Walking in Wisdom

 Read Proverbs 28

Here we are 28 chapters into the Proverbs and Proverbs 3:5-6 keeps making an appearance.  The wording is a little different, but the messages are congruent.

Those who trust in themselves are fools,

    but those who walk in wisdom are kept safe.

How many times must we try to build a tower to heaven before we realize that our own understanding will always fall short of God’s plans for us?

God’s ways are higher than our ways could ever be, but how often do we retreat to living by our own understanding.  It’s understandable.  We think we understand our own understanding.

Let’s return to chapter 1 briefly.

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge,

    but fools despise wisdom and instruction.

Fools don’t want knowledge, wisdom, instruction, or discipline.  They believe in only what their finite minds can conceive.  They trust in their own wisdom.  A fool’s wisdom should be an oxymoron.

They do not want to even conceive of a Being whose thoughts and ways are higher than our own.  The fool wants everyone brought down to his level.  The very idea of God is repulsive to him.

We often want to believe in our own understanding—our own wisdom if you will, but we recognize that God’s wisdom far exceeds what we can comprehend.  The wisest thing we can do is to trust him—completely.

We want to believe what we understand over what God tells us is best, but we know that to be foolish.  God knows more than we can comprehend and the wisest thing that we can do is to trust him.

When we make a habit of trusting our own understanding over God’s, then we have become fools. We have been given eyes to see when this happens and we who desire to be wise, slam on the breaks as far as trusting our own understanding goes.  We trust God with everything that we have.

It is an ongoing wrestling match with our flesh.  Our own understanding always seems to be right, but we must trust that God is always right and is always looking out for us.  We must trust him.

The Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.

The circumstances were different, but the struggle is the same.  Our human nature naturally thinks it’s always right.  We must embrace our new nature—the new creature that we have become in Christ Jesus.  Then trusting God becomes our first nature.

Those who trust in themselves are fools,

    but those who walk in wisdom are kept safe.

How do we trust God more?  Walk in his wisdom.  Put his words into practice.  We have to walk the walk.  Doing helps our believing and our trust.

The more that we practice living God’s way, the more it moves from theoretical to actual in our hearts and minds.  Walking in God’s way is not only right, it keeps us safe.

Remember, that all of the minefields lie in the everything else.  Safety lies in God’s way—in walking in his wisdom.

There is God’s way and there is everything else.  Live God’s way.

Amen.