Proverbs 3:18 Commentary and Bible Study

Every believer in life, in a sense, is like a tree. You've got to go through seasons, there'll be times when your leaves are out, you're bearing fruit; you're a picture of health and happiness and prosperity, and there are other seasons when all the leaves will be shaken off the tree and you'll stand there stark in the cold. But a tree that has life in it. It can stand up to the times and seasons, there's always something prosperous about it, And wisdom alone gives this. The person who has insight and wisdom and can handle the spiritual knowledge he has, even when everything goes wrong around him, he can understand it, he can see what the Lord is doing, he can lay hold by faith on the Lord's goodness. He can look back and see how he's been through these seasons before, and what they added to him, and how he should conduct himself, what his attitude should be. He has the ability to handle the things he knows, and he is a lively tree, in spite of the winter, in spite of the seasons.The tree of life was taken from mankind at the time of his earliest rebellion, a tree so greatly to be desired. What does the tree of life mean? It is a figure of that which will cause to live for ever, spiritual life, eternal life, coming into our beings, relating us to God so that we live for ever. So this wisdom, this salvation, this knowledge that comes from God’s word, this conversion to Christ, this is a tree of life and it will bring eternal blessing. ‘She is a tree of life to them that lay hold upon her.’ Happily most of the modern versions follow the Authorised Version’s rendering. It is the only way to get hold of the Hebrew here - lay hold. It does not just mean take, it does not just mean appropriate, possess. The Hebrew word indicates some urgency, such as when perhaps a child is running away into the road, and about to be run over, and an anxious parent will run and leap towards the child, and lay hold on the child. Salvation comes not to those who coolly investigate without any feeling, or real sense of need, or any interest, not for those who in a superior spirit condescend to give the living God a try. There is eagerness here, a sense of exclusive reliance: I must get this fruit, or all is up with me.