Proverbs 16

Good Morning Everyone,

In my resolve to not fall behind on my Proverbs journey I am bringing you Chapter 16 this morning. I hope you all have a great and blessed Wednesday.

Proverbs 16

Proverbs 16:2

² All a person’s ways seem pure to them,

but motives are weighed by the LORD.

When I was in high school it was a popular thing to wear the WWJD (What Would Jesus Do) bracelets as a sign of your faith, or at least as a sign you were trying to fit in. I reference this with this passage because it seems to me a lot of people I knew wearing these bracelets wore them to look "pure" to the world. You might think that sounds judgmental but a lot of these people were out on the weekends partying and drinking and the reason I know that is because they were always telling me about these exploits while wearing their WWJD bracelets. We still wear our WWJD bracelets in the forms of fake smiles and handshakes when we see people we have issues with. Let's take off the bracelets and start living like God is judging our motives, because he is.

Proverbs 16:6

⁶ Through love and faithfulness sin is atoned for;
through the fear of the LORD evil is avoided.

I love reading scripture and finding that it echoes another part of the Bible. I think this passage sounds a lot to me like John 3:16

John 3:16

¹⁶ “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life."

God sending his son equals atonement and I , for one, am glad that God saw fit to give us atonement.

Proverbs 16:18

¹⁸ Pride goes before destruction,
a haughty spirit before a fall.

Think about any time in your life when you have failed at something. Maybe it was a class in school, maybe it was a business venture or maybe it was a relationship. Anytime you have failed there was probably some aspect of pride that caused it. Maybe you thought you were too smart to study, or you thought your business savvy was so superior that you didn't need to heed the advice of others and maybe you thought you were such a great person that could carry both sides of the relationship. Whatever the case may be pride generally helps you make the worst out of the best situations.

Proverbs 16:31

³¹ Gray hair is a crown of splendor;
it is attained in the way of righteousness.

This one is just kind of funny and I will tell you why. I was combing my hair the other day and I noticed something...a few gray hairs. I'm 29 years old and I am already finding gray hair. April tells me it makes me look distinguished but I feel like it makes me look old. This passage does make me feel a little better about my gray hairs. Keep on enjoying the journey.

Be Strong and Courageous,

Paul