At thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore (Ps. 16: 11)
A man’s heart deviseth his way:B
Proverbs 16:9
ut the Lord directeth his steps.
This verse shows us that the doctrine of God’s absolute sovereignty is not a doctrine that is the private reserve of esoteric theologians. No, the sovereignty of God is an immensely practical and enormously comforting doctrine. It is something that every saint should know and understand, and learn to rely on in all our daily pursuits.
We make our little plans and out into the day we go. There is nothing wrong with this; it is what we are supposed to do. The book of Proverbs is filled with all sorts of exhortations that would encourage the sons of men to get off the dime, and to go do something. We are told to work in the field, to avoid the painted ladies, to lay up an inheritance, to give to the poor, and a host of other things. But when we devise the way to go do any of these things, we must always remember that this is not the end of the story—it is only our part, which is a very small part. God is the one who directs the steps.
He does this whether the decisions of our heart are wise or foolish, righteous or sinful, thoughtful or thoughtless, asleep or awake. We make our free decisions, and God uses our free decisions to accomplish His divine purposes.
We are aware of this when it comes to momentous things, like the crucifixion of Christ (Acts 4:27-28). But we need to remember why Jesus taught us that a cat can’t catch a sparrow apart from the will of the Father. We need to remember why He said the hairs of our head are all numbered. The reason is so that we might not fear (Matt. 10:31).
Because we make decisions, and because we are mortal, we need to trust the only one who can keep us. Whenever you change lanes on the freeway, the lives of your children in the back seat are in the balance, not to mention the lives of your hundreds of thousands of descendants. Better get it right.
A better way would be to trust the Lord. He is the only one who can direct our steps.
