Job God's Ways With Him: November 2024
Table of Contents
A Lesson in Grace
Turn to 1 Corinthians 15:1,10: “Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand. ... But by the grace of God I am what I am: and His grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain.” We are saved by grace, we stand in grace, and by the grace of God we are what we are. Let us remember a lesson that was learned by a servant of the Lord many years ago. The lesson was to recognize that by the grace of God he was what he was. In learning that lesson, he was able to be a profitable servant for the Lord, particularly as a servant of intercession. This servant was Job.
D. F. Rule
Job: God's Ways With Him
God was dealing with Job; but he had to learn himself. When I find what I am and cannot tell what God is, I am in misery. When God is plowing up the ground, this is not a crop. Plowing comes before harvest. “In all this Job sinned not.” There was none like Job in all the earth, but he did not know himself: a spirit of self-righteousness had been creeping over him.
Supposing God had stopped there, what would have come of it? Job might have said, “In prosperity I was eyes to the blind; in adversity I was patient,” and the whole case would have been worse. He goes on till his friends come, and then, perhaps from pride or because he could not bear their sympathy, he breaks down. The process was a trying, humbling one. “O if I could meet God,” he says.
Job, having been thus wrought in and exercised and plowed up, passes through all the various considerations as to how he could meet God. Throughout there are certain true sayings, as, “The righteous Lord loveth righteousness,” but are we righteous? Finally Job meets God, and the result: “I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth Thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.” Now he knows God as he did not before; now he knows himself better and receives the “end of the Lord” – blessing.
J. N. Darby (adapted)
The End or Purpose of the Lord
"Ye... have seen the end of the Lord” (James 5:11). The Lord always has an “end” or object in view in all that befalls His people, particularly when sicknesses and similar troubles come upon them. It is exceedingly important that we have that fact firmly established in our hearts, for if we know “the end of the Lord,” it will enable us to pass even more thankfully through the period of trial. And the more firmly we are convinced of the fact, the lighter the trial will seem and the shorter its duration.
The Apostle Paul, in his unparalleled afflictions, knew that “the end of the Lord” was a “far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.” With that prospect in view, his present affliction seemed to be light as to its character and for a moment as to its duration (2 Cor. 4:17-18).
There is a great difference between looking for the end of the trial and looking for “the end of the Lord.” It is natural to be looking for the former, and if the trial is a sickness, then the usual thing is to send for a doctor and take remedies in order to escape it. However, we are expected to take care of these bodies we now have. But it takes faith to look for “the end of the Lord,” for that is one of the things that are “not seen.” “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Heb. 11:1).
The reference in James 5:11 is the only allusion to the book of Job in the whole Bible, although Job’s name is twice mentioned in Ezekiel 14. Job, in all his explanations of his afflictions, attributed them to God’s actions, but he did not recognize that God had any beneficent purpose in them. The only prospect of escape from them that Job could see was by death. The difference between Job’s view and that of His three friends was that Job maintained that God sent evil upon men, just as He sent good, and that being God He had the right to do as He pleased with His own creatures. Therefore men must accept evil uncomplainingly just as they accept good at God’s hands. Job’s words to his wife state his views: “What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? In all this did not Job sin with his lips” (Job 2:10). Job maintained this until he had silenced his three friends.
Job’s Three Friends
His friends maintained the contrary. They said that afflictions were punishments for sins and were always in exact proportion to the nature of the sins. By this argument it was made plain that Job, being the most afflicted of all men, must be the most wicked of all men. The great discussion came to an end without any of the four men indicating that he had the faintest idea of the purpose of God, in spite of the many excellent things they said about God.
God’s purpose in permitting afflictions is to bring the afflicted one into blessing through self-judgment, confession, and correcting of their ways. None of them had the faintest thought of “the end of the Lord” or that “the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy.” In all that those four men said about God, the words love, mercy, kindness, goodness, compassion, pity and the like did not once occur. Notwithstanding all their great thoughts about God, they did not know Him well. “Thus saith the Lord, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches: but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth Me, that I am the Lord which exercise loving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth: for in these things I delight, saith the Lord” (Jer. 9:23-24).
Elihu
Elihu sums up Job’s contention in chapter 33:9-11: “I am clean without transgression, I am innocent; neither is there iniquity in me. Behold, He findeth occasions against me, He counteth me for His enemy; He putteth my feet in the stocks, He marketh all my paths.” That is, God did all these things arbitrarily, though Job was, in his own eyes, clean without transgression and innocent.
Elihu dismisses that view of the matter by saying briefly, “Behold, in this thou art not just: I will answer thee, that God is greater than man.” Then he proceeds to show that in all God’s dealings with men, His purpose is to save them from going down to the pit and to bring them into the light of the living.
We often act as if we did not have any inspired “Interpreter” to tell us plainly the meanings of these things in our lives, One who will tell us that “the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy.” There is One to reveal the fact that He Himself “has found a ransom” in the Person of His own beloved Son. He will freely open the storehouse of His rich mercies to every man like Job who will say, “I have sinned, and perverted that which was right, and it profited me not” (Job 33:27).
Elihu concludes his lesson with the words in Job 37:23: “Touching the Almighty, we cannot find Him out: He is excellent in power, and in judgment, and in plenty of justice: He will not afflict.” In regard to affliction, it is also written, “Though He cause grief, yet will He have compassion according to the multitude of His mercies. For He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men” (Lam. 3:32-33).
How often God’s children, like Job, have to learn the hard way. The old German saying is sure: “Who will not hear must feel.” The gracious pleadings of the Lord pass by unheeded till each time it must be more plainly spoken. It may be first by a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falls upon men, in slumberings upon the bed. If not heard, it may be next by instruction: “Then he openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction.” Finally, it may be by chastening as “He is chastened also with pain upon his bed, and the multitude of his bones with strong pain.” Finally in his pain Job learned his lesson.
Adapted from Christian Treasury, Vol. 4
God's Dealings with Job
God was dealing with Job; but he had to learn himself. What makes Job so interesting is that the book is independent of all dispensations.
When I find what I am and cannot tell what God is, of course, I am in misery. When God is plowing up the ground, this is not a crop. Plowing comes before harvest. “In all this Job sinned not.” There was none like Job in all the earth, but he did not know himself: a spirit of self-righteousness had been creeping over him.
Supposing God had stopped there, what would have come of it? Job might have said, “In prosperity I was eyes to the blind; in adversity I was patient,” and the whole case would have been worse. He goes on till his friends come, and then, perhaps from pride, or because he could not bear their sympathy, he breaks down. The process was a trying humbling one. “O if I could meet God,” Job says, “He is not like you: there is goodness in Him.”
His friends stood on utterly false ground; they took this world as the adequate witness of the government of God. This only makes Job the more angry: the world is no adequate testimony of the government of God.
There you see a soul rising under that which is upon him, striving and wrestling, the flesh breaking out so that he should know himself. Job, having been thus wrought in and exercised and plowed up, passes through all the various considerations as to how he could meet God. Throughout there are certain true sayings, as “The righteous Lord loveth righteousness,” but are we righteous? This is another story. Are you in a condition, if you had to do with God this moment, to say “I am righteous” before Him? Many a one looks at the cross and says “I am a poor sinner, and I have no hope but the cross.” But can you say, “I am a poor sinner, and the judgment-seat just suits me?”
J. N. Darby
The Greatness of God Shown in His Dealings With Job
The book of Job shows us, as no other book, how God controls all things to accomplish His purposes of blessing for His own. The complex way God blends together the actions of Satan, Job’s wife, his three friends and humble Elihu to bring about His purposes is a witness to His great power, wisdom and understanding. Job was a special object of the favor of God, and the book is given as a demonstration of how the trials through which He puts us are for our good and blessing. The best blessing in reading the book is not found in understanding all the complex discussions, but in seeing the end of the ways of God with Job—that He is merciful. We believe the Lord has given us this book to help us as we go through trials.
Satan’s Work
Satan is the first agent used. Jehovah calls to his attention the perfect and upright life of Job. Satan suggested that Job was pious because of the protection and blessing that God gave him and promptly proposed a plan which he thought would cause Job to curse God. The Lord Jehovah allows this with certain restrictions that would not allow him to go beyond God’s reason for the trial. Satan may be an agent in our trials, but God is over all, and Satan cannot go beyond what God allows. Satan immediately went to extreme measures of death and destruction, bodily sickness and suffering, seeking to disprove what God had said to him and to cause Job to fail. There was no care for the well-being of Job with Satan, nor did his terrible ways accomplish his prediction. Job maintained his integrity and did not curse God. It would seem that Satan’s final effort was to sow a seed of distrust or despair in the heart of Job’s wife, causing her to say, “Curse God, and die.”
But the Lord had other reasons for allowing Satan to do what He did. He desired the good and blessing of Job. He saw something in Job that was a hindrance to that blessing. The blessing that the Lord had in store for Job was much better than what Job could obtain by his own righteousness. This plan necessitated a trial to cause Job to cease from his own righteousness and cling to God alone. The three friends then are the agents used by God to continue the trial.
Job’s Three Friends
After Satan finished all he could do, Job’s friends came to comfort him. But instead of being a direct help to Job by leading him to God, they use their own experience, logic and tradition. Their efforts to teach him why all these things had happened, being off the mark, could only lead Job down a path of resistance and self-justification. Though their words are often true in themselves, they missed the mark of the reason for the trial. The mighty work of God in our lives is too great to be explained by human understanding. We must go into the sanctuary to learn why God allows trials.
God used the three friends to bring out of Job what no one else could see. This was necessary to bring out what needed to be exposed and judged. Job, in his defense against their wrong accusations, wrongly attributed injustice to God (Job 27:2). For Job always to seek to be upright and righteous would have been right, but to defend himself was wrong. God alone is our judge. No man placed on trial is at the same time the evaluator or judge. When we begin to defend ourselves, we are sure to err, although it is especially difficult not to defend one’s position when the accusations are false. God was faithful to have on hand a man that would properly represent Him at the right moment.
Elihu’s Faithful Words
Usually, it is only after we have ceased talking that we begin to learn, and Elihu wisely waits for that moment, before beginning to speak. He justifies God, first of all, and then points out the errors of Job and his friends. He does not take a position of superiority and hardness, but speaks as one made of clay. He is careful to not accuse Job of the unseen things in his heart; rather, he takes up what each one had said and faithfully speaks the truth. After giving Job opportunity to respond, Elihu finishes the discourse with an admonition to fear God. He brings Job into the presence of God, and then he, too, is silent.
The Lord then takes up where Elihu left off. He brings Job into a fuller understanding of who He is and of His great power. Job recognizes his own vile condition after the first discourse. After the second, Job sees God as He is, and he is restored to Jehovah.
The great purpose of God to bless could then be graciously poured out in Job’s life. Job receives double all that he had lost through the trial. These things that were “written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope” (Rom. 15:4). “Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy” (James 5:11).
D. C. Buchanan
Job: Self-Righteousness and Integrity
Job: Self-Righteousness and Integrity
“And the Lord said unto Satan, hast thou considered Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God and escheweth evil” (Job 2:3). Notice that still he holds fast his integrity. This was not mentioned in the other instances.
This is the key to the book of Job — integrity. What does integrity mean? Well, we understand it as an honest man, a faithful man, but it means also one who holds himself righteous, self-righteousness.
That was his trouble, he was self-righteous. This was something that man could not see very well, but God could see it. As far as men were concerned, Job was upright in all his ways; none could point their finger at Job. And now God is going to allow this to come out. God is going to deal with Job, and so Satan asks that Job might be put into his hand again, and he was.
Job breaks out in boils, (notice) from the foot to the top of his head. How would you like to go around with boils covering your body from your foot to your head? Job did, I do not know how long; Job 29:2 speaks of months, several months, but he was covered with boils.
Now notice Job 2:9: “Then said his wife unto him, Dost thou still retain thine integrity? Curse God and die.” She knew, yes, she knew. Integrity, self-righteousness; oh yes, he was a righteous man before men. He did not walk in sin, but he carried that character that he himself was righteous before God, and that will never do.
And what else does she say? “Dost thou still retain thine integrity? Curse God and die.” So Job says, “Thou speakest as one of the foolish women do.” He did not say that his wife was a fool, no he kept his lips. He only said what was in order, “Thou speakest as one of the foolish women do” (Job 2:10). But he said unto her, “What? Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil? In all this did not Job sin with his lips” (Job 2:10). As far as men were concerned his pathway was good. But God looks into the secret of our lives, and reminds us of ourselves.
Self-Righteousness Job 2:11-Job 31
And as Job was debating with his three friends in the next chapters, we find that Job finally admits that there were sins in his life, but he did not consider them too bad. He was righteous: do you see what that does to a man? It does not make a man humble, it makes him proud. Job was proud of his righteousness. That will not do.
Redemption and Resurrection Job 19
Let us go back to Job 19:25. Now here is something that Job knew. I want you to say to your heart and mine, Do I know this?
“For I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God.” Job had a Redeemer; do you have a Savior? Do you believe in resurrection? Job did. He said, “After the worms destroy this body,” (he expected to die anytime—boils from head to foot), “in my flesh I shall see God.” Isn’t that wonderful?
O what a wonderful thing resurrection is, and to “see God” in our flesh. Bodies of glory; Job did not know about the body of glory, but we do.
Elihu Job 36
Now we turn to the thirty-sixth chapter. We have another person coming in on the scene besides the three friends — Elihu. Elihu gave many wonderful things in his ministry, in his answers, but I would like to call attention to two of them.
First, “Behold, God exalteth by his power”; and second, “Who teacheth like him?” (Job 36:22).
The Lord Takes Over Job 38
Now that is just before the thirty-eighth chapter, where the Lord Jesus Himself takes over, and He deals with His servant Job, personally. Before he accuses him of sin, we read — “Canst thou bind the sweet influences of Pleiades, or loose the bands of Orion?” (Job 38:31). What are the sweet influences of Pleiades, or the bands of Orion? Heavenly! Job, can you bind them?
What are the sweet influences of Pleiades? There were several stars in a cluster, they are up there now, six are visible. They have some effect on the earth, sweet influences! That is the literal side of things, but you have in the next chapter or two God speaking to Job, He is going to restore his soul, and Elihu introduces it by speaking of God’s power, and now we have this introduced in the midst of it.
“It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but the honour of kings is to search out a matter” (Prov. 25:2).
Here we have this beautiful illustration, “the sweet influences of Pleiades, the sweet influences of heaven. What were they? The Lord Himself is introducing things that are going to restore this man’s soul. Would he want it otherwise? No! When it is over he wants it that way, but he did not know it then. O how good God is; there was no other way. You see that Job was self-righteous, he did not know that he was a sinner from the bottom of his sole to the top of his head.
Job’s State Job 40-42
In all of these later chapters the Lord is speaking about His power, so we turn now to Job 40.
In Job’s debating with his friends he told about how God was unrighteous in what He was doing to him. Is God unrighteous in what He is doing to His people? No, He is doing the best that He can “according to our state of soul.”
“Then Job answered the Lord, and said, I know that thou canst do everything, and that no thought can be withholden from thee. I uttered that I understood not; things too wonderful for me, which I knew not. Hear, I beseech thee, I will speak, and I will demand of thee, and declare thou unto me. I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes” (Job 42:1-6).
Integrity, oh! That was his trouble, and now he repents of the whole thing. Job was full of sores from the bottom of his feet to the top of his head in the sight of God. It was a picture of what he was morally by nature. He discovered it, have you discovered that?
What a wonderful discovery, because you know that God can flow out in all of this grace to us. Have we discovered that all of the time we were thinking of ourselves and our self-righteousness, we do not have any? If we are righteous it is because God in His matchless grace sent His Son down here to die, that we might have a divine righteous. That is all that have, not human righteousness.
Now, what is the result? It is so blessed, this last chapter of Job. When we read stories, we love to have them end up well. This one ends well; beautiful!
C. E. Lunden (adapted)
Job's Three Friends
Last month, in our first issue of The Christian on Job, we spoke a little of Job and his three friends — who they were and when they lived. We might mention a little about them as to their ancestral origin. It is recorded that Eliphaz was a Temanite, and we know that the original man bearing the name Eliphaz was a son of Esau. In turn, his son Teman is named as one of the dukes of Edom — see Genesis 36:10,15. Bildad the Shuhite is next named, and he may have been a descendant of Shuah, who was a son of Abraham and Keturah. Finally, Zophar the Naamathite is named, and we have no particular information about his ancestry. But all were friends of Job, although they probably lived at some distance from him.
Their interaction with Job is interesting and instructive, for although they wrongly accused Job, yet the Lord allowed it, for it brought out something in Job that had not yet surfaced, despite all his previous affliction from Satan. What was it in their speeches to Job that caused so much difficulty?
It is clear that they really were Job’s friends. In all of their interaction with Job, the Spirit of God never calls them anything else but his friends. That they really cared about Job is evident, for they had arranged to come together to visit him, no doubt after hearing reports of all that had happened to him. More than this, they were not quick to speak, as perhaps some of us would have been. No, it is recorded that “they sat down with him upon the ground seven days and seven nights, and none spake a word unto him: for they saw that his grief was very great” (Job 2:13). Then it was Job who broke the silence, and they began, one after another, to answer him.
Retributive Justice
What was said by those three friends at times had truth in it, and even Job acknowledged this at one point, when he said, “I know it so of a truth” (Job 9:2). However, their outlook and basis of reasoning was a wrong one, and one that has often been used in this world, when God’s dealings with man are in question. All three of them assumed that God’s present dealings with man, and particularly what seemed to be “retributive justice,” were God’s government and judgment on man for wrongdoing. When Job was afflicted so severely, they assumed that God was punishing him for hidden sins. They even made up a litany of supposed sins that Job had allegedly committed, and they accused him of them, without any proof whatever.
As we have pointed out elsewhere in this issue of The Christian, God used all this to bring out something in Job that perhaps even he had not realized was there—an anger and impatience that were the result of his pride in his own character. Sadly, this anger and impatience were eventually even directed against the Lord. However, when Job had learned his lesson, God had to say to Eliphaz, “My wrath is kindled against thee, and against thy two friends: for ye have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job hath” (Job 42:7). They were compelled to offer sacrifices and to ask Job to pray for them. Evidently they did so and were forgiven.
What do we learn from all this? First of all, from Job’s side, we learn that God can and does use those who may say things about us that are not true. An old brother used to remind us, “I will never know how closely you walk with the Lord until someone says something unkind about you, and I see how you react.” Others may be guilty of wrong actions, but are we sometimes, like Job, guilty of wrong reactions?
Wrong Assumptions
From the side of Job’s friends, their reactions to Job’s calamities showed that they had no idea of how the Lord works or what He was doing with Job. As a result, all their advice was “wide of the mark” and only increased Job’s suffering. They based their advice on their own thoughts and experience, rather than on God’s thoughts. In this way they made assumptions about Job that were not true and that did a lot of harm.
Some might argue that they did the best they could and really tried to help with the limited light that they had from God in those days. But then a younger man comes along—Elihu—who had the mind of the Lord and who spoke for God, not only to Job, but also to his friends. How did he get this light, in a day before the Scriptures were written? The answer is that he was walking with the Lord, and as a younger man he did not rely on his own experience or his own thoughts. Rather, he sought to look at the whole matter with God’s viewpoint, and he was the only one able to clarify the whole matter for both Job and his friends. The Lord gave him wisdom far beyond his years because he relied on the Lord, and not on his own wisdom.
Speak Right for the Lord
To be able to speak for the Lord in this world is something much to be coveted by each one of us. We live in a world that is departing from the fear of the Lord with increasing momentum and that despises God’s thoughts, while exalting itself. In the middle of all this, those who can speak for the Lord, with His thoughts, are more and more needed. Paul could remind the Colossians, “Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt” (Col. 4:6), and it is this twofold character of language that we should desire. Grace is the character of this dispensation, for God “will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim. 2:4). On the other hand, salt reminds us of God’s holiness and His righteous claims over us. To be able to blend these together in a right combination can be done only by a walk with the Lord and by the power of the Spirit of God.
W. J. Prost
The Thing Which I Greatly Feared
One of the things which Job said in his discourse with his friends might seem to be rather puzzling to us, and it was said right at the beginning of their speeches to one another, before Job’s friends had falsely accused him.
As we know, the Lord had allowed Satan first of all to take away all of Job’s possessions, and even his ten children. Shortly afterward, the Lord also allowed Satan to afflict Job with boils from head to toe; in short, his health was taken away. But Job passed the test; in all this he did not “sin with his lips” (Job 2:10). Prior to all Satan’s actions against Job, the Lord Himself had commended him, saying that “there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil” (Job 1:8). This was true, and it is remarkable that Satan, whom we know is quick to point out failures in God’s people, could not come up with an accusation against Job or a rebuttal to the Lord’s characterization of him. Yet we find, in the first speech that Job makes after all this, he says these words:
“The thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, and that which I was afraid of is come unto me: I was not in safety, neither had I rest, neither was I quiet; yet trouble came” (Job 3:25-26).
Why Should Job Have Fear?
Why should Job have been afraid? The Lord Himself commended him, and Job seemed to have everything going smoothly for him. He was wealthy, evidently highly respected, comfortable in his life, and walking well before the Lord. Later, in conversation with his friends, he could say of his past life, “Then I said, I shall die in my nest, and I shall multiply my days as the sand” (Job 29:18). It would seem that Job was quite comfortable in his entire situation. Yet he has to say that he had “greatly feared,” and now that serious trouble had actually come upon him, he reveals his innermost feelings.
The fear that Job had was what many a good person in this world has felt from time to time. It is certainly felt by unbelievers who are willing to be honest before God, and it is also felt by true believers where there is something in their hearts that they sense is not right before God. In simple terms, the fear about which we are speaking is the fear of what is unjudged in our own hearts before God. Despite all that Job was before his fellowman and before God, he knew deep down in his heart that everything was not right with God. He had a sinful heart, as do we all, and he sensed that his pride in his own goodness was not right. He knew that there was sin in his heart, despite his outward appearance of uprightness. He wondered when his circumstances might change, and when it happened, he said, as it were, “I knew this was coming!”
Cain’s Fear
We see a similar kind of fear in Cain, when he was told by the Lord, “A fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth” (Gen. 4:12). Cain’s immediate reply was, among other complaints, that “every one that findeth me shall slay me” (Gen. 4:14). Why did he say that? Had anyone threatened to kill him? Not that we know of. Rather, his fear was the product of what was in his own heart. He was a murderer himself, and he supposed that others would do the same. It is a solemn thing that often we project onto others the sins of our own hearts, thinking that they would likely do the same.
We hasten to say that there was a vast difference between Cain and Job. Cain was an unbeliever, and he did not want to be in God’s presence. Job had a new life and was willing to be real before God. But the character of their fear, whether in Cain or Job, ultimately sprang from a similar source. It was the product of what was unjudged in their own hearts.
Job the Upright Man
In the case of Job, he was an upright man, and the Lord commended him for it. But to take pride in it was wrong, for pride is one of the worst sins in God’s eyes. Job had to realize that he had a sinful heart, in spite of the fact that he was a born-again soul. Although he later defended himself before his friends’ accusations and even wished that he might have a meeting with the Lord, yet deep down inside he knew that something was wrong.
There was only One who went through this world as a man, yet had no fear. Our blessed Lord and Master, the Lord Jesus Christ, walked through this world without fear, except (and we speak with utmost reverence) the fear of being made sin. Thus we read that “when He had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto Him that was able to save Him from death, and was heard in that He feared” (Heb. 5:7). On all other occasions, even before the Roman governor Pilate, He showed no fear. Rather it was Pilate who was “the more afraid” (John 19:8).
No doubt all of us, at one time or another, have had the fear that Job had. It can be overcome only by looking at the example of our Lord and Master.
W. J. Prost
Job - the Truth of Resurrection
Faith in Resurrection
Resurrection has been, from the beginning, an article of the faith of God’s people; and, being such, it was also the lesson they had to learn and to practice, the principle of their life, because the principle of a divine dispensation is ever the rule and character of the saints’ conduct. The purchase and occupation of the burying field at Machpelah tell us that the Genesis fathers had learned the lesson. Moses learned and practiced it, when he chose affliction with the people of God, having respect to the recompense of the reward. David was in the power of it, when he made the covenant, or resurrection promise; all his salvation and all his desire would be fulfilled in resurrection, though his house, his present house, was not to grow (2 Sam. 23). The whole nation of Israel was taught it, again and again, by their prophets, and by-and-by they will learn it, and then witness it to the whole world. The dry bones will live again, the winter-beaten teil tree will flourish again; for “what shall the receiving of them be, but life from the dead?” (Rom. 11:15). The Lord Jesus, “the Author and Finisher of faith,” in His day, I need not say, practiced this lesson to all perfection. And each of us, His saints and people, is set down to it every day, that we “may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings” (Phil. 3:10).
By the life of faith the elders obtained a good report. And so the saints in every age. For “without faith it is impossible to please Him”; that faith which trusts Him as a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him, which respects the unseen and the future. They, of whom the world was not worthy, practiced the life of faith, the life of dead and risen people (Heb. 11). Stephen before the council tells us the same. Abraham, Joseph, and Moses, in his account, were great witnesses of this same life; and he himself, at that moment, after the pattern of his master, Jesus, was exhibiting the strength and virtues of it, through the power of the Holy Spirit, and apprehending, through the same Spirit, the brightest joys and glories of it (Acts 7).
Learning Resurrection Power
Now, I believe that the leading purpose of the Book of Job is to exhibit this. It is the story of an elect one, in early patriarchal days, a child of resurrection, set down to learn the lesson of resurrection. His celebrated confession tells us that resurrection was understood by him as a doctrine, while the whole story tells us that he had still to know the power of it in his soul. It was an article of his faith, but not the principle of his life.
And a sore lesson it was to him, hard indeed to learn and digest. He did not like (and which of us does like?) to take the sentence of death into himself, that he might not trust in himself, or in his circumstances in life, or his condition by nature, but in God who raises the dead. “I shall die in my nest,” was his thought and his hope. But he was to see his nest plundered of all with which nature had filled it, and with which circumstances had adorned it.
Such is, I believe, the leading purpose of the Spirit of God in this Book. This honored and cherished saint had to learn the power of the calling of all the elect, practically and personally, the life of faith, or the lesson of resurrection. And it may be a consolation for us, beloved, who know ourselves to be little among them, to read, in the records which we have of them, that all have not been equally apt and bright scholars in that school, and that all, in different measures, have failed in it, as well as made attainments in it.
How unworthily of it, for instance, did Abraham behave, how little like a dead and risen man, a man of faith, when he denied his wife to the Egyptian, and yet how beautifully did he carry himself, as such, when he surrendered the choice of the land to his younger kinsman. And even our own apostle, the aptest scholar in the school, the constant witness of this calling to others, and the energetic disciple of the power of it in his own soul, in a moment when the fear of man brought with it a snare, makes this very doctrine the covert of a guileful thought (Acts 23:6).
Encouragements and consolations visit the soul from all this. Happy is it to know, that our present lesson, as those who are dead, and whose life is hid with Christ in God, has been the lesson of the elect from the beginning — that on many a bright and hallowed occasion they practiced that lesson to the glory of their Lord, that at times they found it hard, and at times failed in it. This tale of the soul is well understood by us. Only we, living in New Testament times, are set down to learn the same lesson in the still ampler page, and after the clearer method, in which it is now taught us in the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.
J. G. Bellett
God Meets Job's Needs
If we look at Christ, we shall find that He exactly meets the need that Job felt. I cannot answer God one in a thousand; but what do I find in Christ? God in His person came to me in this world because I could not do anything. The blessed Lord did not wait up in heaven, but came to these unrighteous people. He never said, “Come to me,” until He had come Himself.
J. N. Darby
Three Principal Teachings
In the history of Job, the Lord teaches us particularly these three things:
1. To what point man may arrive by his own efforts, relatively to piety; in other words, man’s righteousness founded on the strength of man.
2. What becomes of this righteousness, when it is subject to the scrutiny of a holy and perfect God.
3. Grace, the only means of being in true and permanent fellowship with God.
W. Kelly
Man Learning His Own Nothingness
“All our unhappiness and failure, whether as saint or sinner, springs from unbelief of the goodness that is in the heart of God for us” (H. E. Hayhoe).
In Job we see a man learning the lesson of his own nothingness, in the fierce fire of deep affliction, by “the messenger of Satan” — through loss, bereavement and disease — fighting single-handed against the crude philosophy and cruel attacks of his friends, and, above all, with his own proud, unsubdued self-righteousness and unbelief, until “an interpreter” is heard, who leads him to the point where he listens to God and learns the lesson of all the ages, that God alone is God, and therein lies man’s blessing.
Knowing God Personally
In piety as well as in prosperity, there seems to have been in Job a lack of that personal acquaintance with God. It is this lack of true acquaintance with God, with the corresponding ignorance of his own heart, which probably made necessary the trials to which Job was subjected.
God was going to vindicate His truth, silence Satan and wicked men, but He knew that His servant Job needed to learn lessons for his own soul. He would put the precious ore into the crucible, for He knew how much unsuspected evil lay hidden beneath all that outward excellence, mixed even with the inner piety of this good man. He would show that even piety cannot feed upon itself, nor righteousness lean upon its own arm. These are some of the lessons which Job is to learn. May we learn them too!
Doubting God’s Goodness
As long as Job’s sufferings were outward, or physical, he was calm, but when he begins to doubt the goodness of God, he collapsed. This will appear abundantly as we proceed; it is simply noticed here as suggesting a main theme of the book — the vindication of God, and His ways with men.
Job had lost the sense of God’s favor; his sighs gush forth like a torrent because he fears God has forsaken him. He could not withstand the torturing doubt that God had given him over to hopeless misery. This fear had apparently been lurking in his heart — possibly even in his bright days — and now it has come upon him! He laments, “I was not in safety, neither had I rest, neither was I quiet [from Satan’s first attack], then trouble cometh.”
In the controversy of the three friends, we have a unity of thought, based on a common principle. That principle is that all suffering is of a punitive rather than of an instructive nature—that it is based on God’s justice rather than on His love — though these are ever combined in all His ways.
Job differs from his friends in this: While they steadily tend to a conviction of his hypocrisy and sin, Job faces the awful thought of God’s injustice. He is led to this by the consciousness of personal uprightness, which he cannot relinquish in the darkest hour. Why then is he so afflicted? On the other hand, thank God, he has true faith. Even where he cannot understand, he must believe in God, and this faith remains, with increasing light, through all his sufferings and in spite of all mysteries.
In Job’s despair, his affliction is unspeakably great; there is no possible cure, therefore death would be a welcome relief. There is no gleam of hope amid the gloom; faith is almost completely eclipsed for the time, and there is the sense of God’s wrath which is the forerunner of a doubt of His goodness and justice. But Job needs light, and he must learn to trust God when he cannot understand Him. Job wants God to take his life. This, he says, would be a comfort, for his conscious uprightness would sustain him: He has not rejected God’s words—has not been rebellious against Him. We have here, as throughout his long conflict, a statement of conscious uprightness. While true — as it was indeed the fruit of God’s grace in him — Job is using this righteousness in a self-righteous way, to justify himself at the expense of God’s righteousness.
We have here the habitual state of Job’s mind throughout all his controversy with his friends. There is a sense of moral uprightness, of genuine fear of God, which he cannot deny. It is the testimony of a good conscience, and it stands as a rock against all his friend’s suspicions and accusations.
Charges Against God
He makes charges against God, for he is not yet ready to be stripped of all his fancied righteousness. He thinks that God holds him as an enemy, drives him as a withered leaf before the blast, and accuses him of those almost forgotten sins of youth (ah, Job, it seems that even you must acknowledge there have been sins).
The very fact that Job longs for an intercessor shows the faith hidden in his soul. Meanwhile he looks down to the grave, without a pause for God to speak to him. The very fact that he appeals to God bringing his doubts and fears to Him, shows that faith has not failed, and it cannot. Therefore we find here the noble outburst, which has expressed the faith of the saints of all ages: “I know that my Redeemer liveth” (Job 19:25).
Job is totally occupied with his relationship to God— he must understand God. Job charges Him as the author of his misery and suffering. His complaint and hot words give him no relief. He is unwilling or unable to trust God in the dark.
With his sense of outrage, Job desires to go before God and lay charges against Him! He would come boldly into His presence, in His very abode, and lay his case before Him, with his mouth full of arguments. He even challenges any reply from God, “I would know the words which He would answer me.” So can a righteous man speak when at a distance from God. How different it was when he had his desire and God appeared to him!
Mixing Faith and Unbelief
And here, when his almost insane defiance of God is at its height, there bursts forth a glance of that confidence in God which we have already had occasion to note. “Will He plead against me with His great power! No! but He would put strength in me,” or “regard me with compassion.” These are surely not the words of an unbeliever. He doubts God’s ways, accuses Him, but is confident that if he could only see Him all would be cleared. God would consider his “weak and wandering cries” and vindicate him from divine injustice! But what an anomaly—the righteous man disputing with Him and delivered by the Judge Himself from His unjust severity! Strange contradiction it all is, yet better far thus to long to go before God, than the pride which would say to Him, “Depart from us, for we desire not the knowledge of Thy ways.” It is always better to bring even our doubts of God to Himself, if we have nothing else to bring.
All unknown to himself, God’s grace was at work, for he was a child of God: He was not permitted to go where his unbelieving thoughts led him. But we have still to hear him pour forth all his heart, before God can be heard.
There is greater or less inconsistency in Job’s monologue (Job 29-31), corresponding to the state of his heart, in which conflicting emotions, of conscious integrity before man, and of the fear of the Lord, are mingled with unhealthy reminiscences of past greatness and laments over present degradation. The general tone, however, shows the need of God’s dealing with his soul, and prepares us for what follows.
For a sinner to dwell upon his own goodness — of which he has none — is repulsive, and for a child of God to follow the same course shows clearly that he has not yet learned his lesson.
Is Sincerity Enough?
We cannot question the truth and the sincerity of all that Job says, but, we may well ask, is his conclusion a happy one even for himself? He closes the mouths of his friends; he seems abundantly satisfied with himself. Suppose God were to let it go at that, is the spectacle of a completely self-vindicated man a pleasant one? Ah, divine truth, as well as divine love, will not suffer him to wrap himself in these weeds of self-righteousness. In other words, God is left out save as related to Job’s righteousness: His greatness, goodness, holiness, as themes of worship and joy, are ignored. At the close of all that he has to say, Job is as far from God as at the beginning; nay, farther. When we remember that all God’s ways with man are to bring him close to Himself, we see the folly and sin of Job’s course.
But we must take note of the self-righteousness which moved Job to speak of himself thus. He was arraying himself rather than giving glory to God. Doubtless at bottom he was a man of genuine piety, but it is not glory to set forth one’s own glory.
Elihu Speaks for the Lord
No; in one brief sentence Elihu sets aside all human reasonings: “God is greater than man.” In other words, God is God. If we are to reason, let it not be from the lesser to the greater, but from the greater to the less. Let us say, How could the Almighty, an all-perfect Being commit an unrighteous act? “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” (Gen. 18:25). So long as a soul raises a question against the character of God, he is in no state to have his difficulties met. This Elihu now proceeds to explain. So long as Job accuses, he gets no answer; let him submit and God will make all plain.
Elihu makes it plain that God thus speaks to man. When the light of nature is withdrawn, when all is silent, He speaks in “a still small voice” and makes known His mind. Thus instruction is sealed upon the heart of man. His object is to correct wrong thoughts and actions, to withdraw man from “mischief,” or his purpose, and to hide pride from man. This goes deeper than action, for pride lurks in the heart, and God would hide it from man — hinder its control over him. “Keep back also Thy servant from presumptuous sins” (Psa. 19:13). Thus man is kept back from destruction. He bows to the correction of God’s truth and is thus spared from the smiting of the rod or of the sword.
Confidence in the uprightness of God is the foundation of an upright walk. “I know, O Lord, that Thy judgments are right, and that Thou in faithfulness hast afflicted me” (Psa. 119:75). Surely if we lose faith in God’s righteousness, what is left? This is walking “in the counsel of the ungodly,” far more dangerous than outward forms of evil. The effect of such teaching is that there is no profit in seeking to please God or to have fellowship with Him. What a monstrous charge to fall from the lips of one who was a child of God! We can be thankful that Job’s faith did not fail in spite of this cloud of unbelief. How could God act wickedly or pervert the right? He would not be God if this were possible.
“Although thou sayest thou shalt not see Him, yet judgment is before Him, therefore trust thou in Him.” Do not think God has forgotten; be patient; learn the lesson He would teach thee. How admirable and scriptural is this advice — exactly what Job needed. “Wait on the Lord; be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thy heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord.”
In one word he sweeps away the unholy suspicions which had been harbored by Job — “God is great, and despiseth not any.” Infinite in power as He is, He looks with compassion upon the feeblest of His creatures. There are two infinities in which He is equally seen — the infinitely great, and the infinitely small. How comforting is the truth, “He despiseth not any!” The despiser shall meet his doom with all the unclean, but God will save the humble sufferer, “in” and indeed “by” his affliction. It “worketh out” blessing for him. It is the Almighty, we cannot fathom His greatness, but we know His uprightness is as great as His power. Let us bow in worship before Him: He listens not to those wise in their own conceits.
The Voice of Jehovah
Jehovah’s testimony from Creation is testing Job and bringing him into the dust. We are no longer listening to the groping of the natural mind, as in the discourses of the friends; nor to the wild cries of a wounded faith, as in Job; nor even to the clear sober language of Elihu — we are in the presence of Jehovah Himself, who speaks to us.
So the voice that came to Job out of the whirlwind brought him into the presence of One of whose character he had until now been greatly ignorant. He had spoken many excellent things about God, but His actual presence had never before been known. This, it will be found, furnishes the key to the amazing change wrought in Job. When God is personally recognized as present, He is thus recognized in the entirety of His being. It is not merely His power that is seen or His greatness or even His goodness, but Himself, the One in whose presence seraphim veil their faces as they cry, “Holy, holy, holy.”
Peter caught such a glimpse of Him by the sea of Galilee (Luke 5), and was constrained to cry, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” And Paul fell to the earth under the same revelation, as also John in the Apocalypse. The outward display in each of these cases was different, passing from a lowly Man in a fisher-boat to the enthroned Majesty in the heavens; but the essential fact is that it is Himself, and however much He may veil His glory and meet man in mercy and grace, it is God who thus speaks and acts. If this is not realized, no grandeur of setting, no splendor of natural phenomena, can convey His message to man.
This is pitifully apparent in the use men make of the majestic panorama of nature daily spread before their eyes. The heavens as an infinitely spacious tent are arched overhead, resplendent by day and by night; the drapery of the clouds, the greatness of the mountains, the beauty of forest, field and sea—what do these tell to one who hears not the Voice? The heathen makes his image, or bows to sun and moon; the scientist sweeps the heavens with his telescope, and pierces the penetralia of earth with his microscope; he talks learnedly and interestingly of “laws of nature,” of “principles of physics and of chemistry,” of gravitation, cohesion and affinity: but unless he has heard the Voice of Jehovah, he knows Him no more than the poor deluded idolater groveling before the hideous idol Vishnu.
This ignorance is a guilty ignorance, “for the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: because that, when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God,” etc. (Rom. 1:18-25). All men are in a measure conscious of this guilt and moral distance from God, and quite willing to remain in that condition. They stop their ears to the Voice of Him who is not far from every one of us.
How necessary for us, as we speak of it, to realize His voice who speaks in nature and in His Word. May it be ours, not to withdraw to a distance, nor to hide amid His beautiful trees, but to come near with unshod feet and veiled faces and hear what God the Lord will speak.
Looking at His words as a whole, we might be surprised at their character. They are not in one sense profound, as unfolding depths of theological truth. They are scarcely didactic in a moral sense, impressing upon man his duty. They are not so much a revelation of truth as a question to Job if he knows the truths that lie all about him in the vast creation of God. It is this which makes these words of Jehovah so wonderful. He speaks, not “in a tongue no man can understand,” but in the language of nature, about the earth, the sky, the clouds and rain, and beasts and birds.
For creation itself is, we would reverently say, a divine humiliation. It reminds us of Him who, “though He was in the form of God,” emptied Himself of His glory and took a servant’s form, being made in the likeness of men. Creation is the “lattice” behind which the Beloved hides Himself (Song of Sol. 2:9). And yet He reveals Himself thus to faith. The swaddling bands of Ocean are but a figure of those bands which He who made all things took upon Himself, when He became flesh. The whole universe, immense and boundless, forms the garments of the infinite God, who thus reveals Himself.
He encourages us to believe that He is drawing near to us, that the message He has to give is one of mercy. The message of nature and His Word tests and humbles man. Job, who boasted in his righteousness, who seemed to consider his knowledge all-sufficient, is obliged to own his ignorance, his weakness, and his unrighteousness. It is divinely done, and done so effectively that the lesson brings Job to his true place for all time.
Judging God
Job had presumed to sit in judgment upon Jehovah and His ways; his competence for this is tested: What does he know? What can he do? Shall the creature — so puny in power, so ignorant, and withal so filled with vain pride — presume to instruct God as to His duties, to point out to Him His failures, in fact to usurp His prerogatives? The effect upon Job is seen in his two answers. In the first reply to God’s questions, he abases himself and lays his hand upon his mouth. In the second, he makes full confession of his sinful pride and abhors himself, thus preparing the way for the outward recovery and restoration to prosperity.
We may say that the second part of the Lord’s address is devoted to the humbling of Job’s pride, by setting before him the creatures in which this pride is exhibited, in a typical way. The divine purpose can be seen throughout, and the effects are most blessed and complete.
Jehovah asks, “Who is this that darkeneth counsel,” that hides the purposes of God and the truth, “by words without knowledge”? Job had poured out a flood of words — lamentations, protestations, accusations. There was much that was true and excellent, but all was vitiated, so far as God’s purposes were concerned, by the exaltation of his own righteousness at the expense of Jehovah’s. He leads Job through the vast, and yet familiar, scenes of creation. Can he solve one of ten thousand of its riddles? Can he open the hidden secrets of nature? If not, why does he attempt to declare God’s counsels, and intrude into the purposes of One who giveth not account to any of His matters; of whom the worshiping apostle declares, “How unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out!” (Rom. 11:33).
Science has much to tell us that might well fill us with wonder and amazement, and with awe and worship—of WHOM? The more we know merely of His displays, the less we really know of Himself, save as He makes Himself known in Christ. He has not given to us to change the order of nature, or to ascend up into those heavens, but He teaches us to give the true answer to His questions, and that answer is, “We see Jesus.”
Thus Jehovah closes His first testing of Job. He has taken, as it were, the clay of Creation and put it upon the eyes of the poor sufferer, who had been blinded by his own griefs to all the power, wisdom and goodness of God. Will Job “go and wash in the pool of Siloam?”
Job’s Repentance
Will he bow to the testing of his Creator? “Shall he that contendeth with the Almighty instruct Him? He that reproveth God, let him answer it.” Here lies the root of Job’s trouble: He had sat in judgment upon God; he had accused the Omnipotent of evil. God has drawn near, has made His presence felt, and lifted the veil from the face of nature to reveal part of His character. What is the effect upon the proud man?
“I am vile; what shall I answer Thee?....I will lay my hand upon my mouth.”
Many words had Job uttered: at the beginning of his sufferings, words of faith in God. Even during his “crying in the night,” many beautiful and noble thoughts had fallen from his lips, but no such words as these — music in the ear of God—confession, contrition, mute acknowledgment of the whole error of his thought.
Here practically closes the test of Job, and yet in faithfulness Jehovah will probe still further to the deepest recesses of his heart and lay bare its potential evil. So we must listen further to what the Lord has to speak. In His second address the Lord deepens the work already taking place in Job’s heart. In the first, Job is silenced and convinced by the majesty, power and wisdom of God. Such a Being, whose perfections are displayed in His works, cannot be arbitrary and unjust in His dealings with man. The great effect of His first address upon Job seems to be that Jehovah has become a reality to him.
In the second address these impressions are deepened. God will not leave His servant with his lesson half learned: He plows more deeply into his heart until the hidden depths of pride are reached and judged. The second address therefore dwells upon this pride so common to the creature. He invites Job, as it were, to see whether he can humble the proud and bring them low. The manifest implication is that Job himself is in that class.
Yet in the call, “Gird up thy loins now like a man,” we have encouragement as well as rebuke. God is not crushing His poor, foolish servant, but appealing to his reason as well as his conscience. Already Job has learned, as indeed he has in measure known, God’s power, wisdom and goodness. But the present appeal particularly is to his conscience. Will he annul, deny God’s righteous judgment and condemn God that he may establish a petty human righteousness? This is really what lay at the bottom of Job’s complaints; he was suffering affliction which he did not deserve; he, a righteous man, was being treated as though he were unrighteous. The conclusion then was unavoidable — the One who was thus afflicting him was unjust! Elihu had already pressed upon Job these awful consequences of his thoughts: “I am righteous: and God hath taken away my judgment” (ch. 34:5). “Thinkest thou this to be right, that thou saidst, My righteousness is more than God’s?” (ch. 35:2). The Lord would press home upon Job the heinousness of this sin.
He has presumed to judge God — upon what grounds? Has he divine power and majesty? Can he speak in a voice of thunder? Can he quell the proud rebellion of every evildoer and bring men into the dust before him? Has he done so with his own proud and rebellious heart? Has he humbled even his friends? How much less the whole world.
Is it cruel of Jehovah thus to deal with a poor heartbroken creature? Rather let us ask, would it have been kindness to leave him holding his pride about him as a garment, and railing against the Almighty? Only thus can pride be abased, by being brought face to face with its nothingness in the presence of the majesty and boundless goodness of God. Until Job has learned this, and learned it to the full, all the dispensations of God with him in his afflictions, and the reasonings of his friends and of Elihu, are in vain, and worse.
We are brought thus to hearken to the application by Jehovah of the lesson of creature-strength and pride, as exhibited and typified in the behemoth and leviathan. And yet he is but a creature, endowed by God, for His all wise purposes, with superhuman strength. Let Job, let all who are tempted to trust in their own strength, whether of body, as here, or of heart and mind, consider this creature, self-sufficient and resistless. How puny will their own arm appear. Self-righteousness, self-seeking, pride of conduct or of character, denies its need of Christ and of God. Such is sin in the flesh — incorrigible and hideous. Who can subdue it or change its nature?
Job responds to the piercing, humbling words of Jehovah. He repeats first his confession in a complete way. He acknowledges God’s omnipotence and that He cannot be thwarted in His purposes, which exhibit His power, wisdom and goodness as fully as do His works. There is a complete surrender and reversal of all that he had previously said against God. Quoting Jehovah’s own words, he asks himself, Who is he who darkens counsel? Who dares to throw a shadow upon the Almighty? “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. It is high, I cannot attain unto it” (Psa. 139:6).
“Now Mine Eye Seeth Thee”
Applying Jehovah’s words to himself, Job asks himself, “Who is this?” “Hear, and I will speak.” It is as though he would abjectly bow to these questions by repeating them and give his answer to his divine Questioner. And what an answer it is! The only answer human pride can give to God: “I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear” — Job had in a general way been correctly instructed, but he had only learned about God—“but now mine eye seeth Thee” — he had been brought face to face with God, not indeed visually, though there was the awful glory in the sky, but he had had a soul-perception of God by his enlightened reason, and chiefly by conscience. God had drawn near, personally near, and Job was conscious of that ineffable holiness, as well as power, that belong to Him. Previously he had been in the presence of man, and he could more than hold his own with the best of them. In God’s presence no creature can boast, and Job was at last in that glorious, holy Presence. All the “filthy rags” of an imagined personal righteousness dropped from him, and he stood in all the naked horror of pride and rebellion against God. who can doubt that Job’s penitence goes beyond the mere judging of his words; he judged himself—“I abhor myself.”
These are the words for which we may say the Lord had long been listening. God’s purpose was to elicit just this confession. And why? To humiliate him? No, but to give him the true glory — to privilege him, out of the dust, to behold the glory of the Lord and never again to have a cloud upon his soul! Was the experience worthwhile? There is but one answer. May we all give it.
The controversy which has, for Job, so happily closed. Addressing Eliphaz, as the leader of the three, Jehovah declares His wrath against them all, because they had not spoken of Him the thing that is right, as His servant Job had. And yet their entire contention had apparently been for God’s righteousness! At least apparently so. But God does not accept honor at the expense of truth. It is His glory that all His attributes blend in one harmonious light. Can He then accept a vindication of His character and ways that is based upon a false charge? “As my servant Job hath.” When had Job thus spoken “the thing that is right?” Surely not when pouring out bitter charges against God.
This is the speaking of Jehovah “the thing that is right;” it is the taking and keeping of the sinful creature’s place who cannot understand the least of those perfect ways — ways which are right when they seem most wrong. It is the declaration that God is God — Jehovah, the self-existent, perfect One; most wise and just and good as well as most powerful; righteous and holy in all His ways, whatever they may be.
“Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.”
S. Ridout (extracted and adapted)
Tranquility
“Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee: because he trusteth in Thee” (Isa. 26:3).
The hand that set the stars in space
Holds fast my hand;
My life is molded by the One
Who shaped the land.
The mind that planned the march of suns
Can understand
The petty trials of my day, and surely He,
Who hollowed out the cup that holds
The mighty seas
And keeps the waves in check, can give
Tranquility.
In my small storms shall not the One
Who holds in place
The Milky Way keep me each day,
And by His grace
Present me soon, through Calvary’s work,
Before His face.
Author unknown