conditions of life are vanity Gal. 1.2 Psal 39.5 and he was made to possess them as his patrimony and right as if no other portion were due to him 2. The hireling though he work sore in the day yet he gets the nights rest Gal. 1.12 But he is troubled by night as well as by day For after he hath toiled all day long which is here supposed his nights were made so wearisome by Gods appointment that when he lay down he longed for day-light that he might arise to see if that would bring him ease and so was made to measure out the evening as it is in the Original or to reckon how long it was to day-light Yea he was full of tossings to and fro or perpetually tossed inwardly in his mind and outwardly in his body through pain and want of rest and that not for a part of the night only but throughout the whole night even to the dawning of the day so that he got not any sound sleep See ver 14 15. Upon all which this inference is to be repeated that he might lawfully wish for ease in death Which though it was his failing and mistake as is before marked especially having to do with God to whom all ought to stoop and to be content if they get strength to bear what he layeth on and it may be justly suspected that his giving way to distemper of spirit added not a little to his disquietness yet his condition may afford us these Instructions 1. The Lord can when he will make our life which we think so sweet a very great burden to us and our time which ordinarily slips away insensibly very wearisome and tedious For Job is weary of his life and his Months and Nights are wearisome Creature-comforts of Bed and Board will not ease us when God hath us to try which should make us thankful when it is otherwise and teach us not to doat on time or our life For it is of God that all our outward mercies prove not crosses 2. The Lord is more absolute and soveraign over his Creatures to exercise afflict and continue troubles then any man is over his servant and hireling For here he made Job's lot more sad then the condition of any hireling is made by man He is astricted to no rule in those things but his own will to which we ought to submit 3. The coming on or continuance of trouble is not a matter at mans arbitrement God can make us to possess them and appoint them to us whether we will or not See Psal 105.17 18 19 20. Jer. 47.6 7. Which may lead us to eye God much when troubles stick on and to look to him alone for ease of them who can deliver without the consent of enemies as well as afflict us whether we consent or not See Job 34.29 Isa 49.24 25 26. 4. Albeit all men in their best outward estate are vanity Psal 39.5 Yet the Lord is pleased sometime to make some men exemplary instances of that truth of the vanity of all men and conditions For so was it with Job his months were months of vanity being empty of all comfort not having any such issue as he waited for and so disappointed his expectation and he reaping no benefit by all his toil as Psal 78.33 All which vanity as it may be read in other conditions that look not so terrible like as Job's did so they who are under such a lot may read this in it that because they see not the vanity and emptiness of every condition therefore it is made so legible to them 5 Singular troubles do very deeply affect men because they are singular For Job regrets that he was tossed beyond all others Yet Saints may read this in it also that they will be singularly regarded by God under their singular tryals 6. Gods Providence is so condescending that the trouble or quiet of every night is appointed by him For so Job holds forth Wearisom nights are appointed to me when I lie down I say When shall I arise c Where he understands God to be this appointer though he do not expresly name him till afterward that his heat grow more warm It is an evidence of our carnal mindedness when we see little of God in ordinary Providences Psal 139. were it but in a nights sleep And our negligence in this brings us to know by the want thereof how much we enjoy when we do but little observe or acknowledge it 7. As trouble makes any time promise more then the present So changes of that kind will not change our condition till God come For though Job longed for the day being full of tossings to and fro yet the day-light did not ease him See Deut. 28.67 It were our wisdom to make the best of our present lot be it never so hard for changes till we be fit for an issue will but add to our affliction Vers 5. My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust my skin is broken and become lothsome 6. My days are swifter then a weavers shuttle and are spent without hope The third Argument wherein he yet insists to give an account of his trouble doth more distinctly tend to conclude the lawfulness of his desire of death For whereas it might be objected against his former reasoning That his trouble and disquiet might indeed warrant him to seek some ease but not to press so peremptorily for death He answereth That his trouble being irrecoverable left him no door of hope open but in death and therefore he behoved to press after that only The Argument runs thus as if Job had pleaded I may lawfully desire that warrantable issue which I see in the Providence of God approaching toward me and which hath already irrecoverably seised on me But I see death thus approaching and it hath already taken hold on me Therefore I may desire it Now that death is thus approaching he proves two wayes First From the present condition of his body v. 5. being in his graves-cloaths many worms breeding in his sores his body being covered with scabby clods of dust and ulcerous matter running from his sores and his skin being broken as the earth is in a drought in a loathsome manner From all which it is to be inferred that he could expect nothing but death Here we may Learn 1. Health and soundness of body is a great mercy and doth ease us of much vexation and an heavy burden As here appeareth from Job's resenting the want of it 2. Let men make never so much of their bodies yet they carry a mass of putrefaction and corruption about with them and they will come at length to be loathsom spectacles For here Job's body being touched by God his flesh is cloathed with worms and clods of dust c. 3. Death and life are in the power of the Lord and he can when he pleaseth bring down to the grave and bring up again 1 Sam. 2.6 For so much doth
this Verse not so consonant to the Original That in drought and heat and Snow waters in all seasons they robb they sin till the grave which would intimate their assiduousness and pertinacy in sinning Job gives an account how these wicked men continue in the World till they be ripe by age and then dye easily Which he illustrates from a similitude where the Original as in other places implyeth the note of similitude though it be not expressed That as Snow in some places is not taken away till Summer and heat come and then the drought and heat easily turn Snow into waters and then quickly and insensibly consumes them So they dye in a great age and Death takes them to their grave in an ordinary way quickly and easily without any matter of horrour or any languishing infirmity So that here by the Grave which consumes those sinners we are to understand Death which draws to the grave and which easily and quickly pulleth sinners away Though it may point further at their being insensibly consumed in the grave of which more v. 20 as an amplification of the former Doct. 1. Wicked men may dye and goe to their graves without any remarkable token of Gods displeasure against them For so is here supposed as a thing without controversie that though as the other reading hath it they sin incessantly and in all seasons till their graves yet they live long and are not soon cut off And there is no odde thing befalls them in their life till they come to death and the grave See Psal 73.5 And albeit this dispensation of God breed tryal and exercise to godly men Psal 73.3 13 14. Yet it would be considered for breaking of that snare 1. That this indulgence is a great snare upon wicked men to embolden them to sin Psal 73.5 6 7 8 9. 2. It causeth death surprize them while they have not been trained nor made acquainted with it by former tryals Psal 73.19 20. 3. It depriveth them also of proofs of love which afflicted Saints receive for sweetening of their bitter cup Psal 73.26 Doct. 2. Even the death of the wicked may be gentle and in a common way yea and in a way short of what befalls others For when death and the grave come they make an insensible and quick dispatch as drought and heat consume the Snow waters See Psal 73.4 This the Lord doth that men may mind a judgement after death that they may not judge of mens state by the way of their death or think they are approved of God who quickly and easily sleep away and are snatched away from pain and torment and that by this experience they may learn to read wrath even in the want of rods or in an easie way of dying and living which doth not stirr up men to look how they are before God Thus even want of reproof is a judgement Ezek. 3.26 Hos 4.14 3. How easie and sweet soever the wickeds way of dying he yet that we be not ensnared thereby the Text affords several antidotes As 1. Let God deal with the wicked as he will yet they must at last dye and leave all their enjoyments and be content to get a grave for all Now under whatever mask death come unto them or whatever they think of it yet they are triumphed over by it Psal 49.14 and there is matter of terrour in it to them Psal 73.19 See Luk. 12.19 20 21. 2. Whatever be the way of their death yet it is certain they have sinned and as the other reading hath it they have continued to sin even till the grave and it is marked they have done so even here where Gods indulgence is asserted To intimate not only that there will be an after account taken of them for their sins Psal 50.21 whatever indulgence they find in life or death For sin will never be forgotten if it be not pardoned But further to assure us that there is present wrath in their lot be what it will Is 64.5 and a woe upon them Lam. 5.16 3. There is a snatching or violence as the word imports in their death as the heat and drought quickly pluck away the Snow waters Which beside the quick dispatch that is made in their death without any lingring pain and their natural antipathy against death which is common to them with all men and therefore they must be plucked violently away may import that they are never ripe nor ready for death in their resolutions or if it be otherwise it slows only from delusion or a surfet of sin and pleasures not from any assurance of the favour of God And however they judge or look upon death yet the most easie death snatcheth them away as Executioners and Serjeants hurry a Malefactour to the Scaffold And in their resolutions for death they are but like drunken and madd-men who regard not the danger till they be sober Hence it is that their Soul is required of them at death Luk. 12.20 But they do never voluntarily resign it whatever their carriage seem to be Verse 20. The womb shall forget him the worm shall feed sweetly on him he shall be no more remembred and wickedness shall be broken at a tree This easie and ordinary way of the wickeds death is further amplified and enlarged in several branches 1. That the Mother whose womb bare this wicked man and which gets the name here from affection and tenderness shall forget him not so much because he is not worthy to be remembred who had been so wicked in his life as because death takes him away so calmly without any violence or disaster which might leave an impression of horrour and resentment 2. That he shall feed the worms as others do and get an easie and sweet bed in the grave See Chap. 17.14 and 21.33 3. Though he be so grossely wicked as he may be called wickedness in the abstract yet he shall leave no more memorial of any singular or remarkable thing in his death than there is of the cutting down or mouldering away of an old rotten tree Doct. 1. Memorials within time of Estates Children affection of Friends c. are but written on the sand and little to be regarded seeing men may be forgotten by their dearest friends For the womb shall forget him and he shall be no more remembred And if he be forgotten as to the way of his death other memorials of him may also perish See Psal 37.35 36. and 49.11 12. A name with God is much surer Is 56.5 2. As some get no cure of their evils but by forgetting of them The godly may be driven upon this shift Job 9.17 either when they are overcharged and not able to overtake all their sorrows or when they are unsober and refuse the consolations of God they must drive this poor trade And it is the wickeds frequent practice after they have possibly repined a while because they know not how to make up their grievances in God So
moment of the day Or being but short-lived like that creature which is said to live but one day See Psal 39.5 Or being cut off in a short time when God begins to deal with him Isa 38.12 Psal 90.5 6. Or his whole life and every day of it from morning to evening being but a daily dying and travelling from the womb to the grave All these do well enough sute the scope and may teach us 1. That death in it self is a destroying or breaking and braying in pieces as making havock of the poor man crushing his imagined excellencies and irreparably ruining him in his being though without prejudice to the power of God to be exerted in his future Resurrection Therefore it is said They are destroyed or broken in pieces 2. As death is terrible in it self so man lieth under so great hazard of it as may keep him low before God being a creature that is dying daily though he consider it not being uncertain what moment it may arrest him being unable to hinder the stroke of death to do its work in a short time and having but a short while of life if well considered how long soever it be forborn All these humbling considerations are imported in their being destroyed from morning to evening 2. That in regard the death of man is ordinary it is but little regarded ver 20. That they perish for ever is not to be understood here of eternal destruction for this sentence is true of all men even godly men But that men are continually dying and perishing in all times and ages and that though this be a great stroke and a perishing for ever without any hope of restitution to this life again Yet it is but little noticed or emproved Neither do they who are left behind make the use of that which they so ordinarily see nor do they who die ever return to give any proof of their proficiency by that stroke This teacheth 1. Death is in this respect a great stroke that it cuts off a man irrecoverably from all his enjoyments and from all opportunity of emproving any condition in this life So that if a man do not emprove time while he hath it and have no hope of somewhat beyond time he is in a poor condition In this respect all men at death perish for ever without hope of returning to this life 2. It is the constant course of divine Providence that as one generation is coming so another is going And that at all times death is still snatching some from there idols liberating others from their toil separating dearest friends and preaching the doctrine of Mortality to all For thus also they perish for ever in all ages and times 3. Albeit it be the duty of the sons of men to emprove every document of mortality which is laid before them in the experience of others Eccl. 7.2 Yet such is the stupidity of most that they profit nothing thereby nor are made to study the uncertainty of mans life or the vanity of many of mens projects on earth Luk. 12.19 20. For thus they perish without any regarding See Psal 49.13 14. 4. Such is the stupidity and corruption of men that even remarkable dispensations becoming ordinary are sleighted and do not affect them For albeit death be a singular stroke yet being ordinary for ever in all times there is no regarding or emproving of it As wonders will nor profit them who do not emprove the ordinary means Luk. 16.31 So the more ordinary and frequent wonders be our corrupt hearts will regard them the less 3. That by death men are stript of all their excellency which is in them ver 21 Which is not so much to be understood of the souls leaving the body as of their parting with all their external pomp and glory at death For both in sickness before death the memory judgment and other endowments of the mind do perish in some beauty and strength of body do languish in all and at death there is nothing left but a loathsome carcass and all worldly pomp and splendour is cut off from them It is here to be remembred that the Spirit of God doth not hear speak of men as to their eternal state but as to their externall condition which they enjoyed in the world And it teacheth 1. God is very bountiful to the sons of men in conferring many excellencies upon them both in their bodies minds and outward estate For there is supposed an excellency in them And albeit it be mans fault to value these too highly as their chief and only excellency yet their own true worth and Gods bounty in conferring of them ought not to be forgotten 2. God is also so kind as to continue all or many of these excellencies with men even to the grave For so is here supposed that their excellency doth not go away till then 3. Whatever forbearance the sons of men get in this life yet death will strip them of all their outward splendour and pomp For then all their excellency doth go away See Psal 49.17 Isa 14.9 10. c. 4. It is a very great fault and a gross neglect in men that this ordinary plain lesson of the vanity of outward excellencies is so little studied For this Question Doth not their excellency which is in them go away doth import that it is a clear case and yet withal that many do so walk as if they did not believe nor heed it and therefore must be posed if they do not believe and consider it 4. That they die without wisdom ver 21. or they die and there is no wisdom This may be true generally of all men that though some have profited much better in their life then others yet all may confess that they die before they be so wise as to understand as they ought what it is to live well or to emprove the examples of mortality which they have seen in their time It may also be understood only of the wicked who die without the knowledge of God and without that wisdom which floweth from right numbering of their days Psal 49.20 90.12 But it is more safe to understand it generally in this sense That they die without having any skill or wisdom how to avoid death And it teacheth however wicked men play many pranks with their wit in their lives and do nimbly extricate themselves imminent hazards though a prudent man foreseeing the storm may be able to avoid it Prov. 22.3 27.12 Yet death will triumph over all their skill and parts their wit cannot deliver them from death nor afford them any way to escape it Thus they die even without wisdom See 2 Sam. 3.33 Eccl. 2.16 CHAP. V. In this Chapter Eliphaz yet continueth his Discourse to Job consisting as was marked on Chap. 4. of a reprehension wherein he labours to convince Job of wickedness or hypocrisie and of some Exhortations to amend his life and turn to God considering the hand of
however men may be too stupid in not observing and making use of ordinary stroaks yet they should not be remembred with too much resentment were there never so much affection to the parties who are smitten For the womb shall forget him he shall be no more remembred but broken as a tree Which may both import a defect that there is not only no resentment but no use made of this death because it comes but in an ordinary way in which case singular tryals come Is 26.10 11. And also a duty not to make too much noise of ordinary tryals by way of resentment murmuring and repining which argue the strength of lusts though it be our mercy to be exercised thereby lest God do strange acts Is 28.21 to rouze us up 3. The best of men will putrifie in the grave and make a sweet feast to the worms For it is here marked as an ordinary lot that the worm shall feed sweetly on him So low must the highest stoop as being but worms themselves Job 25.6 And then mens high thoughts will fall when Death the great Leveller takes hold upon them 4. The wicked deserve so much severity even in this life that an ordinary death is an easie and great favour to them For it is a proof of Gods indulgence that such sinners dye but an ordinary death and have no odde thing in the way of it to be remembred when they are gone If wicked men were pursued according to their deservings there would be moe than these of old who should not dye the common death of all men Numb 16.29 5. No indulgence of God doth prove the innocency of wicked men nor is their sin the less hainous in Gods sight nor ought others to think more lightly of it that he spareth them For those who are thus spared are yet even wickedness in the abstract It is an horrid sin to call evil good yea or to have more favourable and diminishing conceptions of sin because of sinners success or Gods indulgence towards them And our hearts should rise against prospering sin and call it wickedness otherwayes we are in hazard to be tempted to concurr with sinners in it Verse 21. He evil extreateth the barren that beareth not and doth not good to the widow From this to v. 25. Job returns yet to give more instances of Oppressours who are cut off but in an ordinary way In this Verse he gives an instance of some who oppress the barren and widows who either want Children or Husbands to relieve and succour them Whence Learn 1. Oppression is one of the most rise and odious sins and lyeth as near vengeance as any Therefore doth Job instance that as a sin which God would not pass over if he alwayes punished notorious sinners as his Friends asserted See Exod. 37. Ps 12.5 Eccl. 4 1 2 3. and 5.8 2. Barrenness is a sharp tryal wherewith the Lord is pleased to exercise some Women For here the barren is joyned with the widow as a person already afflicted Yea among the people of Israel it was a special reproach 1 Sam. 1.5 6 c. Luk. 2.24 25. And here 1. Godly persons who are exercised with that tryal ought to remember and make use of the Eunuch's promise and blessing Is 56.4 5. 2. They should also remember that some have been exercised with that tryal that they might afterward receive singular proofs of love in obtaining their Children Thus barren Sarah and Rebekah got Sons of the promise Hannah a Samuel Elizabeth John the Baptist c. 3. All ought to guard lest being unmortified under this tryal they get Children that will but augment their sorrow And however it succeed we should beware of Abraham's tentation Gen. 15.2 and of Rachel's distemper Gen. 30.1 For both sinned in it and Rachel took a sinful course to help it Gen. 30 3. though God at last gave a good issue 4. This should teach them who have Children from the consideration of the tryal of others to improve them as a blessing that their name do not stink for their ill breeding of them Doct. 3. Widowhood is another tryal and exercise of some of Adam's posterity For here the widow is a person afflicted whom men ought not to oppress And by this tryal 1. The Lord would let some see how little sensible they have been of mercy when they were under the shadow of an Husband who cared for them and how ill they have improved marriage society 2. He would invite them to give him more imployment 1 Tim. 5.5 3. He would also sit them for proofs of his love who is the Widows God Ps 68.5 Doct. 4. It pleaseth the Lord to exercise great variety in afflicting the children of men by withholding mercies from some as the barren who want children and depriving others of them after they had them as the widow whose Husband is taken away Hereby as the Lord fits tryals in his deep wisdom to every ones strength temper and need of tryals and none ought to judge that the tryal of another were fitter for them than their own So he would teach these who never had these outward mercies to be content considering how they might be tryed with the want of them after enjoyment and he would teach these who enjoy them to be sober considering that enjoyment especially if they be immoderate in their affections toward what they enjoy may but imbitter and put an edge upon an after-tryal 5. When persons are already under some tryals it may please the Lord yet to exercise them with more tryals For here the barren and the widow are under oppression Hereby to omit how this may be procured by hainous sins and peoples incorrigibleness Is 9.12 Lev. 26.21 22 c. 1. The Lord proves his absolute and soveraign dominion to inflict upon the children of men what he pleaseth 2. He prevents security and takes away all grounds of presumption that one tryal shall hide us from another Amos 9.4 But being once shaken loose in any thing we should loose our hearts from all things if the Lord please to strike 3. He discovers more of our weakness that we may be humbled for it and study to amend it by continued and multiplyed tryals than would appear in one tryal only 4. He quickens us to our duty by a new tryal when habitual sit-fast tryals become blunt and we fall asleep under them 5. He teacheth that being once broken with trouble it is sit to hold us still going and in exercise whatever breathing-times we get lest our spirits should be worse imploy'd if we were idle 6. He fits his people for many proofs of his love by the manifold tryals and times that pass over them 2 Cor. 1.5 Doct. 6. It is the height of cruelty and oppression to add affliction to the afflicted For this is marked as an eminent oppression to be punished as soon as any when men evil entreat the barren c. This holds true of Oppressours whether they
Whether he would maliciously curse and renounce God because of affliction This is so far from appearing here that albeit in so hot a furnace it is no wonder he cast a scum yet his case and his carriage being compared together it is Jobs victory and a great foil to Satan that he devords not more And albeit the Lord might by his power and grace have prevented even this measure of failing Yet it was more for his honour that Infirmity broke out so far That his weaknesses might be as comfortable to after-ages as his graces as is before marked and that the power of God might bâ— the more conspicuous in supporting him 2 Cor 12.7 8.9 and grace might shine in his cleaving to God in the midst of all this as appears from the following debate 2. Albeit his weakness do thus for a time break forth when his Reason and Experience are at under and he is sensible of nothing but pain and sorrow yet he doth not persist in this distemper nor is it the only thing that appears in the furnace but he hath much better purpose afterward in the behalf of God And therefore as in a battel men do not judge of affairs by what may occur in the heat of the conflict wherein Parties may retire and fall on again but by the issue of the fight So Job is not to be judged by those fits of distemper seeing he recovered out of them at last and so God himself judgeth of him Jam. 5.11 Yea those violent fits do serve to demonstrate the strength of grace in him which prevailed at last over them all And his victory was the more glorious that his conflict had been sharp From this verse we may learn 1. There are in the most subdued Child of God strong corruptions ready to break forth in tryal For so appears in Job an holy and mortified man as he is described Chap. 1.1 8. and Chap. 31. throughout The best of men ought to be sensible that they have by nature an evil heart of unbelief even when they are strong in the faith that they have luke-warmness under their zeal passion under their meekness c. 2. Albeit natural corruptions may lurk long even in the Furnace of Affliction Yet long and multiplied tentation will bring it forth As here we may gather from Jobs experience who was not only blameless and streight before the tryal came but having stood it out long under his tryal doth now at last discover his weakness Which may teach godly men and even those who have kept their integrity in many tryals to be still upon their guard and not to be high-minded but fear nor sing the triumph because of some petty atchievements before the compleat victory be obtained For 1. Every exercise and tryal will not be a tryal to every man nor an irritation to every corruption within him 2. The length and continuance of a tryal is a new tryal and may discover that which the simple tryal doth not reach as here we see in Job 3. When men get leisure in cold blood to reflect and pore upon their case as Job did during that long silence of himself and his friends it will prove more grievous then at first it doth 4. When men are disappointed of what they expect under trouble as Job was of his Friends comfort it will grieve them more then if they in sobriety had expected no such thing Doct. 3. The Lords in judging of the grace and integrity of his followers doth afford many grains of allowance and graciously passeth overmuch weakness wherein they do not approve themselves For notwithstanding all this weakness yet not only did the Lord before declare him a righteous man but even after the tryal he commends him as a pattern of patience Jam. 5.11 though he had vented so much passion 4. Albeit a small tryal be sufficient to discover weakness in the best of Saints if God leave them to themselves yet most usually their weakness appears not but in great and sharp tryals nor will they be so tenderly indulged if they fail in lesser trials when their exercise is not so sharp Therefore are those bitter fits of Job recorded together with his great and overwhelming trouble that his example may embolden none to allow themselves in the like bitterness and passion when their tryal is nothing like his Verse 2. And Job spake and said 3. Let the day perish wherein I was born and the night in which it was said There is a manchild conceived 4. Let that day be darkness let not God regard it from above neither let the light shine upon it 5. Let darkness and the shadow of death stain it let a cloud dwell upon it let the blackness of the day terrifie it 6. As for that night let darkness seise upon it let it not be joyned unto the days of the year let it not come into the number of the moneths 7. Lo let that night be solitary let no joyful voyce come therein 8. Let them curse it that curse the day who are ready to raise up their mourning 9. Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark let it look for light but have none neither let it see the dawning of the day 10. Because it shut not up the doors of my mothers womb nor hid sorrow from mine eyes In these verses we have an account at large of Jobs wish that he had never been born set down by way of imprecation against the day of his birth ver 3. 9. to which a reason is subjoyned v. 10. The Imprecation is set forth with great variety of purpose and a flood of eloquent expressions suggested by his present sense of trouble and passion And it is denounced First Against that day in all its parts as it comprehends both day and night or is a natural day or 24. hours ver 3. Where he wisheth that albeit sometime it had been a day of good tidings of the birth of a Son it may perish A vain wish importing his desire either that that day had never been or that now it should never come in account among the days of the year or that it never be kept for a birth day as the custom was among some people but whenever it comes about that it be infamous Secondly against the day or that which is the light-part of that natural day ver 4 5. Unto which he wisheth 1. Darkness without light to shine upon it and that not ordinary darkness but like unto the shadow of death which imports great darkness Isa 9.1 2. and elsewhere like the darkness which is in deep pits where the dead are who never see the light or such darkness as seiseth upon the eyes of dying men whose day of life is drawing to the dark shades of death or palpable darkness the horrour whereof might affright men to death This darkness he further wisheth unto it not for a part of the day only but all along a cloud dwelling upon it
are worth the waiting for albeit we be kept in a furnace of affliction These are some of Jobs infirmities which without further descanting upon the words we are to take notice of in this discourse not to conclude him wicked but passionate and to point out what tentations and infirmities we are especially to provide against in an hour of tryal For which end it is that God will have all that Job spake and said ver 2. here recorded To shew that he takes notice of his peoples behaviour under afflictions and to set up a Beacon to all after-ages in the experience of this holy man Vers 11. Why died I not from the womb why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly 12. Why did the knees prevent me or why the breasts that I should suck In these verses we have Jobs second wish to which reasons as subjoyned v. 13. 19. His wish is set down by way of Expostulation of which see on v. 20. And it amounts in sum to this That since his former wish was to no purpose seeing he was born and came into the world he now wisheth he had died so soon as he was born And therefore regrates that in the birth ha was not left in that helpless hour by the Mid-wife or that ever any care was taken of him by laying him when he was born upon their knees or by giving him suck without which he had soon perished From this complaint no less passionate then the former Observe 1. The mercies which he complains to have received of knees preventing him and breasts to give him suck do insinuate to us That so soon as we come into the world we have so many seeds of death in us that every step of our life needs a proof of mercy to preserve it Without the knees to bear us and the breasts to give us suck we would soon return to dust again So that we may truly be said to be born to die and to be going to death from the day wherein we first receive life 2. Job having quit his former wish as unprofitable and impossible he is not for all that brought to submit but bends his wit to devise new ways of his own and with a great deal of Oratory paints them out as plausible Teaching That is no easie task to bring our minds to a conformity with Gods way and will but many divers courses and shifts will we essay rather then submit to God and follow that way of relief which he hath pointed out to us Submission and patience was a nearer and more ready case of Jobs grievances then any of those yet he wâ—ll rather multiply impossible wishes then come to that 3. We may observe how all these mercies of his birth care of him in his infancy c. wherof Saints have esteemed much and made good use Psal 22.9 10 11. are now all become crosses in his account Which as it flows from great ingratitude in him or whosoever shall be found guilty of the like So it teacheth us not to place our happiness in these or any the like common mercies which may be so soon and easily imbittered and made grievous to our frail and corrupt nature Vers 13. For now should I have lien still and been quiet I should have slept then had I been at rest 14. With kings and counsellers of the earth which built desolate places for themselves 15. Or with princes that had gold who filled their houses with silver 16. Or as an hidden untimely birth I had not been as infants which never saw light 17. There the wicked cease from troubling and there the weary be at rest 18. There the prisoners rest together they hear not the voyce of the oppressour 19. The small and great are there and the servant is free from his master His reasons whereby he endeavours to render his passionate wish plausible may be summed up in this one the great rest and quiet like a sleep which he fancieth in death ver 13. This he further amplifieth 1. That whereas he is now abased he had then been equal with the best even with Kings and great Counsellers who built themselves stately Houses or Monuments where desolations had formerly been ver 14. and who had their Houses replenished with wealth ver 15. 2. That at least if he had died from the womb he had been in no worse case then an Abortive and so had prevented all those miseries which befel him since his birth ver 16. 3. That as he fancieth the rest of death is a singular rest beyond any ease he could find here For wicked troublers cannot pursue men thither but they who are wearied with oppression get leave to rest there ver 17. particularly prisoners or slaves are free from their oppressing creditors and exacters ver 18. and death doth so level all as Masters and Servants are equal and Servants are no more under the power of their imperious Masters ver 19. In sum he points out death as a common rest from outward violence and oppression from weakness weariness servitude or any the like toil reflecting in some of those upon his own sufferings by the Sabeans and Chaldeans and upon the wearied and tossed condition of his body In this Reason we may remark those Truths 1. That death is a rest to man from outward troubles whatever they be As is here at length deduced Which in its own kind is a mercy that outward troubles will follow us no further then death if all be well beside 2. That as nothing temporal gives men a priviledge against death Psal 49.6 7 c. So albeit there be diversity of ranks of men here yet death levels all and makes them equal Ezek. 32.21 22 c. For Kings Princes Oppressours the weary small and great the Servant and his Master do all tryst at death and are all alike there But in Jobs reasoning from these considerations and in reference to his scope we will find many mistakes 1. Whatever rest and ease be in death yet it was not the will of God that Job should be resting now but fighting and serving his Generation by the will of God after which he was in due time to fall asleep as Acts 13.36 Now it is our great fault to see a beauty in any temporal condition save in so far as it is the will of God to make it out lot who makes every thing beautiful in its season Eccles 3.11 2. His reasoning imports that his great drift in wishing he had died is his own case Now ease how desirable soever it appear is not to be impatiently sought after But we should rather acquiesce to be on service as it is carved out wherein we may meet with many proofs and experiences of what is in ourselves and in God for us 3. Albeit desires and longings after death be the fools only back-door in trouble Yet death and the rest thereof in it self considered ought nor to be so
partial to himself in this cause It is true Self-love in such a case is not easily discerned nor is Job to be assoiled even as to this yet his way of speaking insinuates that he held this to be a duty 3. It is to be expected that how clear soever men be in their light before trouble cometh yet trouble and tentation come accompanied with darkness and confusion so that they will hardly be able to judge any thing aright of their case or to know what to do For his way wherein he would walk toward an issue is hid See Lam. 3.1 2. Hence we may gather That the sad apprehensions of Saints under trouble ought to be looked upon as the conjectures of these who are groping the dark And they had need to examine well any light they get in an hour of tentation 4. Darkness confusion and perplexity are the immediate fruits of bitterness of spirit whereunto when men give way they involve themselves in a thick cloud much whereof might be prevented by meekness and patience whereby they possess their souls For upon that v. 20 that he is bitter in soul it followeth here his way is hid 5. Whatever way confusion and darkness come upon troubled Saints yet it is a very humbling exercise to be in a strait without knowing Gods mind in it or what to do for relief For this pressed Job to his impatient wishes that his way is hid This layeth a man as an object of great compassion at Christs feet 6. It is another great addition to the perplexities of Saints when as their light is darkned so their attempts to get relief are in vain and where-ever they turn them they are hemmed in with insuperable difficulties till they lose all hope of out-gate For this is a part of his grievous complaint that he is hedged in See Job 19.8 Lam 3.7 This may point out that mens troubles are never insupportable were they never so sad so long as there appeareth any hope of out-gate 7. Mens natural courage will be so far from bearing out under Gods hand that it will only contribute to heighten thâ—ir distemper and disorder when it is crushed and borne down For his complaint is that a strong stout man as the word in the Original is should have his way hid c. His courage and strength cannot shake it off but makes him repine the more 8. It is the duty and great advantage of men in trouble not to lose a sight of Gods hand in their troubles and perplexities Even albeit in stead of meekness which should be the result of that sight it should afflict them the more that their Rock should seem to sell them For Job loseth not this fight that God hath hedged him in though he fail in bâ—ing imbittered at it And albeit Job had a great hand in his own perplexities Yet God is the over-ruler and orderer even of that dispensation And this ought to be looked unto both to humble us when we see that God giveth us up to that confusion and perplexity which we sinfully choose and lets us lie under it till we see the folly of our passions and when we are humbled to encourage us considering that God who hath a holy hand in these distempers can remove them though insuperable by us and can give in due time some meat out of that eater and some blessed advantage and fruit even of our folly From ver 24. Learn 1. It concerns persons in trouble to guard welâ— that they make not a noise without cause For if it be sinful enough to be imbittered when trouble is saddest much more when they are so under very easie trouble Therefore Job to clear that he complained not without cause subjoyns to what he had said to the case in general what his case in particular was which drew on bitterness darkness and perplexity For my sighing cometh c. 2. It is the duty and commendable practice of godly men that how much soever they be weary of life Yet they dare use no unlawful shift to take it away nor neglect any mean of preserving life For while Job is complaining that his life is continued he still makes use of meat as resolving to wait Gods time and way of taking away that life which is so great a burden to him 3. When the spirits of men are broken with trouble whatever diversion lawful Recreations may sometime afford them yet they will not be always effectual Nor will Natural comforts at any time cure Spiritual exercise of mind For saith he my sighing cometh before the face of my meat He had not so much respite as â—o eat without sighing 4. A child of God may be under much perplexity and distress who yet is not able to vent it much through the abundance thereof over whelming him For he mentions his trouble as great even when he doth express it but by sighing and can do no more 5. When great distress of mind once gets an open vent it will be very impetuous and violent so long at the mind is unsubdued before God and the more violent that it bath been long restrained For from more secret sighing he proceeds to roarings lik a Lion who is rather violently over-powered then voluntarily yieldeth This is an expression usually made use of to represent the complaints of those whose great spirits have not yet learned to stoop to God nor have set about repentance Ezek. 24.23 Where in the Original it is Yee shall not mourn nor weep but roar one toward another and Prov. 5.11 the Adulterer shall roar at last as the Hebrew hath it See also Is 59.11 6. The impetuous disorders of mens spirits being once broken loose are not soon stopped in their course but they will abundantly overflow all to the weakning and exhausting of their spirits if grace prevent it not For his roarings were poured out like the waters in respect of the aboundance of them and in respect of the effects of them dissolving and pouring him out like water as Psal 22.14 7. Though Job do thus insist to aggravate his trouble that he may justifie his desire of death and complain that it is denied him Yet the argument is not sufficient to inferr that desire For neither is God to be quarelled nor pleaded with whatever he do nor was Job himself free of bringing on these distempers through his Passion And therefore he had no cause to blame God when himself had perverted his own way Prov. 19.3 Nor ought he to prescribe an out-gate of death to himself whereas he might find a nearer relief by his own patience and meekness And whatever his condition was which made his life heavy and grievous to him Yet it was great cowardise to long to be away only that he might be rid of trouble Sense of sin which cleaveth fast to us while we are in this life or a desire to be with Christ may justifie a moderate desire after death Phil. 1.23 Yea the tâ—oubles we
meet with in our Pilgrimage ought so to loose our roots as we be not unwilling to depart when God cals us But no trouble can warrant us impatiently to long for death In a word it is sweet when love draws our hearts out of time but not when trouble chaseth us out of it Vers 25. For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me and that which I was afraid of is come unto me 26. I was not in safety neither had Trust neither was I quiet yet trouble came The third reason of his Expostulation is taken from his former Piety and carefulness to avoid sin which might provoke God to send on troubles which since it had not succeeded he would be taken away by death Some expound the words as an aggravation of his misery That he never wanted trouble but in his greatest Prosperity was filled with vexations But neither doth this agree with the Scriptures account of his former prosperity Nor do his Friends so understand him who upon these words chiefly do ground their subsequent debates Taking it ill that he who was so afflicted should claim to Piety and a good conscience and so denied his Antecedent that he had been a godly man though now afflicted Whereas they should rather have repelled his Consequence That because he had been a godly man therefore he might lawfully take it ill to be afflicted Considering Gods Soveraign Dominion and infinite wisdome and the reliques of sin which are in the best of men upon which grounds Elihu and God himself do afterwards silence his complaints In asserting of his Piety and Integrity he doth not describe it at large but with reference to his particular case That he was a man who in the height of his prosperity did not betake himself to carnal ease but was still under a fear that a change might come and that he or his might provoke God to shake him out of his quiet estate and therefore laboured to prevent it by frequent addresses to God Chap. 15. And yet all this his solicitude had not availed to prevent trouble This he sets down both positively ver 25 that what he had feared and studied to prevent was come upon him and negatively ver 26. that though he had not been secure yet that had not prevented trouble Both are to one purpose the repetition serving only to shew how much he was affected with it And for further clearing of the purpose Consider 1. If it be enquired How this fear and solicitude can be accounted an evidence of his Piety it being rather like that anxiety which is never in quiet nor contented with any thing and contrary to our allowance to be joyful in prosperity Eccl. 7.14 Ans It would be considered that Job's fear was not a tormenting fear about troubles to come but a fear of wisdom and caution foreseeing trouble that he might prevent it Nor was it a fear opposite to lawful comfort but opposed to carnal security Nor was it a fear causing him to live in a perpetual distrust of God as an Enemy reckoning that undoubtedly he would afflict him But a fear of doing that which might provoke God to afflict him 2. If it be enquired how this profession of his fearing and his not being in safety and quiet agreeth with Chap. 29 18. where he professeth that he resolved to dy in his nest Answ If that expression Chap. 29. of which more fully in its own place doth import any more then his taking lawful comfort in his outward prosperity it doth only point at some sits of security into which sometimes he fell according to which God doth not judge of a man neither doth Job judge so of himself but according to the more constant tenor of his life 3. As for the scope and drift of this complaint and argument It tends in the first place to justifie his excessive roarings under trouble ver 24 to which it is immediately subjoyned by shewing that he could not but be so much disquieted considering how trouble had come upon him a godly man walking so cautiously and tenderly to prevent trouble His design in it is also to confirm his Expostulation with God for continuing of him in life For finding that notwithstanding all his godly care and solicitude and the means he had used to prevent trouble trouble and commotion had come upon him he could not well digest it but would be dead there being no hope that Piety could bring him out of trouble since it had not prevented it Thus doth Job argue but with more Passion then Reason if we consider beside what is afterwards to be marked that God by his absolute dominion may afflict the most holy yea even a sinless creature and that Piety is otherwise richly advantageous though it neither prevent nor remove trouble Nor is a godly mans case so desperate if he reckon right nor his continuance under trouble so unprofitable an exercise as to make him weary of life From this purpose Learn 1. It is a sure evidence of Piety not to be secure in Prosperity but to look on all things as mutable that we may prepare for changes and be afraid to offend God For thus doth Job assert his Piety I was afraid I was not in safety neither had I rest neither was I quiet It is a sinful temper to be like the rich man taking rest and ease in the midst of wealth Luk. 12.18 19. and it is much worse to be secure because of Prosperity when judgments are upon others about us Amos 6.3 6. 2. It is very rare to see tender walkers who are apprehensive of troubles loosed from the creatures and fearing to offend God meet with troubles in reality For Job looks upon it as a strange dispensation that he fearing and not being in quiet yet trouble came It is true the Lord may deal so with the wicked Prov. 10.24 Isa 66.4 Yet the godly do often find that the more they are loosed from the creatures the more assurance they have of enjoying them and that many times apprehended troubles are made their sore exercise when yet they never meet with them in reality Isa 51.12 13. And that because that very antecedent exercise produceth those fruits which are called for under real trouble 3. Whatever be Gods more ordinary way with mortified and exercised Saints yet he hath not so tied himself to this method but that things which they fear may yet come upon them and albeit their hearts be not settled on the creatures yet they may be shaken out of their enjoyments For so did Job find by experience Out mortification preparation fear and other exercises will not always prevent trouble For God may have wise and holy ends for afflicting even such tender walkers that he may try discover and augment their faith and patience may mortifie the remainders of sin in them may glorifie his grace and power in their support under great troubles c. Yet it should be considered that
performing or not performing of them is in mercy Vers 27. Loe this we have searched it so it is hear it and know thou it for thy good This verse contains the Conclusion of the whole Discourse wherein he exhorts Job to hear and notice what is said Considering 1. That it is not rashly uttered but after serious search and grave deliberation 2. That it is true doctrine as they had found both in reason and experience so it is or so the matter stands and so is thy duty as I have told 3. That it would be Jobs good and profit to notice and apply it All this he speaks in name of all the Friends who it seems had consulted about it And indeed all of them all along speak to the same purpose This way of concluding according as Eliphaz judged of the matter and his mistake therein may teach 1. Men should not publish anything in the Name of God particularly to persons in distress but what is truth indeed and well grounded So much doth Eliphaz import while he hath spoken nothing but what he apprehends is so certain as he may say so it is 2. Such as would find out truth especially in the intricacies of Divine Providence ought to search painfully and take all the assistance from others they can have For saith Eliphaz in name of all the rest Lo this we have searched it 3. The advantage of sound Doctrine consists in the Application thereof made by the hearers which it is a pity it should be wanting when men have spent their time and strength to find it out For this is a general truth If a Doctrine be found sound upon search then know thou it for thy good or for thy self is the duty of every particular hearer 4. Such is the frailty of fallible men especially when they are prepossessed with prejudices and corrupt Principles that after much search for truth and confidence that they have found it out so that they dare recommend it to others yet they may still stick in the mire of Errour As here Eliphaz did after this search and his confident Assertion and serious Exhortation to Job CHAP. VI. In this and the following Chapter we have Job's Reply to Eliphaz's large Discourse recorded in the two preceeding Chapters He doth not succumb nor acquiesce in what was said but finding his case much mistaken and the cure mis-applied he replies at length and with much Eloquence in his own defence And that we may take up his scope in this Reply we are to consider that Job chap. 3. had complained that ever he was born or had a being to meet with so much misery and closeth that complaint with a desire to be now dead and a regret that he was not dead In answer to which the scope of Eliphaz's Discourse was To convince Job that it was a great fault yea an evidence of hypocrisie in him who had comforted others to complain so much under trouble Chap. 4 3-6 5.2 and his afflictions proving him wicked Chap. 4.7 c. 5.3 c. it were more fit for him to be seeking Reconciliation with God and studying patience under the hand of God in hope of Restitution then to be thirsting after death in such a condition Chap. 5 6-26 Now Job in answer to all this sheweth 1. That his complaints were not causeless 2. That being confident of his own integrity and hopeless to get through that trouble or to attain that restitution he promised him upon condition of repentance he did well in desiring to die The first of those is propounded ver 1. 7. The second ver 8. 13. Afterward he enlargeth both of them And he insists upon the cause of his complaints in a sad reproof of his friends for their inhumanity and unfaithfulness in dealing so harshly when they should have sympathized with him and comforted him Chap. 6.14 30. And his desire of death is very pathetically enlarged Chap. 7. in a Speech directed to God before his Friends having declined them as no fit Judges So this Chapter after an Historical Transition ver 1. Contains 1. Jobs excusing of his own complaints from the greatness of his trouble ver 2 3 4. and because his Friends afforded nothing that might ease him ver 5 6 7 2. His desire of death not only pressed with great vehemency ver 8 9. but endeavoured to be justified From the comfort he expected in death having the testimony of a good Conscience ver 10. From his inability to endure this trouble ver 11 12. and from his own skill to discern what is best for him ver 13. 3. His sharp reproof of Eliphaz and his other Friends for their inhumanity ver 14. and unfaithful disappointing of his expectation ver 15. 21. which he aggravates from the smalness of the favour which he expected from them ver 22 23. From his readiness to take with wholesom Instruction ver 24 25. From their under-valuing of his condition and what he said ver 26. and in a word From that eminent cruelty and unfaithfulness that appeared in their carriage ver 27.4 A Conclusion subjoyned to the former reproof which also is a Preface to what he hath further to say Wherein he desires that since they had so far mistaken and miscarried they would give him audience to speak for himself ver 28 29 30. Vers 1. But Job answered and said 2. Oh that my grief were throughly weighed and my calamity laid in the ballances together THe scope of the first part of the Chapter is to prove that Job had cause to complain as he did as is darkly expressed ver 5. and is to be understood throughout the rest of the verses And his first Argument ver 2 3 4. from the greatness of his trouble may be put in this form He whose great trouble presseth him so hard as he must seek some ease by complaining ought not to be censured as an impatient man or wicked But such is my trouble as will be found by any who shall weigh it impartially Therefore c. As for the force of this Argument in general or the first Proposition This may be granted 1. That men should not bewray their own unsubduedness by making too much noise about ordinary and lesser troubles But they should be put to it before they complain For Job doth not justifie his complaints if his trouble be not great 2. That Saints under great trouble are tenderly pitied by God when they pour forth their complaints to seek ease to themselves Provided they pour them out in Gods own bosom As we find Saints have laid their grievous tentations before him Isa 63.17 Jer. 15 18. But 3. Albeit God do tenderly pity the bitterness of his Children as pondering their grievous tentations and great troubles which extort those distempers and passions from them and will be far from judging them hypocrites or wicked men because of these fits of passion as Eliphaz did Yet this is withal to be considered that no
dispositions sutable to their condition whatever it be Vers 8. O that I might have my request and that God would grant me the thing that I long for 9 Even that it would please God to destroy me that he would let loose his hand and cut me off Followeth to ver 14. Jobs desire of death which he laboureth to press and justifie by divers Arguments He bringeth it in upon the back of the former debate thus That though they would not give him leave to complain or desire death yet he seeing no comfort within time nor hope beside would take leave His desire is propounded ver 9. That God who is Soveraign Lord of life would be pleased to destroy him and would not measure out affliction by piece-meal and with a bound up hand but would let loose his hand and make an end of him which he might easily do any death so it were speedy being better as he thought then his present condition This sute he ushers in and presseth from the ardency of his desire ver 8. He had desired it before Chap. 3. and now being the worse of their essays to cure him and of more hopeless of any comfortable issue in this life his longing after death is increased This desire hath been spoken to in part Chap. 3.20 It argues great presumption in limiting of God and doating on a remedy of his own prescribing as if it only could serve his turn And albeit he had the testimony of a good Conscience so that he needed not fear death yet many desires had been more sutable then that he should venture on any death from Gods hand and that as it might seem in justice and when he is already lying under so much of that kind It teacheth 1. God is Lord of our life who can take it away when where and by what means he will For so much doth Job's desire import that he can destroy and cut off at his pleasure 2. An afflicted mind is a great strait and pressure so that many sharp dispensations would be a deliverance if they made men rid of it For Job's pressure of mind is such that it makes him account a violent death a deliverance They who enjoy peace and tranquility of mind in sad times have an easie part of it And men would beware to make a breach upon their inward peace by shifting outward trouble See Matth. 10.28 Many by sinful shifting of trouble have been brought to that extremity that many deaths would have been easier 3. A tentation once fixed in a broken spirit cannot easily be pulled out again For Job cannot be driven from this desire on which he hath once fixed but he presseth it over and over again Men had need to beware of the first rise of such distempers and to crush them in the bud 4. Albeit a Child of God may be pestered and haunted with many sinful passions and desires in his trouble yet it is his mercy to be kept from sinful actings in prosecution of those desires For in the midst of this heat of desire Job's honesty appears in that he will not help God to take away his life how much soever he desire death but will wait on him if he may be pleased to grant his desire in his own way Some sparks of honesty may appear even in the greatest weakness of Saints As to his ardency and fervour in pressing his desire it hath been spoken to Chap. 3.21 22. and that men in their distempers are very earnest that God would do what they desire though yet it were oft-times a sad judgment if God should grant it seeing they may in that case be apt to desire that most which is most prejudicial to them Yea our ardent desires after any outward lot are oft times too great an evidence that we are wrong To these add 1. Job's practice holds forth a right pattern though in a wrong instance of pursuing our lawful desires By praying and requesting for it and a longing expectation backing the Prayer and so renewing the sute often and walking under the delay as they who are afflicted and affected thereby Psal 88.11 12 13. This being Job's practice in so unwarrantable a desire it may give a check to our sluggishness in more honest desires 2. When men give way to sinful tentations they may in Gods holy Providence meet with many occasions to entertain them As Job here longing after death his Friends disappointing of him adds fuel to the fire and makes it more vehement as thinking he was hereby confirmed in the equity of his desires Thus tempters of God fall in snares Mal. 3.15 and hearkners also to false Prophets Deut. 13.1 2 3. This may terrifie men who enter upon a way without a rule and warrant that they may meet with such snares and every confirmation they think they meet with in their way may humble them if they consider that God thereby gives them up to strong delusions Vers 10. Then should I yet have comfort yea I would harden my self in sorrow let him not spare for I have not concealed the words of the holy One The first Argument whereby he labours to justifie this desire is taken from the comfort he expected having the testimony of a good Conscience He professeth that notwithstanding all that had befaln him or could be in a violent death he should yet have comfort if it were a coming or already come And though it might be apprehended that he would repent and cool of that courage when it came to the push He professeth he would harden himself in sorrow he would harden and confirm his heart against that way of death or any sorrow attending it yea or any sorrow in the mean time provided that death were near and the sorrow hastning it forward And for a proof of this his courage and resolution he renews his request and desires that God will not spare Not that he dares desire to be dealt with in justice but it imports only his desire not to be spared as to cutting of him off but the sharper usage the better so it made an end of him And the ground of all this courage was that he had not concealed the words of the holy One he had been a sincere Professour of Gods Truth and had spoken truth in this particular that he was an upright man Or he had not put out the light of Gods Truth in his mind nor cancelled the Seal of his Spirit in his heart by sin Rom. 1.18 and had held forth the Truth of God in his Profession and Practice Psal 40.10 Phil. 2.15 16. And all this he did because God is the Holy One not to be dallied with and who cannot approve of sin By all which he clears that his desire of death was not a desperate wish but grounded upon the testimony of a good Conscience and his hope to be approved when he should come to be judged by God and not by men In this Discourse it flowed indeed from Jobs
weakness that his good Conscience could afford him no comfort but in this out-gate of death which was of his own devising whereas the testimony of his Conscience had been better imployed in bearing patiently the present trouble And indeed we are ordinarily better in our own conceit at any thing then what is our present work and duty and do fancy that we could like any case but our present lot when yet it is the will of God we should take it as it is Yet herein 1. We may with admiration behold the invincible power of a good Conscience that cannot only grapple with death when it cometh but can run to meet it and that on any tearms and at greatest disadvantage and can even then expect comfort in and by it So was it with Job here I should yet have comfort c. A good Conscience is neither afraid of death nor of wrath as it should seem cutting us off nor even of destroying of foundations Psal 11.3 4. nor of any trouble Job 34.29 even which may shake others Isai 33.14 15 16. And the reason of this is every lot to the reconciled man hath this in it from God fear not ye Mat. 28.5 Which may invite men to be careful that their own hearts do not condemn them 1 Joh. 3.21 Act. 24.16 2. We may hence also gather That no fortitude against death or any trouble is worth the speaking of but what is grounded on a good Conscience For Job founds his resolution and comfort on this I have not concealed the words of the holy One. Natural Magnanimity is of little worth without this Only they who would be resolute and magnanimous upon the account of a good Conscience ought not only to have a good Conscience in the particular cause and matter of their tryal but in their other carriage also the want whereof will weaken their hands in most cleanly tryals and especially wherein Job was somewhat faulty in the way of their deportment under trouble which ought to be such as may witness that it is Conscience and not their own spirits that lead them Jam. 1.20 3. Men in trying their resolution and courage flowing from a good Conscience ought not to take themselves at the first word but ought to search and search again For so doth Job repeat his confidence upon this ground once and again I should yet have comfort yea I would harden my self in sorrow let him not spare Our hearts are very deceitful in undertaking and therefore godly jealousie fear and suâ—pition are oft-times antecedent to true courage Hab. 3.16 17 18. 4. The testimony of a good Conscience yielding hope of a blessed issue will make present trouble to be tolerable and more easie For Job expecting to be approved of God at death would yet have comfort and harden himself in sorrow in expectation of so great a good 5. Such as would approve themselves to be sincere ought to entertain right thoughts of God particularly of his holiness For the rise of his upright walk was that he looked on God as the holy One. This doth not only evince that God is not to be reflected upon in any of his dealings Psal 22.3 and in this Job's Principles were sound though his Passions did sometimes over-drive him to complain But doth also teach that none can have communion with God but such as study holiness nor can the holy God endure wickedness Psal 5.5 6 7. Hab. 1.13 And they who want holiness may come to him the Fountain of Holiness to get it 6. Such as do rightly improve the study of the holiness of God to press the necessity of real holiness upon themselves ought with Job not to conceal the words of the holy One. Which imports 1. God must be taken up obeyed and acknowledged according as he hath revealed himself and his will in his Words For they had the words of God among them even in Jobs days though not yet written and to those he cleaves neither lying of God by Error contrary to his Word nor taking up God and his Will according to his own fancy and humour 2. When God reveals his will in any particular it is our duty not to smother or put out our light and so sin against God and his Deputy in our bosom but we ought to avow and profess it in our station For he concealed not these words 3. Beside our Profession of Truth we must be careful not to belie it in our practice For thus also he concealed not the words of the holy One as is above explained Vers 11 What is my strength that I should hope and what is mine end that I should prolong my life 12. Is my strength the strength of Stones or is my flesh of Brass The second Argument wherein he appeals to themselves is taken from his inability to subsist under this trouble and consequently the improbability of the restitution they promised him upon his repentance He had no strength that might give him ground of hope to bear this trouble and avoid death and upon his repentance to be restored as Eliphaz promised unto him For he had not flesh with sense only as Beasts have but with reason also which sharpeneth crosses Far less was his flesh of stones or brass which want both sense and reason to endure this and therefore nothing was fitter for him then to resolve for death As for those words What is mine end c Some understand them thus For what end should I live which is a very sinful question if God will have us live Others thus What evil is in mine end that I should be afraid to die wherein can death prejudice me that I should so seek to avoid it But it agrees best with the rest of the purpose thus as if Job had said Seeing my strength is so disproportionable to my trouble my end by the ordinary course of nature especially being so crushed cannot be far off So that it were folly suppose I should be delivered to hope for any continuance of time wherein I might get reparation of these great evils or what can I expect or design in the rest of my short time that I should seek to prolong it and not presently desire to die So doth himself express it Chap. 16.22 In sum his Argument is this He hath neither strength to subsist under these troubles till he should repent and be restored as Eliphaz had prescribed nor could he look for any thing in the declining part of his life the expectation whereof might encourage him to endure his present troubles till he attained it But he had rather lose all the expected good before he endured the present troubles waiting for it This Argument thus explained doth insinuate these Truths 1. God hath made mans constitution such as it is easily subduable by afflictions For Jobs strength could afford him no hope of bearing through till he saw an issue on the back of troubles Man is made weak and more infirm then brass
things may concurr to corrupt the senses of men in particular exigents Prosperity may blunt their tenderness and bribe their light to allow them ease Desertion as befel David in the matter of Bathsheba and Hezekiah in the matter of the Ambassadours of the King of Babylon may draw forth proofs of weakness and good men may miscarry under it especially when they are not sensible that they are deserted but the refreshments of prosperity do supply the the room of spiritual life And troubles do readily produce a feverish distemper of senses especially when false Christs appears in time of trouble Matth. 24 22 23 24. This may teach us to walk in a continual jealousie of our selves and not to lean to our own understanding Prov. 3.5 CHAP. VII Job having in the preceeding Chapter excused his own complaints renewed his desire of Death and sharply rebuked his Friends for their inhumane cruelty and for their being deficient in that duty he might have expected from them in his need and withal having exhorted them that laying aside prejudices they would take a second look of his condition He now in this Chapter for their further Information falls on a new Discourse concerning his case wherein he labours to justifie his desire of death desires pity and commiseration and complains he can find it at no hand So in this Chapter 1. He studies to justifie his desire of death For seeing mans life was not perpetual but had a prefixed period ver 1. and it being lawful for all oppressed creatures to seek a lawful and attainable out-gate ver 2. Why might not he seek that lawful out-gate of death who was afflicted beyond others ver 3 4. and so neer unto death that he expected not ease but by it ver 5 6. 2. He pleads for pity in regard of his frailty and his miserable and hopeless condition ver 7 8 9 10. 3. He complains sadly of Gods dealing toward him and having resolved to ease himself that way ver 11. regrets that his trouble was greater then he needed to tame him ver 12. that it was uncessant ver 13 14. and put him to hard shifts ver 15 16. And that God needed not deal so severely with him either for tryal ver 17 18 19. or for punishment of his sin ver 20 21. Vers 1. Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth are not his days also like the days of an hireling IN this Discourse concerning Job's desire of death I need not debate whether the discourse be directed to God to move him to grant him that desired out-gate or to his Friends to convince them of their errour in the matter as he judged it For both may be intended in the Discourse as spoken in their audience to God His conclusion or particular desire of death is no further expressed here then in that general Proposition v. 2. and as it may be gathered from the Arguments and the account he gives of the causes pressing him to seek after it Only it is more expressly afterward poured out in the complaint His Arguments justifying this desire may be taken up in that one sum set down in the Analysis of the Chapter But for more clear unfolding of the Text I shall take up three Arguments in it Whereof the first in this verse is taken from the condition of mans life which is not to be perpetual but limited by God to such a period at which it shall end as a Souldier hath a set time of his warfare and watching and an hireling of working And therefore he thinks he may safely desire that end of his task and service on which all men ought to be resolving This argument he holds forth in a general Proposition and appeals to God or his Friends Consciences to which soever of them we take the speech to be directed if this were not a truth That there is an appointed time for man upon earth it being prefixed by God and mans frailty as his name here in the Original imports holding out that he cannot be perpetual within time The word rendered an appointed time signifieth also a warfare which is very opposite to the purpose in hand as not only pointing at the condition of mans life being a perpetual toil and a condition of many tentations and hazards such as a souldier is exposed to in wars See Chap. 10.17 But serving also illustrate the matter of prefixing a period to mans life man being like a Souldier who hath a prefixed age for his coming on service and for going off as Miles emeritus Or a certain time for which he is conduced for such a service in war and afterward disbanded and dismissed Or a prefixed time for standing on his Watch as Centinel after which he is relieved And to this purpose also serveth that other similitude of an hirelings days both pointing at their hard service and toil and the prefixed time for which they are hired This General Proposition holds forth these truths 1. The time of our life is prefixed to us by God There is an appointed time to man upon earth See Job 14.5 Which as it gives us no latitude for unwarrantable hazarding of our life for we ought to live according to his appointment who hath appointed our time So it may teach us not to live as those who are Masters of their own time Isa 56.12 Luk. 12.19 20. To be willing to die when God declares we shall live no longer for many are so far from Job's temper here that they come not the length of duty in this and not to fear them who threaten our life for his sake for they will not get our life till his time come Psal 31 13 14 15. 2. Mans life will end his glass will run and his course draw at last to a period For there is but an appointed time for man upon earth Let men think to make themselves never so perpetual yet they cannot avoid death Psal 49.6 c. Which men ought seriously to think upon Gal. 11.9 and not to be excessively eager in seeking great things seeing they must die and leave them all 3. Our life till we come to the period of it is like unto a warfare wherein as good Souldiers we are not to serve or please our selves 2 Tim. 2.4 nor to dispute our Generals Orders and should resolve to be in perpetual motion and travail and watching to â—un many hazards and look for no issue but either absolute victory or death or to be led captives by Satan And it is also like the dayes of an hireling who is bound to many hard services and much toil So much doth the Text hold forth and they who look otherwise on their life will be deceived Yet in all this we have this encouragement That we are doing our Captain and Master service that we are working our own work as well as his for a Souldier earns pay and an hireling wages by his work and that the worst of it will
have an end As for the Inference that Job would draw from this Proposition That because mans life hath a prefixed period therefore he might peremptorily desire to attain this end of his toil It is faulty in divers respects the observing whereof may give light in the rest of his Discourse And 1. The condition of our life before God is not in all respects like the condition of a Souldier or hireling For our task and service is just debt as theirs is not always it is not needed by God as men need the assistance of Souldiers and Servants we have no skill of our selves to do our work as they have nor do we know our term-day as they do and therefore cannot prescribe it Unless we take him up to be God and our selves but creatures we will never steer a steady course especially under trouble 2. It is ill reasoning to say that because God hath determined our time therefore we should fix the end of it when we will For God hath kept up that from us that we may be ready either to die or honour him in the World as he shall please to order 3. Because there is an end of our toil it is ill argued that when toil cometh we should seek presently to be at the end of it Whereas we should rather bear it couragiously remembering the end of the Lord and that it will not be perpetual Jam. 5.11 4. It was unseasonable for Job to wish so eagerly for the end of his warfare and toil when such a dark cloud was betwixt God and him Saints have acknowledged â—t a mercy that death was kept off in such a condition Lam. 3.22 Psal 27 13. But this was an evidence of his great distress and of his distemper of mind which corrupted his sense and discerning Vers 2. As a servant earnestly desireth the shadow and as an hireling looketh for the reward of his work 3 So am I made to possess months of vanity and wearisome nights are appointed me 4. When I lie down I say When shall I arise and the night be gone and I am full of tossings to and fro unto the dawning of the day The second Argument which presseth the former and cleareth it is taken from that common liberty allowed to all creatures in their strait to press and long for a possible and lawful out-gate The sum of it is as if Job had said If hirelings being weary do long after refreshment and the end of their task when they shall receive their wages So may I under my troubles long after death which is the appointed end of my toil and that so much tâ— rather as my task is sorer then any of theirs In this Argument Consider First The Proposition of the Argument in a comparison ver 2. That as a wearied servant oâ— hireling longeth after some cool shadow or the shadow of the night wherein he may rest and longeth â—oâ— the time wherein he may receive his wages For to work as it is in the Original is taken not â—o much oâ— the end of work as for the reward of it Psal 10â— 20. Jer. 22.13 So mighâ— he long for death whâ—â—e he expected to find the only true eâ—se of his grievances and reward of his integrity In this reasoning beside the former mistakes we may further add 1. That bâ—â—ng an hireling to so great and so good a Master and so uncertain of the length of his day he ought so to long for the close oâ— it as yet he prescribed not to God 2. It was his fault to look on death as the only out-gate and shadow from this â—oil â—â—â—peâ—â—ing that sufficient grace and proofs of love in the midst of trouble might have relâ—â—sheâ— him 3. It was also his fault to eye so much his own ease and the reward of his integrity and that he 〈…〉 rather condescend to what might honour God and edifie others albeit it were greivous to himself as was Paul's practice Phil. 1.22 25. Every one of those mistakes and faults may afford us Instruction But further these Lessons may be observâ—d in it 1. It pleaseth God to let some of Adam's posterity endure much toil in earning their bread that they may be sensible of sin and that others may learn thankfulness who have an easier lot though they be in the same guilt and of the same lump For so is held out in the instance of those wearied servants and hirelings Yea it is to be marked that though many are not put to those hard pinches yet even the greatest of men want not their own toil 2. It is ordinary for men not to find rest in their present condition but they are driven still to look after somewhat they want before them For so are servants and hirelings put to desire and look for somewhat they want And this holds not only true of men in great misery but generally of all men while they are within time Contentment with every estate is a choice lesson Phil. 4.11 Heb. 13.5 and would be more easily attained if men remembered they are within time where complete satisfaction is not to be expected and if they were studying to get the right use of every lot as it cometh 3. The many tossings and vexations wherewith the godly are essayed within time may allow them to look toward death with submission to the will of God as a sweet issue and to make it welcom when it cometh For this comparison imports that there is a lawful desire of death as the servant desires the shadow See 2 Cor. 5.4 Rom 8.23 A spiritual mind finds many calls thither though with submission and therefore do Saints find so many worms in their goâ—â—ds Only it should be our care that a desire to be freed from sin and a body of death do chiefly prevail with us to look to that issue 4. Death will never be a shadow to a man from his trouble who hath not so walked as he may expect a reward of his integrity then also For so much also doth the similitude import As the hireling looks both for the shadow and reward of his work so they whoÌ„ look comfortably on death must see both these in it And therefore a desperate desire of death in wicked men is abominable Secondly we have to consider the amplification and further pressing of this Argument from his particular case ver 3 4. Where in stead of inferring from that Proposition ver 2. that he might long for death as servants do for the shadow or more earnestly long for that issue then they do for their ease He only sheweth that he had greater cause so to long then they had being more hardly put to it And to prove this he holds out the dissimilitude betwixt his case and an hirelings in two 1. The hirelings task is ordinarily for a day but this was much longer even whole Moneths of vanity or eminently vain for any fruit of ease or comfort otherwise in respect of perfection all
Job's mistake in his reasoning teach us It was his mistake to conclude that he would shortly die were the probabilities never so pregnant since God by his soveraign Providence might interpose as afterward he did Secondly He proves it from a general Proposition of his case ver 6. which may relate especially to the days of his former prosperity not secluding the days of his whole life which were for most part spent in prosperity which were more swiftly passed away then the Weavers shuttle crosseth the breadth of the Web and were spent without hope of recovery And therefore there was nothing for him but death and the fair encouragements they held out to invite him to repentance were to no purpose And so however he complained that days of trouble were long ver 3 4. yet here he complains that his days of prosperity were soon over From this regret we may Learn 1. As the days of our life are short and being over are irrecoverable so men are ready out of partiality and self-love to think that good days end too soon and ill-days though indeed short of them last too long As Job here regrets the speedy spending of his former days while he looks on a short while of trouble as intolerably long 2. Our days of greatest prosperity or our longest life in the world will when it is over seem but short and nothing as here Job reckons See Isa 38.12 Psal 90.9 Which may discover the emptiness of time and of the enjoyments thereof however we delude our selves therewith 3. As hope is a man's last refuge in trouble as here Job when his days are spent looks next if any hope remain So sense will soon lose hopes when there is no cause why it should do so For so doth Job's sense conclude here that his days were spent without hope whereas there was hope in his end And here men ought to guard that they become not so effeminate and delicate through prosperity as a blast of trouble will faint their spirits and ruine their hopes Vers 7. O remember that my life is wind mine eye shall no more see good 8. The eye of him that hath seen me shall see me no more thine eyes are upon me and I am not 9. As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away so he that goeth down to the grave shall come up no more 10. He shall return no more to his house neither shall his place know him any more The second part of the Chapter may be taken up as an Exhortation to his Friends and particularly to Eliphaz who spake last in name of all the rest for the word is in the singular â—â—mber That considering his case that it was irrecoverable ver 7 8 and he might see it was so ver 8. and that he was shortly to be cut off from all the comforts of time ver 9 10 they would deal more tenderly with him and not crush him or drive him from his confidence in God or feed him with false hopes upon condition of his repentance which he never expected to see But considering that the following complainâ— is directed to God we may rather take this also as a desire directed to God wherein he pleads for pity in regard of his sad case and apprehending present death in its ugly shape and reflecting upon God's dealing with him he is forced to cry unto God that he would pity him and moderate the extremity of his afflictions as David also pleads Psal 39.13 In it we may consider First His case which he layeth out before God in great variety of expressions 1. That his life is wind v. 7 His former prosperity being passed away like a puffe of wind and his life now hanging by a thread of breath ready to pass away and never to return See Psal 78.39 Jam 4.14 2. That his eye shall see no more good ver 7. and the eye of him that hath seen him shall see him no more ver 8. That is He should never enjoy his former prosperity nor others see him repossessed of it or being dead he should be deprived of all worldly comforts and of any opportunity of conversing with his former acquaintance 3. That Gods eye being upon him he is not v. 8. That is being once dead if God should relent and desire to see him and do him good he should not find him of which ver 21. or rather That God thus fastening his eye upon him in anger would look him to nothing 4. He illustrates the state of the dead wherein he expected shortly to share by a similitude ver 9 10. That as a cloud being spent with pouring out of rain evanisheth and doth not return again to wit the same cloud in number otherwise clouds the same in kind do return Eccl. 12.2 so man being once spent by trouble and sent to the grave can no more return or have to do with his house and station then if they had never known one another In all which Discourse we would not understand Job as if he were denying the Resurrection of the body or the good things of heaven after death For in those things he is very clear Chap. 19.25 26 27. But he is only asserting that in ordinary there is no returning after death to this life to enjoy the good things of time as Isa 38.11 Secondly We are to consider his sute in reference to this his case which is comprehended in one earnest desire that God in afflicting him would remember as it is ver 7. this his frailty and how soon he would be shaken out of time By Gods remembring which is spoken of him after the manner of men we are to understand his pondering and weighing of his condition and his strength to bear it as Psal 78.39 and his giving proof of his affection by helping pitying and relenting toward him as he found his need require as the desires of afflicted Saints are elsewhere summarily comprehended in this one word Psal 74.2 From this whole purpose thus explained we may Learn 1. The true means of getting ease in troubles and grievances is neither our reasoning with men or with our selves but our laying out of our case before God As is Job's practice here Without this our counsels in our own hearts will not diminish our sorrow Psal 13.2 See also Gen. 25.22 2. Trouble when sanctified contributes not a little to make common truths be well studied and sensibly pondered For so doth Job in his trouble speak so sensibly of the frailty of his life and his estate in death Whereas want of exercise makes nauseating and unfruitful hearers even of the most precious truths 3. The things of time are indeed good things as Job here call's them See also Luk. 16.25 They supply many of mans defects and prevent many of his anxieties They are evidences of the goodness of God Matth. 5.44 45. especially to those who are themselves pure and to whom the use of those things is sanctified by the Word and
v. 10 11 12. which now he wishes had never been Ingratitude is an heinous sin in it self and will produce ill humours 3. When any condition how empty and poor soever seems better to men thâ—n what they have and what God hath sweetned with many proofs of his love For he dwells upon his dying from the womb as a sweet condition v. 19. which yet would have deprived him of many proofs of Gods love which he had found in his life God is better and kinder to his people then they many times wish to themselves 4. When men are so devoted to themselves and their own will that they will quarrel all that God doth if it fit not their mind as if all things were to be foâ— them and subservient to their humour For he complains that he was not carried from the womb to his grave only because it would have prevented his great trouble and kept him at great case Selfishness is an ill toot of much distemper 5. When mens passions having distempered them they lay the blame upon Providence As he urgeth this as an argument against Gods dealing that it made him thus discontent with his life Whereas if he had been more sober and borne his trouble and the testimony of his Conscience with more calmness it would have prevented those distempers See Prov. 19.3 Vers 20. Are not my days few cease then and let me alone that I may take comfort a little 21. Before I go whence I shall not return even to the land of darkness and the shadow of death 22. A land of darkness as darkness it self and of the shadow of death without any order and where the light is as darkness In the close which is the second part of the Chapter Job begins to calm a little and in stead of his former expostulating with God and his last great fit of discontent v. 18 19. he tacitly submits to Gods will that he is alive and in what he hath done And seeing death in its own colours he will not rashly hazard upon it but craves this only that he may have some respite and breathing and a little ease in his life For 1. His days were short and he was not like to live long Therefore he would have some speedy help that he might draw his breath a little and have opportunity to shew that he was not the man that his Friends esteemed him or his passion seemed to prove him to be v. 20. 2. Albeit he believed a Resurrection and believed never to go to Hell and knew what it was to die in Christ who is the destroyer of death for he speaks to none of those here nor are his words to be taken in any sense relating to those yet death in it self is ugly being without restitution in this life being a dark and dâ—â—â—ry estate without any order of variety or vicissitude of light and darkness wherein much of this worlds beauty consists but whereas light comes in its turn here it is still darkness there even most dark as darkness it self as it beseems those shadows of death and the grave to be Therefore he would have some change of his condition here before he go to that unchangeable state and some blink of light and comfort before he entered into that dark passage and habitation ver 21 22 with 20. This Doctrine laying aside his mistake of speedy death by this trouble may safely be admitted with little caution as containing only a desire of that which God afterward granted to him though yet it was not necessary he should be peremptory in such a sute It teacheth 1. Saints highest sits of passion will not last but mercy will reclaim them and give them a cool of that Feaver As Job found here 2. As the Feavers and distempers of Saints may come to a very great height So ordinaâ—â—ly that height or excess of them proves the step next to their cool As Job here calms after that â—â—â—â—ly of passion v. 18 19. As God pitieth them in theâ—â—â—xtremities so their very rising to an height and extreâ—â—ty 〈◊〉 â—â—use themselves relent whereaâ— they would have thought less of their passionâ— if they continued moâ—◠〈…〉 3. Humble sober Prayer is a notable 〈…〉 and mean in calming distempered spirits it is as the shower to allay that boisterous wind For Job fâ—lls a praying in stead of quarrelling when he calms See Phil. 4.6 4. As mans life is but uncertain and short so the thoughts of this should make men imploy their time well and to be very needy and pressing after God and proofs of him and where it is thus improved it is an argument of pity and help For so much may be gathered in general from Job's arguing Are not my days few cease then c. though he mistook in his particular case that himself was shortly to die See Psal 39.13 89.47 5. Such as are exercised with much trouble and have their exercises blessed to them will be sober and esteem much of little case to get leave to breath or to comfort and refresh themselves a little with a sight of God or of his grace in them and not their own passions which they ought to abhor For this is his sute when calmed to get comfort a little not only liberty to breath from sore trouble but especially to get his spirit calmed from these passions which he now abhors in himself They who are indeed humble will not despise small things Zech. 4 10. and a victory over their own spirit will be their greatest deliverance 6. The least ease breathing or comfort under trouble cannot be had but of Gods indulgence He must cease and let him alone from vexing of him before he take comfort a little See Joh 34.29 7. It is the duty of men to acquaint themselves with death before-hand and especially in times of trouble they should study it in its true colours For Job in his trouble is so acquainted with it that he can here very pathetically describe it This is Moses study when God is making havock of the Rebels in the Wilderness Psal 90. 8. Death and the Grave in themselves and when Christs victory over them is not studied and men are hurried away to them in a tempest of trouble are very terrible and an ugly sight as bringing an irreparable loss as to any restitution in this life and being so dark and disconsolate an estate that the very common favour of a vicissitude of day and night light and darkness is a mercy when compared with it For so doth Job describe that estate here as it may appear to an afflicted Saint as he was or to one at a distance from God much more may it appear so to men in an unrenewed state or nature And indeed death is in it self a curse and if any find a beauty in it or get a sweeter sight of it it is by the special gift of God And withal it cuts the thread of our life upon which all our
opposition in this quarrel For saith he Tho is he that will plead with me See Rom. 8.35 c. Such wrestlings of faith will hold our griâ—â— will encourage and enable us to purge out any dross which tentations do discover to weaken confidence and will bring many proofs of Gods love And wherefore is faith given to us but that it may stand in such assaults 3 Saints are oft-times hard put to it with trouble so that not only they are weary but like to be crushed thereby For Job is at giving up the ghost with it This should not be mistaken by godly men when it is their lot and as they should labour to avoid this extremity of being crushed and not complain that they want exercise which it may be God knows they could not bear so they should be careful not to be secure and at ease when God is calling them to be exercised 4. When Saints are most hardly put to it by trouble there are still some means appointed which being essayed will bring some case As hâ—râ— Job supposeth there is somewhat to be done which may prevent his giving up the ghost 5. Albeit we should not make too much noise of our exercises and we are not truly exercised if we be proud of it yet even to vent our grievances by speech will be some ease to a troubled mind and when we are under any distress we ought not to be Satans Secretaries to conceal it but should vent it to God and if need require to others also For this is Job's way of ease to tell his â—ase If I hold my tongue I shall give up the Ghost To smother our condition is ill not only when God furnisheth us with good matter Job 32.18 19 20. or when we would keep up guilt Psal 32.3 4. But even under distress of mind our grief will grow by not telling it to God Yea many time we may conceal and hide our condition as singular which others have experienced as well as we and would clear unto us if it were communicate unto them Only we ought so to manage our expression of our distresses whether to God or men as our griefs be not augmented thereby as Psal 77.3 If we open those wounds without some exercise of faith if we do only complain forgetting thankfulness or if we complain only to others without pouring out most of our complaint in Gods own bosom Ezek. 24.23 the essay of this Remedy will but augment the Disease 6. It is an evidence of humility at least of one in a low and pitiful condition when any lawful mean of ease is much thought of when men are willing to be at pains to refresh themselves and when ease of grief by venting of it is looked on as some out-gate For so was it with Job here who was willing to speak lest if he held his tongue he should give up the ghost Such as despise any lawful mean of comfort or the least measure of lawful ease or will not be active to take off what they can of the weight of their own pressures they are not sick enough at least not humbled under their afflictions and exercises 7. The expressions of afflicted Saints ought to be tenderly constructed as being forced upon them through the vehemency of their distress For thus was Job driven upon his complaint lest silence should hazard his life Men that would censure Saints expressions under trouble ought not only to consider what they say but whether they say it willingly and maliciously or whether it be extorted from them through the violence of tentation Vers 20. Only do not two things unto me then will I not hide my self from thee 21. Withdraw thine hand far from me and let not thy dread mâ—ke me afraid 22. Then call thou and I will answer or let me speak and answer thou me After all these reasons justifying Resolution Job proceeds in the third part of the Chapter to his actual reasoning with God which continues till the end of his Discourse To which in these verses he premits a desire by way of Caution that God would grant him two suits and then he would confidently compete and not hide himself as one afraid to enter the lists v. 20. Namely That God would ease him of his present trouble and That he would not confound him with hâ— dreadful Majesty v. 21. Upon which terms he offers unto God his choice of the weapons either to propound or answer as being ready himself to turn either Plaintiffe or Defendant as God pleased v 22. This his desire is the same in substance with what he formerly propounded Chap. 9 34 and almost in words also Only his Hands here is put for his Rod there And he would have this not only taken away but far away that he might not only not smart under it but might not be terrified with the fear of its return And though upon the one hand both his desire and his offer that God may pursue or defend as he pleaseth cannot be excused as free of passion and therefore he is challenged for those both by Elihu and by God himself For in his desire to God v. 20 21. he doth indirectly reflect upon God who had put him to such disadvantages in maintaining his integrity and he attempts to limit God to such a way of dealing with him when he should rather have sought patience and submission to his lot such as it was His offer also vers 22. is too bold and presumptuous as if he could either defend or pursue in maintaining all he saith when though it be true he was an honest man yet neither his desire of death noâ— yet his way of managing the defence of his integrity were justifiable Yet upon the other hand he is not to be too strictly censured as his Friends did seeing all these bold offers do witness his confidence and great honesty though miâ—ed with much perturbation and passion Nor doth he thus challenge and offer to debate with God considered as a severe Judge nor yet doth he intend to plead perfection before him but only to plead his sincerity in his sight as a Father in a Mediatour From the words thus cleared Learn 1. It is the duty and commendation of Saints especially under trouble to be well acquainted with their own condition how things are with them and what they would be at For Job's so frequent repeating of this desire tells so much and that he was not fleeting but knew where he was pinched 2. When Saints are left on God in their troubles they may have many humbling impediments in their approaches to him which will make them ready to hide themselves For so was it with Job here v. 20. See on v. 3. Godly men are not to mistake as if their case were desperate when they are undone without Gods immediate help and yet many things are in their way to deterr them from approaching to him 3. Whoever be the Instruments of the Saints
but that a set time will put an end to it Thus also doth the Psalmist rowze up his confidence under tentations Psal 77.8 9 10. which is worthy of imitation 2. He desires not death desperately as it is only a back-door to shun present trouble but he propounds this extraordinary desire in a way of believing and bodeing well of God in the issue This many do forget in their passionate desires when they cast away all confidence 3. It flowed from his desire of Gods favour and to have it cleared toward him for encouragement to all others to walk in the ways of holiness that he declines to go away for ever in a cloud and would be remembered and appear again when wrath is passed that others seeing the end of the Lord might be incouraged as well as himself would be refreshed And here whatever his failings were his general scope is good to desire to enjoy Gods favour above all things Psal 4.6 7. and that others be not stumbled nor discouraged Psal 69.6 4. As he doth not proudly think he is able to stand out this storm So neither doth he flee from God or to Hills and Mountains Rev. 6.15 16 17. to be hid from this apprehended wrath But knowing that God alone can hide a man from his own indignation he fleeth to him for that effect O that thou wouldest hide me c. Which is a practice well beseeming Saints that whatever anger they apprehend in God they still flee to himself for succour Doct. 5. The perplexities and hard shifts to which Gods people are put is an argument of help especially when somewhat of sincerity appears in the midst of them For as Job's particular scope in this wish is that he may be satisfied in this desire so his general scope in propounding the whole matter to God by way of Plea and Argument in this debate and complaint is to plead for pity and moderation toward a man who was thus perplexed And though it be a mans fault and weakness to be thus distempered yet if we take with it and lay it before God as our weakness as Job doth here v. 14. it will plead pity Isai 57.16 17 18. Namely in so far as is for our good though yet he will humble us that we may know our weakness and will not suffer us to want needful exercise In his correcting of his wish v. 14. wherein as hath been said 1. He corrects it in point of judgment as thinking it absurd to expect that a man once dead should return to this life again 2. He corrects it in his practice resolving to wait submissively and patiently till his great and final change by death shall come We may Learn 1. Such is the Lords mercy towards his tossed Children that their hottest fits of distemper will have sweet cools and abatements As here Job retracts and condemns his former wish 2. A special mean to calm distempered spirits is when they do not persist rashly in their passionate apprehensions and humours as Jonah 4.4 9. but do reflect upon and examine their own frame and desires and when finding that they are wrong they make use of their light and judgment to argue and reason themselves out of their distempers however their affections be pestered Thus doth Job reflect and make use of his light to argue against his own wish If a man die shall he live again See Psal 42.5 3. It is not to be approved in our selves that Gods means and comforts will not satifie us unless impossibilities and wonders be shewed for us and to us For Job finding his desire impossible doth reject it with indignation as his Question imports 4. When our imagined issues fail us there is a nearer and surer issue to be found in Patience Submission and Hope All those are comprehended under waiting which Job fixed upon after he hath found his own desire to be absurd I will wait saith he See 1 Cor. 10.13 2 Cor. 12.7 8 9 10. 5. Such as resolve to find an issue of their trouble in patient submission must let patience have its perfect work Jam. 1.4 They must not fix their own time how long they will wait upon God and no longer as 2 King 6.33 but must submit that God be the appointer of the time of their patience and exercise For saith he All the days of my appointed time will I wait 6. As it is at death that Saints get a complete relaxation case of all their troubles so they must resolve if it be Gods will to wait all their life in a continual warfare without a satisfactory issue of their troubles For Job resolves to wait till his change come even all the days of his appointed time or life and that in a warfare as the word tendered appointed time also signifies 7. It may encourage Saints to wait thus long that death unto them is not a destruction but a change as here he calleth it And indeed it is a great change as in many respects common to all men in that it turns an animated body to a rotten carcase that it is a change wherein a man is fixed everlastingly in that state of his person wherein it finds him that it levels the greatest of men with the meanest Job 3.13 14 17 18 19. Ezek. 32.17 32 c. So Particularly to the godly in that then they are delivered from sin misery toil and discomfort Rev. 14.13 and then they will have the better of the wicked who trampled upon them in the world Luke 16.25 which will be made manifest in the Resurrection Psal 49.14 From v. 15. wherein he resumes his former wish and expatiates upon the advantages he expected if it were granted Learn 1. Passions may be strong in exercised Saints that they will not be permitted to continue in their resolutions of submission For here after he had corrected and rejected his own wish v. 14. he falls upon it again We must not mistake such tossings For submission must be a new gift every moment 2. Passions and Tentations are oft times fed and cherished with many pleasing fancies of happiness if we got our will in our desires As here those sweet apprehensions how it would be with him if God would hide him till the storm were over drew him to his wish and to hearken to the tentation again Then saith he thou wouldest call and I would answer c. whereas now it is far otherwise v. 16. Herein he failed in thinking his own way of guiding would be far better than that which God took in fancying those advantages which God had never promised on his terms and in fancying them to come in a way of his own when he might have expected them with more advantage in Death and at the Resurrection This doth warn us never to promise our selves any good out of Gods way and to limit our expectation of comforts and issues to Gods Promises lest our loving fancies breed us much trouble if they be not satisfied
Mans state after he is dead by what was his condition when a dying And thus sense is attributed to the dead Job 21.33 But because this Interpretation is violent and seems to be strained therefore I encline to understand it of the condition of this afflicted man before God send him away and he die And so the words may be rendered His flesh being upon him he being an intire person not yet dissolved shall have pain and his soul being within him or lying upon him being now broken and crushed as a burden shall mourn Thus the words point out one of those intolerable afflictions whereby God prevails over Man Namely that not only doth God send him away by death v. 20. but even before he die he is made little better then dead while he lives being no way affected with the condition of his dearest relations whether they be in weal or woe but taken up only with his own miseries both in body and mind This Job speaks with a special eye to his own condition who could not get leisure to perceive or take notice of the ruine that had come upon his family nor would their restitution to life and their advancement afford him so much content as to cause him take leisure to know it and enquire after it Far less could he regard any other earthly contentment being kept so throng within himself by reason of the pressures that were upon his body and spirit From these verses Learn 1. It is a sore tryal wherewith God may exercise his people when their souls and bodies are both afflicted at once As here Job propounds the case in general but with an eye to what was his own lot Bodily pain is a sharp tryal yet the spirit of a man will sustain that infirmity but it becomes heavy and crushing when that prop and pillar is taken away A wounded spirit is a burden sad enough of it self but it adds to it when outward bodily afflictions concur with it This may excite us to bless God when we have but one of those at once and both doth not assault us together And when at any time both of these concur to exercise us we ought to see that all that is needful to abase us to draw out proofs of God We need all this for our humiliation and God makes it to be thus that he may take occasion to manifest his all-sufficiency in behalf of his crushed Saints And if our hearts begin to faint under such a lot we ought to look to Job here whose experience doth witness that a Saint may be supported under such a pressure 2. Men may be exercised with strange changes and vicissitudes in the conditions of their posterity which ought to affect them For their sons may come to honour and they may be brought low either the sons of mean men may be exalted and the sons of great men abated or the Children of any of them may be exercised with those lots one after another And this Job speaks of as a thing that will affect Parents with joy or sorrow even in the midst of their own personal tryals if any condition beside their own can affect them This warns Parents to look well to their Children as to a gift whereby they will either have much joy or much grief and whatever God make their exercise by reason of various lots that may befal their Children they ought to be careful that they neglect no duty lest they reap the bitter fruits thereof in the miscarriages and sad lots that befal them 3. Great personal tryals may so toss men and take them up that outward contentments will not divert them For in such a case as here is supposed though a mans sons come to honour yet he knoweth it not or doth not notice it Thus Heman was like a dead man sequestrate from all things of time Psal 88.5 Such a ones condition is above ordinary and outward comforts and cure or rather he is so low that they cannot reach him In this case we ought to beware that we do not peevishly refuse to be comforted Psal 77.2 or neglect to remark even common favours to see if God may be pleased to breath upon them to refresh us thereby For so godly men have gathered ground of hope from this very consideration that they were Gods creatures as is frequent in the Psalms And albeit such refreshments cannot fully serve the turn of afflicted men yet they ought not therefore to be sleighted but rather cherished which is the way to get more It is also to be remembered that when men are so afflicted that the good condition of their Children cannot affect them it may be the fruit of their too eager seeking after or doating upon their Childrens prosperity And therefore God puts Wormwood upon that Breast that they can suck no sweetness from it though they have it Herein also some may reap the fruit of their own selfishnes in taking little notice of the case of others dear to them either to rejoyce or mourn with them in that they are cast in such a condition as they cannot do it though they would Yet when this is the lot of godly men who have walked conscientiously and do endeavour to walk meekly and tenderly under the Rod they may beleive that God hath gracious and sweet purposes in it For hereby God takes proof that their disease is not only great but so really spiritual that carnal and outward Consolations will not cure it and upon this account it may be sweet to them that all those breasts afford them no refreshment Hereby also God prepares the way and sits them for his own Consolations For those are laid aside that he who is the Comforter indeed may come unto them And hereby also the Lord takes occasion to prove that he can bear them up whose weight would sink down all other comforts into the mire with themselves 4. Men may be also so tossed and kept throng with their own troubles that they can admit no more nor be capable to share in the afflictions of those who are dearest to them For they are brought low but he perceiveth not of them or cannot get leisure to take notice of it It may well stupifie him but will do no more It is but like a new wound given to a slain man which will cut indeed but draw no bloud Or like a full vessel into which we may pour what water we will but it runs all over In this case beside that selfishness formerly marked whereof this may be a fruit also sometime men may read the fruit of their taking impatiently any trouble that comes upon any of theirs in that they are kept throng by sharper troubles upon themselves which keeps them from noticing what may befal their dearest Relations It may also be mens fault that they are so drowned and stupified with their own sorrows as to leave no room for the sorrows of others For to say nothing what is our
Original thus Mine eye poureth out or droppeth unto God And he who is true God and doth now subsist to exerce his Office shall plead for a man that is for Job himself spoken of in the Third Person to shew that it is a common priviledge of all godly men such as he was with God and the Son of Man as Christ was to become true Man also for his friend So the meaning of this will be Christ who is God and will become Man shall plead with God on my behalf who am at friendship with him This Interpretation hath those Truths in it That Christ the Mediatour was then known as in his Offices so also what he was or would be as to his Persons and Natures That it is in Christ only that godly men can think to stand or have their integrity approved and That Christs pleading and intercession is a sweet Antidote against the scorn and mistakes of dearest friends As he subjoyns this to what he said of them v. 20. But this doth not so well agree with Job's scope here who as formerly doth assert his integrity rather by wishing he might plead his cause with God if it were possible then by believing it was pleaded as is also implied in the repetition of this wish Chap. 17.3 And withal this verse so interpreted will have no connexion with the reason subjoyned v. 22. Therefore I had rather understand it according to his former practice of his wish that himself might plead his cause with God And for the Original Text which seems to favour the former reading it would be considered that the copulative particle and may be variously â—endered either and or as or otherwise as may best fit the scope Likewise the particle rendered for in both parts of the verse may be rendered for or with or to as frequently it is And if we render the verb which signifieth pleading not only in the Optative mode by way of wish as here it is but Impersonally also not that he or one might plead but that there might be pleading if I say the verb be thus rendered the Text will run fairly thus O that there might be pleading for a man that is that a man might have leave and opportunity to plead with God as a man pleadeth with his neighbour or friend And so the words contain a desire that he might plead his Integrity as familiarly with God as one man pleads with another who is his friend I shall not insist on the particular weaknesses that may be marked in this desire of which see Chap 9 34 35. Chap. 13.20 21 22. Here we may Learn 1. Mens scorn and misconstructions should put men to seek to have their condition cleared betwixt God and them For this Job would be at when scorned by his Friends 2. There is no small disadvantage on the creatures part in seeking to plead with God considering the distance that is betwixt God and them For that Job can wish this only imports that God cannot be pleaded with as with a neighbour or friend And this should be minded not only to terrifie those who presume to enter the lists with God as a Party but to make us sober and humble in all our approaches to him 3. Integrity doth not fear Gods Tribunal in Christ oppose it who will For this wish whatever weakness be in it imports also the strength of his faith that at all disadvantages of scorn from Friends and afflictions from God he is content to plead if he might 4. Men who have a good Conscience have need to guard well under afflictions and misconstructions that they miscarry not For Job did over-drive in the rashness and presumption of his offer It is not enough men have a good Conscience unless they bear it fair and soberly 5. Weaknesses may very often recurr and prevail over Saints in an hour of tryal As Job falls again and again upon his passionate wish This should humble us but not crush us as if we had no grace when we are thus assaulted and borne down 6. Saints may be long exercised with wishes and desires which are not satisfied For so was it with Job who not only is not satisfied as to the passionate and presumptuous way which he propounds for clearing of his integrity but even the substance of his desire which was to have his integrity made manifest is not granted till his tryal was perfected And in general it holds true that many desires of the godly are not satisfied either because they desire not good things in a right way or because it is unseasonable to grant their good desires or because God hath a mind to try them yet more Vers 22. When a few years are come then I shall go the way whence I shall not return In this verse we have the reason pressing this wish taken from the certainty as he judged of his near approach unto death which makes him desire to be cleared before he be removed In this he seems to reflect upon what Eliphaz had said of the wickeds being without hope to be delivered from trouble Chap. 15.22 For he expects no issue from his trouble but by death Only he is under no slavish fear as the wicked are nor will he grant that he is wicked though he have those apprehensions Doct. 1. Saints in their troubles may be in a great mistake concerning their condition and the issue thereof For albeit this General be true that mans life is but short being measured by a few years or years of number any time that can be numbered being short in comparison of Eternity yet he is mistaken in that he thought to die so shortly which that it is his mind in this expression though he speak of years appears from Chap 17 1. 2. Men had need to have their condition cleared against death come it being a dark passage in it self we have need of no clouds beside For upon this supposition that he is to die shortly he desireth to plead his cause that he may be cleared before-hand 3. Men ought so much the rather to have all clear against death that after it there is no helping of our condition if it be wrong as it is in other turns of our life For if once a man go that way he shall not return and this consideration made Job the more solicitous to be cleared 4. The more near men apprehend death to be approaching they should be the more busie For so was Job here supposing that death was near 5. Reproach and unjust imputations are in special a tryal whereof Saints would desire a good account before they die seeing other outward miseries end at their death but reproach will live after them as a blot upon their name For it is upon this account in part that he would be cleared that his Friends might cease to scorn and reproach him as a wicked man 6. The Conscience of mens integrity will not be quelled even with approaching death For Job
to extricate Saints out of deadly difficulties and to give glorious issues from deadly extremities when he seeth it good for them so to do See Isai 26.19 Ezek. 37.11 12. Vers 2. Are there not mockers with me and doth not mine eye continue in their provocation The Second Ground of his pressing desire to plead with God is That being thus afflicted and near unto death his Friends spared not to mistake censure and mock his condition and his discourses and carriage thereupon which did so imbitter him that it deprived him of nights rest This both added to his affliction that when he was a dying he was thus dealt with and it helped on his bodily weakness portending his death And therefore he desires to betake himself to debate his cause with God having such cruel Friends to deal with upon Earth Of this see further Chap. 16.20 Here Learn 1. It is great cruelty to add affliction to the afflicted as here they did to Job when they mocked him who was so low See Psal 69.25 26. Job 19.21 22. 2. Saints in their troubles may expect to meet with this measure of having tryal heaped upon tryal upon them as here Job found One tryal will not be a shelter from another when there is need of it their tryal must be complete to search them throughly others also must be tryed in their compassion and sympathy by the greatness of their tryal and God delights to give proof under how much tryal he will support his people 3. Afflicted men have oft-times cause to ascribe much of their death to the cruelty of their Friends under their affliction as to an instrumental cause For Job subjoyns their cruelty as no small cause of his weakness v. 1. portending his death Vnfaithful friends in a sad time are guilty of many degrees of murder 4. Friends prove very cruel in trouble by their want of tenderness and mocking of the afflicted See Chap. 21.3 When they look lightly upon their afflictions Lam. 1.12 When they read them wrong as if they were evidences of wickedness and do weaken the hands of the godly afflicted man under them For Job finds provocations or imbitterings in their mocking which deprived him of rest 5. He asserts this by way of Question Are there not mockers with me c or by way of grave Asseveration and Oath If there be not mockers c. whereby he purgeth himself of prejudice and calumny in asserting this and expresses his regret that his case was so little considered that he must so strongly assert it and excite others to notice it It teacheth That Saints may get that to bear which is really very sad and yet get little credit or pity under it It will not easily be believed how deep some troubles will draw upon them and how much they will wound and imbitter them They who are cruel to them may be so little sensible what hurt they do that they will rather be ready to justifie themselves And others may be laid by and the afflicted left alone without pity for their tryal 6. Saints may be so afflicted that nights rest would be a great mercy and yet even that be denied unto them For saith he Mine eye continueth or lodgeth in their provocations Not only was this injury not done behind his back but to his face and in his very sight and eye a tryal which Saints may look for but he was kept waking in the night thereby noâ— could he get off his eye from poring on it 7. Whatever injury was here done to Job yet his own weakness bred his distemper in that he was first imbitttered by these provocations and then being so he could not rest for it which was contrary to that Precept Ephes 4.26 It Teacheth 1. How sad soever our condition be yet our own distempers thereby give the immediate rise to our vexations 2. To be at some times distempered and imbittered even to the want of rest though it be a gross fault and a fit of impatience for the time yet it will not conclude one be an impatient man who approves not of those sits and wrestles against them For Job who is so commended for his patience in this tryal James 5.11 fell in such a fit here Vers 3. Lay down now put me in a surety with thee who is he that will strike hands with me In the Second Branch of this part of the Chapter contained in this verse Job subjoyns to his former pressing grievances his renewed desire to plead his cause with God which he propounds to God himself Those words of striking hands with him are borrowed from their way of closing and engaging in bargains particularly in Suretyship Prov 6.1 And as it was their practice that Parties should strike hands in other Covenants So it seems it was their practice also when they engaged to answer in Law which is the business here in hand As for the first part of the verse where he speaks of laying down and of a surety with God some read it thus Appoint I pray thee my surety with thee that is Appoint Christ to be my Surety and then Who is he that will strike hands with me that is upon these terms I decline no man who will engage to enter the lists to debate against me in the matter of my integrity It is indeed certain that Job durst not boast of his integrity but in a Mediator And I would very willingly put this favourable construction upon his wish if I found not God and Elihu pass a more severe censure upon it Others understand it as a desire that God would appoint a common Surety or Umpire to himself and Job who might dispute against his Friends for that cause which was common to them both seeing both God and he were wronged by their doctrine This interpretation hath a truth in it That they who are imbaâ—qued in a common cause with God may expect that he will see it pleaded for both But it agrees not with the latter part of the verse where Job desires that some might strike hands with him as a party in the debate and not as one whose cause was to be pleaded by a common Umpire Therefore I understand it to import his renewed desire that he might have access to plead his cause with God or at least with some who would appear on Gods behalf in this quarrel And the form of speech is taken from the practice of those times where Parties did give in surety or pledges that they would stand to the determination of the Judge and perform what was judged And so the words will run thus lay down now a pledge and if thou do not that for it must be read disjunctively then appoint me a surety not for me or on my behalf to be forthâ—coming for me but for my behoof and security in this debate with thee The meaning is in sum as if Job had said Give me some assurance that thou wilt not judge me according to
your flowers of Discourse Such as are in trouble may indeed be in a Fever and so apt to mistake in many things Yet they will soon miss that in a Comforter which others will not 4. Albeit godliness teach men modesty and sobriety and to be tender of the reputation of others yet that doth not hinder them to tell men what they are when they are called to it in the defence of Truth and that they may give a check to their proud conceit of themselves For Job here spares not to tell his Friends Friends freely of their want of wisdom 5. Tenderness will not prompt men to tell others their faults that they may insult over them or dash and discourage them but out of love to reclaim them For he tells them this that they may return or change their Opinion and come now to themselves or to close with him and learn of him 6. It is the duty and commendation of men when they are found to be wrong not to persist in it because of their reputation but to quit it and come and learn truth As Job's Exhortation to them imports Vers 11. My days are past my purposes are broken off even the thoughts of my heart In the rest of this Discourse Job proceeds to prove their folly and want of wisdom in giving him any hopes of restitution by shewing how low he was brought and how hopeless his condition was in it self v. 11 12. how he could in reason expect no issue out of it in this life v. 13 14. and consequently how groundless their offers were v. 15 16. In the first place to prove that his health or restitution was hopeless in it self he not only declares that his trouble gave him to understand that his days were near an end in the beginning of this verse but further he gives two Evidences of his low and wasted condition One in the rest of this verse is That by reason of his misery pain and trouble all his purposes were broken off even those thoughts which had been the long possessions as it is in the Original of his heart Whereby we are to understand not so much those particular thoughts of his restitution and deliverance from this trouble to which he speaks afterward for it appears not he had any such thoughts since his trouble came upon him whatever thoughts he sometime had of the continuance of his prosperity when he enjoyed it Ch. 29.18 As in general that all his well ordered purposes and exercises wherewith he had been so long acquainted and all his refreshful thoughts in the days of his prosperity were plucked up by the extremity of his trouble and other exercise put in his hand as it is in the following verse Leaving Job's mistake about his approaching death and the end of his days we may here Learn 2. The days of men are but passing and will at last come to a period For Job's apprehension that his days are past supposeth this as a General Truth that mans days will pass 2. The Lord may in deep wisdom bring men to the gates of death and exercise them with thoughts thereof that they may give a proof how they will look upon it and may find what grace will do in such an exigent and that he may evidence his power in delivering from it For these among other causes is Job brought to apprehend approaching death My days are past 3. Man being a rational creature and not at his rest in this life hath his mind full of purposes resolutions and projects whereby especially when he prospereth and is in vigour he refresheth and delights himself and endeavours to add to the satisfaction of his actual enjoyments For so is supposed that Job had purposes and thoughts which were so delectable and habitual to him that they became the possessions of his heart Men had need to look well what those thoughts are which haunt their hearts for thereby they will know themselves better then by their actings 4. Not only will death make the thoughts and projects of most men to perish Psal 146.4 But even sore afflictions in this life will break over-turn and interrupt many of their sweet thoughts and purposes For saith he My purposes are broken off or plucked up even the possessions of my heart Not only can the Lord make sore afflictions batter down all mens thoughts and expectations of good things within time even after they have long stood out under some measure of tryals and have had possessions of heart and settled thoughts that it should be otherwise Mat 1.4 And when afflictions seem thus to over-turn our expectations it is our duty to quit and yield them up to God as Job in this discourse doth apprehending he was to die But even Saints are not to think it strange if the Lord by sore affliction over-turn their orderly sweet thoughts and exercises under prosperity and about the improvement of it to his glory and in place thereof fill them with restless confusion as it was with Job And as from this Truth in general men should learn to curb their vain thoughts and purposes which time and even a cross before the end of their time can over-turn and to labour after other purposes and designs which affliction can never overthrow however it interrupt them So the godly in particular should take warning to improve their time well in spiritual thoughts and purposes while they have ease considering that affliction may put an interruption unto them 5. Unto a godly man it is not only a sad exercise but an evidence of his very low condition when his troubles do drive him from all his sweet purposes and resolutions For Job propounds it not only as matter of lamentation but as an evidence of his low condition and that his days were past that his purposes are broken off c. As indeed however he mistook the matter of his death Yet as it was no ordinary but very deadly trouble that could drive him a godly man off those Principles and thoughts which were so delectable to him So it could not but waste and spend him much more that he was deprived of them Vers 12. They change the night into day the light is short because of darkness Another Evidence of his low and spent condition is taken from his restless anxious thoughts And that in stead of his former sweet thoughts and purposes his present calamities and his anxious thoughts about them did so toss him that he got not the nights rest but night was as day to him and his dark condition through trouble made the day seem short or nothing at all Whence Learn 1. Anxious thoughts are very frequent in trouble and have a strange Empire and Command over the afflicted For saith he They that is my purposes and thoughts which before were sweet v. 11. are now so changed that they change the night into day c. or so haunt me that they take up all my time by night and by
shall now devour him 2. However a wicked man may get some Serjeants shifted yet the Executioner will come at last whom he will not get declined For destruction will come at last which shall pay all home And this is enough let them escape never so often considering how dreadful it will be and how soon it may take hold of them Luke 12.19 20. 3. Death is a great Conquerour and Triumpher over men in their Bodies Dignities and outward Estate For It shall devour the strength or bars of his skin Yea it triumphs over Princes notwithstanding all their grandeur See Job 3.13 14 15 18 19. Psal 49.14 17. 146.3 4. Ezek. 32.23 26 27 c. This tells that men have need and ought to provide somewhat that will be Deaths-proof 4. A violent death is an addition to the sadness and terrour of death Therefore is that called the first born of death Though the godly may fall in common calamities and go to Heaven in a fiery Chariot and wicked men may die peaceably yet this is the desert of the wicked and is executed upon some of them nor have any of them any security against it and it is a mercy in it self to die a quiet and ordinary death 5. God hath reserved singular judgments for wicked men and their plagues are really such however they appear outwardly For their death come what way it will is still the first born of death considering all the consequences thereof whereas the godly are bound to judge that they are dealt with in a different manner though they fall under the same outward dispensation 6. God will at last make it evident that he is too hard for the stoutest of men and that all their strength must succumb and fall before his power For the first born of death shall devour his strength Vers 14. His confidence shall be rooted out of his tabernacle and it shall bring him to the King of terrours In this verse the resemblance is further prosecuted and Job's renouncing of all confidence and hope in his family as making for death Chap. 17.13 14 15. is pointed at as resembling this wicked Malefactour his being desperate of all hopes in his wealth friends and family and his being brought to death which is the Prince and King of Terrours both in it self and in what it appears to be and really proves to the wicked man Here there are also several mistakes As 1. That Job was to die and be cut off at this time 2. That his renouncing of all his temporal enjoyments is looked on as an act of despair whereas it flowed only from his cleanly self-denial a practice which the world doth not understand 3. That Job did fear death or looked on it as the King of terrours who was rather too eager to be at it 4. Or suppose Saints do sometime fear death yet it is a mistake to think that therefore they are wicked For they may be afraid as considering they have a soul to save while the wicked may mock at death and step laughing into Hell And godly men may get proofs of their own weakness when God is to give them most notable proofs of his grace and love But passing those mistakes there are general sound Truths here also as it relates to the wicked And 1. Wicked men may have their own confidences whereby they uphold their hearts when many other things fail them For so is here supposed that there is his confidence This is a great snare to make them stubborn in an ill way Isa 57.10 though when those are removed it will not reclaim them Jer. 2.25 2. It is the wickeds plague that their confidences are but low base and perishing Such as his family wealth or friends all which are comprehended under the name of his Tabernacle See Psal 146.3 4 5. 3. All the carnal confidences of a wicked man will at last come to utter ruine His props will all fail him and his hopes will end in despair and he must quit them For his confidence shall even be rooted out of his tabernacle His confidences will at last prove too weak to bottom his hopes and Gods jealousie is provoked to crush them 4. If not before yet certainly at death all carnal confidences shall come to ruine For then his confidence shall be rooted out when he cometh to the King of Terrours 5. Death of all outward strokes is the chief terrour to men as being the punishment threatened and inflicted for sin and as cutting off all their outward enjoyments at one stroke Therefore is it called the King of Terrours or the chief of Terrours which are visible on Earth So that men had need to prepare for it and to close with Christ in whom they may triumph over it 1 Cor. 15.54 55. 6. Beside what death is in it self and as it is the common lot of all men it is especially dreadful and the King of Terrours to the wicked For it is in reference to them it is so designed here The godly may die in some trouble and fear though that be not their allowance but slow from their weakness But as for the wicked though some of them may die peaceably as others of them die full of horrour Yet to all of them it is terrible if they considered whither they are going Death in its most terrible colours may look sweetly upon the godly and the mildest aspect of it may be dreadful to the wicked 7. The more carnal confidence men have the more terrible will death be when it cometh and all their hopes are cut off For it is his confidence rooted out that brings him to the King of terrours Not so much because the ruine of his hopes hastens his death as because it makes death terrible that he hath fed upon so many vain hopes Vers 15. It shall dwell in his tabernacle because it is none of his brimstone shall be scattered upon his habitation In the last Branch of this Similitude the destruction of Job's family is reflected upon as resembling the consequents of a Malefactours death or the confiscation of his Estate and ruine of his House He seems to allude here to the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah by fire and brimstone and declares that destruction or terrible desolation for the relative It must be referred to what hath been spoken before of the wicked himself v. 11 12 14. as befalling his house also according as it is capable thereof shall dwell in his house and eat up his substance which he had so unjustly acquired and was indeed none of his by right And that his habitation shall be consumed as Sodom was by brimstone or brimstone shall be scattered upon it as a sign of perpetual desolation which the strawing of a place with Salt doth also signifie Judg. 9.45 Here there is an unjust reflection upon Job's purchase of his wealth and upon the stroke of God by fire upon some of his goods Chap. 1.16 as if that evidenced his wealth
Cor. 15.25 26. and shall bring all his Enemies who would not suffer him to reign over them and slay them before him Luke 19.27 Believers need not fear the long continuance of Enemies nor that one Enemy riseth up after another For Christ will out-live and triumph over them all 3. When all those Enemies are destroyed then time will have an end and the General Judgment will come For when he thus stands last then it will be the latter day or the last of time 1 Cor. 15.24 25 26. This was a truth known and believed in the very infancy of the Church as appears from Enoch's Prophesie recorded Jude v. 14 15. 4. The Redeemer of Sinners will be their Judge at the last day For He shall stand over the Earth which as it will be terrible to the wicked who shall then be forced to see him whom they still declined to own So it may comfort all those who have made their peace with him and with God through him in time 5. Our Redeemer will testifie his love to his People by coming to Earth again to fetch them as he came at first to redeem them For he shall in that day stand again upon or over the Earth for this end See John 14.2 3. Vers 26. And though after my skin worms destroy this body yet in my flesh shall I see God In this verse Job prosecutes that encouragement of his Redeemers living and standing upon the Earth professing his faith of a blessed Resurrection in that day to enjoy the presence of God And that notwithstanding that after his skin now broken with sores is pierced the worms also destroy his body Doct. 1. As the bodies of the dearest Children of God may be deformed in their lives so they have no exemption from death notwithstanding their integrity but they must did as well as others that they may enter into their rest For Job looks to be destroyed or cut off by death 2. Believers being dead they have no priviledge in their graves but the worms will feed upon and destroy their bodies as well as others For Job supposeth that after my skin the worms will destroy this body In the Original it is only this not this body but the sense is the same For he thus designs his body as pointing at it with his finger when he spake and intimating that it was not worthy to be called a body being so spent Withal worms who are said shall destroy his body are not expressed in the Original but only they shall destroy but the sense is still the same For the worms are they who use to pierce dead mens skins and then destroy their flesh See Psal 49.14 Both these points should teach the godly that since they are not exempted in those cases they should not plead exemption in lesser things 3. Though mens bodies be thus confirmed in the grave yet they will be raised up again and will be animated with their souls to exerce their Functions For here he believes that notwithstanding this havock to be made of his body yet in his flesh he shall see God The faith of this Article may assure us of the power of God to do what he will Acts 26.8 Rom. 4 17. and of his unchangeable love to his people who seeks after their dust after it hath been so long buried in oblivion Matth. 22.31 32. 4. It is the great happiness of Believers that after death they see and enjoy God and that not darkly and in a glass but face to face For he comforts himself with this that after death he shall see God See 1 Cor. 13.12 Psal 16.11 5. It completes the happiness of Believers that not only their souls but the whole man shall enjoy this sight of God For this is Job's comfort in my flesh I shall see God at and after the Resurrection Not that the soul sleeps or is suspended this sight till then See 2 Cor. 5.6 8. Phil. 1.23 Luke 23.43 with 2 Cor. 12.2 4. but that the happiness of Believers will be completed when the whole person which fought the good fight of faith shall get the Crown See Psal 17.15 1 Thess 4 16 17. 6. The hope of a blessed Resurrection should sweeten all bitterness by the way and it is the mark of a godly man to eye it much for that end As Job doth here comfort himself in that over all his sorrows 7. Faith believing a Resurrection must look over many impediments and objections which to carnal sense seem insuperable as here Job looks over the destruction of his body in believing this Thus in every other case difficulties should but heighten faiths courage and quicken its diligence 8. The belief of Christs living and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the Earth may assure the godly of a blessed Resurrection For having asserted the one v. 25. he subjoyns the other here as a necessary consequent following upon the former For if he live he will not only care for them when they are dead but will cause them live also Joh. 14.19 and his Resurrection is a sure pledge that they also shall be raised again Eph. 2.5 6. Rom. 8.11 Vers 27. Whom I shall see for my self and mine eyes shall behold and not another though my reins be consumed within me In this verse Job yet insists upon this Article of the Resurrection and sheweth his strong faith about it Asserting 1. That he shall see God for himself that is not only he himself and not another shall see him but he shall see him for his own profit and advantage 2. That it shall not be another body but the same wherein he shall see God 3. That all this shall be though his very reins and what is most inward in him were consumed as they were already consumed in part Some read this last part of the verse without Though which is not in the Original as an Assertion that his reins were consumed in him with earnest desire and longing after that day And so it is a special proof of his integrity and honesty But I shall not insist upon that reading seeing the Original language many times wants such Particles which are sufficiently implied in the sense in that language Doct. 1. There is need of many acts of faith about the Resurrection that we may make sure that we believe it and may draw out the rich comforts of it Therefore doth Job so much insist upon that subject 2. Believers should be frequent in studying their own happiness which they shall enjoy at the Resurrection in the sight and vision of God Therefore also doth Job insist on this in particular I shall see and behold him 3. This sight of God cannot but be comfortable to the godly as being for their behoof and advantage their interest in him being then made fully clear and their joy consummate in his favour and presence whereas the wicked shall see him but as the God of others and to their own
pleasure in his house after him c. The meaning whereof is not that he needs not care how it fare with his family after him as many do too anxiously seeing himself is cut off in his own person nor yet that though he expects that his prosperity shall be continued in his family yet it cannot comfort him seeing himself is cut off For his Children being to be destroyed in his own time v. 19. he cannot expect the prosperity of his family when he is gone But the meaning is That though sometime he pleased himself with the expectation of the continuance of his house and family yet he shall be deprived of all that comfort when he and his posterity are cut off violently and before the time for then all his expectations shall be frustrated Whence Learn 1. It is a part of the wickeds folly that they feed themselves with vain hopes and imaginary comforts and pleasures in them as the wicked man here seeks to find pleasure in his house after him or in the apprehension of the continuance of his family See Luke 12.19 Which may put us to try what vain thoughts we may be feeding upon 2. One of wicked mens vain dreams is their hope of perpetuating their house and glory Psal 49.11 And that they feed before-hand upon an apprehension of the eternity thereof For he takes pleasure in his house after him what he presently enjoys will not serve his turn unless he antedate imagined contentments and pleasures to come 3. Such vain hopes of a long tract of prosperity to themselves and their posterity after them are oft-times blasted to the wicked before their own eyes And as God mercifully oft-times disappoints the fears of the godly so he walks contrary to the wickeds hopes For it cometh sometime to this in the wickeds own time What pleasure hath he in his house after him 4. If no less will bear down the wickeds vain hopes God can do it by a speedy cutting off of themselves and all the prosperity of their family and condition For this takes away his pleasure when the number of his months is cut off in the midst Albeit mans months and time be determined Chap. 14.5 yet the number thereof is said to be cut off in the midst when they die violently before the time they might have continued by the ordinary course of nature and before the ordinary term of mans life be expired Psal 90.10 and sooner than they are ready for death or expect it Psal 55.23 and before they be well setled in their prosperity 5. Mans life is so short and uncertain that they are most wise who reckon it by shortest periods As here it is reckoned by months and elsewhere by days Psal 90.12 6. It speaks great wrath and imbitters the wickeds sad lot that they expected the contrary and fed upon vain dreams which are disappointed For this speaks the wrath of the Almighty v. â—0 and renders his condition sad that when he was taking pleasure in his house after him the number of his months is cut off Vers 22. Shall any teach God knowledge seeing he judgeth those that are high From this to v. 27. Job speaks of Gods various dispensations toward wicked men conjunctly that he may silence the carpings of mans wit in these matters This Narration consists of three Branches In the first whereof in this verse he gives an account of his scope in this Discourse which is to demonstrate that none should presume to teach or set bounds to God in these things as his Friends by their doctrine tyed up God to one way of proceeding with wicked men Whereas God being the Supreme Judge of the highest he ought not to be controuled by any but may deal variously with the sons of men at his pleasure Whence Learn 1. In Gods guiding of the world and particularly in his dispensations towards wicked men much of his Knowledge and Wisdom do shine and they come not to pass at random or adventure For so is here imported that there is knowledge in these affairs or God makes his Wisdom manifest in them See Psal 92.5 6 7. 2. Most part of men do not see this Wisdom of God but because they cannot comprehend they do carp at it or would carve out a way of Providence of their own which they think most fit For here it is imported that some men would prescribe a way of their own as his Friends did in the debate betwixt him and them 3. To carp at what God doth or prescribe what God should do in his Providential dispensations is in effect to presume to teach God as if we were wiser than he For so is here imported that they by their Principles and by their censuring of his Doctrine wherein he gave a true account of the dispensations of Providence did presume to teach God knowledge 4. The sinfulness of this course of prescribing unto God is such as should make it to be entertained with indignation by all who fear God and be looked on as abasing God and dishonourable to him who guides all things better than man can prescribe For so much doth this question import Shall any teach God knowledge 5. God is nor only Infinite in Power above the highest but in authority also being a Judge who can call them to an account when he pleaseth For he judgeth those that are high whether faln Angels Jude v. 6. or great men Eccl. 5.8 See Rev. 6.15 16. 6. The absolute Soveraignty of God manifested in his judging even of the highest may discover the folly of mens presuming to teach him wisdom seeing herein shines his Soveraignty not to be carped at his Wisdom sutable to his Authority and his purposes far beyond our reach Therefore is this brought in here as a reason of the challenge Shall any teach God knowledge seeing he judgeth these who are high Vers 23. One dieth in his full strength being wholly at ease and quiet 24. His breasts are full of milk and his bones are moistened in the marrow 25. And another dieth in the bitterness of his soul and never eateth with pleasure In the Second Branch of this Narration in these verses he gives an account of the various dispensations of God toward wicked men 1. For prosperity That some die in full strength of body having inward and outward case and without any disquiet till their death v. 23. which is further amplified v. 24. That they are in great vigour and their bones full of marrow like breasts full of milk or rather that they have affluence of all things instanced in the abundance of milk wherewith their breasts namely of their Cattel or their Milk-pails as the word also signifieth are filled and that because of this affluence they are in great vigour every one of their bones for the verb is singular being moistned with marrow or as the words will also read the marrow of their bones being watered and refreshed by reason of their plenty of food
by men Verse 14. The murderer rising with the light killeth the poor and needy and in the night is as a thief 15. The eye also of the adulterer waiteth for the twilight saying No eye shall see me and disguiseth his face In these Verses Job produceth some instances of these Rebels against the Light namely Murderers who rise by day-break to kill and rob men and spend the night in thieving and Adulterers who take advantage of the twilight to hide themselves and seek to promove their design of being hid from the sight of men by masking or otherwise disguising of their faces Doct. 1. Murther Theft and Adultery are in special works of darkness which prove men to hate the light and which do highly provoke God For these are brought in here as instances of that general Character of wicked men v. 13. and as sins which God would visibly plague if he took that course with all sinners which Job's Friends asserted he did 2. In particular Murther is a sin lying as near a stroak as any For he instanceth the murderer first here See Gen. 4.10 11. Is 26.21 And though this crime be oft-times covered with the mask of War or Authority yet that will not hide it but rather make it more odious 3. The secret wayes of committing murder will not hide it from God but it doth rather aggravate the crime that men think to cover it by that means For the murderer that riseth with the light to kill is a sinner who is obnoxious to vengeance if God please to pursue Sin will find out sinners in Gods time Num. 32.23 4. Bloud-thirsty men are very infatiable in their cruelty and will cut off men upon a very small tentation or for very little advantage For the murderer killeth even the poor and needy by whose death he can reap little or no profit and this he doth without any compassion or regard to their miserable and low condition 5. Oppression especially when it reacheth the life renders the oppressed the object of Gods pity so far as that he is ready to avenge it in due time For in this respect also those whom the murderer killeth are the poor and needy whose cause God will own as his frequent promises concerning the poor and needy do import whatever they have been before Thus Joab is said to have cut off two men more righteous better than himself 1 Kin. 2.32 though otherwise they were not very good men but Rebels against their lawful Prince So that it will not assoil men that these whom they cut off are naughty if they have not a call and warrant to cut them off 6. Wicked men being once engaged are indefatigable in their course and are still either at one trade of sin or other For when this murderer is not killing he is a thief which shews that there is a concatenation of sins and that the wicked are still at one or another of them And their care to lose no time in the pursuit of their sinful designs may give a check to them who lose many opportunities of doing good 7. It will not assoil men that they come not the length of cruel murder if yet they commit other acts of injustice For it is a charge sad enough that he is as a thief a very thief or somewhat like it Wicked men do at some times commit only such lower acts of injustice not because they want a disposition and inclination to grosser evils but because they want a tentation and opportunity or power to bring them to pass 8. Adultery is an old sin in the world and hath been looked on as a sin deserving Gods vengeance For adultery was accounted a sin in Job's dayes and a sin which God would not spare if he did alwayes visibly plague the wicked The sin of uncleanness contributed toward the destruction of the old World and destroyed Sodom and Gomorrhah And if it was so hateful to God in them who had fulness of bread and idleness to foster it Ezek. 16.49 it must be much more abominable when it abounds in time of poverty and affliction 9. It is a plague upon sinners particularly upon unclean persons when they commit wickedness with resolution As the eye of the adulterer waiteth for the twilight with a resolution to perpetrate his wickedness then 10. It is also a plague upon wicked men and especially lustful persons that when they are not acting sin yet their hearts are still resolving and plotting how to go about it As the adulterer waits for the opportunity of the twilight wherein he may commit that sin upon which he is musing and resolving throughout the day 11. It is a Character of wicked men that they forget the eye of God upon them and that their consciences whatever light they have do not fear nor abhor sin but all that they fear is the discovery of their sin which may bring shame and punishment For all that the Adulterer expects is no eye shall see me which imports not so much his presumption that he shall not be seen by God or men though sometimes sinners may be plagued with that also as his desire that it may be so 12. An evil conscience is never truly quiet nor thinks it self secure enough For even in the twilight he disguiseth his face that he may yet less be discerned whereas they may sleep sound who are in Gods way Verse 16. In the dark they digg through houses which they had marked for themselves in the day-time they know not the lâ—ght 17. For the morning is to them even as the shadow of death if one know them they are in the terrours of the shadow of death In these Verses Job points out yet further how these evil doers hate the light and make use of darkness Shewing that they do nothing in the day which may be true of the Adulterer but chiefly of the Murderer especially when he turns Thief but mark out the houses which they break in upon in the night and that they are such strangers to the light that it surprizeth them with the terrours of death as if they were entring into its dark shade if the morning overtake them or any body come to see and know them while they are at their wicked pâ—anâ—s Doct. 1. It is a character of wicked men to be incessant in sinning and witty to improve all times and seasons for it For in the day time they mark and in the dark they digg thorow houses 2. It is also a character of wicked men that they make all their own they can come by For they mark for themselves and then digg thorow 3. It is not usual to see wicked men interrupted in their evil courses by any convictions or impediments from themselves For when they mark they also digg through if they be not otherwise impeded 4. Albeit wicked men goe on in their sinful courses yet they want not convictions that they are wrong nor are they free of deadly
Wicked mens condition be what it will is not desirable as they have it their mercies being cursed and snares unto them and much more their crosses For so is here imported that the estate of the wicked is the worst estate imaginable to a right discerner So that Job thinks it fit for no friend but only the worst of his enemies who not only hate him but rise up against him if he durst wish them so much evil 3. It is the mark of a godly man that in his greatest adversity he abhorrs the state and condition of the wicked in their greatest prosperity For so doth Jobs wish import which is not a prayer against his enemies but an evidence that he detests their lot and consequently a proof that himself is not wicked See Job 36.21 Verse 8. For what is the hope of the Hypocrite though he hath gained when God taketh away his Soul In the next place to v. 11. Job proves that he is no hypocrite especially by his cleaving to God in trouble Where he propounds several characters of hypocrites leaving them to gather that he was free of them In this Verse we have the first evidence that he is no hypocrite That whereas hypocrites though they may be full of presumption in prosperity yet all their gain and advantages will afford them no solid hope when death cometh upon them He on the contrary in the depth of his distress and apprehension of approaching death was still full of hope as may be gathered from his expressions Chap. 6.10 and 12.4 and 13.15 and else-where As for this and the rest of these evidences and arguments proving that he is not an hypocrite they are thus to be understood That where those evidences are contrary to these characters of the hypocrite they do infallibly conclude a man not to be an hypocrite Yet if some weak seeker of God find those wanting in some of their measures and degrees and at some times it should be remembred that every real Saint is not a Job nor can produce such eminent works of grace and sincerity as he had nor wâ—ll real Saints be measured by their infirmities or sits of weakness not by the emanations of their flesh if they renounce and mourn for them As on the contrary hypocrites will not be judged by that stupidity which they may have in trouble instead of faith and hope Doct. 1. Hypocrâ—sie is to be avoided as well as gross wickedness by every one that would approve themselves to God For Job clears that he is free of both and having purged himself of wickedness v. 7. he now comes to purge himself of hypocrisie Yea the name here given to the hypocrite signifieth also one that is prophane to shew that God looks upon every hypocrite as such a one however he mask his wickedness 2. Hypocrisie and Coveâ—ousness of love of gain are evils which frequently concurr and goe together For the hypocrite here is he that hath gained Not that every covetous wretch puts on a mask of profession but that hypocrites make use of a cloak of Religion only for their own advantage See Matth. 23.14 1 Tim. 6.5 3. God may let the covetous designes of hypocrites succeed in their hand and so answer them according to the Idol of their hearts whereas he will famish these Idols if godly men hanker after them For it is supposed here of the hypocrite that he hath gained 4. Much of mens contentment especially of godly men or these who pretend to godliness depends upon their hopes For here hope is supposed so necessary to the Sons of men their present enjoyments being so empty especially to godly men that even hypocrites pretend to the hopes of godly men as they pretend to their piety See 1 Cor. 15.19 5. The Hypocrite may be so bolstered up with prosperity that he may live in a presumptuous dream of hope even till his death which is a sad snare upon him For here it is supposed that he hath hope which he never questions till God come to take away his Soul 6. Approaching death is the great touchstone of mens hopes As here it is supposed their hopes will fail who had stood out long before 7. It is an evidence of an hypocrite that he is never really willing to dye For God takes away his Soul by force as the word imports He doth not willingly resign it as Luk. 2.29 but violence is used upon him as Luk. 12.20 8. Death will blast all the hypocrites hopes and will discover these follies in them which they would not read in the Word For saith he What is the hope of the hypocrite when God taketh away his Soul See Prov. 11.7 So that they who study not mortality well will never be sincere and hypocrites may expect that their hopes will fail them when they have most need of them 9. Though the gain and advantages of hypocrites do in this life delude them and put to silence any clamours of their consciences yet none of these will support them nor keep life in their dying hopes at death For What is the hope of the hypocrite even though he hath gained when God taketh away his Soul 10. Those whose hopes in God are not brangled by adversity nor by approaching death if they have also thâ—se other characters after mentioned are undoubtedly no hypocrites For so would Job inferr in his own savours that he is no hypocrite seeing it is not with him as it is with them in the matter of hope Verse 9. Will God hear his cry when trouble cometh upon him The second evidence that he is not an hypocrite may be thus understood That God hears not the cry of an hypocrite in his trouble whether that of approaching death v. 8. or any other because he doth not cry to him as is said Chap. 36.13 as Job now doth in his distress And it is indeed true That to be dumb as to crying to God in trouble is a very black character Ezek. 24.23 And that hypocrites will essay many shifts before they goe to God in distress But this phrase that God will not hear his cry in trouble as it is frequently recorded in Scripture doth rather import that the hypocrite may indâ—ed cry in trouble but God will not hear him as for many other reasons so among the rest for these reasons subjoyned v. 10. Thus the Argument is of the same nature with that v. 7. whereby he proved that he was not wicked That he abhorts the condition of the hypocrite because God will not hear him in trouble and therefore he was no hypocrite And for further clearing of this it may be enquired Quest If this be a mark of an hypocrite That God doth not hear his cry in trouble how will Job clear himself of it who complains so often that he is not heard To which it is answered Answ 1. When Job complains he is not heard he speaks the language of Sense but here he speaks the language of Faith
his favour but they who know it not 5. As Gods power when he lets it forth in effects is irresistable and insupportable for any creature to endure it however fools do harden themselves So godly men will soon groan under the apprehension thereof For Job resents that by his strong hand he opposed himself against him It is indeed the character of godly men that they are sensible of their own weakness and therefore are soon made to stoop under the mighty hand of God See Job 7.12 Obs 2. If we consider Jobs weakness in his complaint it may further teach 1. All men by nature are apt to have hard thoughts of God in trouble as here Job gives proof in his apprehensions of Gods cruelty and opposition So also did Jeremiah evidence his inclination to mistake God Jer. 15.18 But unrenewed men do come to a greater height in these distempers Rev. 16.19 Therefore we should guard against that evil as being incident to men in trouble and being the great design that Satan drives in it Chap. 1.11 and 2.5 2. Tentation may over-drive even such as are truly godly to speak that which is unbeseeming yea and worse than they think For here Job is over-driven by tentations As Saints must not be judged by what they are at fits so they should be upon their guard when under tentations and must not think that their hard condition will assoil them let them do what they will 3. Sense is Faiths great un-friend under tentation if it he hearkned unto For it was his sense that drave him to say all this 4. When godly men are ready to complain of God without cause or to give credit to sense they will readily find their complaints grow upon their hand For Job being in this distemper he proceeds from complaining that God did not hear him but added to his trouble v. 20. to complain that he was become cruel c. This as it evidenceth our weakness and should keep us from engaging in such a way So God makes use of it as a mean to drive us from our complaints when we see whether they would tend if way were given to them Verse 22. Thou liftest me up to the wind thou causest me to ride upon it and dissolvest my substance In this and the following Verse Job propounds two particular grounds of his apprehensions of Gods cruelty and opposition One is held out in terms borrowed from Chaffe tossed and dissipated in the air by a strong wind Or from Vapours drawn up into the air and there dissolved and melted into rain Or rather from a person carried up by a whirlwind into the air and tossed there till he be over-charged and suffocated The meaning is That he was violently tossed and hurried with a whirlwind of outward troubles under which he was kept till all his means and outward enjoyments were gone and dissolved and with a tempest of vexations upon soul and body to the dissipation of his subsistence and life and of his wit also as the word signifieth In summ He who rode prosperously and in state before is now made to ride in a chariot of strong and fierce afflictions which had ruined him Afflictions had blown away his substance and wealth his body was melted as the word imports and ready to be dissolved and his soul was over-charged so that he is at his wits end Doct. 1. How sure soever men think they sit yet when God sends affliction it will toss and hurry them Therefore it is compared to a wind or a whirlwind because it brings sudden violent and vehement vexation and tossing Thus Job when he was first assaulted did sit divers charges Chap. 1. and 2. yet at last tentation and trouble did prevail And it is one of the effects of trouble to shake those who are setled upon their lees and to keep godly men from fixing themselves upon the things of time 2. As men cannot keep themselves at ease when God hath them to toss and sift So they can put no period to their own tossings till he interpose For he not only lifts them up to the wind and so engageth them but he causeth them to ride when they are thus lifted up Or locks them as it were in the saddle that they cannot get free of tossing The continuance as well as the violence of trouble is in Gods hand and he is to be eyed in the one and the other See Jer. 47.6 7. 3. Gods design in trouble is to sift man and to discover and let it be known what he is For so Job finds in the issue that God designed by causing him ride upon the wind to dissolve and melt or sift him out as when corn or chaffe is lifted up to the wind that he may give proof what is in him and what he is able to endure 4. Whatever man seem to be at another time yet in trouble he will be found to be light and vain like a feather or chaffe in the wind and that nothing in him can abide the tryal but his strength and wiâ— and all will be soon confounded and over-charged For saith he Thou dissolvest my substance or even that which is most substantial in me and in my enjoyments Learn we to trust to nothing in our selves as able to bear out in tryal and to try our profiting under trouble by our being emptied and abased in our selves 5. God may discover those to be weak and very empty in trouble of whom he will yet give a good account For after all his tossing and dissolving of his substance Job got a good issue at last If men could wait for the end of the Lord they would not be ready to apprehend cruelty in his present dispensations and they should learn to suspend such thoughts when they are not able to refute them Verse 23. For I know that thou wilt bring me to death and to the house appointed for all living Another ground of his apprehension of Gods cruelty is That God had given him such mortal and deadly wounds that he is sure to dye and to goe to the grave which is the common lodging of all He joyns this with the former by the particle For as taking it up to be Gods design in tossing him even to cut him off Or it may be translated Surely to intimate how perswaded he was of these his apprehensions Doct. 1. It is an useful study especially under afflictions to be mindful of mortality For in so farr Jobs exercise was right that he minds Death and the grave or the house appointed for all living See Ps 90.12 Deut. 32.29 Lam. 1.9 Men are never in a right frame when they estrange themselves from thoughts of mortality 2. It is of great use to consider that Death will truly discover what we are in our Original For saith he Thou wilt bring me to death and the grave Or Thou wilt return me to death and the grave that is Thou wilt then turn me to be dust as
and provoke God to take away all their excellencies If I say they did consider these things they would find how little cause they had to be puffed up with pride 10. It is the will of God and the scope of his instructions by his Word that men do not pretend to abominate pride while yet their practice declareth that they hugg it in their bosomes But that they endeavour to remove it and rid themselves of it For Pride must be hid from man Which doth not import that it is sufficient that pride be hid and lurking though it be not mortified and subdued but that it must be so hid from man as he shall not find it The phrase to hide signifieth sometime to take a thing quite away as Job 3.10 It seems to be a Metaphor taken from mens burying of these things which they desire not to be seen as Moses hid the Aegyptian whom he slew Exod. 2.12 Thus that is said to be hid which is destroyed and brought to nothing Is 29.14 with 1 Cor. 1.19 Now mens sin is said to be hid two wayes One is by a free pardon when a sinner hiding himself under Christs shadow gets his sins pardoned and covered Neh. 4 5. Psal 32.1 and 85.2 And it is certain that such as repent of their pride must have pardon for their by-gone pride whatever reformation there be for the futuâ—e But this is not principally meant here For by a pardon sin is properly hid from Gods revengeful eye not from man save in so farr as a pardon hides him from the penal effects of his sin The other way of hiding sin is when it is hid from the man himself not by keeping him from seeing his guilt and inclinations to sin but by removing of the sin from him And in this sense it is taken here and it imports That the man who heeds the instructions of the Word concerning his pride will 1. Not satisfie himself with claiming to a pardon when he is convinced of his guilt in it but will endeavour to have it removed from him that the mortification of the evil may be a comfortable evidence of the pardon of â—t 2. He will endeavour to remove it from him with detestation as an evil which he cannot endure to look upon but it must be hid out of his sight as is said of the Idols of penitents Is 30.22 3. Being sensible of his own propensity to that evil he will study to prevent it by hiding from himself all causes and occasions of it and tentations to it He will not study his graces and his privileges without studying his infirmities which may be a counter-ballance to him he will be sparing to reflect upon his afflictions at least he will be careful not to aggravate them lest his corruption and pride be thereby irritated and in studying of his sad lots he will be careful also to study his ill deservings and the mercies which are continued with him and the mercies remembred in wrath which may keep his Spirit sober 4. That all these endeavours may be effectual it should be his care to abide under Christs shadow that vertue from him may prevent the budding of that evil Doct. 11. It may encourage men to hearken to the voice of God in his Word if they consider that his quarrel is not against their persons but their sins that he intends not their destruction or to crush them but only their humiliation and reformation and that the only loss they will sustain if they manage his instructions well is the hiding of pride and the causes and occasions thereof from them For this is declared to be the scope of his instruction which he seals unto and upon man To withdraw man from his work and hide pride from man and men do wrong themselves when they make another use thereof Verse 18. He keepeth back his Soul from the pit and his life from perishing by the sword In this Verse Elihu gives an account of a further and more mediate scope of the Lords dealing with his people by dreams and visions and a result of the former Namely That the Lord leads them to renew repentance and to be humbled that so he may prevent their further hurt if they do it not even the pit and some violent death by the sword or the like violent means The words Soul and Life being different in the Original the first part of the Verse may be understood of the Souls going to Hell at death and the latter part of the manner of their death that it shall be violent And albeit godly men of whom Elihu's scope is chiefly to speak will not actually goe to Hell nor doth Elihu say that here but rather on the contrary that God prevents it yet their failings of their own nature do deserve it and therefore God makes use of the Word here to prevent it and if that succeed not he hath the rod c. as after followeth to effectuate it Or the phrases may be taken promiscuously the latter explaining the former That God keeps their Soul or Life from the pit or grave and death and that not an ordinary but a violent death which otherwise they would incurr if they hearken not to the Word or lesser rods As we find God dealt with Josiah whom he cut off in his presumptuous attempt against Pharaoh Necho and thus did he chasten some of the Corinthians for their miscarriages 1 Cor. 11.30 From this Verse Learn 1. The people of God do therefore run on in their miscarriages and follies and do neglect the renewing of their repentance because they consider not the hazards which they run by these courses Therefore are they informed of their danger here 2. Albeit the eternal state of the godly be secured by Christ yet their failings and particularly their pride do deserve the pit and albeit God prevent that hazard to the godly yet beside the fears of their eternal destruction they may be sharply chastised and even taste of a violent death For so much is here intimated That by their miscarriages and particularly by their pride they run the hazard of the pit and of perishing by the sword 3. It is one great cause of mens mistaking Gods dealing towards them that they can easily feel and resent the want of some mercies which they have enjoyed but they do not study and remark preventing mercies Therefore here lest men should mistake Gods disquieting of them with visions and dreams and his putting them to the unpleasant task of humiliation and repentance Elihu lets them see what hazards are prevented thereby and that he keepeth back the Soul from the pit and the life from perishing or passing namely out of the body by the sword by these means 4. There is nothing so sad which befalleth the people of God but it tends to prevent somewhat that is sadder which otherwise would befall them For here all this trouble by visions and dreams and the toyl of repentance and humiliation
Name of the second imports one so sweet as Aromatick Cassâ—a and the Name of the third implieth that she was one so fair as if an Horn or large measure of Paintry or Varnish had been powred upon her to make her appear beautiful 2. Their Estate and Portions and that they were made joint heirs with their brethren of their Fathers Lands and Estate v. 15. Which doth not import that they were never married but that their Father was careful to settle them near himself and his Sons that so they might have a Society among themselves for Gods Service because of the many Idolaters that were about them who might be ready to infect and corrupt them Doct. 1. Children in themselves are a â—lessing as continuing us in them to serve God even when we are gone for here they are ranked among Jobs Blessings See Psal 127.3 128.3 So that it is a sin to murmure at this mercy or not to improve Children aâ— a Blessing 2. It is in special a Blessing to them who have Wealth to have Children who may succeed to them in their Estates for this mercy of Children is subjoined to Jobs wealth v. 12. to intimate that his wealth would not have been so sweet if he had wanted Children to enjoy it after him So that it is the fault of men of great Estates and Power if they breed not their Children well who are to succeed to their Estates and Dignities whereby they not only wrong their own Families but their Countrey also wherein their posterity may have power And they are also culpable who having great Estates do not marry that so themselves may have a care of educating their Heirs if God give them any but do suffer those who shall succeed them to be bred by they cannot tell whom 3. Even the multitude of Children is a blessing as here it heightens Jobs mercy that he had so many And albeit Job was a rich man and had enough to give them yet they are indefinitely a blessing to poor or rich Psal 127.5 not to be murmured at though not to be doated upon either 4. Every sex of Children sons or daughters is a mercy as here is distinctly marked though we ordinarily doat upon those we want whether sons or daughters 5. Though Favour be deceitful and Beauty vain Prov. 31.30 and God may compense want of Beauty with excellent qualities nor must men cast off their Children because of deformities yet beauty is in it self a mercy not to be abused with a polluted life or wiâ—h pride because of it for therefore is the singular beauty of Jobs Daughters marked 6. It is a great blessing both to Parents and Children when Children are dutiful and obedient for so were Jobs Daughters as appears from his care to provide for them and his delight to have them near himself and this is marked as one of his mercies 7. It is a great blessing and an evidence that Children are dutiful when they live in love one with another as here the sons and daughters delight to live near together See Chap. 1.4 8. It should be a special part of Parents care and an evidence of their love to their Children to study to prevent their infection in the matter of Religion and so to settle them that they be not cast upon tentations so much did Job evidence by setling his Daughters among their Brethren Verse 16. After this lived Job an hundred and forty years and saw his sons and his sons sons even four generations The fourth Particular in this account is his long life after his restitution even for the space of 140 years so that he saw four generations come of him before he died If we apply that General v. 10. to this also and make this sum double to what he lived before his trial we may conclude that he was 70 years old which is the half of 140 when his trial began and lived in all 210 years beside the time of his trial Which if there were not somewhat singular in it might help to prove to the antiquity of this History and that Job lived before these days wherein mens lives began to be shortned as Moses sheweth Psal 90.10 But this supposition of the doubling of his years not being so certain we may only here Learn 1. Albeit our life on earth be but a warfare yet long life is a mercy in it self and to godly men a reward of piety and a benefit to the Church with whom they are continued for therefore is Jobs long life marked as one of his mercies See Psal 34.12 13. It is true godly men have some loss by their long life being so much the longer kept from heaven yet death being in it self a fruit of sin the deferring thereof is in it self a mercy And a long life may be full of rich advantages to godly men while they see Gods goodness in the land of the living before they go hence Psal 27.13 while they have opportunity to honour God and do him much service Phil. 1.23 24 25. while they get many proofs of Gods love Gen. 48.15 1 Kings 1.29 while they have opportunity to sow largely for a rich harvest 2 Cor. 9.6 and get leisure to ripen for death which is their difficult step and great trial All which doth not import that we should doat upon long life but it serves to condemn the Godly who are weary of their life and all those who make little good use of a long life but do thereby render themselves obnoxious to a sudden stroke Psal 68.21 2. It is yet a further proof of kindness when God sweetens our long life with mercies particularly of posterity as here Job saw his sons and his sons sons even four generations 3. Our long life is then especially sweet when we see the Church well and are doing good therein in our stations as Job here had opportunity to train up and see a Church of his posterity See Psal 128.5 6. Verse 17. So Job died being old and full of days The last particular in this account is his happy death when he is full of days Whence learn 1. Did men live never so long and in great prosperity yet they must at last die as here Job did See Psal 49.6 7 8 9. Heb. 9.27 2. It is a mercy in it self when men are ripe to be taken away for it is ranked among Jobs mercies that he died being old It is true young persons do doat upon time expecting an happiness in it but when men come to what Job attained of years or any thing proportionable to it they will count it their mercy to get their Pass to be gone if they be godly 3. Were men never so old when they die yet to be full of days and satisfied with the time they have lived is a mercy and gift of it self for it is here marked as a distinct mercy that he was not only old but full of days when he died And this is a mercy
I was before 3. It is of great use also to look upon death and the grave as the common lot of all mankind For so doth Job describe the grave here that it is the house appointed for all living For however some get not a grave when they dye yet they get somewhat in place of it and though some as Enoch and Elijah were caught up to Heaven immediately yet they had a change in place of death and those instances are so rare and singular that they need not be stood upon as exceptions to this general assertion See Josh 23.4 1 King 2.2 Ps 89.48 Heb. 9.27 The study hereof should cause men more easily digest death as a common lot and should excite all to prepare for it it being none of these tryals wherewith some only are exercised It may also let men see that there is no cause why they should glory in their advantages within time seeing death and the grave will make all equal See Chap. 3.13 14 c. Ezek. 32.18 27. 4. It is also useful to know that God is the dispenser and orderer of all our tryals and particularly that he hath the supreme hand in bringing us to death that so we may know that our times are in his hands and not in the hands of men Ps 31.15 For saith he Thou wilt bring me to death c. 5. Albeit godly men are not unwilling to dye when God calls them to resign their life to him yet it cannot but be sad to them to be taken away in a storm For this is the scope of Jobs complaint that he was put to expect death when God was so cruel and opposite to him v. 21. So that when men are called to close their course in peace they should not decline it considering that God if be please can make death more formidable to them 6. The people of God in trouble are ordinarily too rash in their conjectures and apprehensions for the future They may be more afraid than really hurt and when they have discovered their weakness and fears God may be pleased mercifully to disappoint them For though Job was certain that he would presently dye I know thou wilt bring me to death yet he was disappointed See 2 Cor. 1.8 9 10. Verse 24. Howbeit he will not stretch out his hand to the grave though they cry in his destruction This Verse hath a dependance upon the former but the scope and meaning thereof is difficult by reason of the various readings especially of the latter part of the Verse Some conceive that Job is repeating a promise then current in the Church Namely That God will not stretch out his hand to the grave to send men to the grave if in his destroying them they cry And so the words will contain an aggravation of his complaint that God was bringing him to death v. 23. That howbeit there was such a promise and he was one who might claim a right to it being not only a cryer unto God v. 20. but a merciful man v. 25. yet God would cut him off This interpretation doth import That the best way in difficulties is to have our recourse to the promises to see what grounds of hope there are there and that Gods dispensations may sometime seem to contradict his promises As Job is here conceived to complain But it may suffice to justifie God That this was but a promise of temporal deliverance and such promises are not absolute but conditional to be performed in so farr as God seeth to be best for his people and That Job was disappointed in his apprehensions and was not cut off nor this supposed promise made void to him But I choose to follow our Translation which carries it as a cordial against approaching death That however God send him to the grave as he apprehended v. 23. yet he will not stretch out his hand to the grave or heap alluding to the custome of raising up heaps upon graves that they might be known to afflict him there but death will end all his bodily pain That in the end of the Verse is added as an amplyfication Though they cry in his destruction that is However they who are innocents and cut off do cry in the mean while that he is destroying them or however their enemies cry out while they are a cutting off that they are wicked as his friends and others did raise clamours against him yet they will be at ease there Others read it by way of confirmation thus Is there any cry there in the grave of his destroying them Certainly none at all None ever heard any such cry of these who are in the grave This encouragement which Job takes to himself is not so to be understood as if men had no joy or pain after death but he speaks only of the ease men have after death of that bodily and temporal pain which they endure in this life And albeit all this and much more might have been expected by Job had he been to dye at this time Yet he evidenceth too much weakness that he looks not to further comfort than simple case in the grave which was also his fault in his impatient wishes Chap. 3. Doct. 1. Every bitter lot that befalls the children of God hath its own consolation to sweeten it if it were well studied As here Job finds a cordial to sweeten his apprehensions of approaching death If mens eyes were opened as Hagars Gen. 21.15 16 19. and Elisha's servants 2 King 6.15 16 17. they might discern ground of encouragement even in the midst of their perplexities 2. This may sweeten all our bitterness and toyl in this life that death will put an end to it beside what further may be expected after death by godly men For so doth Job reckon that he will not stretch out his hand to the grave 3. No sad dispensations or rods upon men while they are going to the grave will frustrate them of rest there but death will make a sudden change of all their outward and temporal troubles For so much doth the subjoyned amplyfication and confirmation teach however we read and understand it Though men be crying and groaning in going to death and though clamours and calumnies be raised against them yet the experience of none doth witness that there is any cry there of Gods destroying them 4. The people of God do oft-times come short in their expectation of what is allowed upon them For Job comforts himself only in the expectation of that which is common to all as to the outward part of it whereas he might have looked for much more 5. It is also an evidence of the people of Gods weakness in trouble that they do at too much upon simple case of their pains and troubles For this is all he expresseth here though elsewhere he speak out his mind more fully Verse 25. Did not I weep for him that was in trouble Was not my soul grieved for the poor The third Evidence