Could anything be higher than trusting God? Proverbs 3:5-6 has given God’s people the greatest comfort in life’s difficulties. These verses are among the most beloved and treasured. Unfortunately, popular passages like this one can become so familiar that we may lose the impact of the truth of them.
The verses themselves present a Christian worldview and life-purpose statement. Put 3:5-6 in the first person, and in NT light, and here is the message:
I will trust in the Lord (Jesus) with all of my heart…..I will not live so as to think that I can figure everything out in life……In everything I do and in every plan I make, I will remind myself that God has something to say to me about each situation…..And as I do this I am confident that He will guide me and make my life-paths straight. If I do these things I am confident that He will keep His promise and keep me from crooked paths that waste my life.
That’s a great and safe way to live! That is God’s way. That is the way we want to live, and we have already seen how true it is, and how faithful He is to fulfill these promises. So that’s it, right? Wrong. Look beyond these verses to the rest of chapter 3 and see that they are part of a larger setting – a whole way of life to live as we trust Him.
I believe that Proverbs 3 is a high point in the book of wisdom. Solomon is teaching and urging his son, as a godly father does, to get wisdom – life’s greatest treasure. He does this in chapters 1-9, and then in the rest of the book of Proverbs he gives him a treasure-chest of individual sayings that he can take to guide him safely through the network of life’s complexities and snares.
This is the only way for any of us to make it through life: For length of days and years of life and peace they will add to you (3:2). She is a tree of life to those who take hold of her (3:18). The tree of life that we aspire to is in heaven (Rev. 2:7). Man lost access to the tree of life in the Garden of Eden; he begins to regain it through wisdom, in Christ, and then ultimately in heaven.
How does Proverbs 3 take us beyond trust in the Lord? By teaching us what to do while we trust in the Lord. Trust means rest, being at ease, and having a peaceful confidence that God will take care of things as we lean on Him. But the context shows us that we are to trust and live godly at the same time. The first area that Solomon deals with in this regard is in 3:3-4 and has to do with our relationships with God and man: So you will find favor and good repute in the sight of God and man.
This is about human development which includes growth in the social horizontal and spiritual vertical relationships with God and man. This is God’s standard of personality development and human “psychology,” more properly called “Biblical anthropology.” It was applied to Samuel (1 Sam. 2:26), John (Lk. 1:80), and Jesus (Lk. 2:40, 52). And it is required of us. It is one of our goals in parenting too.
The second beyond has to do with pride vs. the fear of the Lord: Do not be wise in your own eyes – fear the Lord. One might say that the book of Proverbs is a book about the warfare between the pride in our hearts, and the fear of the Lord that brings wisdom for trusting Him. So if we really love 3:5 & 6, then we must hate our pride and high thoughts about ourselves, our thoughts, and plans. We renounce them all to receive God’s good gifts in humility.
A third area in 3:7 is turning away from evil. We can’t trust God and sin with the world; go in worldly ways. Evil is everything from the most awful sins to the very subtle sins of hating a person in our hearts, speaking ill of another, lustful thoughts, inordinate desires, envy, inappropriate responses that wound, etc. (Col. 3:5-17).
Another area is in our possessions. Honor the Lord from your wealth, and from the first of all your produce (3:9). He is teaching his young son how to relate to possessions and give to the Lord the first-fruit of all that he gains in life, and then he gives God’s promise: So your barns will be filled with plenty (3:10).
The last beyond is seen in 3:11-12. Do not reject the discipline of the Lord or loathe His reproof. For whom the Lord loves He reproves, even as a father corrects the son in whom he delights. This has to do with submission to formative discipline – that is, the cultivation of righteous living, true worship, and godly behavior, as well as corrective discipline – the willing reception of correction and rebuke when it is needed and when God and faithful ones give it to us (Prov. 1:5, 9:8, 9:9, 12:15).
-Pastor John Reuther
This article has been reposted with permission from http://cbclumberton.com/.