1.
My son, attend unto my wisdom, and bow thine ear to my understanding:
2.
That thou mayest regard discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge.
3.
For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil:
4.
But her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a twoedged sword.
5.
Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell.
6.
Lest thou shouldest ponder the path of life, her ways are moveable, that thou canst not know them.
LIFE’S LEVEL PATH
‘The level path of life … He maketh level all his paths.’
Proverbs 5:6; Proverbs 5:21 (R.V.).
I. It is a remarkable expression—‘the level path of life’; and there is great comfort in knowing that God is ever before us, levelling our pathway, taking insurmountable obstacles out of the way, so that our feet do not stumble.
II. It may be that you are facing a great mountain range of difficulty.—Before you obstacles, apparently insuperable, rear themselves like a giant wall to heaven. When you cross the Jordan there is also a Jericho, which appears to bar all further advance, and your heart fails. But you are bidden to believe that there is a level path right through those mighty barriers; a pass, as it is called. The walking there is easy and pleasant if only you will let yourself be led to it. God has made it, but you must find it. How we dread the thought of those steep cliffs! It seems as though we could never climb them; but if we would only look at the Lord instead of at the hills, if we would look above the hills to Jehovah, we should be able to rest in sure faith that He would show us the level path of life.
III. Your path is not level, but full of boulders, which have rolled down upon and choked it.—But may this not be partly due to your mistakes or sins, to your wilfulness and self-dependence? There are sorrows and trials in all lives, but these need not obstruct our progress. The text surely refers to those difficulties which threaten us with their arrest, putting barriers in our way. These would be levelled if we gave the direction of our lives more absolutely into God’s hands. When Peter reached the iron gate he found it open; when the women reached the sepulchre door they found the stone gone.
Illustration
‘The stability of a country depends wholly upon its home-life. So long as the homes are pure and God-fearing, it is impossible that its freedom or influence should be permanently obscured. Our strength is not in our arms, or ships, but in the purity of our manners, the elevation of the domestic ideal. Hence this book, which is the vade-mecum of a strong, sweet life, is so emphatic in denouncing impurity. Oh, that young men would lay this chapter to heart!’
7.
Hear me now therefore, O ye children, and depart not from the words of my mouth.
8.
Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house:
9.
Lest thou give thine honour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel:
10.
Lest strangers be filled with thy wealth; and thy labours be in the house of a stranger;
11.
And thou mourn at the last, when thy flesh and thy body are consumed,
12.
And say, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof;
13.
And have not obeyed the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to them that instructed me!
14.
I was almost in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly.
15.
Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well.
16.
Let thy fountains be dispersed abroad, and rivers of waters in the streets.
17.
Let them be only thine own, and not strangers' with thee.
18.
Let thy fountain be blessed: and rejoice with the wife of thy youth.
19.
Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant roe; let her breasts satisfy thee at all times; and be thou ravished always with her love.
20.
And why wilt thou, my son, be ravished with a strange woman, and embrace the bosom of a stranger?
21.
For the ways of man are before the eyes of the LORD, and he pondereth all his goings.
LIFE’S LEVEL PATH
‘The level path of life … He maketh level all his paths.’
Proverbs 5:6; Proverbs 5:21 (R.V.).
I. It is a remarkable expression—‘the level path of life’; and there is great comfort in knowing that God is ever before us, levelling our pathway, taking insurmountable obstacles out of the way, so that our feet do not stumble.
II. It may be that you are facing a great mountain range of difficulty.—Before you obstacles, apparently insuperable, rear themselves like a giant wall to heaven. When you cross the Jordan there is also a Jericho, which appears to bar all further advance, and your heart fails. But you are bidden to believe that there is a level path right through those mighty barriers; a pass, as it is called. The walking there is easy and pleasant if only you will let yourself be led to it. God has made it, but you must find it. How we dread the thought of those steep cliffs! It seems as though we could never climb them; but if we would only look at the Lord instead of at the hills, if we would look above the hills to Jehovah, we should be able to rest in sure faith that He would show us the level path of life.
III. Your path is not level, but full of boulders, which have rolled down upon and choked it.—But may this not be partly due to your mistakes or sins, to your wilfulness and self-dependence? There are sorrows and trials in all lives, but these need not obstruct our progress. The text surely refers to those difficulties which threaten us with their arrest, putting barriers in our way. These would be levelled if we gave the direction of our lives more absolutely into God’s hands. When Peter reached the iron gate he found it open; when the women reached the sepulchre door they found the stone gone.
Illustration
‘The stability of a country depends wholly upon its home-life. So long as the homes are pure and God-fearing, it is impossible that its freedom or influence should be permanently obscured. Our strength is not in our arms, or ships, but in the purity of our manners, the elevation of the domestic ideal. Hence this book, which is the vade-mecum of a strong, sweet life, is so emphatic in denouncing impurity. Oh, that young men would lay this chapter to heart!’
22.
His own iniquities shall take the wicked himself, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sins.
23.
He shall die without instruction; and in the greatness of his folly he shall go astray.