Faith Over Feeling

Faith Over Feeling

It’s a blessing to open God’s word this morning. So let’s turn back in it to Proverbs 3, Proverbs 3. And let’s read these few verses once again. Trust in the Lord with all thine heart, and lean not unto thine own understanding in all thy ways. Acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths. Be not wise in thine own eyes. Fear the Lord and depart from evil. It shall be health to thy navel and marrow to thy bones. And may the Lord bless his word to us as we look into it this morning.

The Apostle Paul, as we well know in 1 Corinthians 5:7, said that we walk by faith, not by sight. I think you saw that in your bulletin. A little picture there with that statement on it this morning. And in Romans 1:17 he said that the just shall live by faith. The just shall live by faith. Well, if we’re living by faith, having been made righteous in Christ, then we’re not living by a lot of other things. We’re not living by feelings. That’s not how we live our lives as Christians now. That’s how we used to live our lives. And in fact we used to live according to the lust of the eye. The scripture tells us that’s all that are in this world who walk according to the course of this world. All that’s in the world and is the lust of the eye. What does that mean? The lust of the eye is I see it and I want it. I see that well watered plant over there, I see that fruit on that tree. I see all these things and I want it. Even if God tells me, even if there’s some kind of prohibition, the sinful nature of man says, I want it even more. I want that thing because it looks good to me. And I think that if I get it, then I will be able to satisfy that second thing, which is the lust of the flesh. I will then find satisfaction, happiness, health, wealth, prosperity, whatever it may be. If I can just get that thing, then I will be happy. It’s going to make me feel good. And the devil deceives. But we also have a heart. That is deceptive, right? Naturally, speaking apart from God. That’s the way we are. And so we see that thing and we get this overwhelming rush of desire to have this thing because it’s going to make me feel good. Well, the Bible says that there is pleasure even in sin for a season. It will make you feel good for a very short window of time, but it will. And then you have to go to something else. Kind of like a drug to make you feel good.

But then we see also that we used to live according to that. What John would say first. John 2. The pride of life. The pride of life. We saw that with David’s men this morning. Some of them said, yeah, they didn’t even do anything to get this. You know, look what we accomplished, look what we did. So we get at least the majority of the spoils from this victory because look at all that we accomplished. That’s what pride says, right? Pride of life says, look what I can do. Look what I did do. Look what I did. And so when I get what I see that I want, and that brings me a good feeling, and then I’m going to brag about it, right? I’m going to boast about it. I’m going to say, look at what I have. I mean, we even have proud chickens. You know, one of them gets something and it shows it off to the other ones and they all go chasing it. And it kind of reminds me of how human nature is. Look what I’ve got. And everybody wants that one thing that, you know, there’s 5,000 other, whatever they just found out there in the ground, you know, cricket or whatever. But worm, we got to have that particular one. Kind of like, you know, it’s like children. They. If one of them has a toy, it doesn’t matter. All the other toys in the toy box got to have that one because now they’re going to show up. I’ve got the. The toy. You know, it could have been meaningless five minutes ago to everybody, but now I’ve got it. I’ve got this toy. Well, people grow up and they don’t grow up, right? I got the trophy wife, I got the sports car. I’m taller, I’m faster, I’m skinnier, I’m more attractive, I’m whatever. Look at me. That’s life, right? That’s how men apart from God, women apart from God, children apart from God, tend to think that’s our bent.

And yet, what are we talking about here? We walk by faith. Now, we don’t walk by sight. We don’t walk. Instead, the just shall live by faith. Faith cometh by hearing, hearing by the word. Faith in God’s word. Not faith in what I think is best for me, but faith in that trusts the one who has given me every good thing, the one whose word has not and will has not failed me and will not fail me. God’s word shall never fail. We learned that from a child Right. We sang that little song. At least I did. God’s word shall never fail. Never fail. No, no, no. And one of our children, like the no, no, no part, they just kept saying, no, no, no over and over again. But it’s a truth. They didn’t understand it when they sang it then. But now I look back on it and think how profound that little song is. How profound. Jesus loves me. This I know. For the Bible tells me so. Not because I feel, always feel like Jesus loves me in every moment. You know, I’m just floating on top of cloud nine here. No, I. I may not feel like that all the time, but I know it because he’s told me he loves me. I know it because the Bible says so.

And so we used to live according to the course of this world. We used to live for man’s approval, right? Man’s approval. You know, isn’t that what people are doing when they see what they think is going to make them happy? And then they get it and they run around with it and say, look what I have. Even if people are jealous of them, that’s kind of an approval of sorts. Like, everybody measures themselves by the Joneses over here because they have all the good stuff, right? I’m not talking about Brother George. Okay? They have all the good stuff. I want to be like that guy. He’s my idol, so to speak. No, our. We shouldn’t idolize anyone. But if we have a role model. A role model or an example that we follow, it should be the people in Hebrews, chapter 11, right? It should be those who trusted God, even though the promises had not yet been fulfilled, not having yet received. Many of the promises had to do with Messiah, and he had not yet even come. And yet they trusted and obeyed. But Jesus died on the cross to save us from our sinful lust and our prideful idolatry. He died to save us from that. I think of one of the hymns that we sing. Riches I heed not, nor man’s empty praise Thou mine inheritance now and always Thou and thou only first in my heart, High King of heaven, my treasure thou art.

So when Jesus came into my heart. By faith, how. We don’t have an actual. We don’t have an actual verse of Scripture that says Jesus came into my heart. But it does say that he stands at the door and he knocks. It does say that he wants to come in and sup with us. But by faith, I. I’m now in Christ, and Christ lives in me. The life that I live, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. So now by faith I am his and he is mine, and he is to take priority in my life. Think about this. When we see so many examples in the scriptures of when someone put their faith in the Lord, their life changed. Look at the prodigal. Well, we have the example of the prodigal in relationship with his father. You know, he said he went out and lived riotously and wasted all of his living. And then he said, you know, I’ll just be glad to go back to my father’s house where I’ll be a servant and just. I’ll live better as a servant than I am living out here in the fields of sin, so to speak, and doing what I want to do. And we see that he was greatly humbled. But we have Zacchaeus right. When his heart was changed, he promised to restore fourfold to those that he had wronged. When the Thessalonians were converted, we see that they turned from idols to serve the living and true gods. We could look at a bunch of examples, the Philippian jailer. Look at what happened with him. It was an about face in his life. A 180 Nebuchadnezzar. When God got ahold of him, he said, those who walk in pride, God is able to abase. And I praise, extol the God of heaven in so many words that has done all of these wonderful things. Think about those that got saved on the day of Pentecost. And now they became part of a thriving healthy church where they were breaking bread, continuing in the doctrine of the apostles and fellowship and prayers. And the church was growing and healthy. And we see that there was a complete difference. These are some of the very same people that said, crucify him, Jesus. Just before that, crucify him. Of course, the Father Jesus prayed to the Father and said, father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Forgive them, for they know not what they do.

But when a person truly puts his or her faith in the Lord, not in feelings, not in I’ll follow the lust of my eye and the lust of the flesh. Flesh and the pride of life anymore. I’m done with that. I believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. When a person turns with all their heart to the Lord, I think of another hymn that comes to my mind. It’s that hymn, I’ll go where you want me to go, dear Lord. I’ll say what you want me to say, dear Lord. Over mountain or plain or sea well, The Lord has got. Just because we get saved doesn’t mean there’s not a lot of things the Lord has to do now in our Christian life. He does. But there is a. There should be a radical change in the direction of the will and the desires of the life. There should be a noticeable change. That happens now. We’re not any longer walking by sight, but we’re saying, lord, your word is the lamp to my feet. It is the light to my path. Guide me. Order my steps according to Thy word. Let not any iniquity have dominion over me. I want to please you. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight. O Lord, my strength and my redeemer. This is the attitude of a believer.

I remember reading a quote by George Mueller. I don’t know. I don’t think I put a quote by George Mueller in the Bulletin today. I considered one of his, but it says faith has nothing to do with feelings or with impressions, with improbabilities, or with outward experiences. You know, like we’re just sort of doing analytics and we’re following the data. No, it has nothing to do with that. If we desire to couple such things with faith, then we are no longer resting on the Word of God. Because faith needs nothing of the kind. Faith rests on the naked word of God. When we take him at his Word, the heart is at peace. When we take God at His Word, the heart is at peace. And so that brings us back to the text this morning here in Proverbs, chapter 3. Trust in the Lord with all thine heart and lean not unto thine own understanding. The time past of our lives may suffice us to have. It will suffice for all. All the times we have lean to our own understanding. Where did that get us? Right? Trust in the Lord with all thine heart and lean not. Lean not unto thine own understanding. Don’t trust your own understanding. Don’t trust your own feelings. You know, your feelings can take you all kinds of places. They can have you up here on the mountaintop, and they can have you way down there in the valley. Now, you may walk through the valley, but the scripture says even we walk through the valley, the Lord can prepare a table for us in the presence of our enemies. Our cup can be running over so we don’t have to be in the dumps even though we’re in the valley. Or just every now and then up on a mountaintop. You know, that’s when we’re trusting our own feelings, trusting Our own heart, trusting our own strength. No. The Bible says here, trust in the Lord with all thine heart.

How do we do that? We haven’t seen him face to face, have we? We haven’t. We haven’t seen him face. How do we trust in the Lord? Somebody we haven’t seen? Well, if you’re a Christian, you understand what I’m talking about. If you’re not a Christian, then I refer you back to the experience that the woman at the well had with the Lord Jesus, the Samaritan woman, and how as she was talking with the Lord. Now, we don’t give that opportunity to say, jesus is going to come over to my house today like he did with Zacchaeus. He’s going to come over and talk face to face with me. But we have just as good, because we have this right here and he’s already spoken. And if we will listen to what he says to us, I think every one of us, if we’re honest, will come to the same conclusion. Come see a man that told me all that I ever did. He knows me better than I know myself. He knows me. He knows my heart. And if I do not hold the truth down in unrighteousness, I will have to come to the conclusion that he’s speaking to me. He’s talking about Daniel Peed or whoever you are. He’s talking about me. I haven’t seen him face to face, but I love him. I love him because. Not because I love him first, but because he loves me. He loved me so much that he laid down his life for me. And now I want to trust Him. I do trust him and I want to trust His Word. What do I do? I trust that his promises are true. I obey his commands because I trust Him. I heed his warnings that he gives me in His Word because I believe that what he tells me is the truth. I don’t think that God has put anything in His Word that is superfluous. It just didn’t really need to even be in there because every jot and every tittle inspired, it’s inerrant. It’s there for a reason. And I have to find out why did God tell us that? What is he saying to me through His Word?

So if it’s true that I’m not leaning to my. If I’m trusting in the Lord, then I’m not leaning to my own understanding. I can’t do both things at the same time, right? I can’t lean on my own understanding while trusting in the Lord because What it means to trust in the Lord. It means to. Well, it means to heed his commands, trust his promises, take his warnings, to be instructed in every way by his word. To have my needs met by his word. It’d be like that lamp we talked about. To my feet. It must be that light to my path to guide me and keep me from sin, to show me the living way wherein I need to walk down day by day. Where I need to walk as a husband, where I need to walk as a father, where I need to walk as a brother in Christ, as a mother, a wife, a child, an employee. God’s word will guide me. It will guide me in the way that I should go.

Now. In all thy ways, it says in verse six here. In all thy ways, acknowledge him. We say somebody walks into a room. I guess back in the day, you know, a woman walked in the room. The man would stand up, right? Take off his hat or whatever it may be, you know, stand up and acknowledge and show in some way, I know that you’re in the room, and I have respect for that. I recognize you. How do we acknowledge the Lord? How do we acknowledge the Lord in our daily lives? Well, we could pray about everything that’s in everything by prayer. The scripture says we can confess him with our mouth as we go about. We should not be ashamed of his words in this adulterous and sinful generation. Right? That’s one way to acknowledge the Lord and to show that I’m recognizing the Lord in this situation. Sometimes, like we saw with David this morning, he didn’t acknowledge the Lord when he went down. We don’t have any indication that he was acknowledging the Lord when he went to Gath 16 months. We don’t have any indication that he’s praying. We’re not told about it anyway, that he’s seeking the Lord’s guidance. Instead, we see a lot of deceptive talk with Achish and trying to save his own life. We got to acknowledge he’s been through the wringer. But he got himself in a situation where he was almost about to go up and fight against his own people in a battle, and the Lord spared him from that. So we got to be careful to acknowledge the Lord in all our ways. Acknowledge the Lord. We can’t say, well, the Lord led me in the past. Well, that’s great. That’s wonderful. But in all thy ways acknowledge him. Because the Lord might have led us in the past, and we can’t take away from that. But it doesn’t mean necessarily that we are, Are we today? Are we really acknowledging the Lord in these set of circumstances? April 27. What is it, 20? 25 today? Am I acknowledging the Lord today? Acknowledge the Lord in all thy ways. Acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths. Didn’t say he might. Didn’t say he is possible. It says that he will. He shall direct thy paths. In other words, he’s going to. As David, when he sought the Lord, the Lord led him in the way to that Egyptian that was fainting and he made provision. He led him where he needed to go. He brought the things into his path. And that’s called faith. Faith. The Lord is going to provide what we need. It’s amazing how many times the Lord can bring something out of seemingly nowhere that it had not even entered on our radar. We hadn’t even thought about this possibility. And it just. There it is. The Lord had been preparing that person or that circumstance or that information, whatever it is, all along, but he was not going to reveal it to us except we acknowledged him and trusted in him and the circumstance. And then he brought it. There it was, there was the provision of that thing for us, and he guided us in it.

And so trust in the Lord in all thy ways. Acknowledge him. He shall direct thy paths, but be not wise in thine own eyes. We’ll pause on that thought for just a moment. But if we trust in the Lord with all of our heart to guide us, we’re trusting him to do that. I am trusting Thee, Lord Jesus, trusting only Thee to guide me. Then what are we going to do? We’re going to obey. Because oftentimes all we can see in our walk is where we need to put the next footstep. Well, I know your word says this, so I’m going to do this. I’m going to pray. I’m going to love my wife. I’m going to bring my children up in the nurture and the admonition of the Lord. I’m going to do these things that I know your word tells me. And as I’m doing those things, I’m trusting that you’ll show me the next steps. And he will, and he’ll show us, and he’ll guide us and direct us in that. If I am not walking in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standing in the way of sinners, nor sitting in the seat of the scornful, the Bible says I am a blessed man, truly happy, not circumstantially happy, not, ooh, I feel really happy today. Everything’s going My way kind of happy. That’s not the kind of happy that we’re looking for as Christians. And good and happy things happen to us. And you can’t help but be happy about those, right? I mean, you know, you can’t help but be happy when you see little bunny rabbits and dogs wanting to come up and lick you and that kind of thing. You know, there’s a lot of happy things that happen in our lives, and it’s. The Lord has given us freely those things to enjoy. But just don’t count on those always being the everyday life. Just know that we are truly blessed if we are walking, meditating in God’s word and saying, lord, I’ll go where you want me to go. I’ll do what you want me to do. What do you want me to do? Well, how do you want me to think? What do you want me to say? And Lord, please forgive me because I just said something I shouldn’t have said. Lord, I thought something I should not have thought. But I want to make it right because I want you to guide me. I want you to direct me. I had a feeling that I should not have had. I had an attitude, a mood or whatever that I shouldn’t have had. But, Lord, your word rebukes that. You’ve chastened me about that. I want that to be put away from me. And Lord, help me to delight only in your law. Meditate in it day and night. And the Bible says that we will be like a tree planted by the rivers of water. The Lord will establish. Will establish us.

Think about Noah briefly with me this morning. Noah was a man who obviously feared the Lord. He feared the Lord. We read here in verse number seven, be not wise in thine own eyes fear the Lord depart from evil. Well, I can’t think of a better example of that than Noah. I mean, when we look at the Bible, he was moved with fear to prepare an ark, right, for the saving of his family. He was moved with fear, not the fear of man, because the fear of man could have been the very strong motivator in his life. But greater than the fear of man was the fear of God. And he says, because I fear God, I believe his word and I am going to prepare this ark, even though people will mock me for preparing it, even though people will scoff at me. Now, we. I have read through that account, and I don’t see anywhere in the actual account that it says that. And Brother Bergman or somebody can correct me if I’m wrong on this, but I Don’t read anywhere in that actual account that it says the people mocked it. But when we look over it in. In Peter’s writing, we find that as it was, the Lord destroyed the earth by a flood in Noah’s day, yet it’s going to be destroyed by fire and in the day to come. And he says, even now we have people saying, where is the promise of his coming? Where is the promise of his coming? They’re mockingly, scoffingly. And yet, just as it was true in Noah’s day, it is true in our day that that judgment is going to come. I cannot help but make the assumption, based on how human nature is, that people were saying the very same thing in Noah’s day. Ha ha. You’re building this ark. Where. Where is the promise that there’s going to be a flow? We’ve never seen such a thing. You’ve lost it. You really have. You’re off your rocker. But Noah, Noah, if there was anybody who had a right, so to speak, because he wasn’t feeling good about this plan, he had plenty of opportunities over those many years of preparing that ark to say, you know, I just don’t feel like doing this anymore. I’m just not feeling it. I’m just not feeling like doing it. Be not wise in thine own eyes. Fear the Lord depart from evil. And because Noah trusted God’s word, he feared the Lord rather than men.

Think about Abraham. Abraham obeyed God. He was going to take his son Isaac’s life in obedience to God because he trusted God, not because he could say, well, I can see how this is going to turn out. Well, no, it didn’t look like it was going to turn out well, did it? We have Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. They were about to walk into a furnace that some men had just died just getting too close to the thing, and they were about to go in, and they said, well, God is able to deliver us, but if he doesn’t, we’re going to trust him anyway. We’re going to do what he wants us to do. We’re not going. We cannot go against his clearly revealed truth just because we want to save our lives. No, we’re going to, in so many words. We’re going to take up our cross, we’re going to deny ourself, and we’re going to go into that fire, and we’re going to do it for his glory.

And so the Lord. A resounding. A recurring theme in my thinking recently has been this matter of patience. We certainly saw it in the book of James, as I’ve been looking at first Peter, with our girls, James and James, we see patience, the need of patience. So many different circumstances of life, we see that there’s patience, need needed. The Lord in all of this, he wants us. Trust is tied in with patience. If we trust in the Lord, we got to patiently wait on him. Because what are we waiting for? We’re not waiting for a feeling. We’re waiting for the. We’re waiting on the Lord. And when the Lord is quite ready, he’s going to bring us through whatever circumstance we may be going through. When he’s quite ready, he’s going to send his son back to take his people. But in the meantime, we cannot. If we’re leaning on feelings, we’re going to. We’re going to throw in the towel, we’re going to get upset, we’re going to have a fit. But we’ve got to trust the Lord with all of our heart. Fear the Lord and depart from evil. And it says here in this passage that it shall be verse number eight. It shall be health. What is it shall be? Well, all that we’ve just read. If you’re trusting in the Lord, if you’re not leaning to your own understanding, if you’re truly fearing the Lord and not man and departing from evil, all of that is a response of the heart to God, saying, I’m denying myself and I’m putting everything, all my trusts in God. And as a result of that, God promises. God promises. If that’s truly our heart toward him, he promises us that it shall be health to thy navel and marrow to thy bones.

Well, God has not God. God provides all of our needs. And even more than physical health, which I believe a lot of the problems, the health problems that we’re seeing today is people are so stressed out, they’re not trusting in the Lord, a lot of problems come. I’m not. And don’t get me wrong, don’t take this the wrong way, because we all have stress in our lives that comes to us. But the best stress management is to trust in the Lord, right? Better than any other thing you could possibly think of doing. To trust in the Lord with all thine heart. Some things are just going to happen. I mean, look at the apostle Paul. We hold him up as an example. The Bible puts him out as an example of the faith, right? You know, he literally says, under divine inspiration, follow my example in so many words. But even that man, of course, he had an affliction in the flesh. This is not talking about we’re going to have divine health. If we’re just trusting the Lord, we’ll never have any physical problems. No, but I believe there will be great blessings that will even extend to our physical lives that will come to us. Kind of like the first commandment with promise. You know, children, honor thy father and mother and so thy days shall be long upon the earth. In so many words, this is one of those kinds of promises. Does that mean that every child that trusted in the Lord always lived a hundred years old? No, but they lived a blessed life. No doubt they lived a blessed life all their days.

But we see that the Lord, the Lord is going to bless with peace this evening. I’d like to speak, Lord willing, on the peace of God as a follow up to what we’re saying this morning, I think, and I don’t want to preach the message for this evening, but here, that word shalom, that uses a greeting among even the Jews. Shalom, peace, Right. But that word is extended even beyond just what does it mean it’s talking about? It even has the idea of health. We say. What do we say? It is well with my soul, all is well. That is what the Lord wants to be the case with us. If we’re trusting him with all of our heart, not leaning on our understanding, it doesn’t mean that we’re always going to be feeling like we’re on cloud nine. But it can be well with us. It will be well with us. We will have true health, true health. Health extends far beyond just the physical body, extends into our mind. It extends into our whole being. In fact, this physical body, we’re only going to have it for so much longer. We need to be good stewards of the body that God’s given us. One of the ways that we can see, the Bible makes it very clear to be a good steward of this body is to trust in the Lord. To trust in the Lord with all of our heart and lean not to our own understanding. Fear the Lord, depart from evil. It shall be health to thy navel and marrow to thy bones.

Let’s pray. Father, thank you for these thoughts from your word. We thank you for how it meets our needs. You meet our needs right where we are, even in and even as we walk through the valley or we may be going over a mountaintop in our lives. It really may be that circumstantially in somebody’s life here today, everything is just going swimmingly, as we might say. It might just be going very well. And yet for others it may be that we are walking through great affliction. It may be that someone is walking through a physical trial. We know of some of those here in our church, Lord, some are walking through some financial crisis or through some relationship difficulty or dilemma of life of not really knowing which way to take in the fork in the road. What are the next steps? Lord, we pray that you’ll help us not to try to figure it out in our own strength, but trusting thee that you’ll guide us, that you’ll bring the proverbial Egyptian that we saw this morning along the way and to give us more information and to give us more direction, you’ll direct our paths, help us to trust in that, help us not to fret ourselves, fret over those things and we know that we will be well. It will be well with us. We ask these things now and pray them in Jesus name. Amen.