Prepare your work outside, and get your fields ready. Afterwards, build your house.
Parallel translations
- KJV Prepare thy work without, and make it fit for thyself in the field; and afterwards build thine house.
- BSB Complete your outdoor work and prepare your field; after that, you may build your house.
- NKJV Prepare your outside work, Make it fit for yourself in the field; And afterward build your house.
- NASB ¶Prepare your work outside, And make it ready for yourself in the field; Afterward, then, build your house.
- NLT Do your planning and prepare your fields before building your house.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Establish your means of livelihood before building your house. Wise planning puts first things first.
Overview
In an agrarian setting, fields had to be readied and provision secured before a household could be sustained, so the proverb teaches prudent ordering of priorities and counting the cost (Luke 14:28). It warns against premature commitments unsupported by labor and foresight. More broadly it commends diligent stewardship of what God provides as the foundation for family life.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 3
- Luke 14:28–30For which of you, desiring to build a tower, doesn’t first sit down and count the cost, to see if he has enough to complete it?
- 1 Kgs 5:17–18The king commanded, and they cut out large stones, costly stones, to lay the foundation of the house with worked stone.
- 1 Kgs 6:7The house, when it was under construction, was built of stone prepared at the quarry; and no hammer or ax or any tool of iron was heard in the house while it was under construction.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Wisdom personified, with God before creation and the agent of all things, anticipates Christ 'in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom' — the wisdom of God made flesh.
How Proverbs 24:27 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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