Proverbs 8:28 Commentary and Bible Study

From the clouds come rain, the fountains of the deep, and the water systems, and the refreshing, the life-giving nature of the clouds. And once again, the wisdom of God is the real source of all certainty and all life, and all refreshment. Wisdom pre-dates the clouds, it made the clouds. Now everything that is in the word of God is fixed and unchanging, but divine wisdom includes the application of the word of God. And just as the clouds are often unpredictable and the weather changes constantly, we know by wisdom that there are whole areas of life that we will not understand. The providences of God are constantly changing and taking us by surprise. We cannot tame them, we cannot make events take the course we would like them to take, but we understand about them, just as with the weather. The weather does not do what you want it to do, but you know why it is doing it. You know that the clouds have come, the rain has fallen; you understand it perfectly well. There are some things which are not under our control, other things vary constantly. We know what causes them to happen, but we do not control them.‘When he strengthened the fountains of the deep.’ Those are the currents and the tides. Now, they are different from the clouds. The clouds are not fixed; they are different from day to day; they are never quite the same. But the tides follow their schemes and they follow fixed lines of activity, and they can be plotted. Human beings say we must understand the tides and then we can organise our ports and our shipping accordingly. We know when the tide is in and when it is out, when the ship has got to sail. So there is something we can plot, and we understand, and we can fit in with.