“The blessing of the LORD makes rich, and he adds no sorrow with it.” – Proverbs 10:22
It does not take a fancy hermeneutic, nor a PhD in Biblical Ethics to understand this truth. Solomon teaches us in this verse that the blessings of the LORD are undiluted. What God calls a blessing is just that — blessed of God — and not a mixed bag of good and bad. It is not a qualified blessing that is only true in certain times and in certain places in the lives of certain people. While the book of Proverbs as a whole should not be understood as speaking unequivocally about all things, there are many truths in this book of wisdom that are confirmed elsewhere in Scripture as being spiritually absolute. These ideas of God’s blessings being undiluted and unqualified are a few such truths. We also see these themes throughout the New Testament in places like 1 Timothy 4:4 in which Paul writes, “For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving.” When the biblical writers use words such as “everything” and “nothing” that argue for the broadest possible scope, it further confirms the idea we see in Proverbs 10:22.
With that being said, one of the greatest temptations of the human heart is to dilute and qualify the blessings of God in our lives. Now we can’t reach up into the heavens and add sorrow to God’s blessings, nor can we change the truth that is revealed about God’s blessings in Scripture; but we can deceive ourselves into thinking and acting in ways in which cause us to live our lives as if God’s blessings were actually diluted blessings and covered over in qualifications. The way we view procreation and children is a great example of this. Solomon says in Psalm 127, ”Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one’s youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.” (italics mine) The language of blessing that Solomon uses here is unmistakable — and not surprisingly, unqualified and undiluted. If we were to take what we saw in Proverbs 10:22 about God’s “blessing” making one “rich”, and Paul’s testimony to Timothy that “everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving” (1 Tim 4:4), do you think we would arrive at a family planning practice that acts in ways that treat children as diluted blessings and qualified riches? If God’s blessings of children really are “good” and “rich”, is it consistent of us to qualify those truths with statements and attitudes such as, “but just not right now” or “they are a blessing — only if you can afford to care for them”?
The dilution and qualification of the blessings of God by “family planning” is no doubt subtle, but the effect of such twisting of the truth holds no subtle danger for the believer. Once the door to subjectivism is opened (in terms of what is “really” considered a blessing or what is only a blessing sometimes and for some families) the doctrine of God’s goodness and providence is immediately called into question. The moment a believer rejects what God calls good, and contra-cepts (the antithesis of accepts) what His Word calls a blessing, is the moment we purpose in our flesh to dilute the truth of God. That is a road, dear friends, that we must endeavor never to take…
To the glory of God alone, whose blessing makes rich,
BH
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