Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no one regarded;
Through the first chapter of Proverbs, Wisdom has been calling out in public. Here the tone changes. Wisdom now speaks to people who heard that call and did nothing. What happens when a call this patient gets no answer at all?
The one speaking here is not an idea or a rule for living.
Wisdom now speaks, and wisdom in this first section of Proverbs is a person, a divine person. The eighth chapter gives us a wonderful vision of that Person, the Son of God, who is the Wisdom. First stands the call of Wisdom. The call may be answered or rejected.
Wisdom does not call in private.
Wisdom speaks with the authority of God, and she speaks aloud. In the ways of God there is a public warning and call to sinners, which wisdom sends out among them. She cries outside, in the street where people gather — to the simple and to the scorner, to the guilty but misled and to the open, insulting enemy. She calls them to turn at her reproof.
"Refused" sounds like a loud, deliberate no. One writer shows that God uses the word for something far quieter and far more common.
"Refused" is the word the blessed God uses to describe the way man treats His call. This refusal does not always take the same shape or form, but refusal it is. Sometimes, in plain words, it is an open admission of dislike for the subject at all costs. Very often it is a kind of indifference. Most often it is putting the matter off, promising itself a more convenient season — a season, let me add, which in most cases never comes. But whatever its character, it all ranks in God's eyes as refusal.
A stretched-out hand is the posture of someone pleading. God held His out for a very long time.
The whole Old Testament bears witness to the truth of verse 24. God has certainly pleaded with mankind for centuries. If we had been in God's place, would we have been so patient in continuing to plead with rebels? So we can well understand why, because men have disbelieved all His counsel and refused His rebukes, He declares, "I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when terror strikes you" (v. 26). What else can we expect in such a case?
God still pleads, and not only through preaching.
The call of God is sent out through many channels. Did He not speak to you by your recent sorrow? Has that recent suffering of yours nothing of God's voice in it? Is there not a voice in your own conscience at this moment? It tells you that if you died now you would be lost for ever. Be sure of this, reader: God has not left Himself without plenty of witness to the patient, long-suffering character of His grace.
Verses 24 and 28 belong together. The roles swap: the people who ignored God's call become the ones calling.
When God calls for mourning and you are deaf, when you call for mercy God may be silent (Prov. 1:24, 28). God may take the later time to judge you because you did not take the earlier time to repent in. Though true mourning for sin is never too late, late mourning is seldom true.
Why does that later cry get no answer?
In the day of desolation and judgment they will call, but there is no answer. They may fear the judgment, but there was no love, no submission to the truth. They will eat the fruit of their own ways. The ease, prosperity and carelessness they have lived in will be their ruin.
How far does this judgment reach? One writer answers by pointing to the kind of book Proverbs is.
What makes this passage so very solemn is that it is the close, the finish, as we say. This is very serious indeed. The book of Proverbs deals with the government of God on the earth. So the judgment here, though it comes from God and is final, does not go beyond judgment in this world. Here God deals with man in this world, and holds him responsible.
- The Caller. The voice in this verse is a person. Commentators identify Wisdom here as the Son of God, who calls out in the street to the simple and the scorner alike.
- The call. It comes through many channels: a recent sorrow, a present pain, or a conscience that warns you where you would be if you died tonight.
- The patience. God has held out His hand to rebels for centuries. Ask yourself whether you would have kept pleading that long.
- The refusal. Open dislike, quiet indifference and "later" all count as refusal before God. The convenient season rarely comes.
- The reversal. Deaf when God calls, you may find Him silent when you call. He takes the later time to judge because you would not take the earlier time to repent.
and ye have rejected all my counsel, and would none of my reproof
Wisdom has just cried out in the open streets. She offered her Spirit and her words to anyone who would turn at her reproof. This verse records the answer she got. So who is speaking here? And what does God do when people brush His warnings aside?
The counsel being ignored here is not human advice. Commentators point to a far greater speaker.
Wisdom now speaks, and wisdom in this first section of Proverbs is a person, a divine person. The eighth chapter gives us a wonderful vision of that Person, the Son of God, who is the Wisdom. First stands the call of Wisdom. The call may be answered or rejected.
The refusal in this verse answers a public summons. It reached everyone in earshot — the naive and the hostile alike.
Wisdom speaks aloud, with the authority of God. This is an important principle about the results of sin. We have seen the care of parents to keep the young from evil. But in the ways of God there is another testimony — the public warning and call to sinners that wisdom sends out among them. She cries out in the crowd of people. She speaks to the simple and to the scorner, to the guilty but misled and to the open, insulting enemy. She calls them all to turn at her reproof.
The rebuke that was refused came with a promise attached. One thing was asked: turn.
Then the Lord tells them plainly to turn at His reproof (v. 23). Turning involves real repentance, for it means a radical change of mind. When this really happens in the soul, God promises to pour out His Spirit and to make His words known.
So what they turn down is not a scolding. It is a gift.
The verses right after this one are hard: Wisdom answers scorn with mockery. Commentators explain that this is a picture, and that timing is everything.
So they would reap the fruit of the folly they had sown, under the government of God that repays people in this world. In their fear and trouble they would call on Wisdom to guide them. But they would not be heard. It would then be too late to learn Wisdom's ways. Wisdom would then laugh at them, so to speak (it is a figure of speech), for what they were suffering. They had set at nothing Wisdom's counsel and reproof, when she cried to them to learn her ways.
Another writer weighs that mockery against how long God's calling went on.
The whole Old Testament bears witness to the truth of verse 24… God has pled with mankind for centuries. If we had been in God's place, would we have kept pleading with rebels so patiently? Men have disbelieved all His counsel and refused His rebukes. So we can well understand why He declares, "I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when terror strikes you" (v. 26).
So which judgment does this refusal lead to? One writer draws a careful line.
What is shown here is not the gospel. It is the call of God in His government of man on the earth. So it does not go beyond the judgment that will be carried out in the day that is coming here below… He did come as the Son of man in grace to the lost. He will surely return as the Son of man, in judgment of all who despise Him, whether alive or dead.
Later in the chapter these same people do call out. God does not answer — and not because He refuses to hear a broken heart. One king shows why.
It was the pressure of despair that wrung a useless cry to the Lord out of Saul's heart. There was no real turning to Him — and He never shuts out the most despairing cry from a soul that is truly broken. All help was gone. In his fear he asks the Lord whom he had made a habit of disobeying and neglecting. Many others since have done the same, and like him have sunk deeper into the swamp of despair.
Wanting rescue is not the same as wanting God.
The warning is meant to move people now, while Wisdom is still calling.
True, the grace of God has no limit. But the day of grace is wearing to its end. For long centuries the sunlight of grace has shone on this guilty world. Now the shadows lengthen and the night draws on.
- Called — the voice refused is Wisdom's: a divine person, calling out in the street to the naive and the scornful alike.
- Offered — the reproof came with a promise: turn, and God pours out His Spirit and makes His words known.
- Refused — ignoring counsel is not neutral. It turns down a gift, after centuries of patient pleading.
- Answered — Wisdom's laughter is a picture of the moment when it is too late to learn her ways. A cry squeezed out by fear alone, like Saul's, is not repentance.
- Open — the shadows lengthen, but the call still sounds today; the door has not yet shut.
I also will laugh in your calamity, I will mock when your fear cometh;
Wisdom has stood in the street and called out loud, and the answer has been a shrug. Verse 26 is her reply. The picture of God laughing at human ruin is one of the hardest lines in the whole book.
Does this verse mean God enjoys punishing people? The answer below starts with who is speaking, and shows why the laugh comes too late.
In this passage it is "Wisdom" who speaks, crying in the streets to the simple, the scorner, and the fool. She calls them to turn at her reproof and to stop loving their own ways, and promises them her spirit and her words. So when they were reaping the fruits of the folly they had sown, under God's government that repays men in this world, they would call on Wisdom to guide them in their fear and calamity. But she would not hear them. It would then be too late to learn Wisdom's ways. Wisdom would then laugh at them, so to speak — it is a figure of speech — for what they were suffering. They had set at nothing her counsel and her reproof when she cried to them to learn her ways.
The laugh answers something. Verse 24 names it, and refusal takes quieter forms than we expect.
Refused is the word the blessed God uses to describe the way man treats His call. This refusal does not always take the same shape or form, but refusal it is. Sometimes it is an open admission of dislike for the subject at any cost. Very often it is a kind of indifference. Most often it is putting things off, promising itself a more convenient season — a season, let me add, which in most cases never comes. But whatever its character, it all ranks in God's eyes as refusal.
Proverbs is not describing hell here. It describes how God runs the world now.
The Book of Proverbs refers to the government of God here on earth, on the principle that "whatever one sows, that will he also reap" (Gal. 6:7). This is true of saint or sinner. Grace saves the vilest, but the government of God is over all... The grace of God in salvation never sets aside these principles of His dealings with men... A true Christian may do something for want of discretion, and for want of listening to Wisdom's words, which he may have to repent of all his days.
What makes the verse heavy is not its reach into eternity. It is the end of the road.
What makes this passage so very solemn is that it is the close, the finish, as we say... The judgment here, though of God, and final, does not go beyond judgment in this world. It is man in this world, dealt with in his responsibility.
Verse 26 does not arrive early. It comes after centuries of calling.
All the Old Testament bears witness to the truth of verse 24. God says there, "Because I have called and you refused, I have stretched out my hand and no one has heeded." He has pleaded with mankind for centuries. If we had been in God's place, would we have been so patient in continuing to plead with rebels? Men have disbelieved all His counsel and refused His rebukes. We may well understand, then, why He declares, "I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when terror strikes you." What else can we expect under such circumstances?
God has said plainly how He feels about judgment.
It is not because judgment is His delight... "As I live, declares the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live." ... Where He foretells those judgments in the most solemn terms, He speaks of rising "that he may do his deed — strange is his deed! — and to work his work — alien is his work!"
Two fears are in view here, and only one of them is the fear of the Lord.
How terrible when the Lord, patient and long-suffering, laughs at the calamity of those who despised Him! He mocks the fears, distress, and anguish of those who mocked Him. He has no answer when they call, and they will not find Him, though they search hard for Him then. To fear the judgment, above all when it falls, is not to fear the Lord.
- Call. Wisdom cries in the street to the simple, the scorner, and the fool. Verse 26 answers a call they had already turned down.
- Refusal. Open dislike, quiet indifference, and "a more convenient season" all count as one thing with God: refusal.
- Harvest. Proverbs works by God's government on earth: a man reaps what he sows, and grace saves without cancelling that.
- Laughter. The laugh is a figure of speech for a call answered too late, not delight in ruin. God calls judgment His strange deed, and says He has no pleasure in the death of the wicked.
- Now. Fearing the judgment when it lands is not the fear of the Lord. That fear has to come first, before the terror.
when your fear cometh as sudden destruction, and your calamity cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish come upon you
This verse pictures weather no one can argue with — a storm that comes on its own schedule and a whirlwind that leaves nothing standing. It ends a speech in which God called and people refused, and it raises a hard question: can a call be turned down until it stops coming?
Commentators say this storm is not the last judgment at the end of all things.
Here it is not the gospel which is thus shown, but the call of God in the government of man on the earth. So it does not go beyond the judgment which will be carried out in the day that is coming here below. This is all the more important to heed. Christ will surely bring the judgment of the living on the inhabited world. Christendom does not believe it, just as the Jews did not believe in the judgment of the dead in the resurrection state.
Yet the words still land with finality.
What makes this passage so very solemn is that it is the close, the finish, as we say. This is very serious indeed. It is man in this world, dealt with in his responsibility.
The storm is not the opening move. It answers a call that arrived through more doors than most people notice.
The call of God is sent out through many channels. Did He not speak to you through your recent sorrow? Has that suffering of yours nothing of God's voice in it? Is there not in your very conscience, at this moment, a voice that tells you that if you were now to die you would be lost forever? Be assured, reader, God has not left Himself without abundant witness to the patient, long-suffering character of His grace.
Writers note that refusal often does not look like refusal.
This refusal does not always take the same shape or form, but refusal it is. Sometimes, in so many words, it is an open statement of dislike for the subject at all costs. Very often it is indifference. Most often it is putting it off, promising oneself a more convenient season — a season, let me add, which in most cases never comes. But whatever the character of it, it all counts in God's eyes as refusal.
Many read the long silence between the call and the storm as proof that nothing is coming.
God has been patient for so long that men mistake it for indifference. They think He will never bring His judgment against evil. But for this very reason, the judgment will be more dreadful and severe when it comes.
The verse says fear will come. Writers say this fear is not the fear of the Lord.
How terrible when the Lord, patient and long-suffering, laughs at the calamity of those who despised Him! He mocks the fears, distress, and anguish of those who mocked Him. He gives no answer to their call, and they will not find Him, though they search hard for Him then. To fear the judgment, especially when it falls, is not to fear the Lord.
The difference shows in what the frightened heart asks for.
Certainly, if their change was one of honest repentance, God would answer. But calling only because of fear of judgment is not repentance. People often want deliverance, with no acknowledgement of guilt.
One writer traces the ruin back to the comfortable years before the storm.
They may fear the judgment, but there was no love, no submission to the truth; they will eat the fruit of their own ways. The ease and prosperity and carelessness they have been in will be their ruin.
The same chapter that ends in a whirlwind began with an offer, and the offer is what the writers press.
Terror will come like a storm, and destruction like a whirlwind, bringing such distress and anguish as has never been known before. How foolish indeed is the pride of man that is determined to keep hardening himself against the faithful appeals of his Creator! On the other hand, what a mercy it is that God works in the hearts of some! He moves them to bow to His Word and to receive the salvation He offers freely to all mankind.
- Called. God speaks through sorrow, suffering and conscience, so no one can say He never spoke to them.
- Refused. Refusal often looks like indifference or delay — a convenient season that never comes. God counts all of it as refusal.
- Mistaken. People read the long wait as God's indifference. Writers call it patience, and say the delay makes the judgment heavier, not lighter.
- Exposed. The ease, prosperity and carelessness that felt like safety turn out to be the ruin itself.
- Too late. Fear of judgment is not the fear of the Lord. Wanting rescue without owning guilt is not repentance, and that cry goes unanswered.
-- then will they call upon me, but I will not answer; they will seek me early, and shall not find me.
Wisdom has been calling out in the open street, and here she describes the day when the roles reverse: those who refused her now call, and hear nothing. Commentators ask two questions — which judgment is in view, and why God would ever leave a cry unanswered.
Before this verse comes a long public appeal to anyone who would listen. One writer traces the path from that open call to this closed door.
Wisdom speaks aloud, and with the authority of God: "she utters her voice in the streets." This is an important principle about the results of sin. We have seen the parental care that guards the young from evil. But in the ways of God there is another testimony — the public warning and call to sinners that wisdom sends out among them... But it is in vain. So, in the day of desolation and judgment, they will call, but there is no answer. They may fear the judgment, but there was no love, no submission to the truth; they will eat the fruit of their own ways.
The verse does not say God refuses a repentant heart. One commentator finds the difference in what drives the cry.
The judgment will be so dreadful and arresting that people will then turn to call on the Lord (v. 28). But however hard they seek, they will not find Him. If their change were honest repentance, God would answer. But calling out only from fear of judgment is not repentance. People often want deliverance without admitting guilt. Verse 29 hints at this: "Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord."
Seeking hard is no guarantee of finding. One writer sets this unanswered cry beside all the calls that came before it.
The Word of God of old, all His Word, is good, and in it He calls man to hear; but He is refused. He held out His hand and pleaded, but no one paid attention. They rejected His counsel, and His reproof too. What remained possible under the law? Unsparing judgment. How terrible it is when the Lord, patient and long-suffering, laughs at the disaster of those who despised Him! He mocks the fears, distress, and anguish of those who mocked Him. He has no answer for their call, and they will not find Him, however hard they now seek Him. To fear the judgment, especially when it falls, is not to fear the Lord.
The passage pictures Wisdom laughing at people in trouble. One writer explains who is speaking, and what that laughter is.
In the passage it is "Wisdom" who speaks. She cries out in the streets to the simple, the scorner, and the fool. She tells them to turn at her reproof and not to love their own ways, and says that Wisdom's spirit would be given them, and Wisdom's words made known to them... So they would reap the fruits of the folly they had sown, under the government of God that repays people in this world. In their fear and trouble they would call on Wisdom to guide them, but Wisdom would not hear them. It would then be too late to learn Wisdom's ways. Wisdom would then laugh at them, as it were (it is a figure of speech), for what they were suffering.
Proverbs works on one principle that covers saint and sinner alike. The same writer states it.
The Book of Proverbs refers to the government of God here below, on the principle that "whatever one sows, that will he also reap" (Gal. 6:7). This is true of saint or sinner. Grace saves the vilest, but the government of God is over all... The grace of God in salvation never sets aside these principles of His dealings with men.
Since the door in this verse closes, the weight of it falls on today.
An unrighteous man can turn from his unrighteousness at the end of his days, like the thief on the cross, and die the death of the righteous. But such cases are rare. Wisdom calls the sinner to seek the Lord while He may be found. And we are told, "Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation."
- Called — Wisdom's warning is public. She pleads in the street with anyone who will hear. The silence in this verse follows a long history of refused calls.
- Refused — They turned down not information but reproof. They hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord.
- Crying — The later call is real, but it comes from fear of judgment, not repentance. Wanting rescue without admitting guilt is not turning to God.
- Unanswered — Seeking hard is not the same as seeking in time; to fear judgment when it falls is not to fear the Lord.
- Reaping — Proverbs rests on God's government of this world, where a man reaps what he sows. So the time to seek Him is now, while He may be found.
Because they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of Jehovah;
Wisdom has been calling out in the streets. This verse gives the reason for her later silence: the people who cry out under disaster were never ignorant, and their refusal was a deliberate choice.
The knowledge in view is not general learning. The writers draw a sharp line between not knowing and refusing to know.
God's compassion never fails toward the ignorant, as long as the ignorance is not deliberate. His hatred is just as strong toward those who hate knowledge in the things of God, and that is of course the only knowledge in view here. And what could be plainer or sadder than to not choose the fear of the LORD? It proves that the heart is hostile to Him.
Wisdom's earlier appeal named three kinds of careless people, and those who hate knowledge come last.
There is a climax in these classes of careless, godless souls. The simple are the many weak ones who have no moral discernment and no aim in life. Evil meets them on every side and at every turn, and their easy indifference makes them a prey. The scorners show a more active corruption. They reject every appeal to conscience and every mention of divine things with rude jokes and insolent sneers. It is a moral disease that keeps growing, and it was never so widespread as in these last days. The fools who hate knowledge may be more godless still, and may become open atheists, as Scripture shows.
The book opened by naming the fear of the LORD as the starting point of knowledge. Refusing it is refusing the one thing that makes real knowledge possible.
Verse 7 contains the keynote to the entire book. The word "fear" means a godly fear, reverence. This fear of the Lord is mentioned fourteen times in Proverbs. This childlike reverence is sadly lacking among the young of our day. It is the beginning of knowledge, and there is no true knowledge apart from the fear of the Lord. It means to acknowledge the Lord, to adore and worship Him. It means to bow in faith to what He has revealed and to put it above everything else.
One writer pictures what holds everything else in place.
"The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge" — not of wisdom, but of knowledge. That is a weighty sentence. All true knowledge, all moral knowledge, begins by putting God in His own place. Nothing is right or true without that. Leave Him out, and every position and relationship becomes false… Each stone has its own place in the arch, but if the keystone is missing, none of them can keep theirs.
Verse 28 says they will seek and not find. This verse explains it: the cry is driven by terror, not by a changed mind.
The judgment will be so dreadful and arresting that people will then turn to call on the Lord (v. 28), but however hard they search, they will not find Him. If their change were honest repentance, God would answer. Calling out only from fear of judgment is not repentance. People often want deliverance without admitting any guilt, and verse 29 points to this: "Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the LORD."
Another writer points to what was missing when wisdom first called.
Wisdom cries out; she lifts her voice in the street, in the crowd of men. She speaks to the simple and to the scorner, to the guilty but misled and to the open, insulting enemy. She calls them to turn at her reproof… But it is in vain. So when the day of desolation and judgment comes and they call, there is no answer. They may fear the judgment, but there was no love and no submission to the truth. They will eat the fruit of their own ways. The ease, prosperity and carelessness they have lived in will be their ruin.
The chapter is not only a warning. One writer sets God's mercy beside the pride that refuses Him.
How foolish is the pride of man, set on hardening himself against the faithful appeals of his Creator! On the other hand, what a mercy it is that God works in the hearts of some! He moves them to bow to His Word and to receive the salvation He freely offers to all mankind.
- Call — Wisdom cries out in the streets to the simple, the scorner and the enemy alike. The refusal in this verse follows a public appeal that no one could miss.
- Choice — The wording is deliberate. They did not simply miss the fear of the LORD. They did not choose it, and that refusal proves the heart is hostile to God.
- Keystone — The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge. Leave God out, and every other relationship goes false, like an arch missing its keystone.
- Cry — This verse explains the unanswered cry of verse 28. Fear of judgment without any admission of guilt is not repentance.
- Mercy — God still works in some hearts. He moves them to bow to His Word and to receive the salvation He freely offers to all.
they would none of my counsel, they despised all my reproof
Wisdom has been calling out in this chapter, and verse 30 gives the reason judgment falls. These people were not ignorant. They pushed the counsel away and laughed at the reproof. So what becomes of a person who has nothing left but his own advice?
The "my" here belongs to Wisdom, who has been speaking since verse 20. One writer shows how that voice grows too large for a figure of speech.
It is a mark of this book, and it fits its contents exactly, that we meet "wisdom" as a person from the first chapter. She rises (as is well known) to the Person of Christ in Proverbs 8:22-31. Even in this first introduction the cry does not fail. It goes on to take the solemnity of a divine warning of certain judgment. So it is hard to separate it from the voice of God Himself, as in verse 24 if not in 23, and in those that follow.
Verse 29 comes first: they hated knowledge. Verse 30 is what follows. One writer links this to people who call on God only when judgment is at the door.
People often want deliverance, but they never admit their guilt. Verse 29 hints at this: "Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the Lord." Those who form their character this way will never reverse their attitude and judge themselves for their sinful folly. They totally refused all God's counsel and despised His every rebuke (v. 30).
Nobody drifts into this. It is a choice, and the choice shows what is in the heart.
Divine compassion is unfailing for the ignorant where it is not wilful. His abhorrence of those who hate knowledge in the things of God is just as severe. And what can be more sadly plain than that they "did not choose the fear of the Lord"? It proves the enmity of the heart.
Solomon's readers had the word of God. Later readers have far more, and the same words describe them more exactly.
Christ has shed better and perfect light, and the final revelation of God is fullness of grace and truth through Him. But what is the outcome of slighting it and Him? It is more clearly true now than in Solomon's time that they "would have none of my counsel and despised all my reproof." When God came into the world in Christ's Person, they turned Him out of it. They hated Him without a cause. His grace only made Him more contemptible in their eyes. His counsel irritated. His reproof was a laughingstock. What will the end be?
One writer finds the same refusal in the leaders who heard John the Baptist preach.
When John the Baptist preached to Israel, the divine counsel through him was "repent and be baptized for the forgiveness of sins," but "the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected the purpose of God for themselves, not having been baptized by him" (Luke 7:30). Had they accepted the counsel of God, it would have meant blessing for them, as it did for those who were baptized, for repentance and confession of sin is the way into divine blessing.
Verse 31 gives the sentence. It is not so much an outside punishment as the harvest of the choice in verse 30.
They cannot escape the consequences. "They shall eat the fruit of their own way, and be filled with their own fancies." The very fact of their attitude and actions comes back on their own heads to slay them.
Israel's history shows the same pattern. One writer names the saddest thing that can happen to a person.
Israel fell away, sad to say, as the Lord now reminds them: "My people did not listen to Me; and Israel would have none of Me." It was not merely failure: it was revolt. The recompense had to follow: "So I gave them over to the stubbornness of their hearts, and they walked in their own counsels." Nothing sadder can happen to men than this.
One writer describes the man who does the opposite of verse 30.
It remains true, that he who hears reproof gets sense; and he who gets sense loves his own soul. The other word that goes with this is of great value — "he who keeps understanding shall find good," and good better than silver or gold. It is well to get, and better still to keep, what is so excellent.
- Whose voice. This is not human advice. Wisdom's cry grows into a divine warning, hard to separate from God's own voice.
- Whose choice. God's compassion never fails the ignorant. But this is not ignorance. Refusing His counsel is deliberate, and it proves the enmity of the heart.
- Whose Person. Reject the counsel and you reject the One who gives it. When God came in Christ, His counsel irritated them and His reproof made them laugh.
- Whose harvest. The punishment is the choice, grown ripe. People eat the fruit of their own way, and God leaves them to walk in their own counsels.
- Whose gain. The door stands open the other way. Whoever hears reproof gains sense, and whoever keeps understanding finds good better than silver or gold.
therefore shall they eat of the fruit of their way, and be filled with their own devices.
This verse is where a long warning turns into a verdict. God invents no new punishment. People are simply handed what they chose, in full measure. Can anyone want their own way and escape it?
The word "therefore" points back to a settled disposition, not a single slip. One writer traces it to a refusal that runs so deep that even the terror of judgment cannot break it.
The judgment will be so dreadful and arresting that people will then turn to call on the Lord (v. 28). But however hard they search, they will not find Him. If their change were honest repentance, God would answer. Calling out only from fear of judgment is not repentance. People often want deliverance, but with no acknowledgement of guilt… Those who form their character this way will never turn around and judge themselves for their sinful folly. They completely refused all God's counsel and despised His every rebuke (v. 30).
Eating fruit is a farming picture: a crop answers to a seed. William Kelly warns that no one mocks God and gets away with it, and that delay is not escape.
The Lord is not mocked without consequence. "Therefore they shall eat the fruit of their way, and have their fill of their own devices." Sowing to the flesh must be reaping destruction. He does not execute judgment as yet; but it will come surely and soon.
God brings in no outside weapon. Their own attitude is the instrument.
They must suffer the consequences. Their own attitude and actions come back on their own heads to kill them. Their own foolish complacency destroys them.
To be "filled" sounds like a reward until you ask what fills them. One writer puts this filling in the same class as the filling of the lost.
A person may hunger after the world and not be filled; the world is fading, not filling. A person may be filled and not satisfied. A sinner may take his fill of sin, but that is far from satisfaction: "The backslider in heart shall be filled with his own ways" (Prov. 14:14). This is the same kind of filling the damned in hell have. They will be full of the fury of the Lord. But the one who hungers after righteousness will be filled and satisfied.
This is not only a future sentence. Another writer sees the same eating going on now, wherever people push God out — and the fruit can taste good.
Whenever and wherever people abandon the truth of God, degradation of every kind follows. Only the truth of God can restrain evil… People eat the fruit of their own ways. Sometimes it is pleasant to the taste of a corrupted nature, but divine and eternal judgment lies at the end. The very lusts that rule and torment the slaves of sin are, in a sense, the pledge and token of God's wrath.
One writer aims these words at people today. The Saviour they shut out still waits at their door, and the outcome of keeping it shut has not changed.
He is knocking, and He will keep knocking until the day of grace runs out. How sad for those who reject such grace and keep their door locked and barred against the waiting Saviour. Grace rejected must end in judgment carried out. They reject Christ, and Christ will cast them out. Then they will prove the dreadful seriousness of those words that cannot be taken back.
- Refusal. The verse begins with "therefore" because the story began earlier. They hated knowledge and refused counsel. Crying out later from fear of judgment is not repentance.
- Sowing. What follows is a harvest, not a random blow. Sowing to the flesh reaps destruction. God's patience in delaying judgment is not permission.
- Self-made. God needs no outside weapon. Their own way comes back on their own heads, and their own complacency does the destroying.
- Filled. They get what they wanted, in full measure, and it never satisfies. The world is fading, not filling. Only those who hunger after righteousness are filled and satisfied.
- Now. The eating has already begun wherever people push God out. The fruit is pleasant to a corrupted taste. The appetite that torments them is the token of what waits at the end. Grace refused ends in judgment carried out — which is why the door is still worth opening.