CRITICAL NOTES.—
Proverbs 3:21. Them, i.e. “sound wisdom and discretion;” Sound wisdom, the same word as in chap. Proverbs 2:7 (see notes there). Miller translates here, as there, “something stable”
Proverbs 3:25. Desolation of the wicked. This is interpreted in two ways.
1. The desolation in which the wicked strive to overwhelm the good; or,
2. The destruction which will sweep away the wicked, leaving the godly unharmed. “A positive decision is probably not possible” (Lange’s Commentary). Stuart, and most modern commentators, adopt the latter view.
Proverbs 3:26. Confidence. “Jehovah shall be as loins to thee” (Miller).
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Proverbs 3:21-26
GOD’S KEEPING, THE REWARD OF MAN’S KEEPING
Here we have the keeping of the Divine commands resulting in a being kept by Divine power and love.
I. There is a possibility of losing what has been attained. The injunction here given is not, as in chap. Proverbs 2:10, to seek wisdom, but as in Proverbs 3:18 of this chapter, to keep a hold upon what has been already gotten. The Scriptures abound in such exhortations. Barnabas exhorted the Church at Antioch to “cleave unto the Lord,” and he and Paul, when in Pisidian Antioch, persuaded the disciples “to continue in the grace of God” (Acts 11:23; Acts 13:43). The word of Our Lord to the Church at Thyatira was “That which ye have hold fast till I come” (Revelation 2:25). There is no safety but in continual watchfulness and in constant study of Divine precepts. “My son, let them not depart from thine eyes.” A mariner may set out on his voyage with his vessel’s head pointing in the right direction, but if he does not hourly keep consulting the compass, it will not avail him much that he started right. The Apostle speaks of men having “made shipwreck of faith and a good conscience” (1 Timothy 1:19). The world, the flesh, and the devil are cross currents and contrary winds which can only be met and overcome by constant, watchful reference to chart and compass.
II. The blessing which will result from “keeping wisdom,” viz., Soul-life. As food and an observance of physical laws are the means by which the body is enabled to perform the functions which are natural to it, so a constant receiving of God’s thoughts and an observance of God’s laws will enable the soul—the spiritual man—to fulfil the end for which it was created—to glorify and enjoy God. Such a man has the assurance that he is under the special guardianship of God. All the subjects of this realm are under the protection of the monarch, but she has a special and personal care for her own children. So God is the “Saviour of all men, specially of those that believe” (1 Timothy 4:10). This particular regard of God for those who have become His children, by falling in with His method of making them right with themselves and with Him, is guaranteed.—
1. In the ordinary events of life. As the heirs of the monarch are always accompanied by those who count it an honour to serve them and, if needful, to protect them, so the heirs of salvation are ever attended by their body-guard, the angels who are “ministering spirits to the heirs of salvation” (Hebrews 1:14). In the night not only do they encamp round about them that fear God (Psalms 34:7), but the Lord Himself is said to be their keeper (Psalms 121:5). His peace “keeps (lit. garrisons) the heart” (Philippians 4:7) and gives the sweet sleep promised in Proverbs 3:24, even although outward circumstances may be apparently adverse (see illustration). This was the experience of David in the night of his adversity, even although he had brought it upon himself (Psalms 3:4). And the certain guidance which is promised in Proverbs 3:6 insures an avoidance of all real danger (Proverbs 3:23).
2. In times of special visitation (Proverbs 3:25). There was a “desolation of the wicked” in the days of Noah, but he and his house were “shut in” the ark by God Himself (Genesis 7:16). In the day when the Lord “rained upon Sodom and Gomorrah He delivered just Lot.” (2 Peter 2:6). When the “abomination of desolation stood in the holy place” at Jerusalem as foretold by our Lord (Matthew 24:15), those who obeyed His command and fled to the mountains escaped the terrible fate of those who remained in the city. (This is recorded by Eusebius). This assurance of constant guardianship and guidance is “life” to the soul (Psalms 30:5). Fear of the future paralyses a man’s energies, but confidence in an over-ruling personal God gives him strength for action.
ILLUSTRATION OF Proverbs 3:24
THE LAST HOURS OF THE NINTH EARL OF ARGYLE, EXECUTED BY JAMES II
So effectually had religious faith and hope, co-operating with natural courage and equanimity, composed his spirits that, on the very day on which he was to die, he dined with appetite, conversed with gaiety at table, and, after his last meal, lay down, as he was wont, to take a short slumber, in order that his body and mind might be in full vigour when he should mount the scaffold. At this time one of the Lords of the Council, who had probably been bred a Presbyterian, and had been seduced by interest to join in oppressing the Church of which he had once been a member, came to the castle with a message from his brethren, and demanded admittance to the Earl. It was answered that the Earl was asleep. The Privy Councillor thought that this was a subterfuge, and insisted on entering. The door of the cell was softly opened, and there lay Argyle on the bed, sleeping, in his irons, the placid sleep of infancy. The conscience of the renegade smote him. He turned away, sick at heart, ran out of the castle, and took refuge in the dwelling of a lady of his family, who lived hard by. There he flung himself upon a couch, and gave himself up to an agony of remorse and shame. His kinswoman, alarmed by his looks and groans, thought that he had been taken with sudden illness, and begged him to drink a cup of sack. “No, no,” he said, “that will do me no good.” She prayed him to tell her what had disturbed him. “I have been,” he said, “to Argyle’s prison. I have seen him within an hour of eternity sleeping as sweetly as ever man did. But as for me——.”—Macaulay.
OUTLINES AND SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS
Proverbs 3:21. Simply attend to them. “Watch” like a sentinel, intently eyeing. Solomon enjoins the voluntary, and promises the involuntary. The voluntary we can do, save only for that grand helplessness, an aversion of the will itself. The involuntary we cannot do, save only mediately through obedient acts. Attention is within our power if God gives grace to the will. This is the drift of the promise: You do your part and God will do His.—Miller.
Eye these things as the steersman doth the load-star, as the archer doth the mark he shoots at, or as the passenger doth his way, which he finds hard to hit and dangerous to miss.—Trapp.
Proverbs 3:22.—Wisdom reveals the righteousness of God, whereby a believer lives before God. Without this the man is dead in sins (Hebrews 2:4, Ephesians 2:1).—Fausset.
There is no life in the soul till knowledge come into it. There was no living creature in the world till light was made. God clears the understanding before He rectifies the will and affections; He keeps the same method in the little world that He did in the great world.—Francis Taylor.
Proverbs 3:23. This promise has a direction embodied with it, “Thou shalt walk in thy way.” We are required to keep the way of the Lord, and in the affairs of life to attend to our own concerns, shunning the character of busybodies by not meddling in the affairs of others.—Lawson.
Good success in the way may be crossed again; what is crowned with good success in the end can never be crossed.—Francis Taylor.
There shall be no cause to make thee stumble. For he that is blind or weak may stumble, though he be never so careful; and he may stumble that is careless, though he be never so well able to walk safely. But wisdom shall take away thy blindness, thy weakness, thy carelessness.—Jermin.
Thou shalt ever go under a double guard, the peace of God within thee and the power of God about thee.—Trapp.
Proverbs 3:24.—Peter in prison, in chains, between two soldiers, on the eve of his probable execution, when there seemed but a “step between him and death.” Yet in such a place, in such company, at such a moment, did he lie down so fearlessly and sleep so sweetly, that even the shining light failed to disturb him, and an angel’s stroke was needed to awaken him.—Bridges.
Surely the way to sleep quietly in this world is to be asleep to the world; his sleep is sweetest, when he is asleep, who, when he is awake, doth sweetly sleep in a neglect of worldly crosses or contentments.—Jermin.
Proverbs 3:25. So safe will all thy ways be that to fear will be a sin.—Plumptre.
From the terms before used, respecting the final destruction of the wicked, it is most likely that to it the reference is in this verse.—Wardlaw.
“Be not afraid” is at once a precept and a promise to the godly. They shall have no cause to fear evil tidings, therefore it is their privilege that they are not to fear them (Psalms 112:7; Psalms 91:5).—Fausset.
The Christian is threatened by the sinners in all their ills, whether for them or by them. Sin breeds the whole of them; and the wise man would magnify the grace by saying that they are all equally indifferent. “Let cares, like a wild deluge come.”—Miller.
Let a David “walk through the vale of the shadow of death” he will not fear, no, though he should go back the same way; “for Thou art with me,” saith he. He had God by the hand, and so long he feared no colours.—Trapp.
Proverbs 3:26. Beware of mistakes here. Do not say God is your confidence, if He be only your dread. An appalling amount of hypocrisy exists in Christendom, and passes current for devotion. He who is himself most worthy is often more disliked than any other being, and, as if this ingratitude were not enough, men double the sin by professing that they have confidence in Him. I have observed that sea-going ships do not trust to themselves in the windings of a river. Where they are hemmed in between rock and quicksand, grazing now the one and now the other, they take care to have a steamtug, both to bear them forward and to guide them aright. They hang implicitly upon its power. They make no attempt at independent action. But as soon as they get clear of the narrows—as soon as they have attained a good offing and an open sea—they heave off and hoist their own sails. They never want a steamer till they come into narrow waters again. Such is the trust in God which the unreconciled experience. In distress they are fain to lean upon the Almighty. While they are in the narrows they would hang on the help of a Deliverer.… The line of their dependence seems ever tight by their constant leaning. But when they begin to creep out of these shoals of life they heave off and throw themselves upon their own resources.… This is not to have confidence in God.—Arnot.