WWUTT 1324 Let Your Heart Keep His Commandments (Proverbs 3:1-4)

Love God With All Your Heart in Proverbs 3

Even in the book of Proverbs we are told to love the Lord our God with all of our heart. And if we love God with our heart, that will be demonstrated on the outside as well, when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand the Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the Word. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we feature New Testament Study, an Old Testament book on Thursday, and our Q &A on Friday.

Now here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.

Thank you, Becky. Really quick lesson today, friends, and I hope you don't mind because it is moving day for us. So we're going to come to Proverbs chapter 3, and I'm going to read to you here through the first 8 verses, we'll talk about it, and I'm going to have to pick up our study in Proverbs 3 at another time.

The Heart, Steadfast Love, and Obedience

So here we are, Proverbs 3, starting in verse 1. My son, do not forget my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandments. For length of days and years of life and peace they will add to you. Let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you.

Bind them around your neck. Write them on the tablet of your heart, so you will find favor and good success in the sight of God and man. Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.

In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths. Be not wise in your own eyes, fear the Lord, and turn away from evil. It will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to your bones.

We saw a few times here just in these 8 verses that the word heart came up. I believe that it was 3 times. Let your heart keep my commandments. Verse 3, write them on the tablet of your heart. Verse 5, trust in the Lord with all your heart.

So our desire for God must come straight from the heart, from the very core of the person. And if it is from the very center of our being that we desire God and his ways, his commandments, his instructions to us, his very word, then those things will be manifested outwardly as well.

The way that it's relayed to us here, you will receive length of days and years of life and peace will they add to you. Now I don't think that this is true for every single person. There are certainly wonderful persons who have desired to know God, loved him with all their heart, soul, mind and strength and did not live a long time by our earthly standards.

But there are people who do extend their days and years of life in a general sense. So you could say this is generally true. A person who desires God will enjoy longer days, years of life. They will have a sense of peace in their spirits because they know their sins are forgiven.

Those who have faith in Jesus Christ, we could definitely apply this in kind of an ultimate sense as well. We will most certainly experience long life if we have faith in Christ. When we're talking about eternal life, our years here on this earth are very, very short by comparison to the eternity that we are going to have with Christ forever in glory.

If we love the Lord with all our hearts, we desire to obey his commandments. If we love Christ, we will obey his commandments. That's what Jesus said to his disciples in John 14, 15. Then we will most certainly enjoy long life.

Peace will they will the commandments of God add to us. We know that we have peace with God when we are doing and obeying his will. It's not that obeying the will of God is well, it's not that obeying his commandments saves us because that would be salvation by works.

But we demonstrate again that that thing that we desire with our heart is demonstrated on the outside. We love God to the very core of our spirit. So we're going to demonstrate on the outside a love for God when we obey his commandments.

Let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you. Meaning we should want to love God steadfastly. Our Christianity, the religion that we have, this love that we have for Christ is not a momentary thing.

It's not something that happened at some chapter in our life when I was moved by the message that I heard the preacher preach. And so I came down front and I prayed this prayer and I became a Christian.

I got baptized in my local church. But then you go and live like the devil for the rest of your life. That's not steadfast love and faithfulness. Faithfulness to God is you are going to endure in this to the end.

The steadfast love of God is upon you when you demonstrate steadfast love for God in your life. Let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you. Bind them around your neck. Write them on the tablet of your heart.

Let no one or nothing change your mind from the mind that you have been given in Christ. So you will find favor and good success, it says in verse four, in the sight of God and man. Now, most certainly, if you have faith in Jesus Christ, you have favor with God.

He looks at you as a son or a daughter. He does not see the sinful wretch deserving of his wrath. When you have faith in Jesus Christ, you are clothed in his righteousness and God looks at you with the same love and affection that he has for his own son.

So you have favor with God through faith in Jesus Christ. But notice here that it says you will find favor and good success in the sight of God and man. But I thought if we love God, if we have faith in Jesus Christ, that man is going to hate us for that.

Certainly that is going to be the case. But you're also going to have people who will observe this witness that you have in Christ, and they likewise, by your witness, will come to know Christ. Matthew 5, 16, Jesus says, let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your father who is in heaven.

So it's not that you have favor with all men, but there are certainly men that you will have favor with because of the God whom you love. Definitely in the family of God, we have favor with God. We have favor with one another.

But there are even others who are going to see this witness that you present in Christ Jesus and glorify the father who is in heaven because of what you testified to in your own life. You proclaim Christ with your mouth and you showed the love of Christ with your actions.

And so many may many come to know the Lord in this way, that our speech and our works are consistent with one another. And that's where I'm going to come to a close for today. I said it was going to be a short lesson, but we'll come back to Proverbs 3 at another time.

Prayer for Favor With God and Man

Let's finish with prayer. Heavenly Father, we thank you for the favor that you have shown us that we may become followers of Jesus Christ. And we pray that likewise, we would gain favor with men that they may see through our words and through our actions, this God whom we serve, and they would be introduced to the father in heaven through faith in Jesus Christ.

And so have favor with you just as we enjoy by the gifts and grace that have been shown to us in Jesus Christ, our Lord. Help us more and more each day to love the Lord, our God, with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength.

Leaning not on our own understanding, but in all our ways, we acknowledge you, O God. Amen.

Thank you for listening to When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. If you'd like to support this ministry, visit our website, www .wutt .com, and click on the Give tab in the top right corner of the page.

Join us again tomorrow as we continue our Bible study when we understand the text.