Issues

Someone ministered on this verse in the meeting this evening:

Proverbs 4:23 (New King James Version)
23 Keep your heart with all diligence,
For out of it spring the issues of life.

It made me think how the meaning of the word "issue" has changed.

In the biblical sense "issue" meant "fruit" as in the issues of your life being it's fruitfulness. So the verse would mean that from guarding your heart you would find spriritual blessing and reward.

In the modern sense "issues" are problems. So the verse reads as a warning to get your heart right and let God deal with you inside. If not, the things you will stumble over and the problems that will rear up and cause you to fall, will be the things from within you that you have not dealt with.

Interesting