Many
a man proclaims his own steadfast love, but a faithful man who can find? The
righteous who walks in his integrity— blessed are his children after him! (Proverbs 20:6-7 ESV)
Talk is cheap. Boasting is worthless. Your history is irrelevant. True character is known by present actions and results, not by self-praise, past events, explanations, or excuses (cf. Proverbs 20:11). Yet fools talk more than wise men (cf. Proverbs 14:33; 29:11), and sluggards talk more than hard workers (cf. Proverbs 26:16). Most men love themselves and will quickly tell how gifted and faithful they are, but real performers as measured by the Bible are very rare.
Men have long loved the damning sins of
arrogance, boasting, conceit, pride, self-love, and self-esteem. But today
these destructive evils are glorified in politicians, popular athletes, and
arrogant entertainers. In fact, this attitude and practice is often promoted as
cures for most psychological or relational problems. In a day of advertising,
mass marketing, and public relations, there is a perverse emphasis on
appearance over performance, on perception over reality, on sound bites over
substance, on feelings over facts. Due to constant communication via telephone,
the Internet, television, radio, email, and texting, there is a perverse
emphasis on words over actions. This distortion has created a situation where
boasting is accepted over results.
We are entering an election year that
promises to be full of such behavior. I remember an old saying that went
something like: “If it walks like a duck and sounds like a duck, it’s probably
a duck.” Yet we are constantly deceived by what someone shouts at us. It is
almost as if something is told to us enough with angry tones, we will come to
believe it. Truth is in what we see in a man, not what we hear. This is the
heart of wisdom.
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