Proverbs 3:5-6 Trust in Yehovah with all your heart and don’t lean on your own understanding. 6 In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.
Step 1: The call is to put our TRUST completely in the Maker of the Heavens & Earth, not partial nor occasional trust, but ALL of our hearts trusting in Yehovah. If someone had a bird’s eye view of your life, what/who would they observe you trusting? Is it truly the LORD?
Step 2: Do NOT lean on your own understanding. What kinds of things could influence or motivate “our own understanding?” Our emotions? Our own goals or desires? Selfish motives in any way? Perhaps lies we’ve inherited from our fathers? And/or lies we’ve believed?
Step 3: Acknowledge Him in ALL your ways. This Hebrew word “yada” means “to know, declare, make known, acknowledge” Everything you do, everything you say, everything you think, everything you read, everything you watch, each conversation, every decision you make…all of your ways…do we declare Yehovah in each of them? How would you even begin that process? Surrender your entire life to Him, turn away from the world’s ways, turn away from your own wicked heart’s ways, turn away from the ways of any manner of falsehood, and turn toward Yehovah and His ways…and there is One Who is the Way the Truth and the Life and no one can come to Yehovah (the Father) except through Him, our Savior, Yeshua (Jesus) the Messiah. Repentance is not merely to turn away from our sin (breaking His instructions) but to actually begin to learn and live by what His instructions for life actually are (showing your faith by how you live)!
The Result: He will make your path straight. Straight paths are always better than crooked ones. Easier? Without trial or difficulty? Certainly not. But, without question, better. It’s most likely Solomon who also penned these words found in Ecclesiastes:
13 Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep His commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.
Ecclesiastes 12:13 KJV
Our whole duty is to fear Yehovah and keep His commandments. The narrow path in Matthew 7 that Yeshua (Jesus) describes is one called “hard pressed” which leads to life. I’d advocate that the same path He will make straight in Proverbs 3 is the narrow path Yeshua describes in Matthew chapter 7. It’s the one that leads to life, few find it, but we’re all invited to begin the journey wherever we are, no matter where we’ve been, whenever we’re willing to give our lives to the One who bought and paid for us with His own life…and His way is far better than any the world could ever offer us!