Leaning

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 make straight your paths. (Prov 3:5-6)

It's not an obscure text. We're not likely to say, "Wow, I never noticed that one before!" Many of us can quote it verbatim. And yet ...

We're in favor of "Trust in the LORD." We urge everyone to "acknowledge Him." God's a pretty good guy, and we're confident that others will benefit from this message. Except, too often, we tend to weaken it by ignoring parts.

So we "trust in the LORD," but not really with all our hearts. Most, at best. We have a lot of other people and things around to trust in and we'll parcel out a portion of trust to the LORD, too, rather than a wholesale all. We certainly acknowledge Him, but in all our ways? Don't be ridiculous. God doesn't care if we acknowledge Him in how we dress or whether or not we take small office supplies from work, right? I mean, surely God is fine with it if I'm not entirely honest in my IRS forms. "Look, God, if you could just look away for a moment, I'm going to be doing my taxes and I have no intention of acknowledging You when I do, so ..."

But I think the phrase I've skipped so far is easily the hardest one for us to accept -- "Do not lean on your own understanding." I mean, come on, don't we have to lean on our own understanding? That's all we really have. Now, on the face of it, it makes perfect sense, of course. God's ways are always perfect (Psa 18:30). Our ways seem right but are generally flawed (Prov 14:12). God's decisions are always right (Psa 145:17). Our thinking comes from deception (Jer 17:9). We can figure out what we want, but God always has the last word (Prov 16:1, 9). Scripture says the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom (1 Cor 1:25). It is only reasonable to go with a wise, loving, merciful, gracious, omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent, holy God than ... our own limited selves. But, really? Do we not engage our own understanding?

We must realize that the text does not actually tell us to avoid thinking, evaluating, reasoning, or understanding. God urges reason (Isa 1:18). Jesus commended the Pharisees for being able to decipher tomorrow's weather from the signs (Matt 16:2-3). If "Don't engage your brain" was intended, He wouldn't have said, "You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky" as if it was a good thing. What the text actually tells is not to lean on our own understanding. Instead, we would trust the Lord with all our hearts and acknowledge Him in all our ways. Our weight would be on Him as we seek to understand. Our first premise would be that we're flawed as we examine and reason and we would need to count on Him rather than lean on our own understanding.

The text is easy; the application is not. Humans are a pretty self-confident race. So if God's thoughts are not our thoughts and God's ways are not our ways (Isa 55:8-9) and you find yourself resting comfortably on an understanding that the world embraces just as comfortably, you might want to consider the possibility that you are leaning on your own understanding. If you're willing to reinterpret Scripture to make it align with your own thinking rather than reinterpreting your understanding in order to align with plain Scripture, you may very well be leaning on your own understanding. If you're not willing to let Him arrange your paths, you may not have the relationship with God that you think or need. Something to consider for those interested in following God and His Word.