Proverbs 5:7-11, The Merciless Avenger!
February 26, Proverbs 5:7-11
Matt. 5:28-29; 2 Tim. 2:2 “The pleasure of sin is but for a season.”
The Merciless Avenger!
- The Lustful way is Senselessly Destructive. These verses give, in vivid detail, the anguish an adulterer brings upon himself by yielding to lust. Our Blessed Lord warned that even a lustful look can lead to sin. Here again the appeal is given: Listen! Don’t forget! Note that it is plural, O my children, my sons, my daughters (Pr. 4:1)! The appeal is addressed to all, for few can say with Paul, None of these things move me (Acts 20:24).
a. A Horrid House: Remove thy foot far from her door (v.8). Her house is full of the leprosy of sin. God has provided plenty of legitimate pleasures, therefore, avoid the strange woman’s touch, or word, or look, as you would an infectious leper. There are perils and pitfalls ahead! Turn back from the precipice before it is too late. Break with those doubtful friends. If you must, change your job, but at all costs avoid this merciless avenger. O sons, O daughters, heed this cry, and flee from this horrid house.
b. A Spoiled Splendour: Lest thou give thine honour to others (v.9). Honour means the glory or splendour (Zech. 6:13) of youth, not just one’s reputation. To lose it is to take away the majesty, the grace, the freshness, the creative energies of youth (or any age). How senseless to see that honour dissipated by riotous living (Lk. 15:17-19). [And give] thy years to the cruel [one] describes sin’s aftermath as a merciless, personal avenger, Satan himself, or, maybe the cruel is collective, gathering up all the consequences of sin!
c. A Forfeited Fortune: Thy wealth (v.10), literally, thy substance, thy strength (marg.), being appropriated by stranger. It may refer to the power of the wealthy. The strangers are the proud (Heb. same as strange woman) getting rich on the sins of others. Sin is big business and ends in the loss of both strength and wealth. Thy labours means thy work, to shape or fashion; hence, to make idols. A secondary meaning is to pain, grieve, provoke to anger. Idolatry, in all its forms, grieves God, and brings sorrow and loss to men (Pr. 10:22)! In the house of a stranger, a foreigner, is where your wealth ends up. What fools that we pay for our own destruction, and all for momentary gratification!
d. A Woeful Wail: Mourn at the last, in thy latter end (v.11)! Her end, your end – they meet! Sad is the mourning over ruined flesh and body (soul and body) because of sin. O damage irreparable! Consumed by a consumption, a pursuing pain, that brings to an early grave. That’s not the way it was supposed to end! Impenitence does not put away sin’s sorrow but only delays it to mourn at the last. A dying hour has been called “an honest hour”. Wasted wealth, wasted health, wasted tears, and wasted remorse, but, alas, too late for proving the repentance to be genuine. “My kingdom for a moment of time.”
Thought: “Sin puts hell into the soul and the soul into hell” (Anon).
Prayer: Dear Lord, Thou must keep me, else I go astray.