Proverbs 16:2

As Brian said, we're in Proverbs 16 again, working our way through verses here. And the number of verses here in the first part of the chapter about the difference between the way we understand things and the way God does, and that's going to be our emphasis tonight as we look at verse 2. A quick reminder for, or maybe you've never heard this before, but I think most of you have, is a proverb. So it's Hebrew poetry. Proverbs are generally true, sort of maxims to explain the world, to help us know how to act. And in Hebrew, poetry is parallel, so it's two lines that are saying something that's connected, and the way they're connected varies. And in this case, the two lines contrast with each other, and that's gonna be important for us understanding what this verse says. So if you have, if you're looking in your Bible, and you have especially one of the pew Bibles, verse two reads, all the ways of a man are pure in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the spirit. It may help if I read a couple of other translations to sort of focus in on what this is saying. So the Christian Standard Bible says, all a person's ways seem right to him, but the Lord weighs motives. And the New American Standard says, all the ways of a man are clean in his own sight, but the Lord weighs the motives. In fact, motives is probably a more common translation of this last word than heart or the spirit is. But it's kind of all supposed to be the same thing. As I said, you know, proverbs are generally true maximums or principles. They often look hyperbolic. So in this particular case, there might be, you might think, I'm not sure this is exactly always true, or how do we understand this? The structure here, I think, is going to help us. So what does this first clause, all a person's ways seem right to him, what does it say about our actions? I think at first glance it seems to say that by our own estimates our actions are pure. The word pure here seems to be similar to something like clean or well-intentioned. So here's my question for you. Is this true? Is it true that to us Our actions seem well motivated as if this is, you know, we're always making the right decision. We think we're always making the right decision or we're making it out of the best motives. Do we generally think that we always do what is good? I'm guessing probably not. So what is this saying? I think it's saying that we generally believe ourselves to be acting in good faith, with good intentions and pure motives. Even when we do something that's self-serving or dishonest, it's because we're trying to get something we want in the moment. And then after the fact, we're really good at justifying ourselves. We try to convince ourselves and others that we really were doing something good, or maybe at least just not so very bad. I think here in this verse, the second clause, the Lord weighs the motives, is a but. So this is contrast, and I think the contrast reveals to us that our self-assessment in which we think that we're always at least well-intentioned is just incorrect. Our ways are not actually always pure. The way we justify our own actions to ourselves, I think, helps us see the point of the second clause. So, there's a question especially for you parents, perhaps. Suppose that you catch someone doing something wrong. I know that would never happen in your house, but suppose it did. What sorts of excuses do you hear for the wrongdoing? This is a part where you can contribute. It was someone else's idea. Oh yes, very true. What else? Oh yes, shifted the blame to the parent. That's a good strategy. What else? You do sometimes get denying it. I'm not sure that's an excuse quite so much. Is it just like a lie? Oh, there's a good one too, but I didn't mean to, or I couldn't help it. You know, that's a really common kind of excuse. A lot of our excuses fall under one of those two types. Either I didn't mean to, or I couldn't help it. Notice that in both of those cases, we're saying something about our own motives. It's not my fault because it wasn't really me. You know, sometimes those are actually true. Sometimes there are actually accidents. I didn't mean to. I mean, sometimes you didn't. But very often it isn't quite true. It sounds kind of plausible, maybe, and even sometimes if it's true that I didn't mean that particular thing, I certainly meant the thing that made it more likely, right? So, yeah, I didn't mean to hit my sister. Well, you know, throwing that thing within three inches of her was really close, right? So, yes, it's kind of true you didn't mean to in that very limited way. Look, even Proverbs talks about how this happens with adults. Compare, for example, Proverbs 26, 18 and 19, which reads, like a madman who throws firebrands, arrows, and death is a man who deceives his neighbor and says, I am only joking. Ah, if you're a parent, I'm sure you've heard that one too, right? I mean, look, this is the way we function. We try to portray our own actions in the best light possible, making ourselves look as good as we can. Certainly, we don't act from pure motives all the time. Our motives are often very mixed, and we are very good at finding the ones that make us look the best. God is not fooled by our self-justification. He knows what we're really after even better than we do. It's interesting, you know, I'm probably maybe the only person in here who reads this psychology literature in which this is becoming more and more a thing in academic psychology. People are realizing, wow, you know, people are really complicated. They act from all kinds of complicated motives and often are quite self-deceived about what they're really doing, to which I say, yes, I have a book here that talks about that in great detail, right? They're starting to recognize it just by watching people. How can we be so wrong about ourselves? Don't you know yourself better than anyone? Remember what Jeremiah 17, 9 says, the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick. Who can know it? We want to believe that we are better than we actually are. And we often want others to believe that we're better than we are. You might say, we read our own press releases too much. We try to make ourselves look good. We often overestimate our own self-knowledge and underestimate how well others know us. Have you ever had this experience? Where maybe you're puzzling over some decision, and maybe a parent or someone who knows you really well says, I kind of know what you're going to pick here. You're like, how do you know? Or maybe you've done this to someone else. Maybe one of your kids is trying to figure out what to do, and you're like, I know what you're going to pick. You know, sometimes we find it really easy to see through someone else's words and, you know, confusion, even when that person isn't even necessarily trying to hide themselves from us. And sometimes when they don't even understand themselves very well. Sometimes we think we're a lot harder to read than we actually are. And if others, other human beings, can read our own motives better than we can? How much more can God do that? So we're afraid often of letting others see what we're really like. We're afraid of admitting what we're really like to ourselves. And in truth, I think it's a kindness from God that we are not aware of all of our own failures and vices. It would, I think, be far too depressing to know about ourselves what God knows about us, right? And yet God does know all of those things. He can't be deceived. He's weighing the motives. He knows everything about us. And even with all of that knowledge, he still loves us. You know, I think that is our fear, and that's why we try to hide ourselves from others. We think we need some degree of respectability in order to get along. And, you know, there's a sense which this is partly true, right? We present kind of a caricature of ourselves to the rest of the world. We want people to see our best side as much as possible, one that's often far more, that appears to be far more competent and selfless than we actually are. Now, that doesn't mean that, you know, unfiltered self-expression is a virtue, right? It's good to be transparent with others in the sense of not trying to deceive them, but it's not good to be transparent with others in the sense of just like saying everything that comes into your head, right? But we don't actually need to know others the way that God knows us because we're not God. And they don't need to know us the way God does because they're not God. But I think we're often afraid that if people really knew what we were really like, what we really wanted, how we really think, they wouldn't like us very much. You know, God is not only merciful to our sinful desires, he is kind in his dealings with us. He's forgiven us for our sins, including those that we've committed only in our thoughts, including those that we don't even realize we committed. But more than just being merciful and forgiving, he is also compassionate. So he doesn't judge us incorrectly. He knows what our motives are. Even when we have deceived ourselves about what they are, God knows them and he weighs them exactly correctly. He doesn't misjudge us. And yet he still shows compassion toward us. I remember what Psalm 103 says, he knows our frame. He remembers that we are dust. And so God's perfect knowledge of us does not need to make us afraid of whether we can gain his approval. God gives us that in Christ without our earning it. So we don't have to be afraid of him, nor do we have to impress him. Instead, we should trust him more in trusting ourselves to the one who is truly faithful. Let's pray. Father, we confess that we are very good at deceiving ourselves and so often try to deceive others too, but we are really grateful that we can't deceive you. because that means when one day we stand before you, we can be completely confident that there'll be no surprises to you and that your promise to forgive us will extend to everything that we've done, everything we've thought, everything we've wanted. Lord, we thank you for the promise of salvation, and we ask you to help us to appreciate how great a gift that is. We also ask you to help us to judge ourselves rightly, to be aware of how you see us as best as we can, and honest with ourselves and with you. And then entrust our own hearts to you, who judges perfectly. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.