Proverbs 25:11-14

A word spoken at exactly the right moment is a beautiful thing — golden fruit set in a silver bowl, lovely to look at and lovely to receive. The old margin pictures it as "a word upon his wheels" — not forced or dragged out, but rolling smoothly into place like a well-oiled chariot wheel, arriving naturally just when it is needed. Notice what makes a word "fit": not only that it is true, but that it suits the time and the person. Truth blurted at the wrong moment, or at the wrong man, can do more harm than good — a well-meaning blunder brings contempt rather than conviction. The Lord Jesus was the master of this: His words about living water and the bread of life rose naturally out of the conversation in front of Him. Learn to speak the right thing at the ripe moment; it is one of the loveliest of all the arts of grace.

The companion picture: a wise rebuke landing on a willing ear is as fitting and beautiful as fine gold jewelry, the two making one lovely whole. Two rare things must meet — a reprover skilled enough to correct well (with knowledge of the case, the right relationship, and love behind it), and a hearer humble enough to receive it. An obedient ear is a very rare thing; even religious people are often more stubborn against reproof than open sinners. It is a false sense of honor that makes a man bristle at correction; true honor counts it a glory to take a rebuke with gratitude. What a triumph of grace it is when the kindness of an honest reproof is not resented but thanked.

Picture a drink cooled with snow brought down from the mountains, handed to exhausted reapers in the blazing heat of harvest — that is what a faithful messenger is to those who sent him. He can be trusted to carry the errand and bring it home, and the relief of it refreshes the soul. (Adoniram Judson, chained in a Burmese death-cell, heard one morning the boom of the rescue-ship's cannon — his faithful messenger had gotten through — and that faithfulness was "like snow in summer to his weary heart.") Now lift it: the Master in heaven actually condescends to be refreshed by His faithful messengers, for we are "unto God a sweet savour of Christ" (2 Corinthians 2:15). Every believer is a messenger carrying an errand from God into the world. Carry it faithfully — "they that turn many to righteousness shall shine as the stars for ever and ever" (Daniel 12:3).

And the dark opposite of the faithful messenger: the big talker. He is like a sky full of promising clouds and gusting wind that raises every hope of rain — and then nothing falls. He is rich in promises and bankrupt in performance, exciting large expectations only to drop them in disappointment. It is bad to promise and then fail; it is far worse to promise with no intention of keeping it — which was the very trade of the Great Deceiver himself ("ye shall be as gods," and the rain never came). Beware the false-gift boaster in the pulpit too: the teacher who promises liberty and delivers only empty wind. Be a man whose clouds bring rain.