Lean Not On Your Own Understanding
This is a transcript. It may contain small inaccuracies.
As I said last time, these verses are very well-known. We're very familiar with them, and they are very cherished verses, very precious verses. And when God saves us, He implants within us a longing to know and to do His will. And so that's what makes these verses really all the more precious. But when we consider familiar texts in Scriptures, such as this one, we need to be careful. Because it is essential for us to come to the text pleading with God for light and trusting Him to give us understanding of its meaning.
Sometimes that familiarity really causes us to really miss the wonderful riches bound up in this portion of God's Word. Well, in our previous study, I suggested that an understanding of our text is not possible without really some perception of the climate of the text, the atmosphere of the text. The climate of these two verses, you remember, is the climate of the biblical doctrine of God. That He is worthy to be the object of exclusive trust. He is the God concerned with the details of the lives of His people, not only the macro, but also the micro.
The climate of the text is the climate of the biblical doctrine of man also, we saw together. Man is inadequate to make his own way through life, and his mind is insufficient to be the final bar of authority on anything that relates to life and Godliness. It is also the climate of the biblical doctrine of communion with God, fellowship with God. The whole text breathes of the blessed reality of a man walking, so walking with his God that he can know that his life is being governed and regulated by God, and his steps are being directed by this God.
Then we began to look at the first division of the text, the commands of the text, verses 5 and the first part of verse 6, and then of course we have the second major division, the promise of the text. But we began to look at the commands of the text, and there are three of them. Last Lord's Day we considered the first one, "Trust in Yahweh with all your heart," and we called that a command to reliance—reliance upon the living God as He is revealed in Scripture, and a command to trust Him with the whole heart, with the entirety of the heart. The measure of our trust is that it's to be all, and the source of it is to be the heart, the human heart, the citadel of my inner being, who I am, all that I am.
Well, we come tonight to the second of these commands, namely, "Do not lean on your own understanding," or the part of the text that I am calling the command to repudiation. So we move from the command to reliance to the command to repudiation. You see, we are not only called to a life of reliance upon God, but we are called to a life in which we repudiate something. What is it? Well, Solomon tells us—our own understanding. We repudiate our own understanding. And as we think our way through this part of the text, by the grace of God, we will attempt to define the key words in this part of the text, and having done that, then we will seek to establish the meaning of the text and apply the principles as we move through.
So first of all, then, when Solomon wrote these words and told his son and said, if you would know the certainty that your life is being directed, regulated by God, you must not only trust in Him with your whole heart, but you must also not lean upon your own understanding. When he said those words, well, what did those words mean? What do they mean? We quote them, we say them, we share them, we end on an email or a letter with them. What do they mean? What do they really mean?
Well, first of all, taking the word "understanding," let us give a definition of understanding. “Binah” (בִּינָה) is the Hebrew word, it basically means comprehension, insight, or perception. In fact, it's the same word used in 1 Chronicles 12:32, concerning, you remember, the men of Issachar, who had understanding of the time, who knew how to discern the times, how to understand their times, to know what Israel should do. That is, they had a perception of the times, they had insight of the times, they had insight, they had comprehension. They did not simply merely see events and people and circumstances and be able to report them. They saw the relationship of one event to another, one circumstance to another. They had insight into things as they really were.
It's the word found in Proverbs 4:1. Look at it. "Hear, O sons, the discipline of a father, and pay attention that you may know"—what? Same word—understanding. So what Solomon's saying is that we're not to lean upon our own comprehension, we're not to lean upon our own insight, we're not to lean upon our own perception. And would you please note the word "own"? It's a key word in the text. "Do not lean on your own understanding."
Now this is really important. That is, when he says that, "do not lean on your own understanding," that is the understanding that has its origin in human thought unaided by the Word and the Spirit. That's what it means. Solomon is not speaking of the understanding that is ours by the acquisitions of grace. Rather, he's speaking of the understanding that is ours by the deposit of nature, and those are totally two different things, and we need to make that distinction to better grasp what the text is saying.
You see, you have an understanding if you're a Christian that is the deposit of divine grace, or we call it the acquisitions of grace, but you also have an understanding that is merely the deposit of nature. And as we shall see in the unfolding of the meaning of the text, when he puts the emphasis on "your own understanding," he's talking about that understanding which is native to man as a creature, even more so as a fallen creature.
Then you have those words, "do not lean." It means to rest upon, to repose. It means to lean upon something so as to be completely supported by it. As a cripple leans upon the cane or crutches, as a dizzy person leans upon a wall. So he says do not lean, do not make as the place of your support, as your resting place. Don't make your understanding to be your resting place, the place of support. By the way, a side note—and we can't go there for the sake of time really—but just for your own, if you would like to follow that later on, it's the same word as used in Judges 16:26 of Samson requesting to lean upon the pillars for support. That's the picture. Do not make the place of your trust that upon which you rest your weight.
Putting the three key words together, what do we have? Well, here's what we have. You have a prohibition, a call to repudiate all leaning— all of it— all leaning upon natural human reasoning as the basis for governing our lives. And if you and I would know the fulfillment of the promise to have Almighty God, Yahweh, God, Creator, Sovereign, direct our paths, we must learn what it is to repudiate all resting upon unaided human reason as the basis of governing our lives.
So much for the definition of the key words. Now that we have the definition, let us come to consider the meaning of the text. This is what the words say. Now, the question is, well, what do they mean? What do they mean when you put them all together? And we're touching a very delicate area tonight, the whole area of the relationship between true religion, biblically speaking, evangelical faith, and the human mind.
And so I want to begin by saying what the words do not mean. That's one helpful way to clear the debris. Let us begin by saying what they don't mean, and we'll start by process of elimination, and I think that will be helpful for us. First of all, let us be clear as to what those words do not mean, what Solomon is not saying, what the text is not communicating.
Number one, taking the negative, this is not a call. It is not a call to jettison the use of our minds in general. It's not. It's not a call to get rid of, to jettison, to discard the use of the human mind in general. Great harm has often come by hyper-spiritual perspectives which regard the use of the mind as an enemy of grace. We need to be careful with that.
And within this kind of thinking, this perspective, the less you think and use your mind, the more spiritual you have become. So park your brain, don't think, just kind of let go, let God, and in the place of the mind, this kind of perspective and its sound judgments— do you know what is offered in this perspective, this kind of philosophy? The vicious tyranny of being driven by; you guessed it correctly, by impulses, urges, whims, and subjective inclinations.
In the place of a calm, rational, sanctified, intelligent response to the Word of God written in seeking to know the will of God, there is this mystical attempt at reading providential circumstances, and you have Christians treating providential circumstances like a fortune teller treats tea leaves, or, you know, flipping a coffee cup upside down, and, you know, of that sort. Proponents of this perspective are saying a mind that is working is the enemy of spiritual progress. It's the idea that to lean not on your own understanding means that we must jettison the use of the mind in general.
Now, how can we know that this is not actually the meaning of the text? How do we know? How do we know? Well, let me share several lines of biblical thoughts as to why this is so. When Jesus was asked, you remember, what is the first and greatest commandment, how did He answer? You have this recorded in all three synoptics, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, but in Matthew 22:37–38, Jesus said in an answer to that question, "You shall love the Lord your God with what? With all your heart, with all your soul, and here it is, with all your what? Mind. With all your mind. This is the great and foremost commandment." That in itself should indicate that whatever it means to know and to love and to serve God, the mind is never pushed down or relegated to some place as being a sort of a necessary evil that we carry along with us. Never you find this in Scripture.
And by the way, what is the purpose, the very purpose of the book of Proverbs? In fact, while we are in Proverbs, go back to chapter 1 and verse 2. He's saying, I'm writing these things for what purpose? Here's the purpose in verse 2: "To know wisdom and discipline, to understand the sayings of what?" Same Hebrew word—understanding. Understanding. Would He say—now think about this—would He say, I'm writing these things that you might have understanding, then turn around and say, but look, get rid of your understanding, I don't want you to have it? No, no. This is the inspired Word of God.
Then, of course, you have the whole thrust of the New Testament epistles in particular. What does Paul say in Romans 12 and verse 2? Those familiar words. How do you approve what the will of God is, that which is good and pleasing and perfect? He says, you do so by what? By the throwing out of your mind? No, no. He says in verse 2: "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed how? By the renewing of your mind, so that you may approve what the will of God is, that which is good and pleasing and perfect." Paul, in Philippians 1 and verse 9, says: "This I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in full knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve the things that are excellent."
And so you see, beloved, the whole idea that a text like this is pointing us in this direction of what I call a hyper-spiritual perspective, calling upon us to jettison the use of the mind in general—that perspective is not supported by Scripture. So it is not a call to jettison the use of the mind in general in the Christian life. So if it's not that, well, what is it? And let me suggest a few lines on the positive side and suggest really three to four positives, depending on our time.
First of all, it is a call to recognize the inadequacies and the limitations of the human mind in three areas. When He says, "Do not lean on your own understanding," this command is a call to recognize the inadequacies and the limitations of the human mind in three areas. When He says, "Trust in Yahweh with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding," He's saying to us: recognize the inadequacies and the limitations of the human mind. Well, in what sense are these inadequacies and limitations ought to be recognized? Well, first of all, the first area—in terms of the human mind as a created faculty. As a created faculty. We begin there. Thank God for the biblical doctrine of creation. Thank God for the biblical doctrine of creation. It is the starting point of all the other issues of life. If you get it wrong in the first opening chapters of Genesis, I mean, you're in trouble.
Let's look back and go back to the Garden of Eden, back to Genesis. Let's see what God intended for Adam's mind in the original creation. This is important. That's why we're taking our time, beloved, on this. Remember, sin does not enter until the third chapter in Genesis. So whatever you find in chapters one and two, you're looking at man as God intended he should function. Man as a perfect creature, man as a creature, but a sinless creature in the midst of a perfect environment. That's the scene.
Now, how was Adam to learn what God wanted him to do? How? Was he simply to trust upon his own innate understanding in order to know the will of God? Well, we will see in a moment that though Adam's understanding was clear and untainted by sin, the light of his understanding nevertheless was not adequate to know all the will of God. It wasn't. And hence, even before sin entered, Adam could not lean upon his own understanding because it was inadequate and limited as a created faculty, as a finite being.
Turn to Genesis 1, and as you read all the other areas of God's creation, God speaks—it was done. God said—it was done. God said, "Let there," and it was done. God blesses the various facets of His creation, but something now utterly unique enters the picture when you get to verse 26. Look at it with me. Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness, so they will have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." And verse 27: "And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them." God blessed them, and now a phrase is utterly unique in the whole creation account: "And God said to them."
Of everything else, this is what I want us to see—of everything else it is said, "And God said," and it is, but it is never said, "God said to the birds." He never said, "God said to the other creatures." But to this unique creature made in the image of God, in His own image, with intelligence, with a faculty of will and rational comprehension, God spoke to him and said, giving him direction. Look at the text: "Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, over every living thing that creeps upon the earth." Then God said, "Behold, I have given to you every plant yielding seed that is on the surface of all the earth," etc.
Now do you see what He said? Having created the man and the woman, He did not simply place them upon the earth and let them, simply out of the storehouse of an infinite mind, dip in to discover what God would have them do. Though they are sinless, and though the light of their understanding is not in any way dimmed or affected by sin, nevertheless it is not adequate to know what God would have them to do. God reveals His will by direct verbal, propositional words—revelation. God said, "Do this." God said, "Do that."
Furthermore, when we turn to chapter 2, we find in verse 16: "And Yahweh God commanded the man, saying,"—He speaks to him—God spoke audibly so Adam could hear what the Lord God is saying: "From any tree of the garden you may surely eat, but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat from it, for in the day that you eat from it, you will surely die." Now what does this tell us about the human mind? What does it tell us? It tells us that Adam could have sat in that garden and could have observed and looked at all the trees all around. He could have sat there for a millennium and never understood the significance of that one tree. It was not stored up in his mind. God had to reveal it to him.
You say, what in the world? Are you all excited about this? Because, beloved, it tells us something about the limitations and the inadequacies of the human mind in its created state. And this is significant. It was never created to be an infinite reservoir of all truth and understanding from which man can draw from it at any time infallible directions for life.
It was never created to be a faculty wrenched loose from utter dependence upon God and still be able to function properly. That's the point. When Solomon said, "My son, if you would have your paths made straight by God, do not lean upon your own understanding," he was saying, "Son, you're a creature with a creature's mind. You are not God." And what Solomon says to his son, the Holy Spirit says to us. And sin is so perverted to us, we don't like that message.
I'm a creature, and even had sin never entered, I would be a creature still with a mind that was not omniscient, but would have to wait in humble dependence upon its God to reveal what the will and the purpose and the plan of God was.
But it is not only a call to recognize the inadequacy and limitations of the human mind in its created state, but in the second place, it's a call to recognize those same inadequacies and limitations in its fallen state. In its fallen state. When mankind fell, the totality of his humanity was affected by sin. All of it. Totality of it. That means his affections were affected. His will was affected. His mind was affected.
When we speak of the doctrine of total depravity, we do not mean that the Bible teaches that man is depraved as intensively as he can be. What we're simply saying, based on the Word of God, is that as one drop of poison pervades the whole glass of water, makes it entirely poisoned, so the entrance of sin pervaded every faculty of man's being, so that sin comes to light in the functioning of the mind. So what does the Bible say about man's mind in the state of sin? Well, it says things like, we read in Ephesians 4:18, "being darkened in their mind." Romans 3:11, "there is none who understands." And then there's a strange phrase in Ephesians 2:3, "we also formerly conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind." Did you catch that? "And were by nature children of wrath even as the rest."
Here the mind, in Ephesians 2, is looked upon as something that is so affected by sin that it has inordinate desires as much as the flesh does. That's the biblical doctrine of the mind in a state of sin. And of course, we remember 1 Corinthians 2:14, "a natural man does not accept the depths of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him. He cannot understand them because they are spiritually examined." The mind has no ability to grasp spiritual things. There's blindness.
2 Corinthians 4:4 tells us that "the mind of the unbelieving is blinded by the god of this world, the devil, in whose case the god of this age has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." Then you have, of course, that classic statement in Romans 8:7, "the mind set on the flesh is at enmity toward God, for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so."
That's a very humbling doctrine. A very humbling doctrine. A man who boasts in his own ability to understand himself, understand his surroundings, his environment, understand the world, understand his problems, and God says, no, no, no, you are utterly blind in darkness. Your mind is at enmity against Me. Your understanding is really in darkness. You cannot perceive the truth of spiritual things.
I need not remind you of the vivid examples of that in our own day, beloved. All you have to do is read the newspaper or watch the news or look around you, people making pompous pronouncements all the time about everything, from such sacred things as the home and male and female relationships, the role of fathers and mothers in marriage and gender and sexuality, making pronouncements about sociological problems, and they're just showing their folly with each passing pronouncement. The mind is darkened and we see the evidence of it all around us.
Now, this text is a call to recognize the inadequacies and limitations of the human mind in its fallen state. And if I'm speaking tonight to anyone whose mind has never been illuminated by the Holy Spirit in what the Bible calls the new birth, the work of regeneration, what Jesus called being born again, being born from above as in John chapter 3, you cannot know what it is to have your paths directed in a way that will be pleasing to God. You will never know that. Because your mind, that faculty by which you gain perspective and make choices and decisions and judgments, is utterly darkened. And it will be that way until you're born of the Spirit of God. You'll never know the meaning of life. You will never know the way of peace, the way of fulfillment and satisfaction until you turn to Him who is truth and who is made unto those who believe in Him, wisdom, even Christ Jesus, our Lord, who is called not only the power of God, but the wisdom of God.
Until you know Him, you will remain in darkness, groping to find your way, chasing after a mirage in the desert. So this text, "do not lean on your own understanding," is a call to every also unconverted person to remember you'll never know the meaning of life, the fulfillment that perhaps you are so desperately seeking, until you repudiate your own ideas as to how that fulfillment could come into your life and you turn to Him who is the truth and say, Oh Lord Jesus, You must teach me how I could find fulfillment, You must teach me what life is all about. Lord Jesus, I've tried, I've sought to pursue my own folly, in my own folly the way of peace and the way of knowing what life is all about and I failed miserably. Help me. That's humbling. That's a humbling thing, but God saves in a way that really undercuts all human pride. "Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe;" 1 Corinthians 1.
But this is not only a call, and this is our first positive, a call to recognize the limitations and inadequacies of the human mind in its created state as well as in its fallen state, but this is the real focus really of the text upon Christians tonight. The third category, it is a call to recognize the inadequacies and the limitations of the human mind in its imperfectly sanctified state in the believers. In its imperfectly sanctified state in the believers. It is to believers who now have the mind of Christ, 1 Corinthians 2:16, it is to believers that this word comes, "do not lean on your own understanding." To us here who are called Christians, John says in 1 John 5:20 that we have been given an understanding so that we may know Him who is true.
But oh dear one, just as the transformation of grace in the realm of ethics is not complete, it's not complete in the realm of the mind. But thank God we've had a basic transformation in our minds through the grace of God at work. The Bible sometimes describes salvation conversion as an illumination of the mind. Acts 26:18, "to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light." That's a description of conversion, an opening of the mind. Peter says that Christ has called us out of the realm of darkness into His marvelous light, 1 Peter 2:9. But beloved, listen, listen. Though there's been this basic transformation, that transformation is not complete. It's not perfect because, and you know this, of the remains, not only of creaturely mind which we'll have through all eternity, but the remains of sinful mind that we need to learn what it is to lean not on our own understanding. While sin does not reign over us, sin remains in us.
And I want to take us to a classic example of how the same mind within the same context can have a powerful and stupendous revelation of the Spirit and be held in the grip of the grossest kind of fleshly ignorance. Turn with me to Matthew 16. Same time, same mind, same person. Matthew 16. You remember the setting very well. Jesus is on the border of Caesarea Philippi. And He asked His disciples in verse 13, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" And they said, "Some say John the Baptist," verse 14, "and others Elijah, but still others Jeremiah, or one of the prophets." He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" And Simon Peter answered and said, "You are the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of the living God."
And Jesus answered and said to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you but My Father who is in heaven." Simon, how did your mind come to that understanding? That I, Jesus of Nazareth, am the Christ, the Son of the living God, God incarnate, the only Messiah. Oh, I tell you, Simon Bar-Jonah, you didn't come to this discovery by leaning upon your own understanding. My Father revealed it to you. This is the result of a direct inward work of My Father through the Spirit, opening your eyes, giving you understanding.
Now, what happens immediately after that confession? Verse 21, "From that time," that precise historical event, when the confession has been of who Christ is, a confession rooted in the revelation of God, to Peter's mind by the Spirit, "Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, suffer many things from the elders, the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day." And Peter took Him aside, began to rebuke Him, saying, "God forbid it, Lord! This shall never happen to You." But He turned and said to Peter, "Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me." Now notice the next phrase very carefully: "For you are not setting your mind on God's interests, but man's." You could translate it this way: you're not thinking the thoughts that originate with God, but the thoughts that originate with man. Do you see residing in the same mind, in the same historical context, is a powerful work of divine revelation and remains of carnal wisdom and understanding? Peter, you're leaning upon your own understanding as to how I, as Messiah, will come to My kingdom. I say I must come to My kingdom by way of a cross and an open tomb. You stand in My way and say, "No, Lord, never, God forbid, any way to the crown and to the throne, but not through the cross."
Peter, you're leaning on your own carnal understanding. Oh yes, you've been wonderfully blessed. My Father’s revealed to you that which is fundamental of all revelations—who I am, Son of the living God, the Christ of God, the God-sent God. But, oh Peter, at this point, in terms of how I will come to My full inheritance as Messiah, your thinking is so shaped by your carnal thought that you've become the mouthpiece of Satan. Get behind Me.
There are other examples of this. God willing, we'll get to them when we study the phrase, "In all your ways acknowledge Him," where good men, godly men, children of God in the Old Testament, New Testament as well, because they were illuminated by the Spirit—yes, of course—but they did not learn to repudiate their own understanding in this sense, where they were guilty of tragic mistakes that scarred them and brought reproach to the living God.
The best summary I know for this first positive—a call to repudiate the inadequacy of human wisdom and understanding—is found in Jeremiah 17:5. Look at it with me. Jeremiah 17:5; "Thus says Yahweh, 'Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind and makes flesh his strength, and whose heart turns away from Yahweh.'" Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind. What part of man? Man's wisdom. Not leaning on your own understanding.
This is not a call to jettison the use of the mind in general. It is not a call to use a good sanctified mind, sanctified by Scripture, but it is a call to recognize that your mind has limitations in mind, rooted in creation, rooted in the fall, and the imperfect state of your sanctification as a child of God. That leads us to the second. In the second place, it's a call also to diligent inquiry of the mind of God as found in Holy Scripture. Diligent inquiry of the mind of God as found in Holy Scripture.
When Solomon says, "Do not lean on your own understanding," this is what he's calling us to do. If you do not trust in your own unaided judgment, well, the proof of this will be that you will be constantly seeking the judgment and the mind of God in the only place that it's found. Where is that? Here. Here. Holy Scripture. If someone says, "Oh no, I don't lean on my own understanding," the immediate question that ought to be asked is, then how diligently do you inquire into the mind of God as found in the Scriptures? For that's the only valid alternative.
If you are not leaning on your own understanding, you will definitely have the spirit of the psalmist. And let me just read several portions briefly from Psalm 119. For in a real sense, Psalm 119 is a continuous commentary on the second positive—this command, this call to diligent inquiry into the mind of God as revealed in Scripture. Verse 19, Psalm 119: "I am a sojourner in the earth; do not hide Your commandments from me. My soul is crushed with longing for Your judgments at all times. You rebuke the arrogant, the cursed." And who are the arrogant? Those who feel they have no need to seek God's Word, God's direction. Those who have so much confidence in their own wisdom that they do not diligently inquire into the mind of God in Scripture. That's how He describes them.
Verse 21b: "Who stray from Your commandments." And down in verse 24: "Your testimonies also are my delight." And I love what he says here: "They are my"—what?—"counselors." They're my counselors. David says, when I need counsel, what do I do? He said, I don't take my own experience and my own judgments and sit down and consult them. He said, I go to my council of counselors. And he says, they are the testimonies of God. And he goes and sits down, as it were, and he says, "Counsel me. Lord, counsel me through Your Word. I must not lean upon my own understanding. Your testimonies, O God, are the men of my counsel." He turns to the Word of God.
Verses 31 and 32: "I cling to Your testimonies." That's the spirit of diligent inquiry into the mind of God. "I cling to Your testimonies. I will not let go. I will cleave to Your testimony. O Yahweh, do not put me to shame. I shall run in the way of Your commandments, for You will enlarge my heart." Solomon says, "Do not lean on your own understanding." Beloved, this is a call to diligent inquiry into the mind of God.
Let me ask, do you live just doing what seems to be right and commonsensical? Just doing what comes naturally as a Christian? Or do you have that sense of holy distrust of even your best common sense? To the point that you say, "O God, O God, I will not lean on my own understanding, my own common sense. If there's some principle of Your Word that I've missed, Lord, bring it to remembrance. Help me see it as it relates to my situation." If there's an area where you know the Bible speaks explicitly to the subject or principles, before you make a decision, you go to the Word of God and have that diligent inquiry into the mind of God as revealed in Scripture. Don't just sit down and try to use your present state of affection and emotions and impulses as some kind of a spiritual compass. Go to the Word. Go to the Word. But you go with that sense of a childlike trust in God, cultivated distrust of your own understanding. And the measure of your refusal to lean on your own understanding is in precise proportion to the measure of your diligent inquiry into the revealed Word of God here.
And then thirdly, it's not only a call to recognize the limitations of the mind, a call to diligent inquiry into the mind of God in Scripture, but in the third place, it is a call, and this is very important, beloved, it's a call to fervent crying to God for light and for direction. It is a call to a fervent crying to God for light and for direction. I mean, we can go back to Psalm 119. We see it all over. The psalmist there. He doesn't say, I will turn to the Word alone. No, no. But mingled with that turning is the constant cry, "Teach me the way of Your statutes. Give me understanding." No wonder why the apostles committed themselves and devoted themselves to the Word and what? Prayer. Prayer. So the psalmist longs that God would illuminate his mind because, you see, there's a subtle form, and this is important for us, there's a subtle form of leaning upon your own understanding even when you're reading the Scriptures as though you had the stuff to really understand what's here. Whereas the teaching of the Bible is that reading the Word in itself is no assurance that you will understand the Word. Remember the Pharisees? "You search the Scriptures." Here's the principle: "It's in Thy light we shall see light" — Psalm 36:9. "In Your light, O God, we will see light." It's as the Spirit opens up to us the meaning of the Word that we understand and we're able to walk in its light.
And so if you're not leaning upon your own understanding, it will be evident not only in your turning to the Word, but this is a call to fervent crying out to God for light even in your treatment of the Word of God. O God, give me light. As I read this portion of Your Word that relates to my situation, God, give me light. Help me see. Help me rightly divide Your Word. I mean, why is it? Why is it as servants of Christ and we get together, we meet to talk about issues that the sheep are going through and beloved people of God and the trouble that we're going through. We bow in the presence of God at the outset and we acknowledge, Lord, You know the heart of the one who has come. You know the need. You know the portions of Your truth which apply to that need. Exactly, Lord, now we throw ourselves at Your mercy and we cry to You for light, for help, for wisdom, for direction.
Why do we do that? Is that some sort of a little gimmick that we learned at the seminary? No, no, no, beloved. It's the one thing, the one thing that we must do if we're walking in the light of Proverbs 3:5-6. In the face of a crisis, a distressing situation, let us really get on our faces before God and say, Lord, I do trust in You as best as I know how with all my heart. I don't understand, but Lord, I trust You. I don't get all of what's happening, but I trust You, Lord. Lord, as I try to understand how to find my way through this present maze of confusion, I'm not going to lean upon my own understanding. I don't know what to make of this. I don't know if this is a trial of faith. I don't know if this is discipline, but Lord, this much I know: I must not lean upon my own understanding. O God, give me light to understand my circumstance in light of Your Word.
So, it's a call to a fervent crying to God for light and direction.
And finally, number four, it's a call to seek the Godly counsel that God may give through others. It's a call to seek the Godly counsel that God may give through others. The same book, Proverbs, the same book of Proverbs says, Proverbs 11:14, “In the abundance of counselors there is salvation.” Or maybe you're familiar with this translation: "In the multitude of counselors there is safety." Do not lean on your own understanding. In so doing, I shall recognize that perhaps God has been pleased to give wisdom and understanding about my circumstance to someone who is outside of my circumstance.
So, the whole biblical doctrine of the necessity of seeking counsel from brothers and sisters, wise believers, godly believers, and we see that beautifully described in Scripture and particularly, for example, in Titus 2, older men teaching the younger ones and older women teaching and instructing the younger women. And there is, beloved, a legitimate place for the human instrument as the vehicle through counsel comes to us, but never as that upon which you and I lean. Our leaning is upon the Lord. The means that the Lord may use may be godly counsel.
What will happen, as I bring this to a close, what will happen if you go on leaning upon your own understanding, your ideas about how to get forgiveness if you're outside of Christ, your ideas of how to find peace, your ideas of how to be ready to live and to die, and you reject the gospel truth again and again concerning the necessity of knowing Christ, submitting to Christ, surrendering to Christ, and being forgiven by the virtue and the doing of His death upon Calvary's cross and His righteousness, and you decide you're going to rest upon your own wisdom, your own way, your own wisdom, your own cleverness, your own plan?
Listen to what God says to you specifically tonight, if that's you. Job 18; Bildad the Shuhite is speaking. We begin in verse 5: "Indeed, the light of the wicked goes out. The flame of his fire gives no light. The light of his tent is darkened. His lamp goes out above him. His vigorous stride is shortened." Now notice this last phrase: "And his own counsel brings him down."
Am I talking to someone tonight who says, look, I've got no use for the stuff, the stuff, trust the Lord, repent, believe. I don't need that to find fulfillment in life. Are you going to lean on your own counsel, a counsel of your own unregenerate, sin-loving heart that will ultimately cast you down into the pit of eternal death? Your own counsel brings you down. Or perhaps you're one who says, oh, yes, I'm concerned about forgiveness, eternal life, but I'll go about it my own way. Listen to the words of this text: "His own counsel brings him down." Lean not on your own understanding.
And let me close with a word to us, children of God. For every child of God tonight, will you turn with me to Hosea 10:6? We'll close with this. God speaking the judgments that fall upon Israel for her sin. In the midst of it, He says in Hosea 10: 6, "The thing itself will be carried to Assyria as tribute to King Jerob. Ephraim will receive shame, and Israel will be ashamed of its own counsel."
Do you remember what part of that counsel was? The prophet Isaiah alludes to it again and again in chapter 30 of Isaiah. When Israel faced her need and began to realize her position of danger, she did not trust in Yahweh her God with all her heart and did not lean and did not follow the command to lean not upon her own understanding and cry to God for help. She said instead, oh, well, we're in a bad shape. We're in a difficult situation. We're in a tough situation, but, you know, well, we're so thankful. There's Egypt, that great nation with many chariots and horses and warriors. We'll go down and strike a deal with Egypt. And God said for that very sin of seeking to escape the impending judgment of that invading army or the invading armies by leaning upon a human carnal counsel, God says that very counsel shall be Israel's undoing.
Oh, child of God, how often God has allowed us to go into some area of captivity—spiritual bondage, the state of being spiritually crippled—because we leaned on our own understanding in that area. There was a circumstance, perhaps in our families, a need in our homes, a difficulty, and we turned to strike a deal with Egypt instead of falling on our faces and turning to the Word and saying, "Lord, what's the answer to my need? Lord, what's the answer to my need?" God's Word is, "Israel will be ashamed of its own counsel."
Beloved, God's ways are not your ways. They're not my ways. "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, My thoughts than your thoughts" (Isaiah 55:9). Oh, beloved, may God teach us—all of us—that the way to have our paths directed by the Lord is to lean not on our own understanding. How can we as believers best serve God? Go to the Word. How can you best do the work of God? Go to the Word. How can we best advance in holiness and sanctification and Christlikeness? Go to the Word. How is the church to increase and multiply? Go to the Word.
Lean not on your own understanding. That's the second directive. The first is a command to reliance: "Trust in Yahweh with all your heart." Then a command to repudiation of all unaided human wisdom: "Do not lean on your own understanding." And next Lord's Day, we will look at, "In all your ways acknowledge Him." That command to recognizing.
Let us pray.
Sometimes that familiarity really causes us to really miss the wonderful riches bound up in this portion of God's Word. Well, in our previous study, I suggested that an understanding of our text is not possible without really some perception of the climate of the text, the atmosphere of the text. The climate of these two verses, you remember, is the climate of the biblical doctrine of God. That He is worthy to be the object of exclusive trust. He is the God concerned with the details of the lives of His people, not only the macro, but also the micro.
The climate of the text is the climate of the biblical doctrine of man also, we saw together. Man is inadequate to make his own way through life, and his mind is insufficient to be the final bar of authority on anything that relates to life and Godliness. It is also the climate of the biblical doctrine of communion with God, fellowship with God. The whole text breathes of the blessed reality of a man walking, so walking with his God that he can know that his life is being governed and regulated by God, and his steps are being directed by this God.
Then we began to look at the first division of the text, the commands of the text, verses 5 and the first part of verse 6, and then of course we have the second major division, the promise of the text. But we began to look at the commands of the text, and there are three of them. Last Lord's Day we considered the first one, "Trust in Yahweh with all your heart," and we called that a command to reliance—reliance upon the living God as He is revealed in Scripture, and a command to trust Him with the whole heart, with the entirety of the heart. The measure of our trust is that it's to be all, and the source of it is to be the heart, the human heart, the citadel of my inner being, who I am, all that I am.
Well, we come tonight to the second of these commands, namely, "Do not lean on your own understanding," or the part of the text that I am calling the command to repudiation. So we move from the command to reliance to the command to repudiation. You see, we are not only called to a life of reliance upon God, but we are called to a life in which we repudiate something. What is it? Well, Solomon tells us—our own understanding. We repudiate our own understanding. And as we think our way through this part of the text, by the grace of God, we will attempt to define the key words in this part of the text, and having done that, then we will seek to establish the meaning of the text and apply the principles as we move through.
So first of all, then, when Solomon wrote these words and told his son and said, if you would know the certainty that your life is being directed, regulated by God, you must not only trust in Him with your whole heart, but you must also not lean upon your own understanding. When he said those words, well, what did those words mean? What do they mean? We quote them, we say them, we share them, we end on an email or a letter with them. What do they mean? What do they really mean?
Well, first of all, taking the word "understanding," let us give a definition of understanding. “Binah” (בִּינָה) is the Hebrew word, it basically means comprehension, insight, or perception. In fact, it's the same word used in 1 Chronicles 12:32, concerning, you remember, the men of Issachar, who had understanding of the time, who knew how to discern the times, how to understand their times, to know what Israel should do. That is, they had a perception of the times, they had insight of the times, they had insight, they had comprehension. They did not simply merely see events and people and circumstances and be able to report them. They saw the relationship of one event to another, one circumstance to another. They had insight into things as they really were.
It's the word found in Proverbs 4:1. Look at it. "Hear, O sons, the discipline of a father, and pay attention that you may know"—what? Same word—understanding. So what Solomon's saying is that we're not to lean upon our own comprehension, we're not to lean upon our own insight, we're not to lean upon our own perception. And would you please note the word "own"? It's a key word in the text. "Do not lean on your own understanding."
Now this is really important. That is, when he says that, "do not lean on your own understanding," that is the understanding that has its origin in human thought unaided by the Word and the Spirit. That's what it means. Solomon is not speaking of the understanding that is ours by the acquisitions of grace. Rather, he's speaking of the understanding that is ours by the deposit of nature, and those are totally two different things, and we need to make that distinction to better grasp what the text is saying.
You see, you have an understanding if you're a Christian that is the deposit of divine grace, or we call it the acquisitions of grace, but you also have an understanding that is merely the deposit of nature. And as we shall see in the unfolding of the meaning of the text, when he puts the emphasis on "your own understanding," he's talking about that understanding which is native to man as a creature, even more so as a fallen creature.
Then you have those words, "do not lean." It means to rest upon, to repose. It means to lean upon something so as to be completely supported by it. As a cripple leans upon the cane or crutches, as a dizzy person leans upon a wall. So he says do not lean, do not make as the place of your support, as your resting place. Don't make your understanding to be your resting place, the place of support. By the way, a side note—and we can't go there for the sake of time really—but just for your own, if you would like to follow that later on, it's the same word as used in Judges 16:26 of Samson requesting to lean upon the pillars for support. That's the picture. Do not make the place of your trust that upon which you rest your weight.
Putting the three key words together, what do we have? Well, here's what we have. You have a prohibition, a call to repudiate all leaning— all of it— all leaning upon natural human reasoning as the basis for governing our lives. And if you and I would know the fulfillment of the promise to have Almighty God, Yahweh, God, Creator, Sovereign, direct our paths, we must learn what it is to repudiate all resting upon unaided human reason as the basis of governing our lives.
So much for the definition of the key words. Now that we have the definition, let us come to consider the meaning of the text. This is what the words say. Now, the question is, well, what do they mean? What do they mean when you put them all together? And we're touching a very delicate area tonight, the whole area of the relationship between true religion, biblically speaking, evangelical faith, and the human mind.
And so I want to begin by saying what the words do not mean. That's one helpful way to clear the debris. Let us begin by saying what they don't mean, and we'll start by process of elimination, and I think that will be helpful for us. First of all, let us be clear as to what those words do not mean, what Solomon is not saying, what the text is not communicating.
Number one, taking the negative, this is not a call. It is not a call to jettison the use of our minds in general. It's not. It's not a call to get rid of, to jettison, to discard the use of the human mind in general. Great harm has often come by hyper-spiritual perspectives which regard the use of the mind as an enemy of grace. We need to be careful with that.
And within this kind of thinking, this perspective, the less you think and use your mind, the more spiritual you have become. So park your brain, don't think, just kind of let go, let God, and in the place of the mind, this kind of perspective and its sound judgments— do you know what is offered in this perspective, this kind of philosophy? The vicious tyranny of being driven by; you guessed it correctly, by impulses, urges, whims, and subjective inclinations.
In the place of a calm, rational, sanctified, intelligent response to the Word of God written in seeking to know the will of God, there is this mystical attempt at reading providential circumstances, and you have Christians treating providential circumstances like a fortune teller treats tea leaves, or, you know, flipping a coffee cup upside down, and, you know, of that sort. Proponents of this perspective are saying a mind that is working is the enemy of spiritual progress. It's the idea that to lean not on your own understanding means that we must jettison the use of the mind in general.
Now, how can we know that this is not actually the meaning of the text? How do we know? How do we know? Well, let me share several lines of biblical thoughts as to why this is so. When Jesus was asked, you remember, what is the first and greatest commandment, how did He answer? You have this recorded in all three synoptics, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, but in Matthew 22:37–38, Jesus said in an answer to that question, "You shall love the Lord your God with what? With all your heart, with all your soul, and here it is, with all your what? Mind. With all your mind. This is the great and foremost commandment." That in itself should indicate that whatever it means to know and to love and to serve God, the mind is never pushed down or relegated to some place as being a sort of a necessary evil that we carry along with us. Never you find this in Scripture.
And by the way, what is the purpose, the very purpose of the book of Proverbs? In fact, while we are in Proverbs, go back to chapter 1 and verse 2. He's saying, I'm writing these things for what purpose? Here's the purpose in verse 2: "To know wisdom and discipline, to understand the sayings of what?" Same Hebrew word—understanding. Understanding. Would He say—now think about this—would He say, I'm writing these things that you might have understanding, then turn around and say, but look, get rid of your understanding, I don't want you to have it? No, no. This is the inspired Word of God.
Then, of course, you have the whole thrust of the New Testament epistles in particular. What does Paul say in Romans 12 and verse 2? Those familiar words. How do you approve what the will of God is, that which is good and pleasing and perfect? He says, you do so by what? By the throwing out of your mind? No, no. He says in verse 2: "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed how? By the renewing of your mind, so that you may approve what the will of God is, that which is good and pleasing and perfect." Paul, in Philippians 1 and verse 9, says: "This I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in full knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve the things that are excellent."
And so you see, beloved, the whole idea that a text like this is pointing us in this direction of what I call a hyper-spiritual perspective, calling upon us to jettison the use of the mind in general—that perspective is not supported by Scripture. So it is not a call to jettison the use of the mind in general in the Christian life. So if it's not that, well, what is it? And let me suggest a few lines on the positive side and suggest really three to four positives, depending on our time.
First of all, it is a call to recognize the inadequacies and the limitations of the human mind in three areas. When He says, "Do not lean on your own understanding," this command is a call to recognize the inadequacies and the limitations of the human mind in three areas. When He says, "Trust in Yahweh with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding," He's saying to us: recognize the inadequacies and the limitations of the human mind. Well, in what sense are these inadequacies and limitations ought to be recognized? Well, first of all, the first area—in terms of the human mind as a created faculty. As a created faculty. We begin there. Thank God for the biblical doctrine of creation. Thank God for the biblical doctrine of creation. It is the starting point of all the other issues of life. If you get it wrong in the first opening chapters of Genesis, I mean, you're in trouble.
Let's look back and go back to the Garden of Eden, back to Genesis. Let's see what God intended for Adam's mind in the original creation. This is important. That's why we're taking our time, beloved, on this. Remember, sin does not enter until the third chapter in Genesis. So whatever you find in chapters one and two, you're looking at man as God intended he should function. Man as a perfect creature, man as a creature, but a sinless creature in the midst of a perfect environment. That's the scene.
Now, how was Adam to learn what God wanted him to do? How? Was he simply to trust upon his own innate understanding in order to know the will of God? Well, we will see in a moment that though Adam's understanding was clear and untainted by sin, the light of his understanding nevertheless was not adequate to know all the will of God. It wasn't. And hence, even before sin entered, Adam could not lean upon his own understanding because it was inadequate and limited as a created faculty, as a finite being.
Turn to Genesis 1, and as you read all the other areas of God's creation, God speaks—it was done. God said—it was done. God said, "Let there," and it was done. God blesses the various facets of His creation, but something now utterly unique enters the picture when you get to verse 26. Look at it with me. Then God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness, so they will have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." And verse 27: "And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them." God blessed them, and now a phrase is utterly unique in the whole creation account: "And God said to them."
Of everything else, this is what I want us to see—of everything else it is said, "And God said," and it is, but it is never said, "God said to the birds." He never said, "God said to the other creatures." But to this unique creature made in the image of God, in His own image, with intelligence, with a faculty of will and rational comprehension, God spoke to him and said, giving him direction. Look at the text: "Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, over every living thing that creeps upon the earth." Then God said, "Behold, I have given to you every plant yielding seed that is on the surface of all the earth," etc.
Now do you see what He said? Having created the man and the woman, He did not simply place them upon the earth and let them, simply out of the storehouse of an infinite mind, dip in to discover what God would have them do. Though they are sinless, and though the light of their understanding is not in any way dimmed or affected by sin, nevertheless it is not adequate to know what God would have them to do. God reveals His will by direct verbal, propositional words—revelation. God said, "Do this." God said, "Do that."
Furthermore, when we turn to chapter 2, we find in verse 16: "And Yahweh God commanded the man, saying,"—He speaks to him—God spoke audibly so Adam could hear what the Lord God is saying: "From any tree of the garden you may surely eat, but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat from it, for in the day that you eat from it, you will surely die." Now what does this tell us about the human mind? What does it tell us? It tells us that Adam could have sat in that garden and could have observed and looked at all the trees all around. He could have sat there for a millennium and never understood the significance of that one tree. It was not stored up in his mind. God had to reveal it to him.
You say, what in the world? Are you all excited about this? Because, beloved, it tells us something about the limitations and the inadequacies of the human mind in its created state. And this is significant. It was never created to be an infinite reservoir of all truth and understanding from which man can draw from it at any time infallible directions for life.
It was never created to be a faculty wrenched loose from utter dependence upon God and still be able to function properly. That's the point. When Solomon said, "My son, if you would have your paths made straight by God, do not lean upon your own understanding," he was saying, "Son, you're a creature with a creature's mind. You are not God." And what Solomon says to his son, the Holy Spirit says to us. And sin is so perverted to us, we don't like that message.
I'm a creature, and even had sin never entered, I would be a creature still with a mind that was not omniscient, but would have to wait in humble dependence upon its God to reveal what the will and the purpose and the plan of God was.
But it is not only a call to recognize the inadequacy and limitations of the human mind in its created state, but in the second place, it's a call to recognize those same inadequacies and limitations in its fallen state. In its fallen state. When mankind fell, the totality of his humanity was affected by sin. All of it. Totality of it. That means his affections were affected. His will was affected. His mind was affected.
When we speak of the doctrine of total depravity, we do not mean that the Bible teaches that man is depraved as intensively as he can be. What we're simply saying, based on the Word of God, is that as one drop of poison pervades the whole glass of water, makes it entirely poisoned, so the entrance of sin pervaded every faculty of man's being, so that sin comes to light in the functioning of the mind. So what does the Bible say about man's mind in the state of sin? Well, it says things like, we read in Ephesians 4:18, "being darkened in their mind." Romans 3:11, "there is none who understands." And then there's a strange phrase in Ephesians 2:3, "we also formerly conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind." Did you catch that? "And were by nature children of wrath even as the rest."
Here the mind, in Ephesians 2, is looked upon as something that is so affected by sin that it has inordinate desires as much as the flesh does. That's the biblical doctrine of the mind in a state of sin. And of course, we remember 1 Corinthians 2:14, "a natural man does not accept the depths of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him. He cannot understand them because they are spiritually examined." The mind has no ability to grasp spiritual things. There's blindness.
2 Corinthians 4:4 tells us that "the mind of the unbelieving is blinded by the god of this world, the devil, in whose case the god of this age has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God." Then you have, of course, that classic statement in Romans 8:7, "the mind set on the flesh is at enmity toward God, for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so."
That's a very humbling doctrine. A very humbling doctrine. A man who boasts in his own ability to understand himself, understand his surroundings, his environment, understand the world, understand his problems, and God says, no, no, no, you are utterly blind in darkness. Your mind is at enmity against Me. Your understanding is really in darkness. You cannot perceive the truth of spiritual things.
I need not remind you of the vivid examples of that in our own day, beloved. All you have to do is read the newspaper or watch the news or look around you, people making pompous pronouncements all the time about everything, from such sacred things as the home and male and female relationships, the role of fathers and mothers in marriage and gender and sexuality, making pronouncements about sociological problems, and they're just showing their folly with each passing pronouncement. The mind is darkened and we see the evidence of it all around us.
Now, this text is a call to recognize the inadequacies and limitations of the human mind in its fallen state. And if I'm speaking tonight to anyone whose mind has never been illuminated by the Holy Spirit in what the Bible calls the new birth, the work of regeneration, what Jesus called being born again, being born from above as in John chapter 3, you cannot know what it is to have your paths directed in a way that will be pleasing to God. You will never know that. Because your mind, that faculty by which you gain perspective and make choices and decisions and judgments, is utterly darkened. And it will be that way until you're born of the Spirit of God. You'll never know the meaning of life. You will never know the way of peace, the way of fulfillment and satisfaction until you turn to Him who is truth and who is made unto those who believe in Him, wisdom, even Christ Jesus, our Lord, who is called not only the power of God, but the wisdom of God.
Until you know Him, you will remain in darkness, groping to find your way, chasing after a mirage in the desert. So this text, "do not lean on your own understanding," is a call to every also unconverted person to remember you'll never know the meaning of life, the fulfillment that perhaps you are so desperately seeking, until you repudiate your own ideas as to how that fulfillment could come into your life and you turn to Him who is the truth and say, Oh Lord Jesus, You must teach me how I could find fulfillment, You must teach me what life is all about. Lord Jesus, I've tried, I've sought to pursue my own folly, in my own folly the way of peace and the way of knowing what life is all about and I failed miserably. Help me. That's humbling. That's a humbling thing, but God saves in a way that really undercuts all human pride. "Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not come to know God, God was well pleased through the foolishness of the message preached to save those who believe;" 1 Corinthians 1.
But this is not only a call, and this is our first positive, a call to recognize the limitations and inadequacies of the human mind in its created state as well as in its fallen state, but this is the real focus really of the text upon Christians tonight. The third category, it is a call to recognize the inadequacies and the limitations of the human mind in its imperfectly sanctified state in the believers. In its imperfectly sanctified state in the believers. It is to believers who now have the mind of Christ, 1 Corinthians 2:16, it is to believers that this word comes, "do not lean on your own understanding." To us here who are called Christians, John says in 1 John 5:20 that we have been given an understanding so that we may know Him who is true.
But oh dear one, just as the transformation of grace in the realm of ethics is not complete, it's not complete in the realm of the mind. But thank God we've had a basic transformation in our minds through the grace of God at work. The Bible sometimes describes salvation conversion as an illumination of the mind. Acts 26:18, "to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light." That's a description of conversion, an opening of the mind. Peter says that Christ has called us out of the realm of darkness into His marvelous light, 1 Peter 2:9. But beloved, listen, listen. Though there's been this basic transformation, that transformation is not complete. It's not perfect because, and you know this, of the remains, not only of creaturely mind which we'll have through all eternity, but the remains of sinful mind that we need to learn what it is to lean not on our own understanding. While sin does not reign over us, sin remains in us.
And I want to take us to a classic example of how the same mind within the same context can have a powerful and stupendous revelation of the Spirit and be held in the grip of the grossest kind of fleshly ignorance. Turn with me to Matthew 16. Same time, same mind, same person. Matthew 16. You remember the setting very well. Jesus is on the border of Caesarea Philippi. And He asked His disciples in verse 13, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" And they said, "Some say John the Baptist," verse 14, "and others Elijah, but still others Jeremiah, or one of the prophets." He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" And Simon Peter answered and said, "You are the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of the living God."
And Jesus answered and said to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you but My Father who is in heaven." Simon, how did your mind come to that understanding? That I, Jesus of Nazareth, am the Christ, the Son of the living God, God incarnate, the only Messiah. Oh, I tell you, Simon Bar-Jonah, you didn't come to this discovery by leaning upon your own understanding. My Father revealed it to you. This is the result of a direct inward work of My Father through the Spirit, opening your eyes, giving you understanding.
Now, what happens immediately after that confession? Verse 21, "From that time," that precise historical event, when the confession has been of who Christ is, a confession rooted in the revelation of God, to Peter's mind by the Spirit, "Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, suffer many things from the elders, the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day." And Peter took Him aside, began to rebuke Him, saying, "God forbid it, Lord! This shall never happen to You." But He turned and said to Peter, "Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me." Now notice the next phrase very carefully: "For you are not setting your mind on God's interests, but man's." You could translate it this way: you're not thinking the thoughts that originate with God, but the thoughts that originate with man. Do you see residing in the same mind, in the same historical context, is a powerful work of divine revelation and remains of carnal wisdom and understanding? Peter, you're leaning upon your own understanding as to how I, as Messiah, will come to My kingdom. I say I must come to My kingdom by way of a cross and an open tomb. You stand in My way and say, "No, Lord, never, God forbid, any way to the crown and to the throne, but not through the cross."
Peter, you're leaning on your own carnal understanding. Oh yes, you've been wonderfully blessed. My Father’s revealed to you that which is fundamental of all revelations—who I am, Son of the living God, the Christ of God, the God-sent God. But, oh Peter, at this point, in terms of how I will come to My full inheritance as Messiah, your thinking is so shaped by your carnal thought that you've become the mouthpiece of Satan. Get behind Me.
There are other examples of this. God willing, we'll get to them when we study the phrase, "In all your ways acknowledge Him," where good men, godly men, children of God in the Old Testament, New Testament as well, because they were illuminated by the Spirit—yes, of course—but they did not learn to repudiate their own understanding in this sense, where they were guilty of tragic mistakes that scarred them and brought reproach to the living God.
The best summary I know for this first positive—a call to repudiate the inadequacy of human wisdom and understanding—is found in Jeremiah 17:5. Look at it with me. Jeremiah 17:5; "Thus says Yahweh, 'Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind and makes flesh his strength, and whose heart turns away from Yahweh.'" Cursed is the man who trusts in mankind. What part of man? Man's wisdom. Not leaning on your own understanding.
This is not a call to jettison the use of the mind in general. It is not a call to use a good sanctified mind, sanctified by Scripture, but it is a call to recognize that your mind has limitations in mind, rooted in creation, rooted in the fall, and the imperfect state of your sanctification as a child of God. That leads us to the second. In the second place, it's a call also to diligent inquiry of the mind of God as found in Holy Scripture. Diligent inquiry of the mind of God as found in Holy Scripture.
When Solomon says, "Do not lean on your own understanding," this is what he's calling us to do. If you do not trust in your own unaided judgment, well, the proof of this will be that you will be constantly seeking the judgment and the mind of God in the only place that it's found. Where is that? Here. Here. Holy Scripture. If someone says, "Oh no, I don't lean on my own understanding," the immediate question that ought to be asked is, then how diligently do you inquire into the mind of God as found in the Scriptures? For that's the only valid alternative.
If you are not leaning on your own understanding, you will definitely have the spirit of the psalmist. And let me just read several portions briefly from Psalm 119. For in a real sense, Psalm 119 is a continuous commentary on the second positive—this command, this call to diligent inquiry into the mind of God as revealed in Scripture. Verse 19, Psalm 119: "I am a sojourner in the earth; do not hide Your commandments from me. My soul is crushed with longing for Your judgments at all times. You rebuke the arrogant, the cursed." And who are the arrogant? Those who feel they have no need to seek God's Word, God's direction. Those who have so much confidence in their own wisdom that they do not diligently inquire into the mind of God in Scripture. That's how He describes them.
Verse 21b: "Who stray from Your commandments." And down in verse 24: "Your testimonies also are my delight." And I love what he says here: "They are my"—what?—"counselors." They're my counselors. David says, when I need counsel, what do I do? He said, I don't take my own experience and my own judgments and sit down and consult them. He said, I go to my council of counselors. And he says, they are the testimonies of God. And he goes and sits down, as it were, and he says, "Counsel me. Lord, counsel me through Your Word. I must not lean upon my own understanding. Your testimonies, O God, are the men of my counsel." He turns to the Word of God.
Verses 31 and 32: "I cling to Your testimonies." That's the spirit of diligent inquiry into the mind of God. "I cling to Your testimonies. I will not let go. I will cleave to Your testimony. O Yahweh, do not put me to shame. I shall run in the way of Your commandments, for You will enlarge my heart." Solomon says, "Do not lean on your own understanding." Beloved, this is a call to diligent inquiry into the mind of God.
Let me ask, do you live just doing what seems to be right and commonsensical? Just doing what comes naturally as a Christian? Or do you have that sense of holy distrust of even your best common sense? To the point that you say, "O God, O God, I will not lean on my own understanding, my own common sense. If there's some principle of Your Word that I've missed, Lord, bring it to remembrance. Help me see it as it relates to my situation." If there's an area where you know the Bible speaks explicitly to the subject or principles, before you make a decision, you go to the Word of God and have that diligent inquiry into the mind of God as revealed in Scripture. Don't just sit down and try to use your present state of affection and emotions and impulses as some kind of a spiritual compass. Go to the Word. Go to the Word. But you go with that sense of a childlike trust in God, cultivated distrust of your own understanding. And the measure of your refusal to lean on your own understanding is in precise proportion to the measure of your diligent inquiry into the revealed Word of God here.
And then thirdly, it's not only a call to recognize the limitations of the mind, a call to diligent inquiry into the mind of God in Scripture, but in the third place, it is a call, and this is very important, beloved, it's a call to fervent crying to God for light and for direction. It is a call to a fervent crying to God for light and for direction. I mean, we can go back to Psalm 119. We see it all over. The psalmist there. He doesn't say, I will turn to the Word alone. No, no. But mingled with that turning is the constant cry, "Teach me the way of Your statutes. Give me understanding." No wonder why the apostles committed themselves and devoted themselves to the Word and what? Prayer. Prayer. So the psalmist longs that God would illuminate his mind because, you see, there's a subtle form, and this is important for us, there's a subtle form of leaning upon your own understanding even when you're reading the Scriptures as though you had the stuff to really understand what's here. Whereas the teaching of the Bible is that reading the Word in itself is no assurance that you will understand the Word. Remember the Pharisees? "You search the Scriptures." Here's the principle: "It's in Thy light we shall see light" — Psalm 36:9. "In Your light, O God, we will see light." It's as the Spirit opens up to us the meaning of the Word that we understand and we're able to walk in its light.
And so if you're not leaning upon your own understanding, it will be evident not only in your turning to the Word, but this is a call to fervent crying out to God for light even in your treatment of the Word of God. O God, give me light. As I read this portion of Your Word that relates to my situation, God, give me light. Help me see. Help me rightly divide Your Word. I mean, why is it? Why is it as servants of Christ and we get together, we meet to talk about issues that the sheep are going through and beloved people of God and the trouble that we're going through. We bow in the presence of God at the outset and we acknowledge, Lord, You know the heart of the one who has come. You know the need. You know the portions of Your truth which apply to that need. Exactly, Lord, now we throw ourselves at Your mercy and we cry to You for light, for help, for wisdom, for direction.
Why do we do that? Is that some sort of a little gimmick that we learned at the seminary? No, no, no, beloved. It's the one thing, the one thing that we must do if we're walking in the light of Proverbs 3:5-6. In the face of a crisis, a distressing situation, let us really get on our faces before God and say, Lord, I do trust in You as best as I know how with all my heart. I don't understand, but Lord, I trust You. I don't get all of what's happening, but I trust You, Lord. Lord, as I try to understand how to find my way through this present maze of confusion, I'm not going to lean upon my own understanding. I don't know what to make of this. I don't know if this is a trial of faith. I don't know if this is discipline, but Lord, this much I know: I must not lean upon my own understanding. O God, give me light to understand my circumstance in light of Your Word.
So, it's a call to a fervent crying to God for light and direction.
And finally, number four, it's a call to seek the Godly counsel that God may give through others. It's a call to seek the Godly counsel that God may give through others. The same book, Proverbs, the same book of Proverbs says, Proverbs 11:14, “In the abundance of counselors there is salvation.” Or maybe you're familiar with this translation: "In the multitude of counselors there is safety." Do not lean on your own understanding. In so doing, I shall recognize that perhaps God has been pleased to give wisdom and understanding about my circumstance to someone who is outside of my circumstance.
So, the whole biblical doctrine of the necessity of seeking counsel from brothers and sisters, wise believers, godly believers, and we see that beautifully described in Scripture and particularly, for example, in Titus 2, older men teaching the younger ones and older women teaching and instructing the younger women. And there is, beloved, a legitimate place for the human instrument as the vehicle through counsel comes to us, but never as that upon which you and I lean. Our leaning is upon the Lord. The means that the Lord may use may be godly counsel.
What will happen, as I bring this to a close, what will happen if you go on leaning upon your own understanding, your ideas about how to get forgiveness if you're outside of Christ, your ideas of how to find peace, your ideas of how to be ready to live and to die, and you reject the gospel truth again and again concerning the necessity of knowing Christ, submitting to Christ, surrendering to Christ, and being forgiven by the virtue and the doing of His death upon Calvary's cross and His righteousness, and you decide you're going to rest upon your own wisdom, your own way, your own wisdom, your own cleverness, your own plan?
Listen to what God says to you specifically tonight, if that's you. Job 18; Bildad the Shuhite is speaking. We begin in verse 5: "Indeed, the light of the wicked goes out. The flame of his fire gives no light. The light of his tent is darkened. His lamp goes out above him. His vigorous stride is shortened." Now notice this last phrase: "And his own counsel brings him down."
Am I talking to someone tonight who says, look, I've got no use for the stuff, the stuff, trust the Lord, repent, believe. I don't need that to find fulfillment in life. Are you going to lean on your own counsel, a counsel of your own unregenerate, sin-loving heart that will ultimately cast you down into the pit of eternal death? Your own counsel brings you down. Or perhaps you're one who says, oh, yes, I'm concerned about forgiveness, eternal life, but I'll go about it my own way. Listen to the words of this text: "His own counsel brings him down." Lean not on your own understanding.
And let me close with a word to us, children of God. For every child of God tonight, will you turn with me to Hosea 10:6? We'll close with this. God speaking the judgments that fall upon Israel for her sin. In the midst of it, He says in Hosea 10: 6, "The thing itself will be carried to Assyria as tribute to King Jerob. Ephraim will receive shame, and Israel will be ashamed of its own counsel."
Do you remember what part of that counsel was? The prophet Isaiah alludes to it again and again in chapter 30 of Isaiah. When Israel faced her need and began to realize her position of danger, she did not trust in Yahweh her God with all her heart and did not lean and did not follow the command to lean not upon her own understanding and cry to God for help. She said instead, oh, well, we're in a bad shape. We're in a difficult situation. We're in a tough situation, but, you know, well, we're so thankful. There's Egypt, that great nation with many chariots and horses and warriors. We'll go down and strike a deal with Egypt. And God said for that very sin of seeking to escape the impending judgment of that invading army or the invading armies by leaning upon a human carnal counsel, God says that very counsel shall be Israel's undoing.
Oh, child of God, how often God has allowed us to go into some area of captivity—spiritual bondage, the state of being spiritually crippled—because we leaned on our own understanding in that area. There was a circumstance, perhaps in our families, a need in our homes, a difficulty, and we turned to strike a deal with Egypt instead of falling on our faces and turning to the Word and saying, "Lord, what's the answer to my need? Lord, what's the answer to my need?" God's Word is, "Israel will be ashamed of its own counsel."
Beloved, God's ways are not your ways. They're not my ways. "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, My thoughts than your thoughts" (Isaiah 55:9). Oh, beloved, may God teach us—all of us—that the way to have our paths directed by the Lord is to lean not on our own understanding. How can we as believers best serve God? Go to the Word. How can you best do the work of God? Go to the Word. How can we best advance in holiness and sanctification and Christlikeness? Go to the Word. How is the church to increase and multiply? Go to the Word.
Lean not on your own understanding. That's the second directive. The first is a command to reliance: "Trust in Yahweh with all your heart." Then a command to repudiation of all unaided human wisdom: "Do not lean on your own understanding." And next Lord's Day, we will look at, "In all your ways acknowledge Him." That command to recognizing.
Let us pray.
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