fallout. I feel like the Lord is using a situation in which others sin in order to expose my pride. The battle at this point in time is not for a good outcome, but for growth in character. I pray that the good outcome might not be too long in coming.