Proverbs 30:15, 16 – “The leech has two daughters. ‘Give! Give!’ they cry. “There are three things that are never satisfied, four that never say, ‘Enough!’: 16 – the grave, the barren womb, land, which is never satisfied with water, and fire, which never says, ‘Enough!’
Hard to believe? Yes. But as late as the nineteenth century leeches were still used by doctors for treatment of a variety of ailments. Slimy as they are these segmented worms were attached to the patient’s body. Suckers at both ends immediately began to work. This is where Agur in the Proverb above came up with the idea of the two daughters both crying, “Give! Give!”- twin sisters no doubt named “Gimme and Gimme More.”
A leeches’ saliva contains an anticoagulant to stop blood clotting and an anesthetic so the patient (victim!) feels no comfort. Leech saliva also contains a substance which dilates the vessels to facilitate the blood flow. Yes, leeches are highly sophisticated suckers. So the medical world saw leeches as creatures who could give value and satisfaction to patients and doctors.
This is not Agur’s take on the leech. He saw the leech as strictly a taker that gave nothing in return. To him a leech never hooked onto anyone and said, “I have a gift I’d like to give to you.” A leech only made withdrawals, never deposits. Agur had in mind the horse leech of his day. This was an aquatic sucking worm larger than common leeches. It fastened on the tongues and nostrils of horses when they drank stagnant water from marshes or pools in the Middle East. Some stored the blood of their victims up to five times their body mass. Only when fully loaded from taking did they fall off.
Agur’s point? It is possible for the human spirit to become leech like in its selfishness. More than that his addition of the grave, the barren womb, unquenchable land, and fire as things that never say, “Enough,” underscore the serious consequences of being leech like. And yet so much in our culture today dictates in this direction. Television ads, commercials, and especially our media culture send one overwhelming message, “It’s good to be a leech!”
Our sinful nature just loves to latch onto that. Before you know it we are at the mercy of the monster of more always and only wanting to take or leech what we can out of the system or the job or life or even our loved ones. In the height of irony even our miserliness can actually be leech like. My dad tried to teach us this through his Bohemian humor as kids growing up. Bohemians pride themselves on their frugality. Yet as he often admitted even Bohemian frugality, in his own words, “is on the take” or we might say “leech like” in its essence. This is from the joke bin of the late Pastor Paul Soukup and shared with absolutely no sympathy at all to the reader in an attempt to make the point.
An Englishman, an Irishman, and a Bohemian go out to lunch together. They decide to eat in an outdoor café. They sit down. They order soup and three flies come cruising overhead looking down at those delicious bowls of soup. All three dive bomb down. Each one lands in one of the guy’s bowls of soup. So the very proper Englishman takes his silver spoon and just carefully dips the fly out of the soup, onto a linen napkin, folds it, and puts it off to the side. The Irishman grabs the whole bowl of soup and goes whoof and blows the fly out of the soup. Half the soup goes out of the bowl and all over the place, but he solved his problem. The Bohemian carefully reaches into the soup, picks up the little fly by its wings and says, “I paid for that. Spit it out. All of it.”
Always on the take. Ever the leech even in our frugality. Agur is saying that you and I can be this gal or guy very easily in life. So what might we do about it? Well, in the same chapter of Proverbs that Agur teaches us a lesson from the leech he prays a mature prayer. Here it is: “’Two things I ask of you, LORD; do not refuse me before I die: 8 – Keep falsehood and lies far from me; give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. 9 – Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the LORD?’ Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God.” Think through this prayer with me.
The poor man, who, understandably is not satisfied with his poverty, may be tempted to steal in order to have enough to survive. His discontent can lead to an endless cycle of trouble and the denigration of God’s name. So we wisely pray like Agur, “LORD, in your mercy deliver me from poverty lest I put you to shame.” But the entrapments of abundance need to be addressed as well, don’t they?
Let’s face it. The affluence most of us enjoy not only creates a desire for more but also a dangerous tendency to self-sufficiency. In our American affluence don’t we often forget God? Don’t we often seek so many other things first rather than his Kingdom? So with Agur we also wisely pray, “LORD in your mercy deliver me from an abundance that disowns you and in its place give me enough to meet my needs –“my daily bread.” Wise people intent on avoiding a leech like existence daily pray this way.
Finally, don’t miss the name of God Agur invokes in his prayer. He’s asking the “LORD” to bless him in these ways. “LORD” is God’s special name that he gives us to remind us he is a covenant keeper. God is not a man that he should lie. What the LORD promises he makes good on. After all, he kept the biggest promise of all. His Son Jesus did come and has saved us from our sins. He can be trusted for whatever else we need. As Paul said in Romans 8:32, “He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all – how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?”
In the end contentment is a Spirit given gift to the one who trusts that everything they have in Jesus is greater than anything they do not have in this life. The one who truly trusts in the LORD avoids leech like living. The LORD’s loyal love inspires this person to be grateful for what one has, generous in giving to those who do not have, and content in praying Agur’s prayer on a daily basis, perhaps in a fashion like this.
LORD, give me enough to live on lest I denigrate your name. LORD, deliver me from an abundance that disowns you. And grant LORD that whatever the portion may be that you bless me with, I am not a leech but a lover and giver like you. In Jesus’ saving name I pray this. Amen.
