CRITICAL NOTES.—
Proverbs 15:10. Correction is grievous, or, “there is grievous correction.” Miller reads, “Discipline is an evil to him.”
MAIN HOMILETICS OF Proverbs 15:10
OUT OF THE WAY
I. There is a pre-ordained way for man to walk in.
1. Nature suggests this. Everything there speaks of law and order.
2. Conscience suggests it.
3. Revelation declares it. (On this subject see Homiletics on chap. Proverbs 12:28; Proverbs 13:13-14; pages 291 and 313.)
II. A man may break loose from this God-ordained path. That he can do this is his glory; that he does do it is his shame. A convict is compelled to keep to a certain path, he is obliged to conform to a routine laid down for him by another. His outward life is governed by no will of his own, all his acts are prescribed by an authority which he cannot resist. But God will not keep men in the way in which He desires them to walk by such means. He did not so fence about the angels in heaven. They were “free to fall,” and so are we. God treats His creatures as free men, not as prisoners. They have power to choose whom they will serve; they are free to choose the way in which they will walk. All the force that is exerted over them is the force of moral suasion.
III. The correction that follows this forsaking of the way is intended to punish and to reclaim. In all well-ordered human governments, and in all well-governed families, the main intention of punishment (except in the case of capital punishment) is improvement of character. This ought to be the chief aim of all human correction. It is the main intention in all the chastisements of God in this world. There is no retribution which comes to man in this world which will not, if accepted in a right spirit, become a means of restoring him to the forsaken path; therefore
IV. To hate reproof is to shut out all possibility of moral restoration. A man who will not be reproved denies the imperfection of his nature. Every imperfect being must need correction, and for man to rebel against the chastisement of God is to pass sentence of death upon himself. (On this subject see Homiletics on Chapter s Proverbs 3:11-12; Proverbs 12:1; Proverbs 13:18; pages 247, 323, etc.)
OUTLINES AND SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS
We would always look hopefully at a sinner under correction. For, surely, so long as the physician administers the medicine, there is no ground for despondency.… This costly teaching brings us on wonderfully. Lord! let me know the smart of Thy rod rather than the eclipse of Thy love.—Bridges.
There are three sorts of passengers that go out of the way. He that mistaketh the way, he that forsaketh his way, and he that loveth to be out of the way. Many miss the way who never were in it, or, being in the way, were missed from it, and these, oftentimes, are glad to be corrected and brought into the way. He forsaketh the way who at first is set in it, and seeing how to go on aright, yet willingly departeth from it: to such an one correction is grievous, and he suffereth it with trouble, but yet many times he is reduced by it. He loveth to be out of the way who hateth reproof, and of his amendment there is little hope.… The force of the verse is, that the suffering of correction is grievous, but that the hating of reproof is most pernicious.—Jermin.
Of all sinners, reproofs are worse resented by apostates.—Henry.
“Discipline is an evil to him who forsakes the path.” (See rendering in Critical Notes.) In our common version this idea is not brought out. It is a very grave one. Men not converted, but steadily “forsaking the path of holiness,” are injured by “discipline.” In “hating reproof” they go through the very soul-action which we mean when we say, “they die.” Each “hating” emotion kills them. And this is the very philosophy of the letter-killing (2 Corinthians 3:6); not that it is poison in itself, but that the gospel awakens opposition, which, on its part, corrupts the mind.—Miller.