May 12 | All Our Ways Seem Right

Proverbs 21:2, “A person may think their own ways are right, but the Lord weighs the heart.”

Have you ever thought you were right about something, but later found out you were wrong? Maybe you were sure that a person you were dating was going to be your spouse, but it turned out they were not the right person for you. Or you might have thought you were going to work a job for many years but you wanted to quit after only a few months and do something else.

All of us in life have thought we were right about something (relationships, jobs, friends or expenditures) and realized afterward we were wrong. The same is true in our walk with God. We too often try to guide our own lives and think we’re doing good until the Lord weighs our heart. It’s like being lost in a car (without your phone) and not wanting to stop and ask someone for directions. The longer you take to try to figure it out on your own, the more likely you are to waste time.

The Lord weighs our heart like a precious metals dealer and tests all our ways. He determines the purity (whether our actions are righteous or not), the weight (the consequences of our actions) and the value (how our actions will effect others). Therefore, we should always seek God in all that we do.

God always knows what is best for us according to His purpose; we don’t. Often times our worst enemy is the one we see in the mirror. Stubbornness and pride will make us think we can “take the wheel” from Jesus and drive our own lives to success. Yet, we will find out in the end, the only thing we’re good at without God is getting lost. Sometimes people say, “I’m a self-made person, I don’t need anyone’s help.” However, without God they are really just a self-made mess, heading towards destruction. It takes love and trust to ask God to weigh our hearts, but He is always willing to guide us on the paths of righteousness for His namesake.

Jonathon Edwards wrote, “The surest way to know our gold is to look upon it and examine it in God’s furnace, where he tries it that we may see what it is. If we have a mind to know whether a building stands strong or no, we must look upon it when the wind blows. If we would know whether a staff be strong, or a rotten, broken reed, we must observe it when it is leaned on and weight is borne upon it. If we would weigh ourselves justly we must weigh ourselves in God’s scales that he makes use of to weigh us.”

Take time today to let God test your heart and find the purity, weight and value of all your ways.

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