Proverbs 3:5,6,  Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not to thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.

We are so prone to figuring out things for ourselves.

This proverbs father now warns his son about figuring out things for himself.

Be careful son about having confidence in yourself and in your own ability to reason things out.

God has ordained it that reason can only take you so far but God, through faith, is to take you the rest of the way.

No one can make the complete journey of life without faith or trust.

Self confidence Son is depending upon a broken reed.

It is building your house upon the sand instead of a rock.

Jesus warned of this Matthew 7:24,25,  Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.

Matthew 7:26,27,  And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it.

(This story is so current as witnessed by the California houses falling into the Pacific because of El Nino)

What do we have here? We have two builders of houses.

We assume the houses they built were no different from each other.

If they were, Jesus would have told us.

I suppose that both builders used strong materials and both used good workmanship.

Both were strong houses for we know that when one fell the fall was great. It was a mighty house.

Both houses suffered through the same storm.

The rain descended and the floods came and the winds blew and beat upon each house with the same force.

But one house fell and the other house stood.

What was the difference here?

The difference was certainly not the houses.

From an outward appearance both houses looked substantial, both looked like they were built to survive any storm.

What caused identical houses to react differently to the onslaughts of the storm.

It was of course the foundations upon which the houses were built.

It was not the house that revealed the weakness, it was the foundation upon which the house was built.

The foundations of the houses were hidden from view and were only revealed by the storm.

Before the revealing storm both houses looked safe.

The house that was built upon the rock was built upon the foundation of trust in the Lord with all thine heart

But the house that was built upon the sand was built by leaning to thine own understanding.

Both house were subjected to a raging storm.

God did not keep the storm from the house built upon a rock.

Neither will God keep the storm away from the righteous but the righteous, whose house is built upon the rock, the Lord Jesus Christ, will withstand the storm but every house not built upon the rock will fall.

As recorded in Psalm 127:1,...... Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the LORD keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.

So this proverbs father instructs his son in foundational principles; way of life principles.

Son, man was not created to be self sufficient.

That is the lie of Satan.

Satan's deceit since the Garden of Eden has been to convince man that he can get along without God.

But man is free only when he realizes that he is complete when he is God dependant.

The whole march of technology and invention is but an effort by man to become independant of God.

It is the modern building of the Tower of Babel, man making a name for himself.

Who needs God when I can fend for myself.

But this father knows the lie of Satan and teaches his son to trust in the Lord.

You are made to trust.

Only God has no one in which to trust.

Man must place his trust in another for man cannot exist alone.

God says trust in the Lord with all thine heart.

God is the ultimate trust and anyone else is to be subordinate to that trust.

God says: Put your confidence in me. Commit yourself to my care

When there is a decision to make, acknowledge me and seek my help instead of leaning toward the help of yourself or others.

I am your maker and I know what you need.

I know what makes you tick. I know every moving part.

I know all about the parts of you that have no moving parts.

I know about your body, your soul and your spirit.

I know where one stops and the other starts.

You know very little about yourself but I know everything.

My wisdom, faithfulness and love are well proven.

My word is always right and will never fail you.

So son, there must be a yielding of the heart in order for the Lord to direct the paths for the heart to go.

Therefore son, you must subjugate your own understanding to the perfect understanding of the one and only one that truly understands the whole.

That is what the wise man did who built his house upon a rock.

He acknowledged God to determine upon what foundation to build his house.

The wise man knew 1 Corinthians 3:11,  For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

But the foolish man simply leaned to his own understanding and built a fine house, by all appearances.

Everyone who came by and saw his house thought it just as good as the wise man's house.

But he built it upon a foundation of his own making, the shifting sands of this life, the principles of this world and the world system.

He built it with utter disregard for God and God's will for his life.

He stole from God his very life in order to spend it upon himself.

But the wise man trusted in the Lord in building his house and by that trust insured that the foundation of his life would hold when the time came.

For he built that house upon the Lord Jesus Christ and only lives built upon him will survive.

It is natural to want to lean on something when we choose a path.

It is natural to favor yourself as a strength to lean on.

What better person to choose a path for your life than you.

Who knows you better than yourself?

It is my life, is it not, you say?

No! you were bought. Leaning to your own understanding will bring you faulty results.

Your own understanding is not complete.

Only God's understanding is complete.

1 Corinthians 2:14,  But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

The natural man chooses sand upon which to build his house but only those who supernaturally know Christ can see to build their house on a rock.

You have freedom to build on sand or on a rock but you don't have freedom as to where that choice takes you.

If you leave the choice to God, where he takes you will be the best place for you.

That is what trust is all about; knowing that someone other than you, knows what is best for you.

And only God is that someone. That's trust!

Proverbs 3:5,6,  Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not to thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.

We will discuss verse 5 this week and, Lord willing, verse 6 next week.

These two verses are the Biblical compass for the believer.

For a compass to be of any value it must be followed.

If it is not believed the compass will do no good.

Trust means to put your confidence in something or somebody.

Who that somebody is means everything.

If that somebody is not worthy of trust than our trust will yield heartbreak, sorrow and failure.

The somebody of this verse is fully worthy of our confidence because it is he that has made us.

He and he alone knows how we tick. He knows every moving part.

He knows all about the parts of us that have no moving parts.

He knows about our body, our soul and our spirit.

He knows where one stops and the other starts.

We know very little about ourselves but he knows everything.

His wisdom, faithfulness and love are well proven. His word is always right and will never fail you.

For this verse to work it must work on a heart that belongs to a child of God.

Trust is alien to a lost sinner. A lost sinner cannot trust.

The heart is like an instrument that must be in the Master's hand in order to respond to the Master's direction.

There must be a yielding of the heart in order for the Lord to direct the paths for the heart to go.

Therefore the believer must subjugate his own understanding to the perfect understanding of the one and only one that truly understands the whole situation.

It is natural to want to lean on something when we choose a path.

It is natural to favor yourself as a strength to lean on.

What better person to choose a path for your life than you.

Who knows you better than yourself? It is my life, is it not, you say?

No! you were bought. You have no right to lean to your own understanding.

That is God's right. God gives you freedom to lean if you so choose but you don't have freedom as to where that choice takes you.

If you leave the choice to God, where he takes you will be the best place for you. That is what trust is all about.

Knowing that someone other than you, knows what is best for you. That's trust!

Proverbs 3:5,6,  Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not to thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.

Before we move into Proverbs 3:6 lets discuss the word trust as we find it in Proverbs 3:5 and in relation to the word faith.

The word trust appears in the Old Testament 107 times while in the New it appears 27 times.

The word faith appears in the Old Testament only 2 times but in the New Testament it appears 245 times.

The books of John, II and III John do not use the word faith.

In fact John only uses the word faith once in his writings in the book of 1 John 5:4,  For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.

The word "faith" occurs in the book of Romans, 34 times while in the book of Hebrews it occurs 31 times, 20 times in Galatians and 18 times in 1st Timothy.

The book of Galatians with 20 occurrences uses the word faith at the highest rate per chapter (3.33) with 1st Timothy next (3.0), Hebrews next (2.38) and Romans next (2.22).

The word trust is most used in the Psalms, 50 times, next in Isaiah, 17 times, Jeremiah, 9 times and in the New Testament it is used most in 2 Corinthians, 7 times, however it is used at the highest rate per chapter in 1 Tim, being used 4 times in 6 chapters.

Many times we use the words faith and trust interchangeably but there are distinctions in the words that we should know.

Hebrews 11:1 says,  Now faith is the substance (the foundation upon which hope is built) of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

The word faith as used in this verse is the English translation of the Greek word pistis.

It means persuasion.

It means credence or certainty or moral conviction of religious truth, or the truthfulness of God or a religious teacher.

Webster’s 1828 dictionary says that faith is the assent of the mind to the truth of what is declared by another resting on his authority and veracity without other evidence.

In theology faith is the assent of the mind to the truth of what God has revealed.

Paul expressed his faith when in 2 Timothy 1:12 he said this,  For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.

Paul's hope was built upon a settled conviction or persuasion of things not yet actual but certain to become so.

He could sing My hope is built (faith) on nothing less than Jesus blood and righteousness.

For he knew whom he believed.

Faith is built upon knowing in whom you believe.

A person lives a life for God and his testimony is such that others know him to be a person who will conduct himself according to the word of God.

They have an assent of the mind to the truth of what is declared by his testimony and they relate to him in the future because of that testimony.

They act in accordance with their faith in him.

They exhibit faith in him, this is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

Matthew Henry in his commentary states it this way:

What is trust then? Is trust and faith identical?

The word trust as used in Proverbs 3:5 is from the Hebrew word batach, baw-takh'.

It means to flee for refuge, to be confident or sure: to be bold in fleeing.

Another word translated trust many times in the Old Testament is from the Hebrew word chacah, khaw-saw' which means to flee for protection, to make refuge.

Trust then is an action word.

It is a word which indicates movement to a place of safety from a place of danger.

Note the defining word flee.

Trust then indicates an urgency of action.

Something must be done and it must be done now.

It is a recognition and that refuge is needed.

It is a recognition that protection must be sought.

But where does trust find that refuge, where does trust get that protection?

Trust reveals that refuge and protection must be sought.

So this is where faith comes in.

Faith reveals where that refuge and protection is to come from.

Trust in the Lord with all thine heart.

But is the Lord the place of refuge and protection.

I know that I am supposed to trust for I am in danger.

But am I sure that I am supposed to trust in the Lord.

That is what faith does.

By faith I am convinced that the Lord is the place of refuge and protection.

My mind assents to this.

Faith then is the engine that causes the movement of trust.