God's Plans and Our Lives: Proverbs 16:1-4

Proverbs 16:1-4
1 The plans of the heart belong to man,

But the answer of the tongue is from the LORD.
2 All the ways of a man are clean in his own sight,

But the LORD weighs the motives.
3 Commit your works to the LORD,

And your plans will be established.
4 The LORD has made everything for its own purpose,

Even the wicked for the day of evil."
(Proverbs 16:1-4 NASB)
God's Plans and Our Lives
God takes our plans personally. He is involved in our lives.
We need to trust Him rather than our plans. More than often, His
plans are too intricate for us to understand. We need to patiently
wait upon Him for their completion in our lives.
Why are His plans so complicated? God's plans go beyond our

understanding so that He might be glorified by showing how great
He is! If we are patient, we can participate in His greater plan that
brings glory to Him. Let's look closely at the principles on wise
planning that we can find in Proverbs 16:1-4.
Wise plans only can be made and carried out in the valley of
humility where the glory of God shines. We need to take steps to
live there so that the Lord does not need to devise some method to
bring us there.
God's plans God's plans Our plans Our plans
overrule our are intricate need are purposed
plans correction
Proverbs 16:2 Proverbs 16:4
Proverbs 16:1 Proverbs 16:3
Proverbs 16:1
1 The plans of the heart belong to man,

But the answer of the tongue is from the LORD.
#1 PLANNING FOR
DISRUPTIONS
God makes no promises to d
The Scripture
what we want but only to d
"The plans of the heart belong to man,
But the answer of the tongue is from what He wants and in a
the LORD." fashion that pleases Him!
A Paraphrase LIFE APPLICATION

Man loves to devise plans which
reflect his heart's ambition; God claims sovereignty over my
God however always does what He life and plans. I can have only one
wishes regarding our lives. of two responses.
1. Distrust & Doubt

When we fuss and fume about
how my plans are upset, this
shows how much our plans were
not rooted in His will but our
own. It is easy to allow plans to
become our demigods. God
desires faith in Him as a faithful
Father rather than insistence on
our ways.
2. Trust & Testimony

When God upsets our plans, he
has a greater plan! My desire
then must be to step back and
acknowledge His sovereign
plans as wise, good and desirous
Wise plans will build the "if the Lord wills" clause into the heart and hope of all of
our plans. Our deepest life plan must be to take pleasure in doing what God wants
in His way and timing.
Proverbs 16:2
2 All the ways of a man are clean in his own sight,

But the LORD weighs the motives.
#2 RECEIVING GOD'S CORRECTION

The Scripture The value of a plan is not dependent on what
"All the ways of a man are clean in his own sight,
But the LORD weighs the motives"
it accomplishes but on why it is done.
Man thinks highly of his plans;
But Jehovah knows why we really make such plans. God tells us that what we accomplish will be
judged on the level of our motives.
 Impure motives
If the reason I do things is to carry out my
plan rather than His, then my motives are
impure and will count as nothing. Jesus
desired His Father's will to be done.
 Pure motives
I need to seek what the Lord has for my life.
His purposes and plans must reign supremely
in my life. My chief joy is to please Him. My
highest purpose is to give joy to Him. In this
spirit then, I seek His calling for my life.
Wise plans must understand that our motives might not be pure. We need to seek
His adjustments of our plans so that our motives can be purified to glorify Him and
pass His love on to others.
Proverbs 16:3
3 Commit your works to the LORD,

And your plans will be established.
#3 TRUSTING GOD WITH OUR PLANS

The Scripture Our plans are not our own until we give
" Commit your works to the LORD,
And your plans will be established."
them to the Lord, and He returns them to us.

In a real sense you must turn over the most precious
plans of your life over to the direction of the Lord; God is possessive of our plans. They need to
This is the only way your plans will be go by His desk before they go into our hearts.
accomplished.
My plans
Those plans and activities that we have not asked
for God's approval are no doubt those very things
that have caught our heart's attention and keep us
from making Him our chiefest delight.
His plans
My confidence is that He will accomplish or
establish what He wants done.
 I need not defend my work; He will.

 I need not be anxious about it; He will care
for it.
 I need not promote myself or this work; He
will prosper it.
I merely need to go along focusing on pleasing Him

and doing His will.
Wise plans must seek their origin and their end fulfillment in the Lord. We must
give our plans to the Lord and see what kind of plans He gives back to us. We then
must accomplish these plans by His grace.
Proverbs 16:4
4 The LORD has made everything for its own purpose,

Even the wicked for the day of evil."
#4 DESIRING GOD'S PURPOSE

The Scripture
"The LORD has made everything for its own Good plans must focus on
purpose, Even the wicked for the day of accomplishing His purposes.
evil. ."

Jehovah has designed His purpose for
everything that He has created; Nothing, even God has His purposes for our lives and
the wicked, are excluded from that plan.
what we do. We have two options:
1. Ignore His purposes

If we are honest, most of what we do is
disregard's God's purposes. We really
don't care most about what He wants
but what we want.
2. Seek His purposes

Our greatest joy is to seek His
purposes of our lives and live in
fulfillment of them. All of His
purposes are grand because they
equally carry out His glorious
purposes. I can accept the difficult
pathways because they carry out His
purposes.
Wise plans must recognize that behind all the purposes we have, God has His own
purpose. The more we acknowledge and seek His purpose, the less we are
frustrated and the greater our joy in His works.

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Proverbs 16:1-4

1 The plans of the heart belong to man,

2 All the ways of a man are clean in his own sight,

3 Commit your works to the LORD,

4 The LORD has made everything for its own purpose,