Proverbs 15

The way you answer changes what happens next. A gentle reply drains heat out of a confrontation; a cutting one feeds it. The proverb is about the temperature of your words, not the truth of them.

Wisdom is not just knowing things; it is knowing how to hand them over. The wise make knowledge good in the telling. Fools spill.

Nothing happens outside God's sight. He sees every place, and He is watching both kinds of people, which means the wicked have no hidden corner and the good have no unseen faithfulness.

Words can nourish a person or fracture one. The NKJV's footnote is the key: a "wholesome" tongue is literally a healing tongue, and healing speech is life-giving the way a tree is.

Scorning correction is the definition of foolishness here, and taking it is the definition of prudence. The dividing line is not intelligence. It is teachability.

Righteousness tends to build a household that holds together; wickedness poisons its own income. The contrast is not size of pile but what comes attached to it.

The wise scatter what they know, the way a farmer scatters seed. The fool has nothing to sow, and the shortfall starts further in than his mouth.

Religious performance without a life behind it repels God; the plain prayer of an honest person delights Him. The costly offering loses to the free one.

God is not neutral about direction. The wicked road repels Him, and He loves the person heading toward righteousness, which is a verse about travel rather than arrival.

Leaving the good road brings hard consequences, and refusing correction is how a person ends up on the wrong side of them. The verse describes where a trajectory goes, not a sentence God pronounces.

If the realm of the dead lies open to God, the human heart certainly does. The verse argues from the greater to the lesser to make one point: nothing is hidden from Him, least of all you.

The scoffer avoids correction and then avoids the people who might give it. Both halves describe the same retreat, and the second one is how it becomes permanent.

The face reports on the heart. Gladness inside shows up outside, and sustained inner sorrow eventually breaks something structural.

Appetite reveals the person. The understanding heart goes looking for knowledge; the fool grazes on nonsense and calls it a meal.

Affliction colors every day it touches, and an inward gladness can set a table where the circumstances have not. The verse holds both truths without pretending either one cancels the other.

A small amount held in the fear of the LORD beats a fortune that comes with turmoil attached. The comparison is not money against poverty but package against package.

A plate of vegetables at a table with love beats a feast served in a house full of hate. What is on the table matters less than who is around it.

A hot man manufactures conflict; a patient one quiets it. Both are doing something active, which is why the calm person in a room is never merely passive.

Laziness makes its own road difficult. Every task looks like a thornbush to the man avoiding it, while the upright find the way open and raised.

Wisdom in a child registers as gladness in a parent, and folly shows up as contempt for the one who raised him. Character is visible first at home.

Folly is genuinely fun to the man who lacks judgment, and that enjoyment is the problem. He is not enduring his foolishness; he is enjoying it.

Plans made alone tend to fail; plans tested against many voices tend to hold. The verse is about durability, not about taking a vote.

There is real joy in saying the right thing at the right moment. The NKJV footnotes "in due season" as literally in its time, and timing is most of what makes a word good.

The wise are on an upward road, and the climb itself is what carries them away from the grave below. Direction is the whole point of the picture.

God takes down the households built on pride and holds the property line of the woman with no one to defend it. He is not an impartial observer of power imbalances.

God's attention reaches the level of thought, not just conduct. What is planned in private is as visible to Him as what is said out loud.

Greed damages the household it claims to be providing for. The man taking the money is usually convinced he is doing it for them.

The righteous think before they speak; the wicked simply discharge. The gap between the two is a pause.

Wickedness creates distance, and honest people are heard. The verse describes proximity in relational terms, not geography.

A bright look from another person gladdens the heart, and good news reaches all the way to the bones. Encouragement is physical.

The ear that can take correction ends up living among wise people. Company follows capacity, and this is how a person joins the wise rather than merely admiring them.

Refusing correction is an act of self-contempt, whatever it feels like at the time. Taking it is how a person acquires the very thing he was missing.

The fear of the LORD is not the introduction to wisdom's curriculum. It is the curriculum. And the road to honor runs through the low place, in that order, every time.