Pathway Through Proverbs: Chapter 7

Chapter 7: Keep the Word

Solomon starts this chapter off saying, “My son, keep my words, and lay up my commandments with thee.” He was telling his son to listen to what he was saying and keep it in his life. Solomon tells his son to make his commandments the most important thing in his life and we see that in verse 3, “Bind them upon thy fingers, write them upon the table of thine heart.”

Solomon than proceeds to tell his son a story about a young man who was simple and void of understanding. Solomon states that this young man was walking one day and passed near the corner of a strange woman. This strange woman caught the young man and ended up ruining his life. We see this in verse 27, “Her house is the way to hell, going down to the chambers of death.”

I believe that this young man was taught to do right, how to do right, and how to live right. I think that he probably heard all the same lessons from his parents that Solomon was teaching his son. I think that this young man had all the potential in the world to make it, but he didn’t do one thing.

As Solomon described him, he was simple and void of understanding. He was also in a group of other simple people. This young man was part of a group just wandering through the city with nothing to do, no purpose in life.

But this young man veered off from the group and passed near the corner of the strange woman. He probably passed the corner a few times before he actually went the way to her house. He waited until the night, when it was dark, because the Bible does say men love darkness because their deeds are evil. The strange woman was waiting for him and once he got there, she had everything all nice and pretty. She made everything look good on the outside but the inside their was pain and hurt and trouble.

The story doesn’t tell us exactly how the young man’s life ended up but it did tell what happened before to men that went her way. “For she hath cast down many wounded: yea, many strong men have been slain by her.” vs. 26

I read this chapter and I liken the young man to people who grow up in church, in a Christian family. I also liken the strange woman to the world, because a strange woman is just one of the many pitfalls that the devil has laid for us.

I see many people grow up in a godly family and go to a good church but they end up in the world not serving God. They let something of the world get ahold of them and it took them out of church and away from God. They are like this young man who didn’t do one thing.

They kept passing near that sin, near that temptation until one day they went down that street and ended up in the “strange woman’s house.” Falling into sin is a gradual thing, you get comfortable around it and before you know it you are right in the middle of it.

What is the one thing that each one of us need to do in our life? “Keep my commandments and live; and my law as the apple of thine eye. Bind them upon thy fingers, write them upon the table of thine heart. Say unto wisdom, Thou art my sister: and call understanding thy kinswoman: That they may keep thee form the strange woman, from the stranger which flattereth with her words.” Proverbs 7:2-5 We need to keep the commandments and the law, which is the Word of God, in the center of our life. If we obey and follow the Word of God than He will lead us where we need to go which won’t be near the corner of the strange woman.

God is the God of second chances. I believe that if you are still breathing, God still has a plan for you. No matter where you are at or what you are doing in life, you can always come back to God. If you are away from God, don’t end up like the strong men that went to the strange woman, they ended up slain.

Keep the Word of God in your life. Obey it! Follow it! Live it!