Faith Baptist Church
4258 Botetourt Road
Fincastle, Virginia 24090
(540) 473-2325
Proverbs 3:5-6
With all that is going on in the world today it is not hard to see why folks, including believers in Jesus Christ, are wringing their hands. Economies are in a strain, military muscle is being flexed all over the world; political rhetoric is in high gear wherein a lot of finger pointing is seen. Men are offering promising solutions to national and global problems. And as sure as the word of God tells believers to participate in their governments we must be cautious that we first put our trust in the Lord.
The Bible tells us that man will fail you. Ps.118:8-9 “It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man. It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in princes.” Ps.146:3-5 “Put not your trust in princes [political rulers], nor in the sons of men, in there is no help. His breath goes forth, he returns to his earth; in that very day his thoughts perish.” Happy is he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord, his God;”
Whenever Israel trusted in her chariots and military might she fell. When Israel feared the chariots of her many enemies her heart sunk in great fear. But whenever she trusted in the Lord she summoned up her faith in the Lord and she took the fight to the enemy and she won the fight.
There are many passages of scripture that plead with the saints of God to trust in the Lord God. One of my favorites as it may also be yours is Prov.3:5-6.
The context of the book of Proverbs finds its place in the canon of Scripture as a book written to give wisdom to our youth. Wisdom comes with our understanding of God’s word. Wisdom cries out wherever the word of God is rightly taught. Wisdom is always viewed as a woman as she responds to the love of her husband. And the husband of wisdom is Bible doctrine. If you know the doctrine; the teachings of God’s word and you have this word stored in your heart, then wisdom will respond to your needs. Prov.2:10-11 says; “When wisdom enters into thine heart, and knowledge is pleasant unto thy soul, Discretion shall preserve you, and understanding shall keep you.”
When coming to Bible class and sitting in the assembly to hear instruction from the word of God is pleasant to you then wisdom will preserve you. When coming to Bible class and sitting in the assembly to hear instruction from the word of God is boring to you then calamity and fear will overtake you as noted in 1:26-32. You can take that admonition to the bank. God is not mocked for whatsoever a man’s sows that shall he also reap.
When divine viewpoint is loved, God is found as per Prov.8:17 “I love those who love me and those who seek me early shall find me.”
Prov.3:5 “Trust in the Lord will all thine heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding.” God has all the angles figured out and there is nothing that can come upon you that he is not already aware of. He will not let harm come to you that he cannot deliver you out of. You might say. “I have been in some troubles before where God did not protect me.” My response to that would be, did you consult God before you got into that mess of trouble? Did God have anything to do with the decision you made, or did you make choices where God’s word advised otherwise?
When we sin against God’s written word God must watch us suffer for our sins, and we must admit they were sins, whether they were intentional or not. We do not suffer as payment for sin, only Christ did that, but we do suffer the consequences of our sins.
This is why I sound like a parrot as I quote to you Ps.119:11 all the time. Hiding God’s word in our hearts and obeying it prevents most of the personal sorrow we experience in life.
If we are going to trust in the Lord with all our heart his divine counsel has to be in place in our hearts where he can speak to us while we are making our choices. He will speak out loud and clear when we are about to dwell on a thing, or say something wrong or do something wrong. Then we must listen to that Voice. Today many churches do not offer that Voice to the congregation and those in attendance do not have the Voice of God steering them from sin and poor thinking. So they lean on the arm of man for their thinking, not the arm of God.
Look for divine solutions to your problems. The answers to these problems are in the word of God. The best defense against becoming tangled in the many problems of life is to avoid as many of them as you can all together. Divine wisdom will help you avoid many of this world’s traps, but you have to have this wisdom in the storehouse of your soul so you can see the traps of the world.
Many times we say, “I never saw that coming.” Perhaps we wanted someone or something so bad that we didn’t heed God’s warning, or maybe we didn’t have the wisdom to see it.
Prov.3:6 “In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.”
Everything we do is important to God because everything we do begins with a thought. Some may say. “I didn’t think before I spoke, or I didn’t think before I acted.” This is not true, this is the deceit of the old sin nature because we are always thinking something, whether it is right or wrong. When we speak or do something it is because that word or that act was instinctive to us. It was an instinct formed by our way of thinking.
This is where the transformation of the life must be taking place in our thoughts. Because we are born in sin, and as we know the sin nature lives on after salvation; our human instincts are based on sin, whether it is self-righteous sin or self-pleasing sin. As we take in the word of God we take on the character of Jesus Christ and when we do our instincts change and we think correctly thus we stay out of a lot of trouble. As believers we must see the urgency to grow in God’s word so that he can change our basic human instincts. We must allow the Lord to develop divine instincts in us.
Now if we live this way, our troubles will mostly come from those who oppose the Lord.
I Pet.4:14-19 read...