The Results of Sin (Proverbs 17:19)

Shakespeare wrote, "Love is a many splendored thing." But is love really love when it is not pure? Can love be love when it involves sin?

"He who loves strife and is quarrelsome loves transgression and involves himself in guilt; he who raises high his gateway and is boastful and arrogant invites destruction." Proverbs 17:19, Amplified

We will break this verse down in its two parts. If you read the New King James you will find that "strife" and "transgression" are actually switched. It is my belief that in either context the verse remains true to itself. You can either love sin (transgression) and invite strife or you can love strife and invite sin. But it is not even inviting, the Bible says that if you love one then you love the other. So in essence, if one loves sin then he is out of the will of God and therefore strife in inevitable. And in the other instance, if one love strife (which opposes the fruit of the Spirit) then sin is sure to follow. There is a union between the two. If you love one, then you will love the other.

In the second part of the verse, we see pride. The gateway being alluded to here is the gateway to a city where the elders of the city would sit and become judges for quarrels. So what this verse is alluding to is making oneself seem more than what he truly is. After being spared his life, King Hezekiah exalted his own gate Babylonian envoys. He took Berodach-Baladan into the treasure houses of the kingdom. "And Hezekiah was attentive to them, and showed them all the house of his treasure - the silver and gold, the spices and precious ointment, and all his armory - all that was found among his treasure. There was nothing in his house or in all his dominion the Hezekiah did not show them." (Second Kings 20:13, NKJV) You see, Hezekiah was given a death sentence from Isaiah the prophet. After Isaiah had left, Hezekiah lifted his voice to the Lord, and before Isaiah could leave the Lord sent him back into the king. The Lord had granted Hezekiah a longer life. Hezekiah became prideful and arrogant and opened himself to the enemy and Isaiah soon returned to the king with a message of destruction and the captivity of Babylon.