The Brain is The Hub and The Tongue is The Sword, Part 1

So many times I have heard how the Old Testament (OT) has no meaning in today’s life. I have heard that once Christ came on to the scene all that was, is no more. All things are made new. I even have heard people, in the same sitting, tell me that Christ changed all that, and then used the OT to validate their thought. In Jesus fulfilling the law all that is left is faith in Him. In some ways, this is absolutely true. We no longer offer the annual blood sacrifice for the covering of our sin. Christ’s blood sacrifice was the completeness of the sacrifice. There is no other sacrifice that can do anything more than that which Jesus dying on the cross has already done. But the New Testament does not negate the Old Testament. There is so much that is alive and just as effective in the application to our doctrine and daily lives. As I read the 21^st Proverb, I was overcome with this feeling. Every single instruction of how to live and every example of God’s view of right and wrong are just as true today as they were when King Solomon wrote them.

Proverb 21:1 The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, as the rivers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will.

The very first verse pierces my heart as it tells me that my God has every heart in His hands. First, we must understand that the word “heart” here really means the mind of man. I have said over and over, the true heart is just a muscle that pumps blood throughout the body. It does not create feelings and thoughts and words. The heart does not control our behavior. It is a vital organ, and we should care for it. But the brain is the hub of where we generate our behaviors. God controls even the King’s mind. I think of all the times that we read about how God hardened or softened a heart (mind). How much further do you have to go than the story of Joseph who was sold into slavery and ended up in the house of the Captain of the Pharaoh’s guard, Potiphar. God had Potiphar’s heart in his hand and cause him to have favor for Joseph. He made Joseph the superintendent of his house. Because he would not lay with Potiphar’s wife, she makes accusations against Joseph and he ends up in prison. God had the Warden’s heart in his hand and caused him to have favor on Joseph. He made Joseph the jail keep. There he interpreted dreams of a baker and cup bearer. The baker was reinstated and after 2 years of forgetting about Joseph, the Pharaoh was having bad dreams that no one could understand. The baker remembered Joseph and told the Pharaoh of the dreams Joseph interpreted and how he predicted rightly that the cup bearer would be executed but that the baker would be reinstated. The Pharaoh called for Joseph. After interpreting the dreams, the Pharaoh did not let Joseph go, but God had the Pharaoh’s heart in his hand, and God directed it like the waters of rivers. He directed Pharaoh to make Joseph the Vizier, the second in command of all of Egypt. The most powerful thing is that the Pharaoh was not a believer. Being a sinner is no match for my God. Let us not forget, that the most evil of all evil, falls in the end. In the hands of the evil and wicked Pharaoh, Joseph went from slave to convict to Second in charge of all of Egypt, and having great influence on the Pharaoh as well. Make no mistake, these simple words, the introductory declaration, are simple, but carry great power when you stop and ponder that the God who had the Pharaoh’s heart in his hand and cause great things to come upon Joseph is the same God who sits on the throne and can be in charge of your life if you believe that He still has man’s heart in his hand. And that sets the tone for this proverb. It is one of wicked compared to righteous. There is no gray area in obedience to the LORD. Either you are living a life serving the Master, or you are living a life serving satan. There is no third party. There is no gray area.

² Every way of a man is right in his own eyes: but the Lord pondereth the hearts.

³ To do justice and judgment is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice.

Most of us, if we are being honest with ourselves, think we are right about a lot of things. Some of us are good at admitting that we are wrong about something, but only after being shown that we are wrong. Most of us start off by thinking we are right. Our faith is no different. Those who reject God think they are right. Those who accept Christ but twist the word of God to suit their own flesh think they are right. There are so many different ways to take this, all ending with the same, we really do think we are right in our behavior. The real story is in the proverbial heart, or literally the mind. That is where God does the examining.

Dr. J. Vernon McGee says, and I am paraphrasing here, Jesus is the great physician, and a heart specialist. Jesus was the first in the heart transplant business. He was the first one to take the old heart and replace it with a heart that is obedient to him.

Matthew Henry states,

“Man is right in his own eyes. The proud heart is very ingenious in putting a fair face upon a foul matter, and in making that appear right to itself which is far from being so, to stop the mouth of conscience…..  God looks at the heart, and judges of men according to that, of their actions according to their principles and intentions; and his judgment of that is as exact as ours is of that which we ponder most, and more so; he weighs it in an unerring balance.”

I do believe that the one thing that Christian behavior has gotten far away from is principle. I think today’s society has convinced even the strongest of Christian that independent and free thinking is best. Being empowered to be you is better than compliance to any norm, including the biblical living Christ calls us to embrace when we accept Him. I fear that we have gotten away from things like principled living, and things like reverence. We have diminished God to someone we can take off a shelf when we need him, and put him back on the shelf whenever we are moved to be empowered or free thinking. We can truly see this as church after church, denomination after denomination allow the unrepentant sinner to enter the pulpit, behind the sacred desk (if your church even has a pulpit or a sacred desk anymore) to lead others. Think about weddings. Most of the Christian Faith have an objection to same sex marriage. But at the same time, the church that refuses to marry a same sex couple will marry two drunks who never attend church or even make confession for Christ. Think about that for a second. The idea of justice is righteousness or holiness. What is righteous about marrying one pair of sinners, but not another. Either we observe God in the boundaries of marriage or you do not. Of course, anyone behaving like this will open the scriptures and find something they will use to justify their position because they are right in their own eyes. But read what the king wrote here. To be just is acceptable to the LORD. Meaning the LORD is watching. We can explain our sin to each other all we want. Explain it to God; give the LORD all the excuses and let’s see how he judges us in return.

⁴ An high look, and a proud heart, and the plowing of the wicked, is sin.

⁵ The thoughts of the diligent tend only to plenteousness; but of every one that is hasty only to want.

⁶ The getting of treasures by a lying tongue is a vanity tossed to and fro of them that seek death.

⁷ The robbery of the wicked shall destroy them; because they refuse to do judgment.

Charles Ellicott States,

The plowing of the wicked.—i.e., their work, all they do; for it is not done to please God but themselves; nor carried on in His strength, but in reliance upon their own, and therefore it is “sin,” not pleasing to Him.

How we live is important. In the four verses above we see pride of man being brought to light. A high look, a facial expression that has your nose high in the air, a look that says that you see me but you turn your head from me as if I am not worthy of your acknowledgment. When God looks into our mind and He sees us, He sees the sinful pride. There are many things to be proud of, to be pleased with. The way to know the difference is to compare your thoughts to God. Jesus would never look down on anyone. Jesus would never allow His joy, pleasure, or simple contentment in any accomplishment to lead to the pain of another. He came as a humble servant, not as one who thought he was better than anyone else, or that their children are better than your children, or my home is better than your home, job than your job, paycheck/bank account than your paycheck/bank account. We see that God certainly did give us brains so that we can ponder life, and temptation, and think about them righteously. Jesus was tempted. It is not a sin to be tempted. There was nothing that satan had that Jesus did not already have. This is not true for us. Sometimes the temptations look so good, they smell, taste, feel and sound so good. To have diligent thoughts is to take into consideration God’s will. To do so leads to abundance. It may not be abundance of what your flesh wants, but it is the abundance that God wants you to have. Quickly, lets examine sexual sin. I am a heterosexual man. My flesh loves beautiful women. My lust desires them. Satan offers me all the women I can have. My God has already blessed me with a beautiful and wonderful wife. I have a choice to make. To be diligent in thinking about it, if I take all the women I can have, I might think that to be a great abundance. But an abundance of what? Pain, sickness, divorce, poverty, loneliness, and a great big hole where true companionship once lived? I had an abundance of women that led to death. Yet, if I diligent consider the gift God has given me, I have a life filled with love, companionship, peace, joy, and a life after death because my behavior was pleasing to God for bringing Glory to Him. That is the abundance He wants us to have. So as His, as a follower of Jesus, it is my responsibility to align my wants with His wants. I do not want, nor need the life of abundant women. I need abundant love.

⁹ It is better to dwell in a corner of the housetop, than with a brawling woman in a wide house.

¹⁰ The soul of the wicked desireth evil: his neighbour findeth no favour in his eyes.

Albert Barnes

“The flat roof of an Eastern house was often used for retirement by day, or in summer for sleep by night. The corner of such a roof was exposed to all changes of weather, and the point of the proverb lies in the thought that all winds and storms which a man might meet with there are more endurable than the tempest within.”

Whom we chose to spend our time with in important. I believe that the command to not be unequally yoked is not just a command for marriage, but also close friendships. We should be a friend to all, and we should always be prepared to let the light of Christ shine whenever darkness knocks on our doors. But when it comes to who we allow into the sanctuaries of our homes, and in the case of marriage into our own bodies as we become one, we should be certain to be equally yoked. Having said that, a brawling man is unbecoming. But I believe that men and women were designed for two totally different purposes. I believe that men are the hunter gatherers. They were designed to be the rugged piece. The woman however is the nurturing piece. For her to act like him is highly unbecoming. The bible does not refer to the woman as the weaker vessel as a testimony of a lack of strength, but of pricelessness. Again, a biblical principle that satan has used society and very determined sinners to destroy. Here, the bible is saying that it is totally unacceptable to be with a brawling woman. Brawling meaning loud and storming voice, violent, filthy mouth, and prone to verbal arguments/fights. God is saying that it is better to be exposed to the scorching sun, violent wind and sand storms and torrential rain storms on the roof of a house, where there is no cover, than to endure this type of woman in a luxurious home, with all the amenities. This behavior is not Christ like from male and female. But again, there should never be any mistake that, while man and woman were both made in the image of God, and that in the pure spirit form all will be equal, there was a specific and real difference between man and woman. I truly wish the church would do more to preach the difference between man and woman. Especially in the home. We are truly off the mark.

When I was not walking with God, thus called wicked, I focused only on what I wanted. This came to a great expense for others, as I would violate others during my quests to satisfy myself. Christians are command to love our neighbors. We ourselves are to be good neighbors. The wicked have no such principle. It is only about their gain. No matter what the behavior, a wicked man does it for his own good, even if it seems to suit the neighbor.

If you stand in the mirror what will the reflection tell you about yourself, and what are you going to do about it? May the peace of God be abundantly heaped upon you and your house, straight from the cross to the Christian!