Scripture Reading:

Proverbs 14:10-11

Proverbs 14:10

The heart knows his own bitterness; and a stranger does not intermeddle with his joy [share in its joy]. 

What may be taken as the most cryptic verse in the Bible provides a truism which can be applied to every man, woman, and child on earth, all the time.

Every person has a heart. Within this heart is to be found the very soul of a person’s core disposition, emotions, attitudes, and perspectives—toward God, toward self, and toward others. The heart is that which loves, hates, sorrows, and rejoices in the most core sense.

But who can read the heart? Only God knows the heart entirely and absolutely. Besides God, nobody can feel what we feel in our own heart. The intensity of these feelings are known and felt by ourselves, and none other but God. Although attempts may be made to bear another’s burdens (Gal. 6:2), it is impossible to completely know the burden and to carry it for them.

When it comes down to it, everyone must bear his own burden (Gal. 6:5). Each person must individually cast his burdens on God, believing that He cares for him (1 Pet. 5:7). In this sense, salvation is an individual matter. Jesus Christ carried the burden of our sins upon Himself at the cross. He knows our bitterness, because He took it upon Himself for us.

As our children grow older, they will begin to experience more conviction of sin, and the bitterness that comes as the consequence of sin. But we trust that they will also know the joy of sins forgiven. Usually this happens to children in Christian homes as they go through their teenage years (from ages eleven to twenty). Because parents cannot always read the hearts of their children, open channels of communication and regular interaction is essential. This enables
better counsel and more specific prayer for the needs of one another.

The “strangers” mentioned are those out of covenant relationship with one another. When young people live apart from family or apart from those who know them and love them, they separate themselves from regular accountability. Of course, family members living in the same home may still isolate themselves from one another, usually by electronic devices, earbuds, or just locking themselves into their own rooms. When we separate ourselves from those who know and love us
best, we lose that person who might correct us or encourage us in the right way. Christians must therefore live close enough to one other so they can knowledgeably exhort each other on a daily basis (Heb. 3:13).

Proverbs 14:11

The house of the wicked shall be overthrown: but the tabernacle of the upright shall flourish. 

A familiar proverb appears again in this verse, but the terms used this time give us a still sharper contrast. As surely as the 10,000 square foot mansion of the wicked will crumble with time, the cheap little mobile home where the upright man lives with his family will yield great blessings for generations to come. The self-centered, materialistic existentialists are happy to live as “DINKS” (Double Income, No Kids) in their sprawling mansions, but they leave no lasting legacy. On the other side of town, there is the family that adopted eight special needs children living in a 1,200 square foot double wide mobile home. It is not so much the quality of dry wall that provides the strength, integrity, and vitality to a home, as the gracious words shared, and the loving sacrifices offered within those walls.

How many humble tradesmen raised sons in a little cottage somewhere in the hills of Tennessee or the highlands of Scotland, sons who became mighty men of God who brought down the kingdoms of the devil in missionary and ministry work? John Paton’s great vision for missionary work in the South Seas began on his knees in family worship as a young boy. Testifying to his father’s keen vision, John writes in his autobiography, “How much my father’s prayers impressed me, I can never explain, nor could any stranger understand. When on his knees, and all of us kneeling around him in Family Worship, he poured out his whole soul with tears for the conversion of the Heathen World to the service of Jesus, and for every personal and domestic need, we all felt as if in the presence of the living Savior, and learned to know and love Him as our divine Friend. As we rose from our knees, I used to look at the light on my father’s face, and wish I were like him in spirit—hoping that, in answer to his prayers, I might be privileged and prepared to carry the blessed Gospel to some portion of the Heathen World.”

Of all the missionaries to carry the Gospel to the far off reaches of the
world over the last two centuries, hardly any may be found with such intrepid courage and faith, as John Paton. This man did more to inspire international missions in the 19th century than any other Christian leader. Who would have thought that a poor Scottish “sock-maker” and his poor family would have amounted to anything? Surely, when a man fears the Lord and delights greatly in His commandments, his seed will be mighty in the earth (Ps. 112:1–2).

For related commentary, reference Proverbs 3:33 and Proverbs 12:7. 

Family Discussion Questions:

1. How do we carry our own burdens, and in what ways might we share our burdens with others?

2. In what ways have we seen our little home flourish over the years? How has God already blessed us?