Proverbs 16:1, God, Our Sufficiency!
October 12, Proverbs 16:1
Acts 16:14-15; Eph. 6:13-20 “When God says ‘Come!’ Who can say Him nay? ‘Let God be God.’”
God, Our Sufficiency!
In the Hebrew word order man is first, setting him in sharp contrast to the Lord. Is man free to plan, and thus he advances God’s purposes? Man’s best plans come to naught unless the Lord guides his tongue, so some interpret this. This is true, but is it what our verse says? It does not say, “The preparations of the heart are in man, but that the answer of the tongue is from the Lord.” New versions generally favour this. RSV reads, “The plans belong to man” (so NIV, NKJV, et al). Kidner says, “AV distorts the Hebrew, in which man and God stand in contrast.” Holden, a century earlier, anticipated this. His “minute and critical examination substantially vindicated the received translation.” This proverb is not parallel to 16:9, 19:21 (devises). This is a military term for the marshalling of an army (1 Sam. 4:2). The thought is that all our fitness and successes are from the Lord.
1. God’s Plan: Apply this to the subject of Salvation. Many avoid this topic, which is why there is so much confusion in evangelism today. Man cannot prepare his own heart for the grace of God. It is God who takes the stony heart and makes it flesh. It is God who draws and man who follows (Jn. 6:44-45). God quickens the heart and it lives. God opens closed hearts and imparts His law and life. God does not work on man only to leave him to his own resources. This proverb teaches that God disposes the heart to goodness. TEV says here: “God has the last word.” No! He has the first and the last. Is He not the Alpha and the Omega? God begins the work or it would never begin at all! This is pure grace. God works in ways we know nothing of (Jn. 1:12-13; 3:8-9). It is enough for us to know that God is Sovereign and the Author of all that is good in our souls.
2. Man’s Plea: Have you made great efforts to be religious, to prepare your own heart to feel, to pray, to die? You have striven hard, but it failed! Set it down as a foundation-principle; you can never prepare your own heart. You must give it back to your Maker. Your prayer must be, “Lord take my heart, for I cannot give it; and keep it for Thyself, for I cannot keep it for Thee” (Vaughan). The answer of the tongue, as well as the preparations of the heart, are from the Lord. When the heart is right, the language of the tongue is right also. The Jews asked how they might work the works of God. Jesus replied, Believe on Him whom he [God] has sent. How can man, dead in sins, believe savingly on Christ? To the man with the withered hand, Jesus ordered him to do the impossible, but he did it! How can that be? “The work, as it is a duty, is ours; but as to the performance, it is God’s. He gives what he requires, and his promises are the foundation of our performances” (Reynolds). Man’s “works” are not the cause but the effect of God’s grace. Man’s plea, as Peter’s cry, is the same, Lord save me! If our helplessness brings conviction, and repentance, and we cry for mercy, this is evidence that God is already at work. It is thus withered limbs are restored, and men are made alive!
Thought: “What God does, He always purposed to do” (A. H. Strong).
Prayer: Thank-You, Lord, for your marvellous, saving grace.