Bill Fitzhenry's Thoughts For Today…

Reading through the 31 chapters of Proverbs each month can give us an understanding of how to serve God.

Proverbs 24:17-20 ESV

¹⁷ Do not rejoice when your enemy falls,
and let not your heart be glad when he stumbles,
¹⁸ lest the LORD see it and be displeased,
and turn away his anger from him.

¹⁹ Fret not yourself because of evildoers,
and be not envious of the wicked,
²⁰ for the evil man has no future;
the lamp of the wicked will be put out.

In these verses there are two extremes presented. Both are dispositions the believer must confess.

At one extreme is God’s refusal to let us take pleasure in His punishment of others. As we never have permission to exercise personal vengeance so this goes a step further. We are not to see His punishment as a personal favor over which we can rejoice.

This does not mean we cannot see the ill desserts of someone and expect justice will reveal this. This does not mean that we cannot rejoice in the justice. By the information available Bin Laden has had justice served upon him. But this is no cause to desire pictures of him to be shown in such a way that is like him being drug through the streets while his enemies rejoice.

Proverbs 24:18: This strange verse is explained as well as possible by Matthew Henry, “it will displease Him; as it will displease a prudent father to see one child triumph in the correction of another, which he ought to tremble at, and take warning by, not knowing how soon it may be his own case, he having so often deserved it….so the righteousness of God was never intended to gratify the wrath of man.”

Proverbs 24:19-20 are the other extreme from rejoicing over judgment. Here the problem of theodicy, the fretting or envy of the welfare of the wicked, is the subject. The Psalmist in Psalm 73 writes extensively about this and the conclusion is the same. The wicked lives with no future but judgment, and dies with no hope of a future.

If we understand this, their brief period of prosperity should never cause envy. The place of understanding is identified in Psalm 73:17 NKJ

¹⁷ Until I went into the sanctuary of God;
Then I understood their end.

Application:

1. The present condition of the wicked - whether ill or good - is not our concern.

2. Our present concern must be directed to personal holiness and service. These are sufficient to consume all of our time.