CRITICAL NOTES.—
Proverbs 11:23. Wrath, i.e. God’s wrath (Zöckler).
MAIN HOMILETICS OF Proverbs 11:23
We cannot understand the first clause of this verse to mean that all a righteous man’s desires are good.
1. History contradicts it. Solomon must have known it was not true of his own father. David was a righteous man, but some of his desires were not only not good, but inhuman and devilish. Of all the good men of whom we read, whether in inspired or uninspired history, there is hardly one of whom some act is not recorded which reveals that their desires were sometimes sinful.
2. Present experience contradicts it. If those who are now looked upon as the salt of the earth were appealed to upon this matter they would emphatically deny that their desires were at all times and altogether good. But this we may affirm. I. That the main desire of a righteous man is that he may be good, and that to all his fellow-creatures “good may be the final goal of ill.” II. That there will be a period in his history when his desires will be “only” good. In nature all things tend towards a perfection—a completion. If no untoward circumstance prevent, a tree or a flower will go on growing until it has attained to the perfectness to which it has been ordained. The Christian is destined to attain to perfectness of moral beauty. And when this completion is arrived at his desires will be only good. See 1 John 3:1-2, etc. (For full treatment of the verse see Homiletics on chap. 10: Proverbs 11:24; Proverbs 11:28.)
OUTLINES AND SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS
Here we are to contrast a wish and an assurance (expectation) like that class of passages already alluded to where the last clause is intensive. The mere wish of the righteous is an intrinsic good; either first, because all actings of his heart, whether wise or unwise, will exercise him (Psalms 84:7), and will speed him to his celestial state; or secondly, because the wish of a righteous man, quoad a righteous man, will be a righteous wish, and, therefore, will be good in itself, and will be sure to be gratified. The wish of a righteous man, like the spongelets of a tree, is that which goes searching for God’s gifts, and is sure in the end to attain them. Therefore, emphasising “only” the wish of a righteous man will be made altogether to work for his good, however disappointed, and however kept low and troubled in the difficulties of the present life. But “an assurance of the wicked;” that is, a thing so grasped and reached as to be no longer a “wish,” but a certainty; wealth, when it is made his, or honour, when it is actually grasped, will not only be lost; will not only be followed by “wrath” in the sense of actually bringing it; but “is wrath” in the sense of being sent as punishment, and in the further sense that the sinner knew it all the time; and that his assurance, though it seemed to be a certainty of joy, was, lower down, a certainty of punishment; we mean by that an assurance (which he would confess if he were asked) that all his properties could end only in increasing retribution.—Miller.
“Desire is the wing of the soul, whereby it moveth, and is carried to the thing which it loveth as the eagle to the carcase, to feed itself upon it, and be satisfied with it” (Bishop Reynolds). The desire of the righteous must be good because it is God’s own work (Psalms 10:17; Romans 8:26-27). It must be only good, because it centres in Himself (Psalms 73:25; Isaiah 26:8-9).… The corrupt mixture of worldliness, selfishness, and pride is against our better will (Romans 7:15). In despite of this mighty assault—“Lord, all my desire is before thee; thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee” (Psalms 38:9; John 21:17).—Bridges.
Evil motions haunt his mind other-whiles, but there they inhabit not … As the ferryman plies the oar, and eyes the shore homeward, where he would be, yet there comes a gust of wind that carries him back again, so it is oft with a Christian. But every man is with God so good as he desires to be. They are written in the book of life that do what they can, though they cannot do as they would.—Trapp.
Proverbs 11:23 and chap. Proverbs 10:24. I. What, or who is the righteous man?
1. He is one whom God makes righteous by bestowing righteousness upon him—by counting the righteousness of His Son for his (Romans 5:19). A man must be righteous by imputation before he can be made good, for the Spirit which makes our persons good—which sanctifies our nature—is the fruit of the righteousness which is by Jesus Christ.
2. God makes a man righteous by bestowing upon him a principle of righteousness. Men must have eyes before they can see, tongues before they can speak, and legs before they go: even so a man must be made habitually good and righteous before he can work righteousness.
3. The man is practically righteous. Fruits show outwardly what the heart is principled with. Mark how the apostle words it: “Being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness” (Romans 6:22). The works flow from the heart of a righteous man—of a man that before he had any good work had a twofold righteousness imparted to him—one to make him righteous before God, the other to principle him to be righteous before the world. II. What a righteous man desires. A righteous man is sometimes taken for his best part, or as he is a second creation, as in 2 Corinthians 5:17; Colossians 3:10, etc. In which places the sinful flesh, the old man, the outward man—all of which are corrupt according to the deceitful lusts—are excluded, and so pared off from the man, that he is righteous. As Paul in Romans 7:15-17 severs himself in twain,—himself as he is spiritual from himself as he is carnal—so the righteous man here must be taken for the I that would do the good, the I that hates the evil. There is a spring that yieldeth water good and clear, but the channels through which this water comes to us are muddy and foul: now, of the channels the water receives a disadvantage, and so come to us savouring of what came not with them from the fountain of grace—the Holy Ghost—but from the channels through which they must pass. The desires of a righteous man, then, are comprised under,
(1) those they would have accomplished here, and
(2) those which they know cannot be enjoyed until after death. And the first are comprised under communion with God in spirit and the liberty of enjoyment of His ordinances. And the second are comprehended under the desire of that presence of the Lord which is personal, and their desire to be in that country where their Lord personally is. These last have a long neck: for they look over the brazen wall of this, quite into another world. They breed a divorce betwixt the soul and all inordinate love of the world; their strength is such, that they are ready to dissolve that sweet knot of union betwixt body and soul and to grapple with the King of Terrors. These desires do deal with death, as Jacob’s love to Rachel did with the seven long years which he was to serve for her. III. What is meant by granting the righteous man’s desires. It is to accomplish them. There is nothing that God likes of ours better than he likes our true desires. For, indeed, true desires are the smoke of our incense, the flower of our graces, the vital part of the new man. Right desires jump with God’s mind; they are the life of prayer; they are a man’s kindness to God; (chap. Proverbs 19:22) and they which will take him up from the ground, and carry him after God to do His will, be the work never so hard. Is it any marvel, then, that God has promised they shall be granted?—Bunyan.
The desire of all, as it is desire, is only of good; but as desire is accomplished, so it is the desire of the righteous only that is good, and their desire accomplished is good only. It is simply good, there is no mixture of evil added to it, yea, it is not only all good, but all the good that desire can wish.—Jermin.