PROFITING FROM PROVERBS

“In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths” (Proverbs 3:6 KJV).

Verse 5, “all thine heart,” and in 6, “all thy ways.” That is total immersion of our life into Him.

“. . . acknowledge him,” what does it mean to “acknowledge?” It means to regard Him, own up to the reality that He right in your ways. You want to relax? Acknowledge Him in your relaxation. We like to relax. We like to lay down and clear our minds, but not of Him. “In all thy ways,” including relaxation, “acknowledge him.” Read about the Lord, about one of His saints, have a devotional handle, or memorize a verse and meditate on it.

Going on a vacation ought not to mean taking a vacation from God and His people. Don’t let mercy and truth forsake you at that time. Did you know that the Devil never goes on vacation? He is constantly seeking to devour you. It is good to have our ways established at all times.

“In all thy ways acknowledge him,” or as Paul writes, “Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God” (Philippians 4:6 KJV). How often do we hear Christians say, “Oh, I thought that was too little to bother Him with!” I often smiled as my wife would pray for the littlest things she was looking for—and she found them!

Children are something for asking their parents about the least little things, that are important to them—though it might not be so important to us. We grow up, it seems, and forget that God is even concerned with the insignificant, “For who hath despised the day of small things?” (Zechariah 4:10). If our kids didn’t talk to us, we might be pretty hurt. How might our heavenly Father feel? God does like to talk to His children.

“In all thy ways acknowledge him,” because there is a promise, you know. “. . . and he shall direct thy paths.” You know, that even includes the path to your car keys. Even when you get off the path, He gets you back on it. Paul certainly leaned on the Lord in all of his ways, but when he got off the path a bit there by going back to Jerusalem, in the wrong direction, God got him back on the path. God will “direct thy paths.”

Sometimes God will just slow you down a bit, but He will direct your circumstances, to keep you from straying off the path. God will do a lot of things to keep us out of trouble if we will acknowledge Him. You want to stay out of a lot of trouble in this life, just commit it all to Him, “Lord, how would You have me to do this or that?”

Past errors belong in the wastebasket. Everybody errs; hence the rubber eraser, the wastebasket's first cousin. So welcome was the invention of the rubber eraser on pencils, that according to reports, it quickly yielded its inventor a fortune of over $200,000.

There is said to be a man in Egypt who has not made an error in five thousand years, but during that time he has been in mummified form. The rest of us, who still make errors, must learn to acknowledge them, to make appropriate restitution, and then, having learned our lesson, consign our errors to the wastebasket.

The apostle Paul gives us the perfect formula for starting over from where we are. In his past there were sins, errors and omissions enough to break the heart of a truly conscientious Christian. “But” says he, “forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3: 13, 14).

Daily Bible study is necessary if we are going to begin our day with the right attitude and the right spiritual diet. Proverbs has 31 chapters, and most months have 31 days, so let's read a chapter of Proverbs a day and see what God might have for us. As the Lord leads, share with us what God has shown you in a special way and by His grace let us build up a devotional repository. Let's keep our knives and forks handy for some daily bread! Ideally, a chapter or two of Proverbs will fit in nicely with a good plan of reading our Bibles through each year.

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