Proverbs 16:7

The LORD has the last word, over the plans we form inside, over the words we speak, and over the whole road of a life.

Verse 3 tells us what to do with our plans. “Commit” is gâlal, which means to roll. The picture is of rolling a heavy load off ourselves onto someone stronger who can carry it. To commit our works to the LORD is to hand over both the work and how it turns out, and to rely on him for it. We roll them onto Yᵉhôvâh, the personal God of the covenant who keeps his promises to his people.

The works, maʻăseh, are our deeds and labour, what we make and the occupations that fill our days. The thoughts, machăshâbâh, are our plans and intentions, and the word comes from châshab, the verb translated “deviseth” in verse 9. “Established” is kûwn, the same verb as “directeth” in verse 9. So verse 3 shows us how to live with verse 9: we make our plans, we roll them onto the LORD, and he makes them stand firm and brings them to their proper end.

The same command comes in the Psalms: “Commit thy way unto the LORD; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass” (Psalm 37:5). Proverbs says it again: “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths” (Proverbs 3:5–6). Paul tells us to bring everything to God in prayer with thanksgiving, and promises that “the peace of God, which passeth all understanding” will keep our hearts and minds (Philippians 4:6–7). Committing our works is active. It means diligent work, brought to God in prayer, and it lifts from us the weight of having to control every outcome.

Verse 2 turns from our plans to the motives behind them. “All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes.” The ways, derek, are a person’s whole conduct, and “clean” is zak, which means clear, clean or pure. Left to our own judgement, we tend to see our conduct as blameless. Pride, ignorance and the wish to escape blame all feed that verdict, and Jeremiah gives the deeper reason: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (Jeremiah 17:9).

“But the LORD weigheth the spirits.” The verb tâkan means to balance, to measure out by weight, and so to test and estimate exactly. The spirits are the inner person, the motives and intentions beneath what we do. Israel knew scales well from the market and the court, and this same chapter says, “A just weight and balance are the LORD’s” (Proverbs 16:11). God’s weighing is exact and just, and he alone can do it. A later proverb says almost the same thing: “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes: but the LORD pondereth the hearts” (Proverbs 21:2). When Samuel looked at Jesse’s sons, the LORD told him, “man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart” (1 Samuel 16:7), and he says through Jeremiah, “I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins” (Jeremiah 17:10). Jesus taught the same in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5), where a man who looks on a woman to lust after her has already committed adultery in his heart (Matthew 5:27–28).

“The LORD hath made all things for himself.” The verb pâʻal means to do, make or work. Everything that exists, the heaven and the earth, every creature and every person, has been made by the LORD for his own purpose and glory. Paul says the same of Christ: “all things were created by him, and for him” (Colossians 1:16). So there is one sovereign over all, and every power of evil stands beneath him.

“Yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.” The wicked, râshâʻ, are guilty and ungodly people who actively do wrong. “The day of evil” joins yôwm, a day or a span of time, with raʻ, what is bad, calamitous or morally wrong. It is a day of calamity, the time God has appointed when wickedness meets its consequences and his justice is seen. The prophets speak of such days. Jeremiah says of Egypt’s hired soldiers that “the day of their calamity was come upon them” (Jeremiah 46:21), Obadiah speaks of “the day of their calamity” (Obadiah 1:13), and Paul writes of “the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God” (Romans 2:5).

“Every one that is proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD.” Proud is gâbâhh, from a root meaning to be high or lofty, and “proud in heart” describes a heart that lifts itself up, arrogant and self-exalting. It is an attitude of the inner person, whether or not it shows in boasting. Abomination is tôwʻêbah, something utterly wrong and detestable, and the same word can name an idol. The Old Testament uses it of idolatry, child sacrifice, certain sexual sins and unjust dealings. To set pride beside these shows how seriously God takes it.

Pride puts self in God’s place. The proud heart trusts its own wisdom, strength and achievements, makes itself independent of God and looks down on others. In that way it makes an idol of self, against the first commandment, “Thou shalt have no other gods before me” (Exodus 20:3). “The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God” (Psalm 10:4), and of the arrogant a psalm says, “pride compasseth them about as a chain” (Psalm 73:6). Isaiah announces a day of the LORD of hosts “upon every one that is proud and lofty” (Isaiah 2:12).

“Though hand join in hand” (Hebrew yad leyad) is an idiom that likely means people joining hands in an oath, an alliance or a common scheme. Even if the proud band together to protect one another, their combined strength will fail them before God. The same words appear in Proverbs 11:21: “Though hand join in hand, the wicked shall not be unpunished: but the seed of the righteous shall be delivered.” “Unpunished” is nâqâh, to be clean or acquitted, and with the negative it means that the proud will be held guilty and will face God’s judgment.

The chapter goes on, “Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall” (Proverbs 16:18), and “Better it is to be of an humble spirit with the lowly, than to divide the spoil with the proud” (Proverbs 16:19). James and Peter both write that “God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble” (James 4:6, 1 Peter 5:5), and Jesus said, “whosoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted” (Matthew 23:12). Pride often hides as confidence, self-reliance or even righteousness, so this verse calls for honest self-examination and a teachable heart.

“By mercy and truth iniquity is purged.” Mercy is cheçed, kindness, steadfast love and covenant loyalty, and truth (ʼemeth) is faithfulness and reliability. God names both when he proclaims his name to Moses: “The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin” (Exodus 34:6–7). Iniquity, ʻâvôn, is moral wrongdoing and its guilt. “Purged” is kâphar, which means to cover, as with bitumen, and figuratively to expiate, pardon or cancel. It is the word for atonement and belongs with the sacrifices of the law. The guilt and defilement of sin are covered and taken away, and God is the one who does it, which is what makes forgiveness and reconciliation possible. “Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other” (Psalm 85:10).

“And by the fear of the LORD men depart from evil.” Fear is yirʼâh, fear, reverence and awe. To depart is çûwr, to turn aside, and evil is raʻ, the same word as in “the day of evil” in verse 4. Reverence for God is what moves people to turn away from wrong thoughts, deeds and paths. Job says, “the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil is understanding” (Job 28:28). “The fear of the LORD is to hate evil” (Proverbs 8:13), and it “is the beginning of wisdom” (Proverbs 9:10). The two halves of the verse belong together. God’s mercy deals with our guilt, and reverence for him changes how we live, as Micah says the LORD requires of us “to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God” (Micah 6:8).

“When a man’s ways please the LORD.” Ways, derek, are again the whole pattern of a life, and “please” is râtsâh, to be pleased with, accept or delight in. This is a life God accepts and takes pleasure in, marked by faith, obedience and integrity. Then “he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.” The enemies (ʼôyêb) are real adversaries. The verb is shâlam, whose root sense is to be safe, whole or complete, and here it means that hostility ends and peace is made. The LORD himself does this, because he rules hearts: “The king’s heart is in the hand of the LORD, as the rivers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will” (Proverbs 21:1). Peter asks, “who is he that will harm you, if ye be followers of that which is good?” (1 Peter 3:13).

“Better” is ṭôwb, the broad word for good, which covers what is pleasant, beautiful, prosperous and excellent. Here it marks one thing as better in quality, more blessed and more truly worth having. Righteousness, tsᵉdâqâh, is rightness and justice, a life in line with God’s standard toward him and toward other people. “Right” is mishpâṭ, a verdict, judgment, justice or law, so “great revenues without right” are large earnings gained unjustly, by dishonest weights, by exploiting the poor, by bribery or by fraud. God’s law forbade such gain: “Thou shalt not have in thy bag divers weights, a great and a small” (Deuteronomy 25:13–16).

In Israel prosperity was often taken as a sign of God’s blessing, and Proverbs keeps that from turning into a love of wealth for its own sake. A modest living gained honestly, with a clear conscience and God’s favour, is worth more than any fortune gained by wrong. Scripture says it several times: “A little that a righteous man hath is better than the riches of many wicked” (Psalm 37:16), “Better is little with the fear of the LORD than great treasure and trouble therewith” (Proverbs 15:16), and “Better is the poor that walketh in his uprightness, than he that is perverse in his ways, though he be rich” (Proverbs 28:6).

Jesus is the one man whose every plan, word and step came from the LORD. He said, “I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me” (John 5:30), and “The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do” (John 5:19). Doing his Father’s will was his food (John 4:34). He “came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me” (John 6:38), and in Gethsemane he committed his way to the Father: “nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done” (Luke 22:42). His steps were directed to the cross as the Scriptures had written of him (Luke 24:44), by “the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God” (Acts 2:23). Since he is the Word made flesh (John 1:14), his words were God’s words.

His spirit weighs true in God’s balance, for he was tempted as we are, “yet without sin” (Hebrews 4:15). In him mercy and truth come to us in person, for he was “full of grace and truth” (John 1:14), “the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Hebrews describes his work in the language of verse 6: “when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high” (Hebrews 1:3). His blood “cleanseth us from all sin” (1 John 1:7).

Against the pride that God detests, Christ humbled himself. Being in the form of God, he “made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant” (Philippians 2:6–7), and Paul calls us to share that mind (Philippians 2:5–8). Jesus said, “I am meek and lowly in heart” (Matthew 11:29). He bore the punishment due to our pride and every other sin, so that the humble who believe in him are acquitted, and God “hath highly exalted him” (Philippians 2:9), so that every knee shall bow to him (Philippians 2:9–11). Though he was rich, for our sakes he became poor (2 Corinthians 8:9), so that in him we “might be made the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21), a treasure laid up in heaven, “where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt” (Matthew 6:19–21). All things were made for him (Colossians 1:16), and the Father “hath committed all judgment unto the Son” (John 5:22), so the day of evil for the wicked will be his day of judgment. Until then, “now is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2).

For those who belong to him, the Spirit makes these proverbs true in us. We are raised to “walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:4), conformed “to the image of his Son” (Romans 8:29), and given good works “which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:10). We run looking to Jesus, “the author and finisher of our faith” (Hebrews 12:2).

We can make plans, and good ones, with all the care Proverbs commends. We bring them to the LORD as we make them and roll them onto him, and we can take the next step in peace, because he is the one who directs it. When a plan changes course, his hand is still on the path. He weighs our motives more truly than we can, and we can ask him to search them. So we keep our earnings honest and our hearts low before him. And when you sin, remember that iniquity is purged by his mercy and truth, and that reverence for him is what turns our feet from evil.