Wisdom: Do Not Lean On Your Own Understanding

Proverbs 3 tonight. Kind of in the middle of your Bible.

In the middle of our study on wisdom.

Up to this point looked at

where wisdom comes from

how our speech relates to wisdom, and

how wisdom impacts our friendships.

Tonight, we consider a text that instructs us to trust in God because this is the wise way to live.

Let’s read:

Proverbs 3:5–6 ESV

5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. 6 In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.

Prayer: Father, would you help us now as we think about your word? Give us ears to hear and eyes to see the wisdom you are setting before us from your word. In Jesus name, Amen.

Intro

Does anyone here like building with Legos?

I’ll be honest, I love playing with Legos. I have a 7-year old son who has recently gotten into Legos and let me tell you, that has been the coolest thing, getting to play with Legos together.

A couple of months ago a friend of ours gave us some Legos. In the box was a bag of pieces. In the bag were all of the pieces to build a Porg from the Star Wars movies. The big like 8 inch one.

The only problem was….there were no instructions.

Now, we could have had plenty of fun just playing with the pieces in the bag.

But if our goal was to build the Porg, without instructions, we would never have been able to do it.

We needed instructions to put it together the right way.

But not only did we need instructions in general, we needed the right instructions. Instructions to build the Disney Princess Castle wouldn’t have helped us at all. It wouldn’t have gotten us any closer to the Porg.

In the same way, in order to live the Christian life as God intends, we need instruction. We need wisdom. But not just any wisdom, we need biblical, godly wisdom.

What I want us to see tonight is:

Main Idea: Biblical wisdom is trusting in God and not in yourself.

Repeat

Let me start with the negative side of the statement.

Point 1: Biblical wisdom is not trusting in yourself.

Proverbs 3:5 ESV

5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.

I’ll come back to trusting in the Lord…

“Your heart” refers to your inner self - where your emotions and feelings come from - this is more than just knowing things in your brain - this is feeling and believing from your very core.

But the proverb says “do not lean on your own understanding”

The image you can think of is a wall.

If a brick wall is not built very well, what happens when you go to lean on it or sit on it? It falls over

“Our own understanding” is like a flimsy and not very well-built wall - because of the sin that dwells in our hearts, it is weak and unable to be trusted.

The prophet Jeremiah says “9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jer17.9)

If we cannot understand it, we most certainly cannot lean on it and trust in it.

As we’ve been studying wisdom in the proverbs, we’ve also been turning to James for his letter to help us understand wisdom.

Let’s go now to James 3, but mark or hold your place in Prov. 3 because we’re coming back to it.

James, in this third chapter, is describing two types of wisdom and the result of each. We’ll see in these next few minutes how one type of wisdom is clearly trusting in yourself and the other is trusting in God.

Let’s read James 3:13-18 and then work through it.

James 3:13–18 ESV

13 Who is wise and understanding among you? By his good conduct let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom. 14 But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth. 15 This is not the wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. 16 For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice. 17 But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. 18 And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.

vv. 14-15 are where James describes this wisdom that trusts in yourself instead of God. Look at it again.

James 3:14–15 ESV

14 But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth. 15 This is not the wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic.

When we lean on our own understanding , that is, when we trust in ourselves instead of God, our actions will show the sin of our heart.

This “bitter jealousy” and “selfish ambition” is not unique to any one of us.

I’m sure we’ve all experienced a time when we felt like one of our friends or classmates was getting everything good that we felt like we deserved.

We wanted to be recognized and get good things and it makes us mad when and jealous when we don’t get it.

This feeling of jealousy comes from the sin in our hearts and it cannot be trusted.

“do not boast and be false to the truth” means: don’t pretend to be wise when you’re really not. You’re really just trusting in yourself.

And if we follow this “selfish ambition,” we would do anything to get ahead, even if it means hurting others. Look at v. 16

James 3:16 ESV

16 For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice.

This “disorder and every vile practice” is chaos and a willingness to do sinful, evil acts to get our way and get ahead in life.

Slow down

Now, I know this is heavy, but this is real-life stuff

This is the end result of trusting in yourself, or leaning on your own understanding.

Chaos and evil actions

James helps us understand why this is in v. 15:

James 3:15 ESV

15 This is not the wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic.

The reason trusting in yourself and leaning on your own understanding is so destructive is because it is not wisdom from God.

James says it is “earthly,” or we might say “worldly”

He says it is “unspiritual” or we might say, it is “of the flesh”

He says iy is “demonic,” or we might say it “comes from Satan”

This is the reality of trusting in ourselves.

But…

There is good news… because God has told us and showed us what true, biblical wisdom is.

Point 2: Biblical wisdom is trusting in God.

Back to Proverbs 3:5

Proverbs 3:5 ESV

5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.

What does it mean then to trust in the Lord with all your heart?

The next verse helps us understand:

Proverbs 3:6 ESV

6 In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.

“In all your ways acknowledge him” - Another way you that can be read is, “in all your ways, know him” - that’s not just, yes God I know you’re there.

It’s knowing that God is present each and every moment of our lives, seeking to guide us and give us wisdom.

And He promises to make our paths straight. If we will know God in all our ways, he will direct the steps of our life.

Think about the way we use Google Maps or Apple Maps to get somewhere.

You don’t navigate to your destination and then only look at it one time.

You would still get lost or end up in the wrong place.

No, you follow the directions step-by-step, because it is supposed to be giving you the best, smoothest drive to your destination.

In a similar way, we pay attention to God and his guidance because he will make our paths straight.

That doesn’t mean the Christian life won’t be difficult.

The Lord Jesus perfectly displayed trusting in the Lord with all your heart, even through a very difficult life.

He lived with a constant awareness of God the Father’s presence in his life.

He knew it was God’s will for him to suffer by bearing the sins of the world on the cross and dying in our place.

Yet he trusted the Father every step of the way, knowing that he would be raised to life and secure our salvation.

Because of Jesus and his work on the cross and his resurrection, we can trust in God, knowing that he will keep his promise to us to direct our paths.

Let’s go back to James 3 now to think positively about how biblical wisdom is trusting in God.

He describes biblical wisdom as opposed to worldly wisdom in vv. 17-18:

James 3:17–18 ESV

17 But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. 18 And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.

Now, I don’t know about you, but when I hear that list of the characteristics of wisdom from above, it makes me think of the fruit of the Spirit.

Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control… don’t these lists sound the same?

That’s not an accident. Wisdom from above, that is, wisdom that comes from God will reflect God in our lives.

And instead of sewing chaos and disorder, as we talked about earlier, it brings about peace and godliness in our lives.

So what do we do with all of this? We’ve talked about how biblical wisdom is trusting in God and not in yourself. Then, the natural question is this:

So What?

Am I trusting in God and seeking to know Him?

The question is really, are we seeking to practice biblical wisdom?

In the 4th chapter of James’ letter, he basically says - no, you’re not being wise. You’re trusting in your own wisdom and it’s leading to jealousy, fighting, murder, and all other kinds of sin.

But he gives them the remedy to their troubles in vv. 7-10.

James 4:7–10 ESV

7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you

I just want to highlight how the entirety of James’ commands here point us to trust in God.

In order to submit to God, to draw near to him, to humble ourselves before him, we must trust in Him.

We must know that when we come to God, he will receive us with grace and give us the wisdom we need to live for him.

Think about this command and invitation to “draw near to God.” It really is incredible

Think back to our studies on the sacrificial system. The priests of Israel had to jump through all kinds of hoops to cleanse themselves to be able to draw near to God in the temple… anyone that came into contact with God in the Old Testament was undone because they recognized their sinfulness compared to God’s holiness… and yet James is telling us to draw near.

How can we, sinful and selfish people that we are, draw near to God?

It’s only through Christ, who first drew near to us in his life, death, and resurrection, that we can now draw near ourselves and be received with grace.

So I want to encourage everyone. If you’re a believer, continue to submit and draw near to God, resist the Devil, and humble yourself before the Lord. He will make straight your paths.

If you are not yet a Christian, I encourage you to recognize your sin, humble yourself, and draw near to God for the first time. Because of Christ, he will draw near to you and exalt you with his salvation.

This is the biblical wisdom we need.

Remember the Lego illustration - if our goal is to live the life God designed for us, this is the wisdom we need.

This is how we trust in the Lord with all our hearts and do not lean on our own understanding.

Let’s pray…