made Jeremie enquire Why doth the way of the wicked prosper As if he had said If I could see the reason of it it would satisfie me but while thou keepest me in the darke and I can give no account to my owne soule or those that aske me of this thy dispensation to wicked men this is the burthen of my soule It is usually said They are happy who know the causes of things And in regard of the diseases of the body we say that a disease is halfe cured when the cause of it is discovered But when a Physition is in the darke and cannot find out the cause of a disease he must needs be in the darke for the remedy of it So it is also with a man in regard of any affliction when he cannot find out the cause he knoweth not what to pitch upon as a remedy When Rebekah Gen. 25.22 had twins in her wombe and they strugled together within her she was much troubled and nothing would satisfie her untill she went to God to know the reason of the thing Lord saith she why am I thus And when God had told her that two Nations were in her wombe and that two manner of people should be separated from her bowels she made no more complaints So when there are such strivings such struglings and contrary motions of trouble in us or about us the soule goes to God and enquires why is it thus Lord I am more troubled with the ignorance of my troubles then with the weight or smart of them Thirdly Take the words as respecting the issue or deliverance from trouble and they affoord us this observation That It is a great addition to an affliction not to see or discerne a way to escape or get out of affliction To be in an affliction out of which there appeares no passage unlesse the soule be mightily supported by the hand and power of Christ brings within a step of despaire The Apostle speakes as much when he saith 1 Cor. 10.13 There is no temptation hath taken hold of you but that which is common to man and then it followes but God is faithfull who will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able but will with the temptation also make a way to escape that ye may be able to beare it As if he should say If God did not indeed discover or make out to you some way of escaping I must needs say you were never able to beare it but saith he God will make a way for you to escape that ye may be able to beare it Meaning that the opening of this way would revive their spirits and then they would be able through the strength of Christ to beare it If so then how shall the soule beare an affliction when God instead of making a way to escape doth as it were make a hedge to stop all escape Therefore when the Lord would support his people in their troubles he promised that they should have a doore of hope opened to them I will give her the valley of Achor for a doore of hope Hos 2.15 He would give her some appearance some glimpses and openings of deliverance in and from their present dangers It is threatned Deut. 28.25 thou shalt come out one way against thine enemies and flie seven wayes before them they should flie many wayes but they should escape no way Thou shalt come out one one way and flie seven wayes that is thou shalt try this and that and every way to escape but thou shalt find a hedge at every wayes end to stop and hinder thy escape We use to say of a man in a distressed condition He is in a wood or in a wildernesse And when God entangles men in their own devises it is said He powreth contempt upon Princes and causeth them to wander in the wildernesse where there is no way Psalm 107.40 So Pharaoh said of the children of Israel they are entangled in the land the wildernesse hath shut them in Exod. 14.3 And when a people are as the children of Israel were having a a Sea before them an army behind them and Mountaines on either hand Then they may say as Job did their way is hid and God hath hedged them in For my sighing cometh before I eate and my roarings are powred out like water Here Job takes up the former proposition and applies it particularly to his own person Before he said only in the generall why is light given to him that is in misery and why is light given to a man whose way is hid and whom God hath hedged in Now he saith in effect it is thus with me I am a man in misery and I am a man whose way God hath hid and hedged in wherefore then is my life continued And he proves that he was in such a condition by the effects of it sighes and roarings So that this verse holds forth two things about Jobs sorrow First The continuance of it in those words My sighing comes before I eate Secondly The extremity of it in those My roarings are powred out c. The argument may be thus framed That man is in extreame and continuall misery who doth not so much breath as sigh who when he would speake is forced to roare But thus it is with me my sighing cometh before I eate and my roarings are powred out like water therefore my misery is extreame and continuall My sighing cometh before I eate In the Hebrew it is word for word thus before the face of my bread my sighings come Which Hebraisme before the face of my bread hath a great emphasis in it It notes the continuance of his sorrowes without any intermission When a thing is said to be before the face of another it notes an equall continuance with that before the face of which it is said to be As in the negative Exod. 20.3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me so we translate it the Hebrew is Thou shalt have no other gods before my face that is so long as I continue to be thy God thou shalt have no other god but I shall be thy God to all eternity therefore thou shalt have no other gods but me for ever So in the affirmative Psalm 72.5 where under the type of Solomons Kingdome the continuance of the Kingdome of Christ is prophecied the Holy Ghost saith It shall continue so long as the Sunne and Moone endureth the Hebrew is it shall continue before the face of the Sunne and of the Moone that is there shall be an equall duration of the Kingdome of Christ and of those lights of Heaven the Sun and the Moone The Kingdome of Christ shall last as long as the world shall last So then according to this sense before the face of my bread my sighings come is as if he had said looke how long I have my bread before me looke how much time I spend in eating so much time I spend in sighing my
for all the rest The Booke begins with the description of his person in the first verse where Job is described by that which is accidentall and by that which is essentiall By accidentals so he is described by the place where he dwelt There was a man in the land of Uz. 2. By his name whose name was Job The essentials are foure qualifications which were essentiall to him not as a rationall man but as a holy man And that man was 1. Perfect 2. Vpright 3. One that feared God 4. Eschewed evill As they who write the Acts or Stories of great men usually give us some description of their persons before they set downe their undertakings or atchievements as you see in the 1 Sam. 17.4 5 6 7. how the great Giant Goliah is described So here the Holy Ghost by the Pen-man of this Booke being to record a glorious combate a combate not with flesh and blood alone but with Principalities and Powers a wrestling with mighty and strong temptations first gives us if we may so speake the Prosopographie of this divine Heroes soule the lineaments and abilities of his spirit This was the heighth and this the stature of the Combitant such were his limbes and such his weapons there he dwelt and this was his name There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job There was That referrs us either to the truth of the Story or to the time of the Story Such a man there was that 's certaine Such a man there was but the time when is uncertaine It referres us to the time onely indefinitely There was such a man but when is not exactly and precisely set downe The Scripture we know doth often keepe an exact account of yeares the Scripture is the guide and key of all Chronology and sometimes it leaves things in generall for the time and onely saith thus much such a thing was or such a person was So here Yet some have undertaken to define what the Spirit of God hath left at large the precise time wherein Job lived and tell us in what yeare of the world these things were done But I desire not to be so accurate unlesse the Rule were so too Onely thus much we may safely say that Job lived betweene the times of Abraham and Moses and nearer Moses than Abraham and for that I conceive there is ground sufficient There are these two speciall Reasons why it should be circumscribed within that limit 1. Because Job offered Sacrifice at that time in his owne Country which after the giving of the law and setting up of a publike worship was forbidden all both Jewes and Proselytes They that were acquainted with the wayes of God knew they must not worship by Sacrifice any where but before the Tabernacle or after the Temple was built at the Temple 2. Because in the whole booke there is not the least print or the least mention of any thing which did concerne those great and glorious passages of Gods providence towards the people of Israel either in their going out of Aegypt or in their journey thorough the wildernesse to Canaan Now in a dispute of this nature such as was betweene Job and his friends there would have been frequent occasion to have considered and instanced some of those things There is scarce any booke in Scripture that beares date after that great and wonderfull dispensation of God but it makes mention of or referrs to some passages concerning them Againe for the time that which some collect to cleare it is from the Genealogie of Job there are three speciall opinions concerning the line of his pedegree One that he descended from Nahor who was brother to Abraham Gen. 22.21 It was told Abraham behold Milcah shee hath borne children to thy brother Nahor Uz his first-borne and Buz his brother c. This Vz who was the first-borne of Nahor Abrahams brother is conceived to have given denomination to the land of Vz and so from him Job to be descended Another opinion there is maintain'd by many that Job was of the line of Esau and that he was called Jobab by Moses Gen. 36.33 And Bela died and Jobab the son of Zerah of Bozrah raigned in his stead This Jobab who was a descendant or one of the Dukes of the line of Esau they say was Job But why the name Jobab should be contracted into Job I see little reason offered A third opinion for his descent is that he came from the children of Abraham by his second wife Keturah Gen. 25. where it is said that Abraham by her had divers sonnes and that hee gave them portions and sent them Eastward into the East country and from Midian who was the fourth sonne of Abraham by that second marriage our Genealogies doe positively and directly affirme that Job was descended That may suffice for the time for bringing of him within a narrower limit I have no grounds but conjecturall A man He is not called A man here barely as the Phylosophers Animal rationale c. as man is opposed to a Beast Nor barely is he called a man to distinguish his Sex as a man is opposed to a woman But there is somewhat more in the expression he is called a man by way of excellency And for the clearing and opening of that we may consider that there are 3. words in Scripture originall by which man is exprest 1. Man is called Adam That was the proper name of the first man and it became the common name for all men since So man was called from the matter of which he was made Adam from Adamah because as the reason is given Gen. 2.7 God made man dust out of the earth or as we translate of the dust of the earth 2. Man is called Enosh So he is called in regard of the infirmities weaknesses and sorrowes which he hath contracted by sinne since the fall sinne made the red earth weake and brittle earth indeed earth moystened with teares and mixt with troubles 3. He is called Ish which the Critticks in that language say comes from and hath allyance with two words One signifying Beeing or existence and the other heat or fire So that the excellency of mans being the heat courage and spirit that flames in him is set forth in that word and that 's the word here in the Text There was a man it is Ish an excellent a worthy man a man of an excellent spirit a man of men a man fitted to honour God and governe men And that it is so used in Scripture I will give you an instance or two that you may see it is not a bare conjecture In the 49. Psalme David as it were summons and divides mankind In the first verse he summons Heare this all ye people give eare all ye inhabitants of the world In the second verse he divides Both low and high rich and poore together The word in the Hebrew for high is Bene-Ish sons of Ish
three-fold hedge made about Job and they are all exprest here in this Text. Here was a hedge first about his Person that was the inmost hedge or the inmost wall in these words Hast thou not made an hedge about him That is an hedge about the very person of Job an hedge about his body least any sicknesse diseases or dangers should invade it and an hedge about his soule least snares and temptations should take hold of or prevaile against that thou hast made an hedge about him so that I cannot come at the person of Job to hurt him Againe Besides this inmost wall and the nearest about his person there is a second wall or hedge and that is exprest to be about his Family Hast thou not made an hedge about him and about his house By house we are not to understand the materiall house of stone or timber the edifice in which Job dwelt but by the house we are to understand the houshold Job and his family as oftentimes in Scripture the house is put for the family This day saith Christ to Zacheus is salvation come to thy house and it is said of the Jaylor that he beleeved and all his house that is all his household so here thou hast made an hedge about him and about his house that is about his Family about his children especially hence the Hebrew word for a child for a sonne doth signifie an house because children build up the house or keep up the name of their Fathers So that the house hedg'd about is the children the family and the followers and servants of Job as if Satan should say thou hast made an hedge not only about his person but about all that belong unto him about his children and servants I may not meddle with them neither There is the second hedge Lastly There is a third hedge or wall Hast thou not made an hedge about him and about his house and about all that he hath That is about his goods about his cattell and about his lands so farre as ever any thing of Jobs doth extend so farre the hedge goeth if Job have but the least thing abroad God doth make an hedge about it he hath not the meanest thing belonging unto him but is under guard and protection That is the meaning of it There is yet another thing to be observed in the words to make it more full Hast thou not made an hedge about him and about his house and about all that he hath on every side It is not only said thou hast made an hedge about him but thou hast made an hedge about him on every side which is a pleonasme or redundancy of speech It was a signe of Gods care of Job when he made an hedge about him but to say he made an hedge about him on every side here is exprest an extraordinary care that God had not left the least gappe for Satan or for any annoyance to come in unto Job There is not the least breach the least hole thou hast hedged him round about on every side whereby the wonderfull safety of Job his family and estate is set out under the protection of God That for the opening of those words First We may observe from the manner of this speech Hast thou not made an hedge about him Satan speakes very angerly Questions as they ever expresse quicknesse of spirit so they many times expresse much passion and trouble of spirit Here. Satan in questioning speakes as if he were vext Hast thou not made an hedge about him Hence note That the protection which God gives to his people and servants is the vexation of Satan and of all his Instruments It troubleth them extreamely that God doth so guard and hedge up his people that they cannot come at them No man can endure to see that defended which he wisheth were destroyed Then againe if we consider the matter of Satans speech it is a truth and a most comfortable truth a truth full of consolation to the people of God Hast thou not made an hedge about him and about his house and about all that he hath on every side We may note hence That Satan the father of lyes sometimes speakes truth for his owne advantage For as it is said concerning Judas about his care for the poore when he would have had the oyntment sold and given to the poore This he said saith the Text not that he cared for the poore but because he was a theefe and had the bagge and bare what was put therein So we may say here Satan sets forth the care of God over his people in most exact termes And why doth he doe this Not that he cares to speake well of God or to advance God in the eyes of his people by telling his people and servants how watchfull he is over them but he doth this only for his owne advantage that hereby he may lessen the service and blemish the obedience of Job because he received so much care and love from God As it is many times with ungodly men they will doe good not that they care to doe good but only for some bie-end So Satan will sometimes speake that which is true not that he regards the truth or that he would speake a word of truth for he hath nothing but lyes in his heart there is a lye in his heart when there is truth in his mouth He never speakes truth but to deceive and doe hurt by it Thirdly Wee may observe this which lyeth plaine in the words That the people and servants of God dwell in the middest of enemies in the middest of dangers Why else need there be an hedge a wall about them What need there be a guard about them unlesse there were dangers about them There are none in the world so envyed and spighted so aimed at and persecuted as the people and servants of God you may see it by the wall that is made about them God will not bestow cost and care in preserving and guarding where there is no danger of invading If you should come to a City and see it mightily fortified and see men make wall after wall about it and bulwarke after bulwarke you will presently conjecture that City stands in great danger and is in the middest of enemies So when we reade that God was faine to make wall after wall to make hedge after hedge about the person the family the estate of Job it sheweth that the devill had an ill eye upon Job and upon all that was Jobs Satan and his instruments had it not bin for this hedge would quickly have fallen upon him No godly man should live a quiet moment did not the Lord stretch forth his hand to save and protect him Fourthly We may observe That God himselfe doth undertake the guarding and protecting of his people Thou hast made an hedge about him and about all that he hath God himselfe either doth it immediately or he doth put
begot a sonne mortall and subject to death he did but look backe to the common condition of man and supported himselfe But now I say this second argument is higher it is not an argument bottomed upon the frailty of nature but upon the soveraignty of God This argument is grounded upon the equity of divine providence and dispensations The Lord saith he hath given and the Lord hath taken away The Lord hath given Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above Jam. 1.17 What gifts doth Job here meane He meanes good and perfect gifts in their kind but not the best and most perfect kind of gifts The Lord once gave me those Oxen those Sheepe all these outward things that now I am stripped of The Lord hath given A gift is any good freely bestowed when we receive a thing which another was not ingaged to bestow that is a gift Now God doth not onely give us those transcendents grace and glory faith in Christ here and full fruition of Christ hereafter not onely are these gifts I say sent in from God and undeserved by us but outward things riches and honour children and servants houses and lands these are the gifts of God likewise we have not the least creature-comfort of our owne we have nothing of our owne but sinne What hast thou that thou hast not received is a truth concerning every thing we have even to a hoofe or a shoe-latchet Wee are indebted unto God for our spiritualls for our temporals for all We must say of all little or much great or small The Lord hath given How did the Lord give Job all his riches and estate The Lord doth give either immediately or mediately When Job saith the Lord hath given we are not to understand it as if the Lord had brought such a present to him and said here take this estate take these cattell these servants but God gave them mediately by blessing the labours of Job So when the Lord prospereth us in our honest endeavours and labours and callings then the Lord giveth us outward things The Lord hath given Job doth not say by my strength and diligence by my policy and pradence I have got this estate as the Assyrian said Isa 10.13 by the strength of my hand have I done this and by my wisdome for I am prudent Iob takes no notice of himself he was not idle yet he speaks as if he had done nothing the Lord hath given This should teach us in the first place to acknowledge the Lord as the fountain and donor of all our outward comforts When you get wealth doe not say this I have gotten such language is barbarous in divinity but say this the Lord hath given Wee find an expresse caution to this purpose given by Moses from God not onely against the former language of the tongue but of the heart When the Jewes should come to Canaan and should grow rich and great there When thou hast eaten and art full then thou shalt blesse the Lord. Beware thou forget not the Lord thy God for the good land which he hath given thee and say in thy heart my power and the might of my hand hath gotten me this wealth but thou shalt remember the Lord thy God for it is hee that giveth thee power to get wealth It is he that giveth thee power Many who are perswaded that God gives them grace that God gives Heaven and Salvation are hardly perswaded or at least doe not so well consider it that God gives riches c. their their hearts are yet ready to say that they have gotten this wealth they have gotten this honour It is a sweet thing when a man lookes upward for these lower things and can say on good grounds that his earth hath dropt down to him from Heaven The Lord hath given Further when Job saith the Lord hath given it is an argument of his owne justice and equity in getting Job did not enrich himselfe by wrong by grinding the faces of the poore If he had done so he could not have said the Lord hath given So much as we get honestly we may looke upon as a fruit of Gods bounty Looke into your estates and whatsoever you have got by wrong dealing take heed of saying this is of Gods giving for so you make God himselfe a partner in your sinnes God sometime gives when we use no meanes but he never gives when we use unlawfull meanes What God said concerning the setting-up of those Kings Hos 8.4 They have set-up Kings but not by me he saith of all who enrich themselves by wrong they have gotten riches but not by me When men leave the rule of justice God leaves them And though unlawfull acts are under the influence of his blessing Wicked men thrive often but they are never blessed their prosperity is their curse Thirdly it is observable that when Job would support himselfe in the losse of his estate he cals to mind how he came by his estate and finding it all given in by the blessing of God upon his honest labours and endeavours he is satisfied Note That what we get honestly that we can part with contentedly He that hath got his estate by injustice can never leave it with patience Honesty in getting causeth quietnesse of spirit in loosing outward things Keepe a good conscience in getting the world and you shall have peace when you cannot keepe the world Wheras a wrong-doer and a wrong-dealer is in such a day under a double affliction he is afflicted with his present losse and he ought to be afflicted for his former gaine Fourthly These words the Lord hath given being rightly handled will be as a Sword to cut-off foure monsters or monstrous lusts which annoy all the world or as a medicine to cure foure diseases about worldly things Two of these lusts are strongest in the rich and the other paire assault the poore The poore pine either with discontent because they have so little or with envy because others have so much The rich swell with pride because they have aboundance or they are fil'd with contempt of those that are in want Let the rich seriously weigh this speech it will cure them of pride Charge them that are rich saith the Apostle 1 Tim. 6.17 that they be not high-minded You see how subject rich men are to this inflammation of pride But with what doth he pricke this bladder It is with this thought that God gives all riches Let them trust in the living God who giveth us all things richly to enjoy That argument of the Apostle 1 Cor. 4.7 If thou hast received it why dost thou boast is as strong and as true in regard of temporals as of spirituals Consider seriously that your estates are the gift of God and downe fals pride If you come honestly by them they are the gift of God If you come dishonestly by them they are the gifts of Satan and you ought to be ashamed of them and