I have understood these verses to mean that he/she who is too lazy to get out of bed will come to poverty. And I believe that to be true. Couch potatoes or bed dwellers (by choice) generally do not prosper with houses and lands; cars, boats or trucks either.
9 Lazybones! How long will you lie there in bed?When will you get up from your sleep?10 “I’ll just lie here a bit, rest a little longer,just fold my hands for a little more sleep” —11 and poverty comes marching in on you,scarcity hits you like an invading soldier.source
Yet there is another poverty that comes when we tap the snooze button again and again, morning after morning.
Poverty of Spirit.
When we love the bed (notwithstanding illnesses and much-needed resting feasts) more than we love fellowship with our Heavenly Father in prayer and in His Word, we are indeed poor. I say this because until recently I had become abundantly poor. Scarcity hits you like an invading soldier— indeed!
When we see His path for us as pleasant simply because it is HE that mapped it; that HE knows best for us and when we are content in our own skin, when we are content with our own heritage; then we are ready to walk WELL with JESUS. Then life is good, really good even when bitter things come our way.
2 My son, if you will receive my wordsand store my commands inside you,2 paying attention to wisdominclining your mind toward understanding —3 yes, if you will call for insightand raise your voice for discernment,4 if you seek it as you would silverand search for it as for hidden treasure —5 then you will understand the fear of Adonaiand find knowledge of God.
But before the then-s comes the if-s. Did you see them?
If we will receive the words of Wisdom; not only receive but actually store them; that means think on them after we have read them. Mediate on them. Keeping them handy. Right there on the desktop of our minds so we can pay attention to them as we navigate the day. As we do this we start to understand the goings on around us.
Verse 3. A Yes and an If.
If we call; if we raise our voices in prayer; if we ask for insight, if we ask for discernment into that situation that we are bummed out about, that one that we can’t make heads nor tails about; if we don’t let up, if we seek Wisdom, if we seek ABBA for this insight, this discernment like sale items on Black Friday THEN, then we will begin to understand this reverence for God we have heard about AND we will FIND the knowledge of the LORD we have been looking for.
And that’s only to verse 5. I invited you to read the rest of Proverbs 2. Look for If-s. Look for then-s. Look for Wisdom’s promises. Find them and rejoice that they are YOURS – IF and THEN.
Yep. There’s a dearth of then in the land.
ABBA, I am so sorry for my lack of then; thank You for Your great grace and forgiveness; I am here before You now for my If-s to turn to then-s in JESUS mighty name.
We are glad you are here; stay a while, look around, and be encouraged. We estimate there to be over 3,000 posts here at The White Stone Blog. Please know my hope is ALWAYS to help and NEVER harm. I have voiced many opinions and thoughts here since 2007 and by now I MAY NOT EVEN AGREE with all of them and some of my grammar and punctuation likely needs editing. But this is changeless: JESUS is our ONLY Savior and Hope. Do you KNOW Him?
