Key Verse: “If your enemies are hungry, give them
food to eat. If they are thirsty, give them water to drink.” (v.21)
The gym smelled like rubber mats and metal.
Someone dropped a barbell across the room and the clang echoed through the weight area. A couple of guys argued near the squat rack while the TVs overhead played muted sports highlights.
I wiped sweat from my forehead and spotted Solomon sitting on a bench near the stretching area, calm as a lake in the eye of a storm. Linen shirt sleeves rolled, silver-streaked hair tied back. His leather notebook rested beside him.
And next to him stood Azariah.
Azariah looked older than I remembered from a few days ago—deep lines around the eyes, the quiet presence of someone used to standing near kings without needing attention.
Solomon tapped the bench.
“Sit, Ethan.”
I dropped down, still breathing hard.
Solomon nodded toward the room. “Conflict everywhere. Competition. Pride. Wounded egos.” He smiled faintly. “Which makes today’s proverb especially useful.”
Azariah folded his hands.
“These,” he said gently, “are among the writings we recovered when King Hezekiah asked us to gather Solomon’s remaining proverbs.”
Solomon opened his notebook and slid it toward me. A simple diagram filled the page: two arrows.
One arrow pointed back. The other pointed forward.
“Most people,” Solomon said, “believe conflict moves in only one direction.”
He tapped the backward arrow. “Strike for strike. Insult for insult.”
Then he tapped the forward arrow. “But wisdom introduces a different move.”
He leaned forward slightly and quoted:
“If your enemies are hungry, give them food to eat. If they are thirsty, give them water to drink.”
I blinked.
“Wait! What ?! You’re telling me to help someone who hates me?”
“Precisely,” Solomon said.
I laughed under my breath. “That sounds like a great way to get taken advantage of.”
A guy across the gym slammed weights down again, muttering something angry.
Solomon nodded toward him.
“Watch.” The man’s workout partner walked away after a heated exchange. The angry guy sat there alone, staring at the floor.
Solomon lowered his voice.
“Hatred thrives on fuel. Anger expects retaliation.”
Azariah stepped in gently.
“When Solomon wrote these words,” he said, “he was confronting the ancient instinct for revenge. Every tribe, every nation believed honor required it.”
He paused.
“But Solomon saw something deeper.” Azariah added softly, “Sometimes the strongest move is refusing to return what was given to you.”
Solomon tapped the notebook again and quoted the next line. “You will heap burning coals of shame on their heads, and the Lord will reward you.” (v.22)
I frowned. “That part sounds so… violent.”
Azariah smiled slightly.
“A common misunderstanding.”
He crouched and drew a small circle on the notebook page.
“In our culture, fire was life—warmth, cooking, survival. If someone’s fire went out, they sometimes carried hot coals home in a clay pot balanced on their head.”
I stared at the drawing.
“So ‘heaping coals on their head’…”
“…means blessing them by restoring their fire,” Solomon finished.
“Exactly,” Azariah said. “Your kindness gives them the heat they lost.”
The gym suddenly felt quieter. Solomon leaned back. “Unexpected kindness does something strange to the human heart,” he said. “It confronts evil without becoming evil.”
I crossed my arms. “But what if they stay an enemy?”
Solomon shrugged lightly. “Sometimes they will, but you can’t control that.” Then he added, more serious now: “But you will not become one.”
“Centuries later, Jesus would take this same idea even further—telling His followers not only to feed their enemies, but to actually love them and pray for them.”
The words sat heavy.
I exhaled slowly. Images flashed through my mind—arguments, grudges, people I still quietly resented.
Across the gym, the angry guy stood up. His former partner walked back over and handed him a bottle of water. They didn’t speak. But the tension broke.
Solomon noticed. “See?” he said softly. The moment seemed to slow, like the world paused long enough to underline the point.
He closed the notebook. “Revenge spreads fire,” he said, “Kindness redirects it.”
Then he leaned back, letting the clatter of the gym fade around us. “Ethan,” he said, “people often assume personality is permanent… They say, ‘That’s just how I am.’”
I shifted uncomfortably.
“But Scripture consistently shows something different,” he continued, voice steady. “Even someone with a long habit of anger can grow into a person known for calm strength.”
He tapped the bench once. “It’s not instant. It’s practiced wisdom… and, most importantly, it’s God’s work inside a person over time.”
Azariah nodded quietly beside him.
“Brick by brick,” he added.
I sat there staring at the rubber floor.
Trying to imagine what my life would look like if I actually lived that way.
What? Proverbs 25:21–28 teaches that responding to enemies with kindness, not revenge, reflects wisdom and requires strong self-control.
So What? Kindness disrupts cycles of anger and protects your own heart from becoming hardened by resentment.
Now What? Think of one person who has wronged you—and take one small step of unexpected kindness toward them this week.
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