14 From Vertical to Horizontal With Wisdom (Proverbs 3:27-35)
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‘27 Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it. 28 Do not say to your neighbor, “Go, and come again, tomorrow I will give it”—when you have it with you. 29 Do not plan evil against your neighbor, who dwells trustingly beside you. 30 Do not contend with a man for no reason, when he has done you no harm. 31 Do not envy a man of violence and do not choose any of his ways, 32 for the devious person is an abomination to the Lord, but the upright are in his confidence. 33 The Lord's curse is on the house of the wicked, but he blesses the dwelling of the righteous. 34 Toward the scorners he is scornful, but to the humble he gives favor. 35 The wise will inherit honor, but fools get disgrace’ (Proverbs 3:27-35).
A transition from our vertical relationship with the LORD in verses 21-26 to our horizontal relationships with others. Let’s discuss.
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Today we complete our study of chapter 3 by looking at how Solomon concludes his thoughts on the value of wisdom to us. If you remember last week we looked at the value of wisdom to the son, talking about the ‘mutual protection society’ that exists between wisdom and man, and how our relationship with wisdom can provide beauty, life, and security to the person and more specifically to the soul.
As I mentioned briefly in the intro, Solomon closes out this chapter of his writing by switching his and our focus off of the wisdom from above, and instead he invites our attention to our neighbor.
In other words, he shifts us from a focus on our vertical relationship with God to our horizontal relationships with people.
In short, our verses today summarize what it means to be a good neighbor to those around you, and the rewards/consequences to being or not being a good neighbor to others.
Now if you have your Bible's open you'll notice a pretty common theme or common command from our verses today, and that is the command 'Do not ___ (blank)’.
We see that command 6 times in the first 5 verses, as Solomon builds differing but similar arguments surrounding our horizontal relationships. As a matter of fact, the arguments and commands Solomon gives quite literally build or escalate on each other in wrongdoing against a neighbor: from the withholding of help in verses 27-28, to the plotting of evil in verses 29-30, to becoming in any way violent in verse 31.
It's like if you were to tell a child, 'Hey little Timmy, do not forget to say thank you to your teacher, and do not plot evil things against your teacher, and most certainly do no employ those evil things and then commit violence against your teacher'. That's what Solomon is doing here. He's giving us negative commands that build and escalate in importance and meaning.
So let's break that down, beginning with the wrongdoing of withholding help in verses 27-28. Solomon says,
‘Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it. 28 Do not say to your neighbor, “Go, and come again, tomorrow I will give it”—when you have it with you’.
This right here in verses 27 and 28 is covering what would be a sin of omission, which means you aren't doing something that you should be doing.
As followers of Jesus Christ, every opportunity of doing good is our call to do so.
It is. I like how Charles Bridges puts it. He says,
'Even if we have no legal debt to any, we have a Gospel debt to all'.
When you think of that, when you think of Gospel debt and what has been done for me and for you, when you think of what we as Christians believe and hold fast to, that Jesus Christ died on a cross for our sins and those who have repented and placed their faith in Him now have received forgiveness and newness of life and the Holy Spirit, should we not be the most generous people on the planet?
C’mon now. We 100% should.
Christians should be the most generous people on the planet.
I mean how could we not be? We have WAYYYY MORE to give than others do. And better yet we have WAYYYY MORE reason to give than others do. We have the gospel! That says it all right there. Every opportunity of doing good is our call to do so, and withholding good from others to those whom it is due is sin for the believer.
Now I don't want to skip over the second part of verse 27 which says 'when it is in your power to do it'...
Yes, we are most certainly called as believers to give at every opportunity, but the Bible is also clear that God does not ask His children to give what they don't have.
2 Corinthians 8:12 says,
'For if the readiness is there, it is acceptable according to what a person has, not according to what he does not have’.
God never asks us to give out of what we don't have, and He never will, but from what we do have, we're called by God to give abundantly, and to do so at earliest expense.
Look at the next verse, verse 28
‘Do not say to your neighbor, “Go, and come again, tomorrow I will give it”—when you have it with you’.
That word ‘tomorrow’ there, no matter the language, whether it is in English or Spanish, Hebrew or Aramaic, that word can be a means of infinite postponement. It's a diplomatic way to make an excuse, and boy are we good at making those. We've all said something along those lines as a means of saying no or excusing ourselves. 'Come back later', 'come again tomorrow', 'Hey ask me again tomorrow'…these are all things I've said before and you've probably said before and we both probably will say again at some point.
For me this verse reminds me of a common college student response to whether or not they can hang out, help with homework, or literally do anything, and that response is 'I'll let you know". Man whenever you get that response you can chalk it up as a no. They are NOT going to let you know. All that response means is that the person doesn't want to say no in person and would rather just wait to either say no over text or just hope you forget altogether.
And it's similar here with this verse.
Why would we postpone our ability to bless someone when we have the capabilities to do so?
Why make excuses when you can bless and give on the spot? Why delay doing good to a neighbor?
I think sometimes we delay doing good out of laziness and idleness, like we're tired and just don't want to get up from the couch to help someone out. Sometimes we delay doing good out of selfishness, like we don't want to quote on quote 'waste' 10 minutes of our day to go grab a meal for the homeless because we just don't have the time. So we say, 'Sorry I don't have any money on me' which is a total lie, one I must confess I'm guilty of here in the last two weeks. Sometimes we delay doing good from indifference, as in we just don't care about the person who desires and needs help. Sometimes it's a mix of those and others.
Whatever the reason may be for you, we all struggle with it; we struggle with doing good when we should.
But as an old saying goes 'he gives twice who gives quickly'.
I like that a lot.
He gives twice who gives quickly.
Ecclesiastes 8:5 says 'a wise man's heart discerns both time and judgment'.
That means wise people understand that blessing is not just found in its content, but also the timing of the delivery of that content. Not only does the blessing matter, but the timing of it does too. I never want you or me to miss out on God's timing because we're overly concerned with our own. Give to your neighbor when you can. Do not hesitate.
‘Do not say to your neighbor, “Go, and come again, tomorrow I will give it”—when you have it with you’.
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Now moving on to verses 29-30, Solomon escalates the wrongdoing against a neighbor from the withholding of help to the plotting of evil. He says,
‘Do not plan evil against your neighbor, who dwells trustingly beside you. 30 Do not contend with a man for no reason, when he has done you no harm’.
There's actually quite a bit we could unpack here, but for the sake of time I want to point out three quick things.
One, verse 29 says we ought not plan evil against our neighbor. Why? Because those who devise evil go astray.
Proverbs 14:22 says just that...‘Do they not go astray who devise evil? Those who devise good meet steadfast love and faithfulness.’.
That means not only do our actions matter, but our plans matter too.
So the question becomes, do your plans honor God?
Now the second thing I want to point out is the fact that your neighbor ‘dwells trustingly beside you’.
That shows us that community is built on trust. As one commentator puts it, ‘Trust is a central ingredient of community. And where that trust is betrayed by devising (or plotting) evil (harm) against a neighbor, no community is possible’.
If you grew up with siblings or if you've experienced life as a parent with kids, you know this to be true. Where the plotting of evil takes place in your house, no community among those living in it is possible. None. And that is true especially when (and this is the third thing I want to point out here), especially when your neighbor has done you no harm and you have no reason to contend with them.
Verse 30: ‘Do not contend with a man for no reason, when he has done you no harm’.
Verse 30 is a parallel to verse 29 and amplifies its meaning.
Why do we plot evil against our neighbor and contend with them for no reason? Because we love sin. That's the true answer.
We love sin and though we may not admit it verbally there's a part in all of us that loves the drama and entertainment that contention brings.
And that's why we watch the reality TV shows, that's why some of us stir the pot so to speak amongst others...it's because we love seeing hearing or speaking of potential evil and sowing seeds of contention amongst our neighbors. Something about the drama entertains us.
But here's the thing: I think a lot of us assume that those seeds of plotting evil and contention will not spring forth and produce anything because after all we weren't being serious or the show is just a show or whatever it might be, but Solomon shows us the inevitable fruit of evil and contentious seeds in the next verse, regardless of how they are sown, and that's violence.
Verse 31: ‘Do not envy a man of violence and do not choose any of his ways…’
This verse is in the center of our passage for a reason. It's our climax. This is the only verse with two 'Do not' commands, and they are there to emphatically warn us against emulating the violent person in even the smallest detail.
Now I think we gotta ask ourselves here: ‘What is there to envy in the oppressor? What is there to envy in a man of violence?’
Well, the love of control and the love of power are dominating and strong passions. And it seems to me to be quite easy to become a man of violence or to envy a person of violence when you begin down the slippery slope of withholding good from a neighbor, and then plotting evil against a neighbor. Naturally, what will come next from that, is violence done against a neighbor.
This is a hyperbolic example I'm about to give, but it serves its purpose. No one becomes a murderer overnight. That is a slow building process, one that certainly escalated again from the withholding of good to a neighbor, to the plotting of evil against a neighbor, until finally violence is executed against a neighbor.
So we are, as Solomon says at the end of verse 31, to '…not choose any of his ways'. We are to stay away from that person and that lifestyle in every way.
Not in some ways, but we are to avoid that lifestyle in every way.
Why?
Verse 32: ‘for the devious person is an abomination to the Lord, but the upright are in his confidence’.
Those who are devious in their ways are an abomination to the Lord...it doesn't get any worse that that. And those who are upright in their ways are in his confidence. Other translations say 'he shares his secret counsel with the upright'. In other words, the upright are in the inner circle with God. And it doesn't get any better than that. It doesn't.
And that leads us to verses 33-35, the antithetic summary of the whole chapter, where Solomon hammers home these truths we've talked about today and in the previous seven weeks by providing a contrast between our chosen conduct and the divine result.
Beginning in verse 33 he compares the chosen conduct of the wicked to the just, saying
‘The Lord's curse is on the house of the wicked, but he blesses the dwelling of the righteous’.
As one commentary explains, This verse here encourages and warns us that our actions affect more than just us. They affect our house, a symbol for life, protection, health, family. And so by the LORD's measure, we can either receive curse or blessing, depending upon our standing with Jesus, and whether or not we know Him. And that's important to note and something we forget so easily:
Where you stand with Jesus impacts others & your house, for better or for worse.
Now in verse 34 Solomon contrasts the scornful and the humble, saying
‘Toward the scorners he is scornful, but to the humble he gives favor’.
I love this verse as a stand alone. I've actually memorized it to combat pride in my own life. I did that because there is no sin, no heart posture, no attitude that the mind of God is more clear on, than that of pride.
Towards the scorners, toward the prideful, God shows Himself to be an enemy.
And nobody wants to be an enemy of God.
But toward the humble, God shows Himself to be a friend. Toward the humble gives favor.
Now lastly in verse 35, Solomon finishes this chapter and this summary by contrasting the wise and the fool, saying
‘The wise will inherit honor, but fools get disgrace’.
I love this here because this verse carries us toward eternity. Charles Bridges puts this verse into perspective so nicely when he says
'The difference between these two classes is not always shown to man's vision. But the day comes, when all shall 'discern' in the full light of eternity'.
We can't always see the difference between the wicked and righteous, we can't always discern the proud and the humble, we can't always tell who is wise and who is foolish, but there will come a day, the day of judgment, when the trueness of everyone's heart will be revealed.
And the promise is certain.
The wise will inherit honor, the humble will be given favor, the righteous dwelling will be blessed, whereas the house of wicked will be forever cursed, the scorners extended God's wrath, and the fools disgraced.
And that right there in verses 33-35, similar to chapter's one and two, is the antithetic summary, summing up the whole entire chapter.
I love you all. God bless.
