Proverbs 26:23
Like glaze covering an earthen vessel are burning lips and a wicked heart.
Sermons
A Wicked Heart Disguising ItselfProverbs 26:23
Putrefaction PhosphorescentScientific IllustrationsProverbs 26:23
Spite, Cunning, and DeceitE. Johnson Proverbs 26:20-28
On GuardW. Clarkson Proverbs 26:23-28














Unfortunately, we have to treat men as we find them, not as we wish that they were and as their Creator meant them to be. We are compelled to learn caution as we pass on our way.

I. OUR FIRST DUTY AND ITS NATURAL REWARD. Our first duty, natural to the young and the unsophisticated, is to be frank, open-minded, sincere, trustful; to say all that is in our heart, and to expect others to do the same; to believe that men mean what they say and say what they mean. And the reward of this simplicity and truthfulness on our part is an ingenuous, an unsuspicious spirit, a spirit as far removed as possible from that of cunning, of artifice, of worldliness.

II. THE CORRECTION OF EXPERIENCE. All too soon we discover that we cannot act on this theory without being wounded and hurt. We find that what looks like pure silver may be nothing better than "earthenware of the coarsest kind lacquered over with silver dross." Behind the lips that burn and breathe affection for us and interest in us is a wicked heart in which are "seven abominations," in which dwells every evil imagination. We find that those who affect to be our friends when they stand in our presence are in fact our bitterest and most active enemies. We discover that our words, spoken in good faith and purity of heart, are misrepresented, and are made a sword to smite us. Experience compels caution, reticence, sometimes absolute silence.

III. THE TWO MAIN EVILS AGAINST WHICH TO GUARD. These are:

1. Fair speaking which is false. The false words that are ostensibly spoken in our interest, by one that means us harm; words which would lead to trust and expectation when we should be alive with solicitude and alert to avoid the danger which impends. By these our treasure, our position, our friendship, our reputation, our happiness, may he seriously endangered.

2. Flattery. The invention and utterance of that which is not felt at all, or the careless and perhaps well-meant exaggeration of a feeling which is entertained in, the heart. Few things are more potent for harm than flattery.

(1) It is readily received.

(2) It is carefully treasured; men's self-love prompts them to accept and to retain that which, if it were of an opposite character, they would reject.

(3) It is harmful in three different directions:

(a) It gives a wrong impression of our estate, and may lead to financial "ruin" (ver. 28).

(b) It encourages an over-estimate of our capacity, and may lead to our undertaking that for which we are incompetent, and thus to an humiliating and distressing failure.

(c) It engenders a false idea of our persona! worth, and may lead to spiritual infatuation, and thus to the ruin of ourselves.

IV. THE DUTY AND THE WISDOM OF WARINESS. As these things are so, as human society does hold a large number of dissemblers (ver. 24), as it is possible that the next acquaintance we make may be an illustration of this sad fact, it follows that absolute trustfulness is a serious mistake. We must be on our guard. We must not open our hearts too freely. We must know men before we trust them. We must cultivate the art of penetration, of reading character. To be able to distinguish between the true and the false in this great sphere is a very large part of wisdom. Next to knowing God, and to acquainting ourselves with our own hearts, is the duty of studying men and discerning between the lacquered potsherd and the pure silver.

V. THE DOOM OF DECEIT. To be rigorously exposed, to be unsparingly denounced, to be utterly ashamed (vers. 26, 27). - C.

Burning lips and a wicked heart are like a potsherd covered with silver dross.
Scientific Illustrations.
The illuminating power of phosphorus appears due to an extremely slow chemical reaction, and it is affirmed that vegetable and animal substances may grow phosphorescent at a certain stage of decomposition, or even without any appearance of putrefaction. Accredited authorities cite a host of examples of fresh or stale meats which have been seen to shine during the night with a more or less vivid clearness. Fish, and especially salt-water fish, when no longer fresh, acquire a phosphorescence which brightens during the first period, of putrefaction. Leave for two or three days dead saltwater fish in non-luminous sea-water; at the end of that time the water will be covered with a thin pellicle of fatty matter, and will soon become phosphorescent. But it is not only in material nature that we thus find brightness in combination with impurity. Genius itself has been found shining amidst moral putrefaction.

(Scientific Illustrations.)

This may be meant either —

1. Of a wicked heart showing itself in burning lips, furious, passionate, outrageous words, burning in malice, and presenting those to whom, or of whom, they are spoken. Ill-words and ill-will agree together as well as a potsherd and the dross of silver, which, now that the pot is broken, and the dross separated from the silver, are fit to be thrown together to the dunghill

2. Or of a wicked heart disguising itself, with burning lips, burning with the professions of love and friendship, and even persecuting a man with flatteries; this is like a potsherd covered with the scum or dross of silver, with which one that is weak may be imposed upon, as if it were of some value, but a wise man is soon aware of the cheat. This sense agrees with the following verses.

( Matthew Henry.)

People
Solomon
Places
Jerusalem
Topics
Ardent, Burning, Covered, Covering, Dross, Earthen, Earthenware, Evil, Fervent, Glaze, Heart, Lips, Overlaid, Plated, Potsherd, Silver, Smooth, Spread, Vessel, Waste, Wicked
Outline
1. observations about fools
13. about sluggards
17. and about contentious busybodies

Dictionary of Bible Themes
Proverbs 26:23

     5259   coat
     5445   potters and pottery
     8784   nominal religion

Proverbs 26:23-24

     5164   lips

Proverbs 26:23-25

     5016   heart, fallen and redeemed

Library
One Lion Two Lions no Lion at All
A sermon (No. 1670) delivered on Thursday Evening, June 8th, 1882, at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington, by C. H. Spurgeon. "The slothful man saith, There is a lion without, I shall be slain in the streets."--Proverbs 22:13. "The slothful man saith, There is a lion in the way; a lion is in the streets."--Proverbs 26:13. This slothful man seems to cherish that one dread of his about the lions, as if it were his favorite aversion and he felt it to be too much trouble to invent another excuse.
C.H. Spurgeon—Sermons on Proverbs

The Hebrew Sages and their Proverbs
[Sidenote: Role of the sages in Israel's life] In the days of Jeremiah and Ezekiel (Jer. xviii. 18; Ezek. vii. 26) three distinct classes of religious teachers were recognized by the people: the prophets, the priests, and the wise men or sages. From their lips and pens have come practically all the writings of the Old Testament. Of these three classes the wise men or sages are far less prominent or well known. They wrote no history of Israel, they preached no public sermons, nor do they appear
Charles Foster Kent—The Origin & Permanent Value of the Old Testament

We Shall not be Curious in the Ranking of the Duties in which Christian Love...
We shall not be curious in the ranking of the duties in which Christian love should exercise itself. All the commandments of the second table are but branches of it: they might be reduced all to the works of righteousness and of mercy. But truly these are interwoven through other. Though mercy uses to be restricted to the showing of compassion upon men in misery, yet there is a righteousness in that mercy, and there is mercy in the most part of the acts of righteousness, as in not judging rashly,
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

Proverbs
Many specimens of the so-called Wisdom Literature are preserved for us in the book of Proverbs, for its contents are by no means confined to what we call proverbs. The first nine chapters constitute a continuous discourse, almost in the manner of a sermon; and of the last two chapters, ch. xxx. is largely made up of enigmas, and xxxi. is in part a description of the good housewife. All, however, are rightly subsumed under the idea of wisdom, which to the Hebrew had always moral relations. The Hebrew
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament

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