Ecclesiastes Chapter Five cont...better before the angels to not vow at all than to vow and break it!

5 “Better is it that thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay”.

Building on V:4 the follow up is the advice that it is a much better thing to not make a vow at all than to make the vow and break it. Fundamentally, we are being advised to be men and women of our word. In the world in which we live many people treat vows lightly; friendship, business and even marriages are not binding. However, in God's eyes once someone has made a vow they are bound to that oath and will give account of it. And so to that end it is very much better to not make the vow than to make it but not honor it.

God does not impose upon His creation rules He Himself isn't following. The character of God demands of Himself absolute compliance to His promises and to His word. His words are true, reliable and dependable. It is absolute folly to doubt Him, in fact except for cases where His people treacherously departed from Him and He was forced to judge them He never broke a promise (Numbers 14:33-34).

6 “Suffer not thy mouth to cause thy flesh to sin; neither say thou before the angel, that it was an error: wherefore should God be angry at thy voice, and destroy the work of thine hands?”

Here we really see how God views one's vows; in His eyes it is an egregious thing for one to break their vow or a promise. We have actually a warning here that if one makes a vow and subsequently breaks that vow then God is not pleased and will not bless the works of their hands. An example of this is in the marital covenant. The failure rate of second marriages is 67 % and 74 % for third marriages (CDC statistic). It is because God does not bless the covenant as a result of the first one being broken.

We have another revelation here and it is that angels are there to witness the making of vows that is what makes them binding. This why it is better to not vow at all than to vow and break it because the angels write down what was said. And finally, we see something of the nature of God (and praise His name for being this way) that He is a covenant keeping God. The Lord takes His promises very seriously; it is part of His nature to be faithful and true to His Word. What He says He will perform and He finds it very distasteful when people do not keep their promises.