Proverbs 16:1-11

that the text message has gone out. Again, if this is something that you would like a reminder about, you can send me a text message, bryan, B-R-Y-A-N, at sharonrpc.org. And I would be more than willing to add you to that text message list where every day you would get a reminder for when this is going up. So I'm gonna go ahead and make sure that that went live over there.
That's wonderful, great. Well, good morning, good morning. Welcome to Coffee and Devotions. It's such a blessing to get together each morning with you to get into God's Word. This is where every day we get together. We get into God's Word. We grow in our love for the Lord together. And this year, 2021, we'll make it through all the wisdom literature. Today we're at Proverbs chapter 16, the first 11 verses. Why don't we have some coffee? We'll pray and we'll get into God's Word. Let's pray.
Father, we thank you so much for this day. What a blessing it is to sit at your feet, to learn from you, to walk in your ways. God, we pray that you would be our teacher this morning. Father, give us your Holy Spirit and press these truths on our hearts so that we might believe them and live them. In Jesus' name, amen. All right, here we go. Proverbs chapter 16, the first 11 verses. The preparations of the heart belong to man, but the answer of the tongue is from the Lord. We make our own plans. We devise things in our hearts. We think we know what's going to happen, what's going on, but in reality...
God is the one who is sovereign. The Lord is provident over all that actually is accomplished. This is why the book of James tells us, you know, we're not supposed to say that, oh, today I'm going to go here and tomorrow I'm going to do this. No, no. Hold on. You should say, it's the Lord wills. I plan to do such and such a thing. It's all at the end of the day, dependent upon God's blessing, the plans that we might put in our hearts. Verse two. All the ways of man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the spirit. It's easy for us. It's easy for us to justify things in our own hearts.
It's easy for us to deceive ourselves and to make our plans, but the Lord weighs heart and the balances right the lord knows what righteousness is and how often our hearts deceive us there's this lie in our american western culture that says follow your heart do what feels best do what's what you think is best for you And that's so unbiblical.
That is a pagan way of thinking about things. No. The heart is deceitfully wicked above all else. We shouldn't just follow our hearts. My heart is bound folly. I need to go after God's wisdom. My heart can deceive me. Go talk to my wife. Sometimes I think what I'm doing is a loving thing. And when I ask her at the end of each day, what did I do to hurt your feelings? It's amazing how often the thing that I was trying to do to love her was the thing that hurt her, hurt her feelings and made her not feel loved. Don't just follow your heart.
Follow the Lord's ways. Verse three. Commit your works to the Lord and your thoughts will be established. So instead, turn our eyes to the Lord. Take our plans to God. Trust in His sovereignty. Trust in His timing. Bow to His will. And as we do that, our thoughts will be established. Why? Because we're thinking His thoughts after Him. We're content in all things, whether we have much or whether we have want. We know that we can trust Him.
Verse four, or verse five, oh four, sorry. The Lord has made all for Himself. Yes, even the wicked for the day of doom. There are no loose strings. This is what I have written in the margin of my Bible here as I was thinking about this. There are no loose strings in God's world.
He's made even the wicked for destruction. It's not like the Lord at the judgment day is going to go, oh, man, I didn't think about them. No, the Lord knows all. He sees all. Even the wicked for the day of destruction. It's not by accident. Somehow something out of God's control. Verse five, everyone proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord. Though they join forces, none will go unpunished.
Again, we live in such a world in Western society where you got to be proud. You should take some pride in your work. Take pride in yourself. This is one of the things that just I'm gonna be honest with you, some of the people who are the most proud people I know should be the most humble people. And I mean, this is true in my own heart too. Often when I find myself proud, like, oh, I can think through that, I can memorize this, I can do that, the Lord humbles me and shows me, you got nothing to be proud of, buddy. Your thinking is fallible, what you say is fallible, the work of your hands is fallible. The proud in heart are doomed for destruction. The text here is so strong. It says that everyone proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord. The Lord will spit them out. That's how the Lord feels about those who are proud in their hearts. Verse six though.
In mercy and in truth, atonement is provided for iniquity, and by the fear of the Lord one departs from evil. This word for mercy here in the New King James is the Hebrew word chesed. have said, loving kindness, covenant loyalty, covenant loyalty in truth, and atonement are provided for by the Lord.
It's the Lord who shows us grace. It's because all of us who are proud in heart But if we fear the Lord, He provides atonement. He provides for us a final atonement in Jesus Christ. He has covered over all of our sins. This is why in 1 John chapter 1 we're instructed if we confess our sins, He is God. He is faithful and He is righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all of our unrighteousness.
He provides the atonement. He provides the loving-kindness. He provides the truth. We look to Him. We humble ourselves before Him. Verse 7, When a man's ways please the Lord, He makes even his enemies be at peace with him. There's a certain amount of peace that comes. when we follow the Lord.
Now, this isn't an overall blanket statement that this is always the truth Jesus told us. Don't be surprised when persecution happens. Why? Because if they've hated me, they're also going to hate you. No servant is greater than his master. But persecution isn't an all-the-time type thing.
Most of the time, if we are living a godly life, if we are loving our neighbor as ourselves, if we are living humble lives, sacrificial lives, servant-like lives, loving the stranger and the orphan and the widow, if we love justice and mercy and are generous, there's generally peace. So, yeah, don't be surprised when persecution comes, because Christians are often the scapegoats, but there is a peace that comes with being a Christian.
Verse 8, better is a little with the righteous than vast revenues with the rich. Guilt will always steal away at the joy that comes with riches. It's better to live with a little with the righteous. than to have a whole bunch and to be among the wicked? Do you value holiness more than the goods and the things of this world?
Verse 9, a man's heart plans his way but the Lord directs his steps. This is why the psalmist in Psalm 119 verse 23 or verse 113 says, direct my steps by your word and let no iniquity have dominion over me." Right? Go ahead, make plans, toil, work hard, but at the end of the day, it's the Lord. It's Him. He's the one who brings the increase. He's the one who establishes our ways.
Verse 10, divination is on the lips of the king. His mouth must not transgress in judgment. The king is supposed to have divine wisdom, especially when this is being written. This is written by Solomon to his son, and he's speaking to his son, and he's saying, You need to be able to speak the words of God. You need to be able to speak righteousness. You need to be able to say honest things.
His mouth will not transgress judgment. The last verse this morning, verse 10. Honest weights and scales are the Lord's. All the weights in the bag are His work. In the Old Testament, this time period, they would have literally had weights. You know, I don't have any coins or anything with me here. Oh, yes, I do. Here we go. And he would have had the scale, the coins, and on it would have been written, you know, one shekel or one ephah or whatever, you know.
And on it would be the signature of the king, the mark of the king saying, this is what the royal standard is. The royal standard is God's. He's the one who hates when people steal. Who say, oh, this is worth a quarter, but then we'll round the edges and we'll take a little bit of silver off of it. Or we'll try to steal from the widow by changing the interest rates just a little bit. The just weights are the Lord's. He's the one who weighs the hearts and knows what righteousness is.
Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for this day. What a blessing it is to sit at your feet. God, we pray that you would let us love you, search after you, follow your ways. We thank you for your mercy and your kindness. We pray that we would walk in the righteousness that you have shown us in Jesus. In his name we pray. Amen. Well, may you be humble in heart. May you love God's Word. May He establish your path today. May you walk in His truth, and may you have peace for today. I'll see you tomorrow. Bye.