A Word in Season: A Faithful Man (Proverbs 20:6)

Most of us like to talk a good game. It doesn't take much prompting or prodding for us to seize an opportunity that's given to us to tell people about our own goodness, about the good things that we do because of the good people that we are.

Sometimes it is a defensive reaction. Somebody challenges us or just asks us a question and the instinct of our proud hearts is to leap into some kind of defence -slash -assault mode in which we rebut the charge that perhaps we're not as good as they thought we were and we make very clear that we're considerably better than they might have imagined us to be.

And it doesn't even need to be that kind of reaction. Sometimes it's just the opportunity just seems too good to be true to make sure people realise our generosity of spirit, our kindness of heart, the way in which we've served.

Of course, we're not trying to draw attention to ourselves. We just can't help but let it be known that we're actually quite impressive individuals.

Sadly, that kind of spirit, that pride, that readiness to draw attention to ourselves can be just as evident in the

Church, among God's people, as it is in the world. And the spiritual virtues which we're commanded to pursue and which it ought to be our delight to cultivate become almost a battleground in which we try and shine a light upon ourselves, upon our generosity, our hospitality, our piety, drawing attention to our own excellence.

And even though it's not in Proverbs 20, verse 6, where we're told most men will proclaim each his own goodness, it's sadly true that not only do we not praise others, but sometimes we just need to shave a little bit off their platform in order to make people realise how great we are.

Because there is that ugly specificity in that proverb. Most men will proclaim each his own goodness.

We like to draw attention to ourselves. We want to be in the spotlight. We want it to be seen and known how impressive we really are.

God have mercy upon us for such arrogance. The contrast in the proverb is plain.

Most men will proclaim each his own goodness. We will talk a good game. But who can find a faithful man?

Who is there who actually lives up to the hype? Who is there who matches the presentation that we make of ourselves?

Are we truly as kind and as generous and as faithful and as diligent as we like people to think we are and try and make sure people imagine us to be?

No, sadly, we fall short even of our own imagined and proclaimed glory, let alone the righteous standard that the

Lord God has established for those who would walk in his ways. And you might say then that that sounds like a despairing question.

Who can find a faithful man? Well, there is one man who was most faithful.

There was one man who was everything he seemed to be and everything that he said he was.

And upon that man's faithfulness hang all our hopes. His name was the

Lord Jesus Christ. He was the true son of God who became man, who stepped into this world that he had made and who lived faithfully and who died faithfully and who rose again in accordance with his own promise and the promise of God his

Father and who remains faithful to every charge that he received, to every trust he undertook, to every promise that he ever made.

There is a truly, entirely, perfectly faithful man, the

Lord Christ. He, when he spoke, did not speak with pride or with arrogance but with simple truth.

And those then who go to him as the faithful Saviour, as the God who delivers, who look to him not professing of or boasting in their own great goodness but relying upon his, receive of his

Spirit so that with humility we may still pursue that generosity, that hospitality, that liberality, that true piety, not drawing attention to our own works, not cutting down our brothers and sisters but simply walking in faithfulness before God.

Let us then pray and let us work in accordance with our prayers that when the cry goes up in our day of boastfulness and pride, who can really find a faithful man?

You and I as God's people may stand as examples that the faithful man has not entirely gone from this earth.