It is better to TRUST IN THE LORD than to put confidence in man!

"He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool." -Proverbs 28:26 [KJV]

We all do so naturally: therefore, we are all natural fools. But, through our blindness, we are ignorant of it; through pride, we will not own it. How many continue in this awful state of folly, ignorance, and pride! Among the many who are made wise unto salvation, how doth this folly of self-confidence cleave to them! Say some, “To be sure, it is the greatest folly for natural men to trust in their own hearts; for they are deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: but God hath given me a new heart, a clean heart, and a good heart; and surely I may trust in it.” This is the natural language of folly; not the judgment of a new creature in Christ. 

Hear the Lord: “I will give them an heart to know that I am the LORD; and they shall be My people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto Me with their whole heart” (Jeremiah ch. 24.) So that the new heart, the clean heart, and the good heart, which is from the Lord, knows the Lord as its only confidence, and returns to the Lord, and trusts in Him wholly and solely. This is the nature of true faith, to go entirely out of ourselves, and to trust wholly in the Lord. 

It is the foolish, deceitful, wicked workings of the old evil heart of unbelief, that causes self-confidence. Such was Peter’s vain confidence: hence, he got a dreadful fall, to teach him more humility. Hazael was very self-righteous: he started and stared, when he was told what a wicked thing he should do. All the disciples forsook Christ, notwithstanding their bold declarations to the contrary. Would not that mariner be a fool, who should trust his ship to ride out a storm, with an anchor of cork, and a cable of straw? He exalteth such folly, who trusts in any inherent righteousness, wisdom, and power of his own: for he thereby withdraws his confidence, in our only righteous, wise, and powerful Friend and Saviour. 

Trust not in the fine frames and warm feelings of your heart. The graces of the Spirit are not bestowed to exalt self-confidence, but to glorify Jesus, in Whom should be our whole and sole trust. For “...of God He is made unto us, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.” To what end? a most blessed one. O! study it more and more, day by day, “That, according as it is written, he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord” -II Corinthians 1:31. 

 

How foolish a part, 

To trust in one’s heart. 

And let go the LAMB, and from Him depart! 

Lord, beat down our pride; 

O! keep near Thy side, 

And keep chaste to Thee, as Thy loving bride. 

While in Thee we trust, 

And of Thee do boast, 

Let us joy in Thee thro’ the Holy Ghost.

 

-preacher William Mason (1724-1797 A.D.)

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