The Sovereign Peacemaker Text: Proverbs 16:7
Introduction: The Futility of Human Relations
We live in an age obsessed with conflict resolution, with diplomacy, with finding common ground. Our politicians, our corporate trainers, and even many of our pastors are all dedicated to the high art of managing human relationships. The world believes that if we just find the right technique, the right therapeutic approach, the right seven-step program, we can smooth out all the friction between men. The goal is peace, but the method is appeasement, compromise, and the careful management of public relations. The problem with this approach is that it is entirely horizontal. It assumes that the conflict between you and your neighbor, or you and your boss, or you and a hostile government, is the ultimate problem that needs solving.
But the Bible teaches us that all conflict is, at its root, theological. All human strife is a footnote to the ultimate hostility, which is the enmity between sinful man and a holy God. And because the problem is fundamentally vertical, the solution must be as well. You cannot fix your horizontal relationships by shuffling the horizontal furniture. You must begin with the vertical reality. You must begin with God.
The book of Proverbs is intensely practical, but it is not a book of secular self-help. It is a book of divine wisdom, which means it grounds all practical advice in the fear of the Lord. And this verse before us is a perfect example. It addresses a very real and practical problem, the problem of enemies, but it provides a solution that is utterly God-centered. It tells us that the key to horizontal peace is vertical pleasure. If you want peace with your enemies, stop focusing on your enemies and start focusing on pleasing God.
The Text
When a man’s ways are pleasing to Yahweh,
He makes even his enemies to be at peace with him.
(Proverbs 16:7)
The Condition: Pleasing Yahweh
We begin with the first clause, which sets the condition:
"When a man’s ways are pleasing to Yahweh..." (Proverbs 16:7a)
The first thing we must do is define our terms with God's dictionary, not our own. What does it mean for a man's "ways" to be "pleasing to Yahweh"? Our modern, sentimental age immediately translates this into being a nice, agreeable, inoffensive sort of person. But that is not the biblical definition. The Pharisees were meticulously "nice" in public, yet Jesus called them a brood of vipers. To be pleasing to God is not to be praised by men; in fact, the two are often mutually exclusive.
A man's "ways" refers to the entire course of his life, his habits, his conduct, his business dealings, his family life, his path. It is comprehensive. And for this path to be pleasing to God, it must be a path of faith and obedience. "Without faith it is impossible to please Him" (Hebrews 11:6). This means, from the outset, that no unregenerate man can fulfill this condition. The ways of the natural man are never pleasing to God, for "those who are in the flesh cannot please God" (Romans 8:8). The foundation of a pleasing life is the new birth, whereby God grants us the gift of faith.
But it does not stop there. This faith must work itself out in obedience. A man whose ways please God is a man who loves God's law and seeks to walk in it. He is a man who fears the Lord, which is the beginning of wisdom. He is a man who deals justly, loves mercy, and walks humbly with his God (Micah 6:8). This is not a call to sinless perfection. David was a man after God's own heart, a man who pleased God, and yet he fell into grievous sin. But the "way" of David, the trajectory of his life, was one of repentance, faith, and a deep love for God's commands. When he sinned, he got back on the path. His ways were pleasing because they were ways of faith, even when that faith faltered.
And in the new covenant, we understand this most clearly through Christ. Our ways are only pleasing to God because we are united by faith to the only one whose ways were perfectly pleasing to the Father. We are clothed in the righteousness of Jesus Christ. God the Father looks at us and says, "This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased." Our faltering steps of sanctification are pleasing to Him because our justification is perfect and secure. So, the condition is this: a life lived by faith in Jesus Christ, which expresses itself in a glad and growing obedience to the Word of God.
The Consequence: Sovereignly Imposed Peace
Now we come to the result, the divine consequence of a God-pleasing life.
"...He makes even his enemies to be at peace with him." (Proverbs 16:7b)
Notice the active agent here. "He makes." This is not, "a man's pleasant demeanor wins over his foes." It is not, "a man's clever negotiating tactics secure a truce." It is God who does the making. This peace is a direct, supernatural intervention by the sovereign Lord of heaven and earth. The heart of the king is a stream of water in the hand of Yahweh; He turns it wherever He will (Proverbs 21:1). And the same is true for the heart of your hostile coworker, your litigious neighbor, or your persecuting government official. God has His hand on the thermostat of their hostility.
How does God do this? He has numerous tools in His sovereign workshop. Sometimes, He simply converts the enemy. The most fearsome enemy of the early church was a man named Saul of Tarsus. He was breathing out threats and murder. The church did not form a committee to dialogue with him. They prayed, and God knocked him off his horse on the road to Damascus and turned the chief persecutor into the chief apostle. God made an enemy to be at peace with the church by making him a brother.
Other times, God restrains the enemy. When Jacob was returning home, he was terrified of his brother Esau, whom he had cheated. Esau came out to meet him with four hundred men, looking for all the world like a war party. Jacob wrestled with God, and God touched the heart of Esau. The threatened violence melted into an embrace and tears (Genesis 33:4). God did not convert Esau, but He certainly pacified him. He made an enemy to be at peace. Think of Laban, who pursued Jacob with malice in his heart, but God came to him in a dream and warned him, "Be careful not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad" (Genesis 31:24). God muzzled him.
This proverb is a profound comfort, but it is also a sharp rebuke to our anxiety and our pragmatism. Our instinct when faced with an enemy is either to fight or to flatter. We either gear up for war, trusting in our own strength, or we begin to compromise, trimming the edges off our convictions to make ourselves less offensive. This proverb tells us to do neither. Our primary responsibility is not the management of our enemies; it is the pleasure of our God. You focus on the vertical. Let God handle the horizontal.
Living in the Proverb
So what does this look like in practice? It means that when you are slandered at work for your faith, your first thought should not be, "How can I fix my reputation?" but rather, "How can I continue to work with diligence and integrity in a way that pleases God?" When a neighbor becomes hostile because of your Christian convictions, your first move is not to hire a lawyer or to start a shouting match over the fence, but to examine your own heart and life and ask, "Are my ways pleasing to the Lord?"
This is not a promise that a faithful Christian will never have enemies. Jesus was the only man whose ways were perfectly pleasing to the Father, and they crucified Him. The Christian life is warfare, not a perpetual ceasefire. The world hated Christ, and it will hate you (John 15:18). But this proverb is a statement of God's governmental principle. God is the one who sets the terms of the engagement. He decides when your enemies rage and when they are quiet. He is the one who determines the outcome of the battle.
The peace spoken of here may not always look like a friendly handshake. Sometimes the peace God makes is the peace of a silenced foe, a confounded accuser whose slander falls flat. Sometimes the peace is the internal peace God gives you in the midst of the storm, knowing that He is sovereign over those who rage against you. But the principle holds: God honors the one who honors Him. He will vindicate His people.
Therefore, our task is simple, though not easy. Stop trying to please your enemies. You cannot do it without displeasing God. The fear of man is a snare, and compromise is its bait. Instead, devote all your energy to the high calling of pleasing Yahweh. Walk by faith. Obey His word. Do justice. Love your neighbor, and yes, pray for your enemies. Put your trust not in your own ability to create peace, but in the sovereign power of God to impose it. For when a man's ways are pleasing in the sight of the Lord, He takes up that man's cause. He stands in the way of his enemies. And He alone is the one who can make wars to cease to the end of the earth.