Originally written this past summer when a good friend asked me to help her with an 'assignment'; her soon to wed step-daughter had asked my friend to bring a five-minute meditation on Proverbs 3:5-6 during the wedding ceremony. ~AireTrust in the LORD with all your heart,
and lean not on your own understanding;
in all your ways acknowledge Him,
and He shall direct your paths.King Shlomo, son of David, wrote and collected many wise sayings to give his readers practical advice about pilgrimaging through this earth-life. He often pictured a person standing at a "T" in the road facing a critical choice. Pursue the road marked "way of destruction"? Or pursue the road marked "way of
life"? There was no moral equivalence in the Hebrew mind.
Our English word "dilemma" captures the
risk associated with having to choose between two mutually exclusive options. At such watershed moments, Solomon counsels, an earthly pilgrim needs three things for the journey:
- A trustworthy Guide
- A teachable spirit
- and Moral Courage
If a pilgrim possesses all three, then Shlomo concludes, "The LORD shall direct [-- or more literally, "make smooth --] your paths." Godly paths can be dangerous, winding, tortuous, and shin-splinting at times. Yeshua taught his disciples, "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to
life, and only a few find it" (
Matthew 7:13-14)
How do we find the narrow gate, the small footpath the masses ignore?First, we must have fortitude to ask: "Who can I trust in this weary world? Who is not going to defraud me? Who won't intentionally, or unintentionally, betray my trust?
Selah [i.e., Meditate before continuing...].
The
Hebrew Book of Proverbs answers: "Trust in the LORD with all your heart." Trust. Count on, rely upon, have confident conviction that the God who revealed himself to Moshe at Mount Sinai is a truth-telling God. He told Moshe: "I am compassionate, gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love and trustworthiness" (
Exodus 34:6). "Trust ... with all your heart" means we can't be "double-souled"; we must be single-minded in trusting the Hebrews' God always has our best good at heart, even when our circumstances and feelings suggest the opposite. Nineteenth century bible teacher Charles Spurgeon put it this way, "When you can't trace God's hand, trust His heart."
The second question a serious pilgrim must ask is, "Are my human intelligence and intuition sufficient to navigate me and my loved ones successfully through this earth life?"
Selah.
Proverbs answers: "... and lean not on your own understanding." Be humble. The Hebrew word "lean" is sometimes used to describe how an ancient man would commit suicide by "leaning" on his spear; perhaps King Shlomo wanted his readers to consider it is spiritual suicide to rely on human wisdom when mapping a course for one's life. Is incest, for example, moral deviancy, or is it 'intergenerational intimacy'? Two opposing paths of thinking. Scripture advises us to remember we human beings are human; we do not have exhaustive knowledge, but we have God's Word, rightly handled, for guidance. We are finite, mortal, and weren't around at the first day of Creation. Nor are we 100% trustworthy or dependable. We don't know the future. We can only make fallible predictions and then revise our theories as circumstances play out. Dr. Larry Crabb, biblical theist and psychologist, has observed, "The people and things we care about the most we have the least control over." Now,
that's humbling!
The third and final question a serious earth-pilgrim should consider when standing at Life's crossroads is, "When I inventory my spoken words, my observable actions, my unseen thoughts and encrypted motives, how do I evaluate their significance? their insignificance?
Selah.
Proverbs answers: "... in all your ways acknowledge Him."
Live every moment
coram Deo aka "before the Face of God." Look for God's invisible, gracious hand in every moment of each new day. Have the moral courage to self-judge your waking moments through the prism of God's precious word. When Rabbi Yeshua walked the Land, Israel had learned from her exile not to flirt with polytheism. However, while Israel was quite monotheistic, some of her leaders (not all!) had become legalists. They emphasized external do's and don't's only. They ignored how the Hebrew Scriptures taught the most important part of a man's religious devotion was his love for God and neighbor, not how many tithes or kosher-rules he kept in a day. How can we hope to overcome Life's moral dilemmas, which inevitably come knocking, if we are self-deceived?
In conclusion, our earth-life is a journey with many unforeseen twists and turns; the God of Avraham, Yitzak, and Ya'acov was a trustworthy guide for Israel's patriarchs over 4000 years ago; He patiently taught them not to rely on their own innate intelligence but to weigh their life journeys on His eternal scales. Hudson Taylor, pioneering bible teacher to China [1865-1905], said Yeshua's words, "Have faith in God," (Mark 11:22) could be translated, "Hold on to the faithfulness of God."
"Why?" we might ask. Because "He shall direct your paths."
Into
life.
Into joy.
Into
shalom.The journey begins with trusting the Trustworthy Guide.
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The opposite of joy is not sorrow. It is unbelief. ~ Leslie Weatherhead
Picture me with my ground teeth stalking joy--fully armed too, as it's a highly dangerous quest. ~ Flannery O'Connor
[This message was edited by Airedale on 01-05-09 at 08:30 AM.]
