Proverbs 22:15 Commentary and Bible Study

The proverb teaches us about the state of all children that come into the world, all the descendants of Adam who as one man sin caused the fall of the human race. Every child comes into the world with a fallen nature, and although the form in which that expresses itself varies, it is present in all. So strong are the ties which we have to sin that Solomon describes foolishness or sin as being bound up in our hearts. This seems to be an impossible situation to deal with. We do not have any direct access to the heart, even as parents who know our children better than all others. How can we deal with something so inaccessible to us, and so much beyond our power to correct directly? How can we cure the heart of another human being, even that of our own child? Man has all sorts of theories about how to bring up children, but most of them assume that they are born with reasonable natures, able to choose freely between good and evil without a natural bias towards sin. This unrealism pervades the world’s assessment of its problems and again and again prevents a successful resolution to them.God has caused children to come into the world in a vulnerable state, greatly dependant on their parents for the basic needs of life, and needing to go through a large part of their early life under the authority and subject to the discipline of their parents. Parents are given a heavy responsibility to train up their children, but in spite of the difficulty of the task, they are not without means to accomplish it, means provided by God. In Genesis 19:19 the Lord says, ‘For I know him [Abraham], that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the LORD, to do justice and judgment; that the LORD may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him.’