What's Your Plan?

*The strategies of *the diligent *surely arise *to success, *but all who are too small *crumble to nothing. (mast)

Proverbs 21:5 (NKJV)

The plans of the diligent lead surely to plenty, But those of everyone who is hasty, surely to poverty.

*[The strategies of] literally, careful intentions. Now from the perspective of a deeper study, this is not strictly an application spinning off from the previous proverb but is a general statement of fact according to the wisdom principles of every age. It is not a moral principle that you are to ground your faith upon that is to be a surety of salvation. In fact, it speaks of the unchangeable testimony of this world system and its pragmatic approach to success (1Jn.2:15-17). Solomon, however, is not condemning it, nor promoting it, as a moral means of bearing fruit to God. He is simply giving us a worldview of how the wisdom of this world is built under the fallen principles of the inventions of men (Rom.1:30; Ecc.7:29). That’s why he said in the previous proverb that the plowing (that is, the labor) of the wicked is sin. That means the proud who are in the position to make their plans work succeed in this present (created) wisdom, which is amoral of itself until the proud process it, then it becomes sin. Therefore in the following proverbs, Solomon goes on to apply more fully that this system of liberty gives the proud the best opportunity to succeed, but at the same time grants them the liberty to do violence to themselves. So those who are too quick to gamble with their liberty burn out their lamps of liberty very quickly (Pr.21:4, 6). But this proverb zeros in on the motivations as well as those who hijack them. Because the wisdom of the world symbolically has an axis of gold, it is what these strategies or plans revolve around. These are plans to prosper. God is not against good motivations to prosper; therefore, this liberty must be tolerated (Ps.103:8; James 5:7-8; Acts 17:30). But the foolish complicate this liberty, and therefore this system requires wisdom to manage its foolishness (Matt.25:27; Lk.16:8; Matt.25:8). The motivation is money because money buys power, and those most able to put their strategies into orbit are observed as the most wise in worldly terms (Pr.4:7-9). Therefore the wise are the most powerful. That is what this proverb centers on, the powerful. The wealthier you are under this system, the most powerful you will be in terms of “succeeding” in your plans. You could say these strategies are the “blueprints” to the Egyptian pyramid scheme. These motivations are ‘the eye’ on top of the food chain.

*[the diligent] poetically, the gild. Typically, it is only the diligent that possess the gold. So, traditionally, it is best understood in the ‘literal’ sense. But I don’t believe that is required or absolute in this context. This [is] speaking of those who were diligent (in the past) but now possess the power. Therefore the poetic sense may be the intended sense. This anthropomorphic understanding is often poetically referred to as ‘a gild.’ A gild is a gold covering. So a gild is something that only looks solid from its surface (2Tim.3:5), but underneath it is as weak as anything else (Rom.6:17). It is a deception that is neither positive nor negative in its spiritual relation (to God) (Gen.1:31; 3:6). Therefore this is to give an appearance of success (1Cor.3:12-17). This [is] the worldly scheme. And it has been the worldly scheme since the fall of man into his motivations of sin (Gen.6:5). But again, this gild isn’t to be judged until the proper time (1Cor.4:5). This gild is to have the liberty to stand or to fall upon its own wisdom. For it is the wisdom that holds this gild together that is going to be judged by its successes or its failures (James 3:13-4:3, 13-17). If it stands by pride, it is prophesied to fall (James 5:1-12). But if it keeps its wisdom by humility, it is God’s grace that is able to make it abide (Rom.14:4-6). Therefore Solomon gives us the following proverbial warnings in the application of this general but proverbial statement of golden fact (Pr.21:6-8).

*[surely arise] dramatically, an exclaimed epiphany. It’s really an exclamation point at the end of the previous clause of thought in the literal sense. It is not really defining anything in addition but is made to keep our attention glued in conjunction to the word picture of the golden gild. “The strategies of the gild; now! that’s superior!” If it does intend to have any meaning, it may be an exclamation of contempt or mockery. But, again, I don’t think that’s likely. This proverb is made to be neutral on the grounds of the scheme of liberty. It is up to God to judge how one takes advantage of it; how this liberty is used on the individual level (James 1:25; 2Pet.2:19-22; Gal.5:1, 13). Nevertheless, if we stick to the traditional narrative sense in conjunction, not to the gild but to ‘the plans,’ which by the way is the feminine subjection of the diligent, then these plans do surely arise to abundance. This [is] equally true, but I don’t think that’s the antecedent of this marker of emphasis by looking at it closer. I believe the antecedent is the head of the clause, which is the golden gild that covers everything. We are not to look back to the motives hiding underneath the gild but are to keep our eyes on the surface. The author wants us to see the glory of the gild for its golden liberty (Matt.7:7-12; Lk.6:30-31). He is bringing these plans under the protection and glory of this gild (1Tim.4:10). It is this liberty of the gild that is good for us, regardless of its motivations lurking underneath (Gal.5:2). It’s good for the atheist as well as the saint (Rom.2:21-24). Its motivations can be judged later. So with this emphatic expression drawing our attention towards the gild, it would be good for us to refresh our minds of all the tools in the holy temple, for it [was] the glory of the temple that sanctified this liberty to pursue the wealth of gold (Ex.25:24-25, 28, 31, 36, 38-39; 26:29, 32, 37). Even the ark of the covenant was gilded with gold (Ex.25:11, 13). Think upon the beauty of this wisdom hidden within the temple. Think how the gold of the temple was stretched out to cover and to add value to the things that were to be used in the temple? No, that’s not inflation; it’s wise use of increasing the quality of a product without ever raising the price (Pr.23:23; Isa.55;1; Lk.4:18). They stretched out the value of things by veneering them with gold. This was to illustrate the spiritual wealth of Israel’s God (Eph.2:4-7; Lk.12:33). There were consumable things in the temple, such as wood, but the gold gave them the appearance of stability and density - a weightiness. Therefore the gold added value to the perishable things. This illustrates the wisdom of God in giving the children of Israel the power of His spiritual name (Num.6:27; Matt.28:18-20). He gives them value when they work under His glorious gild of grace. Though internally they are weak and fragile, His eternal glory covers them and protects them from the trials of these worldly schemes (Rev.3:10). Christ is their success when Christ is their glory (Rom.8:18).

*[to success] literally, preeminence. The gild makes everything it covers superior to everything else. That’s why the things in the temple were most holy and most valuable. They are set apart for the LORD and by the LORD (Rom.9:21-23). It is the LORD that sanctifies them. That’s what Solomon is aiming at in this emphatic exclamation. He wants us to behold the superiority of the LORD’S work so that we would be covered by His sovereign liberty (2Cor.3:17). The more I meditate on this, the more I see it as a comparison of the proud laborers that are bringing their sacrifices to the temple under the ritual obligation but never stay and abide to ponder the beauty of the LORD’S work on their behalf (Pr.21:3). This preeminence is even to transcend the proud. It is to rise above them to such a degree that their proud works cannot even touch it (Matt.5:20, 48; 2Sam.6:7). That’s the beauty of this gild. The thoughts and plans of Yahweh are higher and preeminent than our thoughts and plans (Jer.29:11; Isa.55:9). The plan that God has for us is to prosper spiritually, eternally in the gild that He provided for us in the glory of the only true Son (Jn.14:6). He is the only propitiation that shields us from the fires of the present testing, and therefore He is the only Savior that God has provided (1Tim.2:5). There is no other name under heaven by which we may be saved, and therefore there is no other gild that is God’s. In Christ, our works, down to the very motivations of our works, become purified as we walk in His gild, as we present our bodies to be used by the Lord (Rom.12:1-2). As far as Christ has the preeminence in our walk, our life is hammered out like the gold in the temple, sanctified, and made useful to the Lord for every work that “He has prepared” for us to walk in (2Tim.2:19-21; Eph.2:10).

*[but all who are too small] conditionally, to be in haste. It is a state of mind (Pr.6:18). The verb can also mean to be narrow. It is describes a class of thought that is small-minded. They literally have no plans to honor the gild except to strip it of its honor and wisdom (Isa.30:1). The verb has an additional use, meaning to be pressed or confined. This would speak of being limited in the ability to bring about its plans (Pr.15:22). Therefore it is difficult to determine the direction of thought in Solomon’s mind with a very limited context. So I believe Solomon is using the term under the broader understanding of it, which means all the definitions equally apply. It is a general proverb; therefore, we should look at each definition in how it relates conjunctively to the previous clause. The context is the superiority of the gild. Therefore the condition of this class, in conjunction with the gild, is the response of how the gild is viewed by this class. It is true, therefore, that all who are in haste who run into ‘the plans’ of the gild but are without the means (that is, the wisdom of the gild) shall come to poverty and be left as nothing (Job 5:12; Ps.33:10-11). They will crumble under the weight of the standard of the gild because they run into its plans without ‘purpose’ whether it applies to an evil gild or a sanctified one (Pr.19:21; 20:18; Ps.146:4). They don’t see the true value of the gold (Lk.16:9), so what they earn from the value of the gild (Lk.16:11), they spend on their own empty conceits (Jer.18:12). They lack the vision of the gild (Pr.29:18). And so they are described as ‘being in haste.’ They are too quick to buy into the world system that revolves around selling the soul for the power of the ‘worldly’ gild and ultimately crumble under it as it is divided against itself (Matt.16:26; Rom.1:25-26; 1Jn.2:15-17; Mk.3:24-25). And so they are not only ‘in haste’ but are ‘too narrow’ in their purpose under the power of the false gild (Isa.32:7). All that they can see is the buying power to obtain what the spirit of the flesh wants (Matt.6:32). Therefore they chase after hopeless things and a life that is passing away; life doesn’t consist in these things (Matt.6:26). This condition renders life meaningless and exposes the poverty of the soul’s delight (Matt.5:3). And so they are ‘pressed’ under the weight of this world system, this gild in the pursuit of this buying power that leads to nothingness (Jn.21:3; Acts 5:38). The more that they are ‘pressured’ under the power of the gild, the more they are too quick to trust it and run to it for security (1Cor.1:19, 28; 2:6; Isa.30:2; 31:1; Ezk.30:6). Therefore all who are in this state of disposition do not truly value the gild (Pr.2:1-22). By strictly beholding its veneer, they fail to see the mystery underneath it (Acts 7:15, 34; 1Cor.15:36). By observing it through the eyes of sin, they are blinded to the true purpose of its value (Matt.13:44-46).

*[crumble to nothing] literally, towards want. Yes. The gild is purposed to cause us to want, whether its purpose is for our good or for evil (Rom.8:28; Jer.18:11; 4:22). But it’s our eyes that corrupt the motivations of this want (Hab.2:9). It’s our eyes that blind us from seeing its purpose in God, to cause us to exclusively want Him (Isa. 59:4; Jer.2:13). We don’t perceive it as nothing through the eyes of sin, but underneath enslavement to the world system, that is exactly what it is - nothing - when we are not (in the temple) to understand God’s purposes that are superior to the present gild (Ps.73). God’s ‘temporary’ purpose in it is so that we find its emptiness (Acts 17:29), and in finding its emptiness that we search to be filled only by Him (Acts 17:27). It is by seeing our image in this golden reflection (Dan.3:7), and finding it fading away every day the more we pursue it (James 1:11; Jer.8:13; Isa.64:6), that we shall look away from it to the unfading image of God (1Pet.1:4; 5:4), by pursuing fellowship in the Spirit through the face of Christ (2Cor.4:3-10). Therefore in finding our ‘smallness,’ our ‘nothingness,’ we grow towards a higher, superior view of God. The lower we go in ourselves, the higher God becomes in our thoughts and plans (Jn.3:30; Ps.34:7). It is God fashioning us into His glorious gild (Rom.8:29-30; 9:21)! We become more and more fit to be used as an instrument in His temple the smaller our plans and thoughts become for ourselves (Gal.2:6; Ecc.3:14). The more time we spend in this gild of God, the greater our vision of God becomes. And the greater our vision of God, the higher His thoughts and plans transform us into His perception and vision. Therefore no one can repent ‘too hastily.’ No one can run into His gild ‘too quickly,’ for His gild is not of this world. Let others run into the world system, but let yourself ‘be tested’ by the fires of God’s gild. Don’t do what others do by stripping the temple of its gold. These are thieves and robbers who prophesy false dreams to you (Jer.23:16). They have no vision but their own (Jer.14:14). They walk by sight, by human reason, and not by faith which has been tested and approved by God. Know the plans that God has for you and understand His purposes in the present scheme of fallen men. Hold fast to what is good, and be innocent of the devil’s devices (1Thess.5:20-22; Rom.16:19; Eph.6:11; 2Cor.2:11). Don’t let them have the power over you (Rom.14:16-17; 1Cor.6:12). Be superior in your thoughts, and you will escape being crushed under the devil’s schemes (1Pet.5:8; Lk.20:17-18).

[The schemes of gold; aha, this is superior, but all that is pressed under it; alas, it means nothing ] (mast)