Proverbs 5:14 I was almost in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly.
15 Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well.
16 Let thy fountains be dispersed abroad, and rivers of waters in the streets.
17 Let them be only thine own, and not strangers’ with thee.
18 Let thy fountain be blessed: and rejoice with the wife of thy youth.
19 Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant roe; let her breasts satisfy thee at all times; and be thou ravished always with her love.
Promiscuity is never God’s plan. Those who think they can just “hook up” with a person of the opposite gender and live together or have several “flings”, are deceiving themselves. That is not how God designed man and the short-lived rush that might come from such a situation is not satisfying. I do not need to have experimented to know that. I just need to read and believe God’s Word to know that.
In verse 14 the father is speaking to his children and warning them of his life. As we have mentioned, king Solomon was one who fell into the lust of the flesh. God must have directed him to write this before that happened. In this verse he spoke of when he was tempted to fall for the strange woman.
In verse 15 God talks of the importance of marriage. He used a metaphor here to describe what a marriage is. It is like that cistern that is full of refreshing water. It is like that well that has an abundance of water. It might even be an artesian well. A godly marriage provides all that is needed to satisfy the needs of the couple.
In verse 16 He continued the metaphor. In Genesis 1:28 God commanded the man to be fruitful and multiply. In chapter 2 God gave more detail in relation to humanity. He created the woman on day 6 as well. It takes a man and a woman to produce children.
I received an email recently trying to refute the Biblical record of creation. They used some weird logic to try to change what God clearly stated in Genesis 1&2. There are people who think they are wiser than God. It is important to submit to His authority and to be content to trust in Him. The devil is the author of confusion. God is the author of Truth.
When a couple is considering marriage, they should understand that there could well be children that will result from the marriage. The modern idea that a couple could get married and hold off on having children until they are first of all “established” is a selfish, ungodly attitude. The Bible tells us that God is in charge of the womb. He is the One Who can set the environment for reproduction and He can also withhold that which is needed for that to take place.
Again, the promiscuity of our time, and the number of children who come into this world without an established home environment and where the mother is often left alone with the children while the father is a run-around who only wants the pleasures of the bed but not the responsibility of being a husband and father, is not of God.
Verse 16 is in reference to the offspring that will result in the marriage relationship. Children need to know who their father and mother are. They need to be raised in a home that knows the fear of the Lord and desires to glorify Him. The troubled society we have is the result of the many who have chosen to live with hatred toward God. They do not want to honour Him. If there are children they are not raised in a loving environment. The parents are far too focused on materialism and the children get in the way. Daycares are not a good place for children. The public school system is not a good place for children. Mothers need to be at home with the children raising them in the fear of the Lord. Fathers need to be bread winners who come home after a hard day’s work and rejoice in the wife God gave them and the children that He has blessed them with. Sure there is physical tiredness. Sure there is a need to rest and relax. The children do not need to be raised like wild animals. They can be taught how to behave so that the family can function in a godly manner.
In verse 17 God is reminding us of the unity in a marriage. It should not be that the woman does not know who the father of her children is or that she has multiple fathers to her children. The man needs to be one who lives in the wisdom of God and understands God’s design for life and that he is faithful to the woman he marries. God is not speaking against adoption here. He is warning against promiscuity.
In verse 18 we read that God wants to bless the couple with children. The context here is to the son. He needs to rejoice in the wife of his youth. I spoke with a man recently who is going to celebrate his sixtieth wedding anniversary this week. My wife and I have been married over fifty-two years. It is a blessing to have a godly wife.
In verse 19 God used the illustration of a lovely doe and a charming and graceful female deer. The picture is that of a proper relationship between a husband and a wife. The husband needs to be faithful to his wife and she needs to look after herself and please him in a godly manner. A man with a wandering eye will never be satisfied. He will look for satisfaction elsewhere, but will find there is no satisfaction in looking elsewhere. He will only find heartache and sorrow. The wife needs to be that godly woman that seeks to live for the Lord and is that help that is meet for the man that she married.
We need to stay away from the ungodly magazines and the junk that is on the internet and elsewhere. We need to develop our philosophy of life from the word of God, not from the world.
If a man cannot make it with the wife of his youth, and thinks the grass is greener on the other side of the fence, he is sadly mistaken. He may pretend he has found something better over there, but his heart will tell him otherwise. There is an attachment that comes with marriage. It is an attachment that a piece of paper and some assets cannot erase. A person can try to wipe away that memory, but it just does not erase. It is different when a wife dies. There is still the hurt of losing the love of your life, but you know she is not out there somewhere and you have been unfaithful to her.
God shows us how to have a successful marriage. It starts when the son is young. His father needs to show him a good example. If the father is ungodly, the son can still choose to know God and follow God’s Word.
As we have seen in the opening verses of this chapter, if the son will make God’s Wisdom the centre of his life, he will not get caught with a strange woman. He will seek wise counsel in seeking a godly wife. He will love her and he will rejoice in the wife of his youth.
Pastor Bartel