Jenny Hope

Another good one from James MacDonald! www.walkintheword.com

Don’t Lean on Your Own Understanding

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths." Proverbs 3:5-6

I bet that a lot of people would say that Proverbs 3:5-6 is their life verse. Is it yours? Do you have it underlined in your Bible? Let’s spend a couple minutes digging into this gold mine of truth for an even better understanding of God’s promise to us.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart” is obviously an exhortation not to doubt. Doubt is so destructive. It eats away at your soul. When you trust in the Lord “with all your heart”—with your total commitment, with everything you have, you’re making a tangible choice not to doubt.

But are you trusting with all your heart? This will help you to know— “…And do not lean on your own understanding.” You can’t trust in the Lord with all your heart if you’re leaning on your own understanding. Maybe you know some things. The problem is, are you leaning on those things when you hit a crisis? Are you confident in your own ability to get out of tight spots? “I know how to fix this.” Yeah, that’s not so great.

Well, what then? “In all your ways acknowledge Him…” In every choice, acknowledge God. Everything is about God—His reputation, His fame. You might be able to handle that situation by yourself, but you don’t just want to get out of it, you want to honor God in it.

Let’s say you’ve run into financial problems. Or you lose your job. Or you lose the big sale you were depending on. Not to mention the cost of gas! Things are getting so tight you don’t know how you’re going to pay the bills.

Humanly speaking, the first thing I do is lean on my own understanding. We’re going to tighten the belt around here, baby. No more money to charity. We can’t help our little Compassion Child anymore; she’s going to have to take care of herself. We’re not giving any more money over at that church; they seem to be doing fine.

Now, it’s not wrong to be wise in how you spend, but if you think you’re going to just gut it out, you’re leaning on your own understanding. That might be how you got in this situation, but that’s not how you’re going to get out of it. Instead say, we’re going to honor God as first in our life. We’re going to trust Him to keep His promises. We’re going to keep our commitments and tithe and give.

Don’t you think God sees you? Maybe He has allowed this very thing to teach you what it means to trust Him.