MAIN HOMILETICS OF Proverbs 10:24
THE INHERITANCE OF FEAR AND DESIRE
These words treat of things desired and of things not desired coming to be possessed.
I. Ungodly men have fears concerning the future. These fears proceed from a consciousness of past sin and present guilt, and prove the existence within man of a moral standard of action. In the natural world, we know that certain effects invariably follow certain causes. Sunlight and genial rain produce fertility and beauty, the hurricane and the flood leave behind them desolation. There are certain particles whose action, if diffused abroad in the air, breed disease and death; there are others whose effects are most refreshing and healthful to the bodily frame. Coming into the region of human action and moral responsibility, there are certain actions of men which clothe the spirit with gladness, making the soul as a field which the Lord God hath blest, and there are acts which leave behind them a sting which brings utter desolation. There are deeds done by moral agents which are followed by the disapprobation of conscience in proportion as conscience is educated by moral light, and there are those which are well-springs of joy in the human heart. It is to conscience that we must refer the fears of the wicked in relation to the future.
II. The certainty that the fears of the wicked will be realised.
1. From the inequality of rewards and punishments in the present. There are men whose characters seem to be almost perfect who have not the reward at present which their integrity and uprightness deserve. There are many men who sit, as it were, like Lazarus, at a rich man’s gate in poverty, who are much better men than the rich man himself. The difference in the character of the man who passed the sentence of death upon Paul, and Paul himself calls for a more manifest impartiality on the part of the Divine Ruler in the eternity to come. We feel certain that elsewhere a just sentence has been passed upon Paul and Nero. The inequality in the present dealings of God with the righteous and the wicked demands that in the future the “fear of the wicked shall come upon him.”
2. From the admonition of conscience. Although the mariner’s compass is sometimes unsteady, its direction is always towards the north. And the human conscience, however it may occasionally waver, points to a future judgment. It is not an occasional occurrence but so universal as to be a prophecy of a fact.
3. From the necessity that God should fulfil His own appointment. Revelation declares that, “He hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom He hath ordained” (Acts 17:31). The Righteous Judge of all the earth must keep His own appointment, therefore every wicked man must have what he does not desire, viz., a fair and impartial trial.
III. Good men have had desires which have not been granted. The gratification of such desires would have been an injury to themselves and others. Moses desired to see God in the sense in which the Incarnate Son tells us He had seen Him. But if this desire had been granted Moses must have died, the Hebrew nation would have lost the only man who could lead them, and he would have missed the completion of the glory of his life (Exodus 33:20). Peter desired that His Master should not suffer at the hands of the chief priests and scribes (Matthew 16:21). But what a calamity this would have been for Peter himself and the human race.
IV. But that which a righteous man desires above all other things shall be granted.
1. For himself in the present life, he desires a holy character. This he regards as the “one thing needful” above all other personal possessions. And God desires this for him, therefore this desire shall be granted on the fulfilment of the pre-ordained conditions (1 Thessalonians 4:3).
2. For the world he desires that God’s kingdom may “come” that right may in the end triumph over wrong. Now this desire also must be granted, because Christ has taught His disciples to pray for its accomplishment, and because He Himself at the right hand of God is “henceforth expecting, till His enemies be made His footstool” (Hebrews 10:13).
3. He desires for himself in the future a complete redemption of both soul and body from the curse of sin (2 Corinthians 5:1-4). But this desire is implanted within him by that God who can fulfil his desire, and who has already given an earnest of its fulfilment. This alone is a guarantee that it shall be granted. “Now He that hath wrought us for the self-same thing is God, who also hath given unto us the earnest of the spirit” (2 Corinthians 5:5). He has also the direct promise of Him who is “the Resurrection and the Life,” the assurance of His inspired apostle that this desire of the righteous shall be granted (John 5:28-29; 1 Corinthians 15:49-54).
OUTLINES AND SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS
But if our desires be granted, and even exceeded (Genesis 48:2; 1 Kings 3:13; Ephesians 3:20), faith and patience will be tried in the very grant. Growth in grace is given by deep and humbling views of our corruption. Longings for holiness are fulfilled by painful affliction; prayers are answered by crosses. Our Father’s dispensations are not what they seem to be, but what He is pleased to make them.—Bridges.
The best way to have our wills satisfied is to be godly. For to such there is a promise made. Wherein yet these rules are to be observed: First, that our will be agreeable to God’s will, the desire must be holy, and seasoned with the Spirit; and not carnal and corrupted by the flesh. Secondly, that sometimes lawful desires are not performed in the same kind, but exchanged for better, and that which doth more good is bestowed instead of them. Moses desired to enter into the land of Canaan; he was denied that, but he entered sooner into the heavenly and blessed rest of everlasting life. Thirdly, that we tarry the Lord’s leisure, and depend on His hand, to minister, in fittest time, all those good things which our souls desire, and so we shall not fail to receive them when He seeth that they will be most expedient for us.—Dod.