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When was the last time you read Pr 29? Hopefully, your reply will be, “On the 29th of September”. You ask, “Why the 29th of September?”, because you should consider reading one Proverb a day. Is it the 1st day of the month? Read Proverb 1. Is it the 15th day of the month, read Proverb 15, etc. There are 31 Proverbs, so at the end of the month you may need to read more than one Proverb. You may wonder why you should include the Proverbs so continually in your studies? The argument for the book of Proverbs provided by the most excellent translators of the Geneva Bible explain it this way, “The wonderful love of God toward His Church is declared in this book: foreasmuch as the sum and effect of the whole Scriptures is here set forth in these brief sentences, which partly contain doctrine, and partly manners and also exhortations to both.”
Take a look at Proverbs 29:18-Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he-(KJV).
The Geneva Bible translates it this way, Where there is no vision, the people decay: but he that keepeth the law is blessed (the law is the commandments of God—If ye love me (Jesus), keep my commandments-Jn 14:15).
The word, “Vision” is interrupted to mean, faithful ministers of the Word of God.
Matthew Henry gives an excellent understanding of this verse: See here, I. The misery of the people that want a settled ministry: “Where there is no vision, no prophet to expound the law, no priest or Levite to teach the good knowledge of the Lord, no means of grace, the word of the Lord is scarce, there is no open vision (1 Sam 3:1), where it is so the people perish; the word has many significations, any of which will apply here.
1. The people are made naked, stripped of their ornaments and so exposed to shame, stripped of their armor and so exposed to danger. (Sounds like the Laodicean Church from Rev 3.) How bare does a place look without Bibles and ministers, and what an easy prey is it to the enemy of souls!
2. The people rebel, not only against God, but against their prince (leader); good preaching would make people good subjects, but, for want of it (or, because they lack hearing the Word of God), they are turbulent and factious, and despise dominions, because they know no better.
3. The people are idle, or they play, as the scholars are apt to do when the master is absent; they do nothing to any good purpose, but stand all the day idle, and sporting in the market-place, for want of instruction what to do and how to do it.
4. They are scattered as sheep having no shepherd, for want of the masters of assemblies to call them and keep them together, Mark 6:34. They are scattered from God and their duty by apostasies (a total desertion, or departure from one's faith or religion), from one another by divisions; God is provoked to scatter them by his judgments, 2 Chron 15:3, 5.
5. They perish; they are destroyed for lack of knowledge, Hos 4:6. See what reason we have to be thankful to God for the plenty of open vision (preaching) which we enjoy.”
However, we need to take responsibility at choosing a good house of worship. That is why it is so important to read the Word of God so you may make a clear distinction of those who preach the Word of God and those who preach what your itching ears want to hear-For the time will come when they will not suffer wholesome doctrine: but having their ears itching, shall after their own lusts get them an heap of teachers-Timothy 4:3 (Geneva Bible). Faithful Pastors in times past took all occasions they could, because men were very prompt and ready to return to their fables.
Source: https://www.biblestudytools.com; Proverbs 29:18.
