Your Own Understanding

“See how great a forest a little fire kindles!” James 3:5b

Just a comment—that’s all it was. She didn’t mean to hurt me. She didn’t intend for it to become a problem.

It was just a little match that had been lit, after all.

But it became an inferno within. A forest fire that blazed and crackled, with trees crashing down around me, leaving blackened silhouettes of death where before had been vitality and life.

Joy turned to mourning. Laughter turned to sorrow.

I tried to reconcile it any way I could, just to get my peace back. Then the night was upon me, and I was facing sleeplessness, tossing and turning, a wrestling-with-alligators long, dark night of the soul. I hate when I can’t sleep, when I keep rehearsing the wrongs done to me.

I prayed. Cried out, really. Begged. “God, give me truth. Give me a word to keep me through this night.”

He gave me the word I needed. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding.” Proverbs 3:5

It was the “lean not on your own understanding” that helped me.

After I got into bed, I began to examine my “own understanding” about the little match that had kindled such an inferno.

“I know she hurt my feelings.” Don’t lean on that.

“I know I feel rejected.” Don’t lean on that.

 “I don’t want to be around her.” Don’t lean on that.

“I don’t deserve this.” Don’t lean on that.

Leaning: to rest against something for support; to depend or rely upon. Will pain support me? Can I depend upon bitterness for deliverance from trouble? If I rely on retribution, will I know the peace of God?

His counsel is superior to the counsel of my own heart. Lean on Him. Trust Him with all my heart. ALL MY HEART. What I know and understand will not help me. He instructs me not to lean on it. Instead, look to Him. Focus on His eyes. Stare into His face. Embrace Him with all I’ve got within me.

I have no idea how this situation will turn out; sometimes all I know is that He promises to hold me. And I’d rather be in His hands than my own, or anyone else’s. “I am in great distress. Please let us fall into the hand of the LORD, for His mercies are great; but do not let me fall into the hand of man” (2 Samuel 24:14).

Oh Father, we look to You and fall into Your own hands of mercy. Show us when we are leaning on our own understanding, so we can change our mind and trust You with all our heart. In Jesus’ name, Amen.