Bible Commentaries
Proverbs 24

Verse 10

Proverbs 24:10

I. The special object of all the training and discipline through which we pass in life is the increase of strength.

II. Every life has its day of adversity. It is in the day of adversity that a man's character is tested. Adversity makes or mars a man. A man is either the better or the worse for the trial through which he has passed.

III. Think what it is to faint as a Christian. It is to distrust God. Let us glorify God in loss, in suffering, in waiting.

Parker, City Temple, vol. iii., p. 363.

Reference: Proverbs 24:11 . E. White, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiv., p. 310.

Verses 11-12

Proverbs 24:11-12

I. Groundless excuses can be of no avail as made to God, because, in the first place, He is a Being who considers everything. If God considers, if He be a God who searcheth the spirits, a God by whom actions are weighed, then I instantly learn, if there be vanity in an excuse, it must be detected, and if there be falsehood, it must be exposed. There is an overwhelming weight of condemnation in the question, "Doth not He that pondereth the heart consider it?"

II. But Solomon is not content with pointing out to the self-apologist that God considers everything: he goes on to remind him that God knows everything. It is the necessary property of the Divine Being that He should be acquainted with whatsoever was, or is, or is to come, so that to suppose Him ignorant or forgetful of the minutest thing is to charge Him with imperfection; and this, in other words, is to deny the Divinity. Throughout the circuits of immensity there cannot be the motion of a will nor the throb of an affection which escapes God's observation. His is that omniscience to which there has never been an addition, from which there has never been an abstraction; His is that prodigious mind to which prophecy is history, and to which history is observation, which embraces everything at once, so that it can be said to foreknow or to recollect only in accommodation to our limited faculties, foreknowledge having to do with our future, recollection with our past, but both equally with the interminable present of Him who can describe Himself as "I am that I am." The question, "Doth not He that pondereth the heart consider it?" is followed with the yet more startling and the yet more overcoming one, "He that keepeth thy soul, doth not He know it?"

III. "Shall He not render to every man according to his works?" Man may be unmoved by our declaration of God as a God who considers and knows; but we have exhausted our resources and are forced to regard him as morally invulnerable if we find him unmoved by the startling interrogation, "and shall not He render to every man according to his works?"

H. Melvill, Penny Pulpit, No. 2658.

References: Proverbs 24:11 , Proverbs 24:12 . W. Arnot, Laws from Heaven, 2nd series, p. 273.Proverbs 24:13-22 . R. Wardlaw, Lectures on Proverbs, vol. iii., p. 115.Proverbs 24:16 . F. Tholuck, Hours of Devotion, p. 281.Proverbs 24:17 . J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 8th series, pp. 266, 272, 279, 286. Proverbs 24:21 . W. Arnot, Laws from Heaven, 2nd series, p. 282.Proverbs 24:23-34 . R. Wardlaw, Lectures on Proverbs, vol. iii., p. 129.

Verses 30-32

Proverbs 24:30-32

I. The scene shows that if we will not have flowers and fruits, we shall certainly have thorns and nettles.

II. The scene shows that the sluggard and the fool cannot hide the results of their neglect.

III. The scene shows how possible it is to be right in some particulars and to be grievously wrong in others. The legal right of the slothful man to the possession of the field might be undisputed. It is not enough to possess; we must increase.

IV. The scene shows that even the worst abuses may be turned to good account. Keep your eyes open, and you will read moral lessons everywhere. (1) You will see that the finest possessions may be wasted: property, talent, influence, opportunity. (2) You will see that wickedness always moves in the direction of destruction.

Parker, City Temple, vol. ii., p. 108 (see also Pulpit Notes, p. 48).

References: Proverbs 24:30-34 . S. Cox, Expositor, 2nd series, vol. vi., p. 401; W. Arnot, Laws from Heaven, 2nd series, p. 290.

Verse 32

Proverbs 24:32

I. When the learner in God's school goes out to observe mankind, he will think of the manner, and cautions, and rules for turning what he sees to the most beneficial account and of the most instructive points to fix his attention upon. (1) Let not his observing be merely of the nature of speculation, not simply a seeing and judging what men are. (2) Another admonition is against prejudice and arrogance in observing and judging. (3) Another is against taking pleasure in perceiving and ascertaining what is wrong in man. (4) Another grand rule is that our observations on other men should not be directed or suffered to go to the effect of our being better pleased with ourselves, with this exception: that if Divine grace has really wrought a work in us, we may well be delighted with that as such.

II. To such general considerations there might be added a variety of more special observations. (1) Think of the probable difference between our judgments of the persons we look upon and their own judgments of themselves. (2) One of the most conspicuous things to be noticed in looking on mankind is how temptation operates and prevails. (3) A prominent and mournful thing to be seen in looking on mankind will be the great errors, the lapses, of good men. "Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall." (4) In looking on men, observe the effect of situation and circumstances. Look watchfully how men are affected, and who shall dare to say, "I have nothing to fear in a like situation"? (5) Happily there are worthier things here and there: exemplary virtues, graces, wisdom; and it is delightful to turn for instruction to these from the many things that instruct us as being evil. Let these better examples be observed, with attention to understand how they are formed and an earnest effort of imitation.

J. Foster, Lectures, 2nd series, p. 29.

References: Proverbs 24:33 , Proverbs 24:34 . Spurgeon, Evening by Evening, p. 331.Proverbs 25:1-5 . W. Arnot, Laws from Heaven, 2nd series, p. 296. Proverbs 25:1-7 . R. Wardlaw, Lectures on Proverbs, vol. iii., p. 143.Proverbs 25:2 . Spurgeon, My Sermon Notes: Genesis to Proverbs, p. 187. Proverbs 25:8-13 . R. Wardlaw, Lectures on Proverbs, vol. iii., p. 152.Proverbs 25:11 . S. Cox, Expositions, 4th series, p. 149. Proverbs 25:13 , Proverbs 25:19 . W. Arnot, Laws from Heaven, 2nd series, p. 303.Proverbs 25:14-20 . R. Wardlaw, Lectures on Proverbs, vol. iii., p. 163.Proverbs 25:15 . Clergyman's Magazine, vol. i., p. 224.