'Thou shalt also decree a thing, and it shall be established unto
thee, and the light shall shine upon thy ways.' Then is my will to be
omnipotent, and am I to be delivered from the experiences of
disappointments and failures and frustrated plans that are common to
all humanity, and an essential part of its discipline, because I am a
Christian man? Eliphaz may have meant that, but we know something far
nobler. Again, I say, remember the conditions precedent. First of all,
there must be the delight in God, and the desire towards Him, the
submission of the will to Him, and the waiting before Him for
guidance. I decree a thing--if I am a true Christian, and in the
measure in which I am--only when I am quite sure that God has decreed
it. And it is only His decrees, registered in the chancery of my will,
of which I may be certain that they shall be established. There will
be no failures to the man whose life's purpose is to serve God, and to
grow like Him; but if our purpose is anything less than that, or if we
go arbitrarily and self-willedly resolving and saying, 'Thus I will;
thus I command; let my will stand instead of all reason,' we shall
have our contemptuous 'decrees' disestablished many a time. If we run
our heads against stone walls in that fashion, the walls will stand,
and our heads will be broken. To serve Him and to fall into the line
of His purpose, and to determine nothing, nor obstinately want
anything until we are sure that it is His will--that is the secret of
never failing in what we undertake.
We must understand a little more deeply than we are apt to do what is
meant by 'success,' before we predict unfailing success for any man.
But if we have obeyed the commandment from the psalm already quoted,
which may be again alluded to in the words of my text--'Commit thy way
unto the Lord; trust also in Him'--we shall inherit the ancient
promise, 'and He shall bring it to pass.' 'All things work together
for good to them that love God,' and in the measure of our love to Him
are our discernment and realisation of what is truly good. Religion
gives no screen to keep the weather off us, but it gives us an insight
into the truth that storms and rain are good for the only crop that is
worth growing here. If we understand what we are here for, we shall be
very slow to call sorrow evil, and to crown joy with the exclusive
title of blessing and good; and we shall have a deeper canon of
interpretation for the words of my text than he who is represented as
speaking them ever dreamed of.
So with the promise of light to shine upon our paths. It is 'the light
which never was on sea or land,' and not the material light which
sense-bound eyes can see. That may all go. But if we have God in our
hearts, there will be a light upon our way 'which knows no
variableness, neither shadow of turning.' The Arctic winter, sunless
though it be, has a bright heaven radiant with myriad stars, and
flashing with strange lights born of no material or visible orb. And
so you and I, if we delight ourselves 'in the Lord,' will have an
unsetting sun to light our paths; 'and at eventide,' and in the
mirkest midnight, 'there will be light' in the darkness.
IV. Lastly, such a life will be always hopeful, and finally crowned
with deliverance.
'When they'--that is, the ways that he has been speaking about--'when
they are cast down, thou shalt say, Lifting up.' That is an
exclamation or a prayer, and we might simply render, 'thou shalt say,
Up!' Even in so blessed a life as has been described, times will come
when the path plunges downwards into some 'valley of the shadow of
death.' But even then the traveller will bate no jot of hope. He will
in his heart say 'Up!' even while sense says 'Down!' either as
expressing indomitable confidence and good cheer in the face of
depressing circumstances, or as pouring out a prayer to Him who 'has
showed him great and sore troubles' that He would 'bring him up again
from the depths of the earth.' The devout life is largely independent
of circumstances, and is upheld and calmed by a quiet certainty that
the general trend of its path is upward, which enables it to trudge
hopefully down an occasional dip in the road.
Such an obstinate hopefulness and cheery confidence are the natural
result of the experiences already described in the text. If we delight
in God, hold communion with Him and have known Him as answering
prayer, prospering our purposes and illuminating our paths, how shall
we not hope? Nothing need depress nor perturb those whose joys and
treasures are safe above the region of change and loss. If our riches
are there where neither moth, rust, nor thieves can reach, our hearts
will be there also, and an inward voice will keep singing, 'Lift up
your heart.' It is the prerogative of experience to light up the
future. It is the privilege of Christian experience to make hope
certainty. If we live the life outlined in these verses we shall be
able to bring June into December, and feel the future warmth whilst
our bones are chilled with the present cold. 'When the paths are made
low, thou shalt say, Up!'
And the end will vindicate such confidence. For the issue of all will
be, 'He will save the humble person'; namely, the man who is of the
character described, and who is 'lowly of eyes' in conscious
unworthiness, even while he lifts up his face to God in confidence in
his Father's love. The 'saving' meant here is, of course, temporary
and temporal deliverance from passing outward peril. But we may
permissibly give it wider and deeper meaning. Continuous partial
deliverances lead on to and bring about final full salvation.
We read that into the words, of course. But nothing less than a
complete and conclusive deliverance can be the legitimate end of the
experience of the Christian life here. Absurdity can no further go
than to suppose that a soul which has delighted itself in God, and
looked in His face with frank confidence, and poured out his desires
to Him, and been the recipient of numberless answers, and the seat of
numberless thank-offerings, has travelled along life's common way in
cheerful godliness, has had the light of heaven shining on the path,
and has found an immortal hope springing as the natural result of
present experience, shall at the last be frustrated of all, and lie
down in unconscious sleep, which is nothingness. If that were the end
of a Christian life, then 'the pillared firmament were rottenness, and
earth's base built on stubble.' No, no! A heaven of endless
blessedness and close communion with God is the only possible ending
to the facts of the devout life on earth.
We have such a life offered to us all and made possible through faith
in Jesus Christ, in whom we may delight ourselves in the Lord, by whom
we have 'access with confidence,' who is Himself the light of our
hope, the answer of our prayers, the joy of our hearts, and who will
'deliver us from every evil work' as we travel along the road; 'and
save us' at last 'into His heavenly kingdom,' where we shall be joined
to the Delight of our souls, and drink for evermore of the fountain of
life.
'THE END OF THE LORD'
'Then Job answered the Lord, and said, 2. I know that Thou canst do
every thing, and that no thought can he withholden from Thee. 3. Who
is he that hideth counsel without knowledge? therefore have I uttered
that I understood not; things too wonderful for me, which I knew not.
4. Hear, I beseech Thee, and I will speak: I will demand of Thee, and
declare Thou unto me. 5. I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the
ear: but now mine eye seeth Thee. 6. Wherefore I abhor myself, and
repent in dust and ashes. 7. And it was so, that after the Lord had
spoken these words unto Job, the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite, 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.
8. Therefore take unto you now seven bullocks and seven rams, and go
to My servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering; and
My servant Job shall pray for you: for him will I accept: lest I deal
with you after your folly, in that ye have not spoken of Me the thing
which is right, like My servant Job. 9. So Eliphaz the Temanite and
Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite went, and did according
as the Lord commanded them: the Lord also accepted Job. 10. And the
Lord turned the captivity of Job, when he prayed for his friends: also
the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before.'--JOB xlii. 1-10.
The close of the Book of Job must be taken in connection with its
prologue, in order to get the full view of its solution of the mystery
of pain and suffering. Indeed the prologue is more completely the
solution than the ending is; for it shows the purpose of Job's trials
as being, not his punishment, but his testing. The whole theory that
individual sorrows were the result of individual sins, in the support
of which Job's friends poured out so many eloquent and heartless
commonplaces, is discredited from the beginning. The magnificent
prologue shows the source and purpose of sorrow. The epilogue in this
last chapter shows the effect of it in a good man's character, and
afterwards in his life.
So we have the grim thing lighted up, as it were, at the two ends.
Suffering comes with the mission of trying what stuff a man is made
of, and it leads to closer knowledge of God, which is blessed; to
lowlier self-estimation, which is also blessed; and to renewed outward
blessings, which hide the old scars and gladden the tortured heart.
Job's final word to God is in beautiful contrast with much of his
former unmeasured utterances. It breathes lowliness, submission, and
contented acquiescence in a providence partially understood. It does
not put into Job's mouth a solution of the problem, but shows how its
pressure is lightened by getting closer to God. Each verse presents a
distinct element of thought and feeling.
First comes, remarkably enough, not what might have been expected,
namely, a recognition of God's righteousness, which had been the
attribute impugned by Job's hasty words, but of His omnipotence. God
'can do everything,' and none of His 'thoughts' or purposes can be
'restrained' (Rev. Ver.). There had been frequent recognitions of that
attribute in the earlier speeches, but these had lacked the element of
submission, and been complaint rather than adoration. Now, the same
conviction has different companions in Job's mind, and so has
different effects, and is really different in itself. The Titan on his
rock, with the vulture tearing at his liver, sullenly recognised
Jove's power, but was a rebel still. Such had been Job's earlier
attitude, but now that thought comes to him along with submission, and
so is blessed. Its recurrence here, as in a very real sense a new
conviction, teaches us how old beliefs may flash out into new
significance when seen from a fresh point of view, and how the very
same thought of God may be an argument for arraigning and for
vindicating His providence.
The prominence given, both in the magnificent chapters in which God
answers Job out of the whirlwind and in this final confession, to
power instead of goodness, rests upon the unspoken principle that 'the
divine nature is not a segment, but a circle. Any one divine attribute
implies all others. Omnipotence cannot exist apart from righteousness'
(Davidson's _Job_, Cambridge Bible for Schools). A mere naked
omnipotence is not God. If we rightly understand His power, we can
rest upon it as a Hand sustaining, not crushing, us. 'He doeth all
things well' is a conviction as closely connected with 'I know that
Thou canst do all things' as light is with heat.
The second step in Job's confession is the acknowledgment of the
incompleteness of his and all men's materials and capacities for
judging God's providence. Verse 3 begins with quoting God's rebuke
(Job xxxviii 2). It had cut deep, and now Job makes it his own
confession. We should thus appropriate as our own God's merciful
indictments, and when He asks, 'Who is it?' should answer with
lowliness, 'Lord, it is I.' Job had been a critic; he is a worshipper.
He had tried to fathom the bottomless, and been angry because his
short measuring-line had not reached the depths. But now he
acknowledges that he had been talking about what passed his
comprehension, and also that his words had been foolish in their
rashness.
Is then the solution of the whole only that old commonplace of the
unsearchableness of the divine judgments? Not altogether; for the
prologue gives, if not a complete, yet a real, key to them. But still,
after all partial solutions, there remains the inscrutable element in
them. The mystery of pain and suffering is still a mystery; and while
general principles, taught us even more clearly in the New Testament
than in this book, do lighten the 'weight of all this unintelligible
world,' we have still to take Job's language as the last word on the
matter, and say, 'How unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways
past finding out!'
For individuals, and on the wider field of the world, God's way is in
the sea; but that does not bewilder those who also know that it is
also in the sanctuary. Job's confession as to his rash speeches is the
best estimate of many elaborate attempts to 'vindicate the ways of God
to man.' It is better to trust than to criticise, better to wait than
to seek prematurely to understand.
Verse 4, like verse 3, quotes the words of God (Job xxxviii. 3; xl.
7). They yield a good meaning, if regarded as a repetition of God's
challenge, for the purpose of disclaiming any such presumptuous
contest. But they are perhaps better understood as expressing Job's
longing, in his new condition of humility, for fuller light, and his
new recognition of the way to pierce to a deeper understanding of the
mystery, by illumination from God granted in answer to his prayer. He
had tried to solve his problem by much, and sometimes barely reverent,
thinking. He had racked brain and heart in the effort, but he has
learned a more excellent way, as the Psalmist had, who said, 'When I
thought, in order to know this, it was too painful for me, until I
went into the sanctuary of God; then understood I.' Prayer will do
more for clearing mysteries than speculation, however acute, and it
will change the aspect of the mysteries which it does not clear from
being awful to being solemn--veils covering depths of love, not clouds
obscuring the sun.
The centre of all Job's confession is in verse 5, which contrasts his
former and present knowledge of God, as being mere hearsay before, and
eyesight now. A clearer understanding, but still more, a sense of His
nearness, and an acquaintance at first hand, are implied in the bold
words, which must not be interpreted of any outward revelation to
sense, but of the direct, full, thrilling consciousness of God which
makes all men's words about Him seem poor. That change was the master
transformation in Job's case, as it is for us all. Get closer to God,
realise His presence, live beneath His eye and with your eyes fixed on
Him, and ancient puzzles will puzzle no longer, and wounds will cease
to smart, and instead of angry expostulation or bewildered attempts at
construing His dealings, there will come submission, and with
submission, peace.
The cure for questionings of His providence is experience of His
nearness, and blessedness therein. Things that loomed large dwindle,
and dangers melt away. The landscape is the same in shadow and
sunshine; but when the sun comes out, even snow and ice sparkle, and
tender beauty starts into visibility in grim things. So, if we see
God, the black places of life are lighted; and we cease to feel the
pressure of many difficulties of speculation and practice, both as
regards His general providence and His revelation in law and gospel.
The end of the whole matter is Job's retractation of his words and his
repentance. 'I abhor' has no object expressed, and is better taken as
referring to the previous speeches than to 'myself.' He means thereby
to withdraw them all. The next clause, 'I repent in dust and ashes,'
carries the confession a step farther. He recognises guilt in his rash
speeches, and bows before his God confessing his sin. Where are his
assertions of innocence gone? One sight of God has scattered them, as
it ever does. A man who has learned his own sinfulness will find few
difficulties and no occasions for complaint in God's dealings with
him. If we would see aright the meaning of our sorrows, we must look
at them on our knees. Get near to God in heart-knowledge of Him, and
that will teach our sinfulness, and the two knowledges will combine to
explain much of the meaning of sorrow, and to make the unexplained
residue not hard to endure.
The epilogue in prose which follows Job's confession, tells of the
divine estimate of the three friends, of Job's sacrifice for them, and
of his renewed outward prosperity. The men who had tried to vindicate
God's righteousness are charged with not having spoken that which is
right; the man who has passionately impugned it is declared to have
thus spoken. No doubt, Eliphaz and his colleagues had said a great
many most excellent, pious things, and Job as many wild and untrue
ones. But their foundation principle was not a true representation of
God's providence, since it was the uniform connection of sin with
sorrow, and the accurate proportion which these bore to each other.
Job, on the other hand, had spoken truth in his denials of these
principles, and in his longings to have the righteousness of God set
in clear relation to his own afflictions. We must remember, too, that
the friends were talking commonplaces learned by rote, while Job's
words came scalding hot from his heart. Most excellent truth may be so
spoken as to be wrong; and it is so, if spoken heartlessly, regardless
of sympathy, and flung at sufferers like a stone, rather than laid on
their hearts as a balm. God lets a true heart dare much in speech; for
He knows that the sputter and foam prove that 'the heart's deeps boil
in earnest.'
Job is put in the place of intercessor for the three--a profound
humiliation for them and an honour for him. They obeyed at once,
showing that they have learned their lesson, as well as Job his. An
incidental lesson from that final picture of the sufferer become the
priest requiting accusations with intercession, is the duty of
cherishing kind feelings and doing kind acts to those who say hard
things of us. It would be harder for some of us to offer sacrifices
for our Eliphazes than to argue with them. And yet another is that
sorrow has for one of its purposes to make the heart more tender, both
for the sorrows and the faults of others.
Note, too, that it was 'when Job prayed for his friends' that the Lord
turned his captivity. That is a proverbial expression, bearing
witness, probably, to the deep traces left by the Exodus, for
reversing calamity. The turning-point was not merely the confession,
but the act, of beneficence. So, in ministering to others, one's own
griefs may be soothed.
The restoration of outward good in double measure is not meant as the
statement of a universal law of Providence, and still less as a
solution of the problem of the book. But it is putting the truth that
sorrows, rightly borne, yield peaceable fruit at the last, in the form
appropriate to the stage of revelation which the whole book
represents; that is, one in which the doctrine of immortality, though
it sometimes rises before Job's mind as an aspiration of faith, is not
set in full light.
To us, living in the blaze of light which Jesus Christ has let into
the darkness of the future, the 'end of the Lord' is that heaven
should crown the sorrows of His children on earth. We can speak of
light, transitory affliction working out an eternal weight of glory.
The book of Job is expressing substantially the same expectation, when
it paints the calm after the storm and the restoration in double
portion of vanished blessings. Many desolate yet trusting sufferers
know how little such an issue is possible for their grief, but if they
have more of God in clearer sight of Him, they will find empty places
in their hearts and homes filled.