Dave's Diary

Prayer

God of Purifying Grace, please use Your Word to purify my heart and my motives today. Amen.

Reading

Read Proverbs 12 slowly and prayerfully. Notice which verse particularly jumps out at you. Re-read that verse a few times, slowly. Write it down in your journal. Try to memorise it so that you can reflect on it without having to read from the page.

Prayerful Reflection

Now take that Proverb and think about your life at the moment. Is there a situation in your life to which that Proverb applies. Ask the Lord how this verse from His Word is telling you to live out His wisdom in that situation. Make notes in your journal.

A Devotional Thought

Proverbs 12: 
¹ Whoever loves discipline loves knowledge,
    but whoever hates correction is stupid.

The way I react to being corrected or disciplined reveals my true priority and it uncovers whatever role pride and self-centredness might be playing in my life.

If my true priorities are to honour, glorify and please God as much as I can, or to do the job at hand as well as it can possibly be done, I will embrace the feedback, discipline or correction I receive from others as instruments serving my highest aims. I will gladly accept them as tools that sharpen the blade of my sword.

But, if pride is at work in my heart and my true priority is to receive praise for myself or to prove my own personal worth through what I do, I will hate correction, feedback or discipline and find it devastating. It will crush me and I may very well respond with anger.

The Hebrew word translated as “stupid” in most modern versions and as “brutish” in the KJV literally means “to burn”. It was the word used to describe the burning bush in Exodus 3:2. It helps me to realise that if feedback or correction causes me to burn with anger, I would be wise to check my heart humbly and carefully for pride and self-centredness, and to repent of it wherever I discover it lurking.

Prayer

Almighty God, You deserve all the glory, and I long to bring You praise through all that I do and say. Please bring wise counselors and mentors into my life, who will offer me loving discipline and gentle correction, so that I may glorify You more excellently in all things. Amen.