Sunday, May 24, 2009

May 24

Proverbs of Solomon (Continued) Persons and Attributes, Parents and children - Proverbs 1:8-9, 10:1, 11:29, 15:20, 17:2, 17:6, 17:21, 17:25, 19:26, 20:20, 23:22-25, 28:24; The elderly - Proverbs 16:31, 20:29; Women and wives - Proverbs 11:22, 12:4, 14:1, 18:22, 19:13-14, 21:9, 25:24, 21:19, 27:15-16; Kings and rulers - Proverbs 14:28, 14:35, 16:10, 16:12-15, 17:7, 17:11, 19:12, 20:2, 20:8, 20:26, 20:28, 21:1, 22:11, 23:1-3, 24:21-22, 25:2-7, 28:2-3, 28:15-16, 29:12, 29:14; Messengers - Proverbs 13:17, 25:13; Companions - Proverbs 12:26, 13:20, 14:7, 17:17, 18:24, 24:1-2, 27:8-10, 29:24; Various Concerns, Caution - Proverbs 16:17, 22:3, 27:12, 22:5; Reputation - Proverbs 22:1, 25:9-10; Courage - Proverbs 3:25-26, 14:32, 22:13, 24:10, 26:13, 28:1; Hope - Proverbs 13:12, 13:19, 23:17-18


"Gray hair is a crown of splendor;
     It is attained by righteous life."

"The glory of young men is their strength,
     gray hair is the splendor of the old."

I know there are times the old point to the dress, mid-drift revealing fashions, purple spiked hair and pierced belly buttons of the young.  But we only have ourselves to blame.  They learned it from us.  They, like we, have bought into what the world would have them believe about their own self-worth.  It might not be purple and spiked, but we dye our hair.  We hide the gray so that we appear younger than we are, to sacrifice self-respect at the altar of popular culture.  When really we should think of it as a crown and as our splendor.  Who wants to dip a golden crown in black paint?


"A quarrelsome wife is like a constant dripping...." 

"Better to live on a corner of the roof
     than share a house with a quarrelsome wife."

And now it's time for the King Solomon Komedy Hour.... I love this.  Humor from Solomon.  Perhaps the first recorded instance of the age-old male pastime of wife jokes.  Some good stuff.  The quarrelsome wife as an annoying and constant drip, drip, drip water torture.  And what a wonderful mental image of a husband sitting alone on the corner of the roof with a content little smile on his face while sounds of his wife's blustering and nagging erupts from the house beneath him.

Solomon had plenty of opportunity to come up with good material on this particular topic.  Lord knows.  


"Have no fear of sudden disaster
     or of the ruin that overtakes the wicked,
for the Lord will be your confidence...."

Fueled by the immediacy of the media, we seemed to panic over the Swine Flu pandemic... which out of deference to the Pork people was quickly renamed H1N1.  Fortunately the alphabet and number system don't have protection groups.  Our confidence shouldn't be in the news media or CDC or vaccines.  The Lord is our confidence.  In times of panic, we should be the coolest people around.  Our confidence should surprise the world and when they ask, we should be ready to give an answer.  Our faith, our religion, counts for very little if it doesn't make a difference in difficult times.


"Hope deferred makes the heart sick
     but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life."

There it is, again.  A symbolic reference to the tree of life.  This proverb about Hope deferred reminds me of poem from my youth and the racial strife of the '60s.

A Dream Deferred
by Langston Huges

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?


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