Don't Trust Yourself

Take your Bible and turn back with me to Proverbs chapter 3. I know that we were there earlier I think you see a pattern that I have developed in taking at least one of our verses and in Reading it for our children to to hear and making some application there I had verses 5 and 6 especially and then on down to verse 8 for that I had that on my heart for the scripture reading and I hope the Lord used that This week we're gonna start with chapter 3 and again We're gonna deal with it in two verses.

We'll be covering verses 1 to 12 Tonight now My way of introduction just kind of get it right getting our mind going a particular direction I want to remind you of what we just sung a while ago one of the songs that brother Keith let us in It's one that we are familiar with come thou fount of every blessing Sometimes you'll hear people abbreviate it. They'll call it just come thou fount. That's okay But I want to direct your attention to two different verses.

This is the second part of verse 2 It's before you Jesus sought me when a stranger Wondering from the fold of God he to rescue me from danger of course, the next phrase is about the blood of Christ and Verse 2 this portion of verse 2 it's obvious it relates to our salvation But then when we go on down to verse 3 the second part of verse 3 He says prone to wonder Lord.

I feel it prone to leave the God I love Here's my heart Lord taking seal it seal it for the courts above now this phrase it speaks to our sanctification And I walk with God so in verse 2 that verse that we read earlier That speaks of our salvation and then here with the verse that I just put before you this speaks of our of our sanctification now specifically I really want you to see how the Him writer here he has in mind with this phrase prone to wonder Lord I feel it prone to leave the God that I love he knew what Solomon knew Solomon knew that his son was prone to leave God's ways Solomon knew that his son was leave prone to leave God's Word and his instruction and then starting in verse 1 in chapter 3 We will see Solomon reminding his son not to forsake his teaching we will see Solomon calling his son Not to forsake God's ways and God's Words and that's what we have here in these 12 verses verses 1 to 12 Solomon is reminding his son.

He is telling his son not to trust his feelings He is telling his son not to trust his own thinking his own understanding I read that verse earlier Solomon is telling him set telling his son not to trust himself But to remain true to the teaching that has been given him that leads me to the title of tonight's message I title these verses don't trust yourself That's what Solomon saying Don't trust yourself What does the hymn writer say prone to wonder Lord? I feel it. I don't trust myself Now I read verses I'm five to eight earlier. I will go back.

I want to read those verses again And this is the heart of the message for me Verses five on down to verse eight really verses five to seven. I kind of was back and forth about including verse eight This is the heart of the message And then I'm gonna read the rest of the verses really as we just progress through the message Let's go back to verse five trust the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own Understanding see that don't trust yourself In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths Straight make straight your paths or make your paths straight. Do not be wise in your own eyes.

See don't trust yourself fear the Lord and turn away from evil and it will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to Your bones. So this is what we're going to be looking at tonight in verses 1 to 12 Don't trust yourself and there are four truths that we're going to look at four ways that I'm dividing these verses I call them major truths I think you can follow me and I will give them to you as we progress through the message So the the first truth that we're going to look at I'm calling this we must not forget this comes out of verses 1 to 4 As I've said before in these verses we see the language of a loving father To his son we saw this in chapter 2 verse 1 and then going back into chapter 1 We saw it really after the introduction of verses 1 to 7 or an introduction We saw it in verse 8, but notice what Solomon is doing He's calling his son not to forget what he's been taught verse 1 my son Do not forget my teaching but let your heart keep my commandments Isn't that what he's doing now with verses 1 to 4 there are four observations or four specifics These are the ways I want to break this down and to me these specifics these observations Just reveal what Solomon is doing here this this work that he's wanting to do in his son So notice right away Solomon is is obeying the Old Testament scriptures Verse 1 my son do not forget my teaching Just this one phrase my teaching that tells us that Solomon was being obedient to the Old Testament He would have known that commandment that all good Jews knew which was out of Deuteronomy 6 He knew that Deuteronomy 6 commanded him as a father to teach his children So just that phrase tells us that he's obeying the Old Testament Commandments that he most definitely had and that was to teach his son And then second notice Solomon is teaching the Old Testament scriptures Solomon is teaching the Old Testament scriptures notice the last part of verse 1 Let your heart keep my Commandments this word commandment here at the end of the verse The scholars tell us that that is a reference to God's commandments or God's divine instruction Now the basis of these commandments would have been what's called the Torah or the first five books of the Bible Solomon would have possessed these so Solomon is teaching his son From the Word of God the Old Testament scriptures and he most certainly had them so notice right away Solomon is obeying what the scripture says and teaching his son and he is teaching his son the scriptures And then third notice Solomon is calling his son to faithfulness Verse 3 let not let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you Bind them around your neck write them on the tablet of your heart So you will find favor and good success in the sight of God and man I went on down to verse 4 but here in verse 3 There is a reference to to what I see is the external and the internal notice the language He talks about binding the truth around your neck write them on the tablet of your heart.

That's the internal the external This bind them around your neck It reflects teaching from Deuteronomy 6 where God's Word was to be bound on the forehead and on the hand and then this writing Of putting them on the tablet of your heart. It speaks of internalizing God's commandments So Solomon is calling his son to keep God's commandments Notice on the inside and the outside not just one or the other but on the inside within his heart and then on the Sternals of his life so he's calling him the faithfulness and then last Solomon is revealing to his son a Blessed life or a blessing in life if he is faithful We see this in verse 2 in verse 4 for length of days and years of life and peace They will be added to you verse 4 so you will find favor and good success in the sight of God and man These two verses right here.

It is easy to see that Solomon promises blessing for faithfulness One commentator posed a kind of a comical question But it is one that can can help us to see this I think a little better and the question is this does Proverbs preach a prosperity gospel? We know what the prosperity gospel is. It's it's not the gospel But that's a good question for us to ponder in verse 2 Solomon clearly says that obedience to God's law It does prolong the days of life and peace in life.

He says it This is a similar promise found in in chapter 2 verse 21 that we dealt with last week and he goes on in verse 4 and he says that obedience Will gain favor in the sight of God so Solomon is clearly teaching His son that a certain amount of blessing will follow obedience and faithfulness So in summary and I like to summarize what I've taught you in verses 1 to 4. What do we see? To me everything is summarized in three words Three words and they happen to start with an F. The first word is forget The second word is faithful and the third word is favor.

I'm just boiling it down to three words Solomon is calling his son Not to forget don't forget God's words. Don't forget what I've taught you Solomon is calling him to remain faithful to God's words We see that in verse 1 and in verse 3 and then then he says you will find favor with God We see that in verse 4 really those three words come right out of the text Forget don't forget be faithful and you will find favor Now I'm happen happen to be dealing in threes now and for application I want to call you to apply the verses in three ways This is just what came to my mind as I was studying and praying even today So an application first we must not forget God's Word in God's teaching We must not forget.

Isn't that what Solomon saying my son don't forget don't forget And so we must see we must not forget what we learn on Sunday mornings We must not forget what we what we learn from the gospel of John and and what we're learning in the sermon on the Mount And on Sunday nights as we're studying those Churches and see other words and exercises come to my mind We must be faithful to read and then we must be faithful to study It's not just enough for us to hear it.

We must go back and everybody learns differently some take thorough notes in here And some go back and listen and and everybody must be disciplined See there's that other word and we must feed the mind. We must store it up in in our mind So so we must not forget God's Word in God's teaching. I Shared this years ago. I remember quite a few years ago I stumbled across some old preaching cassettes of my home church pastor and I found a way to play them and I was listening and all of a sudden this flood of Memories and and all these things that I learned years ago came back into my mind and it made me realize how easy it Is for us to forget that's why I emphasized taking notes Taking what's been given to you from the pulpit in small group Bible study and working hard not to forget it Solomon's doing that and then second an application.

We must make sure that we internalize it with understanding I remind you of what we learned in chapter 2 verses 1 to 4. It was about gaining understanding Gaining an ability to understand the word it was about having Insight with what the word says not just putting it in the mind now I've used other ways to communicate that meditating on it praying over what you're looking at spending time Reading it memorizing it but yet wanting to understand the meaning of it and I have said this I'd rather you know the meaning of the text than to be able to rattle it off If you know the meaning of the text and it's in your heart and in your life and in your bones You'll live it even if you quite kind of misquoted I'm not saying one is is bad.

I'm just saying rather than memorizing it Let's make sure that that we internalize it and this takes a work of the spirit the Holy Spirit to help us So first we don't need to forget it second. We need to internalize it Okay, let it be in us and and it'll form us and then third just leave the blessing in the favor up to God However, he chooses to bless you. That's God's business. Okay? Some of the other denominations focus on the blessing God will bless us in ways in which we do not Know and just let that let God take care of that. So what do we see number one? We must not forget and Solomon is a loving father.

He doesn't want his son to forget. So let's move on I want us to see number two We must trust in him We see this in verses 5 to 8. We must trust in him These verses verses 5 to 6 are very familiar when people are asked about their favorite verse Many times these two verses will come up These two verses were some of the first ones that I memorized years ago and I memorized it the NIV and sometimes that reading Comes out when I'm reading my English Standard version, but those are familiar verses Sometimes in Bible studies or Bible promises books devotionals those verses will be there But I like how one commentator described these verses he calls them a very serious Admonition, but then he goes on to talk about how they were wonderful.

There's wonderful assurance and guidance Yes, this is very serious, but yet it's very practical and to me I see encouraging very encouraging words Now three ways I want to divide these verses and this will help us see how we must trust in him Notice right away Solomon is calling his son to trust God He is calling his son to trust God the beginning of verse 5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart and then we go on down to verse 6 in all or your ways Acknowledge him and he will make your path straight Here in these two verses we have the beginning of wisdom. Is that that the truth?

We have the beginning of wisdom Trusting in God in his ways that is the beginning of wisdom. That's the first step in this work This word trust here pictures one who is helpless The picture is of one who is prostrated or spread out face down before God Again, I call you to see this word heart This speaks to the very center of one's being and this is more than the mind So Solomon is calling his son to trust in God and his word in great humility Face down before God and his word.

He is calling him to acknowledge God's Word and God's ways in every part of his life Last week we saw where God's wisdom protects man Remember the protection from the evil gang the evil crowd and the adulterous seductive woman and here we see where God's wisdom directs man Let me go back trust the Lord with all your heart Do not lean on your own understanding and all of your ways acknowledge him.

Here's the direction and he will make your path straight So Solomon is calling his son in great humility to trust in God and to trust his word and then second notice Solomon is calling his son not to trust in himself Not to trust in himself Verse 5 do not lean on your own understanding verse 7 do not be wise in your own eyes Here's Solomon plainly calls his son not to trust his thinking not to trust his understanding Notice the contrast in verse 5 Trust the Lord with all your heart do not lean on your own understanding. I mean that's black and white Is it not and then Solomon? Continues in his teaching from verse 5 moving over into verse 7.

What does it say? Be not wise in your own eyes To be wise in one's own eyes is the opposite of not leaning on one's own understanding So Solomon right here. He just gave me the sermon title truthfully. That's where it comes right out of here That's why I call it the heart of the message. Don't trust yourself That is exactly what he's saying to his son don't trust yourself humbly trust in God and Then third this third observation Solomon is revealing to his son another blessing verse 8 It will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to your bones here Solomon is promising that inner blessing it will come this speaks of the inner parts of the young man the inside there seems to be a Physical well-being which Solomon is speaking of here as well So Solomon is speaking of a blessing for faithfulness and there is a promise attached to this So in summary, what are we seeing here with this trust in him?

Solomon is calling his son to humbly. I think that word humbly is key to humbly trust in God's ways and at the same time Rejecting his own thinking rejecting his own ideas rejecting his own understanding the picture here is of a servant Submitting to the master's orders Solomon is saying stay a servant to God's ways. He is saying reject yourself Don't trust yourself Again, I must be applying in threes tonight in application.

I think of three pictures here I think of three pictures first in your mind picture a humble servant kneeling before his master When we study the story of the prodigal son He comes to his father and he comes and kneels in great humility before his father I even think of the wise men when they came before Jesus they came kneeling before King Jesus and then think of second think of the the picture of a humble servant Receiving orders from his master. I think about the Apostle Paul when he was Saul and he was converted and he was knocked off his horse and blinded and what does he immediately say? What do you want from me Lord?

He immediately started using that language of a humble servant Receiving orders from his master. So picture for yourself a humble servant kneeling before Spread out before the master and then humbly receiving orders from his master That's exactly what he's saying here. Don't trust yourself and Then the third picture picture picture the one rejecting himself Rejecting himself.

It's like with one hand he's submitting and with the other hand he's rejecting It's like there's this two-fold work going on all the time humbly submitting to God and his words and then constantly rejecting the flesh You know if you turn your copy of God's Word over into the New Testament Every man and every woman every one of the disciples those that we know a lot about and those that we know little about They did the same thing They came before Jesus kneeling because they were coming to him as master and Lord of their life They were receiving orders.

That's what being a disciple means and then they were rejecting themselves rejecting sin We see this in so many examples in the New Testament Let me go back and read those verses and see if it just doesn't come off the page when we read the verses Trust in the Lord with all your heart Do not lean on your own understanding and all of your ways acknowledge him and he will make your path straight verse 7 Do not be wise in your own eyes fear the Lord and turn away from evil So what does he say number two here? We must trust in him And then let's move on.

I want us to see number three our third Major truth here as we're breaking down verses 1 to 12. We're looking at two verses. It's a little shorter here We must honor him out of verses 9 to 10 Honor the Lord verse 9 with your wealth and with the first fruits of all your produce then your barns Will be filled with plenty and your vats will be bursting with wine Now if we take a few steps back with all of these verses, we really see a progression So if you can do that, let's this big picture. I know I use that language a lot Solomon is called his son to run from evil He's called him the run from evil ways last week.

We saw he called him the run from the evil crowd in the evil Adulterous woman we saw that in chapter 2 Solomon is called his son in the work of heart matters He is to store up God's Word in his heart. This is work of the heart he is to see wisdom and understanding and discernment it comes from God and that wisdom and discernment understanding that is given from God is to be stored up in the heart See that's hard work But now Solomon turns to matters of the hands He begins to deal with material possessions. He begins to deal with monies. He begins to deal with wealth Everything so far has been spiritual you think about it now.

He's dealing with the physical now again Here comes that question. It just keeps coming back does Proverbs teach a prosperity gospel? I don't think so, but we see blessings and we see promises and we see principles now I want to break this down two ways this will help us see about this honoring God notice Solomon gives a command that's right away in verse 9 honor the Lord with your wealth For Solomon he knew that everything he possessed came from God and oh he had a lot He was extremely wealthy We don't have time to get into his wealth and he knew that it all came from God Solomon was calling his son to honor to honor back to God that which God had honored him with and that was the firstfruits of his possessions He was calling his son to honor God as God had honored him with those Possessions these commands are seen all throughout the Old Testament We see them specifically in Leviticus 23 verse 10 that'll be a good passage for you to go back and study Deuteronomy 18 verses 1 to 5 So Solomon was calling his son to honor God as God had honored him as God honored him with possessions He is calling him to honor God with the fruit first fruits of those material possessions And now the promise which much makes us think this is a prosperity gospel which is not now the promise Verse 10 then your barns will be filled with plenty and your vats will be bursting with wine Here we see that Solomon makes a promise of generosity Solomon teaches his son that if he is generous in giving to God then God will bless him in return This teaching is found in Deuteronomy 7 verses 12 to 15 as God's people Were faithful in keeping God's commandments to give God promise that he would do Things well for them that things would go well for them and he would bless them So Solomon is teaching his son to honor God with the wealth of those things that God has given him Solomon is teaching his son to honor God with the first fruits as God honors him.

He honors God back So in summary, what do we see in verses 9 and 10? Simply Solomon is calling his son to honor God with the first fruits of all of his possessions And I thought about it like this. No doubt the Sun had seen this teaching flashed out in Solomon's life He'd seen this No doubt this teaching had been modeled for him because we know that God used Solomon's wealth in a great way for his purposes now for us an application we must see that this principle is seen in the old and the new a Couple of verses here that will help you see it in the old the Jews They were to bring the first fruits of their animals in Exodus 13 verses 1 to 2 Of course, they were in agricultural society.

So it wasn't just animals They were to bring first fruits of their produce and Leviticus 23 Starting in verse 9 on down to verse 14 So you see this commandment being fleshed out with with animals and with produce now if we turn over into The book of Matthew Matthew chapter 6 which is a part of the Sermon on the Mount. We just hadn't gotten to Chapter 6 yet.

We see some of this this teaching here concerning Giving let me read you a couple of verses Jesus is saying in verse 28 Why are you anxious about clothing consider the lilies of the field how they grow they don't toil they don't spin Yet, let I tell you even Solomon in all of his glory was not a raid like these he's teaching against worry He's saying God will take care of your needs and notice in verse 33 Jesus deals with priority But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added to you What are they all these things all of the material possessions and such that we need?

So so he's saying this you honor me with your life You honor me with with kingdom living in kingdom priorities and I'll take care of those other things But I want to go a little step father. That's not enough When we get into the New Testament specifically in Acts chapter 2 when we see the birth of the New Testament church We see the church giving Beyond the type now, let me explain I've taught on the top here Many in the church today believe in holding on to the principle of the type the 10% of the type We teach that you type you type so that we can do the the weekly things here in the life of the church But that's not enough if you just tie then that's it.

That's not enough based on what we see in the New Testament I've heard people say well, you know, I don't believe in tithing. I just believe in giving like they do in the New Testament Well, if that's your position you're gonna give way more than the time because they did So we use it as a standard kind of a basis. Yes, we don't have a problem with that we Todd Yes, it takes care of the weekly needs But then we move on to that and we see how they gave and why did I read you that verse in Matthew earlier?

Because those New Testament Christians Sought first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and what God added is what God added and then they used more in the life of the church And you know what I found out is when we seek first the kingdom of God, he'll get all that we have You know, I think about something that we learned Sunday night in our Richard Mayhew study on what would Jesus say about your church He talked about the Ephesian church that they had a love problem He talked about their love problem in three ways. They're they're upward love love for God.

It wasn't right their inner Love their love for each other people in the church that wasn't right and then they're their outer love loving for the world lost people See when we get our love right with God when we love God like we should all the other loves fall into place and In the life of the church. Listen when we are loving God we will automatically be led to honor God with the things that we have and one of the first places we see it is when we Want to reach out to others brothers and sisters and bless them and love them and serve them with what we have That's how we tangibly see that happen.

I know it's a big disconnect between us and our day and Solomon's Day but when we Seek first the kingdom of heaven We will automatically want to honor God with what we have and we will see that tangibly worked out We're glad to give to the life of the church We're glad to pour our resources in what God's doing here and then we're glad to reach in in the body in meat needs So we see number three here.

We honor him as he honors us with our possessions and then number four the last two verses We see that we must not reject Discipline we must not reject Discipline we see a transition here My son do not despise or reject the Lord's discipline or be wary of his reproof for the Lord reproves or corrects him whom he loves as a father the son in whom he delights Now to me I see Solomon switching gears here as he's teaching his son This is a completely different subject than wealth But it does fit within the theme here. What is he saying? What's the theme?

Don't trust yourself Trust in him trust in his ways as a humble servant Don't trust yourself if the son is going to trust in God as a humble servant as he relates to his loving master Then discipline is a part of that relationship Solomon knows God's Word and God's ways are key to gaining wisdom for his son And he also knows that God uses discipline as a part of training and correcting Solomon knew that There are two lessons here out of these verses that help us understand this discipline Notice Solomon says don't despise Discipline that's right there in verse 11 Solomon knows his son's natural or Fleshly response will be to reject that discipline.

He will despise it the flesh will not want it That is the way of the sinful man. That is the way of a of a fleshly man It is not in verse 11, but you can almost feel Solomon calling his son to submit to the discipline Receive it willingly. So Solomon is telling his son not to despise it. Don't reject it. Don't react in the flesh And then second Solomon says God loves those he disciplines I love how it ends on verse 12 for the Lord reproves corrects disciplines those that he loves Solomon reminds his son the heart of God.

I like that Solomon knows God's heart and discipline from his own life He knows God is not this harsh ugly mean judge He is a loving Heavenly Father. So Solomon is showing his son the motive behind God's discipline It's always love God is a loving Heavenly Father and he delights seeing his children live correctly So in summarizing these verses Solomon is dealing with a very serious area of his son's life He knows his son must relate to God as a loving Heavenly Father And he knows that his son must receive discipline because he knows if he doesn't receive and welcome the discipline He will be rejecting God Now I've moved away from threes with the application I want us to see two basic realities and then I'm going to give us some specifics that will help us here And this is part of applying what we see here first.

We need to see that discipline is a part of the Christian life Discipline wasn't just for Solomon in his son's day. Now, I'm gonna give you a passage to read over We're limited on time. So I give you passages to read in Hebrews 12 verses 1 to 11 We see that discipline is a part of the Christian life And then the second reality I want us to see Discipline from God is out of a love God loves those whom he has saved Solomon knew that God loved his son and we must see that our God loves us the same So discipline is a part a normal part of the Christian life and it's always out of love Now our flesh will react differently.

We won't see it that way at first Now I want to give you some specifics here. This will help you see it our Lord our God He may discipline us because we've rebelled in a particular area of life Maybe we've not prayed something through maybe we've done something we shouldn't do and there's an area of our life where we find ourselves Rebellious maybe it's a job circumstance or or a group of friends that we're associating with I've known teenagers who love God who had one or two friends or someone of the opposite sex They were friends with and they realized that they were wrong there It was an area of rebellion that had snuck up and they saw it and they ran from it We find ourselves in an area where he is not Lord of our life and he shows us that that is rebellion It could be a business adventure or a business partnership There's a whole host of things as we're walking with God in our life We can find ourselves in an area of life where we are rebelling and that will bring discipline He may discipline us because of a particular sin in our life Maybe we're watching something on television that's sinful and God deals with it Maybe it's something in music that we're listening to that God deals with us about Maybe it's an attitude.

Maybe it's the way we find ourselves talking I'm not talking about cursing but just some flippant language and God begins to deal with it But maybe it's something within our heart in our mind that others don't see see if we are born again The Spirit of God works within us and he starts to discipline us because of sin in our life He may discipline us to keep us from sin It's not always something that we've done. He may discipline us to keep us from sin He may discipline us to prepare us for usefulness.

Now, let me show you what God does many times He will discipline us in area of relationships sometimes relationships within our families Maybe we have relationships with brothers or sisters or even moms or dads maybe there are relationships in our in our families or workplaces and They're not good for us and God will discipline us to make us more godly away from those people Sometimes he will carve people out of our lives and it can be very very painful and ultimately it is for godliness and usefulness Now I can think of no other illustration no better illustration than when we discipline our children Oh if we discipline our children properly, we will discipline them for a whole host of reasons All types of behavior even things that they can't understand and that's the way God does And we must not reject it.

We must welcome it and this is part of not trusting our sales Now as I move to conclude I Want us to see that there's been a negative tone and what we've seen and there's been a a positive tone The negative tone is don't trust yourself Remember, I mean remember maybe the Sun read it and said, you know dad you told me that Remember don't trust yourself. I know these musts that I've listed You know, these can come across as negative but notice the positive or six in all your ways acknowledge him And he will make your path straight And there is a condition that we must meet to receive these promises So what do we see here?

We see the negative and the positive and then when we are faithful and we meet these conditions There are promises of fruitfulness and blessing within our life. So it's negative Yes, it's positive. Yes, but then there's blessing that does come about Now I want you to notice from last week in chapter 2 we saw how wisdom protects does it not the evil gain the bad crowd the peer pressure that doesn't just apply to teenagers and Then wisdom protects from the immoral woman the adulterous woman that seducing woman wisdom protects I was able to use that teaching ministering to someone this week and then now we're seeing how wisdom directs Because what does he say?

Trust alone with all your heart do not lean on your own understanding and all of your ways acknowledge him And here's that familiar word and he will make your paths straight Let me go back to what I started this off with I Think that this hymn writer had the heart of Solomon far more than we knew What does he say prone to wonder Lord? I feel it prone to leave the God I love That's us people That's us.

We're prone to wonder We're prone to leave the God that we love but always born-again Christians He lives within us through the person of the Holy Spirit and he disciplines us and corrects us and works in us And calls us he loves us and listen the message is trusting him We're prone to wonder don't trust yourself be humble and we'll see This teaching these verses it'll just work out in our life and we'll be more godly and more useful and more pleasing to him So don't trust yourself Don't trust yourself because I sure can't trust myself either