"He Shall Direct Thy Paths" Is Not a Map

Last Sunday a sister in my Relief Society, a kind woman with a lovely voice who I won't name, said that when you really trust the Lord, the next step lights up. She said it about Proverbs 3:6, with the confidence of someone who has never had to say it to an eleven-year-old at a kitchen table. I nodded the way you do. Then I drove home thinking that if the step lights up nobody needs trust at all. That's a strange thing to build on a verse about trust.

This week's Come, Follow Me is titled "He Shall Direct Thy Paths," and I understand why people hear a map in it. The LDS Daily study guide from Friday walks through the Proverbs and Ecclesiastes chapters, and Sunday's Church News pulled together what leaders have said about them. Sister Cordon, in what they gathered, calls the promise one of direction, which is a different thing from clarity. That's the part I'd tape to the fridge, and I have, in fact. Proverbs 3:5-6 has been up there for a week on a strip of masking tape that's already curling at one corner, right next to the dentist reminder.

What the rest of Proverbs 3 does to the title

Proverbs 3:6 is a whole sentence, and the lesson title borrows only the end of it.

In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.

Proverbs 3:6

Verse 5 comes first and asks for trust with all the heart. Verse 7 follows and says, "Be not wise in thine own eyes: fear the Lord, and depart from evil." Cut those two and you've printed a card for a gift shop. I do like verse 8 better than any of it, because nobody could stitch health to the navel and marrow to the bones onto a pillow.

Then there's the part parents tend to skip, which is that the directing comes with correction.

My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord; neither be weary of his correction: For whom the Lord loveth he correcteth; even as a father the son in whom he delighteth.

Proverbs 3:11-12

So a hard week can be part of the directing. Verse 17 says wisdom's paths are peace, and I'll come back to that, because it's the thing I get asked about most. Verse 25 tells you not to be afraid of sudden fear, which only makes sense if sudden fear is expected.

What Ecclesiastes 3:11 says to a child who wants the whole path

The Preacher starts by asking what profit a man has of all his labor under the sun (Ecclesiastes 1:3). My eight-year-old asks that question every time I hand her a dish towel and I've stopped hearing it as backtalk. It's the Ecclesiastes question, and it's in the lesson.

He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end.

Ecclesiastes 3:11

"Beautiful in his time" gets quoted as comfort, as though everything will look fine from far enough down the road. Maybe it will. But look at what's tucked behind it. God put the whole of it in their heart, the wanting to see it all, and in the same breath says no one finds out the beginning to the end. A child who keeps asking what the path is has the wanting in good working order. Nobody has to fix it.

A few verses on, he asks who can bring a man to see what shall be after him (Ecclesiastes 3:22). He doesn't answer. Psalm 23 has the same habit, if you've ever read it when you were scared, and I wrote about that in Psalm 23 at Midnight Is a Harder Read Than You'd Think. The valley is in the psalm, and the shepherd walks through it with you.

Proverbs 22:6 and the age nobody mentions

When it's your own child facing the hard choice, Proverbs 22:6 arrives in your head like a casserole nobody asked for.

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

Proverbs 22:6

People hear a contract, and I've heard it preached as one, with a refund if the teenager wanders. But the verse says "when he is old," which is a date a good deal further out than next Thursday. Ecclesiastes 12 describes what old looks like in the same week's reading, a house with trembling keepers and darkened windows, a grasshopper that has become a burden, mourners going about the street. I read that picture twice at the sink this morning while a loaf cooled on the rack, and it is a long way from the afternoon a fourteen-year-old picks his friends, or an eleven-year-old decides whether to quit the team. The verse promises something about the far end and gives no help with the Thursday decision.

What I'd say to a parent in the middle of one is smaller. Proverbs 22:3 says a prudent man sees the evil coming, so looking hard at what a choice could cost is allowed. "Lean not unto thine own understanding" doesn't ban it. It only takes away the last word, and Proverbs 22:19 gives the reason, "That thy trust may be in the Lord." Proverbs 15:22 adds that purposes fall apart without counsel, so the child isn't meant to carry it alone and neither is the parent.

Acknowledging him in the choice itself

The clause the title leaves off is the one I'd practice with a child. Ways are the roads already under your feet. Acknowledging him means saying his name inside the real decision, in a prayer that lists the actual options including the embarrassing one and in a commandment you could read aloud without lowering your voice.

I'll admit I find Proverbs 15:11 sterner than I'd like when I want to see inside a child's head myself.

Hell and destruction are before the Lord: how much more then the hearts of the children of men?

Proverbs 15:11

He sees the heart and I don't, which I take to mean I don't have to pry it open at bedtime. Ecclesiastes 12:1 tells a young person to remember the Creator in the days of youth, before the evil days come.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I explain Proverbs 3 to a child who wants the whole path?

I tell mine that God knows the road she's on, she can talk to him right in the middle of the choice, and he will direct her. Then I stop. If I add a forecast, she'll hold me to it.

Are we supposed to stop thinking the choice through?

No, and I'd take a child who can say what might go wrong over one who calls guessing faith. Think it through and ask a person you trust, then give your own reading less than the final say.

Is Ecclesiastes too bleak to read with kids?

Opening with "vanity of vanities" and leaving the room would be too bleak. I'd start with 3:11, because it lets a child want the whole story without being scolded for it. Vanity in the book means what doesn't last under the sun, and chapter 12 ends on a duty a child can follow.

What if we trusted God and the choice still went wrong?

The verse never said the choice would go right. Correction sits in the same chapter as the path, so a bad turn can be a place where he is still directing, consequences included. A child can hear that without taking it as a punishment.

How can I tell God's direction from what I want?

Peace counts. In D&C 6:23 the Lord asks, "Did I not speak peace to your mind concerning the matter?" So I do watch for it. But peace alone doesn't settle it for me, because wanting something badly can feel peaceful too, and the chastening in Proverbs 3 doesn't feel calm even when the chapter calls it love. So I pair it with the check in Ecclesiastes 12:13, "Fear God, and keep his commandments." If a choice has to stay hidden, or it breaks a commandment I could name in a normal voice, I don't call it his directing, however warm it feels. Ecclesiastes 12:14 comes right after that conclusion and says God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing. I think it's there for exactly this question, because the directing in Proverbs 3 happens in front of someone who already sees the part we can't.

with love, Melissa