Proverbs 6:21 Bind them on your heart always; tie them around your neck.
When I think back to my dad and my mum and ask myself what values I have today that they instilled into me, I think I see their work ethic.
My dad would rise at 5 am to leave for work six days a week and would work till late often to provide for the family. He worked as a crane operator of major projects in the 1960s and 1970s.
His job was rarely secure and if he did not turn up one day it would be gone. It was not a well-paid job either. Many men who had left the army after the second world war had certificates to operate cranes. It was easy to fill a vacancy the same day then.
My mum worked as a cleaner, and as a domestic assistant in hospitals and aged care facilities. When she cleaned wealthy people’s homes they always wanted her to come back and work for them again and again – she was a really hard worker and really detailed cleaner.
I had my first job delivering papers at the age of 12. 5 am starts were normal even then.
As my life has unfolded I have seen their work ethic in my own life pay dividends over and over.
Time after time I have found myself in a position that was well within my capability and capacity. I would simply work hard, do the jobs that no one else wanted to do, and do the shifts that no one else wanted to do, and hey-presto I would find myself being moved to roles with more responsibility and more rewards.
These values that my earthly dad and mum exampled by their lives have fared me well in my life. As I read this passage today, my thoughts turn to the values that Christ exampled here on earth as he revealed his father to us.
These values are also to be held dear by me each day, and to be put into practice in my life. The writer of Proverbs is speaking from experience and is urging us to listen with the preconceived intention of obedience, once again. This is true wisdom.
KNOWLEDGE
In Chapter 3, verse 3 the writer tells us to bind steadfast love and faithfulness around our necks and to write them on the tablet of our heart. Here, three chapters later were are told to bind our father’s commandment and our mother’s teaching on our heart and to forsake on our mother’s teaching.
Like a teacher for our intellect and our soul, this passage calls to the deepest part of our life. The echo from chapter three amplifies the importance of these instructions. Can we also hear an echo from the New Testament as Jesus would say twenty-five times in the book of John, truly, truly?
The Greek word for “truly” is amen – let it be so.
The writer of proverbs is re-emphasising the key point so that we get it, not only in our head but deep into our heart, into the vulnerable places of our life, so that we too can say with John, “yes, Amen, let it be just as you have said”.
UNDERSTANDING
Let’s pick one word from this verse to look closer at and see if that can help us gain a deeper insight into how God would love us to live?
The word for “bind” in Hebrew is pronounced as “qasar” and this word appears forty-four times in the Old Testament. The ESV translates this word into the English words, stronger; tied, bind; conspired; made; joined together; plotted together; and tie.
In our reading of these verses we see the idea of being “joined with” as at the heart of the word “bind”, so it is an intentional and ongoing action.
WISDOM – what teaching do you reflect on every single day?
STRENGTHS THOUGHT: Learner, there is honesty about what you do and don’t know, the enjoyment of collaborative learning, and a desire to help others take their own learning journeys.
Allan’s Unauthorised Version – [be joined with them [father’s commandments and mothers teaching] in your inner person, the seat of your thinking and feeling, constantly, daily, continually. Bind them around your vulnerabilities.]
PRAYER: Father, thank you for today. Help me to put into practice all the things that are dear to your heart. Thank you.
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