It's Not My Fault
“She seizes him and kisses him, and with bold face she says to him…” -Proverbs 7:13
Poor dude. He has been victimized by this aggressive and seductive woman. It’s not his fault that he caved in to adultery. She provoked him.
But there’s more to the story here. Look at verse Proverbs 7:8-9. “…passing along the street near her corner, taking the road to her house in the twilight, in the evening, at the time of night and darkness.” It’s entirely plausible that he’s just really ignorant. But the “night and darkness” line leads me to believe that he is intentionally placing himself in the path of this “unavoidable” situation.
Now, before I go any further, it’s important to say clearly what I’m not saying. Any point I am making here is not to say that a vulnerable person should be shamed for being victimized. It is unfitting and inappropriate to question a woman that is sexually abused with “what were you wearing?” I don’t want anything here to be misconstrued as saying something like, “you deserved it!” or even “you wanted it!” when that clearly wasn’t the case.
Having said that, there is a principle here for us to consider. There is something I’ve noticed (and particularly with guys) where they’ll place themselves in the path of temptation and then pretend to be a helpless victim. It’s easier to blame the woman, to blame the system, to blame something else instead of taking responsibility. These words from John Kitchen are challenging:
If we are to ‘flee immorality’ (1 Cor. 6:18; cf. 2 Tim. 2:22) then we must not flirt with temptation. We must not dawdle at the edges of what is permissible. We must not toy with the idea of sin, being titillated by the mere thought of indulging. Sadly, He who stops to play in the devil’s neighborhood seldom ever leaves.[1]
There is a particularly pernicious type of temptation which deceptively allows one to engage an action and then come through the other side believing yourself to be a helpless victim. We can make verse 13 be the highlight of our story and leave out verses 8 and 9. But the Lord sees and knows. He knows the motivations in our heart. He knows when we are playing in the devil’s neighborhood. And he knows when we have truly been helpless victims.
I think here of our first couple. After their sin, they hid and then they blamed. “The serpent seized me…” or “the woman you gave me…!” Both attempted to portray themselves as the victim. Why? It’s the same reason they sewed those fig leaf underpants—it was an attempt to cover their guilt and shame. We can sympathize with the poor guy who was seized by the adulterous woman. We can connect him to Joseph’s story in Genesis with Potiphar’s wife. But we feel much less sympathy for a guy who “accidentally saw nudity” at a strip joint.
The answer to this madness is the gospel of Christ. We hide because we fear that we won’t be accepted. We reframe our sinfulness to make it more socially acceptable. But when we truly believe the gospel, we dare to believe that our acceptance isn’t based upon our performance. We aren’t surprised by our foolish dawdling with sin, because we know there is still sin remaining within our hearts. But we also know and believe that redemption is taking place. We know that sin is no longer our native impulse—but righteousness is. And so, we embrace a life of repentance. We don’t have to pretend to be something we aren’t. We can confess to God in full honesty that we weren’t a helpless victim who was “seized” but rather that we were foolishly “passing along the street”. We can be bold like this because we know our acceptance is based upon the finished work of Jesus.
[1] John A. Kitchen, Proverbs: A Mentor Commentary, Mentor Commentaries (Fearn, Ross-shire, Great Britain: Mentor, 2006), 161.