Intel in the Light
By Anthony Casperson
8-22-26

Three options stand before you in a story. One appears to have long-term ramifications, but doesn’t seem to really help in the moment. The second provides limited aid, but at least it’s something. And the third sounds incredibly fun, with all sorts of short-term good.

Which do you choose?

If you’re anything like me, you probably want to hear more about the options. Do the long-term ramifications of option one outweigh the short-term rewards of option three? Are there negative consequences for any of the options? Are the costs for any of them greater than the others?

Having as much understanding as possible can make the decisions easier. This is why I will often consult a game guide or an online walkthrough when playing video games with a lot of choices. I want full intel on everything so that I’m not blindsided with detrimental resource costs, companion disapproval, or failure to achieve the best possible ending. All because I happened to choose the “fun” option.

More information and insight will always bring to light the better choice, if we can gain that intel.

While finding the full description of costs and consequences for a game might be easy, just a page flip or search engine prompt away, it’s not as easy in real life. We can’t tell the future in that way. Even if someone has gone through something similar, we won’t necessarily experience the exact same outcome. Life has many more variables than a video game.

However, one thing we’ve been seeing while looking through the opening nine chapters of Proverbs is that an understanding of wisdom can point us toward the most common outcomes of various actions. Wisdom, the proper reverence of God and his ways, can be a light that shines on a few of the dark spaces. It can give us greater range into the fog of war that is life.

Often this greater understanding includes what the possible consequences of certain actions are most likely to be. Thus, if we listen to God’s ways and wisdom, we can be more informed on the pitfalls. And we can then make the best choice.

This week’s blog, from Proverbs 6:20-35, shows us this idea as we get another speech of wisdom from father to son. It again personifies foolishness as an unauthorized woman, an adulteress, because of the extreme temptation that such activities have in the lives of boys who’ve yet to understand the value of wisdom. But again, we can broaden the application beyond just the sexual.

Yet, this passage does include an idea of there being layers and levels of consequences, beyond just, “Wisdom calls us to life, while foolishness leads to death.” Much as we saw in last week’s blog, depths of negative ramifications do exist. And so, likewise, there are foolish actions that have lesser—but still negative—costs, while there are also deeds which cost us life itself.

And it is through the wisdom of the fear of Yahweh that we can gain the intel on which is which. The light shining on the layers.

This is the point of verses 20-24 of Proverbs 6. Solomon tells his son to keep his father’s commands and his mother’s law close to heart. As we’ve repeatedly witnessed, this discussion of commands and law point us to the ways of God, more than just obeying one’s parents to the letter.

God’s ways and commands should be so deeply ingrained in our lives that we metaphorically bind them to our hearts. Tie them around our neck so that it hangs directly over that vital organ.

Then, wherever and whenever we go, wisdom will lead us, watch over us, and continually be our companion. We can have deep conversations with wisdom long into the night.

As well, those commands will be a lamp that guides. That law will be a light that shines the way. The disciplinary corrections they provide will lead us to life.

Following wisdom points us to the most likely choice that hurts the least.

Because the danger of foolishness is high. Even while the temptation of the forbidden woman of folly draws us so strongly to the “fun” of the worst options.

Verses 24-29 speak more to those dangers, providing examples of lesser and greater versions of the hazards.

For instance, the first couple of those verses contrast a prostitute to an adulteress. The danger of an adulteress is more than even one whose job is sexual. (Not that Solomon is advocating prostitution, rather he’s trying to make a point with it.)

At least the repeated visits to a prostitute will leave one with the barest of necessities for life. The cost leaves one with at least a loaf of bread. But the married woman of folly won’t be happy until we’re dead. She hunts for our lives.

This is why Solomon tells his son to not fall for folly’s beauty, or the temptress’s eyelash fluttering. The deepest of foolishness—the options of life with the amazing short-term pleasures—will most often seek our entire being and livelihood. Rather than leave us with next to nothing, she will track us down and take us out like prey.

In verses 27-28, Solomon explains the dangers in another way. Falling for the depths of folly is like hugging a lit torch and expecting to not end up enflamed. It’s like putting your full weight on a bed of coals and thinking that you won’t end up with hot feet.

When we toy with the options of foolishness, we’re playing with fire. And we will get burned. Badly.

That’s part of the point of verse 29. Going to the embrace of the adulteress will lead only to an angry husband. Deep foolishness will lead to punishing consequences. The cost of foolishness is great.

Solomon continues this though with another analogy between a thief and an adulterer in verses 30-35.

He says that no one will hold a thief in utter contempt if they stole out of hunger. Sure, theft is still wrong, but it wasn’t out of malice. Rather, it was out of need that they stole. And so most people would at least have a little bit of understanding as to why it happened. Even though it would still require punishment.

Yet, as verse 31 points out, when the thief is caught, he will still be required to pay the recompense that God’s commands require, a sevenfold return of stolen goods. A crime that people can understand should still have a cost. The price set by the Creator of all things.

But what about actions that expand far beyond one of that can at least be understood?

To those, Solomon provides the example of verses 32-35. The man who seeks the bed of a married woman will not find understanding in the eyes of the husband. That senseless action will lead to the adulterer’s destruction. Because there’s no equivalent of a sevenfold return on what was stolen.

For merely trying to touch a forbidden woman, the adulterer will be touched with the smiting blows of the husband. Disgrace and dishonor will follow the man for the rest of his life, if he still has one after the husband finds out. Jealous fury will seek revenge, and no amount of bribery can repay what had been taken.

This is the cost of foolishness in general. Some actions of folly can be repaid after being caught. But there are depths of folly that mercilessly smite us no matter how much we promise to pay back for our foolishness.

And so, with the light of wisdom shining onto the hidden ramifications of our choices, we have to consider which option to make. Yes, some will sound fun in the moment and provide amazing short-term pleasures, but those options most often have the hidden cost of deadly consequences.

The best choice is not the one that gives us the most desirable short-term experience, but those that provide long-term good with little to no negative consequences. The cost of discovering wisdom and the ways of God right now will pay off greatly in the end.

At the very least, that cost allows us to witness the most likely outcome of our choices before it’s too late.

So, as always, the options are in front of us. Which one will we choose?