Proverbs 10:16

The book of Proverbs gives us insights into so many different areas of life. The book gives us instruction on how to live our lives for God. Here is a proverb that gives us insight: 

Proverbs 10:16 (ESV)

The wage of the righteous leads to life,

the gain of the wicked to sin.

The Bible has a lot to say about our wages in life.   Probably the most known verse is Romans 6:23:  

The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord."   

Here in this proverb we have the same message.   The wages for wickedness is punishment and the wages for righteousness is life.   Perhaps Paul was reading this proverb when he penned Romans 6:23.  God knows the righteous and the wicked.  God makes the wicked righteous.   God gives life and God gives punishment.   God rewards us for our work.   We are obligated to fulfil the Law. That is our work.   We will fail at our work and our wages are punishment.   The only hope is that, by faith, we accept Christ’s payment for us.  He fulfils the Law for us.  When He fulfils the law for us we have life.  When we try to fulfil the Law ourselves we fail and have death.  Only God can make a person righteous. When God makes us righteous, the wages of that righteousness is life.  We have both life everlasting and righteous life here, on this earth.  The everlasting life is full and complete with God and without sin.  The life here still has the presence of sin and we have to suffer with that.  But God promises to provide us hope and joy and spiritual fruit as we live this life. That fruit gives us the wages of the righteousness He imparts to us through faith.