The Thorn Hedge

It has been said that the shrewdness of the Scotch nation is owing to the pretty general study of the Book of Proverbs in that country. Of this I am not a judge; but certainly, if carefully followed, the Proverbs of Solomon make men wise for this world with a high order of prudence. God would have his people wise. There is no credit in being a fool, even if you have the grace of God in your heart. To me it seems a duty to make as much of myself as I can, since I am a servant of the Lord: I do not want everybody to think that all my Lord’s children are short of wit. In meditating upon this two-leaved proverb, we shall—

I. TAKE THE TEXT IN ITS TEMPORAL BEARINGS.

1. It is clear from the apposition that a slothful man is the opposite of righteous. Certainly he is so. His sins of omission abound. He breaks his word, he vexes others, Satan finds him mischief to do; he is, in fact, ready for every bad word and work.

2. It is not enough to be diligent unless we are righteous; for though the curse is to the idle, the blessing is not to the active, but to the righteous. It is diligence in the service of God, under the Holy Spirit, which wins the reward of God.

3. A slothful man’s way is net desirable. “A hedge of thorns.”

   • It is difficult in his own apprehension: a rough and thorny road, and he cannot have too little of it. He would sooner look at it a month than run in it an hour.
   • It becomes really thorny before long. His neglects hedge him up, involve him in difficulties, bring losses, and create hindrances.
   • It becomes painful: he is poor, mistrusted, harshly dealt with by weary creditors, and at last without a livelihood.
   • It becomes blocked up: he does not know where to turn; he cannot dig, and he tries begging. Laziness gets little pity, and charity itself repels it.

4. A righteous man’s way is under a blessing.

   • It becomes plain as he proceeds in it diligently.
   • God makes it so.
   • He makes it so himself.
   • Other people become willing to aid him, or, at least, to trust him, employ him, and recommend him.

II. TAKE THE TEXT IN ITS SPIRITUAL BEARINGS.

1. The spiritual sluggard.

   • Takes the way of indifference, carelessness, indecision, and unbelief; and this, though it may seem easy, is as full of sorrow as a thorn-hedge is full of pricking points.
   • He will have his own way; and self-will and obstinacy are briar hedges indeed: besides, his frowardness provokes others to oppose him, and the thorns thicken.
   • He chooses the way of sin, and he soon finds it full of sorrows, difficulties, perplexities, entanglements, and snares.
   • By his evil ways, and the inevitable consequences of his sins, he is shut out from God and Heaven.

2. The righteous man.

   • His way is that of faith and obedience.
   • It has its impediments: these are swept away.
   • It is frequently mysterious; but it is cleared up.
   • It is sometimes hilly; but it is the King’s highway,
   • Wherein we are right.
   • Wherein we are protected.
   • Wherein we are secured of a blessed end.
   • Are you wonderfully easy in religion, taking things as they come, in a slovenly way? Then your way will soon become a hedge of thorns. Neglect is quite sufficient to produce an immense crop of thorns and briars.
   • Do you seek to be righteous? Do you love holiness? Do you know Christ as your Way? Then go on without fear; for your way will be made plain, and your end will be peace. Psalm 37:37.

Confirmations

“The way of the slothful man,” the course which the sluggard takes in going about his affairs, “is as a hedge of thorns,” is slow and hard; for he goes creeping about his business, yes, his fears and griefs prick him and stay him like thorns and briars. “But the path of the righteous is as a paved causeway.” The order which the godly man takes is most plain and easy, who so readily and lustily runs on in the works of his calling as if he walked on a paved causeway.—P. Muffet.

Who can tell the pains which lazy people take? the muddles into which they bring themselves? They are driven to falsehood to excuse their sloth, and one lie leads on to more. Then they scheme and plot, and become dishonest. I knew one who fell out with hard work, and soon he fell in with drink and lost his position. Since then, to earn a scanty livelihood he has had to work ten times as much as was required of him in his better days, and he has hardly had a shoe to his foot. Meanwhile, a simple, plodding man has gone onward and upward, favored, as he confesses, by Providence; but, best of all, upheld by his integrity and industry; to him there has been success and happiness. He works hard, but his lot is ease itself compared with the portion of the sluggard.

Nobody rides to Heaven on a feather-bed. Grace has made a road to Heaven for sinners, but it does not suit sluggards. Those who reach the Celestial City are pilgrims and not lie-a-beds. Neglect is a sure way to Hell; but we must strive to enter in at the strait gate, and so run that we may obtain. If you let your farm alone it will be overrun with weeds, and if your heart be let alone it will be eaten up with sins. Nothing comes of sloth but rags and poverty here, and damnation hereafter. Let idlers in Zion note this.

It is wonderful how difficulties vanish from the path of the righteous! In traveling up the Rhine you appear to be landlocked, but as the steamer proceeds you perceive a clear passage; a sudden bend enables you to see the opening between the hills. The road of Israel seemed blocked at the Red Sea, and again at the Jordan; but as they were following the Divine Leader, he made a way for them through the waters. Old Roman roads are still visible which were thrown up along the sides of hills and across valleys; these were plain enough to be followed by the least familiar traveler: even so has the Lord cast up the road-way of his people and they shall not miss it. “The way-faring man, though a fool, shall not err therein.”

The spiritually negligent involve themselves in much sorrow. Neglecting prayer and other means of grace, they seek spiritual ease; but if they are God’s children they do not find it, but sow for themselves abundant thorns of regret and depression. I know of a surety that the diligent Christian is the only happy Christian. True religion is above all other things a business which is not only worth doing but is worth doing well. High farming in the fields of the soul is the only farming which pays.