"A wicked doer giveth heed to false lips; and a liar giveth ear to a naughty tongue."
Proverbs 17:4
Part 1
“A wicked doer.”
This is the person who does wickedness, and this word means “to be bad, be evil”1 (BDB). It is the wicked person’s way of life. They love to do bad things to people. They are always looking for new ways to do evil to others.
“For they sleep not, except they have done mischief, and their sleep is taken away unless they cause some to fall” (Proverbs 4:16).
“Fret not thyself because of evil men, neither be thou envious at the wicked” (Proverbs 24:19).
Believers, we don’t need to let these kinds of people stir us up (“fret not” = “chafe not thyself”2), and we certainly do not envy them or their wickedness. God will reward these wicked people for their evil.
“Giveth heed to false lips;”
The interesting thing about “wicked people” is that because they love evil and telling falsehoods, they will gladly listen to lies from other liars. There is a simple reality in the Bible that when people refuse to hear the truth, all that’s left for them to believe is a lie. And a liar inclines to hang out around other liars.
“If a ruler hearken to lies, all his servants are wicked” (Proverbs 29:12).
This makes sense. Followers generally emulate their leaders. If the king is a liar, so will be his subjects.
The problem with being a liar is that they cannot be trusted. Years ago, when our sons were young, we had to deal with one of them for lying. Fortunately, he had not become habitual in his lies yet, but we were concerned and wanted to help him learn to tell the truth all the time. One day when he was in trouble for something small, he said to me, “But dad, this time, I’m telling the truth!” It was an excellent opportunity to teach him that a liar can’t be trusted because we can never know when to believe him.
As incredulous as it is, some people love to listen to lies. Come back tomorrow, and let’s see what we can learn about these destructive individuals.
1. Brown, Driver, Briggs. Brown-Driver-Briggs’ Hebrew Definitions, the electronic version in eSword.
2. E.W. Bullinger, The Companion Bible, the electronic version in eSword.