The Cardboard Citadel: On Imaginary Walls Text: Proverbs 18:11
Introduction: The Architecture of Pride
The book of Proverbs is intensely practical. It does not deal in ethereal abstractions but rather gets down into the grit and grime of our daily lives, our relationships, our work, and, as we see here, our bank accounts. And like a skilled physician, it diagnoses the spiritual diseases that fester beneath the surface of our ordinary routines. One of the most persistent and deadly of these diseases is the pride that wealth so easily engenders. The Bible is not against wealth as such; God is the one who gives the power to get wealth, and He can and does bless His people with it. But money is hazardous material. It is radioactive. If you handle it without the fear of God, you will get sick. You will start to believe your own press. You will start to think you are the master of your fate.
Our text today describes the fortress a rich man builds for himself. It is a marvel of engineering, a strong city with high walls. But there is a critical flaw in the design, a fatal weakness in the materials. The entire fortification is built in the land of make-believe. It is a high wall, Solomon tells us, "in his own delusion." It is a cardboard citadel. This is the nature of all godless security. Men labor their whole lives to build walls that have no objective existence. They trust in things that cannot save, and their trust is the very thing that blinds them to their peril. They are like a man who, fearing a flood, builds himself a magnificent houseboat out of sponge cake.
We must understand that this is not just a problem for the one percent. This is a problem for any man who locates his ultimate security in something other than the living God. Your 401(k), your job title, your reputation, your political tribe, these can all become the bricks and mortar for your own imaginary fortress. This proverb forces us to ask a fundamental question: What are the walls of my city made of? Are they built on the bedrock of God's promises, or on the shifting sands of my own deluded imagination?
The Text
A rich man's wealth is his strong city, And like a high wall in his own delusion.
(Proverbs 18:11 LSB)
The Strong City of Stuff (v. 11a)
The first clause sets up the rich man's perspective. It tells us what he believes about his money.
"A rich man's wealth is his strong city..." (Proverbs 18:11a)
In the ancient world, a strong city was the ultimate symbol of security. It was where you went when the marauding hordes swept through the land. Behind its thick walls, you had protection, provisions, and a community. The city was your salvation from the chaos outside. This is precisely how the rich man views his portfolio. His wealth is his refuge. It is his defense. It is the thing that separates him from the precarious existence of the common man.
If there is a medical emergency, he has his strong city of top-tier health insurance and access to the best doctors. If there is a political upheaval, he has his strong city of offshore accounts and a plane ticket to somewhere stable. If his children get into trouble, he has his strong city of high-powered lawyers. In his mind, every problem can be solved with a check. His wealth is his functional god; it is the one to whom he looks for deliverance in the day of trouble.
And we must be honest, there is a certain plausibility to this. Wealth does solve a great number of earthly problems. It can put food on the table, a roof over your head, and braces on your children's teeth. Scripture itself says that money is a defense (Eccl. 7:12). The error is not in recognizing the instrumental utility of wealth, but in elevating it to the status of a "strong city." The error is in making it your ultimate trust. The man who trusts in his riches is like a man who builds his house on the San Andreas Fault. It may be a beautiful house, and the weather might be fine for years, but the foundation is doomed. And as Proverbs tells us elsewhere, "He that trusteth in his riches shall fall" (Proverbs 11:28). This is not a possibility; it is a certainty.
This is because wealth cannot solve the ultimate problems. It cannot stop the aging process. It cannot cure a guilty conscience. It cannot buy you one more second of life when God requires your soul. And it certainly cannot stand in the day of judgment. On that day, the man who made gold his hope will find that he has built his fortress on the shores of a lake of fire.
The High Wall of Imagination (v. 11b)
The second clause of the verse pulls back the curtain and shows us the reality of the situation. The security is not real. It is a mental projection.
"And like a high wall in his own delusion." (Proverbs 18:11b LSB)
The Hebrew word for delusion here is maskith, which has the sense of imagination, image, or conceit. The wall is high, but only in his head. To everyone else, it is glaringly obvious that the emperor has no clothes. But he is insulated by his own pride. He looks at his bank statement and sees an impregnable fortress. God looks at it and sees a house of cards in a hurricane.
This is the essence of pride. Pride is not simply thinking too highly of yourself. Pride is a profound detachment from reality. It is the sin of creating your own world with your own rules and making yourself the god of it. The rich man has constructed an entire worldview where he is the sovereign, his wealth is his power, and he is secure. But it is a fantasy. He is living in a story he tells himself, and the final chapter, which he refuses to read, is titled "Destruction."
Notice the progression. Wealth gives the feeling of a strong city. That feeling, indulged and trusted in, grows into the delusion of a high wall. He begins to mistake the feeling of security for actual security. He has become his own spin doctor, his own propaganda minister. This is why God hates pride so much. It is a refusal to see things as they are. It is a direct assault on the sovereignty of God, who alone is our refuge and strength, our very present help in trouble (Psalm 46:1).
The true high wall, the true strong tower, is the name of the Lord. "The name of the Lord is a strong tower; The righteous runs into it and is safe" (Proverbs 18:10). Notice the contrast. The very previous verse gives us the divine reality. The righteous man does not trust in his own resources. He runs to the Lord. He acknowledges his weakness, his need, his utter dependence. The proud rich man, by contrast, sits comfortably in his imaginary fortress, convinced of his own strength. One is safe because he trusts in God's reality. The other is in mortal peril because he trusts in his own fantasy.
Conclusion: Fleeing the Imaginary City
So what is the application for us? We must, with the Holy Spirit's help, conduct a thorough inspection of our own fortifications. We must ask ourselves what we are truly trusting in. When anxiety strikes in the middle of the night, where does your mind run for safety? Is it to your savings account? Your resume? Your political party? Or do you run to the name of the Lord?
Wealth is a tool, and it can be a blessing when it is held with an open hand and stewarded for the glory of God. But the moment it becomes your strong city, it has become your idol, and that imaginary city will become your tomb. The great Puritan Cotton Mather once said that faithfulness begat prosperity, and the daughter devoured the mother. This is the constant danger.
The gospel is the demolition of our self-made strongholds. When Christ comes to a man, He does not offer to renovate his cardboard citadel. He brings the battering ram of the law to show him that his walls are useless against the wrath of God. He brings the earthquake of grace to level the entire structure of self-reliance. And then, in the rubble of our pride, He builds a new city, a heavenly Jerusalem, whose builder and maker is God.
Jesus Christ is the ultimate reality check. He is the one who, though He was rich, yet for our sakes became poor, so that we through His poverty might become rich (2 Cor. 8:9). He exchanged the true security of heaven for the ultimate vulnerability of the cross. He faced the ultimate chaos and judgment not with a high wall, but with nails through His hands and feet. He did this to become our strong tower. He is our refuge. He is our fortress. All other ground is sinking sand. All other walls are a delusion. Flee your imaginary cities and run to Him, for He alone is safe.