Proverbs 30:3 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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Proverbs 30:3

Comments

No one has properly learned wisdom who does not obey God. Wisdom that does not lead to obedience is a fiction, a fraud. It may have entered the mind but it has not entered the heart. It may have been tasted by the soul, but only as something pretty; it has not been embraced and allowed to take control of the heart. There has been some significant reservation which has preserved self intact, as the commanding authority in the soul. In Solomon’s case this was as a result of serious sin which handed him back to the power of his residual fallen nature. In this state he could honestly say that he had not learned wisdom, for there was currently no evidence of it in his life. The returning backslider must put himself in the position of one who really knows nothing. Anything that he might have taken credit for in his past Christian obedience must be disowned for he needs to come to the Lord all over again as one who can say, ‘Nothing in my hands I bring, only to thy cross I cling.’‘I have no knowledge of the Holy One’ – that, coming from one who is now contributing to Scripture, is a statement similar to Job’s: ‘therefore have I uttered that I understood not; things too wonderful for me, which I knew not’ (Job 42:3). The Lord’s thoughts are high above ours and he does not give account of his ways to us. We live in a world prepared by him which has in it provisions which go far beyond what we are aware of. He does not burden his creatures with a task that they are incapable of carrying out: the task of running his created universe, or even a small part of it. He gives us work which we can do and do with pleasure: the maintenance of a small ordered garden in the midst of a vast world. Yet Solomon means more than this; he means that sin has caused his mind to be darkened concerning even the moral attributes of God. God is holy and he demands that his people be holy also, and he sanctifies them through the experiences of life. But those who are backslidden have lost sight of this and think that they can continue in his favour however they choose to live.

Application

Left alone, I could not tell you anything about what it is to know God, and to be guided by him. Before conversion, what human being knows anything about God? What living man has ever investigated heaven, or known his work? The only way we can know anything about him or how we should live is by listening to him. If we were to ask questions such as, ‘Is there any hope for me?’, ‘How do I approach God?’, ‘Can God look with favour on such a one as me?’, then we cannot answer from our own imaginations. The answers must come from heaven, out of God’s own mouth, otherwise what value would they have, and why should we trust them.

The realisation that God is so much higher than they understood causes the soul to be shocked, and shows them the great distance between the sinner and God. How can that gulf ever be crossed? Only by the Lord condescending to come down to us and carry us back into glory. The returning backslider must make no claims for himself other than that he deserves nothing from the Lord. This is what qualifies him to call on the name of the Lord.

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Proverbs 30:3 Commentary and Bible Study