Proverbs 30

The tongue when it is let loose will be ready to speak loosely; watch it, lest it run beyond its bounds, in frothy and sinful discourse. (Proverbs 30:32) If you have thought evil, lay your hand upon your mouth: That is (say some) lay your hand upon your mouth in token of repenta…

The serpent uses many shifts, and glides so cunningly, that we cannot trace him. This was one of those four things which wise Agur could not find out, the way of a serpent upon a rock (Proverbs 30:19). 'Tis a deceitful creature: we should not in this sense be like the serpent, f…

So where there is sanctification there is not only God's image in the heart, but a superscription of holiness written in the life. Some say they have good hearts, but their lives are vicious (Proverbs 30:12). There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes, yet is not wash…

The inanimate creatures are in motion: the sun goes its circuit, the fountain runs, the fire sparkles. And animate creatures; Solomon sends us to the ant and pismire to learn labor (Proverbs 6:6; Proverbs 30:35). The bee is the emblem of industry; some of the bees trim the honey…

Judges 17:6: When there was no king in Israel, every man did that which was right in his own eyes. A wonder (Proverbs 30:27). (2.) God has promoted kings, that they may promote justice.

You cannot honor your Father in Heaven, unless you honor your earthly parents. To deny obedience to parents entails God's judgments upon children (Proverbs 30:17). The eye that mocks at his father, and despises to obey his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick it out, and…

Poverty is a sore temptation: [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉], Menand. (Proverbs 30:29) Give me not poverty. Many by their sin have brought themselves to poverty; and when a great estate is boiled away to nothing, then they are discontented, and think better to die quickly, than lan…

It is lawful to use the world, indeed, and to desire so much of it, as may, 1. Keep us from the temptation of poverty. (Proverbs 30:8.) Give me not poverty, lest I steal, and take the name of my God in vain. 2. As may enable us to honor God with works of mercy.

It is hard to carry a full cup without spilling, and a full estate without sinning. Agar feared if he were full, he should deny God, and say, Who is the Lord; (Proverbs 30:9). Prosperity breeds, 1. Pride: The children of Kohath were in a higher estate than the rest of the Levite…

Qu. 3. How then are these ways and means of the worship of God made known to us? Answ. In and by the written word only; which contains a full and perfect revelation of the will of God; as to his whole worship, and all the concernments of it: John 5:39, Isaiah 8:20, Luke 16:19, 2…

In handling which, I trust I have not at all incurred that severe reproof of the Apostle, against curious speculations about angels, of intruding into those things which I have not seen ground and warrant for in the word (Colossians 2:18). Sure I am I have endeavored to follow t…

3. There is Benedictio Charitativa: this is, when one is said to bless another, by praying for a blessing on him, or using the means whereby he may obtain a blessing. This may be done by superiors, equals, inferiors, any or all persons mutually towards one another (see 1 Kings 8…

I shall open this particular thus. We have the will of God revealed to us, in the Word of God: and the Word of God is complete, and perfect; there is no need to have it altered, by adding to it, or taking from it (Proverbs 30:5, 6; Revelation 22:18, 19), so that if in any case w…

Daily] The word in the original is thus much in effect, Bread to our essence or substance: then the meaning is, give us such bread from day to day, as may nourish our substance. Thus prays Agur (Proverbs 30:8): Feed me with food convenient for me. Some there are which put an Ang…

Once more, false grace is not accompanied with humility: when men the more they profess, the prouder they grow and more self-conceited, there is cause of suspicion. With true grace there always goes along a spiritual poverty, or a sense of our spiritual wants; the more knowledge…

Acts 20:35: It is a more blessed thing to give than to receive. Proverbs 30:8: Give me neither riches nor poverty. Deuteronomy 28:22: Poverty is numbered among the curses of the law, none of which are to be vowed.

[Daily] The word in the original is thus much in effect, Bread to our essence or substances: then the meaning is; Give us such bread from day to day, as may nourish our substances. Thus prays Agur (Proverbs 30:8): Feed me with food convenient for me. Some there are which put an…

If any be called to take notice of this doctrine, they are called to take notice of it. There is a generation, says Solomon (Proverbs 30:12), which are pure in their own eyes, and yet are not washed from their filthiness. They conclude they are absolved, but never look inward, t…

By Samuel Rutherford, Minister of the Gospel, and Professor of Divinity in the University of Saint Andrews in Scotland. (Proverbs 30:4) What is his name, and what is his Son's name if you can tell? (Isaiah 53:8) He was taken from prison, and from judgment, and who shall declare…

Three sorts of temptations he then uses to us, the same he did to Christ. 1. Either he tempts us to unlawful means to satisfy our hunger, so he did to Christ, who was to be governed by the Spirit, to work a miracle to provide for his bodily wants at Satan's direction: so us, pov…

"for it signifies Retreat or Concealment, which serves to denote that becoming shame which ought to be in virgins." They produce a passage from the book of Proverbs, "the way of a man with a maid," בעלמה, (Proverbs 30:19.) But it does not at all support their views.

All true spiritual Knowledge is of that Nature, that the more a Person has of it, the more is he sensible of his own Ignorance; as is evident by 1 Corinthians 8:2. He that thinketh he knoweth any Thing, he knoweth nothing yet, as he ought to know. Agur when he had a great Discov…

As (1) to the Spirit who is the principal Efficient of the whole. Not that Sanctification consists wholly herein, but firstly and necessarily it is required thereunto; Prov. 30. 12. Ezek. 36. 25.

So great is he, that all men, all kings and princes, are as worms of the dust before him, all nations are as the drop in a bucket, and the light dust of the balance; yes, and angels themselves are as nothing before him. He is so high, that he is infinitely above any need of us;…

So. Jacob, Genesis 28:20 and Agur, Proverbs 30. 8, 9. Wise Providence considers our condition as Pilgrims and Strangers, and so allots the Viaticum provision, that is needful for our passage home. It knows the mischievous influence of fulness and redundancy upon most men, though…

Many children have been undone by their parents giving them too large a stock to trade for themselves: it has made them spendthrifts, careless, and wanton. Should the Lord entrust his people with a continued stock of mercy, perhaps they would be full and deny him, and say who is…

With this aim and purpose, an endeavour to impose that on the Church, as an immediate revelation from God, which was the product of his own pains and diligence, is utterly inconsistent. For by no means could he more dishonour God, whose glory in sincerity he appears to have soug…

[in non-Latin alphabet] in construction from [in non-Latin alphabet] is from [in non-Latin alphabet] to hear, attend, obey. The word is but once more used in the Scripture, Proverbs 30:17, where it is rendered Doctrine, or Teaching given out with authority, and therefore to be o…

First, They deny that here is any thing spoken of the conception or bearing of a Son by a Virgin. For the word here used, say they, ([in non-Latin alphabet]) signifies any young woman, married or unmarried; yes sometimes an adulteress; as Proverbs 30:18. So that the whole founda…

But whom in this matter shall we believe, a few ignorant Jews, or God himself, bearing witness that his Law is perfect, and requiring no more in his Worship but what is in that Law prescribed? See (Psalms 19:8; Proverbs 30:5, 6; Deuteronomy 4:1, 2). And this perfection of the Wr…

Extremes are very dangerous: to be extreme poor or extreme rich, is an extreme temptation. Therefore the wise man Agur (Proverbs 30:8) prays, Give me neither poverty nor riches, Lord says he, I would not be in any of the extremes: it is a sore temptation to be far on either hand…

And even so the deeper a man looks under him, the better he sees himself. But the world and man's eyes do the contrary, they look only above themselves, they will mount on high as Solomon says: (Proverbs 30): There are people which have high looks, and cast up their eyelids. Thu…

If God command us to aske him bread, and to depende upon him for it, wee must not judge basely of it: nowe in this chapter God commands us to depend upon him for foode to eate: yea, 1. Pet. 5. 7. we must cast all our care on him: and Iacobs practise in praying for bread to eate,…

Next, the commendation of her hair, in both its parts, will confirm this. 1. It is like a flock of goats: goats are stately and comely in going, and a flock of them must be very stately, as they were especially in these parts (Proverbs 30:21, 31). And so this ornament of a good…

The second step or degree of this love, and the similitude illustrating it, is in these words, jealousy is cruel as the grave: it is the prosecution of the same purpose, only, what she called love before, is here termed jealousy; jealousy may be taken in a good sense, or an evil…

Certainly the hand of Joab is in all this. Concerning these, I shall say no more, but what the wise man observed of such a race of confident self-justiciaries in his days (Proverbs 30:12): There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes, and yet are not washed from their f…

Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: So shall your poverty come as one who travels; drawing nearer and nearer to you by soft and silent degrees; and your want as an armed man; who, though his pace be slow, by reason of the weight of his a…

So we find (Genesis 48:12) that Joseph, as highly exalted as he was in the court of Pharaoh, when he brought out his sons to receive the blessing of Jacob his father, he bowed himself with his face to the earth. And on the contrary, that an ill-conditioned look towards a parent…

To make him who is truth itself attest that which is falsehood and deceit. And therefore (Proverbs 30:9) Agur prays against pinching poverty, as well as superfluous riches, "Lest," says he, "I be poor, and steal, and take the name of my God in vain." That is, lest poverty compel…

1. Alas, says one, I fear I have no such treasure as here is described, for I have a very ignorant head, and therefore an empty heart, these treasures enter in by the door and window of knowledge, but I know nothing yet as I ought to know; I cannot conceive aright of one truth,…

The Scripture says, The heart is deceitful above all things (Jeremiah 17:9). Solomon said, there were four things too wonderful for him that he could not know (Proverbs 30:19). He might have added a fifth; the way of man's heart.

When our outward enjoyments are by providence shaped and fitted to our condition, as a suit is to the body, that fits close and neat, neither too curt nor long; we cannot desire a better condition in this world. This was it that wise Agur requested of God (Proverbs 30:8-9): Give…

Ib. 47. Proverbs 30:8. By reason of man's imbecility and proneness to elation of mind, too high a flow of prosperity is dangerous; too low an ebb again as dangerous; for that the virtue of patience is rare, and the hand of necessity stronger than ordinary virtue is able to withs…

And many such things are with him; the more spiritually minded any is, the more bent is the heart to follow and eye God in all his actings. He shall see how wise in heart the steersman is, who watches at the helm; and it shall appear what precious thoughts take up the believer,…

Psalm 51:5: Behold I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother warm me. Upon this account the Lord suffers his own to fall and lie in the dust, and to know what beasts they are, as the godly confess (Psalm 73:23; Proverbs 30:2) themselves to be. Nothing men are more asham…

Sovereignty is not our rule, clay is not to watch over the Lord's acts of holy sovereignty, but in point of submitting to the opened and revealed Decrees, but is to eye the rule, watch over the heart in point of duties. 2. All things to be, and never to be, are written in his bo…

It is no great thing if you are ignorant of his counsels. It is made an argument why we should not search into his secrets (Proverbs 30:4), Who has ascended up to heaven, or descended? who has gathered the winds in his fist? who has bounded the waters in a garment? who has estab…

So pride, that will make a man singular. There is a holy singularity (Proverbs 30:31) — the going of the he-goat is comely, that is as he walks before the flock. Thus to be a leading man in religion is honorable, but pride puts a man upon an evil singularity (Colossians 2:19), i…

Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is his name, and what is his son's name, if you can tell (Proverbs 30:2, 3, 4)? It is in Christ alone, that we may have a clear distinct view of the glory of God and his excellencies.

It is to the tongue as the helm is to the ship (it is the apostle's comparison, James 3:3-4) — not to silence it, but to guide it, to steer it wisely, especially when the wind is high. If at any time we have conceived a passion, and thought evil, meekness will lay the hand upon…