Proverbs 11:24 There is that scatters, and yet increases; and there is that withholds more than is meet, but it tends to poverty.… One would say that to scatter anything is to part with it without advantage; and that to withhold, to keep back, is undoubtedly to save and to retain. The text teaches that this may be quite a mistake on our part. There is reckless scattering and there is wise withholding. The text is not to be taken in its literalness; it is to be examined in its spirit. Happily we have no need to go further in search of illustration of the truth of the text; we find it on every farm, in every business, in every school. The text calls to benevolent activity founded on religious faith. The doctrine enlarges and glorifies life by calling into life elements and considerations which lie beyond the present and the visible. The very exercise of scattering carries blessing with it, breaks up the mastery of selfishness, and enlarges the circle of kindly interests. Beneficence is its own compensation. Charity empties the heart of one gift that it may make room for a larger. But if any man think to give God something with the idea of having it back again, that man will be disappointed and humiliated, and justly so, The other side of this text is as emphatic and as often illustrated in practical life as the first. Selfishness is suicidal; selfishness lives in gloom; selfishness injects poison into every stream of life. Selfishness is most intensely selfish when it assumes the name of prudence. When selfishness chatters proverbs, it has reached the depth beyond which there is no death. God can turn the wicked man's very success into failure, and out of selfish ambition He can bring the scorpion whose sting is death. Though this text is found in the Old Testament, the principle is distinctly held by Jesus Christ. It is a moral principle, universal and unchangeable in its force and application. (J. Parker, D.D.) Parallel Verses KJV: There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth; and there is that withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to poverty. |
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