There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death.
– Proverbs 16:25
I read that verse, and I just think about the tendency that we all have to think we know what is right and to do what we think is best. Even when that involves going against what God’s Word says is right, or what God’s Word says is best.
Proverbs 16:25 teaches us that apart from Christ our ways lead to death.
I mean, this is the first sin in the world. Adam and Eve thought it was desirable. It was best for them to eat from this fruit only to realize that this choice would lead to death.
So I read Proverbs 16:25, and I just want to pray in my own life, God, keep me from ways that seem right to me, but that lead to death or lead me away from you and what’s best for me, and not just to pray that for my own life, but to pray that for the people around me to pray this for my family,
God, keep my family from doing what seems right to them instead of what you say is right. I pray this for the members of my church and pray this for people around me, including praying for this, for people who don’t know Jesus, who are going at life according to ways that seem right to them, but apart from Jesus’ lead to death.
Proverbs 16:25 reminds us to guard our lives from earthly wisdom.
And so let’s just pray this over our lives and the lives of others around us. Proverbs 16:25, God, we pray that you would save us today, all day today, at every moment from anything that seems right to us, but is not right according to you and your Word and your Spirit. God, we pray that you would calibrate our hearts and our minds around that which is right according to your Word and your Spirit, and save us from ways that seem right to us, but that lead to death, that lead us away from you.
God, please save us all day long from ourselves and from our sinful tendencies. And God, we pray this not only over our lives, we pray this over the people in our lives, for our family members, for our friends, for people that we will see today, God, we just intercede for them based on Proverbs 16:25.
Keep them from going in ways that seem right to them and that lead to death. God guard them, save them from themselves. Lord, we pray this for our friends who don’t know Jesus. God, we pray for boldness to share the gospel with them, that they might experience the way that leads to life.
Prayer for the North African People
Lord, we pray for people who’ve never heard this good news, specifically people across North Africa who are totally unreached by the gospel. God, we pray for North African peoples to be reached with the way, the truth, and the life with you. Jesus. Oh God, we pray all this according to your Word in Proverbs 16:25. Keep us today from ways that seem right to us, but in their end, lead to death. In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
