《The Biblical Illustrator–Job (Ch.30~42)》(A Compilation)
30 Chapter 30
Verses 1-31
Verses 1-15
Job 30:1-15
But now they that are younger than I have me in derision.
Job’s social disabilities
Man’s happiness as a social being is greatly dependent upon the kind feeling and respect which is shown to him by his contemporaries and neighbours. The social insolence from which he suffers, and of which he complains, was marked by the following circumstances:--
I. It came from the most contemptible characters. He regarded them as despicable in their ancestry. “Whose fathers I would have disdained to have set with the dogs of my flock.” “They were driven from among men, and people cried after them as after a thief.” “Among the bushes they brayed.” These were the creatures amongst whom the patriarch now lived, and whose insolence he had to endure. They had no faculty to discern or appreciate his moral worth, and so utterly destitute of any power to compassionate distress that they treated him with a heartless cruelty and revolting insolence. Men may say that a man of his high character ought not to have allowed himself to have been pained with the conduct of such wretches. But who has ever done so? Even Christ Himself felt the reproaches of sinners, and was not indifferent to their revilings and their sneers. “He endured their contradictions.”
II. It was manifested in personal annoyances. “Now I am their song,” he says, “I am their byword.”
III. It was shown to him on account of his providential reverses. Not because he had become contemptible in character, or morally base and degraded. Only because his circumstances were changed, great prosperity had given way to overwhelming adversity. Learn--
1. The worthlessness of mere social fame. What is it worth? Nothing. Its breath of favour is more fickle than the wind.
2. The moral heroism of the world’s Redeemer. Christ came into a social position far more heartless and insolent than that which the patriarch here describes. “Of the people there was none with Him, He was despised and rejected of men.”
3. The importance of habitual reliance on the absolute. Do not trust in man. (Homilist.)
Verse 12
Job 30:12
Upon my right hand rise the youth.
The prospects of life
I. The prospects of life are generally bright. Young people are full of buoyancy, animal spirits, ardent desire, sanguine expectation, high hope: all that is before them takes a colouring from themselves. There is little or no experience of life, by the use of which exaggerated views may be modified, and a correct estimate of the future ensured. Youthful hope often anticipates long life, and it fills up that life with many visions of success and happiness.
II. The prospects of life, to which hope gives such a colouring are often illusive. A fine morning often ends in a wet and stormy day. Projects begun under favourable auspices frequently come to nought. Young people live in a realm of illusions. The young are liable to misapprehension, and need to be prepared for some measure of disappointment. Men at fifty often find that they have failed to reach the height to which at twenty they aspired. Often the secret of failure has been lack of ability, or of perseverance, or of character.
III. A few counsels.
1. The present is a season of preparation for the future. Life is very much what we make it. Then sow now the seeds that shall grow up, and blossom, and fruiten into a good and blessed future.
2. Prepare for the future by the exercise of fidelity to yourself and to God in the present.
3. You need physical preparation for the future. A man’s body has much to do with his mind and character. Courage and fortitude derive much support from a healthy physical constitution.
4. You need mental preparation for the future. I have had many opportunities of seeing what men lose for want of education and mental culture, and what they gain by their possession. Increase your knowledge by reading and observation. Strengthen your mental powers by use.
5. Moral and spiritual preparation. Set before yourself a noble object in life. Form a purpose, and seek to fulfil it. Place yourself under the teaching and government of conscience. Have right and fixed principle to guide you. Consecrate yourselves to God, and commit your life to His care. Have faith in Him. (W. Waiters.)
Verses 16-20
Job 30:16-20
The days of affliction have taken hold upon me.
Physical pain
In these verses the patriarch sketches his great corporeal sufferings, his physical anguish. Probably man’s capability of bodily suffering is greater than that of any other animal existence. His nerves are more tender, his organisation is more exquisite and complicated.
I. It tends to stimulate intellectual research. “Pain,” says a modern author, “has been the means of our increasing our knowledge, our skill, and our comforts. Look to the discoveries made in science--in botany, in chemistry, in anatomy: what a knowledge have we gained of the structures and uses of plants, while we were seeking some herb to soothe pain or cure disease! What a knowledge have we gained of drugs, and salts, and earths, useful for agriculture, or for the fine arts, while we have been seeking only to find an ointment or a medicine! We have sought a draught to allay the burning thirst of a fever, and we have found a dozen delicious beverages to drink for our pleasure or relief. We studied anatomy to find out the seat of disease, and how to attack it, and we found what we did not seek--a thousand wonderful works of God, a thousand most curious contrivances, most admirable delights! We found a model for the ribs of a ship; we found the pattern of a telescope in the eye; we found joints and straps, strutting and valves, which have been copied into the workshop of the mechanic and the study of the philosopher. Yes, we may thank our liability to pain for this--for if pain had not existed, who can tell whether these things would have been so soon, if at all discovered.”
II. It tends to heighten man’s estimate of Divine goodness. The physical sufferings of men, however aggravated and extensive, are not the law of human life, but the exception. They are but a few discordant notes in the general harmony of his existence, a few stormy days and nights in his voyage through life. We appreciate the dawning of the morning, because we have struggled fiercely with difficulties in the night. We appreciate the full flow of health because we have felt the torture of disease. Inasmuch, therefore, as human suffering, which is an exception in the general life of mankind, helps to heighten our estimate of God’s goodness to our race, it is anything but an unmitigated evil. Nay, it is a blessing in disguise.
III. It tends to improve our spiritual nature. Physical sufferings have led many a man to a train of spiritual reflections that have resulted in the moral salvation of the soul. As by the chisel the sculptor brings beauty out of the marble block; as by the pruning knife the gardener brings rich clusters from the vine; as by the bitter drug the physician brings health to his patient; as by the fire the refiner brings pure gold out of the rough ore--so by suffering the great Father brings spiritual life, beauty, and perfection into the soul. “Affliction,” says quaint old Adams, “is a winged chariot, that mounts up the soul toward heaven.” (Homilist.)
The use of afflictions
As opposite colours in a picture contribute to the beauty of the scenery or figures portrayed on the canvas by the artist, so God makes contrary things to promote His glory, and equally develop grace and character in us. There could be no vocal or musical harmony if all the voices and sounds were exactly alike in a concert. There is no real beauty in a painting that has no shades blending with the bright sunlight. As a foil is adapted to make the lustre of a diamond more conspicuous to the eye of the observer, so the contrary things and afflictions of this life God will use to make His love more illustrious and convey His grace with more agreeable sensations to our souls. (R. Venting.)
Verse 20
Job 30:20
I cry unto Thee, and Thou dost not hear me.
Unanswered prayer
1. There is no state so low but a godly man may have a freedom with God in prayer. Though a poor soul be in the mire, though he be but dust and ashes, yet he hath access to the throne of grace.
2. It is our duty to pray most, and usually we pray best, when it is worst with us; when we are nigh the mire and dust, prayer is not only most seasonable, but most pure.
3. Affliction provokes a soul to pray to the utmost, to pray not only in sincerity, but with fervency, not only to pray with faith, but with a holy passion, or passionately.
4. When prayer is sent out with a cry to God in affliction, it is a wonder if it be not presently heard.
5. Not to be heard in a day of trouble and affliction is more troublesome to a gracious heart than all his afflictions. Job thought he was not heard, because he had not present deliverance; and in that sense, indeed, he was not heard. And thus many of the saints may pray and not be heard; that is, they may pray, and not have present deliverance. How may we know that we are heard at any time?
Verse 21
Job 30:21
Thou art become cruel to me.
Job’s grievance against God
He says that God, who formerly had been kind to him, was now become cruel in His actings and dispensations toward him; and whereas He was wont to support him, He did now employ His power, as an enemy, in opposition to him. Job, in expressing his sorrow and resentments, is too pathetic, and expresseth much passion and weakness, for which he is reproved by Elihu. Considering this complaint in itself, it teacheth--
1. It is the way of God’s people to take up God as their chief party in all their troubles.
2. God may seem, for a time, not only not to hear godly supplicants, but even to be a severe foe to them. “Thou art become cruel.”
3. It is a character of a godly man, that he is sadly afflicted with any sign of God’s indignation, or even with the want of an evidence of God’s favour and affection in trouble. Wicked men look rather to their lot in itself, without minding God’s favour, or anger, in it.
4. Whether the wicked think of God’s favour, who never knew it, yet the want of it will be sad to the godly, who have tasted by experience how sweet it is.
5. As God’s power, when He lets it forth in effects, is irresistible and unsupportable for any creature to endure it, however fools do harden themselves, so godly men will soon groan under the apprehension thereof. It is indeed a characteristic of godly men that they are sensible of their own weakness, and therefore are soon made to stoop under the mighty hand of God. Learn--
(1)
All men by nature are apt to have hard thoughts of God in trouble.
Misunderstanding God
The only safe, sure way of avoiding this terrible peril is to study reverently and carefully what He has told us about Himself. It is a common temptation to accept the statements of others when they have the semblance of authority, and are asserted stoutly, as if they must be true. We may, and we ought, each of us, to become personally acquainted with our Heavenly Father. But our only hope of learning to know Him lies in patiently, lovingly, studying His character as revealed to us in Jesus Christ. His providences, too, often are such that we misunderstand them. Few of us are allowed to walk only in the light of conscious, joyous peace. Most of us sometimes are at a loss how to interpret the Divine dealings with us. There are occasions in some lives when God Himself seems to render it almost impossible to obey Him. Undoubtedly the object of such trying experiences is to develop a mightier faith. There must be always one possible next step forward in the path of duty; or, if there be actually none, this must be because the time to take it has not come, and patient, prayerful waiting is the present duty. We may misunderstand the meaning of what is ordained for us, but we need not misunderstand its purpose. Those who have a faith strong enough to feel that behind the tangled scheme of human affairs God sits calmly directing all things, are wisest and happiest. His providences are meant to teach this, at the least. When the last analysis has been worked out it becomes apparent that the great central, fundamental evil which we most need to guard against, is this of misunderstanding our Heavenly Father. If we can learn to see things from His point of view, to look upon life, duty, pleasure, eternity, as He looks upon them, we shall be assured of safety and peace. Otherwise we never can be. (Christian Age.)
Verse 23
Job 30:23
To the house appointed for all living.
The house appointed for all living
What were the definite grounds on which Job formed this conclusion?
1. What he saw around him on every side.
2. Job’s bodily sufferings intimated also the same result. These increased and accumulated, and plainly tended, unless arrested, in the providence of God, to dissolution.
3. Creation around him impressed on him the same conclusion.
4. Job learned the lesson from Divine teaching. Learn who is the dispenser of death. We are prone to attribute all to second causes. Notice Job’s personal application and appropriation to the truth in the text. We must translate Christianity from the impersonal to the personal. We have a description of that change of which the patriarch was thus personally assured. He calls it “death,” and the “house appointed for all living.” Death is the child of sin, though grace has made it the servant of Jesus. It is not annihilation. There is nothing natural or desirable in death itself. This is the only house that may be called the house of humanity. It is a dark house, a solitary house, a silent house, an ancient house. Even this house has a sunlit side. It is not an eternal prison house, but a resting place, a cemetery or sleeping place. (John Cumming, D. D.)
Variety in the conduct of men at death
1. Consider those whom we esteem pious. Of these, in the time of death, there are three classes, widely differing from each other in their dying experiences. Some are agitated by terror, doubts, and apprehensions. Some are exulting and triumphant. Some, without any extraordinary raptures, have a sweet calm and tranquillity of spirit, a filial confidence and trust in their Redeemer. We refer, of course, only to those whose rational powers are unimpaired. We are not to judge of the future state of a man merely by his death-bed exercises. This is an error to which we are far too prone; an error that in its consequences is most pernicious.
2. The deathbeds of those who have lived impenitent and unbelieving without God, and without Christ in the world. Here we find similar diversity. Some are filled with agony and horror, some have a false joy, and an unwarranted exultation; and some are stupid, insensible, and unconcerned. (H. Kollock, D. D.)
Death universal
Man’s life is a stream, running into death’s devouring deeps. Doctrine--All must die. There is an unalterable statute of death, under which men are concluded. This is confirmed by daily observation. The human body consists of perishable materials. We have sinful souls, and therefore have dying bodies; death follows sin, as the shadow follows the body.
1. Man’s life is a vain and empty thing. Our life, in the several parts of it, is a heap of vanities.
2. Man’s life is a short thing; a short-lived vanity.
3. Man’s life is a swift thing; a flying vanity. Having thus discoursed of death, let us improve it in discerning the vanity of the world in bearing up, with Christian contentment and patience, under all troubles and difficulties in it; in mortifying our lusts; in cleaving unto the Lord with full purpose of heart at all hazards, and in preparing for death’s approach. (T. Boston, D. D.)
The certainty of death
The certainty of death. “All must die.”
1. There is an unalterable statute of death, under which men are included.
2. If we consult daily observation. Everyone seeth that “wise men die, likewise the fool and brutish person.”
3. The human body consists of perishing principles.
4. We have sinful souls, and therefore have dying bodies.
5. Man’s life in this world is but a few degrees removed from death. Scripture represents it as vain and empty, short in continuance, and swift in its passage.
Improvement--
1. Let us hence, as in a glass, behold the vanity of the world; look into the grave, and listen to the doctrine of death.
(1)
This world is a false friend, who leaves a man in time of greatest need.
2. It may serve as a storehouse for Christian contentment and patience under worldly crosses and losses.