Leaning

The word is “lean” — a body word, not a thinking word. Everyone leans on something by mid-morning: a plan, a person, a bank balance, our own ability to figure things out. The proverb does not scold you for leaning. It asks what you are leaning on, and whether it can hold.

Your own understanding is not worthless — Scripture spends a whole book praising wisdom. But it makes a poor load-bearing wall. It has blind corners. It gets tired. It was never meant to carry the full weight of a life.

“In all thy ways acknowledge him” is wonderfully unglamorous. It means bringing God into the ordinary decisions, not just the crises — the email, the errand, the conversation you are rehearsing. Acknowledge Him in all of it, and the promise follows: the path gets directed. Not always explained. Directed.