Tonight we’ll be beginning a new section of Proverbs, chapter sixteen.

By Way Of Introduction

My wife and I love to watch certain shows from The History Channel like “Mountain Men” and “Ax Men”. I don’t know what it is about it, but I like seeing reality shows where people are struggling against nature. One of our favorites is “Swamp People”. One of the characters on there is Glenn Guist. Glenn lives off of what he can find in the swamp. Several years ago his brother Mitchell died while working on a houseboat. In remembrance of his brother, Glenn and several others finished the project that Mitchell was working on when he died. Glenn said:

“I know my brother is looking down from Heaven smiling, happy that we finished this project for him.”

I’m now speaking the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15). I’ve watched the show since it came out in 2010. At no point has either Glenn or Mitchell acknowledged the God of the Scripture, nor His Son Jesus Christ our Lord. When they were able to trap squirrels (and other things) to eat, they made statements like “That was lucky”, never “We were blessed”. Perhaps they are believers in Christ. Perhaps the network cut that part out when airing it. If so, I praise the Lord. But what Glenn said echoes what many people tell me every day. When the lose a loved one they say,

“At least they are not suffering now.”

or “I know Heaven gained another Angel.”

or “I know that ____ is looking down on me right now.”

Those are foolish and unbiblical statements. If the person who left this life without faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, they are not in a “better place now”. When the self involved rich man died, and was buried, “he lifted up his eyes in HELL, being in TORMENT” (Luke 16:23-24). He was not in a better place. When Lazarus died and was carried by the angels to Abraham’s Bosom (Luke 16:22), he was in a better place.

Neither Lazarus nor the rich man “looked down from Heaven” to see their earthly families.

Lazarus did not become an angel, but was carried by the angels.

How does one get to Heaven? You must “believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and be saved” (Acts 16:31). The God Who owns Heaven, and all things (even us) has made faith in what His Son did on Calvary the key to Heaven. I believe much of our problems come about because we misunderstand the nature of God. God is not a “Big Man in Heaven”. He is IMMENSE, SOVEREIGN. The King James, along with the New King James, the New Living Translation, the New International Version, the English Standard Version, The Christian Standard Bible, the New American Standard Bible all translate YHWH or Yᵊhōvâ [Strong’s Concordance] into English as LORD (all capital letters).

Our God is SOVEREIGN. He is YHWH, LORD. As we come into Proverbs 16 we’re coming into a collection of scriptures that emphasizes the SOVEREIGN NATURE of our God. Eight of the first nine verses are YHWH sayings. Often translated into English as Yahweh or Jehovah, this name of God was considered so holy that the ancient Jews from around 300 BC refused to say it out loud. They substituted the name of God ADONAI in its place.

The God Of The Bible Is Sovereign,
Ruling All That He Has Made

Proverbs 16:1 The preparations (maʿărāḵ) of the heart in man, and the answer of the tongue, is from the LORD.

Word Study: The word translated “PREPARATIONS” is the Hebrew maʿărāḵ, which means “the mental planning, arrangements, calculations, plotting in the mind”. Found only here in the Scripture, this word emphasizes that even our “free-will” can be over ruled by God.

Illustrate: Humans are often arrogant, speaking big plans. We are much like those at the Babel, originally founded by a mighty hunter named NIMROD. A powerful and charismatic man, he built a kingdom beginning with Babel, Erech, Accad and Calneh (Genesis 10:10). That Kingdom was so prosperous that they thought they could build a tower to Heaven (Genesis 11:4).

The plan of man at the Tower of Babel was to defy God (Genesis 1:22 compared with Genesis 11:4), to NOT fill the earth, but to stay in one place.

God confused their language at Babel, and they scattered. “The answer of the tongue, is from the LORD”. God gives us air to breath, and a tongue to speak. Man may plan his words, but God controls the outcome of our words and plans.

The Sovereignty of God gives the believer comfort:Jesus told us that we as believers would be hated in this world. Jesus said:

Luke 21:12-15 (ESV) … {unbelievers} will lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons, and you will be brought before kings and governors for my name’s sake. 13 This will be your opportunity to bear witness. 14 Settle it therefore in your minds not to meditate beforehand how to answer, 15 for I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict.

Though we will be tried, we are to rely on God. Evil may abound, but God SUPER ABOUNDS. The Joel Osteen of the Old Testament, Balaam, was hired to curse Israel (Numbers 23-24). Though he tried, God would not allow him to curse His people. Balaam found out through a talking donkey that God is in control. “The answer of the tongue, is from the LORD”.

Again Jesus said, “When they bring you to trial and deliver you over, do NOT be anxious beforehand what you are to say, but SAY WHATEVER IS GIVEN YOU IN THAT HOUR, FOR IT IS NOT YOU THAT SPEAK, BUT THE HOLY SPIRIT” (Mark 13:11, ESV).

God is in control. Let HIM LEAD. Rest in His power, not in yours. Skipping down to …

Proverbs 16:9 A man’s heart DEVISETH (ḥāšaḇ) his way: but the Lord directeth his steps.

Word Study: God is saying the same thing here. Though the word maʿărāḵ is only found once in Scripture, the word translated “DEVISETH”, ḥāšaḇ is used 124 times. ḥāšaḇ means “to reckon, calculate, to determine”. The very first time the word is used is when God shows Abraham the stars of Heaven, and says “as the stars are, so shall your children be”. We are told:

Genesis 15:6 (KJV) {Abraham} believed in the LORD; and HE (the LORD) COUNTED {ḥāšaḇ} it to him for righteousness.

We may pray, but God has the final say. God has given us freedom of will, but God’s will is always greater. Praise God for that! If God not exercised control over human history, we would more than likely have destroyed ourselves and the planet long ago.

The Sovereign Nature of God is displayed in the work of salvation. We do not work our way into Heaven. We believe on the Lord Jesus, surrendering our lives to Him. When that happens God changes the believer, just as He promised through the Prophet:

Ezekiel 36:26-28 (ESV) I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. 28 You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be My people, and I will be your God.

God opens our eyes to our sinfulness, our hopeless estate, and calls us to salvation. We REPENT, and surrender to Him. He SOVEREIGNLY effects a change in us.

God changes us from the heart outward. The Christian obeys God because the Christian has a changed heart. This is illustrated in an early disciple called “Lydia”:

Acts 16:13-14 (ESV) … on the Sabbath day we went outside the gate to the riverside, where we supposed there was a place of prayer, and we sat down and spoke to the women who had come together. 14 One who heard us was a woman named Lydia, from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple goods, who was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul.

Going back to what Glenn Guist said earlier – and what many others tout – those we consider good people do not automatically go to Heaven. Who makes the determination of Heaven of Hell? Not my opinion, not your opinion. God’s determination. We read:

Proverbs 16:2 All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes; but the LORD weigheth the spirits.

Everybody believes themselves to be better than the one next to them. Those in the most egregious sins justify their actions by comparing them to the actions of others in humanity. We consider ourselves “clean” or “unclean” based on our judgment. But “The LORD weighs the spirits”. The LORD examines the soul, because He made the soul, and owns the soul. The LORD defines right and wrong.

The LORD Weighs The Soul

It is so sad that so many are headed toward hell fire and eternal damnation, believing themselves to be “good, moral people”. We make excuses for our sin. We minimize our sin. We imitate the sin of Adam and Eve, and blame others – even God – for our failures. We pass laws that make our evil seem righteous, murdering children or twisting God’s standards. “The LORD WEIGHETH the SPIRITS”. It is God Who determines right and wrong.

God Looks At The Heart: The Pharisees thought that they were the ones who determined what was right and wrong. They fasted. They prayed. They were quite open in their religious acts. Yet Jesus called them “hypocrites”, people with two faces who did their acts of religion to please people, not the Lord. Jesus said:

Matthew 6:1-6 (ESV) Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. 2 Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. 5 And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. 6 But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

Jesus was not saying that we should not do good in public. Far from it. In another placed Jesus told us as the Children of God “Let your LIGHT SHINE BEFORE MEN that they may SEE YOUR GOOD WORKS, and GLORIFY your Father which is in Heaven” (Matthew 5:16, KJV). What Jesus – and the Bible – is telling us is that God knows the state of your heart. You are to do good to please God and bring glory to His Name. But you are not to do good to be seen of men so that YOU will be glorified.

God knows what YOU are DOING.

The Pharisees were not impressing God, for they were doing what they did so others would praise them. It was for THEIR gain, not for the glory of God. One commentary notes:

“Jesus told a Samaritan woman that the Father seeks those who worship Him in Spirit and in truth (John 4:24). An outward practice of religion is worthless unless it is motivated by love for God and done in accordance with the truth of God’s Word. It is God, not man (1 Samuel 16:7), who is the perfect measure of our morality.”

To Please God, Do All With God In Mind

Proverbs 16:3 Commit thy works unto the LORD, and thy thoughts shall be established.

Give your life to God. Don’t let it be about you, but for God’s glory. To be self seeking and narcissistic is to ultimately come to vanity. The happiest and most joyful life is the one of service, surrendered to Christ. Jesus said:

John 16:33 (ESV) I have said these things TO YOU, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.

You may be in a bad job. I’ve often been in bad jobs, bad places, bad assignments. But when I gave the job to Jesus, and did as best as I could for His glory, and not mine, I was able to overcome. In God, in Christ, you have peace. Do what you do for God’s glory. When your efforts are fully entrusted to God’s will and God’s control – you will have good results.

Psalm 37:5 (ESV) Commit your way to the LORD; trust in Him, and He will act.

Illustrate: A good example of this was when Abraham sent his trusted servant to find a bride for Isaac. This was a tall order! God had promised Abraham his son Isaac. Through Isaac, the line of the Messiah would go. Through Isaac, God would “bless all the nations of the world” (Genesis 12:3). Abraham was “well advanced in years” (Genesis 24:1), and unable to find a mate for his son. So he asked his trusted servant to go. Abraham told the servant:

Genesis 24:3-4 (ESV) swear by the LORD, the God of heaven and God of the earth, that you will not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I dwell, 4 but will go to my country and to my kindred, and take a wife for my son Isaac.

Abraham knew that the Canaanite women would lead Isaac away from God, for they were idolaters. So he sent his servant back to Ur of the Chaldees to find a bride. Traveling for many miles, the servant sought God in prayer. He prayed:

Genesis 24:12-14 (ESV) O Lord, God of my master Abraham, please grant me success today and show steadfast love to my master Abraham. 13 Behold, I am standing by the spring of water, and the daughters of the men of the city are coming out to draw water. 14 Let the young woman to whom I shall say, ‘Please let down your jar that I may drink,’ and who shall say, ‘Drink, and I will water your camels’—let her be the one whom you have appointed for your servant Isaac. By this I shall know that you have shown steadfast love to my master.

When Rebekah, the future wife of Isaac came to the well, she did exactly as that servant prayed for. Rebekah was to be Isaac’s bride! Finding Isaac’s wife, that precious servant said …

Genesis 24:48 (ESV) I bowed my head and worshiped the Lord and blessed the Lord, the God of my master Abraham, who had led me by the right way to take the daughter of my master’s kinsman for his son.

Every great work that has been done for God, has been done through God. The Bible says that “when PRIDE COMETH, then COMETH SHAME” (Proverbs 11:2), and “PRIDE GOETH BEFORE DESTRUCTION, and an ARROGANT SPIRIT BEFORE A FALL” (Proverbs 16:18). Put your life and its outcome in God’s hands – and you will be blessed with success.

Illustrate: When Nehemiah wanted to leave his master to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, he prayed and asked God to guide the King in sending him (Nehemiah 2:4). Following his prayer and request, King Artaxerxes not only blessed Nehemiah’s mission, but he also supplied the building materials.

God controls the heart of the King (Proverbs 21:1). Our God is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords (Revelation 19:16).

The LORD God Owns EVERYTHING

Proverbs 16:4 The LORD hath made all things for Himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.

God owns everything, and controls everything so that ultimately HE WILL BE GLORIFIED. The wicked often think that they have gotten away with their evil – but a day of reckoning is coming. God said in His Word …

Romans 14:11-12 (KJV) … As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to Me, and every tongue shall confess to God. 12 So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God.

What we have, we have on loan from God. God did not make people wicked, but He foresaw their wickedness, and permitted it to a point – but He controls the outcome. When our Lord Jesus came into the world the Bible says:

John 3:19 … (NKJV) the Light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than Light, because their deeds were evil.

Jesus came unto His own, but His own would not receive Him. Crucifying Jesus, the wicked thought that they were destroying Jesus Christ, and hiding His influence from the world. Instead, evil and wicked people caused Calvary, which in turn provides salvation to whosoever believeth in Him. God says:

Ezekiel 33:11 (NKJV) ‘As I live,’ says the Lord God, ‘I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn, turn from your evil ways! For why should you die, O house of Israel?

God bids the wicked to REPENT and TURN BACK to Him. But whether they will or will not, it has no effect on the final outcome. God uses the wicked.

When the wicked enter into Hell forever, they will be monuments to the JUSTICE and LONG SUFFERING of God. The Bridges Commentary notes:

“ {God} can decree nothing but good. If he permits evil, so far as not to hinder it, He hates it as evil, and permits it only for, the greater good – the greatest of all good – the more full manifestation of His own glory in it, and out of it. He will be glorified in, or on, all his creatures. ‘All thy works shall praise thee, O Lord!’ (Psalm 145:10). His retributive justice, no less than the riches of His grace, sets out His glory. (Romans 9:22-23)”.

Wickedness comes about when we set ourselves above God. We end with:

Proverbs 16:5 Every one that is proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord: though hand join in hand, he shall not be unpunished.

God has a special distaste for the arrogant, the pride filled person. When God spoke of the seven deadly sins:

Proverbs 6:16-17 There are six things that the Lord hates, seven that are an abomination to him: 17 A PROUD LOOK (rûm ʿayin)..

The very first of these is PRIDEFULNESS. Pride is the sin of the devil. Made beautiful by God, the Arch Angel Lucifer began to become pride filled and narcissistic. Filled with pride he forgot that what he had, he had from the Lord. The Prophet declared:

Isaiah 14:12-15 (KJV) How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations! 13 For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north: 14 I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High. 15 Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit.

Lucifer the Arch Angel, through pride, became the devil, the Red Dragon, that Old Serpent. He entered the Garden of Eden and introduced pride to Adam and Eve. Pride is the chiefest of sins, the root of all other sin. The step brother of Christ wrote:

James 4:6 (AP) God resists the PROUD, but GIVES GRACE to the HUMBLE.

You cannot be saved in your pride. Pride led man to eat of the forbidden tree, and to walk away from the Tree of Life. Pride leads people into damnation today. Many are proud of how good they feel they are. They virtue signal, but refuse to come to the Tree of Christ, that Old Rugged Cross. Hear the words of King David:

Psalm 51:17 (ESV) The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

God will not bless the prideful. God will not save those who will not bend the knee to Him. We are told:

Proverbs 16:6 By mercy and truth iniquity is purged: and by the fear of the Lord men depart from evil.

Grace is not available to the prideful. God says, “He that worketh PRIDE SHALL NOT DWELL IN THE MIDST OF MY HOUSE” (Psalm 101:1-2). By the mercy and truth of God in Jesus Christ, the sins of the believer are taken away. The power of sin over the life is destroyed by the mercy of Calvary. Christ bids us to bring our lives, broken and confused, to Him. Surrendering to Him as Lord and Savior, we humble ourselves before God’s Word and God’s Command. The Father sent His Son into the world to atone for our sin. Jesus Himself, King of Kings and Lord of Lords, humbled Himself. Jesus …

Philippians 2:7-9 (KJV) made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: [8] And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. [9] Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name:

God humbled Himself to save you. You must humble yourself to be saved. If you are saved, it is “BY MERCY AND TRUTH”. I have been asked the question before, “When I sin, I ask God to forgive me for Christ’s sake … and yet I still feel there is something else I must do. Why do I still feel at odds with God?” Beloved, this is PRIDE.

It is PRIDE that says, “I must do this penance, I must count these beads, I must pray to this saint, I must flagellate myself emotionally to please God”.

Salvation is all of humility, not pride. The proud Pharisees would not follow the path of Christ, the path of “MERCY AND TRUTH”. Jesus told them:

Matthew 21:31 (ESV) Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you.

Who shall enter into Heaven? The religious? No, but “the one who DOES THE WILL OF MY FATHER WHO IS IN HEAVEN” (Matthew 7:21). What is the will of the Father? Jesus said, “This is the Work of God, that YOU BELIEVE ON HIM WHOM HE HATH SENT” (John 6:29).

It is not by our efforts that we are saved, by by the finished work of Christ. Once saved, we follow Him, and do His will. When we fail, we REPENT, and put our sin under His Blood and His Work – not ours. It is abnormally normal to want to “pay back” God, or to “make good” our bad. It is also prideful, foolish, and ineffective. The Christian way of life cannot be lived in the power of the flesh. It must be lived out through the mercy and truth of God’s Sacrifice, of God’s Savior. May God touch your hearts with his Word. Amen.