Proverbs 12:25 Commentary and Bible Study

It is good for a person to suffer anxiety at times, for it will goad him into action which avoids some evil that threatens him, but too much anxiety is not good. When anxiety settles on us and never leaves us, then it becomes a paralysing force within us. This settled state is particularly unsuitable for the believer who has every reason to be an optimist. It may be a failure of faith to embrace the wonderful future than God has promised because we are surrounded by present troubles. It is too easy to allow those troubles to grow out of all proportion and even to wallow in sorrow and derive some perverse satisfaction from it. The proverb warns us of the harmful effect of remaining too long in a state of anxiety. Some are prone to this state of mind more than others, and need to take deliberate steps to try to lift themselves out of it. They must pray often to the Lord for help and reflect on all the positive aspects of the Christian life. They must remember that it is easy to allow gloomy thoughts to become completely out of proportion and to expand beyond what is real, so that problems grow in our minds, and we fear things that will never happen. As a result we find ourselves fighting not against real hardships which the Lord allows into our lives, but against imagined hardships which are not real; this is a needless battle. The emphasis however is on the second half of the proverb. A good word has the power to lift a person out of this state of gloom and unreality. How so? It reaches down and lifts up the despondent soul by giving solid hope which it dares to take hold of. It breaks down the prison door of gloom and shows that God’s outcome takes account of all and makes up for all. It shows the sun breaking in on the darkness of depression, and convinces the downcast that there is solid ground of hope to stand on. It clarifies a confusing scene, and gives knowledge where the mind of the despairing was ready to faint with repeated failed attempts to understand. Only a mouth taught by God can truly deliver such a word.