Give Me Thine Heart—Observe My Ways

And Lord, I pray that you would, in our church, raise up families that would desire that their purpose would be, that Christ would be magnified. Lord, we pray as we look at this one verse this morning, we pray that you would guide our understanding, help our hearts to be inclined and to lean into the scripture. Help us to be to evaluate ourselves and to open our hearts that we would not be resistant to the truth of your word but we would be desirous to conform to it.

Because Lord, we know that your will is always best, your way is always right, and we want to live uprightly in your sight. So Lord, help your people here this morning. Help me as I try to explain the scripture, help me to say the things you’d have me to say and to say them in a way that’s helpful and encouraging to your people as well. For we ask in Jesus’ name, amen.

My son, give me thine heart and let thine eyes observe my ways. This is not the only time in the book of Proverbs that you’ll see a son directly addressed. In fact, you see it dozens of times in the book of Proverbs because really the entire book of Proverbs at its core is a like a heartfelt set of practical instructions and wisdom, many of which are gained from from hard experience, but a set of instructions from a father to his beloved son. If you would look back at chapter one, we’re gonna come back to chapter 23, but just to show you what I mean, Proverbs chapter one verse number eight, almost the beginning of Proverbs, of course, the most important beginning is verse seven. You can’t have wisdom and knowledge unless you have the fear of the Lord, but then verse eight is an important first as well. My son, hear the instruction of thy father and forsake not the law of thy mother. And many times starting at chapter one verse eight throughout the book of Proverbs, you see the father or if you will, just by extension, the parent speaking to his child and imploring the child to to listen.

Imploring the child to take heed to the wisdom that he has gained not only through life experience but through the fear of god which is what it’s really about. Far more important than life experience is the fear of god. In fact, there are verses in Proverbs that remind us that taking heed to the word of God and the wisdom and knowledge and fear of God makes us wiser than our teachers.

And so and so that that’s what the book of Proverbs is. It is a set of heartfelt and practical instructions from the parent to his child. And that’s how I want to view this verse, chapter 23 verse 26 together. Of course, this is one of those many verses that addresses the child. So this morning, if you are somebody’s child, and that’s everybody here, although your parents might have already passed on, but if you’re a child, I’d like your attention.

Because I wanna talk to you a little bit, not only as maybe minor children, you know, someone 18, but also as adult children, because these things apply in both cases. I wanna speak to you and then after we do that, I want to also speak to the parents and see what verse 26 has for us. The first thing I want you to see from verse 26, my son, give me thine heart. Now, we’re going to say a lot of things about this but let’s just start with let’s just start with a couple of prerequisites.

You know, as parents, we have power. We have authority as parents, and rightly so. In other words, God commands our children to obey us. We know they don’t always do that, but behind the parent, there is the force of a command to the child to obey his parents and then to honor one’s parents. And so we know we can tell our kids to do this and wash the dishes or clean up your room or whatever we tell them to do.

And that’s fine, we should exercise that, we have to exercise that from time to time. But that is not what we see in this verse here, in chapter three verse 26. What you see here is you see a request.

And this request, my son, give me thine heart and let thine eyes observe my ways. This request is a request that basically in which the father asks his child for a voluntary response. Now, you can, we can tell our children, you can say to your child, I can say to my my children, we can say, you will give me your heart. You will observe my ways and they’re just going to roll their eyes. If they don’t do it outwardly, they’re going to do it inwardly and they say, yeah, okay, yeah.

You know why? Because we’re dealing with something inward. You can, we do have power as parents to to enforce some kind of of of compliance on the outside and especially when you have little kids, you have to do that. You have to do that because you if you let your kids run amok, they will absolutely run over you and run over me. And so we do have means and mechanisms especially when our children are small to enforce compliance and to enforce obedience, but you know that obedience is just outward.

There is a limit to what that obedience will get us as parents. And if our if our goal as parents is only to to bring about outward obedience, and that is our only concern, we at the end of it all, at the end of our parenting journey, will be sorely disappointed. Because there’s something more and greater than that. And that’s what’s in this verse, my son give me thine heart and let thine eyes observe my ways.

You know, with that power, with that ability to enforce compliance on the outside, although that’s true, there is no mechanism. There’s no means. There’s no way to enforce the compliance to verse 26 of chapter 23. It’s not possible. You can’t make your child give you their heart. You can’t make your child pay attention to your ways. You know, as a parent, what I’ve realized is as my children get older, maybe maybe that’s the best way to view this. I I don’t know that that’s the case but but you know, as you think about it and as many of you have are much further along in in the whole parenting journey than I am, would, but you would probably agree that there comes a point and it’s not a line for those of you that are hoping to have children or have little kids, there’s not a line at which, you know, at this age or at this stage, it goes from you must obey what I say to give me your heart. There is no line there.

But there is a transition that takes place. In other words, in our parenting journey, something must happen that takes takes us from ruling our home to, you know, and enforcing compliance to what we tell our kids to do to the point where our children are doing it voluntarily. That they want to follow our guidance and follow our instruction. There comes a point even when you have children that the number of things that you can enforce gets smaller and smaller and smaller.

And some people, and there’s this whole, every generation or every stage of people looks at the other and say, oh well, this is the hardest stage, and then you move further along and this is hardest stage. Some people think when you have little kids, you think, man, you’re up all the time and all that, and that’s the hardest stage, and then you get to have teenagers and that’s the hardest stage, and then you have adult children. And all of those are various kind of eras of parenting.

And they’re all different. But this verse reminds us of a truth about parenting that you and I cannot always enforce compliance. At some point, got there has to be something inwardly in our children where they respond to a request, which is what we have here. That their will, that their attention, that their response is yielded voluntarily. Not because they feel threatened of punishment or anything like that, but because they have been asked by their parent to do something and they respond to their parent in that way.

Now, do you think not right to make requests of your kids? It’s okay to make a request of your child. Not everything has to be a command. And I know I don’t think I’m dealing with most people in this in our congregation are not like that. They’re not browbeating sort of types. But there are absolutely times when you have to tell your kids something and then there are other times when, and changes over time as you know, but there are other times when you need to say, hey, need you to do something.

Or do something for me. And this is this is one of those and this is very important because this, what we see in verse 26, continues on into adulthood. This is not just to get them to do the thing you want them to do. Beware of that. Beware of using the power as a parent that you have to just get your kids to do what you want them to do simply.

But here is, give me your heart. So there’s a voluntary response that is required and it must be given by the child voluntarily. So that makes us, as parents, that should give us a little bit of pause and say, okay, woah.

So that means I have to have a relationship with my kids. It has to be more than just commands, there has to be a connection with my kids that is significant, that has some depth beyond just I tell them to do this and sadly, many parents go through their parenting journey, their kids fly the coop, you know, whenever they’re, you know, of age, and they never really developed any kind of relationship with their parents.

And now you have an adult who really has no connection with you other than the the shared kind of day to day life that you had and that is a bad place to be in. As a parent, that is a bad place to be in. But it’s not only as a parent, as a child that is a bad place to be in as well. So there’s a voluntary requirement, a voluntary yielding to this request. But then there’s also, the second thing I want you to see is that this request, my son, give me thine heart and let thine eyes observe my ways, especially the first part of this verse, it reminds us of reminds us of the fact that this request is not a request only for outward obedience.

This is a request that touches the inner man which is why he uses the word heart. And again I repeat, it is and to those of you who have kids or will have kids, let me remind you, one of the most important parenting principles, one of the most important parenting principles that we should all implement is, it is not enough that my kids simply obey on the outside.

I must get my kids hearts also. Almost anybody can endure and tolerate obedience for the time being, but their heart being far from their parents will produce fruit in the future that will not be nice. As soon as the outward obedience is no longer required, they’re gone, they are gone, They are gone. So our goal as parents, the point is our goal, it should be beyond that to the heart.

And that’s the wisdom of Proverbs to us. The wisdom of the man who raised a child, who is now passing it on to us in verse 26 is, parent, seek the heart of your children.

Seek the hearts of your children. We must do that if we want to help our kids, if we want the best for our kids, it must be more than just outward obedience, it is a request of the inner man. Now verse 26 it says, my son, give me thine heart. Now the word heart is such a big word. Sometimes when we say the word heart, we’re referring just simply to the inside of somebody, and that’s totally true and valid.

Sometimes when we say the heart, sometimes in the Old Testament in particular, it’ll say, take heart. In other words, be courageous. Right? And and so it can refer to the courage, which is also inward. But usually the most common way to describe the heart is not so much in in kinda one definition, but but to look at at what kinda areas it covers in in our inner life.

And it usually boils down to three things. Our heart covers our affections, that is our emotions. Our heart covers our intellect or our mind, and then our heart also covers our will.

Our heart covers our will. So I wanna talk to you, I wanna talk to you, you people who are still growing up, maybe you who are already adults, but have, you know, obviously your parents are still with you. I wanna talk to you for a minute. Because in this proverb, the father, the parent is asking the child, maybe an adult child, probably I would say an adult child, and he’s saying, listen, give me your heart.

And let me just say this before I get into the details. If you’re a young person, if you’re a person who’s parent, you have parents who are still with you, your parents need to have your heart. You do not need to live in such a way that you are just biting your time until you can escape. You need to have a relationship with your parents. You need to have a connection with your parents.

You need to know them. And you need to have Your heart needs to be intertwined with them, not just a roommate that lives in their house free of rent.

Listen, it is important that you have a relationship with your parents. So the heart covers three things. Number one is affections. Is affections. So in this passage he said, in this verse he says, give me thine heart. So I’m gonna say to you that that are that are younger, who who are looking at a relationship, an active relationship with your parents right now. I’ll say it, I’ll say it to you. It’s like the parent is saying to you, give me your affections.

In other words, I want and to to my children and what what you should have to your parents is this, you should have an emotional attachment to your parent and that’s a good thing. You should have affection towards your parents. Now, here’s the problem with that. Well, obviously, there’s nothing to problem with that but here’s the problem with the world touching this. Is that for those of you in young, those you young people who and listen, I know, you know, we have people Christmas we have people that go to public school, we have people homeschool and everything in between. Listen, the world that you guys interact with is all the same. It doesn’t matter if it’s a Christian school, public school.

If you’re on a video game, if you do social media, whatever, any interaction you have with broader world of people your age, everything, everything in your life, every influence around you is teaching you to have contempt and disdain for your parents. Everything around you is teaching you that you should look down upon them, that you should have distaste for them, that they’re old and they’re not cool and they shouldn’t be listened to and and what they say is stupid.

And listen, I I was a teenager too. I know I know what this is like. And every generation is like this. Your friends tell you this, my own children’s friends have said comments like this about my children’s parents.

Everything around them tells them to avoid their parents, to keep their distance. And it always comes through these little nagging subtle insults of their parents and their parents generation, that they’re old and they dress stupid and they look stupid and they talk stupid and and you know, it’s become a thing in society where where people kinda roll their eyes at their parents. And what I want to tell you is this, you must not give into that. You need to have affection for your parents because what they’re trying to teach you is not to.

Not to love them, not to want to be near them, to avoid them, to keep distance, to have your own friend group and not hang out with your parents. One of the saddest things is when kids don’t wanna hang out with their parents. But you should want to, that’s affection. This is, son, give me your heart.

Now to the parent, that’s exactly what you should want also. You should not be looking for ways to get away from your children, but to bring them to you.

That they would That you would love them and they would love you and there would be a mutual affection for one another. That there would be an emotional attachment. That’s good and that’s right.

My son, give me thine heart. The second thing is this, the intellect and the mind. So to the kids, this is as if your parent is saying to you, give me your mind, give me your heart, Give me your intellect. In other words, that’s a parent saying, let me teach you. Let me instruct you. Open your heart to the wisdom and knowledge that I have obtained. Now to to the young people, to the teenagers with us young adults, let me remind you of something.

Your parents do know more than you. And generally speaking, your parents will always know more than you. You know why? Because your parents are twenty to thirty years down the road. And it’s easy to know stuff when you’ve already been there. And that’s one thing that that you, that that all of us that have parents need to remember, is that our parents do indeed have the ability to give us knowledge that we need because they have obtained knowledge before we have. They’ve already been where we’re going.

And listen, when the parent says, my son give me thine heart, he’s saying give me your mind. Open your heart to my wisdom. Let my knowledge be weighty. Let my wisdom be influential to you. Take what I say seriously. Don’t quickly dismiss what I’m telling you. It should carry gravity. When your parents Listen, young people, when your parents speak, it should carry weight.

Because number one, you know that there And here’s where it gets down into trust. And I’ll talk to the parents about trust in a minute. Your parents really do would sacrifice everything for you and they want the best for you. They’re gonna tell you the truth.

And so their words should be weighty, not only because you know they have your best interests at heart, but also because they have more knowledge than you do. And so kids, listen, you guys need a lot of humility to humble yourself and say, whatever I’ve heard about my parents, however stupid I’ve been told to think that they are, I need to humble myself and realize that my parents do have wisdom.

They have been there. They know what I think and feel. And that my parents do know things that I cannot yet know because I’ve not been there. Proverbs five one, another one of the my son statements in Proverbs says this, my son attend unto my wisdom and bow down thine ear to my understanding. Will you just please, will you listen to me? Will you lend me your brain? Will you lend me your mind?

Will you listen to the wisdom I’m telling you? It will help you. I know what I’m talking about. I’ve been there. My son, give me thine heart. That’s part of what he’s saying. You think of Proverbs chapter four, just a couple of examples. Proverbs chapter four refers to the strange woman. And this is the parent telling the son about the strange woman. He says, now here’s what the strange woman does and here’s how she acts, and it says, but her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two way sword. Listen, young people. Here’s the thing that you don’t have. You don’t have the benefit of having seen something all the way to the end of the thing.

Where you can look back and say, well, I know how that turned out. And so when your parents give you advice, that’s what they’re saying. They have already come to the end of that thing just like the end of the strange woman. There has to be somebody who’s lived long enough to get to that point to observe that end And then they take that and then they give it to you in wisdom, in a little capsule, and you’re like, well, I’d rather figure it out all I’m on. No, don’t.

Let that word be weighty. Let it be serious. Wisdom gained by experience is something that younger people, and listen, this includes me in my stage of life as just as includes the teenagers in your stage of life, right? There’s things that I haven’t come to that many of you have come, many of you have had to actually go through the process of watching your parent pass away and burying your parent.

I’ve not been there, and I thank the Lord I’m not there yet. And that is no fun, but that’s not a bridge I’ve ever crossed. So whatever someone says to me about that process, I better listen, right? And the same is true as you go back in time.

And the third thing I want you to see about the heart when the Proverbs writer says, My son, give me thine heart. He’s saying, My son, listen, give me your will. And this is where trust really matters. There’s trust when it comes to advice and counseling guidance about this decision that, do my parents have my best interest at heart? Or is there some selfish motive? That’s a matter of trust.

Do my parents really care about me? Affection, that’s a matter of trust. But the real big one, just like we talked about last Sunday with the the wife submitting herself to her husband. Remember I I said that’s a bit a matter of trust. There’s a big trust factor there. Well, is the same thing. This is the will. My son, give me thine heart. In other words, yield your will to me. Let me direct you.

Listen to my guidance and do what I tell you to do. In other words, submit your will to me. And no, listen, nobody’s inclined to do that. I mean, this is a spiritual enterprise from start to finish. But once again, we see the truth I mentioned at the beginning. We see that the heart is yielded voluntarily. No one submits their will to you when you at a request unless they’re doing so voluntarily.

Proverbs one ten gives an example of this. It says this, my son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not. That’s an example where the the the father is saying to his son, listen, don’t do this, just avoid it.

Do what I say. And then Proverbs 22 verse 24, make no friendship with an angry man for and with a furious man, thou shalt not go. In other words, don’t do this. Listen to me. Do my will. Do what I’m telling you.

So you young people, if you’ll just give me your attention real quick, I know that we all, myself included, we all have relationships with our parents that are all, they’re all different, right? Some of us in here probably have good relationships with our parents and there’s probably some people that have mediocre relationships with our parents and there’s probably some that have poor relationships with our parents. But what I want you to see is, I’m gonna talk to your parents in just a minute, but I want you to see is this, you should give your heart to your parents.

You should give your heart to your parents. You should be seeking to have that kind of relationship where you are entrusting your inner man to those in your life who care the most about you, who have the most wisdom to give you and who would not dare give you any wisdom contrary to your well-being. You should seek to not roll your eyes at them but get close to them in that way.

Give them your heart. Now to the parents, look at what it says in verse 26 again. My son, give me thine heart, and the second part is really to the parents, And let thine eyes observe my ways.

Let, for those of you who have children or even adult children, consider the power of the second part of that verse. Just stop a minute and just let that verse get into your mind. Let thine eyes observe my ways.

The father in this verse is inviting. He is requesting his child to watch him. The parent is requesting her child to watch her. She’s in essence saying, watch me.

Think about what we’re asking our child to do. When you say, if you are going to honestly, if I’m going to honestly look at my child, my son or my daughter and I’m gonna say, listen, give me your heart and watch me.

There’s a lot there’s a lot of there’s a lot behind that. Now what we often want is we want our kids to do what we say, not what we do. But is it not true, those of you that have lived the proverb that something is easier caught than it is taught?

It is. And with the proverb, although there’s much about in the proverbs about instruction, how a parent teaches his child and all that, that’s all true. But in this verse, he’s saying, he’s not talking about verbal instruction. He’s saying, look at me. Look at me. And this speaks to leadership and I know I beat the leadership drum especially in in August when we do our August Family Focus Because leadership is so important in the family. And leadership is not about you always making the right decision. Leadership is first and foremost as a spiritual leader, as a family leader, leadership is first and foremost about being an example.

Being the person that you want others to follow you. Being the person that you want them to be by being that person yourself. That is a leader. We have failed in our parenting if we have told our kids to do all the right things, but we have not provided an example in doing those things. We have failed. And if that, listen, if that’s the case with you, I certainly hope it’s not, but if that’s the case with you, then you need to make a beeline to a quiet place where you can get right with God.

We must be the thing that we we tell our kids to be. We must be that. That is rule number one about spiritual leadership. It’s not poise, it’s not knowing what to say at all the right times. The leaders don’t always have all the answers. That has nothing to do with it. Any kind of spiritual leader. It’s about being an example. Our lord Jesus exemplified this as as our shepherd, always leading us.

And so when in verse 26, when he says, and let thine eyes observe my ways, the father or the parent is saying to his child, he’s saying this, these watch my steps, look at what I do. Look at where I go. Look at what I say. Look at what I do. These are my priorities. These are my values. These are my desires. These are my standards. These are my limits.

My principles. This is what is important to me. This is my faith. This is how I flee from sin. This is how I pursue righteousness. It’s not about what you say, although you must sometimes say, it’s about what you do because all of those things become evident in how we live and the steps we take. In other words, in verse 26, my way.

We can say whatever we want about what is the right thing. Our kids believe what we do is our priority and is our value and is our faith. What we do is what teaches them.

And we should never be in a place where what we say and what we do contradict. Do you want your kids, I’m sure all parents in here want your values and your priorities and your faith and your principles and your personal standards and your limits and all of the things in your life. I’m sure you want those carried on to your child, right? I actually don’t know if the answer is yes.

So, me ask you a question. This is a hard question. I know I’m asking some hard questions today. Would you dare ask your kid to watch you? Would you dare ask your kid to watch you? Would you dare ask your kid to, whether it’s an adult or a young child, would you dare say, do what I do?

Do you want your kid to do what you do? You see, that’s a hard question to answer, is it not? But that’s exactly what he’s telling his son to do. Watch me, look at my way, you’ll know everything about me. You know, some parents have developed this idea that they need to keep distance from their kids. Like they have what their kids know, and then they have their like really personal life that their kids don’t listen. First of all, your kids know about everything you do, whether you think they do or not. But secondly, there shouldn’t be that. In fact, that’s the whole idea of leadership. You and the Lord Jesus with his disciples, what did he do? He invited them, they slept with him, they ate with him, where he went, they went. There was no gap there. That’s how they learned.

They saw him in every circumstance. They saw his steps. Note, the father does not say to his son, give me thine heart and listen to what I tell you. Although that’s true in other proverbs, but in this proverb, he doesn’t say that, he says, not listen to me, he says, watch me.

And just as the father in Proverbs here, we should ask ourself the question, would I be willing to tell my kids to watch me and do what I do? Is that what I want for them? If there’s any other answer besides yes, then there’s room, there’s reason for us to go to the Lord and say, God you have to help me. You have to help me. I cannot ask and expect my children to seek God when I’m not seeking God. I cannot expect my children to flee from sin and wickedness if I am not fleeing from it. I cannot expect my kids to have the right priorities and values in their life and seek God above everything else if I don’t do that thing.

But the second thing is this, just as this father in Proverbs does, we should intentionally say and express with our mouth, give me your heart, watch my ways. You know, there’s a lot of things in parenting. I think poor examples in parenting lead to the next generation just kind of stumbling through it and just assuming that it’s just gonna happen. Like just assuming your kids are gonna know what to do, just kind of assuming that yeah, they’re gonna know right from wrong and just kind of assuming that the kids know they’re supposed to listen to me and they’re supposed to follow my advice and all that. Listen, there is almost nothing in the Christian life that is automatic like that. Either you do it on purpose or it doesn’t get done.

And here’s what he’s doing. Here’s what he’s doing. He’s looking at his son like Joshua here and he’s saying, Josh, listen to me. Give me your heart. He’s saying the words to him. Josh, watch me. Observe my ways.

You see that? It’s not that he’s doing the wrong thing, it’s not the issue. It’s sometimes what we do is we fail to actively do the right thing. We just think it’s gonna happen. No. We have to go to our kids and say listen, I want you to listen to me. I want to I want us to have a good relationship and I want you to hear what I say. I want you to give me your heart. I want you to entrust me with your heart.

I want you to watch me. I wanna challenge the parents in the room here. Whether you have adult children or whatever stage you’re at, I wanna challenge you to do this. I wanna challenge you to actually verbally, physically go to your children and say, will you give me your heart? And will you observe my ways?

Now in order to do that, what it might require is some repentance and some confession. Because as parents, we know when we fail, we know when we sin against our kids, and as a parent we have the obligation. If we have sinned against our kids, have an obligation to get that thing right with our children. To go to them and apologize and ask our children for forgiveness, because even in that we’re setting an example for our children to follow.

It is only then that we can build the trust that is required to say, will you give me your heart? Will you watch my ways? Observe my ways? But I also wanna go back to speaking to the kids, to the teens, to the young adults, listen.

If that’s not your heart towards your parents, if there’s nothing in you that actually wants to have a relationship with them, listen to what they say and you’re just biding your time, I wanna invite you to also get right with God. You can have the greatest parents in the world and if your heart is not inclined to give your heart to your parents, doesn’t matter. They can speak till they’re blue in the face, you won’t listen.

So in this one verse, to close, we have this. We have a cooperation between the parent and the child. The parent provides the wisdom, he provides and she provides the invitation, right? And provides the example.

And the child provides the voluntary yielding of himself, of herself, of her heart. And the child commits to watching the parent, paying attention to the values, to the habits, to the purposes, and taking the role that that parent has seriously and to let it change their life. Let’s pray.