The Grief of a Foolish Investment Text: Proverbs 17:21
Introduction: The Covenantal Echo
The book of Proverbs is intensely practical. It is God's inspired wisdom for navigating the nitty gritty of everyday life, from the marketplace to the dinner table. And at the heart of this wisdom is the family. The family is not a sociological construct or a sentimental convenience; it is the fundamental, God-ordained unit of society and the primary vehicle for covenant succession. It is the first church, the first school, and the first government. How things go in the home is how they will go in the world. And so, it is no surprise that Proverbs returns again and again to the relationship between parents and children.
We live in an age that desperately wants to sever consequences from actions. Our culture wants to detach the fruit from the root. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the realm of parenting. We are told that a child's rebellion is a mysterious affliction, like catching a cold, with no clear cause or moral dimension. We are encouraged to see a child's foolishness as a phase, a journey of self discovery, or worse, as the parents' fault for being too restrictive. But the Bible, in its rugged realism, will have none of this. It tells us plainly that choices have consequences, and that the choices of a child echo loudly in the heart of his parents.
This verse before us is a stark and sober warning. It is a splash of cold water in the face of our therapeutic age. It does not speak of disappointment or frustration, but of grief and the absence of joy. This is the language of bereavement, the language of deep, personal loss. The Bible is telling us that a certain kind of child can bring a living death into the household. We must therefore understand what the Bible means by a fool, and we must understand the nature of the grief that he inevitably brings to his father.
This is not a verse about the challenges of raising a child with a low IQ or a physical disability. That is a different kind of sorrow, one that can be borne with grace and even great joy. No, the fool in Proverbs is a moral category. He is a rebel. He is the one who despises wisdom, mocks instruction, and hardens his heart against the Lord. And his rebellion is not a private affair; it is a covenantal catastrophe that strikes at the very heart of his father.
The Text
He who begets a fool does so to his grief,
And the father of a wicked fool is not glad.
(Proverbs 17:21 LSB)
The Sorrow of Begetting (v. 21a)
The first clause sets the scene with a blunt and painful reality:
"He who begets a fool does so to his grief..." (Proverbs 17:21a)
The word "begets" is crucial. This is not about adopting a fool or mentoring a fool. This is about the man who is the biological source of the fool. This speaks to the profound connection, the covenantal identity, between a father and his son. In the biblical mindset, a son is his father's legacy. He is the arrow in the quiver, the carrier of the family name, the next link in the generational chain. A father invests everything in his son, his name, his inheritance, his instruction, his hopes for the future.
To "beget a fool" is therefore to see your entire life's investment turn up worthless. It is to pour your life into a vessel that is cracked and refuses to hold anything of value. The grief here is not just emotional pain; it is the sorrow of a failed enterprise. It is the grief of seeing the covenant line, which you are responsible for cultivating, veer off into the barren wilderness of rebellion.
Who is this fool? The Hebrew word is kesil. This is not the simpleton, but the thick, dull, arrogant rebel. He is not ignorant; he is insolent. Proverbs 1:7 says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction. The fool is the one who hears his father's teaching, understands it, and says, "No." He is defined by his rejection of God's authority, mediated through his father. His foolishness is not a lack of brains but a lack of fear, the holy fear of God.
So, the father's grief is the sorrow of seeing his own flesh and blood declare war on the God he serves. It is the grief of seeing his son choose the path of death. It is the grief of knowing that the instruction, the discipline, the prayers, and the love have been thrown back in his face. This is the grief King David felt over Absalom. "O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! Would I had died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son!" (2 Samuel 18:33). That is not the cry of mere disappointment. That is the cry of profound, covenantal grief.
The Absence of Joy (v. 21b)
The second clause parallels and intensifies the first, moving from the presence of grief to the absence of joy.
"And the father of a wicked fool is not glad." (Proverbs 17:21b LSB)
This might seem like a simple restatement, but there is a crucial addition. The word "wicked" is added before fool. The Hebrew here is nabal. This is not just the arrogant fool (kesil); this is the morally corrupt, vile fool. This is the fool who has graduated from despising instruction to actively pursuing wickedness. Nabal, the husband of Abigail, is the quintessential example, a man whose name literally means "fool" and whose actions were churlish, evil, and destructive (1 Samuel 25).
The text says the father of such a man "is not glad." This is a masterful understatement, a figure of speech called litotes. It's like saying a man drowning in the arctic "is not warm." The point is to emphasize the totality of the condition. There is no gladness. There is no silver lining. There is no "well, at least he's good at sports." The son's wickedness is a black hole that sucks all the joy out of the father's heart. Every report that comes back about this son is a fresh wound. Every thought of him is a source of pain. His successes are worldly and vain, and his failures are a public shame to the family name.
Why is the father's joy so tied to his son's character? Because in a covenantal worldview, this is the whole point of the enterprise. God promises to be a God to us and to our children after us (Genesis 17:7). The father's central task is to raise his children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord (Ephesians 6:4). The goal is not to produce successful accountants or famous athletes, but to raise wise and godly men and women who fear the Lord. A wise son makes a father glad (Proverbs 10:1), not because he brings home a good report card, but because he is walking in the truth. The apostle John expresses this paternal joy perfectly: "I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth" (3 John 4).
Therefore, the father of a nabal fool has no joy because the central project of his life, covenant succession, has met with rebellion and ruin in this particular son. The arrow he was meant to shoot at the enemy has turned in his hand and wounded him.
Application for Fathers and Sons
So what do we do with this heavy, somber text? First, for fathers, this is a call to diligence. This verse is not intended to crush the spirit of a faithful father whose son has gone astray. The father of the prodigal son was a good father. But it is a warning against passivity. You are begetting children, and what they become is your business. It is your grief or your joy. This should drive us to our knees in prayer and to the Scriptures for wisdom. It should motivate us to be diligent in instruction and consistent in discipline. We cannot be our sons' Holy Spirit, but we are commanded to be their fathers. We are responsible to create a household where wisdom is treasured and foolishness is swiftly and consistently corrected.
This also means that a father's joy should be rightly ordered. If your primary source of gladness in your son is his athletic prowess, his academic achievement, or his financial success, then your heart is not aligned with God's. Your joy must be centered on his character, his integrity, and his fear of the Lord. If you rejoice in his worldly success while he is a fool toward God, you are storing up grief for yourself.
Second, for sons, this is a call to sobriety. Young men, understand what you are doing. Your rebellion is not a victimless crime. Your foolishness, your dismissal of wisdom, your insistence on your own way, is a knife in your father's heart. You are not just breaking God's commands; you are actively stealing your father's joy. You are causing him grief. The fifth commandment, to honor your father and mother, is given so that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land. To despise your father's instruction is to choose a short life of misery for yourself and to bring sorrow upon the very man who gave you life.
Finally, for all of us, this verse points us to the gospel. Every one of us has been a fool. "The fool says in his heart, 'There is no God'" (Psalm 14:1). We have all, like sheep, gone astray, each of us to his own way. We have despised the wisdom of our Heavenly Father and brought grief to His heart. Isaiah says of Israel, God's son, "I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me" (Isaiah 1:2). Our foolishness is the reason Christ had to die.
But God, in His infinite mercy, did not leave us in our folly. He sent His only wise Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to die for fools. He took the grief that we deserved upon Himself. And through faith in Him, He not only forgives our foolishness, but He gives us a new heart, a heart of wisdom. He adopts us as sons, and our Heavenly Father now rejoices over us with singing (Zephaniah 3:17). For the father whose heart is broken by a foolish son, the gospel is your only comfort. You must cast this grief upon the Father who understands it perfectly. And for the son who is trapped in his folly, the gospel is your only hope. Turn from your rebellion and come home to the Father who is waiting, not with condemnation, but with a robe, a ring, and a fatted calf.