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Job Chapter
Nine
Job 9
Chapter Contents
Job acknowledges God's justice. (1-13) He is not able to
contend with God. (14-21) Men not to be judged by outward condition. (22-24)
Job complains of troubles. (25-35)
Commentary on Job 9:1-13
(Read Job 9:1-13)
In this answer Job declared that he did not doubt the
justice of God
when he denied himself to be a hypocrite; for how should man be
just with God? Before him he pleaded guilty of sins more than could be counted;
and if God should contend with him in judgment
he could not justify one out of
a thousand
of all the thoughts
words
and actions of his life; therefore he
deserved worse than all his present sufferings. When Job mentions the wisdom
and power of God
he forgets his complaints. We are unfit to judge of God's
proceedings
because we know not what he does
or what he designs. God acts
with power which no creature can resist. Those who think they have strength
enough to help others
will not be able to help themselves against it.
Commentary on Job 9:14-21
(Read Job 9:14-21)
Job is still righteous in his own eyes
1
and this answer
though it sets forth the
power and majesty of God
implies that the question between the afflicted and
the Lord of providence
is a question of might
and not of right; and we begin
to discover the evil fruits of pride and of a self-righteous spirit. Job begins
to manifest a disposition to condemn God
that he may justify himself
for which
he is afterwards reproved. Still Job knew so much of himself
that he durst not
stand a trial. If we say
We have no sin
we not only deceive ourselves
but we
affront God; for we sin in saying so
and give the lie to the Scripture. But
Job reflected on God's goodness and justice in saying his affliction was
without cause.
Commentary on Job 9:22-24
(Read Job 9:22-24)
Job touches briefly upon the main point now in dispute.
His friends maintained that those who are righteous and good
always prosper in
this world
and that none but the wicked are in misery and distress: he said
on the contrary
that it is a common thing for the wicked to prosper
and the
righteous to be greatly afflicted. Yet there is too much passion in what Job
here says
for God doth not afflict willingly. When the spirit is heated with
dispute or with discontent
we have need to set a watch before our lips.
Commentary on Job 9:25-35
(Read Job 9:25-35)
What little need have we of pastimes
and what great need
to redeem time
when it runs on so fast towards eternity! How vain the
enjoyments of time
which we may quite lose while yet time continues! The
remembrance of having done our duty will be pleasing afterwards; so will not
the remembrance of having got worldly wealth
when it is all lost and gone.
Job's complaint of God
as one that could not be appeased and would not relent
was the language of his corruption. There is a Mediator
a Daysman
or Umpire
for us
even God's own beloved Son
who has purchased peace for us with the
blood of his cross
who is able to save to the uttermost all who come unto God
through him. If we trust in his name
our sins will be buried in the depths of
the sea
we shall be washed from all our filthiness
and made whiter than snow
so that none can lay any thing to our charge. We shall be clothed with the
robes of righteousness and salvation
adorned with the graces of the Holy
Spirit
and presented faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding
joy. May we learn the difference between justifying ourselves
and being thus
justified by God himself. Let the tempest-tossed soul consider Job
and notice
that others have passed this dreadful gulf; and though they found it hard to
believe that God would hear or deliver them
yet he rebuked the storm
and
brought them to the desired haven. Resist the devil; give not place to hard
thoughts of God
or desperate conclusions about thyself. Come to Him who
invites the weary and heavy laden; who promises in nowise to cast them out.
── Matthew Henry《Concise Commentary on Job》
Job 9
Verse 2
[2] I
know it is so of a truth: but how should man be just with God
I know —
That God is just in all his ways
that he doth ordinarily bless the righteous
and punish the wicked.
Before God —
And I know that no man is absolutely just
if God be severe to mark what is
amiss in him.
Verse 3
[3] If he will contend with him
he cannot answer him one of a thousand.
One —
One accusation among a thousand which God shall produce against him.
Verse 4
[4] He
is wise in heart
and mighty in strength: who hath hardened himself against
him
and hath prospered?
He — He is infinitely
wise
and searcheth all mens hearts and ways
and discovers a multitude of sins
which mens short sighted-eyes cannot see; and therefore can charge them with
innumerable evils
where they thought themselves innocent
and sees far more
malignity than men could discern in their sins.
Mighty — So
that whether men contend with God by wisdom or by strength: God will be
conqueror.
Hardened himself —
Obstinately contended with him. The devil promised himself that Job in the day
of his affliction
would curse and speak ill of God. But instead of that
he
sets himself to honour God
and speak highly of him. As ill pained as he is
and as much as he is taken up with his own miseries
when he has occasion to
mention the wisdom and power of God
he forgets his complaints and expatiates
with a flood of eloquence on that glorious subject.
Verse 5
[5]
Which removeth the mountains
and they know not: which overturneth them in his
anger.
Who — He
proceeds to give evidence of the Divine power and wisdom.
Removeth —
Suddenly and unexpectedly.
They —
The mountains
to which he ascribes sense and knowledge figuratively.
In anger — In
token of his displeasure with the men that live upon them.
Verse 6
[6] Which shaketh the earth out of her place
and the pillars thereof tremble.
The earth —
Great portions of it
by earthquakes
or by removing islands.
Pillars —
The deep and inward parts of it
which like pillars supported those parts that
appear to our view.
Verse 8
[8]
Which alone spreadeth out the heavens
and treadeth upon the waves of the sea.
Who. … — A
farther description of a black and tempestuous season
wherein the heavens seem
to be brought down nearer to the earth.
Treadeth —
Represseth and ruleth them when they rage and are tempestuous: for treading
upon any thing
signifies in scripture using power and dominion over it.
Verse 9
[9]
Which maketh Arcturus
Orion
and Pleiades
and the chambers of the south.
Ordereth —
Disposeth them
governeth their rising and setting
and all their influences.
These he names as constellations of greatest eminency; but under them he seems
to comprehend all the stars
which as they were created by God
so are under
his government. Arcturus is a northern constellation
near that called the
Bear. Orion is a more southerly constellation
that rises to us in December.
The Pleiades is a constellation not far from Orion
which we call the seven
stars: by the chambers
(or inmost chambers
as the word signifies) of the
south
he seems to understand those stars and constellations which are toward
the southern pole
which are called inward chambers
because they are for the
most part hid and shut up from these parts of the world.
Verse 10
[10]
Which doeth great things past finding out; yea
and wonders without number.
Doth great things
… — Job here says the same that Eliphaz had said
chap. 5:9
and in the original
in the very same words
with design
to shew his full agreement with him
touching the Divine perfections.
Verse 11
[11] Lo
he goeth by me
and I see him not: he passeth on also
but I perceive him not.
Goeth — He
works by his providence in ways of mercy or judgment.
Passeth — He
goeth from place to place: from one action to another: he speaks of God after
the manner of men.
Verse 12
[12]
Behold
he taketh away
who can hinder him? who will say unto him
What doest
thou?
Taketh — If
he determines to take away from any man his children or servants
or estate
who is able to restrain him from doing it? Or who dare presume to reprove him
for it? And therefore far be it from me to quarrel with God
whereof you
untruly accuse me.
Verse 13
[13] If
God will not withdraw his anger
the proud helpers do stoop under him.
Helpers —
Those who undertake to uphold and defend one another against him.
Stoop —
Fall and are crushed by him.
Verse 14
[14] How
much less shall I answer him
and choose out my words to reason with him?
How shall I —
Since no creature can resist his power
and no man can comprehend his counsels
and ways; how can I contend with him? Answer his allegations and arguments
produced against me.
Verse 15
[15]
Whom
though I were righteous
yet would I not answer
but I would make
supplication to my judge.
Tho' —
Though I were not conscious to myself of any sin.
Would not — I
durst not undertake to plead my cause against him; or maintain my integrity
before him
because he knows me better than I know myself.
Supplication —
That he would judge favourably of me and my cause
and not according to the
rigour of his justice.
Verse 16
[16] If I
had called
and he had answered me; yet would I not believe that he had
hearkened unto my voice.
Yet — I
could not believe that God had indeed granted my desire
because I am still
full of the tokens of his displeasure; and therefore should conclude that it
was but a pleasant dream
and not a real thing.
Verse 17
[17] For
he breaketh me with a tempest
and multiplieth my wounds without cause.
Breaketh —
Unexpectedly
violently
and irrecoverably.
Cause —
Not simply without any desert of his
but without any special cause of such
singular afflictions; and peculiar and extraordinary guilt
such as his friends
charged him with.
Verse 18
[18] He
will not suffer me to take my breath
but filleth me with bitterness.
Breath — My
pains are continual
and I have not so much as a breathing time free from them.
Verse 19
[19] If I
speak of strength
lo
he is strong: and if of judgment
who shall set me a
time to plead?
If — If my cause were to
be decided by power.
Is Strong —
Stronger than I.
Judgment — If
I would contend with him in a way of right.
Who —
There is no superior judge that can summon him and me together.
Verse 20
[20] If I
justify myself
mine own mouth shall condemn me: if I say
I am perfect
it
shall also prove me perverse.
Justify — If
I plead against God mine own righteousness and innocency.
Verse 21
[21]
Though I were perfect
yet would I not know my soul: I would despise my life.
Perfect — If
I should think myself perfect
yet I would not know
not acknowledge
my soul;
I could not own nor plead before God the integrity of my soul
but would only
make supplication to my judge
I would abhor
or condemn my life
I would not
trust to the integrity either of my soul and heart
or of my life
so as to
justify myself before the pure and piercing eyes of the all-seeing God.
Verse 22
[22] This
is one thing
therefore I said it
He destroyeth the perfect and the wicked.
This — In
the other things which you have spoken of God's greatness
and justice
I do
not contend with you
but this one thing I do
and must affirm against you.
He — God sends afflictions
promiscuously upon good and bad men.
Verse 23
[23] If
the scourge slay suddenly
he will laugh at the trial of the innocent.
Suddenly — If
some common judgment come upon a people.
Laugh —
God will be well pleased
to see how the same scourge
which is the perdition
of the wicked
is the trial of the innocent
and of their faith
which will be
found unto praise and honour and glory.
Verse 24
[24] The
earth is given into the hand of the wicked: he covereth the faces of the judges
thereof; if not
where
and who is he?
The earth —
The dominion over it.
Into —
Into their power. As good men are frequently scourged
so the wicked are
advanced.
Faces —
Meantime he covers the faces of wise and good men
fit to be judges
and buries
them alive in obscurity
perhaps suffers them to be condemned
and their faces
covered as criminals
by those to whom the earth is given. This is daily done:
if it be not God that doth it
where and who is he that doth?
Verse 25
[25] Now
my days are swifter than a post: they flee away
they see no good.
Now —
What he had said of the calamities which God frequently inflicts upon good men
he now exemplifies in himself.
My days —
The days of my life.
Post —
Who rides upon swift horses.
See — I
enjoy no good in them. Seeing is often put for experiencing either good or
evil.
Verse 26
[26] They
are passed away as the swift ships: as the eagle that hasteth to the prey.
Eagle —
Which flies swiftly
especially when in the sight of his prey. See here how
swift the motion of time is! It is always upon the wing
hastening to its
period. What little need have we of past-times! What great need to redeem time
which runs out
runs on so fast toward eternity! And how vain are the
enjoyments of time
which we may be deprived of
even while time continues! Our
day may be longer than our sunshine: and when that is gone
it is as if it had
never been.
Verse 28
[28] I am
afraid of all my sorrows
I know that thou wilt not hold me innocent.
Afraid — I
find all such endeavours vain; for if my griefs be suspended for a time
yet my
fears continue.
Will not — I
plainly perceive thou
O God
(to whom he makes a sudden address
as he doth
also
verse 31
) wilt not clear my innocency by removing
those afflictions which make them judge me guilty of some great crime. Words
proceeding from despair and impatience.
Verse 29
[29] If I
be wicked
why then labour I in vain?
I shall — I
shall be used like a wicked man still.
Why —
Why then should I comfort myself with vain hopes of deliverance
as thou
advisest me.
Verse 30
[30] If I
wash myself with snow water
and make my hands never so clean;
If — If I clear myself
from all imputations
and fully prove my innocency before men.
Verse 31
[31] Yet
shalt thou plunge me in the ditch
and mine own clothes shall abhor me.
Yet —
God would prove him to be a most guilty creature
notwithstanding all his
purity before men.
Abhor — I
shall be so filthy
that my own clothes
if they had any sense in them
would
abhor to touch me.
Verse 32
[32] For
he is not a man
as I am
that I should answer him
and we should come together
in judgment.
A man —
But one infinitely superior to me in majesty
and power
and wisdom
and
justice.
That —
That I should presume to debate my cause with him.
Come —
Face to face
to plead upon equal terms.
Verse 33
[33]
Neither is there any daysman betwixt us
that might lay his hand upon us both.
Days-man —
Or
umpire.
Lay his hand —
Order and govern us in pleading; and oblige us to stand to his decision. Our
Lord Jesus is now the blessed days-man
who has mediated between heaven and
earth
has laid his hand upon us both: to him the father hath committed all
judgment. But this was not made so clear then
as it is now by the gospel
which leaves no room for such a complaint as this.
Verse 34
[34] Let
him take his rod away from me
and let not his fear terrify me:
Fear —
The fear and dread of his majesty and justice. Let him not deal with me
according to his perfect justice
but according to his grace and clemency.
Verse 35
[35] Then
would I speak
and not fear him; but it is not so with me.
Then — I
would speak freely for myself
being freed from that dread
which takes away my
spirit and courage.
It is not — I
am not free from his terror
and therefore cannot plead my cause with him.
── John Wesley《Explanatory Notes on Job》
09 Chapter 9
Verses 1-35
Verses 1-4
Then Job answered and said.
Job’s answer to Bildad
Job was utterly unaware of the circumstances under which he was
suffering. If Job had known that he was to be an example
that a great battle
was being fought over him
that the worlds were gathered round him to see how
he would take the loss of his children
his property
and his health
the
circumstances would have been vitiated
and the trial would have been a mere
abortion. Under such circumstances Job might have strung himself up to an
heroic effort. If everything with us were plain and straightforward
everything
would be proportionately easy and proportionately worthless. Trials
persecutions
and tests are meant for the culture of your strength
the perfecting of your
patience
the consolidation of your hope and love. God will not explain the
causes of our affliction to us
any more than He explained the causes of Job’s
affliction to the patriarch. But history comes to do what God Himself refrains
from doing. What course does Job say he will take? A point of departure is
marked in the tenth chapter. Now he speaks to Heaven. He will speak in the
bitterness of his soul. That is right. Let us hear what Job’s soul has to say.
Do not be harsh with men who speak with some measure of indignation in the time
of sorrow. We are chafed and vexed by the things which befall our life. Yet
even in our very frankness we should strive at least to speak in chastened
tones. Job says he will ask for a reason.
“Shew me wherefore Thou contendest with me?” Job will also appeal
to the Divine conscience
if the expression may be allowed (Job 10:3). We must have confidence in the
goodness of God. Job then pleads himself--his very physiology
his constitution
(Job 10:8-11). What lay so heavily upon
Adam and upon Job
was the limitation of their existence. This life as we see
it is not all; it is an alphabet which has to be shaped into a literature
and
a literature which is to end in music. The conscious immortality of the soul
as that soul was fashioned in the purpose of God
has kept the race from
despair. Job said
if this were all that we see
he would like to be
extinguished. He would rather go out of being than live under a sense of
injustice. This may well be our conviction
out of the agonies and throes of
individual experience
and national convulsions
there shall come a creation
fair as the noonday
quiet as the silent but radiant stars! (J.
Parker
D. D.)
Job’s idea of God
I. He regarded Him
as just. “I know it is so of a truth: but how should man be just with God?” His
language implies the belief that God was so just
that He required man to be
just in His sight. Reason asserts this; the Infinite can have no motive to
injustice
no outward circumstance to tempt Him to wrong. Conscience affirms
this; deep in the centre of our moral being
is the conviction that the Creator
is just. The Bible declares this. Job might well ask how can man be just before
Him? He says
not by setting up a defence
and pleading with Him; “if he will
contend with Him
he cannot answer him one of a thousand.” What can a sinner
plead before Him?
1. Can he deny the fact of his sinfulness?
2. Can he prove that he sinned from a necessity of his nature?
3. Can he satisfactorily make out that although he has sinned
sin
has been an exception in his life
and that the whole term of his existence has
been good and of service to the universe? Nothing in this way can he do; no
pleading will answer. He must become just before he can appear just before God.
II. He regarded Him
as wise. “He is wise in heart.” Who doubts the wisdom of God? The whole system
of nature
the arrangements of Providence
and the mediation of Christ
all
reveal His “manifold wisdom.” He is wise
so that--
1. You cannot deceive Him by your falsehoods; He knows all about you
sees the inmost depths of your being.
2. You cannot thwart Him by your stratagems. His purposes must stand.
III. As strong.
“Mighty in strength.” His power is seen in the creation
sustenance
and
government of the universe. The strength of God is absolute
independent
illimitable
undecayable
and always on the side of right and happiness.
IV. He regarded him
as retributive. There is a retributive element in the Divine nature--an
instinct of justice. Retribution in human governors is policy. The Eternal retributes
wrong because of His instinctive repugnance to wrong. Hence the wrong doer
cannot succeed. The great principle is
that if a man desires prosperity
he
must fall in with the arrangements of God in His providence and grace; and
wisdom is seen in studying these arrangements
and in yielding to them. (Homilist.)
But how should man be just
with God.
On justification
With respect to the relation in which man stands with God
two
considerations are essential: the one regarding ourselves
the other regarding
our Maker. We are His creatures
and therefore wholly and undividedly His
and
owe Him our full service. Our employing any part of ourselves in anything
contrary to His wish
is injustice towards Him; and therefore no one who does
so can be just with Him in this. But since our wills and thoughts are not in
our own power
whatever we do
it is hopeless to endeavour to bring the whole
man into the service of God. Such a perfect obedience as we confess we owe as
creatures to our Creator
is utterly unattainable. Are we then to lower
not
indeed our efforts
but our standard? Will God be satisfied with something less
than absolute perfection? Since we are God’s creatures
we owe Him a perfect
and unsinning obedience in thought
word
and deed. And God cannot be satisfied
with less. If His holiness and His justice were not as perfect as His mercy and
His love
He would not be perfect
or in other words He would not be God.
1. That man cannot be justified by the law--that is
by his obedience
to the law
or the performance of its duties
--is clear from its condition
“This do
and thou shalt live.” It makes no abatement for sincerity; it makes
no allowance for infirmity. Mercy is inadmissible here; it just asks its due
and holds out the reward upon the payment of it.
2. Neither can he be justified by a mitigated law; that is
by its
being lowered till it is within reach.
3. Nor yet can he be absolved by the passing by of his transgressions
through the forgetfulness (so to speak) of God; as if He would not be extreme
to mark what was done amiss.
4. How then shall man be just with God? It must be in a way that will
honour the law. Christ hath “magnified the law
and made it honourable”--
The mode of the sinner’s justification before God
How is man justified before God? We speak of man as he is now
found in the world--fallen
guilty
and polluted. Man was made upright at the
first. The first action of his nature
in its several parts
was in harmony
with the laws pertaining to each
and so for a short time it continued. When I
speak of the laws pertaining to each part
I mean those of matter and of mind
of body
sense
and intellect. God had laid a prohibition upon him
and to the
observance of this He had promised His continued favour
and to the
non-observance He attached the forfeiture of that favour. The trial here was
not whether man would attain to the Divine favour
but whether he should retain
it. The danger to be apprehended
for danger is involved in the very notion of
a probation
was
that Adam might fall
not that he might not rise
as is the
case with us
his descendants. How was Adam kept
as long as he stood in a
state of acceptance before God; i.e.
how Adam was justified
so far as
the term justification can be predicated of him? He continued in the Divine
favour as long as he obeyed the law. He was justified by works. There is
nothing evil necessarily in the idea of justification by works. Conscience
naturally knows of no other mode of justification
and where that is
impossible
she gives the offender over to condemnation and despair. Conscience
knows of no justification but that of works. When it is possible
the first
the obvious
and the legitimate
the natural mode of securing the Divine favour
is by a perfect obedience
in one’s own person
to the Divine commands as
contained in the moral law. How are Adam’s posterity justified? Not in the same
way that he was. Their circumstances are so different. He was innocent
they
are guilty; he was pure
they are impure; he was strong
they are weak. The Gospel
mode of justification cannot be by works. But what is it positively? A
knowledge of this subject must embrace two things
namely
what God has done to
this end--to make justification possible; and what man does when it is become
actual. It has pleased God to save us
not arbitrarily
but vicariously. He has
not cancelled our sin
as a man might cancel the obligation of an indebted
neighbour
by simply drawing his pen across the record in his ledger. This may
do for a creature in relation to his fellows. We are told in Holy Writ that God
the Father has given His Son to be a “ransom” for us
a “sacrifice for our
sins
” a “mediator between Him and us
” the “only name under heaven amongst men
whereby we can be saved.” The Father hath laid in His atoning death the
foundation of our hopes
the “elect cornerstone” of our salvation. By the Holy
Spirit and through that Son
He hath also granted to mankind
besides an offer
of pardon
an offer of assistance
yea
assistance in the very offer. The
mediatorship of the Spirit began the moment the Gospel was first preached to
fallen Adam. So indeed did the Mediatorship of Christ
i.e.
God began
immediately to have prospective regard to the scene one day to be enacted upon
Calvary. But the mediatorship of the Spirit could not be one moment deferred.
In order to render the salvation of men subjectively possible
the Spirit must
be actually and immediately given. What then is necessary on the part of man?
This may appear to some a dangerous way of viewing the subject. I am not about
to establish a claim of merit on the part of man. When a man is justified
as
justification takes place on the part of God
there must be something
correlative to it on the part of man--man must do something also. This great
act of God must find some response in the heart of man. There must needs be
in
a fallen
guilty
and polluted creature
emotions which were at first unknown
in Paradise. Deep penitence befits him
pungent sorrow
bitter self-reproach
and utter self-loathing. If we look to the honour of God
or the exigencies of
His moral government
we come to the same conclusion. As His honour requires
that the obedient should continue obedient
so does it require that
having
disobeyed
they should repent
and cease to be disobedient: it is
in truth
the Same spirit in both cases
only adapted to the adversity of the
circumstances. If God should
in mercy
justify the ungodly
it must be in such
a manner as shall not conflict with these first and manifest principles; and
the Gospel
therefore
must have some contrivance by which men may attain to
justification without impairing the Divine government
or degrading the Divine
character
or thinking highly of themselves. What then is that contrivance? It
is not the way of works. What suits Adam in Paradise cannot suit us
driven out
into the wilderness of sin and guilt. We are inquiring
as the correlative to
justice and law on the part of God is obedience on the part of man
what is the
correlative to merely and atonement? it cannot be that self-satisfied feeling
which belongs to him who has fulfilled the law. His present obedience
however
perfect
could not undo past disobedience. The correlative to the Divine acts
of justification cannot be human acts in obedience to law. “By the deeds of the
law shall no flesh be justified.” But may not man be justified by obedience to
a mitigated law? Is not the Gospel
after all
only the moral law with some
abatements designed to bring it down to the level of our infirmity? This is the
most plausible and deceptive supposition that could be made. It suits exactly
man’s natural pride
his fondness for his idols
and has withal an air of
mingled mercy and justice. But
however specious
it is utterly unfounded in
reason or Scripture. It supposes the law
which we regard as a transcript of
the Divine character
to be found faulty
and its requirements in consequence
to be cut down to the true level. Neither the violation of the law
nor yet its
observance in its original or any mitigated form
can be the ground of our
justification before God
in our present state
what way then remains to this
infinitely desirable object? Are we not shut up to the way of faith? “Being
justified by faith.” Nothing that is morally good either precedes
justification
or is simultaneously instrumental of it; all real good follows
it. By faith we understand a reliance upon Christ as our atoning sacrifice
and
the Lord our righteousness
for acceptance before God. It is reliance on
another. There is no self-reliance or self-complacence here. This principle
consults and provides for every interest involved in a dispensation of mercy to
fallen creatures through a Divine Redeemer. It humbles the sinner. It exalts
the Saviour. Holiness is promoted. If such then be the nature and tendency of
faith
if it be the sole instrument of justification
and if it is only in a
state of justification that man can render real and acceptable obedience
how
earnest and ceaseless ought to be our prayer
“Lord
increase our faith!” (W.
Sparrow
D. D.)
Atonement and modern thought
What extorted this cry from Job was a crushing consciousness of
God’s omnipotence. How could I
the impotent creature I am
stand up and assert
my innocence before Him? What prompts the exclamation now is something quite
different. We have lost even Job’s sense of a personal relation to God. The
idea of immediate individual responsibility to Him seems in this generation to
be suffering eclipse. The prevailing modern teaching outside Christianity makes
man his own centre
and urges him from motives of self-interest to seek his own
well-being
and the good of the whole as contributory to his own. In the last
resort he is a law unto himself. Such moral rules as he finds current in the
world are only registered experiences of the lines along which happiness can be
secured. They have a certain weight
as ascertained meteorological facts have
weight with seamen
but that is all. He is under no obligation in the strict
moral sense. The whole is a question of interest. Now we hold that all this is
not true to fact. Obligation pressing upon us from without establishes an
authority over us; and conscience
recognising obligation
yea
stamping the
soul with an instinctive self-judgment
as it fulfils or refuses to fulfil
obligations--these go with us wherever we go
into school
college
business
social relations
public duty. If we recognise our obligations
and
conscientiously meet them
we secure our highest interests. But that by no
means resolves obligation into interest. The two positions are mutually
exclusive. If a man from mere self-interest were to do all the things which
another man did from a sense of obligation
not a shadow of the peace and
righteous approval of the latter would be his. The selfish aim would evacuate
the acts of all their ennobling qualities. While the conscientious man would
find himself by losing himself
the selfish man would be shut up in a cold
isolation
losing himself--having no real hold on any other soul--because his
aim all along has been to save and serve himself. But if this is the true view
of life
we must accept all that flows from it. Let us trust our moral nature
as we do that part of our nature which looks out to the world of sense. If I be
really under obligation then I am free. Obligation has no meaning such as we
attach to it
unless we pre-suppose freedom. If the moral is highest in me
if
every faculty and interest of right is subject to its sway
then in simple
allegiance to facts I must infer that the highest order of this world is a
moral order. But once grant that
and you are in the region of personality at
once. The moment you feel yourself under duty you know yourself a person
free
moral
self-conscious. You are face to face with a Divine Moral Governor
in
whom all your lower moral obligations find their last rest
since He
established them; and who
as your author and sustainer
has a right to the
total surrender of your whole being. The supreme meaning of life for you is
meeting your obligations to your God. Being made by a God of holiness
we must
suppose that we have been called into existence as a means of exemplifying and
glorifying the right. The right is supreme over every merely personal interest
of our own. We exist for the right. The man can be justified with himself only
as he pleases God: With the consciousness of disobedience comes guilt
fear
estrangement. When this unfortunate ease ensues
as it has ensued in the ease
of all
the first point is settling this question of right as between man and
God. Before anything and everything else in religion
before sanctification
before even we consider in detail how our life is to be brought into union with
God
comes the great question of our meeting and fulfilling the claims of God’s
law. Atonement is our first and most pressing concern. The Bible commits itself
to three statements about you. Take the last first. By the works of the law
or
by your own actions
you cannot be counted a perfectly just man in God’s sight.
Secondly
you cannot clear yourself of guilt for this result. Thirdly
you see
the Bible occupies ground of its own
and you must judge it on its own ground
Now consider the chief difficulty exercising men’s minds at this hour. We live
in a practical rather than in a theoretical age. We say--How can a mere arrangement
such as the atonement
rectify my relations with God
separate me from sin
and
secure my actual conformity to God’s will? Taking the Gospel way as it stands
I go on to show what a real root and branch all-round redemption and
restoration it confers. Where men err is that they leave out of view the great
personality of Christ. They forget that the redemption is in Him. (John
Smith
M. A.)
The demand of human nature for the atonement
1. Our subject is the atonement
and facts in human nature which
demand it. Religion can account for all its principles and doctrines by an
appeal to the facts of our being. The doctrine of reconciliation with God
through the atoning death of Jesus is confessedly the chief and
in some
respects
the most obscure doctrine of the Christian religion. Nevertheless
belief in its general features is essential to any honest acceptance of the
Gospel. Without discussing obscurities
I wish
in aid of faith
simply to
point out how true it is to all the facts of human nature.
2. “How should man be just with God?” It is not a question that is
raised by recent ethical culture or by the progress of man in moral
development
as some have thought. It is as old as the human soul
as ancient
as the sense of sin
as universal as humanity
and is heard in all the
religions. Beneath the burning skies of primeval Arabia this mighty problem is
debated by an Arab sheik and his three friends. First--
3. I affirm
as a matter of Christian experience
that all the
necessary features and implications of the orthodox doctrine of the atonement
are true to the facts of human nature. When I say the orthodox view
I mean
that view in the highest form of its statement
the substitutional view
namely
that Christ’s death becomes an actual satisfaction to justice
to that
sense of justice which exists in our own bosoms and in the bosoms of all
intelligent creatures
and which
in the nature of things
must be a
duplication of the sense of justice within the bosom of God Himself; that
Christ’s sufferings and death become an actual satisfaction to justice for our
sins that are past
when we accept it as such by faith. And the proof that it
is a satisfaction
the evidence that it does take away the sense of demerit
the feeling that we owe something to justice
is that we are conscious it does.
The philosophers have sometimes voted consciousness down and out by large
majorities
but it refuses to stay down and out. It comes back and asserts
itself. “A man just knows it
sir
” as Dr. Johnson said
“and that is all there
is about the matter.” All that we Christians can do
all that we need to do
is
to have the experience of it
and then stand still
and magnificently and
imperiously declare that it does
for we feel it to be so. Men may tell us that
it ought not to be so; we will rejoin that it is so. They may say that our
sense of right and wrong is very imperfectly developed
or we could not derive
peace from the thought that an innocent Being has suffered in our stead.
Against our experience the world can make no answer. We aver that man feels his
sin needs propitiation
and that
if he will
he may find that the death of
Christ meets that need.
4. Let us go outside distinctively Christian experience
and note
some facts in human nature which show its trend toward the atonement in Jesus.
“There is no power in holy men
Nor charms in prayer
nor purifying form
Of penitence
nor outward look
nor fast
Nor agony
nor
greater than them all
The innate tortures of that deep despair
Which is Remorse without the fear of hell
But all in all sufficient of itself
Would make a hell of heaven--can exorcise
From out the unbounded spirit the quick sense
Of its own sins
sufferings
and revenge
Upon itself.”
Now
recollect that this is poetry. In poetry we get the deepest
philosophy--there the heart speaks. It has no voice but the voice of nature.
Byron speaks true to nature when he declares not prayer
nor fast
nor agony
nor remorse
can atone for sin or satisfy the soul. Is there not in the
confession of that volcanic spirit a fact which looks toward man’s need of
Calvary? I take down my Shakespeare and open it at “Macbeth
” that awfulest
tragedy of our tongue
matchless in literature for its description of the
workings of a guilty conscience
to be studied evermore. Lady Macbeth--King
Duncan having been murdered--walks in her sleep through her husband’s castle at
night bearing a taper in her hands. “Physician: How came she by that
light? Servant: Why
it stood by her; she has light by her continually;
‘tis her command.” As she walks
she rubs her hands. A servant explains: “It is
an accustomed action with her to seem thus washing her hands; I have known her
to continue in this a quarter of an hour.” Then Lady Macbeth speaks: “Yet
here’s a spot. What! will these hands ne’er be clean?. . .Here’s the smell of
the blood still; all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand!”
Is there not something there which sounds like the echo of Job’s words in the
desert: “I am afraid of all my sorrows”? Does not Lady Macbeth
walking at
night and repenting of her crime and washing her hands in dreams from Duncan’s
blood
look as if an accusing conscience and the sense of justice unsatisfied
could make its own hell?
“I stood in silence
like a slave before her
That I might taste the wormwood and the gall
And satiate this self-accusing heart
With bitterer agonies than death can give.”
That seems to say to me that nothing will give the soul peace but
atonement of some kind.
5. I think
therefore
that if you could bring Job and his three
friends
and my acquaintance who stole in his youth
and Byron
and
Shakespeare
and Coleridge here today
they would see eye to eye
and agree
upon some things in the name of facts in human nature.
Verse 4
Who hath hardened himself against God
and prospered?
Hardened against God
This passage intimates--
I. That appeals
are addressed by God to men in order to bring them into allegiance to Him. The
conduct which is imputed to men is susceptible of explanation only as the
existence of such appeals is assumed.
1. God has appealed to us by the instrumentality of conscience.
Conscience is the testimony of secret judgment in the mind of a man as to the
moral quality of his own thoughts and actions. The true dictates of conscience
are conformable to the extensive principle of the Divine law; and the judgments
of the one are substantially the judgments of the other.
2. By the instrumentality of providence
The events which happen under
the superintendence of God in the temporal sphere
and affect the temporal
interests of man
are intended always to speak powerfully on his behalf. This
fact was recognised by Job
when he uttered the language before us.
3. By the instrumentality of revealed truth. All Scripture is
profitable “for doctrine
for reproof
for correction
for instruction
” and
for what belongs to righteousness.
II. Men treat the
appeals of God with obdurate resistance. The text takes the case of men who
“harden themselves against God
” indicating a habit which is heinous in its
nature
and which is progressive in its influence. It is emphatically
resistance
the surrender of the heart and life to objects against which God
has pleaded
and the retention of the heart and life amidst indulgences which
God has protested against
and which He has condemned. This resistance is
introduced as voluntary. It is also introduced as continued. That continuance
augments the guilt. Such resistance becomes more heinous and aggravated in proportion
as the calls addressed by God are solemn and weighty. Resistance is also
progressive in its influence. In proportion as it is continued in the
indulgence
it exercises increasing power and authority over the soul. It
becomes more steady
more settled
more confirmed--this being in accordance
with what we know of the tendencies of all habits to strengthen and establish
themselves.
III. Obdurate
resistance to the appeals made by God exposes to fearful and fatal
consequences. No human being placing himself in voluntary and continued
opposition against God can escape final punishment and ruin. God will inflict
upon those who harden themselves against Him temporal sorrow; and if their
resistance be continued till the last
the irremediable loss of their souls.
There will be a proportion between punishment and guilt. (James Parsons.)
Fatal issue of final impenitence
These words imply that there is such a thing as for a man so to
harden himself as to contend with God.
I. Inquire wherein
this hardness of heart consists.
1. The word signifies a spirit that is obstinate and incorrigible.
2. It is descriptive of a rebellious spirit
which discovers itself
under the various dispensations of God
both in a way of mercy and judgment.
3. There is also a judicial hardness to which sinners are liable
in
a way of righteous judgment for their iniquities. This is not owing to any
defect in the Gospel
or in the dispensations of God towards us; but to the
depravity of the human heart
which perverts the means of salvation into those
of destruction.
II. Notice some of
the instances in which this sin is still committed.
1. It appears in indulging hard thoughts of God
of His government
and of His holy law; in esteeming Him as a hard master
and in considering
sinful propensities as an excuse for sinful actions
though no one thinks of
excusing the offence of others against himself on the ground of such a plea.
The indulgence of such thoughts lead on to final impenitence.
2. It manifests itself in a rejection or dislike of God’s way of
salvation.
3. Persisting in an evil course
amidst many convictions and fears
is another instance of this sort of depravity. Pharaoh knew that he was wrong
and yet he dared to persist.
4. This hardness of heart appears in the resistance that is offered
to the hand of God in providence instead of being humbled under it.
5. Presumptuously tempting God
amidst the most affecting means of
salvation
is another instance of this hardness of heart. It was thus with
Israel in the wilderness.
III. The fatal issue
of final impenitence. “Who hath hardened himself against Him
and prospered?”
1. The longer you continue in this state
the more hardened you will
become
till at last you will be past feeling (Ephesians 4:19).
2. This also is the way in which God punishes men for their
impenitence (Isaiah 6:8).
3. The end of this impenitence and hardness of heart is fearfully
described by an apostle
and should warn us of our danger (Romans 2:5-9). (T. Hannam.)
Man hardening himself against God
Every act of sin hardens the heart of man
but the heat of
blasphemy at once shows and puts it into the extremity of hardness. Man hardens
himself against God four ways especially.
1. Upon presumption of mercy. Many do evil because they hear God is
good. They turn His grace into wantonness
and are without all fear of the
Lord
because there is mercy so much with the Lord.
2. The patience of God
or His delays of judgment
harden others.
Because God is slow to strike
they are swift to sin.
3. Gross ignorance hardens many.
He that knows not what he ought to do
cares not much what he
doth. None are so venturous as they who know not their danger.
4. Hardness of heart in sinning is contracted from the multitude of
those who sin. They think none shall suffer for that which so many do. Man doth
not grow hard at once
much less hardest; but when once he begins to harden
himself
where he shall make an end he knows not. The first step is
the taking
time and leave to meditate upon sin
and roll it up and down in the thoughts. A
hard heart lets vain thoughts dwell in it. A holy heart would not let them
lodge with it. A second step is
some tastes of pleasure and delight in sin. It
proves a sweet morsel under his tongue. The third step is
custom in sinning.
It argues great boldness to venture often. By the fourth step of hardness he
comes to defend and maintain his sin.
5. The hard heart grows angry and passionate with those who give
advice against sin; he is resolved; and a man that is resolved in his way is
angry if he be desired to remove out of his way. He that is resolved to sleep
loves not to be awakened.
6. Hard hearts grow too hard for the Word. They are sermon proof;
they can sit under the preacher
and hear from day to day
but nothing touches
them.
7. The heart is so hard that the sword of affliction doth not pierce
it; the man is judgment proof. Let God strike him in his person or estate
let
God set the world afire about his ears
yet on he goes. He is like the man of
whom Solomon speaks (Proverbs 23:34)
who lies sleeping in a
storm upon the top of the mast.
8. The hard heart sits down in the chair of the scorner. He derides
the Word
and mocks at the judgments of God. (J. Caryl.)
Contenders with God
A gentleman came to me in the streets of Liverpool a few years
ago
and told me of an incident in my father’s ministry
of which he was an
eyewitness
many years before. “Your father
” he said
“was preaching on a then
vacant spot of ground near where St. George’s Hall now stands. Directly opposite
the place where he was standing
an ungodly publican
finding his business
interfered with
came out and endeavoured to interrupt the proceedings
mimicking the preacher’s manner and gestures
and using very horrible language.
I remember
” said the gentleman
“how solemnly your father turned round upon
him
and said
‘Take care
my friend
it is not me
but my Master that you are
mocking
and remember you cannot mock God with impunity; take care lest you
draw down upon your head His just vengeance.’ He afterwards announced that he
would preach in the same spot the next Sunday afternoon
which he did; and as
he gave out his text
you may imagine the feeling of awe that settled down upon
the crowd as they saw a hearse draw up to the door of the public house
to
carry away the corpse of that very man who one short week before had been
defying God
and insulting His messenger.” (W. Hay M. H. Aitken
M. A.)
Which removeth the mountains.
God in nature
I. Its
almightiness is overwhelmingly grand in its manifestations. “Removeth the
mountains
” etc. The whole passage impresses one with the unbounded energy of
God.
1. His almightiness should impress all with a sense of their utter
insignificance.
2. His almightiness should impress the sinner with his impious
hardihood.
II. Its
almightiness is co-extensive with the universe. Job here touches every part of
material nature--the earth
the sea
the heavens--and sees God working in all.
1. His universal agency explains all material phenomena.
2. His universal agency binds men practically to recognise Him in
every part of nature. He is the Force of all forces
the Pulse of all life
the
Spirit of all forms. (Homilist.)
Religious interest in nature
There are some who feel no interest in nature
others feel a mere
commercial interest in it
others feel an artistic or scientific interest in
it
but how few feel a religious interest in it--regard it as the product
the
mirror
the organ
of the Infinite Mind. If I fear an artist
I care not for
his pictures; if I fear an author
I feel no interest in his work. If men
loved
instead of feared God
how beautiful nature would appear to them. The
painting and poem of a father
how interesting to his child! (R.
Venting.)
Which doeth great things past finding out.
Job’s idea of what God is to mankind
He regards the Eternal as--
I. Inscrutable.
1. In His works. “Which doeth great things past finding out.” How
great are His works! great in their nature
minuteness
magnitude
variety
number. Ask the chemist
the astronomer
the entomologist
the physiologist
and the anatomist; and the more accurate and comprehensive their knowledge of
the Divine workmanship is
the more ready will they be to acknowledge that “His
works are past finding out
and wonders without number.”
2. He is inscrutable in His essence. “He goeth by me
and I see Him
not; He passeth on also
and I perceive Him not.” I see His works
but I cannot
detect the essence of the Worker.
II. As
irresponsible. “Behold He taketh away
and who can hinder Him? Who will say
unto Him
What doest Thou?”
III. As resistless.
“If God will not withdraw His anger
the proud helpers do stoop under Him.”
1. God is an offendable Being. He is not an impassive existent
sitting at the head of the universe
utterly indifferent to the moral character
of His creatures.
2. The proud have “helpers” and abettors. Were the whole universe to
arm itself against Him
its opposition would be infinitely less than the
opposition of the smallest insect to the eagle or the lion.
IV. As inexorable.
1. As uninfluenced by man.
2. As unapproached by human argument.
3. As too holy to encourage anyone to have confidence in his own
virtues. Were the patriarch even a “perfect” man
he feels that to plead his
virtues before a God so holy would not only be utterly useless
but impious and
pernicious.
4. As utterly regardless of the moral distinctions of society. “This
is one thing
therefore I said it. He destroyeth the perfect and the wicked
”
etc. (verses 22-24). Here Job hits the main point now in discussion between him
and his friends. Their position was that God dealt with men here according to
their moral characters
and that Job suffered because he was wicked. The
patriarch again refutes it
and asserts the broad fact that the perfect and
wicked are treated alike. This is not the scene of retribution
it is the
domain of discipline. (Homilist.)
Verse 11
So He goeth by me.
God passing by
These mighty saints of old may have had fewer books to read than
we have in our day
but they had one glorious book
the volume of nature
whose
ever-open pages
written within and without by the finger of God
were spread
out before their wondering eyes. And they read carefully and devoutly the great
truths about God these pages were always teaching them. God was passing by them
in the grand panorama of His works which their eyes beheld. They dwelt chiefly
in tents. They lived much in the open air
under the blue sky of those
beautiful Eastern lands. They lived a simple
primitive life
with few wants
and few cares. They had far more time than we have for holy thought and
heavenly meditation on things spiritual and eternal. Many a sacred tradition
may have floated down the quiet stream of time--of the revelation of God made
to man
of His will and purpose concerning the race that had so sadly gone
astray from Him. They knew that God had not finally abandoned the world and
consigned it to utter destruction. They followed their flocks and herds all day
in the wild
trackless desert
or in the fertile plain. They lived much of the
time alone--and men who are much alone with God become terribly in earnest.
They are away from man and all his little ways
and hold communion with God
through His works. Men like Moses and Elijah and John the Baptist may be
separated from their fellow men; but they are near to
and enjoy wondrous
communings with the infinite and eternal God. God is passing by them in a
thousand ways. They watch with eager eye every variation in the clouds and in
the stars. They could see the glorious play of the forked lightning as it
gleamed
in a thousand fantastic forms
on the bosom of the storm-cloud
resting on the distant mountain tops. In the storm God was passing by--that
same God whose goings forth have been of old
from everlasting. They knew
it
may be
little of the laws of electricity or of sound; but they could hear in
the thunder
as it rolled from rock to rock
or shook the earth from pole to
pole
the very voice of God (Psalms 29:3-8). These mighty saints may
have had no formulated system of theology
where God was mapped out with all
His perfections
with all the nicety and precision of a mathematical figure;
but to them He was the omnipresent God. They saw some rays of His glorious
presence reflected from every cloud. They heard His voice in every passing
breeze. God was passing by then. God--the same God--is passing by us now.
Whatever changes have come or yet may come to His universe
He Himself is
unchangeable. In the glorious panorama of the heavens God is passing by us. In
the noiseless tread of the seasons God is passing by. Spring and summer
seed
time and harvest
autumn and winter
as they quietly come and quietly go
all
tell the same story
“God is passing by.” In the regular succession of day and
night
in every rising and setting sun
in every waxing and waning moon
God is
near us and passing by us. In every national blessing and every national
chastisement God is passing by. When the streams of earthly comforts flow full
and strong around our life
and equally when these streams run low or dry
God
is passing by us. When war
with all its accompanying desolations
its misery
and agony and woe
is sweeping over a country
God is passing by. And no less
surely is He passing by for us in our days of peace and our nights of quiet.
God is ever near us
though we see Him not. In every beat of our pulse
in
every throb of our heart
in every movement of our brain
God is there. He is
about our bed and around our path. Above us
behind and before
we are flooded
with the omnipresence of Deity as with the noonday sunshine. But because we see
Him not with the bodily eye we forget that He is there. He passeth on also
but
we perceive Him not. (James Carmichael
D. D.)
Man’s ignorance of God
1. That God is invisible in His essence
and incomprehensible in many
of His actions. Man’s eye cannot see Him. Man’s understanding cannot comprehend
what He doth.
2. As the Lord in His nature cannot be seen at all; so (such is the weakness
of man
that) we cannot see Him fully in His Word or works. Thus we see men
but we seldom see God in the great transactions and motions of kingdoms. And we
see Him least of all in the course of spiritual things
in His working upon our
hearts. God works wonders in us
and we perceive Him not.
3. Man is not fit to sit as a judge upon the works and dealings of
God. Shall we judge God in what He doth
when we cannot apprehend what He doth?
A judge must have the full cognisance of the matter before him
how else can he
pass sentence about it?
4. It should be matter of great humiliation to Us
that we see so
little of God. (J. Caryl.)
Present though invisible
We are reminded of this profound spiritual truth by reading the
following account of an occurrence which illustrates an impressive scientific
fact touching the invisible. Photographs of the invisible are what M. Zenger
calls two pictures which he took about midnight of 17th August from a window
looking out upon the Lake of Geneva. They gave faint yet distinct images of the
lake and of Mont Blanc
which could not be seen in the darkness. Mr. Bertrand
remarks that invisibility is a relative term
the significance of which depends
on the power of the observer’s eye. The photographs were taken with a light of
very small intensity
and did not represent an invisible object. So sky
photographs
taken in observatories
show stars which cannot be discerned by
the most piercing vision. (Homiletic Review.)
Verse 12
Behold
He taketh away.
The conduct to which adverse dispensations should lead
Job was a sufferer. Of his property he was deprived; of his
children he was bereaved; in his own person he was sorely afflicted. It would
not have been strange had Job given way to murmuring and repining. Unsupported
and uncomforted from above
what else can be expected from man when in deep
distress
but the expression of uneasiness and fretful discontent? Some
indeed
attempt to bear up under adversity by hard-hearted callousness
and
others by a prideful aversion to complain. Job felt what he endured
and he
acknowledged what he endured
but his feeling and acknowledgment indicated calm
submission.
I. The doctrine
taught--the agency of God. His agency in providence. Not to be classed with
chance or accident. It would be a mistake to represent God as exercising no
providential superintendence
no control
no management
no rule. Some hold
that God’s agency is general
not particular
not concerned with details. But
great and little are not to God what they are to us. What it was no degradation
to God to create
it can be no degradation to God to superintend. A particular
agency on His part is the only intelligible notion of God’s agency in providence.
The manner in which God’s agency
in the various dispensations of providence
is regarded respectively by the believer and by the unbeliever
constitutes one
of the most marked distinctions between the characters of these two classes of
person.
II. The lessons
which this doctrine teaches.
1. Privation and loss are the doing of Him who neither does nor can
do us any wrong. God is never arbitrary
never capricious
never unjust. He is
essentially righteous. In no sense can He do that which is unrighteous. He
cannot do it from ignorance
or from design.
2. Privation and loss are the doing of Him
all whose doings in
reference to us are in accordance with what He Himself is--wise and gracious.
Not only is He wise
but all-wise; actually
absolutely
yea
necessarily
all-wise. His understanding is infinite. He is gracious. His nature is love.
What a proof of this did He afford in devising a plan by which sinners might be
rescued from the penal consequences of sin.
3. Privation and loss are the doing of Him who is able
and as
willing as He is able
to educe
in our experience
good from evil. Out of the
strait in which we are involved there may be no seeming way of escape. But is
it irremediable by Him whose arm is full of might
who is equal to our support
and deliverance
whatever be our condition? This subject calls for
thankfulness; it should produce resignation; it should lead us to prepare for
changes. (A. Jack
D. D.)
Who will say unto Him
What doest Thou?--
The Divine dispensations not to be questioned
In the cup of life there are many bitter ingredients. From the day
we are born
till the day we die
there is an invariable mixture of joy and
sorrow. The world is full of uncertainties. Its best satisfactions are neither
substantial nor permanent Religion is not satisfied with directing our
attention to second causes. It leads us above them to the First Cause of all
things. It conducts us to God; and presents Him to us under the mild aspect of
a Father
always mindful of our happiness; and who has given us so many proofs
of this in nature
providence
and grace
as to merit our entire confidence and
unreserved submission. There is much in the present state of things to perplex
the understanding
as well as to wound the heart. I find in the revelation which
religion has made to me another and better world
where my perplexities will be
resolved
and my troubles cease. In ‘dines of sorrow
philosophy has no
effectual help for us. Various and contradictory maxims may be urged upon us
and to all we must reply
with the ancient sufferer
“Miserable comforters are
ye all.” But it is not in vain to direct our thoughts to God; to make an
oblation of our wills to Him. There is too much disposition in mankind to
disregard the providence of God; to overlook His agency in the occurrences of
life. What would become of us if our life were an unmingled portion of good; if
our day were never darkened with the clouds of adversity? Afflictions are
intended as the instruments of good to us. Afflictions
rightly improved
are
real blessings. (C. Lowell.)
Submission to Divine sovereignty
Job was afflicted not more for his own benefit than for the
benefit of others. His discourses with his friends gave him a good opportunity
of justifying the sovereignty of God
in the dispensations of His providence.
The friends insisted that God treated every man according to his real
character
in His providential conduct towards him; but Job maintained that God
acted as a sovereign
without any design of distinguishing His friends from His
enemies
by outward mercies and afflictions. In the preceding verses
he gives
a striking description of Divine sovereignty.
I. It is the
natural tendency of afflictions to make the friends of God realise and submit
to His sovereignty. Afflictions always display the sovereignty of God. Whenever
God afflicts His children
He gives a practical and sensible evidence that He
has a right to dispose of them contrary to their views
their desires
and most
tender feelings. Of all afflictions
those which are called bereavements
give
the clearest display of Divine sovereignty.
II. Such a
realising sense of the sovereignty of God in afflictions
has a natural
tendency to excite true submission in every pious heart.
1. While they realise the nature of His sovereignty
they cannot help
seeing the true ground or reason of submission.
2. God designs thus to bring His children to submission.
3. It has so often produced this desirable effect in their hearts.
Apply the subject.
Divine providence
These words speak of three solemn and weighty truths.
I. The Lord’s
sovereign agency. We see this in families
we see it in provinces
we see it in
whole nations. We perceive prosperity or adversity--peace or discord--joy or
misery--coming both to individuals and to communities without their knowledge
and often without their concurrence. The human race are subject to other
influences besides their own. From the Bible we learn that the smallest
as
well as the weightiest affairs
are under Christ’s supervision and control.
Nothing arises in this our world by chance or by accident. The same sovereign
agency is seen in the issues of life. The keys of the invisible world are
committed to Christ’s sole custody. All second causes work out the sovereign
will of the Great First Cause. It is He who fixes the precise moment for the
removal of men by death from their busy occupations.
II. His
irresistible might. This is the groundwork of the patriarch’s argument in the
passage before us. Who can hinder Him? Shall the man of wisdom? Shall a parent’s
love avert the threatening blow? Shall the tears of a wife? Shall the regrets
of an admiring nation?
III. His
unsearchable wisdom. The Almighty doeth all things well. From all eternity the
Lord has had certain purposes to be accomplished. In some matters the wisdom of
the Lord’s dealing is so palpable that we are compelled to acquiesce. At other
seasons we are all in the dark. Then it is our privilege to exercise faith in
the fatherly care and unfailing love of our Almighty Redeemer. (C. Clayton
M. A.)
Verse 16
Yet would I not believe that He had hearkened unto my voice.
Prerequisites to belief
It is hard to believe in that
some faint earnest of which we do
not find in our own souls. A man cannot believe facts which are in the very
teeth of his instinctive affinities and dispositions. The head hunters of
Borneo would necessarily treat as fables the thousand and one humane
institutions which are the products of Christian civilisation. A race of
colour-blind barbarians
if such a race existed
would ridicule the idea of
finding out the elements of which distant stars are fashioned by observing the
bands and lines of colours disclosed by the spectroscope. There must be the beginning
of vision in us if we are to receive the fairy tales of the microscopist and
the astronomer. God can be made known to us only in these aspects in which we
desire
however faintly
to be like Him. (T. G. Selby.)
Verse 20-21
If I justify myself.
The folly of self-justification
One of Rev. Murray M’Cheyne’s elders was in deep darkness and
distress for a few weeks
but one Sunday after the pastor’s faithful preaching
he found his way to the Lord. At the close of the service
he told Mr.
M’Cheyne
who knew of his spiritual concern
that he had found the Lord. When
he was asked to explain how this happy change had come about
he said
“I have
been making a great mistake. I have always been coming to the Lord as something
better than I was
and going to the wrong door to ask admittance; but this
afternoon I went round to the sinner’s door
and for the first time cried
like
the publican
‘Lord
be merciful to me a sinner’; and
oh
sir
I received such
a welcome from the Saviour!” Are any of our readers like the self-righteous
Pharisee? Such have no room for the Saviour; for the Lord “came not to call the
righteous
but sinners to repentance.”
If I say I am perfect.
Our exact worth
A bright little fellow was on the scales
and being anxious to
outweigh his playmate
he puffed out his cheeks and swelled up like a small
frog. But the playmate was the wiser boy. “Oho!” he cried in scorn
“that
doesn’t do any good; you can only weigh what you are!” How true that is of us
bigger children
who try to impress ourselves upon our neighbours and friends
and even upon ourselves
and--yes
sometimes upon God Almighty
by the virtues
we would like to have! It doesn’t do any good. You may impose upon your
neighbour’s judgment
and get him to say you are a fine fellow--noble
generous
brave
faithful
loving; but if it is not true
you are a sham. “You
can only weigh what you are.”
Not quite perfect
A London publisher once made up his mind to publish a book without
a single typographical error. He had the proofs corrected by his own readers
until they assured him that they were faultless. Then he sent proofs to the
universities and to many other publishing houses
offering a prize of several
pounds for every typographical mistake found. A few were discovered
and the
book was published. It was considered a perfect specimen of the printer’s art.
Six or eight months after publication the publisher received a letter calling
his attention to an error in a certain line on a certain page. Then came
another and another letter
until before the year was out half a dozen mistakes
were found. St. Paul says that Christians are epistles read and known of all
men; and it certainly does not require as much scrutiny as this to discover
that we are not free from faults. We must look forward to the new edition of us
that will be brought out in another world
revised and amended by the Author. (Quiver.)
A blow at self-righteousness
Ever since man became a sinner he has been self-righteous. When he
had a righteousness of his own he never gloried of it
but ever since he has
lost it
he has pretended to be the possessor of it.
I. The plea of
self-righteousness contradicts itself. “If I justify myself
mine own mouth
shall condemn me.” For the very plea itself is a piece of high and arrogant
presumption. God hath said it
let Jew and Gentile stop his mouth
and let all
the world stand guilty before God. We have it on inspired authority
that
“there is none righteous
no
not one.” Besides
dost thou not see
thou vain
and foolish creature
that thou hast been guilty of pride in the very language
thou hast used? Who but a proud man would stand up and commend himself? But
further
the plea of self-righteousness is self-contradictory upon another
ground; for all that a self-righteous man pleads for
is comparative
righteousness. “Why
” saith he
“I am no worse than my neighbours
in fact a
great deal better; I do not drink.” Just so
but then all that you claim is that
you are righteous as compared with others. Do you not see that this is a very
vain and fatal plea
because you do in fact admit that you are not perfectly
righteous;--that there is some sin in you
only you claim there is not so much
in you as in another? Suppose now for a moment that a command is issued to the
beasts of the forest that they should become sheep. It is quite in vain for the
bear to come forward and plead that he was not so venomous a creature as the
serpent; equally absurd would it be for the wolf to say that though stealthy
and cunning
and gaunt
and grim
yet he was not so great a grumbler nor so
ugly a creature as the bear; and the lion might plead that he had not the
craftiness of the fox. A holy God cannot look even upon the least degree of
iniquity. But further
the plea of the self-conceited man is
that he has done
his best
and can claim a partial righteousness. It is true
if you touch him
in a tender place he acknowledges that his boyhood and his youth were stained
with sin. A perfect righteousness you must have
or else you shall never be
admitted to that wedding feast.
II. The man who
uses this plea condemns the plea himself. Not only does the plea cut its own
throat
but the man himself is aware when he uses it that it is an evil
and
false
and vain refuge. Now this is a matter of conscience
and if I speak not
what you have felt
then you can say I am mistaken. Men know that they are
guilty. The conscience of the proudest man
when it is allowed to speak
tells
him that he deserves the wrath of God.
III. The plea is
itself evidence against the pleader. There is an unregenerated man here
who
says
“Am I blind also?” I answer in the words of Jesus
“But now ye say we
see
therefore your sin remaineth.” You have proved by your plea
in the first
place
that you have never been enlightened of the Holy Spirit
but that you
remain in a state of ignorance. A deaf man may declare that there is no such
thing as music. A man who has never seen the stars
is very likely to say that
there are no stars. But what does he prove? Does he prove that there are no
stars? He only proves his own folly and his own ignorance. That man who can say
half a word about his own righteousness has never been enlightened of God the
Holy Spirit. But then again
inasmuch as you say that you are not guilty this
proves that you are impenitent. Now the impenitent can never come where God is.
Further than this
the self-righteous man
the moment that he says he has done
anything which can recommend him to God
proves that he is not a believer. Now
salvation is for believers
and for believers only. The thirsty are welcome;
but those who think they are good
are welcome neither to Sinai nor to Calvary.
Ah! soul
I know not who thou art; but if thou hast any righteousness of thine
own
thou art a graceless soul.
IV. It will ruin
the pleader forever. Let me show you two suicides. There is a man who has
sharpened a dagger
and seeking out his opportunity he stabs himself to the
heart. Who shall blame any man for his death? He slew himself; his blood be on
his own head. Here is another: he is very sick and ill; he can scarcely crawl
about the streets. A physician waits upon him; he tells him
“Sir
your disease
is deadly; you must die; but I know a remedy which will certainly heal you.
There it is; I freely give it to you. All I ask of you is
that you will freely
take it.” “Sir
” says the man
“you insult me; I am as well as ever I was in my
life; I am not sick.” Who slew this man? His blood be on his own head; he is as
base a suicide as the other. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Now my days are swifter than a post . . . as the swift ships.
Illustrations of life
I. The text
teaches us the brevity of human life. “My days are swifter than a post.” They
are as swift-footed messengers
as couriers
as the medium of communication
from one province to another. They are “swifter than the swift ships”; than the
“eagle hastening to his prey.” There are illustrations from earth
and sea
and
sky. We often speak of the brevity of life; it is only now and then we are
really impressed with the fact. Our days are brief as the preface to a new and
undying life. Our days are brief as the period for the culture of our whole
nature. How great a portion of the present life is necessary as the
introduction to the remainder. Our physical nature requires growth and
development. How slowly our mental faculties open themselves. The culture of
our spiritual nature seems to demand a longer period than the present life
for
it is the education of a nature that dies not; that will take with it all the
training of earth. Our days are brief
when we think of the solemn realities
with which they have to do. Our days are brief
because our destiny depends on
them. On these days that pass so quickly
all the future hangs; these days give
a colouring to a whole eternity.
II. The text
teaches us the unsatisfactory nature of life. “They see no good.” “What shadows
we are
and what shadows we pursue.”
1. Our days bear with them the freshness and joyousness of life. Our
days rob us of the freshness and beauty of youth
and as they pass they carry
with them all that we deemed most precious--friends
kindred
joys
hopes.
2. Life is unsatisfactory
because of the fragmentary and unfinished
character of its work. God’s providence is in strong contrast with man’s.
3. If the present be all
life must be most unsatisfactory
for we
can see no good.
III. Our text
suggests to us the importance of life. Our days are as a post.
1. They carry with them the records and impressions of our minds.
Thoughts for good or for evil must live--must live to be a blessing or a curse.
2. Our days carry with them the treasures of our hearts. What
treasures the swift ships convey from one land to another; how they enrich one
country with the wealth of others. Our days carry the wealth
the priceless
affections of our nature. (H. J. Bevis.)
The fleetness of life
I. As a prophetic
fact. Can it be that this short life is the end of our existence?
1. We quit this life with unwrought powers. The tree grows on until
it exhausts its latent powers
and animals die not (unless they are destroyed)
until they are worn out. But man has to quit this life just as some of his
powers are beginning to bud
and others without measure undeveloped and
unquickened.
2. We quit this life with unfulfilled plans.
II. As a terrific
fact. To whom is it terrible? To all whose hearts are centred in this world.
1. That their wealth relatively becomes less valuable to them every
day.
2. That eternity becomes relatively more awful to them every day.
III. As a cheering
fact. To whom is it cheering? To those who
though they are in the world are
not of the world
those who are born into the Divine kingdom of Christly
virtues and imperishable hopes. (Homilist.)
If
I say
I will forget my complaint.
Concerning
Job’s sufferings
I. As too great to render any efforts of self-consolation effective.
Three things are suggested.
1. A valuable power of mind. The power to alleviate sufferings. “If I
say
I will forget my complaint.” Herein is the implied power. All have it. It
is a remedial force that kind heaven has put within us. If he cannot quench the
flame
he can cool it; if he cannot roll off the load
he by his own thoughts
can make it comparatively light. He can go into a circle of ideas so engrossing
and delectable as to experience transports of rapture in the dungeon or in the
flames. What is pain but a mental sensation? And wherever that mental sensation
may burn
its fires can be quenched in the river of noble thoughts and lofty
aspirations.
2. A natural tendency of mind. What is it? The exertion of this
mitigating power within us under suffering; an effort to “forget” the
“complaint
” to “leave off” the “heaviness
” to “comfort.” Who under suffering
does not essay this?
3. A sad defect in mind. “I am afraid of all my sorrows; I know that
Thou wilt not hold me innocent.” Why did his mental efforts at self-consolation
fail? Simply because he had not the inner sense of innocence. Though he always
maintained that he was innocent of the sin of hypocrisy with which his friends
charged him
he always felt that before the Holy he was guilty
and herein was
the failure of his mind to mitigate his pain. He regards his sufferings--
II. As too deserved to justify any hope of relief.
1. He feels that no self-cleansing would serve him before God. “If I
be wicked
”--or
as it should be
I am wicked
--“why then labour I in vain? If
I wash myself with snow water
and make my hands never so clean; yet shalt Thou
plunge me in the ditch
and mine own clothes shall abhor me.”
2. He feels that there is no one to act as umpire between him and his
Maker. “Neither is there any daysman betwixt us
that might lay his hand upon
us both.”
3. He feels that his afflictions were directly from God
and until
they were removed there was no hope for him. “Let Him take His rod away from
me
and let not His fear terrify me; then would I speak
and not fear Him: but
it is not so with me.” (Homilist.)
Verses 30-32
If I wash myself with snow
water.
An estimate of the
morality that is without godliness
In the eyes of the
pure God
the man who has made the most copious application in his power of
snow water to the visible conduct
may still be an object of abhorrence; and
that if God enter into judgment with him
He will make him appear as one
plunged in the ditch
his righteousness as filthy rags
and himself as an
unclean thing. There are a thousand things which
in popular and understood
language
man can do. It is quite the general sentiment
that he can abstain
from stealing
and lying
and calumny--that he can give of his substance to the
poor
and attend church
and pray
and read his Bible
and keep up the worship
of God in his family. But
as an instance of distinction between what he can
do
and what he cannot do
let us make the undoubted assertion that he can eat
wormwood
and just put the question
if he can also relish wormwood. That is a
different affair. I may command the performance; but have no such command over
my organs of sense
as to command a liking or a taste for the performance. The
illustration is homely; but it is enough for our purpose if it be effective. I
may accomplish the doing of what God bids; but have no pleasure in God himself.
The forcible constraining of the hand may make out many a visible act of
obedience; but the relish of the heart may refuse to go along with it. The
outer man may be all in a bustle about the commandments of God; while to the
inner man God is an offence and a weariness. His neighbours may look at him; and
all that their eye can reach may be as clean as snow water can make it. But the
eye of God reaches a great deal farther. He is the discerner of the thoughts
and intents of the heart; and he may see the foulness of spiritual idolatry in
every one of its receptacles. The poor man has no more conquered his rebellious
affections than he has conquered his distaste for wormwood. He may fear God; he
may listen to God; and
in outward deed
may obey God. But he does not
and he
will not
love God; and while he drags a heavy load of tasks
and duties
and
observances after him
he lives in the hourly violation of the first and
greatest of the commandments. Would any parent among you count it enough that
you had obtained a service like this from one of your children? Would you be
satisfied with the obedience of his hand
while you knew that the affections of
his heart were totally away from you? The service may be done; but all that can
minister satisfaction in the principle of the service
may be withheld from it;
and though the very last item of the bidden performance is rendered
this will
neither mend the deformity of the unnatural child
nor soothe the feelings of
the afflicted and the mortified father. God is the Father of spirits; and the
willing subjection of the spirit is that which He requires of us--“My son
give
Me thy heart”; and if the heart be withheld
God says of all our visible
performances
“To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto Me?”
The heart is His requirement; and full indeed is the title which He prefers to
it. He put life into us; and it is He who hath drawn a circle of enjoyments
and friendships
and interests
around us. Everything that we take delight in
is ministered to us out of His hand. He plies us every moment with His
kindness; and when at length the gift stole the heart of man away from the
Giver
so that he became a lover of his own pleasure rather than a lover of
God
even then would He not leave us to perish in the guilt of our rebellion.
Man made himself an alien
but God was not willing to abandon him; and
rather
than lose him forever
did He devise a way of access by which to woo and to
welcome him back again. The way of our recovery is indeed a way that His heart
was set upon; and to prove it
He sent His own Eternal Son into the world
who
unrobed Him of all His glories
and made Himself of no reputation. If
after
all this
the antipathy of nature to God still cleave to us--if
under the
power of this antipathy
the service we yield be the cold and unwilling service
of constraint--if
with many of the visible outworks of obedience
there be
also the strugglings of a reluctant heart to take away from this obedience all
its cheerfulness
is not God defrauded of His offering? (T. Chalmers
D. D.)
Washed to greater foulness
The similitudes of grief
are here piled up in heaps
with what an old author has spoken of as the
“rhetoric of sorrow.” Physical sufferings had produced a stain on Job’s mind
and he sought relief by expressing his anguish. Like some solitary prisoner in
the gloomy keep of an old castle
he graves on the walls pictures of the abject
despondencies which haunt him.
I. At the outset
we observe that quickened souls are conscious of guilt. They know it; they feel
it; and they blush to find that they are without excuse for it. All men are
sinners: to most men
however
sin appears to be a fashion of the times
a
necessity of nature
a folly of youth
or an infirmity of age
which a slight
apology will suffice to remove. Not till men are quickened by Divine grace do
they truly know that they are sinners. How is this? Some diseases are so
insidious that the sufferers fancy that they are getting better
while in very
truth they are hastening to the grave. After such manner does sin deceive the
sons of men: they think they are saved when they are still unrenewed. How is
this
you ask again? Few give themselves the trouble to think about these
matters at all. Ours is an age in which men’s thoughts are keen upon politics
and merchandise
practical science
and economic inventions. To natural
ignorance we may attribute much of the ordinary indifference of men to their
own sinfulness. They live in a benighted age. In vain you boast the
enlightenment of this nineteenth century: the nineteenth century is not one whir
more enlightened as to the depravity of human nature than the first century.
Men are as ignorant of the plague of their own hearts today as they were when
Paul addressed them. Hardly a glimmer of the humbling truth of our natural
depravity dawns on the dull apprehension of the worldly wise
though souls
taught from above know it and are appalled by it. In divers ways the discovery
comes to those whom the Lord ordains to save. Sometimes a preacher sent of God
lets in the dreadful light. Many men
like the false prophet Mokanna
hide
their deformity. You may walk through a dark cellar without discerning by the
eye that anything noisome is there concealed. Let the shutters be thrown open!
Bid the light of day stream in! You soon perceive frogs upon the cold clammy
pavement
filthy cobwebs hanging on the walls in long festoons
foul vermin
creeping about everywhere. Startled
alarmed
horrified
who would not wish to
flee away
and find a healthier atmosphere? The rays of the sun are
however
but a faint image of that light Divine shed by the Holy Spirit
which
penetrates the thickest shades of human folly and infatuation
and exposes the
treachery of the inmost heart.
II. We pass on to
notice that it often happens that awakened souls use many ineffectual means to
obtain cleansing. Job describes himself as washing in snow water
and making
his hands never so clean. His expressions remind me of my own labour in vain.
By how many experiments I tried to purify my own soul! See a squirrel in a
cage; the poor thing is working away
trying to mount
yet he never rises one
inch higher. In like case is the sinner who seeks to save himself by his own
good works or by any other means: he toils without result. It is astonishing
what pains men will take in this useless drudgery. In seeking to obtain
absolution of their sins
to establish a righteousness of their own
and to
secure peace of mind
men tax their ingenuity to the utmost. Job talks of
washing himself “with snow water.” The imagery is
no doubt
meant to be instructive.
Why is snow water selected?
1. The reason probably was
first
because it was hard to get. Far
easier
generally
to procure water from the running brooks than from melted
snow. Men set a high value on that which is difficult to procure. Forms of worship
which are expensive and difficult are greatly affected by many
as snow water
was thought in Job’s day to be a bath for kings; but
after all
it is an idle
fashion
likely to mislead.
2. Besides
snow water enjoyed a reputation for purity. If you would
have a natural filtered water gather the newly-fallen snow and melt it.
Specimens yet remain among us of piety more than possible to men
religiousness
above the range of mortals; which piety is
however
not of God’s grace
and
consequently is a vain show. Though we should use the purest ceremonies
multiply the best of good works
and add thereto the costliest of gifts
yet we
should be unable to make ourselves clean before God. You may wash yourself till
you deny the existence of a spot
and yet you may be unclean.
3. Once again
this snow water is probably extolled because it
descends from the clouds of heaven
instead of bubbling up from the clods of
earth. Religiousness which can colour itself with an appearance of the
supernatural is very taking with many. If I “make my hands never so clean
” is
an expression peculiarly racy in the original. The Hebrew word has an allusion
to soap or nitre. Such was the ordinary and obvious method anyone would take to
whiten his hands when they were grimy. Tradition tells that certain stains of
blood cleave to the floor. The idea is that human blood
shed in murder
can
never be scrubbed or scraped off the boards. Thus is it most certainly with the
dye of sin. The blood of souls is in thy skirts
is the terrible language of
Jeremiah (Jeremiah 2:34). These worthless experiments to cleanse yourselves would be
ended once for all if you would have regard to the great truth of the Gospel:
“Without shedding of blood there is no remission The blood of Jesus Christ His
Son cleanseth us from all sin.”
III. But as sure as
ever quickened souls try to get purity in the wrong way
God will thrust them
down into the ditch. This is a terrible predicament. I find
on looking at the
passage closely
that it means “head over ears in the ditch.” Often it happens
with those who try to get better by their own good works
that their conscience
is awakened by the effort
and they are more conscious of sin than ever. The
word here rendered “ditch” is elsewhere translated “corruption.” So in the
sixteenth Psalm: “Neither wilt Thou suffer Thine Holy One to see corruption.”
Language cannot paint abasement
reproach
or ignominy in stronger terms. “Thou
shalt plunge me in the ditch.” Is it not as though God Himself would undertake
the business of causing His people to know that by their vain ablutions they
were making themselves yet more vile in His eyes? May we not regard this as the
discipline of our Heavenly Father’s love
albeit when passing through the trial
we do not perceive it to be so? “As many as I love
I rebuke and chasten: be
zealous therefore
and repent.” Perhaps the experience I am trying to describe
will come to you through the preaching of the Word. Frequently our great Lord
leaves a poor wayward soul to eat the fruits of its own ways
and this is the
severest form of plunging in the ditch. While striving after righteousness in a
wrong way
the man stumbles into the very sin against which he struggled. His empty
conceit might not have been dislodged from its secret lurking place in his
depraved nature without some such perilous downfall. Thus do we
in our
different spheres
fly from this to that
and from that to the other. Some hope
to cleanse away sin by a supreme effort of self-denial
or of miraculous faith.
Let us not play at purification
nor vainly hope to satisfy conscience with
that which renders no satisfaction to God. Persons of sensitive disposition
and sedentary habits
are prone to seek a righteousness of inward feeling. Oh
that it could turn from feeling to faith; and look steadily out of inward
sensation to the work finished once for all by the Lord Jesus!
IV. By such severe
training the awakened one is led to look alone to God for salvation
and to
find the salvation he looks for. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Verse 33
Neither is there any daysman.
The daysman
At this point of the poem we are seeing Job at his worst. He has
become desperate under his accumulated miseries. In this chapter Job answers
Bildad. He admits that God is just; but from His infinite justice
holiness
and power
he concludes that the best man has no hope of being approved by Him.
His protest he clothes in the figure of a legal trial. God comes into court
first as plaintiff
then as defendant; first asserting His rights
snatching
away that which He has a mind to claim
then answering the citation of the man
who challenges His justice. In either case man’s cause is hopeless. If the
subject of His power calls Him to account
He appears at the bar
only to crush
the appellant
and
with His infinite wisdom
to find flaws in his plea. As we
study
certain deep-lying instincts begin to take shape in cravings for
something which the theology of the day does not supply. The sufferer begins to
feel rather than see that the problem of his affliction needs for its solution
the additional factor which was supplied long after in the person and work of
Jesus Christ
--a mediator between God and man. As he sees it
plaintiff and
defendant have no common ground. God is a being different in nature and
condition from himself. If now there were a human side to God. If there were
only some daysman
some arbiter or mediator
who could lay his hand upon us
both
understand both natures and both sets of circumstances
--then all would
be well. This desire of Job is to be studied
not as a mere individual
but as
a human experience. Job’s craving for a mediator is the craving of humanity.
The soul was made for God. Christ meets an existing need. Manhood was made for
Christ. With Christ goes this fact of mediation. There is a place for mediation
in man’s relations to God. There is a craving for mediation in the human heart
to which Job here gives voice. One needs but a moderate acquaintance with the
history of religion to see how this instinctive longing for someone or
something to stand between man and God has asserted itself in the institutions
of worship. This demand for a mediator is backed and urged by two great
interlinked facts--sin and suffering. Job’s question here is
How shall man be
just with God? He urges that man as he is cannot be just with God as He is. Let
him be as good as he may
his goodness is impurity itself beside the infinite
perfection of the Almighty. God cannot listen to any plea of man based on his
own righteousness Again
this craving for a mediator is awakened by human
experience of suffering; a fact which is intertwined with the fact of sin. We
need
our poor humanity needs
such a daysman
partaker of both natures
the
Divine and the human
to show us suffering on its heavenly as well as on its
earthly side
and to flood its earthly side with heavenly light by the
revelation. In Christ we have the human experience of sorrow and its Divine
interpretation. Job’s longing therefore is literally and fully met. Despise not
this Mediator. Seek His intervention. (Marvin R. Vincent
D. D.)
The daysman
This passage is one whose difficulty does not arise from crudities
of translation
but rather from the subtle sequences of passion-moved thought.
It consists of a lament over the absence of an umpire
or daysman
between God
and the sin-stricken soul
and a vehement longing for such a one. In the notion
of an umpire
there are three general thoughts apparent at the outset. There is
a deep-seated opposition between the two parties concerned: this is only to be
removed by vindicating the right; and the result aimed at is reconciliation.
How far does such arbitration differ from mediation? It is mediation
with the
additional element of an agreement entered into between the opposing parties. A
daysman is a mediator who has been appointed or agreed on by both. Let us see
how these general thoughts are applicable to this cry of Job.
I. He is labouring
under a sense of hopeless sin. This is not less true because it is not
persistent through the Book of Job
but intermittent; sometimes lightly felt
at other times crushing. It is on that account only a truer exhibition of human
character. Here the feverish sense of it is at its strongest.
1. He is “plunged in the ditch
” in the mire
in the “sewer”; so that
his “clothes abhor him.” The mire is his covering: he is all sin!
2. In this state he is self-condemned. He cannot “answer God
” he
cannot come into judgment with Him! That is probably the true meaning of these
words
and not the common explanation
that he is afraid to answer God. God is
not a man; He is not to be answered. He is Himself the judge; He must be right.
That was not always Job’s spirit
it is true; but that is his spirit in the
present passage.
3. Then again
he cannot put away his pollution. He cannot make
himself pure. “If I wash myself in snow water
and make my hands never so clean
(‘cleanse them with lye’)
yet shalt Thou plunge me in the ditch.” Struggling
to get free only shows one’s utter helplessness.
4. And why does he feel so helpless? What is it that reveals his sin
to him? It is the character of God! God’s holiness! God’s law! He had not known
sin but for that law. God’s requirement
God’s inspection of the soul after it
has done its best
seems to “plunge it into the ditch.”
II. It is this
sense of hopeless sin that has taught Job the need of a Mediator.
1. As yet he can find none. His words do not go the length of
asserting that there is not a daysman between God and any man; they are
confined to his own need at the present moment--“Betwixt us!” For him there is
none
and that is his overwhelming trouble.
2. But there is a need. He longs (more than one of the Hebrew words
bring out the longing) for an umpire who should mediate between him and God.
3. This mediator must be able to “lay his hand upon us both.” Not
surely in the poor and irreverent sense (for it is both)
that by a restraining
hand of power he might control the action of the Almighty. The meaning is
surely the simple one
that the umpire must be one who can reach both parties.
4. On the one hand we must do justice to God’s holiness. In the
mediation that must be sacred. It must issue from the trial not less glorious
than before.
5. And on the other hand
the mediator must confess and deal with the
sin of man. He must neither conceal nor excuse it; but
admitting
and rightly
measuring the fact
he must be able to deal with it so as to satisfy God and to
save man.
III. The results of
such mediation are indicated. Generally there is reconciliation
the removal of
that state of enmity existing between the sinner and his God.
1. Specifically
there is pardon. “Let God take His rod away from
me!” God’s punishment
whatever form it may assume
shall pass wholly away.
“Thy sins be forgiven thee!” That would come from such a “daysman.”
2. Next there is peace “Let not His fear terrify me!” May I look up
to God
the Omnipotent and the holy God
and say
I am not afraid; for I have
been reconciled unto Him! The mediator has laid a hand upon both
has reached
God’s holiness
and has reached my sin.
3. Then fear passes
and trust comes. “Then would I speak
and not
fear Him.” There can be no communion with God till the daysman has cast out the
fear which has torment. Till then I can neither speak to Him nor hear Him.
IV. We have in the
New Testament the antithesis of this longing cry of Job. “The law (says Paul
Galatians 3:19-20) was ordained in the
hand of a mediator. Now a mediator is not a mediator of one; but God is one.”
And who is the other party? It is sinful man. And “Jesus is the Mediator of the
new covenant” (Hebrews 12:24)
“laying a hand on both
”
mediating between two who have been long and sorely at variance; the “daysman
betwixt us” and God
who “pleads as a man with God
as a man pleadeth for his neighbour”
(Job 16:21). The need then of a mediator
as a spiritual necessity of the sinner who has come to look down into his own
heart and to compare it with God’s holiness
is one of the strange teachings of
the Book of Job. (J. Elder Cumming
D. D.)
The need of a daysman
There are two attributes of God--His might and His righteousness.
The one a natural and the other a moral attribute. One manifested in creation
the other dimly discernible in the moral nature
that is
the conscience of
man
and yet greatly needing a revelation to bring it home to man’s heart with
awful reality and power. Job’s thoughts were evidently occupied in this chapter
with both these attributes. But if we are asked with which he is most occupied
we must answer
not with the highest
not with the righteousness so much as
with the power of God. These verses seem to show a two-fold feeling in Job’s
mind
corresponding to the two attributes--the righteousness and the power of
God; but the predominating feeling was that of the irresistible power of God.
Job longed for something to bridge over the terrible chasm between the Creator
and himself
and not for some thing only
but some living person
some
“daysman
who should lay his hand upon them both.” Taken critically and
historically
the word “daysman” seems to signify an “umpire.” If Job felt “the
power of God” more than His righteousness
and his own weakness more than his
guilt
this is precisely what he would want. He could not
he felt
contend
with God himself; could not stand on a level with the Creator in this great
controversy. He felt
therefore
his need of an umpire. But what is the
difference between a “daysman” so explained and a mediator? The difference is
not great
but such as it is
it corresponds to the difference between feeling
the “power” and the “righteousness” of God. The feeling of wanting a mediator
is the higher. A consciousness of guilt and inward corruption is a higher
feeling than that of weakness; and the longing for a “Mediator” a higher
longing than that for a “daysman.” (George Wagner.)
A Mediator between God and man
When no man could redeem his neighbour from the grave--God Himself
found a ransom. When not one of the beings whom He had formed could offer an
adequate expiation--did the Lord of hosts awaken the sword of vengeance against
His fellow. When there was no messenger among the angels who surrounded His
throne
that could both proclaim and purchase peace for a guilty world--did God
manifest in the flesh
descend in shrouded majesty amongst our earthly
tabernacles
and pour out His soul unto the death for us
and purchase the
Church by His own blood
and bursting away from the grave which could not held
Him
ascend to the throne of His appointed Mediatorship; and now He
the lust
and the last
who was dead and is alive
and maketh intercession for
transgressors
“is able to save to the uttermost all who come unto God through
Him”; and
standing in the breach between a holy God and the sinners who have
offended Him
does He make reconciliation
and lay His hand upon them both. But
it is not enough that the Mediator be appointed by God--He must be accepted by
man. And to incite our acceptance does He hold forth every kind and constraining
argument. He casts abroad over the whole face of the world one wide and
universal assurance of welcome. “Whosoever cometh unto Me shall not be cast
out.” “Come unto Me
all ye who labour and are heavy laden
and I will give you
rest.” “Where sin hath abounded
grace hath much more abounded.” “Whatsoever ye
ask in My name ye shall receive.” The path of access to Christ is open and free
of every obstacle
which kept fearful and guilty man at an impracticable
distance from the jealous and unpacified Lawgiver. He hath put aside the
obstacle
and now stands in its place. Let us only go in the way of the Gospel
and we shall find nothing between us and God but the Author and Finisher of the
Gospel--who
on the one hand
beckons to Him the approach of man with every
token of truth and of tenderness; and on the other hand advocates our cause
with God
and fills His mouth with arguments
and pleads that very atonement
which was devised in love by the Father
and with the incense of which He was
well pleased
and claims
as the fruit of the travail of His soul
all who put
their trust in Him; and thus
laying His hand upon God
turns Him altogether
from the fierceness of His indignation. But Jesus Christ is something more than
the agent of our justification--He is the Agent of our sanctification also.
Standing between us and God
He receives from Him of that Spirit which is
called “the promise of the Father”; and He pours it forth in free and generous
dispensation on those who believe in Him. Without this Spirit there may
in a
few of the goodlier specimens of our race
be within us the play of what is
kindly in constitutional feeling
and upon us the exhibition of what is seemly
in a constitutional virtue; and man thus standing over us in judgment
may pass
his verdict of approbation; and all that is visible in our doings may be pure
as by the operation of snow water. But the utter irreligiousness of our nature
will remain as entire and as obstinate as ever. The alienation of our desires
from God will persist with unsubdued vigour in our bosoms; and sin
in the very
essence of its elementary principle
will still lord it over the inner man with
all the power of its original ascendency--till the deep
and the searching
and
the prevailing influence of the love of God be shed abroad in our hearts by the
Holy Ghost. This is the work of the great Mediator. This is the might and the
mystery of that regeneration
without which we shall never see the kingdom of
God. This is the office of Him to whom all power is committed
both in heaven
and in earth--who
reigning in heaven
and uniting its mercy with its
righteousness
causes them to flow upon earth in one stream of celestial
influence; and reigning on earth
and working mightily in the hearts of its
people
makes them meet for the society of heaven--thereby completing the
wonderful work of our redemption
by which on the one hand He brings the eye of
a holy God to look approvingly on the sinner
and on the other hand makes the
sinner fit for the fellowship
and altogether prepared for the enjoyment of
God. Such are the great elements of a sinner’s religion. But if you turn from
the prescribed use of them
the wrath of God abideth on you. If you kiss not
the Son while He is in the way
you provoke His anger; and when once it begins
to burn
they only are blessed who have put their trust in Him. If
on the
fancied sufficiency of a righteousness that is without godliness
you neglect
the great salvation
you will not escape the severities of that day when the
Being with whom you have to do shall enter with you into judgment; and it is
only by fleeing to the Mediator
as you would from a coming storm
that peace
is made between you and God
and that
sanctified by the faith which is in
Jesus
you are made to abound in such fruits of righteousness as shall he to
praise and glory at the last and the solemn reckoning. (T. Chalmers
D. D.)
The daysman
How is this daysman
Jesus Christ
constituted to hold this
office? Job knew what were his real wants; he did not know how these wants were
to be supplied
and yet he gives us in the context the whole constitution of
the office of a daysman. In the depth of his woe
in the valley of his
degradation
while he sat in dust and ashes
he sighed forth
“If I wash myself
with snow water
and make my hands never so clean; yet shalt Thou plunge me in
the ditch
and mine own clothes shall abhor me. For He is not a mail
as I am
that I should answer Him
and we should come together in judgment. Neither is
there any daysman betwixt us
that might lay his hand upon us both.” Mark this
context. Here the patriarch gives utterance to a full recognition of his guilt
of his consciousness of the wrath that had descended from heaven upon him
of
the impossibility of his making himself just with God. He dwells in the ditch
of corruption
and is self-abhorred; and God
whom he has offended
“is not a
man” that he should answer Him
that they should come face to face
that they
should reason together. “He is not a man as I am.” He looked upon God as the
heathen looked upon Him
--as a God of Majesty
a God of holiness
a God of
sublimity and of glory
inaccessible to man. God is not a man
that I should
come near Him
said Job
and I have none to introduce me to Him. That was his
misery--“God is not a man
” that I should speak to Him
and I have none to
stand between myself and God to present my prayer to Him. Hopeless
hapless
wretched patriarch! What he wanted was a daysman betwixt the two to lay his
hand upon them both. I have come here to tell you that that daysman is
Christ--“the man Christ Jesus.” And what saith He? “Behold
I am according to
thy wish in God’s stead; I also am formed out of the clay.” That is my plea
and that is my glory
that God has become a man as I am
and I now can answer
Him. I now can come to Him face to face; I now can fill my mouth with
arguments; I now can come
and by His own invitation reason with Him. He is
“formed out of the clay”; thus is He the one between God and man; and He lays
His hand upon us both. This is Jesus; therefore is He constituted a Mediator
between God and man; and this He has attained by His atoning sacrifice.
Atonement!--what is the meaning of that word? We pronounce it as one word; but
it is really three words
“at-one-ment”; and that is its meaning. By reason
of our sin
there are two parties opposed the one to the other; there is no
clement of union
but every element of antagonism to part and keep us asunder.
Christ is the atoning sacrifice
and His atonement is a complete satisfaction.
This is because Christ
our daysman
is both God and man
both natures in one
person. To be a mediator it is necessary to have power and influence with both
parties. Christ
as our daysman
has power with God
for He Himself is God; and
to obtain influence with man He became a man
and bare our sorrows and endured
our griefs. He became as one of us
“sin only excepted.” Behold the sympathy of
Jesus!--a participator in our sufferings
a sharer in our sorrows
and
acquainted with our grief. It is true the majesty of God was unapproachable; no
man could approach unto it; the spotless glory of that Presence was too
dazzling for mortal sight to behold; His holiness was too pure to come into any
contact with sin; the height of that glory was beyond what man had any power to
attain unto. Then God in Christ came down to us. Oh
what grace! And whereas
the Majesty of the Godhead was too august
He left it there upon His Father’s
throne
and He wrapped Himself for a time in the familiar mantle of our
humanity; He became a man as we are. Inasmuch as man could not approach unto
God
Christ brought the Godhead to the level of our humanity
that He might
raise the human race from death and sin to the enjoyment of the life of
righteousness. This is the true dignity of man
that Christ has dignified him
and elevated him to His Father’s glory. “To him that overcometh will I grant to
sit with Me upon My throne
even as I also have overcome
and am set down upon
My Father’s throne.” This is the Daysman who lays His hand upon us both. Does
not that span the gulf? You know a bridge
to be of use and service
must rest
its springing arch upon one bank and upon the other. To stop midway spoils the
bridge. The ladder that is lifted up must touch the place on which you stand
and the place where you would be
So is Christ the daysman. He lays His hand
upon both parties. With one hand He lays hold upon God
for He Himself is God
and with the other He stoops until He lays hold upon sinful man
for He Himself
is man; and thus laying His hand upon both parties
He brings both to one--He
effects an at-one-ment
and “God is in Christ reconciling the world unto
Himself.” Oh
blessed meeting! happy reconciliation! where mercy and truth met
together
and righteousness and peace kissed each other! Again: a mediator for
sin must suffer
and by his sufferings he must satisfy. Here
again
the
necessity for this daysman to be both God and man. If He had been God only
He
could not suffer
and if He had been man only
with all His sufferings He could
not satisfy. He is God and He is man. As a man He suffers
and as a God He
satisfies. Brethren
what think ye of this? He is the daysman betwixt us. And
now we are able to contemplate God
not as the angry lawgiver only
but
through Christ
as “merciful and gracious
slow to anger
and of great
kindness.” Now we are in our Christian liberty
and in the adoption of sons
enabled to look upon God
not as robed in thunder
not as though He were girt
in indignation
not as clothed in dazzling light
that no man can approach unto
but I can look upon Him as a man like as I am
touched with the feeling of my
infirmities--“in all points tempted like as we are
yet without sin.” I see in
Him not a master
but a brother; not an enemy
but a friend; not an angry
judge
but a sympathising advocate
pleading for me. And what is His plea? Our
innocence? Nay
nay
He knows we are sinners; He admits our sin
He admits it
all; He offers not one single word of apology or extenuation for our fault; but
He pleads His own righteousness
He pleads His own sufferings in our stead
and
His death in our behalf. He is the substitute
and as such He is the daysman
betwixt God and man. He lays His hand upon us both. (Robert Maguire
M. A.)
The sinner’s daysman
All that a sinner needs he may find in the Saviour.
I. The sinner
needs a “daysman.” Nothing but a sense of sin will ever lead a man in reality
to seek a Saviour.
1. Mark the situation in which the sinner stands before his God--a
condemned criminal
2. The sinner cannot plead his own cause.
3. There are none around to befriend his cause.
II. A “daysman” is
provided. The Gospel is called the “ministry of reconciliation.” It bears this
name because it points to Jesus as the sinner’s “daysman.” He is fitted for the
character He sustains
and He effectually discharges the office.
III. The importance
of our seeking an interest in this “daysman.” He is not our “daysman” unless we
have sought Him. We must come to Him
and it must be by faith. The interest in
Him surely should be sought at once. (G. Hadley.)
The great arbitration case
The patriarch Job
when reasoning with the Lord concerning his
great affliction
felt himself to be at a disadvantage and declined the
controversy
saying
“He is not a man
as I am
that I should answer Him
and
we should come together in judgment.” Yet feeling that his friends were cruelly
misstating his case
he still desired to spread it before the Lord
but wished
for a mediator
a middleman
to act as umpire and decide the case. But what Job
desired to have
the Lord has provided for us in the person of His own dear
Son
Jesus Christ. There is an old quarrel between the thrice holy God and His
sinful subjects
the sons of Adam.
I. First of all
let me describe what are the essentials of an umpire
an arbitrator
or a
daysman.
1. The first essential is
that both parties should be agreed to
accept him. Let me come to thee
thou sinner
against whom God has laid His
suit
and put the matter to thee. God has accepted Christ Jesus to be His
umpire in His dispute. He appointed Him to the office
and chose Him for it
before He laid the foundations of the world. He is God’s fellow
equal with the
Most High
and can put His hand upon the Eternal Father without fear because He
is dearly beloved of that Father’s heart. But He is also a man like thyself
sinner. He once suffered
hungered
thirsted
and knew the meaning of poverty
and pain. Now
what thinkest thou? God has accepted Him; canst thou agree with
God in this matter
and agree to take Christ to be thy daysman too? Art thou
willing that He should take this case into His hands and arbitrate between thee
and God? for if God accepteth Him
and thou accept Him too
then He has one of
the first qualifications for being a daysman.
2. But
in the next place
both parties must be fully agreed to leave
the case entirely in the arbitrator’s hands. If the arbitrator does not possess
the power of settling the case
then pleading before him is only making an
opportunity for wrangling
without any chance of coming to a peaceful
settlement. Now God has committed “all power” into the hands of His Son. Jesus
Christ is the plenipotentiary of God
and has been invested with full
ambassadorial powers. If the case be settled by Him
the Father is agreed. Now
sinner
does grace move thy heart to do the same? Wilt thou agree to put thy
case into the hands of Jesus Christ
the Son of God and the Son of Man? Wilt
thou abide by His decision?
3. Further
let us say
that to make a good arbitrator or umpire
it
is essential that he be a fit person. If the case were between a king and a
beggar
it would not seem exactly right that another king should be the
arbitrator
nor another beggar; but if there could be found a person who
combined the two
who was both prince and beggar
then such a man could be
selected by both. Our Lord Jesus Christ precisely meets the case. There is a
very great disparity between the plaintiff and the defendant
for how great is
the gulf which exists between the eternal God and poor fallen man? How is this
to be bridged? Why
by none except by one who is God and who at the same time
can become man. Now the only being who can do this is Jesus Christ. He can put
His hand on thee
stooping down to all thine infirmity and thy sorrow
and He
can put His other hand upon the Eternal Majesty
and claim to be co-equal with
God and co-eternal with the Father. Dost thou not see
then
His fitness? There
cannot surely be a better skilled or more judicious daysman than our blessed
Redeemer.
4. Yet there is one more essential of an umpire
and that is
that he
should be a person desirous to bring the case to a happy settlement. In the
great case which is pending between God and the sinner
the Lord Jesus Christ
has a sincere anxiety both for His Father’s glory and for the sinner’s welfare
and that there should be peace between the two contending parties. It is the
life and aim of Jesus Christ to make peace. He delighteth not in the death of
sinners
and He knows no joy greater than that of receiving prodigals to His
bosom
and of bringing lost sheep back again to the fold. Thou seest then
sinner
how the case is. God has evidently chosen the most fitting arbitrator.
That arbitrator is willing to undertake the case
and thou mayest well repose
all confidence in Him: but if thou shalt live and die without accepting Him as
thine arbitrator
then
the ease going against thee
thou wilt have none to
blame but thyself.
II. And now I shall
want
by your leave
to take you into the court where the trial is going on and
show you the legal proceedings before the great Daysman. “The man
Christ
Jesus
” who is “God over all
blessed forever
” opens His court by laying down
the principles upon which He intends to deliver judgment
and those principles
I will now try to explain and expound. They are two fold--first
strict
justice; and secondly
fervent love. The arbitrator has determined that let the
case go as it may there shall be full justice done
justice to the very
extreme
whether it be for or against the defendant. He intends to take the law
in its sternest and severest aspect
and to judge according to its strictest
letter. He will not be guilty of partiality on either side. But the arbitrator
also says that He will judge according to the second rule
that of fervent
love. He loves His Father
and therefore He will decide on nothing that may
attain His honour or disgrace His crown. He so loves God
the Eternal One
that
He will suffer heaven and earth to pass away sooner than there shall be one
blot upon the character of the Most High. On the other hand
He so loves the
poor defendant
man
that He will be willing to do anything rather than inflict
penalty upon him unless justice shall absolutely require it. He loves man with
so large a love that nothing will delight Him more than to decide in his
favour
and He will be but too glad if He can be the means of happily
establishing peace between the two. Let justice and love unite if they can.
Having thus laid down the principles of judgment
the arbitrator next calls
upon the plaintiff to state His case. Let us listen While the great Creator
speaks. “Hear
O heavens
and give ear
O earth: for the Lord hath spoken
I
have nourished and brought up children.” The Eternal God charges us
and let me
confess at once most justly and most truly charges us
with having broken all
His commandments--some of them in act
some of them in word
all of them in
heart
and thought
and imagination. He charges upon us
that against light and
knowledge we have chosen the evil and forsaken the good. All this
calmly and
dispassionately
according to the great Book of the law
is laid to our charge
before the Daysman. No exaggeration of sin is brought against us. The
plaintiff’s case having thus been stated
the defendant is called upon by the
Daysman for his; and I think I hear Him as He begins. First of all
the
trembling defendant sinner pleads--“I confess to the indictment
but I say I
could not help it. I have sinned
it is true
but my nature was such that I
could not well do otherwise; I must lay all the blame of it to my own heart; my
heart was deceitful and my nature was evil.” The Daysman at once rules that
this is no excuse whatever
but an aggravation
for inasmuch as it is conceded
that the man’s heart itself is enmity against God
this is an admission of yet
greater malice and blacker rebellion. Then the defendant pleads in the next
place that albeit he acknowledges the facts alleged against him
yet he is no
worse than other offenders
and that there are many in the world who have
sinned more grievously than he has done. The sinner urges further
that though
he has offended
and offended very greatly and grievously
yet he has done a
great many good things. It is true he did not love God
but he always went to
chapel. The defendant has no end of pleas
for the sinner has a thousand
excuses; and finding that nothing else will do
he begins to appeal to the
mercy of the plaintiff
and says that for the future he will do better. He
confesses that he is in debt
but he will run up no more bills at that shop.
What is the poor defendant to do now? He is fairly beaten this time. He falls
down on his knees
and with many tears and lamentations he cries
“I see how
the case stands; I have nothing to plead
but I appeal to the mercy of the
plaintiff; I confess that I have broken His commandments; I acknowledge that I
deserve His wrath; but I have heard that He is merciful
and I plead for free
and full forgiveness.” And now comes another scene. The plaintiff seeing the
sinner on his knees
with his eyes full of tears
makes this reply
“I am willing
at all times to deal kindly and according to loving kindness with all My
creatures; but will the arbitrator for a moment suggest that I should damage
and ruin My own perfections of truth and holiness; that I should belie My own
word; that I should imperil My own throne; that I should make the purity of
immaculate justice to be suspected
and should bring down the glory of My
unsullied holiness
because this creature has offended Me
and now craves for
mercy? I cannot
I will not spare the guilty; he has offended
and he must die!
‘As I live
I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked
but would rather
that he should turn from his wickedness and live.’ Still
this ‘would rather’
must not be supreme. I am gracious and would spare the sinner
but I am just
and must not unsay My own words. I swore with an oath
‘The soul that sinneth
shall die.’ I have laid it down as a matter of firm decree
‘Cursed is everyone
that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to
do them.’ This sinner is righteously cursed
and he must inevitably die; and
yet I love him.” The arbitrator bows and says
“Even so; justice demands that
the offender should die
and I would not have Thee unjust.” The arbitrator
therefore
after pausing awhile
puts it thus: “I am anxious that these two
should be brought together; I love them both: I Cannot
on the one hand
recommend that My Father should stain His honour; I cannot
on the other hand
endure that this sinner should be cast eternally into hell; I will decide the
case
and it shall be thus: I will pay My Father’s justice all it craves; I
pledge Myself that in the fulness of time I will suffer in My own proper person
all that the weeping
trembling sinner ought to have suffered. My Father
wilt
Thou stand to this?” The Eternal God accepts the awful sacrifice! Yes
sinner
and He did more than say it
for when the fulness of time came--you know the
story. Here
then
is the arbitration. Christ Himself suffers; and now I have
to put the query
“Hast thou accepted Christ?”
III. Let us now look
at the daysman’s success.
1. For every soul who has received Christ
Christ has made a full
atonement which God the Father has accepted; and His success in this matter is
to be rejoiced in
first of all
because the suit
has been settled
conclusively. We have known cases go to arbitration
and yet the parties have
quarrelled afterwards; they have said that the arbitrator did not rule justly
or something of the kind
and so the whole point has been raised again. But
O
beloved
the case between a saved soul and God is settled once and forever.
There is no more conscience of sin left in the believer.
2. Again
the case has been settled on the best principles
because
you see
neither party can possibly quarrel with the decision. The sinner
cannot
for it is all mercy to him: even eternal justice cannot
for it has had
its due.
3. Again
the case has been so settled
that both parties are well
content. You never hear a saved soul murmur at the substitution of the Lord Jesus.
4. And through this Daysman both parties have come to be united in
the strongest
closest
dearest
and fondest bond of union. This lawsuit has
ended in such a way that the plaintiff and the defendant are friends for life
nay
friends through death
and friends in eternity. What a wonderful thing is
that union between God and the sinner! We have all been thinking a great deal
lately about the Atlantic cable. It is a very interesting attempt to join two
worlds together. That poor cable
you know
has had to be sunk into the depths
of the sea
in the hope of establishing a union between the two worlds
and now
we are disappointed again. But oh! what an infinitely greater wonder has been
accomplished. Christ Jesus saw the two worlds divided
and the great Atlantic
of human guilt rolled between. He sank down deep into the woes of man till all
God’s waves and billows had gone over Him
that He might be
as it were
the
great telegraphic communication between God and the apostate race
between the
Most Holy One and poor sinners. Let me say to you
sinner
there was no failure
in the laying down of that blessed cable. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
──《The Biblical Illustrator》