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Commentaries and Other Bible Study Helps - Prayer Tents - Prayer Tents
3:1-12 Third Paternal Appeal: Fear the Lord. The address to "my son" brackets these verses (vv. 1, 11), which consist of six sets of instruction. Each section includes a call to act in wisdom and the grounds for doing so (vv. 1-2, 3-4, 5-6, 7-8, 9-10, 11-12). As a whole, the appeal calls for living in light of the fear of the Lord in all respects: cultivation of faithfulness and humility (vv. 1, 3, 5-6a, 7), gratitude that treats the products of one's labors as a gift (v. 9), and willingness to submit to reproof (v. 11). Obeying this instruction brings favor and success before God and man (vv. 2, 4, 6b, 8, 10) so that one lives in light of the Lord's delight (v. 12).
3:3 steadfast love and faithfulness. These terms are used together in the Lord's self-declaration to Moses of his character in covenantal relationship (Ex. 34:6, "abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness"). In light of the appeals to trust (Prov. 3:5), fear (v. 7), and honor (v. 9) the Lord, the call here to bind them around your neck and write them on the tablet of your heart is best understood as encouragement to live faithfully to the covenant (see also 14:22; 16:6; 20:28) by heeding faithful parental instruction (cf. Ps. 25:10).
3:5-8 Subordinating one's own understanding to the Lord is in keeping with the major thesis of Proverbs, that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge (1:7).
3:5 Trust in the Lord is necessary for fulfilling any of the wise ways of life taught in Proverbs; trusting the Lord is closely connected to "fearing" him (cf. 1:7; 2:5; 9:10; 15:33; 19:23; etc.). With all your heart indicates that trust goes beyond intellectual assent to a deep reliance on the Lord, a settled confidence in his care and his faithfulness to his Word. Do not lean on your own understanding further explains trusting in the Lord. One's "understanding" in Proverbs is his perception of the right course of action. The wise will govern themselves by what the Lord himself declares, and will not set their own finite and often-mistaken understanding against his.
3:6 To make straight a person's paths means to make the course of the person's life one that continually progresses toward a goal. In Proverbs, the emphasis is on the moral quality of one's life path (here, its moral "straightness").
3:9-10 Honor the Lord. This requires giving proper weight to your wealth by using it only for righteous, just, and equitable purposes ("in all your ways acknowledge him," v. 6), which begins with offering the firstfruits of everything to the Lord (see Deut. 18:1-5). To give the firstfruits is to imply that the whole belongs to God, indeed the whole worshiper. The prosperity described in Prov. 3:10 is the blessing of the covenant (Deut. 28:1-14), a kind of restored Eden. Your barns will be filled with plenty is a generalization concerning the effect of honoring the Lord with all that one has and is. It is not, however, more than a generalization (as Job's comforters held), for to view this as a mechanical formula dishonors God and his inscrutable sovereign purposes.
3:11-12 A father who reflects on these words will take pains to mold his own parenting (esp. discipline) according to the pattern set by the Lord's parenting. Hebrews 12:4-5 cites these verses, commending endurance to harried believers.
