Proverbs 5:15-19, Keep to Your Own Cistern! (2)
February 29, Proverbs 5:15-19
1 Cor. 13; Col. 3:19 “Love is the fulfilling of the law” (Rom. 13:10).
Keep to Your Own Cistern! (2)
Don’t let the pride and privileges of home and family become a snare. Pastors too often see possessive parents and obstinate offspring. God will not bless selfishness or rebellion. When He gives the water He expects it to be dispersed abroad. “To keep all to yourself will defeat your own end; to hold it in will make it stagnate. The only way of keeping it sweet for ourselves is to let it run over for the good of others” (Arnot). Any family united in devotion to God, benefits both parents and children. When C.T. Studd announced he was going as a missionary to China, his mother, though a devout Christian, was distraught. She implored him not to go. When, however, she knew “CT” was settled in his decision, she withdrew her opposition and supported him warmly for the rest of her life.
- A Finality in Marriage: This verse is a summary of v.15, and underscores the blessings of the intimate love of a husband and wife as a God-ordained provision (v.18). Today, fatally, marriage is looked upon more as a business contract. As a result, God’ gift of sexuality is misused and misapplied, leading to a loss of the sanctity of marriage. Instead of a God-blessed finality in marriage, there is too often today, a sin-cursed fatality in marriage. The godly husband should rejoice with the wife of his youth whom he still finds “lovely” in every way. She is never lacking in beauty or duty as a wife. Let the husband regard her as God’s special gift. He should cherish her with tenderness and love (Gen. 24:67). For Christ’s sake, men are to love their wives, “with an affection so ardent, that other women, however beautiful, may appear in their presence like painted flowers” (Lawson). Only where marriages are in the Lord, where both partners submit to the Lord and each other, will this ideal finality be fully realised (Ecc. 9:9; Eph. 5:18f).
- A Felicity in Marriage: Here we catch the delicate language of Song of Songs. Let her be as a loving hind and a pleasant roe (v.19; Song. 2:9, 17). Such animals were used to illustrate the grace and charm of the young wife in movement and manners. The husband can always relax in her company after a busy day. Bridges quotes Bp. Davenant in a footnote: “Abroad man may consider himself as tossing on the waves; but at home with his wife, in repose, as in a desired haven.” Whenever anything interrupts the unity in this tender relationship, the door opens to temptation. The best defense against the strange woman and wandering affections is to maintain that first love. Satisfy means to saturate (Ps. 65:10). It is a figure of how God blesses, satisfies, pours water on languishing souls, like a well-watered garden (Jer. 31:12, 25). Thus it gives a pleasing picture of man’s complete satisfaction with the wife of thy youth. Ravished or infatuated, literally means to reel, to be blessedly intoxicated over your wife. The margin gives a charming alternative: Err thou always in her love. That’s exactly it! Err on the side of loving your wife! How different this is from the sickly sentimentalism that too often passes for love today.
Thought: “Joy ceases to be joy when it ceases to be in the Lord” (Motyer).
Prayer: Holy Spirit, pour out Thy reviving waters on our languishing souls.