Proverbs 30:25; Proverbs 6:6-11
The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the summer.
Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise: Which having no guide, overseer, or ruler, provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest. How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep? Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep: So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man.
ADAM CLARKE (1760-1832): The ant is a remarkable creature for foresight, industry, and economy.
JOHN GILL (1697-1771): What is weaker than an ant? a multitude of them may be destroyed at once, with the crush of a foot—“yet they prepare their meat in the summer.” What diligence and industry it uses in providing its food; which, though a small, weak, feeble creature, yet will travel over flints and stones, climb trees, enter into towers, barns, cellars, places high and low, in search of food; prepare little cells to put their provisions in, which are so built as to secure them from rain.
MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): Ants are very industrious in gathering proper food, and have a strange sagacity to do it in the summer, the proper time. This is so great a piece of wisdom that we may learn of them to be wise.
JOHN TRAPP (1601-1699): “Consider her ways, and be wise.” Let us be so, but especially in spirituals.
JOHN BUNYAN (1628-1688): If you would know a sluggard in the things of heaven, compare him with one that is slothful in the things of this world: He that is slothful is loath to set about the work he should follow: so is he that is slothful for heaven. He that is slothful is one that is willing to make delays: so is he that is slothful for heaven. He that is a sluggard, any small matter that cometh in between, he will make it a sufficient excuse to keep him off from plying his work: so it is also with him that is slothful for heaven. He that is slothful doth his work by the halves; and so it is with him that is slothful for heaven. He may almost, but he shall never altogether obtain perfection of deliverance from hell; he may almost, but he shall never, without he mend, be altogether a saint.
MATTHEW HENRY: The more a slothful temper is indulged the more it prevails.
CHARLES BRIDGES (1794-1869): A quickening sermon do these little insects preach to us! They make preparation for the coming winter. Improve, after this pattern, the summer and harvest season—the time of youth, the present, perhaps the only moment.
CHARLES SIMEON (1759-1836): Dream not of a more convenient season, lest that season never arrive. Procrastination is the ruin of thousands—of millions. It is Satan’s grand device for keeping you from God.
MATTHEW HENRY: The advantages which we have of learning this lesson above what the ant has, will aggravate our slothfulness and neglect if we idle away our time.
CHARLES BRIDGES: The ant hath “no guide.” But how many guides have you? Conscience—the Bible—ministers! She has “no overseer.” You are living before Him, whose “eyes are as a flame of fire,” Proverbs 15:3; Revelation 1:14. She has no “ruler” calling her to account. But “every one of us must give account of himself unto God,” Romans 14:12. What must be the thoughtlessness of making no provision for the coming eternity! “How long then wilt thou sleep, O Sluggard?” is the solemn remonstrance of thy God.
JOHN ANGELL JAMES (1785-1869): This procrastination is irrational.
WILLIAM MASON (1719-1791): If we put off repentance another day, we have a day more to repent of, and a day less to repent in.
THOMAS FULLER (1608-1661): You cannot repent too soon, because you do not know how soon it may be too late.
JOHN BUNYAN: They that are slothful, do usually lose the season in which things are to be done: and thus it is also with them that are slothful for heaven, they miss the season of grace.
THOMAS COKE (1747-1814): Nothing is so dangerous as procrastination: how many souls have perished, by putting off to a more convenient season what present duty required!
CHARLES SIMEON: With multitudes who once heard the word of reconciliation, the day of grace is passed: they are now gone into that world where offers of mercy are never sent. And how soon may this be the case with you! Many who, but year ago, were as likely to live as you, have been summoned into the presence of their God in the past year; and many who are now in health will, before another year, be called to follow them: but who they shall be we know not: the young and vigorous have no more security than the weak and sickly: it is of the present hour only that we can speak with any measure of certainty; and it is of that only that we can say, “It is the day of salvation.”
F. W. KRUMMACHER (1796-1868): “Today, if you will hear His voice, harden not your hearts.” So spake the Holy Ghost, by the mouth of David, to the thousands of Israel, Psalm 95:7,8; and again, by the apostle, to the Christian church, Hebrews 3:15; and let us, dear brethren, seriously lay these words to heart.
CHARLES SIMEON: It is possible that you may still be preserved in life, and the Gospel be yet sounding in your ears, and your day of salvation may have actually already come to a close. We may, by our obstinate rejection of mercy, provoke God to withdraw his Holy Spirit, who alone can make those offers effectual for our good. He has said, “my Spirit shall not always strive with man,” Genesis 6:3. And when He sees us obstinately bent on our own evil ways, He may say of us, as He did of Israel of old, “Ephraim is joined to idols; let him alone,” Hosea 4:17. He has given us many awful warnings on this subject, see Proverbs 1:23-33; and fearful examples of the judgment actually inflicted—see Hebrews 3:11,18,19 and Luke 14:24. Surely, this should lead us all to “seek the Lord whilst he may be found, and to call upon him whilst he is near,” Isaiah 55:6.
JOHN BUNYAN: What shall I say? Time runs; and will you be slothful?
C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): It seems but yesterday that the rivers were locked in ice. Soon we saw the flowers peeping up from the soil and now we have reached midsummer—and shall soon be looking for the appointed weeks of harvest! And it will not be long before winter will be here again.
CHARLES BRIDGES: Can you bear the thought of that desponding cry of eternal remorse, Jeremiah 8:20—“The harvest is passed; the summer is ended—and I am not saved?”
JOHN BUNYAN: Your souls are worth a thousand worlds; and will you be slothful? The day of death and judgment is at the door; and will you be slothful? The curse of God hangs over your heads; and will you be slothful? Besides, the devils are earnest, laborious, and seek by all means every day, by every sin, to keep you out of heaven, and hinder you of salvation; and will you be slothful? Your neighbours are diligent for things that will perish; and will you be slothful for things that will endure for ever?
CHARLES SIMEON: Go then to the ant, and learn wisdom of her.
