As a Man Thinketh in His Heart
As a Man Thinketh in His Heart
"The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts. "
Proverbs 10:4
Two things stand out here in this verse. The first thing is "Through the pride of his countenance". What does that mean? The Strong's concordance says
Countenance:
1) nostril, nose, face
2) anger
Interesting definition there. I'll go with definition #2....so through man's pride (anger is often a result of wounded pride)-through his desire to be right, his high opinion of himself-man will not seek after God. It is one of those self sufficiancy problems. You don't feel the need to ask Christ for his guidance in everything. Now for the part that really stands out. "God is not in all his thoughts." There is one little word that makes a world of difference. The world is "all"-all his thoughts. Christ wants to be & He needs to be the center of our life-the one thing that is always on our mind. If Christ is always there in our thoughts and we are thinking "What would the Lord have me do?" We will be seeking after the Lord. There is no way that pride can take over when we have the Lord in control. It is when we let go of Christ that we allow those wrong thoughts and pride to gain control, and then we are no longer seeking after God, but after ourselves, our "countenance."
"Commit thy works unto the LORD, and thy thoughts shall be established."
Proverbs 16:3
Isn't it interesting that is says that when our works are right, our thoughts will be "established"? The first thing that came to my mind when I read that text is "But I thought thoughts produced actions!" so I looked up the word "established" and this is what I found:
1) to be set up, be established, be fixed
a) to be firmly established
b) to be established, be stable, be secure, be enduring
c) to be fixed, be securely determined
2) to be directed aright, be fixed aright, be steadfast (moral sense)
3) to prepare, be ready
4) to be prepared, be arranged, be settled
So to me this verse is saying that when you commit, or may I say, give, dedicated, all your works, everything you do, fully give up everything for God, your thoughts will be directed aright, stedfast. You will be firm in principle, not settled on the shifting sand but upon the true rock, which is Christ.
"And thou, Solomon my son, know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind: for the LORD searcheth all hearts, and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts: if thou seek him, he will be found of thee; but if thou forsake him, he will cast thee off for ever." 1 Chron. 28:9
We are called to serve the Lord unreservedly. We are to be willing to have an open mind for him. This verse is calling for us to have pure thoughts. We may often fail but God is there for us and He will accept true repentance of the heart. He knows and understands you more than you yourself can understand. Don't let that word "perfect" catch you up and think "I can't be perfect. Every time I try, I fail."
In the Strong's Concordance again, the definition for the "perfect" used in this verse is:
1) complete, safe, peaceful, perfect, whole, full, at peace
a) complete
1) full, perfect
2) finished
b) safe, unharmed
c) peace (of covenant of peace, mind)
1) perfect, complete (of keeping covenant relation)
If we have fully surrendered every aspect of our lives to Christ moment by moment, we can be at peace-have a perfect mind. Remember, this isn't something we can do on our own though. We must ask Christ to remind us and prompt us, when temptation comes, to give it to Him and not hold anything back
Proverbs 23:7 " For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he:"
I can act like something totally different than I am but that does not make me become the person I am pretending to be.You know it reminds me of a story I recently was forwarded.
A man was exploring some sea shore caves one day and was having such a nice time when he came upon a canvas bag laying in a dark corner in one of these caves. He opened the bag up, and inside there were lots and lots of clay balls. This of course made him curious. It was like some people had been having a clay ball fight and someone stuck all thier balls in a bag and left them there and they had dried and hardened! They didn't look like really anything more than that, but he thought it might be fun to see how far out in the ocean he could throw them, so he took them with him and began to walk down the shore throwing the balls as far as he could and watching them splash into the foamy waves. He didn't think about it much until he accidentally dropped one of the clay balls on the rocks and it cracked open and there inside was a beautiful precious stone. He was shocked and excitedly took out his other clay balls and began to crack them open, and inside of each he found more and more treasure. When he had cracked open the last clay ball, the suddenly realization that he had just thrown 50 or 60 of these seemingly worthless clay balls out into the ocean. No longer did it seem to him like he had thrown away "clay balls" but he now thought of it has having thrown away "precious jewels"...
The balls looked like clay, just like we can look. But inside there are jewels. That is really what the clay balls were. Precious stone. It is what is on the inside that counts in the end.
Do not decieve yourself that if you do all these wonderful things for the Lord you are a Christian. Make sure you're heart is right with God. Obey him in your heart as well as on the outside. "For the LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart." (1Sam 15:7)
If you have been struggling with wrong thoughts and think that it's too late to come back to the Lord, or if you are discouraged and think that there is no hope for you to ever be able to change your thoughts, the Bible has good news for you in Isaiah 55: 7. "Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon."
And Psalms 103:8 says "The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy."
It's never too late to ask the Lord for mercy. If you truely repent the Lord will ubudantly pardon and you will have a peace like you have never had before.
~JnH June 2006