Chapter 28 begins with a verse that always encourages me in my faith, "The wicked flee though no one pursues, but the righteous are as bold as a lion." (Proverbs 28:1) The godless man lives in constant uncertainty. What can he cling to in an unpredictable world? What can be counted on? Who can he trust? There's an undercurrent of fear running through his mind and a sense of impending doom. But the godly man has the unchanging hand of the Lord to cling to, and he has the promises of a Savior who said He'd never leave us or forsake us, and he has the assurance of his salvation in Christ. This is a firm and unshakable foundation, which is why King David praised the Lord by saying, "Truly my soul finds rest in God; my salvation comes from Him. Truly He is my rock and my salvation; He is my fortress, I will never be shaken." (Psalm 62:1-2) The godly flee at the first sign of trouble, even imaginary trouble. But the righteous are able to turn and face danger head-on, knowing their help is in God. This is why we who belong to the Lord can boldly proclaim, "God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging." (Psalm 46:1-3) The ungodly person cries, "The sky is falling!", even when no danger is on the horizon. But the godly person calmly states, "Even if the world falls apart, my God is with me."
"When a country is rebellious, it has many rulers, but a ruler with discernment and knowledge maintains order." (Proverbs 28:2) We only have to look at the history of the kings of Israel to see the truth of this verse illustrated. Both David and Solomon ruled a long time over the united twelve tribes of Israel, but then the ten northern tribes broke loose during the reign of Solomon's son Rehoboam. Their chosen king, Jeroboam, feared the people would turn their allegiance away from him if allowed to go up to Jerusalem to worship at the temple, so he set up replacement shrines containing golden calves at Dan and Bethel. Israel began to fall away from the one true God, becoming rebellious toward Him. Just as Solomon predicted, the country that is rebellious has many rulers. In its latter years there was a succession of short-reigning kings over the ten northern tribes of Israel. The instability of the nation began with a leader who lacked godly discernment and order, and things went downhill from there. The two southern tribes of Judah and Benjamin, which became known simply as the nation of Judah, enjoyed a more stable government for a longer period of time because it took Judah longer to fall into apostasy than it took Israel. Judah had several rulers who possessed godly discernment and knowledge; therefore it wasn't until about one hundred and fifty years after the fall of Israel to Assyria that Judah fell to Babylon.
Solomon has something to say about rulers who have no compassion on the needy. "A ruler who oppresses the poor is like a driving rain that leaves no crops." (Proverbs 28:3) Crops need rain, but they don't need torrential rain. Flash floods are able to wash all the sown seeds and the tender young plants out of the ground, causing there to be no harvest. Solomon points out, "A king who takes advantage of the poor and needy is just as much of a disaster as a destructive flood. A man like that is taking the food right out of people's mouths. What a shame and disgrace he is!" I think we ought to stop and give Solomon credit for all the compassion he's shown for the poor in the book of Proverbs. A man like him, who grew up with power and wealth, could easily have turned a blind eye to the fate of the needy. He could have been callous and uncaring, but instead we find him with a tender heart toward those less fortunate. He has often spoken of defending the poor in court and of not treating the poor with less respect than the wealthy and of taking care of those who are needy. It's a credit to him and to the godly upbringing he received that he never allowed his wealth and position to make him hard-hearted.
I think the reason he has a heart for the poor can be explained by this verse, "Evildoers do not understand what is right, but those who seek the Lord understand it fully." (Proverbs 28:5) Solomon grew up with King David as his father, a man who loved the Lord with all his heart. He saw faith in action through the way David trusted in the Lord, and he understood repentance and redemption from the events of his father's life. Solomon was taught the word of God and he was familiar with all the laws of God. He wandered from the Lord for a good part of his life, but in his older years he came back to Him, seeking in the Lord a remedy for the emptiness in his soul. So now Solomon can say, "Those who seek the Lord know what is right. The Lord commands us to care about the poor and needy and about the widow and the orphan."
Solomon learned this next lesson from experience, "Better the poor whose walk is blameless than the rich whose ways are perverse." (Proverbs 28:6) Solomon's wealth was never able to provide him with peace of mind. It couldn't secure his salvation. It couldn't satisfy the deep longing in his soul. It couldn't fill up the empty hours of the night when he walked the floor in sleeplessness, saying to himself, "Meaningless! Meaningless! Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless!" (Ecclesiastes 1:2) He knows now that peace with the Lord matters more than all the gold and silver in the world, so he can attest, "I'd rather be poor and know the Lord than to be rich and be lost in my sins." Or, as the Lord Jesus put it, "What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?" (Mark 8:36)
Whether we have much or little by the world's standards, we are rich beyond all measure if we know the Lord Jesus Christ. Nothing can compare to such a fortune! Nothing can compete with such stunning and undeserved mercy! "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich." (2 Corinthians 8:9) This is a King who has compassion on the poor, for no one is more poverty-stricken than the one who is lost and undone. This is a King who has so much love for the needy that He forfeited everything He had to lift us out of the ash heap of sin and crown us as the children of the most high God. He didn't want the treasures of heaven if He couldn't share them with us! Therefore He has made us co-heirs with Him of all the riches of our God. Christ, the holy and sinless Son of God, invites us to share His inheritance with Him. How rich we are through the One who made Himself poor for us!
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