He who sires a fool gets himself sorrow, and the father of a fool has no joy.
If I wanted to destroy a society, a community, a church, there’s one element I’d target above all others: the family. The fruit of that targeting, after all, is obvious in the modern world. State education, feminism (and its effect on both genders), and all the other dysfunctions of the family are endemic to our society. Both as part of this and in response, the West has taken its individualism to a deadly extreme, pretending that family does not matter, that a child is an entity without respect to his parents, that parents and children are in a voluntary association. Yet there is an impossible-to-remove quality in the parental relationship. A father and his son are father and son regardless, and this has consequences, for children can grow in two directions: to honor God or to rebel against Him.
Today’s proverb is first and foremost a warning concerning the second. It is a warning to parents, to start with. The father who raises a fool will reap sorrow; this is a fact of life. It therefore behooves him to take every measure available to him in order to teach his son, to raise him in the ‘discipline and instruction of the Lord’ (Eph. 6:4). This is no guarantee- a good father can have a wicked son- but the promise of God is that the righteous will, as a rule, be blessed with his fruit, though perhaps it will be outside the usual descent of family in a few cases, by adoption or mentorship (Ps. 127:4-5).
The dangers of a father who does not attend sufficiently to this proverb are seen most impressively, I think, in David. A great man in the faith David was, but the level of messed-up his children hit is remarkable. One assaulted his step-sister, the daughter of his father’s wife (2 Sam. 13:1-22). Another responded by murdering said assailant (2 Sam. 13:23-33). These two were Amon and Absalom; Absalom then proceeds to attempt insurrection, ending in his death (2 Sam. 8:9-15). Then, after David’s death, his children engage in a power struggle that requires the death of Adonijah for treason (1 Kings 1:5-27, 2:25). As it turns out, siring that many children on that many women had consequences, a legacy that echoes in Rehoboam’s foolishness and scorn at the commencement of his reign (1 Kings 12:1-15).
The suffering this brought to David we see very clearly in 2 Samuel 18: “And the king was deeply moved and went up to the chamber over the gate and wept. And as he went, he said, ‘O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! Would I had died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son!’” (v31). But that’s only half the story and only half the warning. David’s children didn’t have all that happy of a time either, which can’t be laid on David’s doorstep alone. Amnon manifestly knew what he was doing (2 Samuel 13 is a look at some really intense depravity, a dehumanizing thirst for something precious only while it was not his); Absalom put a lot of thought into his revolt (2 Sam. 15:1-3); Adonijah didn’t exactly lack mental faculties, as he persisted in his plotting even after being given mercy (1 Kings 1:50, 2:25).
The wicked son should take warning, then, that his wickedness is not against himself only. It is against his family, against his parents particularly, an abiding pain. What is greater than the love of parent for child, save the love of God for His children? There are equals, I think, but nothing human to excel it, save for the depth of the love a Christian should live towards God. To see one so beloved running towards destruction, whether in God’s mercy to discipline or in His providence to Hell, that is a pain I dread to think of. The wicked son should recognize what he inflicts.
We should recognize too that we are God’s creation. Are we a joy to Him, when we act as fools? Is the wicked man who uses His image (Gen. 1:26) to rebel against Him and inflict evil upon others, is he not a sorrow to God? The sinner unrepentant, of course, faces judgement, and in that judgement’s righteousness God is glorified. Here we find the flip side, too, of God’s parental relationship: His adopted children, His Son.
If a foolish child is only sorrow, we are much sorrow to God, but by His grace we are less and less a sorrow, growing in maturity, learning to bring joy to the God we are learning to love (Rom. 13:10). More, He has joy eternal in the righteousness of His son, both in His righteousness given to us (1 Cor. 1:30) and in His righteousness in Himself (Matt. 11:27; John 8:54; Rev. 19:7). It is the good work of Christ, in fact, to bring judgement upon all those who sin, all those who spurned sonship and disowned themselves via sin from their Creator (John 5:22). In Christ is a great gladness for the Father, then, and we in Christ are a joy also- a joy this proverb directs us to make greater in works of love, of righteousness towards Him.
God bless.
Written by Colson Potter
Sanctuary Functional Medicine, under the direction of Dr Eric Potter, IFMCP MD, provides functional medicine services to Nashville, Middle Tennessee and beyond. We frequently treat patients from Kentucky, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, Ohio, Indiana, and more... offering the hope of healthier more abundant lives to those with chronic illness.
