Good evening. Tonight as we continue our studies in the book of Proverbs, I'm going to be preaching to you tonight from Proverbs chapter 3 verses 5 through 7. Proverbs 3 verses 5 through 7, we have an opportunity tonight to think about in whom we have placed our trust. If you'll listen carefully as I read it to you, you will discern a very strong exhortation. And as you listen, you will discern a very strong warning. And as you listen, you will perceive the needed strength to obey what the Lord is telling us to do here. So, Proverbs 3 verses 5 through 7, Well, this is a very familiar portion, I'm sure to you, from the book of Proverbs. Let me begin by emphasizing what the proverb is not saying because this is an often misunderstood proverb. The proverb is not saying that what you understand is unimportant. The proverb is not saying that you are supposed to shut your mind off and let God speak to you. The proverb is not saying that if it's your idea, then it's automatically not the will of God. You're familiar with the bumper sticker theology that says, let go and let God. Let us dismiss with such foolish notions tonight. I remember being told, and this was many, many years ago, that if I was using my mind, then I was not listening to the Holy Spirit. This proverb is not saying that the work of thinking and understanding is sinful. It is saying that our thinking and our understanding can be sinful and that it must be sanctified. So the proverb is not about whether we're supposed to understand or we're not supposed to understand. This proverb is about two ways of thinking and two ways of understanding. And why do we think? Why do we understand? Well, we use that faculty in order to make decisions on directions that we take. We think, we strive to understand so that we are making good decisions on what path we're supposed to put our feet to. And that's what we're always doing all the time, isn't it? And the proverb is telling us that there's two directions we can take with our understanding or with our thinking. In life, we take a certain direction. We pick a path, and we do this all the time. We pick a path at work, and we pick it at church, and we pick a path in family life. In all areas of life, we do this. And at every moment, With our thinking and understanding leading to decisions and leading to the plans that we make, leading to the reactions that we give, at every point, at every moment, we are under a persuasion to do one thing or another. There's a persuasion working in our understanding or our thinking. Somebody has your ear all the time. This proverb would have us to ask, well, who has our ear? Who has our ear? And what I mean by that is you make the decision every day to be persuaded by one thing or another, by someone or another. The proverb teaches that it's not a matter of whether you do this or whether you don't do this. The proverb assumes that you do this. The issue is whether or not your understanding and your thinking are being guided by godly principles. When we read the proverb, we need to ask ourselves this question, who do we believe to be most trustworthy? Is it us or the Lord? Who do we believe to be most trustworthy? Well, let's look at some of the details of the proverb. We notice in verse 5 that the word trust and the word lean, as I'm reading it to you from the New King James, those are put as parallel. They're parallel terms, trust and lean. Both of those words from the Hebrew can mean to trust in. Verse 5 tells us who to trust in and who not to trust in. Trust in the Lord with all your heart. He can be trusted with your entire reliance. You must entrust yourself entirely to Him, that is, with your whole heart. Entrust yourself to Him heart, soul, mind, and strength with no hesitation. And the second part of the line furthers the explanation by putting that idea into the negative, lean not on your own understanding. That word to lean, that carries the idea of trust. It means to support yourself. So who to trust and who not to trust and who to lean upon entirely, who not to lean upon entirely. So again, God has given you a gift. He's given you the faculty of thinking and of understanding. And you go through a process. You use your God-given ability to think and to understand. And you do that in order to do all of the planning and the decision-making of life. So again, the question is, in whom do you trust? To whose word, to whose law are you submissive? Now the prophet gives you two options, it's God or yourself. So at this point, you're already hearing the exhortation, aren't you? That there should be no hesitation in leaning yourself entirely upon the Lord. There's no reason to think that if you lean yourself entirely upon him, that He's going to move or change and make you fall and make you look like a fool for trusting Him. He'll never do that. How do we know? He commands us here that we may entrust ourselves to Him entirely with our whole heart. We may do so safely. We may do so in full confidence that He'll never make us look like fools for trusting Him. The word for trust can literally mean to fall face down. and His people can do that before Him safely. One of the things that I do when I study the Scriptures, there's a question that I always ask of the text. And it's a helpful thing when reading the Bible or listening to a sermon and a certain text is presented to you. I believe it's always a helpful question to ask, well, why do I need to be told that? I'm being told to entrust myself entirely to the Lord and to not lean, to not entrust myself to myself. Why do I need to be told that? What is it as a result of the fall that makes that second line necessary? Why do I need to be told what not to do? Well, I think it's for this reason, because we sinfully, naturally, do not have a proper suspicion of ourselves. We tend to have too high of an opinion of ourself. We naturally don't have a proper self-suspicion of the fallen and broken condition of our understanding. So we need to be told not to trust it. When it comes to the planning and the decision-making of life, our first tendency is to sinfully, trustingly fall down before ourselves. We are naturally unsubmissive. We are naturally self-worshipping. We are naturally self-relying. This is why we need to be told this in verse five. In other words, we are naturally autonomous. We are self-ruled. And we can feel very comfortable with that. And that is most dangerous, this problem of autonomy, of self-rule. Is there any hesitation on your part to act and to think and to decide independent of anything but yourself? The proverb tells you exactly what you need to hear in order to be suspicious of your own natural independent thinking and natural decision-making. It tells you exactly what you need to hear. Notice that in verse 7, It further explains what it means to lean on your own understanding. Leaning on your own understanding or falling down before yourself is the same as being wise in your own eyes. That means you look in the mirror and you never question that person's opinion. That's what it means to be wise in your own eyes. It means you look in the mirror and without fail and without any suspicion, you always agree with who you're looking at. Notice that verse 7 continues, to diagnose the sinfulness of self-rule, the sinfulness of autonomy. The self-ruled person does not fear the Lord. We remember the very helpful definition that Derek Kidner gives about fearing the Lord. referring to the worshipful or reverential submission to the God of covenant. Fearing the Lord has to do with a true saving faith. So now it gets painful as it diagnoses autonomy. The self-ruled person does not fear the Lord or offer their worshipful, reverential submission to the God of covenant. So what we have to do at this point is we have to humbly agree with how the Lord Himself is describing leaning on our own understanding. He is describing here in this proverb an act of unbelief on our part, where we are unsubmissive and unbelieving and withholding our trust from Him. And then you'll notice that verse 7 concludes with the truth, that leaning on our own understanding, not submitting to Him with our thinking, with our understanding, not submitting to Him when we choose the path to walk on, ruling ourselves with our own law, do you see what it is? It is to pursue evil. It is to pursue evil. I know you've heard before this phrase, leaning on your own understanding, but you have to hear the rest of the context here of how the Lord Himself is diagnosing it and describing it. It's an act of unbelief. It's an act where we are refusing to submit ourselves to Him. We're withholding our trust, trusting ourselves instead. This, the Lord says, is to pursue evil. Now, maybe an illustration at this point would be helpful. So, when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, so she heard, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave her husband with her, and he ate." This is leaning on yourself. This is leaning on your own understanding. And that first act there of leaning on your own understanding instead of leaning yourself entirely upon the Lord, that sort of becomes the prototype of every other time in human history that a man or a woman or a child, they have leaned upon themselves rather than the Lord. Proverbs 3, 5 through 7 then is a warning to us of the dangerous evil of autonomy, of being self-ruled. It is warning us of the act of unbelief whereby we choose to walk and to plan and to decide and to react by sight rather than by belief in God's Word. What did Eve have? All she had was God's Word. That's all she had. The tree, there was nothing wrong with the tree. It was a good tree. There wasn't anything wrong with the fruit. It wasn't poisonous fruit. All she had was God's Word, but she chose to walk by sight rather than by faith in what God had said. Well, how do we begin to repent of this? How do we begin to repent of this sin described here. How do we begin to pursue trusting the Lord? By submitting ourself to Him, by submitting all of our paths to Him. Well, in verse 6, we notice this is in all your ways. That is to say, with all of your plans, with all of your decisions, acknowledge Him. In all your ways, acknowledge Him. This is what it looks like when we begin to repent and pursue obedience with this. When you put your faculty of thinking and understanding to use, which is all the time, acknowledge the Lord. Acknowledge the Lord. Acknowledge is a word that can simply mean to be aware of. But in this context, in the context of this very strong exhortation to entrust yourself to Him with no hesitation, with your whole heart, we should read acknowledge the Lord as being parallel with fear the Lord. To acknowledge Him is more than just to simply be aware No, to acknowledge Him in this case is to genuinely offer to Him your reverential submission, remembering that you are coming before the God of covenant, the God of tender mercies. Acknowledge Him is therefore describing, as I've said, something that's worshipful. something that's reverential, something that's submissive to the God of covenant. Acknowledging Him in this context must involve then true and saving faith. How do Adam and Eve go from leaning on their own understanding, and how do they go from being wise in their own eyes, how do they go from that display of autonomy in front of that tree, how do they go from ruling themselves to then speaking about life? Well, it was only by the preaching that God gave to them of the gospel promise. We're thinking about the foundation of a path of true life, and we would say that the beginning and controlling principle is faith in God who makes a covenant, who offers the terms of peace and reconciliation. You go through the book of Proverbs and it speaks about this fear of the Lord, and certainly at the beginning of the book describes the fear of the Lord as the beginning of wisdom. This is making us go back to the gospel promises that God has preached. Because fearing Him is a worshipful, reverential submission to who? To the God of what? To the God of covenant, to the God who condescends to us with the terms of peace and with the terms of reconciliation. This occupies the mind of the one who is acknowledging the Lord. So Proverbs 3, 5 through 7 is resting on a gospel foundation. I think there's a parallel passage in the New Testament, and it's Romans 12, 1 through 2, where Paul said, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by what? By the mercies of God. It's a reference to all the precious gospel assurances that Paul has already rehearsed in the book By the mercies of God, upon that gospel foundation, I beseech you that you present your bodies, and by that Paul means the entirety of your life, he's not talking about your skin, he's talking about your entire life. You present your bodies, a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service, and do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. In light of the truth, conform your life in light of the gospel, with gospel assurance. Acknowledge the Lord. Everybody is conformed to something. It's either this world or it's the truth. Here's a believer, as Paul is describing, There's a believer who's checked by the word, who's repenting of that sinful resistance to the sword that can so effectively plunge down into the mind, to the heart. Now, you'll notice that there's a sweet fruit to be harvested. I want you to really think about this. Notice back to the proverb, reverential, worshipful submission to the God who has preached the gospel to us. the God of covenant, the God of tender condescension to us with the terms of peace and friendship and reconciliation and forgiveness and trusting ourselves to Him entirely. There's a sweet fruit that God promises. Proverb tells us that God shall direct your paths. The ESV says He will make straight your paths. Your paths of life, the road of your thinking, the road of your planning, the road of your decision making, and that along with all of the consequences of those plans and decisions will be straightened. It will be cleared. It will be protected by the truth. It is the humbled and submissive and mercy-reliant believer in the Lord who finds relief from the bitter fruit of crooked sinful paths. Sin is ugly, and sin is destructive, and sin puts you on the path of death, remembering that death is not just a final moment of breathing. Death is a realm. Self-rule, autonomy, this is evil rebellion producing death. Here God promises to those who entrust themselves to Him the straightening of their path. It's by this truth that you'll find protection from your own sins and protection from the destruction of self-rule. But we have to be very careful. because the proverb is not the secret of how to have an easy life. Don't hear that when you hear about straightened paths. This isn't the secret of how to have an easy life. The path is straight because it's the path of righteousness, because it's the path of holiness. It's not straight in the sense that there's no suffering. You know, you can entrust yourself entirely to the Lord and submit your understanding and your thinking and your planning. You can submit that to Him and still plans go awry. You thought you had gathered all the necessary information that you could gather to make a godly decision and the plan still falls apart. You obey. You submit yourself to the Word of the Lord and you obey and you're working on your repentance and you're working on the strengthening of your faith and life at moments still falls apart. Well, it's helpful to remember what we've heard the preacher say from the book of Ecclesiastes, that what is crooked cannot be made straight and what is lacking cannot be numbered. We live in a broken world. We live in a broken world. Later on, we're not there yet, but later on in the book of Ecclesiastes, the preacher will say, he'll say, I have seen everything in my days of vanity. There is a just man who perishes in his righteousness and there's a wicked man who prolongs life in his wickedness. Well, that doesn't make sense to us. That's one of those perplexing gaps that he mentions all the way back in chapter one. There are these deficiencies in this broken world that don't make any sense to us. So we remember that when we hear the promise of the sweet fruit of God directing our paths, of God straightening our paths. This is not a promise that all of life will suddenly become smooth sailing. but it will be the path of safety. It will be the path of safety, and you will have to rely upon His promise that it is so, and not upon your sight, and not upon the other things that your senses can take in. You will have to rely upon the promise that God has given that He is straightening and securing your path, even if it doesn't feel like that. We remember The woman doubted God's preservation as she stands before the tree. She's doubting His promise of safety. And so she ate, thinking that that was the path for her preservation and safety. When you hear this promise that He will direct your paths, He will make straight your paths, I think you need to hear this also, that it's a promise of preservation. It's a promise of preservation. Well, I can give you some thoughts here on building on the foundation. How do we practically work out, don't be wise in your own eyes? How do we practically work this out? How are we to practically work out acknowledging the Lord? How do we work out fearing Him as we walk the path of life? How does this look to entrust ourselves to Him, to lean ourselves entirely upon Him and not upon our own understanding. What does this look like when we are repenting of autonomy, when we're repenting of self-rule, and instead we are submitting ourselves to the Lord's Word, to the Lord's rule, to the Lord's law? Well, let me ask you this question. How willing are you to be guided? Are you willing to be guided? Maybe you can hear from the proverb that it is speaking to our need for guidance outside of ourselves. Well, how is that guidance obtained? Well, I can say it to you in two words. It's through means. It's through means. Notice the list of proverbs that I've given to you in your handout. Proverbs 1, 5, and 6 says, a wise man will hear and increase learning, and a man of understanding will attain wise counsel. Have you ever found a wise, mature Christian? Have you ever wondered, well, how did he get that way? How did she get that way? They learned to listen. They learned to listen. A wise man will do what? and thereby his learning will increase. He listens. He's not standing in front of the mirror saying, hey, I like what you have to say. No, he is repenting of that and he's listening to counsel from outside of himself. How do we know that? Because a man of understanding will attain wise counsel. That's a word there that means guidance. How willing are you to be guided? Proverbs 11.14 says, where there is no counsel, the people fall. But in the multitude of counselors, there is safety. If you are falling down before yourself, it's probably a pretty isolated thing to do. Proverbs 11.14 warns us of the danger of isolation. In a multitude of counselors being surrounded by those who are wise, there is safety there to be enjoyed. Proverbs 12, 15, the way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but he who heeds counsel is wise. How do the wise get wise? We know enough from the Scriptures they weren't born that way. They heed counsel. They learned, they have learned to listen. They've learned to be suspicious of themselves. They learned to heed counsel that is wise. They know they need help. 1522, without counsel plans go awry, but in the multitude of counselors they are established. 19 verses 20 and 21, R20, listen to counsel and receive instruction that ye may be wise in your latter days. Have you ever found an older, mature Christian wise in the Word of the Lord? They learned to listen when they were young, perhaps. They learned to receive instruction. In Proverbs 2018, plans are established by counsel, by guidance, by wise counsel wage war. Well, let me draw out a general principle that we can see here from that quick survey. The book of Proverbs shows us the importance of being teachable. We're answering the question, well, how does it practically work out that we acknowledge the Lord and we lean upon Him instead of leaning upon ourselves? We learn to be teachable. If we're going to have His Word and have His rule and have His law, we learn to hear, we learn to listen. 2 Peter 3.16 says, Peter says, there is also in all his epistles, speaking of Paul, speaking in them of things in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction. Do you know why they're untaught? It's because they're unteachable. It's not because they lacked good educational opportunities. It's because they refuse to listen. And this makes them so unstable. It leads them to twisting the Scriptures to their own destruction. And we should always remember Titus 1.9, there Paul instructing Titus on some of the qualifications for the elders. He says that they should hold fast the faithful word as he has been what? As he has been taught that he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and convict those who contradict. Do you want to find someone who will be a trustworthy, faithful teacher in the church? Well, he must be first, teachable. If he's not teachable, then he runs the risk of being untaught and unstable, like Peter warns. Now, let me run out a little rabbit trail here for you. Would you like some help in being teachable? Because Proverbs 3, 5 through 7, if we're going to work that out practically, we have to learn to listen. If we're going to heed the Lord, if we're going to submit ourselves to His Word, if we're going to submit being guided by what the Lord has revealed, we have to learn to listen. We have to be teachable. Would you like some help on that? Here's a tip. And you can take this with you with any kind of preaching or teaching situation that you find yourself in. What you can do is apply the Beatitudes to yourself to encourage yourself being teachable. So, for example, blessed are the poor in spirit. Listen as if you are poor. That'll help you. That will help you. We're all born children of wrath. We're all born having no hope or hope in the world. While coming to the world spiritually beggarly and destitute, in the Beatitudes, Jesus describes the person who not only recognizes this, not only understands this, but has been changed so as to take it personally. I'm the one who's poor." God says in His Word, for example, you are a transgressor of My law. God says in His Word, you have fallen short of My glory. And the one who is poor in spirit says, yes, I agree. I agree. Apply poverty of spirit. Think about, meditate on poverty of spirit. This will help you to grow in being teachable. for the sake of leaning upon the Lord. From this parvia of spirit flows your own response to sin. Blessed are those who mourn. Because this person has the characteristic of true poverty of spirit, the mourning of which Jesus speaks is not worldly sorrow which leads to death, but it's the mourning and the grieving of hatred of sin. It's that mourning and grieving of repentance. It's sorrow which leads to repentance. meditate on that. This will help you to grow in being eager to hear and being eager to listen and being eager to be guided if you know how poor you are apart from grace. And if from that you're growing in a grief over your own sins in particular, you come into this room on a Lord's Day morning, you settle yourself down in the pew and your mind is filled with how poor I am without my Savior, and how I hate my sins. That will help you to sit at the edge of the pew ready to grab any kind of crumb and to feed upon it. Well, we could go through that, but I think you get the point. Hungering and thirsting for righteousness. See, this will help you in being teachable. That word counsel, by the way, some translations use the word guidance. The origin of that Hebrew word has to do with pulling on a rope, like the use of the rope in the tackle on a ship, to guide the ship. Well, it's the wise man who recognizes his need. It's the wise woman who recognizes her need of being steered from something outside of themselves. Well, I can also say a word to you that it certainly matters where you find that guidance and where you find that counsel. The Proverbs, as we did a quick survey there, they remind us that we must attain wise guidance or wise counsel. wise guidance or wise counsel. Well, how do we find that? How can we be sure? How can we have any confidence that we are getting wise counsel? Well, we do have the sufficiency of the Scriptures, and this ought to be of great relief to your soul when you consider the sufficiency of the Scriptures. We should read these proverbs of God directing us, God straightening our paths. We ought to read these with great hope because God has given us His sufficient Word, His sufficient Word. This is a very helpful paragraph from chapter 1 of our confession. It says, the whole counsel of God concerning all things. I love the use of those two words, whole and all. The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man's salvation, faith, and life is either expressly set down or necessarily contained in the Holy Scripture, unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelation of the Spirit or traditions of men. Nevertheless, we acknowledge the inward illumination of the Spirit of God to be necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the Word." And so what is it that the Lord gives to us? How may we find wise counsel? How may we find this wise and reliable guidance? Does He not, especially every Lord's Day morning, provide us with the means of grace, especially the preaching of His Word. So we ought to come with prayerful hearts, praying that the preacher would be faithful to his task, praying for the working of the Holy Spirit that we may savingly understand the things that are being preached, that we may have wise counsel, wise guidance Have you ever prayed? I'm sure you have at some point or another. Have you ever prayed, Lord, preserve me? Lord, help me to make it to the end. Have you ever thought about how he answers that prayer? Well, he gives you a Lord's Day morning, and he gives you a pew to sit on, and he gives you a preacher to preach to you his word. He's giving you His guidance. He's giving you His counsel, wise counsel from His all-sufficient Word. God is working to keep you. God is working to preserve you by the preaching of His Word. He's, as you're listening, He's straightening your paths. He's protecting you and He is preserving you. He's keeping you. You're safe. You're safe to do this. You are safe to depend upon the Lord through the Word to give you everything you need, all of the guidance that you need for life and for faith. And then a final word here is to speak of the sufficiency of the covenant. We should read these Proverbs about our responsibility to acknowledge God. We should read them with hope. And we should realize that really only the regenerate can obey Proverbs 3, 5 through 7. You stand with Christ. You stand upon a foundation of gospel hope. It's covenant of grace hope. It's new covenant hope. Think about this from Proverbs 8, this comparison between the old and new covenants. It says in Hebrews 8 in verse 7, it says, For if that first covenant had been faultless, then no place would have been sought for a second. But finding fault with him, he says, Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. When we read the writer there speaking of the first covenant having a fault, the way that I have explained that before is It's like a piece of paper that has a line of perforation in it, and it's designed to be cut. It's designed to be torn at that point. Maybe you, at one point, you've gotten a paycheck, and it's perforated, so you tear off the top part of your paycheck, and you save the bottom part. Maybe that's a way of thinking about it, that God had designed these lines of perforation in the Old Covenant. They were designed to be, it was designed to be torn at certain points. So by fault, it doesn't mean that there was something wrong with the covenant. It was designed to be that way for a point, for a good purpose. So it goes on, because finding fault with them, he says, Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, because they did not continue in my covenant. And one of the most powerful statements that you'll find in Scripture says, and I disregarded them. That's a divorce statement. I disregarded them, says the Lord. For this is the covenant, He says. For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. I will put my laws in their mind. Write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be My people." I hope that that strengthens your soul when you go to Proverbs 3, 5 through 7, the precious promises that we have as members of the New Covenant. I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother saying, Know the Lord, for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more." In Christ, you have been granted all that you need that Proverbs 3, 5 through 7 is requiring of us. It's a precious thought. It's a precious gift to see here that God has given us a multitude of counselors. He has By the blessing of this wonderful new covenant, He's placed you into a community of the regenerate. He has placed you into a community of those that have His law written upon their hearts, of those that have been changed so as to love His Word and to love His law. So when you come and gather on a Lord's Day morning especially, And you have scooted to the front edge of your pew with poverty of spirit, and you're leaning your ear forward, hungering and thirsting for righteousness. You can be refreshed in your soul with the truth that you are not listening as an isolated individual, but you're listening with us. And we are listening with you. We're listening together. What a precious gift that God gave really under the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, that God gives the gift of assembly, that we may hear the Word together. What a great help this is. Christopher Ashe points this out in that little booklet that he wrote entitled, Listen Up, where he talks about the great benefit that we enjoy listening to the Word together because when we are here together in the assembly and the Word is preached, that means I know what you just heard. And you know what I just heard, and that's good for me, and that's good for you. I need you to know that I just heard what you just heard, and you know that. You know what I know that you know it. This is good for us. There we find God giving us all that we need for our guidance and for our safety, giving us wise guidance and surrounding us in a multitude of good, regenerate counselors as we listen to the Word and listen to the Word together. Well, I hope that this will be of encouragement to your soul. May the Lord help us with these things.