The Inescapable Calculus of God Text: Proverbs 11:31
Introduction: A World Without Consequences
We live in an age that is desperately trying to abolish consequences. Our entire culture is a massive, concerted effort to detach actions from their results, to sever the link between sowing and reaping. Men want to live like devils and arrive in a sanitized heaven of their own devising. They want to redefine reality by committee, to declare that gravity has no say in what happens after you jump, that debt has no relationship to bankruptcy, and that debauchery has no connection to disease and despair. They are like children who believe that if they close their eyes very tightly, the monster in the room will simply cease to be.
This is the official religion of secularism: the denial of cause and effect. It is a worldview built on the sandy foundation of wishful thinking. But the God who made the world, the God of the Scriptures, is not a sentimentalist. He built reality with a fixed and unyielding moral grain. The universe runs on a divine calculus, an operating system of perfect justice. You cannot cheat it, you cannot hack it, and you cannot opt out of it. This is what the book of Proverbs teaches us on every page. It is a book of applied physics for the soul. And the verse before us today is one of the clearest statements of this principle in all the Bible. It tells us that God’s accounting system is always running, the books are always open, and payments are always made, right here, in the dirt of this world.
This is a truth that many Christians, in their own way, have also tried to evade. We have sometimes relegated all of God's justice to the sweet by and by. We speak as though God is a passive observer of history, patiently waiting on the sidelines until the final judgment to settle all accounts. But this is a profound misreading of Scripture. God is not an absentee landlord. He is an active, governing king, and His justice is not something that only appears at the end of the movie. It is woven into the fabric of every scene. This proverb forces us to confront the reality that God’s government is immediate, it is active, and it begins, of all places, with His own people.
The Text
If the righteous will be repaid in the earth,
How much more the wicked and the sinner!
(Proverbs 11:31 LSB)
The Father's Discipline (v. 31a)
We begin with the first clause, which is a startling proposition.
"If the righteous will be repaid in the earth..." (Proverbs 11:31a)
The first thing we must do is clear away a common misunderstanding. This "repayment" for the righteous is not about earning salvation. The book of Proverbs is not a manual for self-justification. The righteous man, in the biblical sense, is the one who trusts God, who lives by faith, and who is therefore in a right covenant relationship with Him. His standing is by grace. But that grace does not suspend the law of cause and effect; it reorients it. For the righteous, this "repayment" is the fatherly discipline of God.
The righteous man still sins. David was a man after God's own heart, and he sinned grievously. When he did, he was "repaid in the earth." The sword did not depart from his house. The child of his adultery died. His own son rose up against him. God forgave David's sin, absolutely and eternally, but He did not wave a magic wand to erase the temporal consequences. Why? Because God is a good Father, and a good Father disciplines the sons He loves (Hebrews 12:6). That discipline is a form of repayment. It is the earthly consequence meant to train us, to correct us, to prune us so that we bear more fruit. It is a severe mercy.
When a Christian is lazy, he may find himself in financial trouble. When he is sharp with his tongue, he may find himself lonely. When he compromises with the world, he may find his children wandering from the faith. This is not God casting him off. This is God treating him as a son. This is the "repayment" on earth. Peter picks up this very theme when he quotes this proverb's Greek translation. He says, "For it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God? And if it is with difficulty that the righteous is saved, what will become of the godless man and the sinner?" (1 Peter 4:17-18). Judgment, in this life, begins with us. It is the refining fire. If God is so meticulous in justice that He will not let His own children get away with their foolishness in this life, what does that tell us about His dealings with those who hate Him?
This is a profoundly comforting and sobering thought. It is comforting because it means our earthly struggles are not meaningless. They are part of God's sanctifying curriculum. It is sobering because it reminds us that our sin has real-world, temporal consequences. Grace is not a license to be stupid.
The Inevitable Payday (v. 31b)
The proverb then turns from the righteous to the wicked, using an argument from the lesser to the greater. This is what we call an a fortiori argument.
"...How much more the wicked and the sinner!" (Proverbs 11:31b)
The logic is airtight. If a loving Father disciplines His beloved sons for their missteps here on earth, how much more certain is it that a just Judge will bring calamitous consequences upon His avowed enemies here on earth? If the green wood is set on fire, what will happen to the dry? (Luke 23:31).
This is a direct assault on the prosperity of the wicked, which so often vexes the saints. Asaph wrestled with this in Psalm 73, seeing the wicked with no struggles, growing fat and proud. But then he went into the sanctuary of God and understood their end. Their end begins now. The proverb insists that the wicked and the sinner are being repaid in the earth. Their payday is not just in hell; it begins the moment they cash the check of sin. The man who gives himself to drunkenness gets cirrhosis of the liver on earth. The man who gives himself to promiscuity gets a broken family and diseases on earth. The society that murders its unborn children gets demographic collapse and a curse on its land, on earth. The nation that calls evil good and good evil finds itself drowning in absurdity, confusion, and ultimately, tyranny, on earth.
The consequences of wickedness are not arbitrary penalties that God zaps people with from heaven. They are the natural harvest of the seeds being planted. Sin is cosmic treason, but it is also cosmic foolishness. It is self-destructive. When you sin, you are not just breaking God's law; you are fighting against the way the universe is actually wired. It is like trying to swim up a waterfall. You can flail for a while, and it might even feel exhilarating, but the direction of travel is fixed. The wicked are not "getting away with it." They are simply running up a tab that has an astronomically high interest rate, and the bill always comes due.
This is why we must not envy the wicked. We are seeing the sowing, but God sees the harvest. We see the party, but God sees the hangover. We see the fleeting pleasure, but God sees the long, grinding payment plan. Their path is a slippery slope in a dark place, and their apparent success is nothing more than the fattening of a calf for the day of slaughter.
Conclusion: The Great Reversal
So what do we do with this? This proverb is intensely practical. First, it should drive the believer to swift repentance. When you sin, understand that God's fatherly discipline is coming. It is a mercy. So run to Him, confess your sin, and embrace the correction. Do not despise the chastening of the Lord. He is treating you like a son, preparing you for glory. Your earthly "repayments" are designed to make you more like Christ.
Second, this should give us a profound patience and confidence as we look at the world. Do not be dismayed by the apparent triumphs of the wicked. Do not fret. God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man, or a culture, or a nation sows, that will it also reap. The moral laws of the universe are as fixed as the law of gravity. Their comeuppance is not a matter of if, but when. And it is happening all around us, if we have eyes to see. We should not rejoice in their destruction, but we should rejoice in the justice of God. His kingdom is coming, and His will is being done, on earth as it is in heaven. And the advance of that kingdom involves the dismantling of rival kingdoms built on sand.
But the ultimate fulfillment of this proverb is found at the cross. On that dark afternoon, the perfectly Righteous One, Jesus Christ, was "repaid in the earth." He who knew no sin was made to be sin for us. He received the wages of our wickedness. The full, undiluted, horrific consequences of all our rebellion were laid upon Him. He was repaid in the earth so that we, the truly wicked and sinful, could be repaid with His righteousness.
The cross is the great transaction where this proverb is turned on its head. The Righteous was repaid as the sinner, so that the sinner could be counted as righteous. But this does not abolish the principle; it establishes it. It shows how seriously God takes repayment. He takes it so seriously that the debt had to be paid. It was either to be paid by us, in eternal ruin, or by His Son, in His temporal ruin on the cross. If you are in Christ, your ultimate debt has been paid in full. The discipline you receive now is from a Father, not a judge. But if you are not in Christ, you are still facing the Judge, and the repayments you are experiencing now are just the down payment, just the first installment on a debt you can never hope to pay.
Therefore, the logic of this proverb should drive everyone who hears it to the foot of the cross. If even the righteous are disciplined in this life, how much more will the wicked be judged? The only escape from that "how much more" is to flee to the One who took the "how much more" of God's wrath for you. Flee to Christ, and you will find that the calculus of God, which was once your greatest terror, is now your greatest comfort.