Today we look at the wisdom in Proverbs 29.
He who is often reproved, yet stiffens his neck, will suddenly be broken beyond healing.
We are often reproved by God in ways unlooked for, unexpected, and sometimes blindly unheeded. He uses many different means, be it circumstances, people around us, situations, or even suffering. The reproof is meant for our good and to point us to the hope we have in Christ Jesus, a hope that is above all hope. Yet still we often will ignorantly of obstinately refuse to heed that reproof.
God, in his omniscience, omnipotence, and omnipresence, has His plans and purposes for timing things the way he does. We are allowed to walk in error for however long He desires due to purposes we can't necessarily fathom. His "patience", as it were, does have limits based on His plan. That "patience" can often run its course and we find our stiff necks being crushed so that we come to the end of ourselves.
I use a program called E-Sword, it's a free bible study tool kind of like a poor man's Logos. It comes with multiple bible versions, dictionaries, and commentaries that are laid out on screen side-by-side to use for study. It comes with a lot of free resources, one of them being Matthew Henry's commentaries. Hence, why I refer to Henry's work often.
The obstinacy of many wicked people in a wicked way is to be greatly lamented. They are often reproved by parents and friends, by magistrates and ministers, by the providence of God and by their own consciences, have had their sins set in order before them and fair warning given them of the consequences of them, but all in vain; they harden their necks. Perhaps they fling away, and will not so much as give the reproof a patient hearing; or, if they do, yet they go on in the sins for which they are reproved; they will not bow their necks to the yoke, but are children of Belial; they refuse reproof, despise it, hate it.
I came to belief in Christ in 2012, though I have struggled mightily with the fear of man and of persecution. Where I had full belief in Jesus Christ, his death and resurrection, and his propitiatory sacrifice for us on the Cross; I still had a very long way to go in wisdom and understanding. For many years, I struggled with the intellectual assent of the basic tenets of Christianity while still not having an understanding of how to apply it rightly. I couldn't get past the milk to the meat.
God went about things in a strange way that I am still having trouble understanding. He gave me the natural (e.g. inborn) gifts of reasoning and perception, but not clarity, making the intelligence and perception difficult to use in a sense of determining and rightly discerning Biblical wisdom. I spent years struggling with this as sin and the world still clung to me tightly, refusing to let go. This presented a major problem in marriage - I was unable to get past the slow dying corpse of myself in front of me in order to rightly and properly lead and disciple my family. I ended up causing much hurt and trauma, being unable to apply biblical discernment or right-minded response and leadership. That being said, I am not solely responsible for everything, only for my conduct; not how others may have responded to this.
The most interesting thing, to me, is looking back at my early few years as a believer and applying gained wisdom to my gifts. In the southern US, as part of the Bible Belt, churches are a dime a dozen and there's a mixing of wolves amongst the sheep. I ended up at First Baptist Atlanta, under the tutelage of Charles Stanley. It is a fairly large denomination, probably easily seeing 3,000 or more every Sunday. I remember walking through the crowds, doing my SOP of people-watching, and almost being able to tell a difference in people, like I could perceive how authentic they were being. Subtle hints in body language and action can tell you what a person really believes in their heart - I remember this distinctly when visiting Grace Community Church under John MacArthur. Almost everyone there had this sense of genuine hospitality that was unmistakable. Yet walking through FBA there was such a mix of people that you could tell, on their faces, that they might attend church, but they certainly didn't act on those beliefs during the week.
Such was I, an exhibitor of this behavior, in my struggle to shake off the dead man in me and live as a new creature in Christ. The memory of it nearly makes me weep with sorrow.
The issue of this obstinacy is to be greatly dreaded: Those that go on in sin, in spite of admonition, shall be destroyed; those that will not be reformed must expect to be ruined; if the rods answer not the end, expect the axes. They shall be suddenly destroyed, in the midst of their security, and without remedy; they have sinned against the preventing remedy, and therefore let them not expect any recovering remedy. Hell is remediless destruction. They shall be destroyed, and no healing, so the word is. If God wounds, who can heal?
The Lord's patience was tried with my obstinance, and at the end of 2020 and the beginning of 2021, I got the axes. That story is perhaps for another time; it suffices to say that I was utterly ruined. It took over a year and a half of continuing to point myself in the wrong direction before beginning to correct paths (e.g. driving headlong, at breakneck speed, toward focusing on meeting my financial obligations instead of working on my heart matters). I was still being disobedient.
Then, this year, something changed. That is also another story for another time. I will sum it up in simple terms: I am no longer afraid. My sails have been trimmed and I am slowly turning the hulk of the near-derelict ship back to safe harbors to be repaired. Through God's breaking of my neck, He healed and reset it to better than it was before. Fear is being driven from me every day that passes. I grow bolder in Christ and proclaiming Him.
In a sense, the prodigal is returning Home.