Saying 25

If you falter in a time of trouble,
    how small is your strength!
Rescue those being led away to death;
    hold back those staggering toward slaughter.
If you say, “But we knew nothing about this,”
    does not he who weighs the heart perceive it?
Does not he who guards your life know it?
    Will he not repay everyone according to what they have done?

Proverbs 24:10-12

This is a tough saying to be sure. It is a sort of call to boldness consisting of 3 admonitions. The first of these, in v. 10 is a call to encouragement. When the student of wisdom perceives that a neighbor is faltering in a time of trouble or trial, even just a bit, he should speak up and encourage that neighbor to hang on, to stand tall in the face of trouble, lest God should not stand up for him.

After the warning of v. 10, we come to the second admonition in v. 11: Here, the student of wisdom is admonished to boldly intervene in a situation where his neighbor is in mortal danger, to either intervene physically or by other means, to rescue the threatened neighbor. It would appear that this admonition applies to situations in which a life is at stake.

Verse 12 contains an explanation for us to consider: What would we say to He who “weighs hearts” if we failed to act to rescue our doomed neighbor? Will a small little lie get us out of trouble? If we decide not to notice the situation, would that mean we really didn’t know?

Not a chance.

If we decided that we were too weak to effectuate rescue, might we have called for help? I think we get the point here, and that we can probably all think of one or more famous examples of this situation playing out in history.