For surely there is an end; and thine expectation shall not be cut off.
In its setting the promise is given to turn the heart away from envying sinners and to hold it in reverence and fear of the Lord, with wise living urged as the right course and the promised future added as assurance for that course. The assurance is that there is surely a coming end and reward, and that hope and expectation fixed on the Lord will not be disappointed or cut off. Trusting and hoping in the Lord is therefore safe, even when sinners seem for a time to prosper.
That promised end means every course of life reaches its own sure outcome. Intemperance ends in poverty of soul, in spiritual drowsiness, and in being clothed with the rags of unrighteousness, while steadfast constancy in the right way ends in unending life, health, and peace. The warning reaches beyond wine and food to excess in pleasures, in dress, and in ambition. Envy and covetousness open the way into such excess, so the heart must be kept free from them.
As part of Proverbs 23 the verse helps qualify the permission in Deuteronomy 14:26 to buy strong drink: God desires His people to rejoice when they gather together, yet those standing in the light will not lust after what is wrong or run into unseemly excess, and the strong drink of ancient times is not to be compared with the poisonous preparations of the present time. The same promise also assures that trial and the struggle against sin will not go on without end, for there is an end and hope will not be disappointed. That certainty encourages confidence that divine grace can enable believers to overcome murmuring and that deliverance will come.
In its setting the promise is given to turn the heart away from envying sinners and to hold it in reverence and fear of the Lord, with wise living urged as the right course and the promised future added as assurance for that course. The assurance is that there is surely a coming end and reward, and that hope and expectation fixed on the Lord will not be disappointed or cut off. Trusting and hoping in the Lord is therefore safe, even when sinners seem for a time to prosper.
That promised end means every course of life reaches its own sure outcome. Intemperance ends in poverty of soul, in spiritual drowsiness, and in being clothed with the rags of unrighteousness, while steadfast constancy in the right way ends in unending life, health, and peace. The warning reaches beyond wine and food to excess in pleasures, in dress, and in ambition. Envy and covetousness open the way into such excess, so the heart must be kept free from them.
As part of Proverbs 23 the verse helps qualify the permission in Deuteronomy 14:26 to buy strong drink: God desires His people to rejoice when they gather together, yet those standing in the light will not lust after what is wrong or run into unseemly excess, and the strong drink of ancient times is not to be compared with the poisonous preparations of the present time. The same promise also assures that trial and the struggle against sin will not go on without end, for there is an end and hope will not be disappointed. That certainty encourages confidence that divine grace can enable believers to overcome murmuring and that deliverance will come.