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.