What Is The Life And Power Of Darkness (Eph.2:1-3; 5:8)?

Pompous eyes *and a greedy heart *are the light of the wicked; *together, they are *the life of sin. (mast)

Proverbs 21:4 (NKJV)

4 A haughty look, a proud heart, And the plowing of the wicked are sin.

*[Pompous eyes] literally, raised eyes. The initial crux of this thought speaks to the preconceived self-importance of a proud heart. These are eyes that view everything selfishly. In serving others, they are eyes that serve with the attitude that they possess the highest interest in the good of others (Rom.12:16). But they are eyes that only see what is good for their own gain; therefore, since they think of themselves as the greatest good, they require the greatest good from others. So they are eyes that are always elevated above other people’s best interests (Phil.2:4). In this, they are consistently frowning upon others in the imaginations of their high-mindedness. They are lustful eyes that are full of darkness (Matt.6:23). They look upon the world with an appetite for gaining it all (Matt.6:32). These are eyes that see themselves as God’s perfect gift to the world (Matt.4:5-11). They believe they see everything rightly with no blindness, and therefore there is no darkness in them (Isa.42:18-20; 1Jn.1:5-10). Therefore they trust only in what they can know with the physical senses and deny the reasoning that clearly displays the supremacy of the Creator (Rom.1:18-21; 2Cor.5:4). These eyes are so high on themselves that nothing internally can cloud their vision (Ps.14:1). They are self-focused, like an auto-adjusting camera lens (Pr.3:5; Jer.17:5, 9). They have no desire for another perspective because they imagine themselves to be the highest perspective in the world (Matt.4:8-10). They are eyes that, in practice which look upon everything as existing for their own pleasure (Mk.10:44-45). They perceive themselves as the center of the world. These are eyes utterly blinded by sin (Acts 9:1-4), oblivious to the reality of the scales and cataracts that keep them from beholding God’s glory in the weaknesses of others (2Cor.12:9; Acts 9:18).

*[and a greedy heart] literally, a large heart. This speaks of a heart that is free and hungry for the pride of life (1Jn.2:16). It is wide-open and exceedingly broad in its ambitions for all the world has to offer. You might refer to it as what is commonly called a ‘free-spirit’ (Acts 6:9). The Hebrew noun form means ‘wide.’ As a proper noun, it was used of Rahab, the harlot. So it speaks of being wide and loose in the seat of affections for this present world system (1Jn.2:15; Jude 22-23). It isn’t necessarily a forbidden lust that is intended here, in the meaning, but rather an eye for all that the world that was once called good in God’s eye has to offer (1Jn.2:16). It can be a thirst for what is good but is so enlarged that it grows evil (Gen.3:6). As it widens and becomes more open to the lies of the spirit of the world (Gen.3:7), it allows all kinds of evil to grow fruit upon its tree (Pr.30:15). Although it is a large heart, it is an empty heart (Jer.4:22-23). But in its hunger to fill this void, it fills itself with more of the emptiness of sin (Isa.30:1). Sin never satisfies nor has enough (Isa.56:11), but stores up wrath for itself that will be poured out into its emptiness on the day of wrath (Rom.2:5-10). So the narrower the commandment becomes, the broader this heart grows in its hostility against it (Rom.8:6-8). It is a proud heart because it grows proud (1Cor.15:56). It begins its life in pride and broadens its life in pride (Ezk.30:15). Its eyes are haughty and pompous because the heart is proud. Therefore the eyes see by the light of nature in this heart (Lk.11:34).

Therefore it is a greedy heart that feeds on the pride of life and is enslaved to the desires of the flesh and the lust of the eyes (1Jn.2:15-17). It is a heart without the Spirit (Rom.8:9), and without the Spirit, it is without self-control (Gal.5:22-23). Nothing restrains its prideful desires (2Thess.2:7; Lk.24:16). It is not possessed by love but by the power of pride (Rom.2:8; 2Tim.1:7; 2Cor.5:13). Therefore it is a greedy heart because it is a self-seeking heart (James 3:16). Looking ahead to the consequential proverbs, we see that it is good to make plans to obtain an abundance (Pr.21:5; Ps.119:32), but this heart is so greedy that it competes according to the pride of life with haste (Eph.2:2; 1Tim.5:22; Gal.5:4), obtaining riches apart from grace (2Tim.2:5-6; Mk.10:41-45). It makes selfish business deals through a heart of corruption and a deceptive standard of trust (Pr.21:6). Such a heart ignores that life is to be a grace by living life as though it is a right and by pursuing its own honor to enforce its standard of life upon others (1Pet.3:7), inflating the means by which everyone must obtain that imaginary standard of life (Rom.12:10-11; Lk.16:15), while in reality depreciating the life of others (1Cor.12:22-27; Phil.2:29; James 2:6). Therefore it treats life as if it were a competitive race that one must win at all costs, by-passing the one who has finished the race before us (Heb.12:1-2). The greedy heart cares nothing for the other competitors (2Tim.2:5; 4:6-8) and therefore races without any rules or boundaries (1Cor.9:19-27). And if it does believe in rules, it exalts itself to create them and recreates them for its own benefit to win against the others for the crown of the present life (2Pet.2:18-22). So it creates a race without grace and without faith, except in its own free spirit to do whatever it pleases, at the expense of all others encouraging its subjects to love the present world system (Rom.13:7; 1Jn.2:15-17). Therefore it has to be the smartest in the room. So it becomes the biggest shark in the tank, pretending to be the smallest while it devours the others while they’re sleeping in deep darkness. It is “America’s Pastor” promising the world her best life now (2Tim.4:3-5). Therefore ‘together,’ they exchange the glory of heaven’s throne for the present emptiness of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life (Matt.16:26; Rom.1:25).

*[are the light of the wicked] literally, the lamp of the wicked. This speaks to the nature of the soul as a modifying source of the greedy heart. In other words, the light by which this heart sees is not an external light enlightening the soul, but the light of the soul shining outward unto the world at large (2Cor.11:14). It is a worldview that is learned through its own understanding as it imagines the world to be regardless of the reality that it is (Gen.6:5; 8:21; Lk.1:51). This light abides within the nature of the heart itself, and the eyes are simply the window into the power of the soul. In other words, as face reflects face in water, the soul sees the world exclusively through its own image, its own light (Matt.20:15; Mk.14:5). Its worldview is introverted, and its life is pride, self-focused, beholding things exclusively for itself (Pr.20:20). The eyes see the world through the light that powers this lamp (2Cor.11:13-15; Rev.18:23). Therefore Solomon is saying that this is an evil lamp, an evil heart (Pr.6:23; 13:9; 24:20). Another way to say it is that this heart has an evil eye (Matt.20:15). The fruit on this tree is bad because the core is rotten, and the roots are not truly secure (Mk.4:6, 17). It springs up as a beautiful sight very rapidly, but having no root in itself, it also quickly fades away (Lk.8:13). It is a lamp that is burning out (Matt.25:8).

There is an additional root meaning to this Hebrew word for lamp. In its verb form, it means ‘to furrow’ or ‘to plow.’ The KJV and NKJV translators have chosen to render it according to that meaning. But that is not most likely intended here. It is true, however, that the plowing of the wicked is sin. And in context, it is a plausible meaning. When the wicked are together to cultivate the world, the result is always sin and death (Ezk.17:9; Heb.6:7-8). They only plant evil trees that produce nothing of value to the life of God because they do not plant their garden in God, who is the source of true life (Jn.3:19-21). So the sweat of their labor and hard work is always sin (Rom.6:23; 11:6), for their roots do not drink from the water of life (Ps.1:3; Jer.17:7-8; Ezk.17:5; 19:10). Their heart is too proud and therefore too fallow to be a good tree that bears the fruit of repentance (Matt.12:33-37). The roots are dried up and good for nothing but the brush fire (Jer.17:5-6; Jn.15:6).

*[together, they are] conjunctively, it is adding up to an equation. One plus one equals two, but the previous Hebrew adjective, though it is absolute, describes the addition as the joining factor to the equating answer. Therefore the definition of the previous construct expands to the feminine absolute under the adjectival construct/clause. Therefore the conjunction which adds the haughty eyes together to the large heart is the joining factor between these two absolutes as the antecedent answer of the word problem. While literally, it reads: the lamp of the wicked, it is sin. The nature of the equation is being more broadly defined due to the Hebrew adjective describing the “nature” of the lamp. A lamp produces light, but this is the light of the wicked. But the wicked are dead in trespasses and sins (Eph.2:1-5), yet (in them) the pride of life seems to thrive over the grace of life (Ps.37:7; 73:3; Jer.5:28; 12:1). Therefore this light describes the nature of the wicked, which is the power of their life (Ps.14:3; 94:21). But if they are not working together, their light burns out (Ex.27:20; Isa.64:6). Therefore the plurality of the wicked, since the Hebrew adjective is plural, is the life of this light (Rom.3:10-18), but even this togetherness is sin in God’s sight (Rom.3:19-20; Ps.2:1-3; Rev.18:23). So to define ‘the lamp’ more fully is to exegete the conjunction that equates the nature of the lamp, which is feminine to (or comes under) the previous construct as an additional absolute and a modifying clause.

*[the life of sin] literally, it is sin. But, again, this is modifying the previous absolute regarding the lamp of the wicked. So it is a feminine clause of the previous construct modifying the source of the lamp. The light of the life of the wicked is sin (Jn.8:12, 21-24; Lk.11:36). Therefore Scripture defines it as a life of darkness (Lk.11:35), a flame of a lamp that is going out (Jn.5:35; Matt.25:3, 8). Flames of a fire go out because they do not have fuel or a power source like a lamp without oil, a candlewick without wax. Sin runs the gas tank on empty and does not refill it (Lk.22:53; 1Cor.15:45; Matt.10:28). But when God pours his wrath upon sin, the life of sin becomes infinite (Matt.6:23). God’s wrath becomes the fuel of sin’s destruction (Rev.14:8, 10; 16:1, 19; 18:3). It becomes a lamp that is no longer enlightened from within but from without (Job 3:20; 21:17; Pr.20:27; Ps.36:9). Therefore it is a lamp that burns for its own light but is never satisfied because it has no life in itself and its glory has run out (Matt.8:12; Lk.13:28). Yet its sin continues by the power and source of God’s wrath (Job 3:20; 21:17; Rom.2:5). It forever lives in resistance to the illuminating power of God’s wrath (Rev.20:11-15). Sin forever hates the light and life of God because his face will forever be before them (2Cor.4:6; Rev.14:10). Sin is lawlessness because it despises God’s righteousness. Sin glorifies God but has none of God’s glory living in itself (Matt.25:26-30; 5:15-16; 25:4-13). God is justified in punishing the source of evil (1Jn.3:8). But evil has nothing in the life of God (Jn.14:30).

[Raised eyes and a large heart; the lamp of the wicked, it is sin]