cleared and vindicated they may be ready to take it ill As here Job complains that God had taken away his judgement or had not given him an hearing to silence the reproaches and mistakes of his Friends See Psal 69.20 and 120.3 4. Men should acknowledge it a mercy when they are born out under this tryal and though it do prove sharp unto them yet that is not a mark of wickedness for godly men have been afflicted with it before them and withall others should take heed that they inflict not such a tryal which may prove so sharp and vexing to an afflicted godly man 6. Beside misconstructions and other outward tryals under which godly men may be continued and God not interpose to vindicate and deliver them godly men should resolve to be exercised with soul-trouble by their outward troubles breaking in upon their spirits to distemper them and Gods hiding of his face under it For when Job is not delivered from misconstructions nor his cause cleared he is also vexed in soul Here we are to consider 1. Godly afflicted men may meet with more trouble instead of being delivered from what they are under As Job iâ— not only not delivered and cleared but his soul is also vexed 2. Troubles are never sharp and searching till they get in upon mens spirits and souls For Job complains of this as a sad addition to the former tryal Then tryals will become insupportable Prov. 18.14 and they will readily discover any scum of corruption that is within us So that men have cause to bless God if they be free of this whatever their lot be otherwise Hence 3. Men should look well to what their souls are doing under trouble for if they be not vexed with sin Jer. 2.19 they are justly made to smart under other vexations Doct. 7. Bitterness is ordinarily the result of soul-trouble For here his soul is made bitter as it is in the Original See Chap. 9.18 Troubles are of themselves grievous and bitter Heb. 12.11 and when they break in upon our spirits they work upon our bitterness and we represent them to our selves as more bitter and grievous than indeed they are And therefore we should be upon our guard that we may possess our souls in patience and meekness Luke 21.19 And for this end we ought to remember that it is our distance from God our pride our hearkning to every tentation and our aversion from exercise that breed us all our bitterness 8. Soul-bitterness is the great distemperer and misleader of godly men under affliction For this bred all his resentment here and whatsoever is afterward censured in this discourse flowed from this beginning of it with a reflexion upon his soul-bitterness Which may tell the afflicted where to find a cure of their own distempers even in wrestling against their bitterness 9. It is but a tentation and fruit of bitterness to father our distempers upon God or to reflect on him in what he doth As here Job complains of him that by his dispensations which were most cleanly and justifiable he had made his soul bitter when it was indeed the result of his own weakness See Prov. 19.3 Yea by calling God the Almighty in doing of this he insinuates a sharp reflexion that God had employed his power thus against him who was a weak afflicted man See Jer. 20.7 10. Godly men notwithstanding their weaknesses under affliction are yet giving proofs of honesty and integrity which may be seen by right discerners As here may be seen in Job who notwithstanding all these distempers 1. Seeth Gods hand in all and never takes his eye from off his providence which was commendable though he fathered his own distempers unjustly upon him 2. By his swearing by God though he thus dealt with him he gives proof that he will still worship him and reverence him as the supreme Iudge the witness to the conscience and maintainer of truth and so will cleave to him and appeal to his Tribunal and will not suspect any prejudice from him whatever his sense may say of him for present 3. He loves integrity and will still abide by it yea he will swear himself Gods servant and that he will not deal deceitfully And so he gives proof that he loves piety and integrity even when he thinks God deals hardly with him which may condemn them who are wicked when they are well dealt with Verse 3. All the while my breath is in me and the spirit of God is in my nostrils Thirdly unto his oath and description of God he subjoyns an account of his constancy in the resolution after-mentioned wherein he swears that he will persevere all the dayes of his life Whence Learn 1. Mans life is but in his lip and nostrils and continues but for a while For it depends upon the breath in his nostrils See Psal 146.3 4. Isa 2.22 So that we ought not to set up our rest upon time or the enjoyments thereof Psal 49.11 12 c. Luk. 12.19 20. 2. Our life and breath are from God and consequently at his disposal For it is the spirit or breath of God given by him in his nostrils See Psal 104.29 30. Act. 17.25 28. The consideration whereof 1. Obligeth man to glorifie God upon this very account Dan. 5.23 2. Is an argument why man should â—ender his life as the gift of God not cutting it off by intemperance neglect of the body wearying of it under trouble or otherwise 3. It may secure us in troubles that our times are in Gods hand Ps 31.15 and 66.8 9. 4. It is an argument perswading us to live in a continual dependence upon God Jam. 4.13 14 15. Doct. 3. Godly men ought to be constant and persevere to the end in good resolutions not being shaken by vicissitudes at length of time For Job swears that all the while his breath is in him c. he will abide at his resolution See Matth. 24.13 4. When men consider the uncertainty of their life and that it is at Gods disposal it should make them very serious and ingenuous in the maâ—â—eâ— of their integrity For that his breath is the breath of God and that but in his nostrils may be looked on also as an argument and reason why he will be sincere in what he hath sworn to declare concerning his integrity Verse 4. My lips shall not speak wickedness nor my tongue utter deceit Fourthly In this and the two following verses he subjoyns the resolution it self which he swears to abide by so constantly and that is to maintain his own integrity which is the state of the controversie betwixt him and his Friends In this verse he gives an account of this his resolution in general termes That he will not speak wickedness nor use deceit to see off his cause as men use to do when they have a bad cause Whence Learn 1. It is a great proof of piety to take heed to the tongue For Job begins his resolution to maintain
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
here a Job is provided for those about him Gods faithfulness is engaged that his people under tentation shall find such a way to escape that they may be able to bear it 1 Cor. 10.13 And this is one special mean of support among others to have a faithful and useful friend to encourage and direct them So that Saints in distress may certainly expect in Gods due time and way consolation and comforters were it even in Arabia where Job lived 5. In dealing with crushed and tender minds Jobs practice affords two Rules necessary to be observed 1. That the afflicted be well instructed and their judgments informed in divine truth which will cure much anxiety disquiet and diffidence which flow from ignorance Psal 9.10 For Job made it his work to instruct many 2. That whatever Instructions or reproofs and admonitions be found necessary to give them as afflicted souls may need such yet care must be had that they be not thereby weakened but strengthened to keep their grips For Jobs scope in all his Instructions was still to strengthen and uphold See 1 Sam. 12.20 21. Doct. 6. God not only can but when he seeth it fit doth add an effectual blessing to the weak endeavours of his servants and children for strengthning and encouraging of fainting souls and other gracious effects As here his words upheld him that was falling c. which may encourage men as they have a calling to go forth in the strength of the Lord to deal with souls according to their various cases which otherwise doth appear to be an insuperable task as Exod. 6.9 Jer. 22.21 See 1 Cor. 1.22 2 Cor. 10.4 5. Secondly Jobs present behaviour under his own trouble ver 5. He who had been stout enough so long as trouble kept off himself now when it cometh and but toucheth himself becometh so faint in spirit and troubled and perplexed in mind that he knoweth not what to do In this he reflects upon Jobs former complaint Chap 3. wherein there was distemper of spirit more then enough discovered And it doth hold out these Truths 1. Greatness of trouble may drive a man from the comfortable use of what light he may have in his judgment ready to minister to others in cold bloud For Job who comforted others now faints and is troubled This needs not seem strange if we consider Partly That comforting of souls is the work of God and therefore had men never so much clear light yet if God withdraw they will want the use of it when they have most need Yea Ministers who dispense Consolation to others may yet be disconsolate enough themselves till God interpose Not that men are warranted to lie by from making use of what light they have for their own encouragement 1 Sam. 30 6. But that their activity without dependence upon God will not effectuate any thing Partly That there is a great difference betwixt a tryal apprehended in our judgment and felt by sense In the one case a mans judgment may be clear enough and his spirit resolute But in the other his spirit and judgement being over-charged he cannot so easily recollect and fix himself Hence it was that even our Lord was troubled in soul when the real sense of trouble came upon him Joh. 12.27 2. Faintness and discouragement of spirit when way it given thereunto doth soon perplex men that had they never so much light they will want the comfortable use of it for when once fainteth then he is easily troubled confounded and perplexed So that humble fortitude of mind being endeavoured and studied after it keeps a man in a near capacity to receive influences and direction from God for expeding him out of his perplexities Psal 27.14 Yet in this challenge we may observe a double injury done to Job 1. That Eliphaz doth so much aggravate his weakness and frailty For neither did he so faint as to quit his grips of an interest in Gods love and favour Nor is it solidly argued That because in his tentations his weakness did appear in his fainting and perplexities Therefore he is a wicked man as he would infer in the following verses It is our mercy that God doth otherwise judge of the ravings and swoundings of his afflicted Children For if this were sound Divinity that every able comforter of others when he is not able to comfort himself and every one that faints and is perplexed when God is emptying and humbling him under trouble is a wicked man or hypocrite Who of all the Lords tryed Worthies should ever dare to claim to integrity These things do indeed proclaim our frailty and oft-times we our selves have a sinful hand therein Yet the experience of Saints recorded in Scripture doth witness that they are incident to the best of Saints 2. Eliphaz doth also too much extenuate Jobs tryal and tentation drawing forth this weakness calling it but a touch contrary to their thoughts thereof Chap. 2.12 It is true a touch may import a sharp stroke which a man is made to feel as Chap. 2.5 Yet it is but a very slender word to express all Jobs great afflictions And it teacheth That many are apt to pry into and aggravaâ—e the failings of Saints who do little ponder the strong tentations they have to drive them so to slip But God though he be angry with those who raise a clamour above their strait doth ponder our tentations when he judgeth of our failings and consequently pitieth as Elisha did the Shunamite 2 King 4.27 The third head of his Argument is an Inference and conclusion drawn from his comparing the former two together ver 6. Wherein he thinks himself so clear that he dare appeal to Job himself whether this his way did not prove his Religion unsound and hypocriticall and that by his fainting who had comforted others he had given a poor proof of that Piety to which he had so much pretended Some take up those Questions thus Hath not thy fear been thy confidence and the uprightness of thy ways been thy hope That is Doth it not now appear that thy pretending to Piety to fear God and walk uprightly of which Chap. 1.1 was only mercenary because thou trusted and hoped to continue in prosperity thereby seeing now when thou art stripped of what thou enjoyedst thou faintest and discoverest that thou wast not sincere This was Satans very calumny against Job Chap. 1.9 10. now cast in his teeth by a godly friend As oft-times also the child of God may meet with his own very bosom tentations cast up to him by way of reproach for his further tryal and that he may be roused up to resist these tentations which otherwise he doth but too much cherish Psal 22.1 7 8 with 9. And whatever wrong they did to Job in this of which we heard somewhat on the former verse and somewhat will be added hereafter yet there is a general truth in this That time-servers can take up a form of godliness when it
at best their passionate inadvertency in some cases that they are little sensible of this truth and do little improve it in their practice Therefore it must not only be asserted here but disputed and proved also In this verse we have the first branch of the comparison or the case and state of Angels before God to which â— Behold is prefixed as being remarkable For the words some read them thus He putteth no trust in his servants though he put light of purity or praise that is praise-worthy excellencies in those his messengers But I shall not insist on these seeing they come all to one purpose with our own Translation And for clearing of the words we are not to restrict them only to faln Devils who do not usually if at all get the name of servants But they are to be understood even of the confirmed Angels Not simply as they are now confirmed but upon an impossible supposition thus That if they were compared with God or considered in themselves without his supporting and confirming grace and especially if they should contend with God which yet will never be they would not only be found impure but would have faln into the same sin with Devils to wit unfaithfulness in Gods service and foolish and mad attenpts against his Empire and glory In sum Though they are not privatively impuâ—e yet comparatively or being compared with God they are impure and being left to themselves they would be found not trusty or to be confided in as the phrase is Joh. 2.23 24. having that frailty as creatures which would betray them to disloyalty and they would commit acts of folly Doct. 1. So transcendent is the infinite perfection and purity of God compared with the most perfect of creatures as is admirable and wonderful and ought not to be thought upon by us without elevated minds and affections even to admiration Therefore doth this comparison begin with Behold 2. It speaks the Supreme Dominion and Excellency of God and how little need he hath of the service of base men That the glorious Angels are but his Ministers and Servants attending continually to fulfil his command For his Servants are Angels as the latter part of the verse expounds the former See Psal 1â—4 4. and of their services in attending his presence tendering the welfare of his people c. See Isai 6.1 2 3. Psal 34.7 91. â—1 Matth. 4.10 24 31. Luk. 16.22 Heb. 1.14 and elsewhere 3. The choice of created perfection being compared with God is but impurity for He put no trust in his servants c. See Chap. 15.15 Hence it is that Angels do cover their faces in the presence of God and do proclaim him only holy Isa 6.2 3. 4. The chief of created and dependent perfection is mutable and unstable without Gods support For even Angels he charged with folly What was found in Devils would be found in all of them if left to themselves Which may teach creatures still to depend on God in their most established and settled state 5. Trust and confidence is so weighty a thing that nothing which is created and dependent can bear the weight of it though it were never so perfect For he put no trust even in his servants to warn all that nothing can bear the weight of our confidence but God alone Vers 19. How much less on them that dwell in houses of clay whose foundation is in the dust which are crushed before the moth Followeth the Second Branch of the Comparison or the Inference from the condition of Angels to prove the imperfection of men before God The word of comparison in the Original may either be rendred How much less and so it relates to the first part of the former verse If he put no trust in his Angels how much less in man Or How much more and so it answers to the latter part of the verse If he charge Angels with folly how much more may he charge man In sum the scope cometh to this If Angels cannot plead purity in comparison of God nor be trusted in as having any stability without supporting grace How shall man dare to enter the lists with God And to make this inference good there are insinuated three disadvantages that men have in point of purity and stability being compared with Angels 1. Angels are Spirits Men though they have souls yet they officiate in a body of clay 2. Angels are near God in Heaven Men are kept on the Earth as on their basis and foundation while they are in their bodies 3. Angels are sinless Man hath sin resident in him as appears by his frailty and mortality being but mouldring dust and proving so since the fall Gen 3.19 and being destroyed before the moth sooner cut off then these weak creatures and appointed to be destroyed and consumed by moths and worms Doct. 1. Albeit vain man be ready to swell in pride before God yet upon a right reckoning he will find himself inferiour in the point of purity and righteousness even to other creatures as this comparison doth teach And if Angels do cover their faces before God and proclaim him holy how dare men quarrel 2. Albeit men do not see nor regard their impurity and sinfulness in it self yet it is so visible in the frailty of their constitution and daily miseries as they must be blind who will not observe it For thus is it convincingly demonstrated here 3. Albeit Man was created perfect in his kind yet his very corporal and animal life in the body common to him with beasts did speak him more weak and mutable in himself then Angels and now since the fall these affections that are common to him with beasts do most easily mislead and pervert him For it is mans disadvantage that he dwells in an house of clay 4. As Mans body was but formed of the dust so his fall hath brought him so experimentally to know that his base original as may make him sober in his quarrellings with God For it may lay him low that his foundation is in the dust both as to the constitution of his body and as to his habitation See Gen. 18.27 5. Whatever man do think of his present disadvantages and defects yet his mortality and the consideration of his being easily crushed and how the worms will triumph over him may quell his pride especially before God For this layeth him low that he is destroyed before the moth See Isai 2.22 Vers 20. They are destroyed from morning to evening they perish for ever without any regarding it 21. Doth not their excellency which is in them go away they die even without wisdom To inculcate this doctrine of mans Mortality which man himself doth so frequently forget and little emprove it is here insisted on and laid before us in these particulars 1. The brevity and uncertainty of mans life being destroyed from morning to evening ver 20. that is between a morning and an evening or destroyable every
thing to fall unto the hands of the living God Heb. 10.31 it is no wonder if it affect the godly much when they see that it is not man but the great God with whom they have to do 8. Albeit sharp troubles inflicted by the hand of God be very sad to the people of God Yet all that is easie in comparison of the apprehension of Gods anger in the trouble and perplexities of spirit and tentations arising upon those troubles For this is the deep wound of the Arrow and the venom of the poysoned Arrow which inflames the wound and makes it deadly 9. Tentations and sense of divine displeasure under trouble will soon exhaust created strength and make the spirits of men succumb For saith he the venom thereof drinketh up my spirit See Prov. 18.14 And this is an argument whereby we may plead with God for moderation Isa 57.16 10 It is a great addition to the present troubles and tentations of Saints when terrours and fears for the future do assault and perplex them especially when they apprehend that God is pursuing them by those terrours Therefore doth Job add that the terrours of God were against him See Psal 88.15 Jer. 17.17 And albeit in these cases we may safely repel them with this Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof Matth. 6.34 and many of those fears prove in the issue to be but mere apprehensions and not real Yet broken crushed spirits can hardly get them avoided 11. When once a broken mind is haunted with terrours and fears their wit and fancy may multiply and aggravate them far beyond what they are or will be in reality For Job here doth apprehend the terrours of God acting against him in an hostile manner yea so set in aray against him that he seeth no way to escape and yet in all this he was mistaken Vers 5. Doth the wild ass bray when he hath grass or loweth the oxe over his fodder 6. Can that which is unsavoury be eaten without salt or is there any taste in the white of an egge 7. The things that my soul refused to touch are as my sorrowful meat These verses may be taken up as the same in substance with the former thus It being natural for Beasts to complain when they are afflicted with the want of food why might not he also complain of his affliction and his Friends having enough like Beasts well provided for could not be sensible of his desolate condition ver 5. For he could be content to bear his affliction if it were sweetned with any thing But could not force his mind more then a man can force his appetite to think that savoury and seasonable which was nothing so ver 6. For now he was made to feed upon these torments the thoughts whereof would formerly have affrighted him ver 7. This interpretation cannot well be admitted for albeit Job took but too much liberty to complain yet we cannot justly charge upon him that he did so utterly abhor afflictions as this interpretation would bear Therefore comparing it with ver 24 25. I take the verses to contain a second Argument justifying his complaint That he could not but complain of his great trouble seeing Eliphaz by his Discourse had ministred nothing which might have mitigated his sorrow but rather contributed to increase it For saith he to give a brief sum of the words I were worse then the wild Ass or Ox yea and cruel to my self if in this straight I should not accept any counsel that would prove wholesom food to my mind ver 5. But your doctrine which ye offer as food and medicine to my afflicted soul wanting the Salt of Prudence and Charity in application and being like the white of an Egge but frivolous and not substantial cannot but be unsavory and tastless unto me ver 6. Especially considering that those things ye now suggest to me to feed upon in my adversity are such aâ— he very thought of them in my greatest prosperity made me abhor and tremble at them ver 7. Or as some read it and it agreeth as well with the Original My soul refuseth to touch them they are my sorrowful food That is I cannot now digest those things they being so sad and sorrowful food for a man in my case This censure passed by Job upon Eliphaz's doctrine cannot well be contradicted For albeit he spake sound Doctrine in some and but in some particulars yet it was very impertinently applied to Job and upon an unsound Principle that he had been a wicked man and so behoved to begin of new to seek God Hence Learn 1. This Metaphor taken from the Beasts ver 5. shews That even nature it self teacheth men that they ought to be content when they have what may supply nature For Doth the wild Ass bray out of discontent when he hath grass or loweth the Ox over his fodder The question imports a Negative that they will not And so men who are not thus content do offer violence to Nature See 1 Tim. 6.8 As mens anxieties are also thus refuted Matth. 6.26 28. 2. As an afflicted soul ought to be sober so it ought to be very hungry after sound doctrine and a seasonable word to it ought to be as food which refresheth and strengthneth it For so the comparison imports that sound doctrine would be to him as grass to the wild Ass and fodder to the Ox over which if he had it he would not complain It is an evidence of an unsanctified trouble when it makes not the word precious Psal 119.71 3. Every one is not fit to deal with a troubled spirit For not only unsound doctrine but even misapplied truth will be unsavoury to such Therefore doth be account his doctrine unsavoury and without salt See Isa 50.4 Prov. 15.23 4. These who would speak a right to souls in trouble ought to propound substantial doctrine for whites of Egges and Moon-shine or empty airy notions will not then bear them up as Job here asserts Is there any taste in the white of an Egge 5. Though men speak truth and substantial truth yet that is not enough especially if the doctrine in it self be sharp to flesh and bloud unless they prudently take up the afflicteds case that they may speak to the point and unless there be much discretion and tenderness much warmness and charity in applying it For through the want of these the best of Eliphaz's doctrine was but unsavoury and could not be eaten without that Salt 6. Such may be the Revolutions of Divine Providence that what men have greatest antipathie against may yet be made their sad exercise and so ordinary as their daily food For so were those things charged on Job to him his soul refused to touch them and yet they were set before him as his sorrowful food This may befal the godly both in their inward and outward condition Which may teach them to stoop to a Soveraign Lord and to labour for
this was an evidence that Job's course was wrong seeing he came so easily by it in his passion 2. Albeit complaints against God be in any case unlawful Yet this adds to the sinfulness thereof when we run voluntarily and without any restraint upon them As Job professeth to do here Otherwise it is an extenuation of the fault when our complaints run violently over the belly of our consent as we will find it befel Job afterward Chap. 10. where he speaks more distinctly of this exercise Obs 3. The more remote ground and rise of this complaining is bitterness of soul and anguish or as the word is straitness of spirit which cannot contain his griefs Oâ— this distemper of an imbittered spirit See Chap. 3.20 Only here we may further Learn 1. However mens spirits when at ease do rove at large yet trouble will soon straiten them It will hem them in from gadding abroad to seek imaginary delights and will soon over-charge them so as they cannot contain or bear their sorrows For Job here is put to anguish or straitness of spirit 2. Bitterness and discontent rather then humility is the ordinary result of a straitned spirit For upon anguish of spirit followeth bitterness of soul 3. Bitterness is a very unsutable frame wherewith to go to God in trouble and will produce unbeseeming language to God For in this condition all his speaking is to complain Thus we find the Prayer of the Disciples very passionate in trouble Mar. 4.38 Obs 4. The immediate rise of this his resolution is implied in the inference Therefore I will not refrain c As if he had said Seeing my end is so neer at hand when I will be deprived of all worâ—dly enjoyments and seeing I can get no ease from God by laying my case before him as he had essayed to do ver 7 8 9 10. I will now rather then be over-charged with affliction ease my self by complaining This teacheth 1. It is a great snare upon afflicted spirits when they think they have reason for their distempered humours As Job here speaks of his way and resolution as a rational inferâ—nce drawn from the consideration of his case and what he had said formerly Thus was it also with Jonah Joâ— 4.9 2. Long-continued trouble and our seeing no relief nor ease under it may discover much boisterousness and untractableneness in us For in this case more of will appears in Job's resolutions then formerly 3. Disappointment of help and relief when we pray to God in trouble will readily incâ—ease bâ—tterness and heighten our distemper For Job not speeding in his former desire ver 7 c doth upon that infert that therefore he will now complain It is indeed a sore tryal when Prayer to God in trouble seems not to be successful Job 3â— 20 Psal 80.4 And therefore we ought to guard against stumbling at it By believing aâ—ceptance in wâ—rrantable desires though we cannot discern it 1 Joh 5 14 â—5 By humility causing us think little of our selvâ—s or of our Prayers and this will prevent that quarrelling unto which hypocrisie prompts men Isa 58 3 Mal 3.14 â—5 By justifying and commending of God whatever our sense suggest against his dealing Psal 22.1 2. with 3. and By a fixed resolution to pray on how unsuccessful soever it seem to be Psal 88.1 13 14. Vers 12. Am I a sea or a whale that thou settest a watch over me Followeth the complaint it self where the thing he complains of may be gathered from the whole Discourse to be his great and insupportable trouble That being arrested by affliction ver 12. without any rest or ease ver 14 15. God would neither cut him off ver 16. nor mitigate his trouble ver 19. nor be reconciled with him and take away any quarrels he had against him ver 21. But left him under his burden without relief one way or other Those particulars regrets may be considered as I go through the words Here I shall summarily take up the words as a complaint directed against God that he should be so sharply afflicted This he presseth upon four grounds or Arguments The first whereof in this verse is That his trouble was disproportionable not only to his strength of which see Chap. 6.12 but to any need he conceived he had of such a measure of trouble seeing in his judgment less might serve his turn What he hints at of the Sea and Whale doth point at what is more fully expressed Job 38.8 9 10 11. of the boisterous nature of the Sea if it were not hemmed in and of the Lords confining of the vast Whale to be kept within the Sea Psal 104.25 26. or Land-Dragons as the word also signifieth to abide in Deserts lest they should hurt men or at their being chained by men when they are taken So the meaning of the words is That he is neither so tumultuous and untameable as he must be hemmed in from sin and violence by those strong afflictions nor so terrible a delinquent that he should need so strong a guard to keep him under arrest till he be tryed and his cause judged Of this arrest and enquiry we find him complaining again Chap. 10.6 7. Chap. 13.27 This Argument and way of reasoning doth point out those truths 1. The Lords Providence extends it self to the ordering of all creatures even to the over-ruling of the most unruly For he hath a watch over Seas and Whales or Dragons to bound and limit them His hand can find men even in the uttermost parts of the Sea and among Sea-monsters as a proof that he is there Psal 139.9 10. Amos 9.3 and there he can give proofs of love to his people as he did to Jonah in the Whales belly in the midst of the Sea and to Daniel in the Lions den 2. It is a great mercy and brings much ease to men when they are not stubborn and untameable and are not as a Sea or Whale that need a watch over them For stubborn mockers do procure strong bonds Psal 68. 6. Lev. 26.21 23 24 27 28. Isa 9.9 10 11. Chap. 28.22 whereas the meek do dwell at much ease See Psal 32.9 10. Hos 10.11 But beside those general Truths there are many mistakes and weaknesses in this arguing For First It is mans weakness that he hath too good an opinion of himself and is ready to think he hath no need of Gods way of dealing with him Am I saith he a Sea or a Whale that thou settest a watch over me Whereas man should reckon he needs every thing that God makes his lot and that it is but if need be that he is in any heaviness 1 Pet. 1.6 Secondly Job's enquiry if he was a Sea or Monster needing such a guard doth bewray his ignorance of mans nature and even of himself though gracious in particular For 1. Every man by nature is no less tumultuous and untameable then the raging Sea Isa 57.20 which may be instanced In
sit up by the way For Job's evidence here is not simply his work but his labour or his diligence even till he weary again as the word imports though indeed there be no weariness in this labour but to the flesh which is not to be spared So that as it is no good evidence that men are sincere when they meet with few difficulties in their way which is an evidence Satan is not much afraid of their diligence So they do obscure the evidences of their own integrity who do ly by and wrestle not through their difficulties when they meet with them Though yet it be true that all our wrestling will not avail us without faith in Christ and encouragement through faith and we must chiefly wrestle to hold fast our confidence as Job did that thereby we may be enabled to labour in other duties 3. Whosoever engage themselves seriously to labour in seeking God will find that it shall not be in vain For this question Why labour I in vain is a strong denyal that it shalt be in vain See Isa 45.19 God who is pleased to reward even hypocrites their seeking of him with temporal favours or with suspending of judgments 1 King 21.27 28 29. will not fail to reward them who sincerely labour in his service And the hopes of this ought to be cherished for our encouragement Psal 73.28 For Job looks on it as a sad case if his labour were in vain Only it savours too much of hypocrisie too much to eye advantages of Piety within time and will readily breed a quarrel Job 21.15 Isa 58 3. Mal. 3.13 14.15 And there will be some found to fear God when such have stumbled Mal. 3.16 4. It is an unquestionable evidence that a man is not wicked when he seriously exerciseth himself in godliness for that scrapes a mans name out of the roll of the wicked Isa 55.6 7. particularly when he will not give up with God but comes to him as to a Father even when he seems to deal with him like a foe and cleaves to God and calls upon him with hope under trouble For thus Job proves he is not wicked since he is exercised in that labour which will not be in vain It is true it is a sad case when the friendship seemeth thus to be kept up only on our part yet it is an unquestionable proof that a man is not an hypocrite for such will not always call upon God Job 27.8.10 See Psal 88.13 14 15. As to the second extreme of Integrity a conceit of purity or sinlesness He professeth v. 30 31. that if he should pretend to that either as to himself or person or to his hands or actions and should take up a fond conceit of his own righteousness and his earnest study of sanctification God by plunging him in a ditch or pit of calamities if not also permitting him to fall in sin would refute that fancy and his own cloaths would abhor him or let him see himself worthy to be abhorred for such a thought That is his bodily affliction and boils fowling all his cloaths as a man cast into a fowl ditch or his very Apparel which was given to man after the fall would prove him a sinner and consequently would refute him in his pretensions to perfection as an abominable lyar He expresseth his pretending to purity under the borrowed term of washing with an eye to those washings of old which did signifie and point out purity Of which the Scriptures especially in the Old Testament speak so frequently See Deut. 21.6 7. Psal 26.6 Ezek. 36.25 Heb. 10.22 with many other places And he expresseth his pretending to perfection in purity by washing himself and making his hands never so clean with Snow-water whereby we may understand a washing with water so pure in itself and making what is washed therewith so pure as Snow is white Or it may be he alludes to some custom among them of making use of Snow-water or Water made of Snow by melting of it in their religious Purifications because it was purer then their other water and had less of Earth in it And so whether there were any such custom among them or not the phrase may simply import his taking the most effectual way of setting forth his purity as such Snow-water is more pure then other water and of greater exfficacy to purge uncleanness And the phrase is not a diminishing expression of his endeavours as if his own justification of himself would fowl him the more as we see Snow-water after it hath faln upon the Earth and melted upon it doth rather defile then wash because of the Earth which is mixed with it But it is made use of to point out an exact washing or at least a pretending to it like that phrase Jer. 2.22 Hence Learn 1. A mans avoiding of open and gross wickedness is not enough to prove him righteous unless he avoid conceit also especially of his perfection and sinlesness For as Job declined that he was wicked so also he did not wash himself with Snow-water nor made his hands so very clean or pretended not to justifie himself as if he had no spots Both of those are alike contrary to the truth of grace and ought to be avoided as such And here a child of God whose faith is much shaken by reason of his infirmities may see that a man may be not wicked or unregenerate who yet is not sinless And that he may safely take with his faults which are incident to all the Sons of Adam in this life when yet he will not hearken to the tentations of Satan bringing his integrity and grace in question 2. Mens conceit of their own purity renders them yet more impure in Gods sight Luke 18.11 14. And because proud Pharisees will not notice and believe that provokes God to convince them of it For If I wash my self yet shalt thou plunge me in the ditch 3. God hath afflictions whereby to refute proud self-conceit whereby he doth discover men to be sinners and gives them other work then to doâ—t upon their own supposed perfection And if that prevail not he can leave them to themselves to fall into such gross sins as may discover how vile they are For this is the ditch wherein he will plunge such Yea if he but set the Consciences of such on work they will see themselves no less vile then a man will be foul if plunged in a ditch Haughtiness of spirit goeth before a fall in one or it may be all of these respects 4. As all things may justly prove Enemies to a self justifier So in particular mens very Apparel which they wear however they glory in it is a badge of sin and a witness against their conceit of themselves For saith he my own cloaths shall abhor me 5. Men will be then most serious in the thoughts of their own imperfection when they have most present thoughts of God For Job in this passage speaks to
to send those tossings to awake such sleepers 2. They should be carefull to rest and acquiesce much in God when they have case lest otherwise this restlesseness be made their lot and exercise 3. They should also avoid idleness and vanity of minde the bitter dregs whereof may prove to be terror and restlesseness Somewhat also is to be spoken here to these who are vexed with these tossing terrours And 1. It is their advantage not to slee before them but to set their faces against them and sleight them in God For when men flee they pursue the more eagerly 2. They should be looked upon while they are their lot as needfull to keep them going and to purge them from their folly and vanity of minde And to improve them is an effectual mean to take off their edge 3. It must be their care while they are thus tossed to see if they can rest as a Ship rests an Anchor keeping their grip however they be tossed though they cannot rest so quietly as an House rests upon its foundation 4. Even in this tossed condition they are bound by faith to bless God who will guide them through this storm to a safe Harbour Doct. 6. It is not onely a cause but another humbling fruit of terrours also that the Soul can finde no welfare where they are For saith he my welfare passeth away where by his welfare we are to understand especially his Health and Prosperity As it is very suitable that all things look sad and desolate upon a Childe of God when God seems to be a terrour So here we may also observe the emptiness and vanity of all worldly contentments which will faile us when we have most need and when God cometh to deal in severity with us Onely we ought to be carefull even in the midst of terrours to observe and acknowledge the mercies that are continued with us and not to undervalue them 7. When terrours get place and prevail upon men ordinarily there is a little hope of what is to come as there is contentment in what is present For Job looks upon his welfare not onely as passed away and gone for the present but that it is passed away as a cloud which being once scattered can promise no rain for the future Mens fears and terrours do not onely make them a sad life for present but do bring up an ill report of all that may befall them for the future Yet such reports are not to be trusted for Job was mercifully disappointed 8. If we consider Jobs case we will finde that these two things adde much to the disquiet of troubled Souls 1. When they have too high an estimation of what they want For Job in his tossed condition accounts his former prosperous and healthfull condition his welfare or Salvation And it is true it was a great mercy which he formerly enjoyed yet probably in this his distress he esteemed more highly of it then when he did enjoy it and that addes to his trouble But we should learn to live without all that which God is pleased to take from us and should reckon that to be our welfare which we have whatever it be if we guide and improve it well 2. When their expectations are too much fixed upon the things of time and upon recovery out of trouble For sometime his condition looked like a cloud promising rain so that when it passed away the disappointment rendered his condition the sadder Sober expectations would free us of much toyle and vexation From Vâ—rse 16. Learn 1. As trouble in its time is very sad now saith he my Soul is powred out of which see v. 1. So Saints are not complementers in the matters of their exercise But the grievousness of what they complain of is seen in the sad fruits thereof For he proves that his Soul was puâ—sued v. 5. by very sensible effects And now my Soul is powered out 2 VVhatever the spirit of a man be able to do as to bearing of common insiâ—mities and troubles Prov. 18.14 Yet Soul terrours will overcome all his spirit and courage For saith he my Soul is powred out not in prayer as the phrase sometime importeth Ps 61.8 but become faint and weak through irresolution and other pressures The allusion is to waters powred out or to wax melted as Ps 22.14 As natural courage it 's alone will never do well in acting for Christ as the issue of Peters Resolution to dye with Christ doth witness So they who have no more but that for bearing of trouble and especially Soul-trouble will finde that trouble will press the life out of it 3. A crushed Spirit in stead of being a supporter under terrours doth it self become an heavy burden For saith he it is powâ—ed out upon me or lyeth upon me as an heavy pressure and burden when it is powred out and becomes faint Thus a wounded Spirit is so far from being able to sustain a mans infirmities that self becomes a burden which who can bear Prov. 18.14 And a man thus perplexed becomes the heaviest burden to himself Job 7.20 VVhich shews how good God is who yet supports such crushed one Ps 73.26 4. As Afflictions have their time and day and may sometime continue long and for many daies So albeit men naturally desire to shift trouble yet when it hath God's Commission it will seise upon the stoutest and greatest Shifter and arrest and keep him as it were in bands For saith he the dayes of affliction have taken hold upon me To seck to decline trouble either the feeling of it or making use of it when we must feel it and to be as bullocks unaccustomed to the yoke is the ready way to augment our sorrow and trouble 5. Men never knew pressing trouble whatever they have endured who know not Soul-terrours and perplexities and where they are other troubles will easily get in upon Spirits to vex them For in both these respects Job saith Now being under terrours v. 15. the dayes of affliction have taken hold upon me because those terrours were in themselves a pressing trouble and because they made his other troubles become pressing upon him Verse 17. My bones are pierced in me in the night-season and my sinewes take no rest 18. By the great force of my disease is my garment changed it bindeth me about as the collar of my coat 19. He hath cast me into the mire and I am become like dust and ashes In these Verses we have the fourth Head or Branch of Job's present miseries Namely the great Infirmities and pain of his Body occasioned by the terrours of his Soul and the loathsome disease of his Body And 1. He points out the vehement pain he had in his Body v. 17. That not onely his flesh but his very bones were so pained as if they had been pierced insomuch that not onely in the day but in the night when men should rest he was afflicted with exquisite pain and his sinews being
man here did See Isa 6.5 5. It is not enough that men receive gifts from the Spirit of God unless they receive also continual influences to quicken and excite those gifts and keep them fresh and in vigour For there must be a Spirit in man and the inspiration or breathing of the Almighty to give understanding See Cant. 4.16 Without this most eminent gifts yea and habitual graces will soon wither and fall into a decay 6. As Gods bounty in giving gifts to men doth proclaim his All-sufficiency So those to whom these gifts are sanctified will have high thoughts of him and his fulness Therefore is he called the Almighty or All-sufficient here to intimate that this gift proclaims him to be such and that he to whom it was sanctified esteemed of him as such From v. 9. Learn 1. Albeit men generally have a great conceit of their own Wisdome and readily they have most conceit who have least of wisdome yet it is not a gift given in common to all men For here some have it not 2. Albeit ordinarily God blesseth the use of means yet in some cases it is verified that wisdome and sound judgement doth not follow upon greatness and good education nor is attained by age or by men who might have had much experience For Great men are not alwayes wise or are not wise that is there are great men found who are not wise neither do the aged understand judgement There are great men who have had much pains taken upon them in their education and aged men who yet have not been wise men And what wisdome they had it did not slow principally from their greatness and age but from the gift and inspiration of God This point doth more particularly import 1. When men have any wisdome they must not sacrifice to their own net as if they had acquired it of themselves by the improvement of their means and time but they should ascribe the glory of all to God 2. Because this is much forgotten by men and God little seen and acknowledged by them therefore God makes it visible that he is the Author of all they enjoy by with-holding wisdome from great men and men of years which stroak is the just fruit of the want of self-denial 3. Which is the case in the Text When men are indeed other-wayes wise and great men as Job and his Friends were yet in some things and cases they may be found destitute of wisdome and in an errour and mistake As all of them were in this debate This the Lord ordereth not only that he may declare that he is tyed to no condition or age of men but that we may not take things upon trust from any men or pin our faith upon their sleeve but may be careful to try and examine all that men say or do by the rule laying aside the consideration of their persons And as we should not reject truth though it be offered by obscure young and unexperienced persons so we should not implicitely give credit to men in every thing because they are known to be wise and holy persons For that may be our very tryal and that whereby God takes proof of our sincerity and respect to his Word if we will call no man Rabbi Only in this case men should walk in much sobriety as hath been formerly marked For as God is not tyed to great able and experienced men so neither is he tyed to others Farr less are men to be cryed down by their inferiours in parts and experience upon this account that great men are not alwayes wise when yet they are never able to refute them as Elihu solidly refutes both parties here From v. 10. Learn 1. When God hath given abilities to men they should communicate their Talents to others for their edification and clearing of mistakes For saith he I also as well as ye will shew mine opinion As it is a sin for men to be idle and not put forth their Talents to use especially when there is great need of them as here there was So no bashfulness and modesty which were ready to hinder him being a young man will warrant them to lye by from that work to which they are called 2. Such as undertake to clear controverted truths and particularly to contradict holy able and experienced men themselves being young had need to be well grounded fitted and called to such a work For this resolution to shew his opinion comes in with a Therefore or by way of inference from what he hath said That being inspired and excited by God as he hints in general v. 8. and having noted their mistakes as he also insinuates in general v. 9 therefore he may well hazard to take his turn having the call and assistance of God and being able to instruct wherein they had erred This young men had need to advert unto in debates For however it may encourage men to stand for truth if it be on their side that the gifts of God are free to bestow them upon whom he will and in what particular exigents and controversies he pleaseth Yet as it is a sin to have a partial and implicite respect to the persons of great and experienced men as hath been marked So it is a double sin for young men to engage against them without cause and to cry them down and the truth which they maintain 3. Whoever they be that speak having a calling to matters in controversie they ought to be heard with attention without stumbling through prejudices at their persons till what they say be tryed For even this young man when he is speaking to old and grave men bids them hearken unto him 4. Then do men hear aright when every one doth not pass what is spoken to many together as nothing concerning them but is careful to apply to himself what is spoken as if none else were present Therefore is this exhortation directed in the singular number as hath been explained 5. It evidenceth wisdome in speakers when they single out those to deal with who stand in greatest need of help and when they are careful to speak what may tend most to edification On this account also it may be conceived that he will not insist to deal with the three Friends but singles out needy Job in particular to whom it was to good purpose to speak And this is indeed an evidence of a man who is guided by the Spirit of God in speaking when he minds edification and the need of Souls much Verse 11. Behold I waited for your words I gave ear to your reasons whilest you searched out what to say 12. Yea I attended unto you and behold there was none of you that convinced Job or that answered his words The second Reason of Elihu's interposing to speak which is more special and particular is the insufficiency of what they had spoken to convince Job So that having marked all that they had said and searched out all that long time
mercy daily So that Job had no cause to complain of his afflictions seeing God might proceed further against him even to the taking away of his life Doct. 1. Mans breath and life is a borrowed loan which he holds by Gods gift For it is his spirit and breath Man 's indeed by use but Gods as the Author and Giver of it and therefore he gathers it to himsâ—lf when he recalls it as his own gift Both the words Spirit and Breath may signifie one and the same thing or the first may signifie his rational soul and the second his animal life common to him with beasts However this should teach men to make good use of their life and breath and not employ it against God They who look upon their enjoyments as their own will readily abuse them Ps 12.4 2. God may when he will take back his own loan and that easily For he can gather unto himself his spirit and breath See Psal 90.3 and 104.29 And therefore we should not promise unto our selves long tacks of our life See Luk. 12.19 20. 3. Albeit God be not moved with any thing about man as if it were a great business Yet as he doth nothing at randone so we should look upon the taking away of life as a very serious and important business Therefore doth he express this act thus as Gods setting his heart upon man Not that he is so taken up as we are with weighty businesses nor yet only because he doth not proceed to do this at randome but acts in it as a weighty matter however we do not alwayes see that or that he sets his heart in love upon his own people even when he is cutting them off But he speaks thus of God that we may learn to set our hearts and be serious about this change 4. Men by death return to God either to appear before him in judgement to receive the reward of their sin or to be absolved by him and to abide with him for ever For he gathereth the spirit and breath to himself Eccles 12.5 6 7. 5. Gods Dominion over the lives of men is irresistable For if God gather these unto himself man must perish his unwillingness will not help him 6. No person hath any priviledge against a sentence of death when or wheresoever God shall be pleased to pronounce it For All flesh shall perish together if he please 7. Whatever man think of himself in his life yet death will give him an humbling sight of himself For then he is found to be flesh and turns again to dust from whence he was taken Gen. 3.19 8. However men quarrel Gods exercising of his Dominion in some cases yet upon a serious review they may rather find cause to admire his goodness than to quarrel his severity For in answer to Jobs complaints that God had afflicted him Elihu lets him see that God might cut him off and not him only but all flesh together And it should be our work to study such mercies in our saddest grievances Verse 16. If now thou hast understanding hear this hearken to the voice of my words Elihu having propounded these Arguments to the Auditory doth now to v. 31. lay them more distinctly before Job himself And 1. He turns himself to Job and calls for his attention v. 16. 2. He propounds the Argument taken from Gods dominion and justice v. 17. 3. He amplifieth and instanceth it in several particulars wherein the exercise of dominion and justice are conspicuous Namely his dealing with Kings and Rulers v. 18.19 with People and Nations together with their Rulers v. 20 23. and with mighty men v. 24 28. 4. He recapitulates the Argument pointing out the efficacy of Gods administrations v. 29. and his end in some of those acts of his dominion and justice formerly mentioned v. 30. In this Verse Elihu turns himself from the Auditory and expresly and particularly addresseth his speech to Job craving that he would give him an hearing and that he would apply this Doctrine to his case whereby he should give a proof of his wisdome and understanding Doct. 1. General Doctrine is not sufficient to do Souls good without application Therefore doth Elihu tell over again to Job what he had already spoken to the Auditory 2. Mens case may be very plainly spoken unto who yet need to be rouzed up to make application For though he hath been speaking to this very business before yet he must direct his speech to Job end call upon him to hearken to the voice of his words and apply 3. In order to application men should be attentive hearers to which they need frequently to be excited Therefore again after all the former excitations he calls him to hear and hearken that so he might apply and be convinced 4. As men do evidence their wisdome by being willing to be taught For so is here supposed that if he have understanding he will hear of which also before So it is not enough to hear unless we understand For here understanding is required with hearing 5. There is great wisdome required in taking up the mind of God in his dark dispensations toward his people and in the World For this is the particular subject in hearing whereof he requireth understanding 6. Not only are natural men uncapable to perceive the things of God 1 Cor. 2.14 and weak Saints unable while they continue such to comprehend many points of truth Joh. 16.12 But even men eminently wise and godly may have their wits to seek in some difficult and trying cases and when they are under the power of affliction and tentation For this Supposition If thou hast understanding imports no denial that Job was wise in an eminent measure but that his understanding had need to be quickened and he had need to rid himself of those mists which involved and darkened his judgement if he would take up this matter well Verse 17. Shall even he that hateth right govern And wilt thou condemn him that is most just In this Verse he summarily propounds the Argument taken from Gods Dominion and Justice for he joyns them both together to which he desires he may hearken As for the first part of the Verse Shall even he that hateth right govern The word govern in the Original is to bind up as a Chyrurgion And so it may point at a particular act of his government that he binds up and heals those whom he hath smitten upon their repentance as it is Chap. 5.18 Which speaks that he cannot be unjust or hate right seeing he is content upon repentance to heal those whom he hath smitten But the word is taken more generally for governing and a Ruler is called an Healer or binder up for it is the same word that is here Is 3.7 because government in the exercise thereof should tend to prevent or to heal and bind up breaches that are made upon or among a people And thus the Argument runs well That God being the
him in their Office and carrying of Ambassages unto men It is said these came to present themselves before the Lord not that they are any time absent or out of his presence Matth. 18.10 Luke 1.19 but to express their ready willingness to receive or execute any of his Commands as Ministers of great Princes do come dayly to receive their Instructions Where it is said Satan came also among them by Satan or that Adversary we are to understand that Prince of Devils together with all these evil spirits that fall with him His coming among them or in the midst of them doth not import that he hath any communion with these blessed Spirits nor that he is in the presence of God by way of approbation as they are nor yet that he voluntarily cometh before God as they do But the borrowed expression doth only import That as on great Court days not only Princes and their Guards and Attendants do appear there but Delinquents also So Satan is made to appear before God to whom he is subject and accomptable as the sequel cleareth And as in great Conventions some naughty persons are ready to thrust in among the croud to do some ill turn So Satan is ready to catch at all opportunities to tempt or accuse as the sequel here doth also make manifest In this we may learn 1. Sâ—â—h is the greatness of God that not only all the Angels are obedient but even the very Devils are subject to him as here we see 〈◊〉 this was necessary to be premitted to this dispensation wherein so much oâ— Greatness and Soveraignty was to appear To show that mâ—n maâ— learn to cure many of then distempâ—rs of spirit occasioned by the cross dispensations of Proviâ—â—nce by taking a right view of God the Author 〈◊〉 2. Here we have also a comprehensive view of the Administration and Government of the World Wâ—â—â—â—e 〈◊〉 still to be seen and acknowledged as supreme 〈…〉 â—hings beneath instanced here in the pâ—rson and injoyments of Job are a part of the object about which his Providence is exercised So that it cannot without blasphemy be said that he hath forsaken the earth Ezek. 9.9 oâ— that he doth not take notice of the meanest things therein were it even the hairs of our head Matth. 1â— 39 The Ministers to be imployed for executing of his pleasure are not only Angels whom he imployeth both to good to his people and for evil of punishment also But Devils also whom he imployeth sometime as his Executioners against the wicked and sometime as here to be a scourge to his owne children Nâ—t out of any necessity having sufficient besiâ—e to imploy but because he seeth it best 3. This name Satan or that Adversary As it doth point out a Character of a wicked disposition and of one who is of the Devil to be an adversary to all gâ—â—d As here Satan after his own fall proves to mankind So it reaches us further that the emnity betwixt the seed of the Woman and the Sâ—rpent and hâ—s seed was known by the godly from the beginning and consequently they were taught to resolve on a 〈…〉 conflict in their course of holiness Therefore 〈…〉 he here designed by the name of Satan 〈◊〉 Lesson needful yet to be inculcated after all the â—â—â—ments of his opposition in former ages Eph. 6.10 c The forgetting whereof is the cause why we are â—o often 〈◊〉 prized while we live and walk as if we were 〈…〉 Enemies Thirdly As to the Lords calling of Satan to an account and his answer thereunto ver 7. We are not to conceive that God makes any enquity as needing Information but only that he is supreme to call Satan to an account Nor are we to dream of any speech properly so called betwixt God and Satan the terms here being only figuâ—ative and borrowed to point out some other thing Nor yet are we to understand Satans speech of his going to and fâ—â—iâ— the earth and then of his walking up and down in it as a câ—mplaint that however he used diligence in going to and fro tempting yet was he so â—emaâ—d in that he had no success not could get a desired â—eâ—â— but was still forced to walk up and doâ—n compare Matth. 12 43. It is true indeed Satan is unsatiable in his malice notwithstanding aâ—â—his success yet this form of speech is used where desired success is Zech. 1 10 11. 6.7 And here both the expressions â—o only point out his restless and assiduous activity Withal it is to be considered that Satan is said thus to go to and fro in the earth because however Devils since their fall are thrust down to Hell yet till the Judgment of the great Day till which they are reserved then to get their 〈◊〉 and sin sentence and complâ—â—â— punishment Jude ver 6. they have their chains â—â—gthened to come and tempt and afflict in this 〈…〉 world and so have also power in the 〈◊〉 to raise Tempeâ—ts c. Ephâ—s 2.2 This doth 〈◊〉 out 1. That Satan is restless â—nd assiduously diligent in obstructing mens happiness as being vexed that they should fill that room in Heaven from whâ—ch he fell For this 〈◊〉 doth he go to and fro in the earth and walk up and down in it by temptations calamities and persecutions 〈◊〉 much as he is permitted hindering men from embracing Piety or retarding their progress or weakning their hands therein See 1 Pet. 5. â— Luk 22.31 Rev. 12.12 We should remember that we sojourn in a world where Devils are and do haunt among us He is such a waâ—ker in the Earth as doth diligently mark and observe all particulars that he may apply his tentations sutably to his purpose He doth so go to and from it that no place how remote soever from other distractions can secure us from his tentations if God do not hide us And he is so incessant and restless Going to and fro and walking up and down that he will not be put away by never so many repulses but will again and again assault and tempt 2. Whatever be the malice power or restlesness of Satan Yet it as to be still fixed that he is subject and accountable to God in all he is permitted to do and that God hath an eye upon all his proceedings in the world For this Question Whence comest thou doth import Gods over-ruling Providence over him no less then if a Judicial enquiry were made into his Actions and he called dayly to give an account of them 3. Aâ—bâ—â—t God notwithstanding his over-ruling Providence do not altogether bind up Satan but do suffer him to act many strange parts in the woâ—ld by himself immediately or by his Instruments Yet it is firmly to be believed that God doth not approve of or take pleasure in these hâ—s violences For this Question doth also import Gods indignation and dislike of him and his proceedings as Questions are made use of in Scripture to testifie dislike 1 King
that he is so far from a calm or end of his tryal that wrath is but only beginning to appear This is indeed the sad case of the impenitent and wicked Isa 9.12 17 21. Yet Saints ought to guard against such a tentation as if growing wrath were against them in growing tryals and still more and worse ready to break out upon them 4. That he so contrives the coming of the messengers that while one is speaking another comes with more sad news so that he gets not leave to draw his breath betwixt the one news and the other this he complains of in his after-exercise Ch. 7.19 9 18. And hereby as the people of God are taught to expect not only variety of successive tryals but even many troubles crowded one upon the back of another till all their terrors be gathered at in a solemn Assembly Lam. 2.22 So if they be humbled indeed under such Exercises they will count it a mercy if they get leave but to breath a moment betwixt the pangs of Affliction 5. That in all this he hides himself his designs and wrath And endevours to represent God and Man Heaven and Earth and the course of Nature as all armed against Job Sometimes he lets him see Instruments the Sabeans and Caldeans that he may be imbittered against them being so egregiously wronged without any provocation given and so might sin against God And sometime he so conveighs the tryal as if God were his party in wrath sending fire to devour his Sheep a whirl-wind to cut off his Children in their sin All which may warn us That it is not easie to discern Satan and his snares in a tryal That Gods mind may be very far contrary to these false Alarms we get in trouble That no dispensation seeming to speak wrath ought to be hearkened unto where the word speaks love as it was with Job And That it is not the way and manner of death whereby we ought to judge of mens estate whose way hath been upright for the sudden death of Jobs Children did not speak wrath from God against them All things considered together may teach us how subtile Satan is to present many tentations to Saints upon their case and how contrary Gods mind in afflicting may be to these false Alarms we have from Satan Vers 20. Then Job arose and rent his mantle and shaved his head and fell down upon the ground and worshipped 21. And said Naked came I out of my mothers womb and naked shall I return thither the LORD gave and the LORD hath taken away blessed be Name of the LORD In these verses is contained an account of Jobs carriage under this his tryal evidenced 1. By his practices v. 20 which are partly such as evidenced his sense of the affliction In that he arose and rent his mantle and shaved his head which were signs of his sorrow and abasement before the Lord see Gen. 37 34 Josh 7.6 Isai 22.12 Jer. 7.29 though more sutable before the coming of Christ then since Yea even then the resting on such things was condemned Joel 2.13 And whereas Job seems by shaving of his head to go contâ—ary to that Precept Levit. 19 27. It suffiâ—eth beside what furthâ—r might be said to know that Job lived not under the Law but before it Partly his practices are such as evidenced his moderation of his sense and that he did not let his spirit rise but submitted to God falling down on the ground and worshipping 2. By his Profession and speech v. 21. wherein he studies to find out for himself grounds of Submission and Patience taken from the common Law of Nature that as we came naked into the world so we must go naked out of it And from the Providence and Soveraignty of God who dispenseth all things at his pleasure And upon these grounds he inferreth a conclusion contrary to what Satan intended For in stead of cursing God as he alleadged Job would do v. 11. he blesseth God who had continued these mercies so long From v. 20. learn 1. Piety doth not teach men Stoicism or to despise and harden themselves under the Rod of God but alloweth them to be sensible when they are afflicted For it is commendable in Job that in this case He arose and rent his Mantle and shaved his head See Jer. 5.3 2. As it is the duty of the Children of God to be sensible and mournful under Affliction so this is very consistent with a patient and meek frame of spirit under trouble For Job a pattern of Patience sets himself in a mournful posture and that without guilt as appears from Gods own verdict v. 22. 3. Albeit Sense and Sorrow under trouble be very consistent with Patience yet Saints in such a posture have need to be upon their guard lest they devord For Job doth not satisfie himself with expressing only his sorrow but somewhat to testifie his humble submission 4. It is the safe way of managing sense of trouble and a clear evidence that we do not devord under it if we run to God with all that grieves us For so doth Job add worshipping to his former practices Which speak sadly against those who estrange themselves from God under trouble Dan. 9.13 5. It is not our simple going to God under sense of trouble that will prove us free of passion unless it be managed with much humility and self abasement before God For thus Job in this mournful posture fell down upon the ground and worshipped From v. 21. learn 1. As Patience it wise and considerate proceeding upon solid grounds and reasons whereas impatience is rash and unreasonable So it is the duty of the people of God under trouble to study and seek out arguments whereby they may perswade themselves to be patient For such is the practice of patient Job here and not to make it their work to muster up their own difficulties before their eyes till their corruptions be irritated as is the practice of too many 2. It will contribute much toward the begetting of Patience and Submission if man consider the uncertainty of mans life that it is but a coming into the world and a going out of it again a being born and so soon as we are born under a necessity to learn to die For so doth patient Job look on his life I came out and I shall return Such as do thus look upon life will not much regard the various events wherewith they are exercised in it 3. It is also no small help to Patience if men consider that in their lowest condition they want nothing which they can claim by original right For so doth Job reckon Naked came I out of my Mothers womb and therfore ought not to complain since as yet I am not so quite destitute 4. Men may see just reason to be patient under trouble if they remember that they are certain once to be deprived of these things about the want whereof they are so
much doated upon For notwithstanding all he saith here of death yet not only is death contrary to nature and as in the grave our bodies feel not the troubles of this life so as little do they feel or are sensible of the quiet in the grave But whatever rest be in death yet it is not a compleat out-gate but in Christ nor is it a common rest to all without any difference as to their states who rest there 4. He is so much out of conceit with his present case that he would be content of any were it even to be an Abortive rather then the present Thus doth our folly judge any condition better then our own whereof we would soon repent us if we were essayed with a change 5. It will be found upon tryal that his wishes came far short of what good the Lord was doing to him For albeit somewhat like that ver 16. may be true of a wicked man that an untimely birth is better then he Eccl. 6.3 Yet who in his right wits would consider Job in the whole of his life and think an Abortive comparable to him who had so eminently honoured God and was blessed of him in his former dayes and who was now imployed to give so eminent a proof of his integrity in the furnace So far short may the desires of godly men fall even of that good which they presently enjoy if they had eyes to see it And so infinitely wise is God who knoweth better how to guide us then our selves do and so gracious that he doth not ask our consent to deal better with us then we could carve to our selves Vers 20. Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery and life unto the bitter in soul From this to the end of the Chapter we have Jobs third wish with the reasons whereby he presseth it The wish is propounded in this verse by way of Expostulation as the former was and is only repeated from thence in the Translation ver 23. to make the sense the clearer The sum of the wish is That since none of the former desires weâ—e now possible but that he was now come that length of his time he desires that now at length the Lord would put an end to his toil and expostulates that light i. e. the light of the Sun Eccl. 11.7 8. or life as is afterward added is continued with him Unto this he subjoyns the first reason of his Expostulation taken from his great trouble being in so much trouble as might denominate him a miserable man and so disconsolate and anxious by reason of trouble as made him bitter in soul As to the Expostulation his expressions do indeed flow from that great misery and bitterness which himself afterward resents Yet it is to be remarked that albeit this Expostulation reflect on God who had given and continued his life yet reverence to God doth lead him to forbear to name him in his complaint Hereby pointing out That grace even when it is most overpowered with weakness and passion will yet one way or other be letting forth some Evidences of it self and of its respect toward God if it could be discerned But further in this Expostulation we may observe 1. He continueth still in the strain and heat of his passion his Feaver is not yet calmed notwithstanding all his former ravings To teach us That distempers of mind and passions let loose under tentation and trouble are not soon and easily calmed and quieted again but they will lead men from one extravagant desire and complaint to another 2. He not only insists still to have his will satisfied which is mans great Idol albeit it be true that it were his misery to get his will in many things But still he pursues that particular desire of death as the only comfortable issue in his apprehension whereas there were many better nearer at hand as strength to bear his tryal faith in Gods love notwithstanding all his afflictions and even a comfortable issue within time after his tryal was perfected as the sequel cleared But it is our folly and weakness so to doat upon one imagined way of relief as we cannot observe any beside 3. He propounds his desire by way of Expostulation questioning Wherefore is light given which flows not so much from a desire of Information as from a bitter proud Passion full of conceit of its own skill This is a distemper incident to men especially under trouble that they dare quarrel God as if they could guide better then he and that they judge every thing unreasonable of the reasons whereof they are not capable Not considering that we ought to adore Infinite Wisdom and stoop to Soveraignty when we are in the dark 4. Albeit it was his sin to despise the good gift of life Yet his distemper teacheth That the Lord by leaving us to our selves can make our best things even our selves and our lives a burden instead of a comfort As here his experience doth teach So also Chap. 7.15 16.20 Which may teach us to acknowledge Gods goodness that any thing is made comfortable to us within time In the first reason we may observe 1. It is no strange thing to see Saints put in that pitiful plight by trouble as may even render their life a burden to them as they are men compassed with infirmities For that is the pitiful reason why he wisheth to be dead He is in misery and bitter in soul 2. Outward troubles are but a small part of Saints complaints but that which makes afflictions grievous to them is the inward exercise of mind which usually accompanieth the same For that is subjoyned to his misery that he is bitter in soul This is sharper then any outward trouble For without this trouble will be very easie and a sound mind will bear much 3. Among other sad distempers of soul accompanying trouble this is not the least when soul-serenity and tranquillity is disturbed and men are imbittered thereby insomuch that although they do not question their state of Reconciliation yet they can read no love in what they suffer nor walk under it with meekness but are taken up with hard constructions of God and his dealing For this is his case in particular He is bitter in soul 4. When Saints narrowly examine their sad lots they will find that whatever is intolerable in them cometh of themselves when either their apprehensions represent them as sadder then indeed they are or when their broken spirits do render their case more insupportable then otherwayes it would be For so must we judge of Jobs complaint It is true he was under great affliction yet it flowed from his own apprehension that he looks on himself as miserable or in misery And whereas he complains of a bitter soul much of that flowed from his own giving way to that distemper of spirit For albeit God may be said to fill us with bitterness Job 9.18 Lam. 3.15 in so far as he
smother whole Armies and yet when it is much augmented by its continuance and renewed provocations from his Friends he is made to subsist under all of it The third evidence of the greatness of his trouble is taken from an effect of its weight that it swallowed up his words or it put him to silence and he wanted words when he spake to express the greatness of his grief This must not be understood so as if Job could justifie himself that he complained too little For how little soever he spake he complained too much But in this respect it is true that his trouble went above his expression though he ought not to have reflected on God because of that And the truth of this evidence may appear not only from his seven days silence with his Friends before he spake Chap. 2.13 with 3.1 But that when he spake his speech was interrupted with sighs and groans and what he said was far short of his case It is true his own distemper and bitterness had no small hand in this yet it is no less true that his real afflictions were so vast and great that it was nothing to be wondered at if he could nor express them fully Doct. 7. It is a great ease to an afflicted person to get liberty to express and pour out his grievances whether in the bosom of a confident tender friend or especially to God For so much doth this regret import Such as get their heart poured forth with Hannah 1. Sam. 1.15 have reason to be thankful 2. It is the great aggravation of some afflictions that they are above all complaints and expressions of sorrow that silence is the best oratory that can express them and that they who are under them do sadly feel them but cannot utter them For so was it with Job my words are swallowed up They who are in this case ought to look much unto God who not only hears what we lay but observes what we need Hos 14.8 and ought to believe that when they are full of confusion he will see and ponder their affliction Job 10.15 Vers 4. For the arrows of the Almighty are within me the poison whereof drinketh up my spirit the terrors of God do set themselves in aray against me The fourth evidence of his great trouble clearing and confirming all the rest is taken from the cause and kind of his trouble That it was the Almighty God with whom he had to do and that in apparent severity Whose dealing with him he expresseth in two Metaphors 1. Of poisoned arrows made use of by some Nations which had not only given him a piercing wound but the poyson of them had proceeded further even to the inflaming of his vital spirits to the hazard of his life By which poysoned Arrows we must understand not only his boils the heat and inflammation whereof had dried up his moisture vigour and strength but all his other outward troubles also which stuck fast in him and his inward tentations and sense of Gods wrath flowing there-from which like the inward deep wound of the arrow had by the furious poyson thereof so exhausted him that he was ready to faint and give it over See Psal 38.1 2. 2. Of an Army set in Battel-aray By which he understands the terrours of God shewing that he had not only present tentations but future fears mustered up before him and that not in a tumultuary way but as in Battel-aray so that he could not think to escape In this sad description of his case there want not some weaknesses and mistakes For he doth apprehend God more terrible then he was or intended to be in his dealing toward him Nor wanted he special proofs of Gods love if it were but that he had grace given still to cleave to God which he ought to have observed and ackowledged amidst all his resentments And albeit his case had been really no less terrible then he apprehended Yet it had been no argument to justifie his bitter complaint Chap. 3. which is his scope in this Narration But on the other hand we ought to avoid the errour of Eliphaz in censuring too rigidly the complaint of this deserted Saint who doth here represent his case truly as his present sense and deserted condition represented it to be For as he did well in not noticing of Satan but eying of God in all that befel him So the multiplicity of his strokes on every hand and his inward desertion could not but make him apprehend that his case was thus deadly Hence Learn 1. Though to quarrel and complain of God in any case be a great fault Yet it pleads for much compassion to Saints when they do not make a stir about their lot except when their trouble is extream For so doth Job prove the former general evidences of his great trouble by producing real instances thereof For the Arrows of the Almighty are within me c. 2. It is the duty of those in trouble to turn their eyes off all Instruments that they may look to God For Job hath not a word of Sabeans Caldeans or of Satan but of the Almighty God They who see and eye him little in trouble their trouble will do them the less good or rather no good at all 3. As it is our duty always to entertain high and reverent thoughts of God Gen. 14.19 20 22. So trouble will cause men to know his Almighty power Therefore is Job in this particular made to see him the Almighty 4. A sight of God as a party and of his great power put forth in trouble will make it very formidable and this may be represented to the truly godly for their tryal and exercise For this affects Job that he hath seen God as the Almighty in his trouble 5. It is an humbling sight of Gods Almighty power in trouble when his strokes are like Arrows and do not only pierce deep and come suddenly and swiftly upon men as an arrow doth But especially do speak God angry at them in that he makes them his Butt at which he shoots and God at a distance from them in smiting of them as Arrows are shot by an Enemy at a distance And all this may a Child of God apprehend in his trouble As Job here doth while he compareth his trouble to the Arrows of the Almighty 6. In this case the number of troubles doth contribute much to afflict the Child of God every particular stroke adding to the weight So Job resents that there was not one Arrow only but Arrows of the Almighty shot at him 7. When God in his power and displeasure appears to be the godlies party his strokes cannot but pierce deep and wound even the soul For saith he the Arrows of the Almighty do not only touch or hurt and wound me but are within me As an Arrow shot by a strong hand makes a deep piercing wound so do strokes coming thus from Gods Almighty hand For if it be a fearful
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
this was a root of their failing Ye see my casting down and are afraid 5. God may so support an afflicted Saint as an on-looker on his tryal may be more affrighted therewith then himself For Job here quarrels them that they were afraid and endeavours to infuse courage in those who ought to have sympathized with him Vers 22. Did I say Bring unto me or give a reward for me of your substance 23. Or deliver me from the enemies hand or redeem me from the hand of the mighty Job having thus reprehended his Friends for their inhumanity and unfaithfulness He proceeds to aggravate those faults and to charge them home upon them from several considerations The first aggravation of their fault in those verses is That he expected but a small favour of them and yet had not obtained it Whereas he being poor and oppressed by his Enemies might have called to them for supply of his necessities and might by the laws of friendship have desired that they would bestow of their means or interpose their power for recovering of his lost substance out of the hands of his mighty Enemies who had spoiled him and they were bound to have done for him Now when as would appear he did not so much as expect their coming and when they came did not desire any thing of them and the most he expected was only their good and comfortable counsel they were much more bound to have been tender and not so cruel toward him In this challenge and aggravation of their fault there may be this mistake That wholesome counsel tendered in a prudent and fit way which is the favour Job misseth among his Friend is more difficult to give then to expend either our goods or our life for our friend a request wherewith Job had not charged them Yet these things are considerable in it 1. That godly and true friends owe much to one another in their troubles Not only to supply their necessities For he might have said Bring unto me and to lay forth of their wealth to allay the fury of their Enemies For he might also have said give a reward or bribe or gift to the Enemy for me of your substance But even to imploy their power also in a lawful way for their relief as Abraham did for Lot Gen. 14. For he might also have said Deliver me from the Enemies hand or redeem me from the hand of the mighty Love is a large debt Rom. 13.8 9 10. See 1 Joh 3 16. 2. It is the property of godly and sober spirits to stoop and acquiesce in a mean condition when God calls them to it without burdening any so far as may be For whatever was the duty of Jobs Friends and whatever was their practice afterward Chap. 42.11 yet for his part he did not say Bring unto me or give a reward for me c. he would not burden them to uphold him in his former pomp and grandeur 3. Unto a right discerner no outward trouble is any thing so sad as inward exercise and disquiet of mind For Job could bear the one without troubling his Friends but he misseth comfort to his troubled spirit We ought not to carp too much at outward troubles lest we meet with that which we will find sorer 4. It is very great inhumanity in men not to endeavour to be comfortable by their counsel to the godly in affliction when no more but that is called for at their hands For this was the great fault of Jobs Friends Jonathan dealt otherwise with David 1 Sam. 23.16 And herein even the poor who can contribute nothing else to the afflicted may be very useful Vers 24. Teach me and I will hold my tongue and cause me to understand wherein I have erred 25. How forcible are right words but what doth your arguing reprove Secondly He aggravates their fault in dealing so cruelly with him from his readiness to take with wholesom counsel It cometh in by way of prevention of an objection that might be moved against his former challenge They might say we have not been wanting in giving wholesom counsel as they alledge they did Chap. 5.27 and therefore he complains unjustly Job replies that it was nothing so For ver 24. if they would solidly teach him and convince him of any errour he should soon take with it For ver 25. true and pertinent discourses are very forcible But as for their discourse it was nothing such being full of untruths or unseasonably and impertinently applied truths and so nothing to the purpose but missing the scope and therefore could not convince him For however they should endeavor to cry him down with arguing yet what doth it reprove what solid ground doth it proceed upon or how is it to the purpose or how could it take with him Hence the aggravation of their fault is That had they to do with a stiffe man they might have pretended some excuse for their way of dealing But having to do with a man who would easily be bound by truth their neglect was the more culpable Not to insist how far Job might mistake his own disposition and tractableness in this hour of tentation We may from the General Doctrine Learn 1. True Piety disposeth men to receive Instruction and humbly to submit to it For saith he Teach me and I will hold my tongue and thus was he easily convinced by Elihu and by God Whereas men wanting Piety even when their Consciences are convinced and put to silence their wit may be talkative and studious to invent somewhat to justifie their way See Prov. 30.32 2. Grace leads a man to be docile by convincing him that he is obnoxious to Errour through Ignorance Passion Self-love or the like distempers For cause me to understand wherein I have erred saith he Which though it doth not imply that he did take with any Errour in this Debate yet it supposeth that he thought not himself above the reach of Errour and imports his aversion from Errour and his love to Truth and his willingness to take with any Information that might draw him out of an Errour And who so in the sense of their own proness to err do make use of means for prevention or recovery out of such a snare they are in a fair way to be led in the paths of truth 3. Challenges or reproofs ought not to be nakedly and pro impeâ—io only charged upon any but they ought to be pressed and put home upon solid and convincing grounds otherwise they will not readily take For Job will not be convinced because they say he was wrong unless they cause him to understand wherein he hath â—râ—ed It is true some do shelter themselves here when they are challenged upon many suspicions which cannot demonstratively be made appear to be true But that is their own great unhappiness that they walk in the dark with their wicked courses and so are deprived of the mercy of being discovered and convinced Others also see
Prayer 1 Tim. 4.4 5. Tit. 1.15 Which should teach us to esteem more of them and of God for them to look upon straits and penury as sent to cause us see our sin in under-valuing those things and to beware of abusing those good things 4. Death cuts man short of all his earthly enjoyments Relations comforts c. For then man shall see no more good The eye of him that hath seen him shall see him no more As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away so he that goeth down to the grave shall come up no more He shall return no more to his house c. The time will come when a man shall see none of those things to which his heart is now so much addicted So that we do but weave the Spiders Web when we make such things our confidence and delight 5. However the people of God have hope of eternal life yet death is so dreerie and dark a step essayed but once for all having vast Eternity at the back of it and shaking us loose of so much that it cannot but be dreadful to go through it under a cloud For so doth Job reckon while upon this consideration he pleads for pity and a moments quiet use of what he was so soon to leave To die is a lesson which we should early study and mind Psal 90 12. Not only that we may make sure that we have true grace which may be much questioned then but may walk spiritually in the exercise of substantial Piety and depend on God for much sense or much faith at such a time 6. God dealing in anger is so dreadful a party that even a look of him will destroy and bring the creature to nothing For saith Job Thine eyes are upon me and I am not See Psal 90.11 80.16 104.29 Therefore Gods anger is that which ought chiefly to be deprecated in afflictions Psal 6.1 Jer. 10.24 And they ought to consider how much they are obliged to him who find life in the light of his countenance Psal 80.3 7. Man's frailty when he is sensible of it is an Argument pleading for pity before God Nor is our weak frail and crushed condition any disadvantage when well improved For in the faith of this doth Job plead with God by laying his frail condition before him O remember that my life is wind c. See Psal 78.38 39. 103.13 14. Deut. 32.36 2 King 14.25 26. Isa 57.16 8. The best way of praying for the ease of our griefs is to commit our case to Gods affectionate considering of it and to trust his wisdom and love with the answer For so doth Job sum up his desire O remember saith he that my life is wind c. When we thus trust God every necessity which we cannot overtake hath a mouth to plead with God for a favourable and tender regard to be had of us 9. As the creatures do hold out much of God so man may be minded of his frailty by studying many of them So much doth Job mind us here while he points at the clouds ver 9. as so vive an Embleme of mans frailty as we find also the flowers and grass Isa 40. Psal 103. and other Creatures made use of to inculcate the same We need not want matter or occasion for spiritual thoughts so long as we have the creatures about us to look upon These are sound truths to bâ— gathered from these words Only these cautions should be taken along in all this pleading 1. We must not be so peremptory with God in any sute as to fret and rage if we get not our will As we will find Job doth in the sequel of this Discourse The Children of God ought so to pray for ease comfort or temporal mercies and deliverances as believing it will be well whether they get their will or not and as resolving if they get not what they desire to study more humility and not to carp 2. We ought and may lawfully with Job plead our frailty before God Yet so as that we refuse not to bear what he will support our frailty under For in this he was faulty that though he was supported yet he was not satisfied Our laziness or love to ease or our want of spare strength beyond what is presently imployed must not furnish us with Oratory in our sutes or with complaints if we be more hardly put to it then we would See 1 Cor. 10.13 3. We ought not to make our burden insupportable by apprehending that which God doth not intend in our trouble as Job apprehendeth death here in all its outward disadvantages when yet he was not to be essayed with it at this time Our own apprehensions are very often the life and sling of our crosses Isa 51.13 4. We ought so to plead for Gods remembring of us in our low estate Psal 136.23 as yet our bitterness do not insinuate any complaint of his forgetting or not noticing of us wherein Job was sometimes faulty but that these our Prayers be joyned with thanksgiving Phil. 4.6 Vers 11. Therefore I will not refrain my mouth I will speak in the anguish of my spirit I will complain in the bitterness of my soul Followeth the third part of the Chapter wherein Job apprehending himself to be neer unto death and finding that God will not comfort or ease him by any relenting of his hand his griefs with recounting of them do so exasperate him that he resolves to comfort himself and seek ease in complaining And accordingly he buâ—sts forth in a bitter complaint that God had smitten him and allowed him not comfort nor ease any way In this verse he expresseth his resolution to complain and that he will be so far from bridling his tongue or smotheâ—ing of his grievances as he had done before Chap. 2-10 that he will let loose the reins to his bitterness and anguish of spirit to express it self at liberty and without controul and so seek ease to his mind by complaining Here we may Observe 1. That which Job resolves to do is to speak and as he after expresseth it to complain Whence we may Learn That complaints and quarrellings are one of the poor shifts whereof men in trouble make use for attaining ease thereby whereas oft-times they widen the wound by awaking all their griefs while they are mused upon without faith and submission and by provoking God against that unsubdued humour that dare quarrel him or his dealing Thus by complaining spirits have been over-whelmed and by taking liberty to complain tentation hath prevailed â—sal 77.3 Seâ— Psal 39 9. Obs 2. The manner how he resolves to complain is without putting any restraint upon himself but giving full and loose reins to his own imbittered spirit Which teacheth 1. That what our spirits run upon without controul under trouble ought to be suspected It not being probable that when we are in a Fever and Distâ—mper we can fall upon what is right without a conflâ—ct For
his vast and boundless desires like the vast and spacious Ocean Psal 104.25 Lam. 2.13 In his continual instability as the Sea is in continual motion In the distempers to which his lusts drive him as the Sea is tossed and made to swell with winds See Jam. 4.1 Jude ver 12. In his raging most at the banks of Law prefixed to him Rom. 7.8 or of affliction restraining him from sin Isa 1.5 8.21 as the Sea makes a great noise in beating upon the shore And In his continual casting out of wickedness at all occasions as the Sea casteth out mire and dirt See Isa 57.20 Jude ver 13. 2. Man by nature is also a menstruous creature like a Whale or Dragon for beastly cruelty violence and unreasonableness in his mad passions and lusts Hence it is that men are so frequently compared to those monsters Psal 57.4 74.13 14. Isa 51.9 An unrenewed man is as gâ—eâ—t a monster as can be imagined which is made conspicuous in the behaviour of some of them 3. Albeit true grace make a change in godly men such as Job was yet even renewed men have somewhat of that old violent temper in them and may give a proof of it in their fits of passion and tentation So did Job himself sometime discover how boisterous he was by nature Even Saints should not forget their natural disposition when grace subdues and covereth it lest God discover it for their humiliation Hence 4. As Saints are boisterous by nature So when they turn brutish and violent under any fit it is most meet that God by force restrain them If they turn like a Sea or a Whale as even Job himself was too violent at sometimes Why should he not set a watch over them to hem in their violence and bring them to an account for it Psal 32.9 Thirdly However Job might plead that he needed not all this sore and sharp usage Yet he could not deny but God in his absolute soveraignty might dispose of him at his pleasure If the Lord do what he pleaseth in Heaven and Earth and in the Sea Psal 135.6 why not also on his people And why should they only seek to carve their own lots when all other creatures stoop or are made to stoop to him and even the insensible creatures do continue in their obediential subjection to their Maker Vers 13. When I say My bed shall comfort me my couch shall ease my complaint 14. Then thou skarest me with dreams and terrifiest me through visions The second Argument whereby he pleads against his being so sore afflicted is taken from the incessantness of his trouble and that when he expected but a little ease in his Bed his trouble was augmented by affrighting Dreams and Visions His expectation is set down ver 13. That being wearied with sitting up he imagined to find some comfort and ease of his complaint by his Bed and Couch Either to ease his body and pain which caused his complaints by lying there or as the following verse cleareth to interrupt his complaints by sleeping a little while which would have comforted him Unto this is subjoined ver 14. his disappointment That when he lay down not only was he tossed with pain and want of rest as he hath regreted ver 3.4 but when at any time his eyes went together with sleep God did terrifie him with Dreams and Apparitions and so new trouble was added to what he had formerly What these Dreams and Visions were it is not needful to enquire particularly It sufficeth to know that they were affrighting and so added to his affliction What Job's failingâ— were in this case will come to be spoken to on the following verses Here we may Learn 1. Leave to rest in our Bed is a very special mercy and will be acknowledged as such by those who know how sad it is to want it For â—â—b looks on it as a great case if his Bed should comfort him and his Couch ease his complaint Sleep is acknowledged as Gods gift Psal 127.2 and the want of it sadly regreted Psal 77.4 2. Truly humble Saints will acknowledge the meannest mercy were it but a moments bâ—eathing under trouble though it be not removed For Job would account it a mercy to get his complaint a little sifted by sleeping for a little while Albeit his bands would not thereby be loosed yet breathings and intermissions are looked on as a favour Our pride which repineth when we get not full deliverance doth hide the mercy of a day of small things which yet being observed and acknowledged might prove the little cloud that brings the plentiful rain 3. Trouble makes men restless expecting ease in every change which yet only one change can bring For so Job being disquieted when he sate up expected and said my Bed shall comfort me c. It is a mercy when our present case in trouble is so moderated as we can acquiesce and submit to bear it without seeking ease in changes as persons in a Feaver do by changing of Beds And a restless tossed minde is much to be pitied and will be pitied by right discerners And those who are under that cross ought to to study what is their true ease lest forgetting their resting place they seek rest where it is not to be found 4. Probable means will not ease troubled minds till God give the command and their tryal be perfected And then even improbable means will do it For Job looking for ease misseth it So did Joseph's trouble go on notwithstanding his dealing with the chief Butler till his word came Psal 105.18 19 20. It is God who commands deliverance to his people Psal 44.4 and till that command come forth we may look for peace and behold no good c. Jer. 14.19 and the harvest may pass and the summer end and we not be saved Jer. 8.20 5. There is no common favour we enjoy were it but sleep and quiet rest but God is to be depended on and acknowledged in it For as he giveth his beloved sleep Psal 127 2. So saith Job Thou scarest me with dreams c. that I cannot sleep We little consider how far Gods bounty and care in those common mercies doth outstrip our Prayers and dependance and how many crosses he could let loose upon us in these common things See Jer. 31.25 26. 6. It is the duty and advantage of the Lords people to take every lot they meet with out of his hand For whatever hand Satan or Job's sick temper and melancholy spirit had in these dreamâ— and visions yet saith he thou scarest me with dreams and terrifiest me through visions Even when we find evidâ—nt causes in nature for our distempers we ought yet to look up to the God of Nature And we will never attain a spiritual use or comfortable sight of our case till we ascend thither 7. It may be the lot of Gods people not only to be exercised with incessant trouble Isa .. 38 12. in
plead that since by his efficacious Providence he preserveth mankind therefore he would not destroy him who takes with his guiltiness Where we may observe a double mistake in this pleading For neither was he destroyed as he supposed and feared but continued a monument of Gods wonderful care and preservation Nor yet doth it follow that because God is the Preserver of men therefore he may not destroy any of them when he pleaseth For his preserving of them is an act of his Soveraign good pleasure From all which we may Learn 1. As all Creatures having a dependant Being do need continual preservation â—o man beside the consideration of his being is so weak a creature and so obnoxious to many hazards that he could not subsist in the world without a continual preserving hand about him As here is supposed 2. As God alone must be the continuer of that being which he hath given so he is most sit for that undertaking Having infinite power to support and guard men wisdom to prevent and ward off inconveniences Patience to suffer their peevish humours which might provoke him to cast off care of them c. beside his special love and interest in his own people Therefore is he called the Preserver of men 3. It is useful and necessary especially in a time of tryal that Saints do know God what he is and do retain right thoughts of his properties and operations Therefore Job in his tryal fixes on this that he is the Preserver of men 4. Even those more general and common notions of God taken from his common works of Providence in the world are of great use to be studied by the people of God in an hour of tryal As here Job studieth his being the Preserver of men For not only are these comfortable to the godly as flowing from special love to them But even when at any time they are driven from more special grounds of love whereupon faith might build as is not seldom the lot of godly when the foundations seem to be destroyed it is their wisdom to make use of those and upon the account thereof clame and cleave to him till more comfortable grounds appear to them As David clames in his dâ—sertions to Gods taking him out of the womb and his care of him from his Mothers belly Psal 22.9 10. And here there will be need that we guard against our pride which will be ready to rejâ—ct all these grounds of faith because we can get no other 5. The people of God through their weakness and mistakes are oft-times ready to look upon Gods dealing as inconsistent with his properties or what is recorded of him For Job brings in this designation of God as a ground of his following plea that God being the Preserver of men should not deal so severely with him 6. Whatever God do to his people or whatever their sense judge of his dealing yet faith in the penitent is allowed to have comfortable thoughts and looks of God and to feed on his sweetest Attributes under saddâ—st dâ—spensations And to believe that even when God seems to destroy he is the Preserver of men though they cannot reconcile this with the sense of his present dealing As Job here doth in his plea. And indeed there is not only ground to believe the preservation and safety of a sinner taking with his sinfulness and desperate of a remedy in him self which was Job's present condition by vertue of that other righteousness Rom. 3.20 21 22. the Gospel coming to intercept and prevent the execution of the Law-sentence whereby the sinner becomes most safe by being thus undone But even when the Lord seems to pursue such a Penitent it is to be believed that he delights not in their destruction or prejudice Lam. 3.33 nor intends it always when they apprehend it as the Church pleads Hab. 1.12 Nor will he destroy such though it may seem good to him to take them out of the world Thirdly His Inferences upon these grounds wherein he pleads against his sore afflictions and for some other issue of the matter then yet he had found His first Inference ver 20. is by way of pleading against Gods present dealing with him making him the Butt of his indignation alluding to what be said Chap. 6.4 See also Job 16.12 Lam. 3.12 by reason whereof he was become a burden to himself or weary of his life as ver 15 16. Chap 10.1 and left to himself and on his own hand The sum of this Inference is as if Job had said Lord since thou delightest in friendship with thy people and to manifest thy self to be a Preserver Why dost thou thus pursue thy own penitent servant to destroy me For thou knowest that thou wilt sooner destroy me by this usage as already I am become an insupportable burden upon mine own back then bring me to make any amends for my faults And therefore why dost thou take this course which seems so contrary to thy Name and Titles and which is not the way to reconciliation and friendship but to ruine me Hence Learn 1. As for this way of pleading by challenging and questioning of God Why hast thou set me c Albeit it be not sutable that dust should speak in such terms to God yet herein he is not only to be pitied as being under a tentation but his vehemency is not to be too rigidly censured as flowing from love seeking friendship with God Love hath much boldness and is allowed to be very importunare 2. Gods being a party in anger is a very insupportable buâ—den to a sensible and tender soul For that is the sad regret here Why hast thou set me as a mark against thee to spend the Arrows of thy wrath upon me See Job 13.24 This is a stroke sadder to a right discerner then all strokes beside or then if all the world beside were against a man Psal 3.5 6. 109.28 Happy are they who are affected with this as their burden for many never mind it who have best cause And if I may add this also it is sad addition to this already insupportable burden when tentations and apprehensions of Gods displeasure drive us to bitterness against God When we are not only a mark against him pierced by his Arrows but our spirits turn also to be against him by our bâ—tter resentments of his dealing Zech. 11 8 Job 15.13 It would be more easie to tender souls that God seemed to be against them if they could love him for all that But this crowns their misery when apprehending God a Party they turn head again and become bitter It is a mark of Saints honesty to bewail this when they can do no more Job 9.18 Lam 3.15 And the humble may from this consideration plead for a relenting of Gods hand seeing the friendship will never be made up till he be first kind 3. Tentation and weakness in a time of tryal will raise and bring up many false reports of
to cause him know himself 3. No man can free himself from being quarreller of Gods Righteousness except the man who is sensible of sinfulness and misery under afflictions though he cannot condescend upon a particular cause for which God afflicts him Thus Job takes up man to be a frail sinful creature though he knew not in particular wherefore God contended with him Chap. 10.2 that he may witness that he is not quarrelling 4. Sense of sin is an especial mean to make a man carry right before God under trouble Therefore Job begins with this as his chief Argument why he would not quarrel with God For trouble and terrour may crush and silence the spirits of men but sense of sin bows them and makes them stoop to God In ver 3. Job as hath been said amplifieth that Argument formerly insinuated taken from mans sinfulness We need not enquire who this He is that will contend and with whom For it may be understood both of God and of the man that dare offer to quarrel with him And in sum it cometh to this Man is so environed with so innumerable infirmities and sins that if he should attempt to enter the lists with God and Gold undertake to contend with him he could not clear himself of one among never so many challenges but should be as often condemned as accused Hence Learn 1. Man is naturally a contentious striving creature As here is implied he would be at contending Not only is he apt to be contentious with men 1 Cor. 11.16 Rom. 2.8 Hab. 1.3 which is a fruit of flesh Gal. 5.19 20. but he is even ready to quarrel with God in the matter of his deep counsels Rom. 9.20 of his Law and Directions Rom. 8.7 Joh. 6.60 of his Providences and dispensations Psal 73. Jer. 12.1 Isa 45.9 58.3 and particularly in the matter of denying his own righteousness Rom. 10.3 This we should look upon as the result of our pride and the ordinary root and rise of much of our vexing exercise whereby we obstruct the use and profit we might reap by our condition 2. Nothing will subdue this proud contentious humour in man but sin discovered and charged home putting man to answer Either the Lord awaking the Consciences of contenders with him or with men either and so putting other work in their hand and curing their idleness which causeth contention or permitting them to fall in some sin to recover them from conceit and security which make them so quarrelsome 3. The best of the Children of God are environed with innumerable evils and frailties which may humble them For there are thousands of them here See Jam. 3.2 These should be seriously laid to heart Psal 40 11 12. lest we prove them to be not infirmities but presumptuous sins They should also be watched over and observed in every step of our way and when this is remembered it will call for charity one toward another and to bear one anothers burdens 4. Our unrighteousness and multitude of failings must be of Gods discovering when he comes to contend For he must make the challenge and put them to answer This is not only true of the wicked Psal 50.21 and of refined Formalists Rom. 7.9 But even of Saints who with David may lie over for a time in sin without discerning it either in the Glass of the Law or checks of their own Conscience till God come and put the Conscience to it So little cause have we to lean to our inherent grace And when we are most tender and vigilant in observing our own escapes yet how little are we able to pry into the Law or our own Consciences Who knoweth the perfection of the Law the depth of his own heart and all his escapes See 1 Joh. 3.20 This teacheth us to be mindful what strangers we are to our own errours Psal 19 12. and that therefore we ought not to lean to our own verdict of our selves 1 Cor. 4.4 Psal 139 23 24. 5. Albeit a spirit of bondage under tentation may cause Saints restore what they took not away and subscribe to every accusation of Satan as a true challenge yet all Gods challenges are true whether we see it or the conscience take with it or not And they are challenges which no man can ward off or answer but in a Mediator Every challenge of God is in it self a sentence of condemnation as often as we are challenged by him so often are we condemned For Man cannot answer him even one of a thousand He can neither deny them nor defend himself but must succumb in that debate See Rom. 3 4. Psal 130.3 and 143.2 This may demonstrate their folly who will not be concluded by the verdict of God in his Word concerning them but do stand out against it or who being convinced do not flee to a mediatour in whom alone they are able to answer to their dittay Vers 4. He is wise in heart and mighty in strength who hath hardened himself against him and hath prospered The Second Argument confirming this Assertion concerning the Righteousness of God and that he is not to be contended with as unrighteous is taken from the consideration of his power and wisdom This is propounded in this verse and amplified and enlarged in the several branches thereof His power especially though not secluding his wisdom ver 5. 10. and his wisdom especially ver 11. In this verse God is asserted to be wise and mighty where he is said to be wise in heart which is an expression borrowed from what the Scripture speaks of mens wisdom where the heart is taken not only for the seat of wisdom Prov 2 10. but for wisdom it self a man of heart is a wise man Job 34 34. Prov. 6 3â— 19 8. in the Original So the meaning here is that God is singularly and infinitely wise and powerful And in this 1. There is a proof of Gods Righteousness supposed For he neither wants wisdom which might cause him err or mistake in any thing nor wants he power for execution to cause him fail and come short in any of his purposes as we see men of best integrity may miscarry or come short through want of either of those 2. There is proposed an express argument wherefore God should not be contended with He being so wise and powerful none will offer to contend with him but fools seeing they are not able to prosecute a controversie with him either by skill or power And this is confirmed from experience that never any who yet essayed this course found it thrive in their hand Hence Learn 1. A right study of the Attributes of God will prove a solid ground for religious dispositions toward God it will help faith to judge what he is doing and will do and teach us to expect that his operations according to his Word will be like himself and that our behaviour before him should be sutable to such a One Therefore doth Job recâ—â—r to
make supplication and implore grace and mercy as the word imports and therefore need not and will not answer 5. The Lords being a Judge whose Tribunal none can shun nor decline whose examination is most accurate and searching whose sentence and the execution thereof are most effectual and whose severity in correcting doth point out his dreadfulness I say the Lord 's being such a Judge should deter men from pleading their righteousness against him as a party and invite them to humble themselves by supplication before him For saith he I would not answer but I would make supplication to my Judge Vers 16. If I had called and he had answered me yet would I not believe that he had hearkened unto my voyce 17. For he â—reaketh me with a tempest and multiplieth my wounds without cause 18. He will not suffer me to take my breath but filleth me with bitterness The words contain a third ground of Job's resolution not to contend with God The scope and meaning whereof are made difficult and obscure by reason of the different acceptions of the words calling and answering ver 16. Which at first veiw seem to be meant of Prayer and Gods answer thereunto And so the sense is given diverse ways As 1. That though God were hearing his Prayers yet he could hardly believe it were so v. 16. seeing he did so afflict him with breaches upon his body mind family and goods and did uncessantly vex his spirit therewith v. 17 18. And it is indeed true That however men may be dear to God and their Prayers heard by him when yet sad afflictions are not removed Psal 10.17 Dan. 10.12 13. Yet great afflictions may so toss and confound them that they cannot discern audience and respect But I see not how this comes up to Job's scope to perswade him to plead for Gods Righteousness and not to contend against him It is true the greatness of his trouble might affright him though innocent from contending as well as hinder him to discern audience and upon that account it may be looked on as a ground of this his resolution But that doth not so fully exhaust the scope nor so clearly reach it Therefore 2. Some leave out the word yet v. 16. which is not in the Original and changing the time a little do read the latter part of the verse by way of question thus If I have called and he have answered would I not believe that he had hearkened to my voyce And so the sense is given to this purpose as if Job had said I dare not complain or quarrel God For if I have prayed to him and have found him answering my Prayers might not I expect he would hear the voyce of worse language in my complaints and quarrellings and answer it accordingly This Interpretation holds out this truth That such as find Communion with God in Prayer will get the clearest sight of his presence and watchful Providence over all their ways and will be most afraid to provoke him or put him to it to give a proof of his Providence against them by their miscarriages But however this be a sound truth and may seem to be grounded on what is said v. 16. yet it cannot be the meaning of this place For it takes not in the rest of the verses which confirm what is said there and therefore are connected with it by the particle For 3. Some understand the words thus as if Job had said Though God should hear my Prayers yet would I not believe that he had hearkened to my voyce that is I would not believe he had hearkned thereunto out of any respect to my voyce or to the worth of my Prayers but meerly of his own goodness as may appear by his smiting of me being innocent and free of gross wickedness And how much less durst I think to be accepted in contending This is also a truth That such as are most real supplicants and speed best at it will be most humble and see most of free grace in the answers they get and this humility will keep them from quarrelling and other sinful attempts Yet neither is this Interpretation so clear or full and it seemeth to place the emphasis and force of the Argument where it is not only upon his voyce as not regarded in the answer Therefore passing that acception of the words calling and answering I conceive it safer to understand them more especially of Job's calling or provoking and challenging of God to enter the lists and debate with him and of Gods answering or undertaking and being ready to abide the challenge Thus calling and answering are frequently taken in this Book and even in this Chapter And so the sense is as if Job had said I will not contend with God about his righteousness nor plead my righteousness to the prejudice of his For if I should call God to debate the matter with me and he declared himself ready to defend against me yet I would not believe that either he would endure my contentious discourse or judge me to be righteous v. 16. For if now when I am not contending but walking in my integrity he hath so violently afflicted me v. 17 18. What would he do if I should wickedly provoke him Thus the sense runs clear Though Job kept not at his resolution not to contend but frequently calls on God to answer him in that dispute and though in his complaints and challenges both in this speech and elsewhere he do reflect upon the Righteousness of God and cry up his own righteousness too much for which he is checked by God yet his general grounds are good that upon the grounds mentioned it is not to be expected that contending will gain any thing at Gods hand And from all this we may Learn 1. Whatever be the endeavours attempts or desires of men or how much soever God seem to condescend to them or homologate their will yet it is not to be thought that he will do or approve any thing but what is right For so much doth Job's assertion v. 16. teach in general That though Job should presume to call and God should condescend to anâ—wer yet he doth still right and will not patiently hearken to his voyce of contention and justifie him 2 Whatever the Lord do with any of his people it is not to be expecteâ— that he will approve of quarrelling or justifie quarrellers For that is it in parâ—â—cular that Job will not believe It is true when Job so often called God at last in so far hearkned to his voice as to puâ— him to answer for himself But in so doing he was â—o far from hearkening to and applauding the voic◠〈◊〉 hâ—s complaints that he put him to humble himself in the dust for them And who so believe or expect any other of him they do but delude themselves and will be disappointed in end 3. In Job's experience and lot we are here taught what Saints may expect to meet with
yea sometime in a fit Nature getting the upper hand As here Corruption and Grace wrestle for it and at last Sense and Corruption carry it Afterward we will hear more of this conflict betwixt his Faith and Sense in this complaint And we find it was Paul's exercise to be tossed betwixt the law of his members and the law of his mind Rom. 7. This may teach us to have a jealous eye over our selves even in our best frame For trouble may discover much dross which doth not then appear And it teacheth us not to stumble when we find dross in trouble not only with our good but over-flowing it for a time We have as little reason because of that to say we have no good in us as we have to say we have no corruptions when they are borne down and disappear in our good condition Obs 2. As for the strength of his Argument That not only his Friends ought not to censure but it beseemed God to respect his extorted complaint and give him ease we may consider 1. God may justly take a proof of what is in man and how weak any inherent grace he hath is to resist tentation as it proved here in Job And therefore the Argument is faulty as to concluding that God should altogether forbear to put him to it to give this proof of himself which was so needful for him 2. Were Saints never so pressed with tentation and over-powred with infirmity in their failings as Job here was not malicious nor wicked in his complaints but forced to them through weakness and tentations yet even those their failings which flow meerly from infirmity and tentation are real sins which need a Mediatour to expiate them and a pardon for his sake upon their closing with him by faith and their renewing of their repentance And therefore his Argument cannot at all conclude that God or his Friends should look upon it as no fault in him thus to complain when he is put to it Yet 3. There is somewhat of an Argument in it both in reference to God and to his Friends In reference to God Albeit he may try what is in Saints and they ought to flee to Christ for the pardon of their infirmities Yet it is an Argument pressing that God should pity them when they do not run wilfully to sin but are driven out of the way through the power of tentation and they are sensible of their failings in such a case For God is a tender considerer of a willing spirit even when it is under the power of weak flesh Matth. 26.41 It is also an Argument pleading for pardon in a Mediatour and such infirmities will more easily obtain it then other sins Rom. 7.24 with 25. And further such a condition doth also plead for moderation of Gods dealing which yet ought to be pressed with much sobriety and submission and staying of his rough wind in the day of his East wind Isa 27.8 seeing God is a tender Shepherd who â—as Jacob Gen. 33.13 will not over-drive his flock Isa 40.11 1 Cor. 10.13 and who is tender in preventing his peoples being driven to sin Psal 125.3 In reference to his Friends the Argument may hold out this great truth That it is not just to be too rigid in judging of Saints or to judge of them and the state of their person though of their condition they may by their violent fits to which they are driven through affliction and tentation and wherein there is a conflict betwixt the flâ—sh and the spirit and the whole man consents not For however Job's Friends might have censured his complaints as passionate which yet in his weakness he would not admit yet there was no reason they should judge by his complaints which he could not suppress that he was a wicked man In particular If we look to the several parts acted by the flesh and the spirit in him in the rise of his complaints each of them may afford us useful instructions and cautions And 1. The flesh or his present sense speaks first My soul is weary or I am heartily or very weary of my life or my soul is cut off with wearying of my life or is cut off that it is in life All those readings come to one purpose That he did very earnestly and affectionately with his soul weary of his life he would very gladly be rid of it and was even killed that he was alive To this issue came his resolution Chap. 9.35 When he had resolved to smother his griefs they did so press and overcharge him that he was not only wearied of them but even of his very life because of them desiring to get an end of these miseries by the end of his life And this he must speak out before them Whence Learn 1. Gods people will not be always Masters of their own passions and resolutions under trouble For Job Chap. 9.35 had thought to digest all his sorrows with silence but now he is forced to speak them out My soul is weary or cut off And especially when men do digest their grievances but with a grudge as Job grudged and regreted that he could not be heard to plead his cause Chap. 9. 35. it will prove a boil that will break out at last 2. Albeit life be Gods gift and benefit and men do oft-times doat much upon it yet God when he pleaseth can make it one of their greatest burdens For saith he My soul is weary of my life It ought to be acknowledged as a mercy of God when he makes our life tolerable or in any measure comfortable to us 3. Men in their desires after death under trouble do oft-times discover much weakness as Job doth here For albeit it be mens duty to be ripening dayly for death and the duty of Saints to eye and long much for that end of their course considering the glory and happiness that abides them after death Phil. 1.23 2 Cor. 5.1 2. and considering their own sinfulness to which they are obnoxious in this life and the sins of the time wherein they live which may make them many a sad heart 1 King 19.14 2 Pet. 2 7 8. yet it is a sin even in those cases to weary and not submit to Gods pleasure as Elijah was faulty in his desires of death 1 King 19. Far more is it a sin when men out of desperation rush upon death or even when because of trouble or discontentment or diâ—â—idence of Gods help they weary and are not contenâ— to have their graces exercised as God pleaseth or when they look on death as their only issue from present trouble And here Job failed both in his aversion from the real advantages of his being tryed and in his fixing of his expectations too much upon death 2. Grace steps in to correct sense and what had flowed from his weak flesh I will leave my complaint upon my self The meaning whereof is not that he will complain at his own peril and take
his hazard of what may ensue upon it as he elsewhere resolves Chap. 13.13 But the meaning is That when his weariness was like to make him complain and cry out grace and submission would as formerly Chap. 9.35 yet have smothered it and rather have sunk under the pressure then utter any thing of his passion to God or against his dealing Whence Learn 1. Much trouble affords occasion and matter of many lamentations and complaints and it is a demonstration of mans frailty that when he is hardly pressed he can do no more for his own relief but complain and lament Psal 102. in the Title For here it is supposed that Job's hard case pressed him to a complaint 2. Men do not a little feed and encrease their complaints under trouble by their own wearying and so making their burden uneasie For it is when he is weary of his life that he hath a complaint But formerly till his spirit wearyed he got it borne down Chap. â— 10 3. Albeit afflicted and grieved Saints may find great ease by pouring out their case to God yet the ill and bitter frame of their spirits is better suppressed than vented For saith he I will leave my complaint upon my self Thus did he labour not to sin with his lips Chap. 2.10 as not knowing but his passion if once it bâ—â—ke loose might utter worse language then simple complaints 4. Albeit men be driven from their good resolutions through the violence of their tentations yet it is their duty to essay them again For after his endeavours to ease himself Chap. 9.27 28. and to smother his grievances are overturned he will yet again essay to leave his complaint upon himself 3. Flesh at last over powers all his good resolutions I will speak in the bitterness of my soul or I am so put to it with grief and bitterness that I must give my self a vent Whence Learn 1. Saints may be put from their resolutions over and over again For here after he hath again resolved to bury his complaint he is put from it and he must speak and his passion for this time carrieth all before it This may teach Saints not to mistake such humblings in the matter of their resolutions and such violent fits in themselves 2. Saints resolutions of submission and patience will not hold when they only smother their sorrows and do not labour to cure that inwardly and at the root which they endeavour to suppress outwardly For therefore comes he at last to this I will speak notwithstanding all his former resolutions because he did not labour to remove the cause of his complaint by reading Gods dealing aright and seeking patience but did only leave it upon himself 3. Resolutions also will not hold when men take their burdens upon themselves and do not roll the grievancâ—s they would suppress over on God For in this also his resolution was defective that he will leave his complaint upon himself or smother it and take all the weight of it upon his own spirit and therefore it came to this issue I will speak 4. Much trouble and perplexity is apt to breed much soul-bitterness especially when nature and corruptions are let loose to read our lots and grapple with our difficulties For Job here confesseth his trouble had produced bitterness of soul 5. Bitterness of soul is not only a fountain of complaints and resentments against Gods dealing but it is very boisterous carrying down all good resolutions and a very bad Oratour before God For saith he I will speak in the bitterness of my soul Which imports that it was his bitterness that furnished those complaints which before he would have suppressed that it was bitterness also that overturned his former resolutions to be silent and drave him to this I will speak and that all the faults in his following Discourse slowed from this Fountain of bitterness which prompts a man to speak not what he ought but whatever it suggests were it such as the Disciples Prayer was Mar. 4.38 Vers 2 I will say unto God Do not condemn me shew me wherefore thou contendest with me In this verse we have Job's Proposition of his complaint which contains the second Argument justifying and pressing it He not only insinuates that his Friends should not censure those complaints which he dare propound to God leaving them as unfit Judges though this do not conclude strongly seeing men in passion may dare to speak that to God which is not meet But in the very Proposition of his case he insinuates this Argument against Gods present dealing and why he should deal more tenderly with him That it was very hard measure thus to condemn him before he be convinced of his crime The meaning is as if Job had said Lord by this way of Procedure thou seemest to deal with me as with a wicked man whom thou hast condemned to be thus consumed and cut off as such Now in this I request for a just procedure that I may understand the quarrel thou hast against me who am a righteous man before thou give me such hard measure and I expostulate that it is not so that either thou wilt not cease to proceed against me as a guilty and wicked man for so the word to condemn is in the Original to make wicked or to declare one to be such by the sentence and stroke of a Judge or else shâ—w me the cause and quarrel In this reasoning we may observe thâ—se Truths for our Instruction 1. Whatever distemper be in our spirits which we cannot get suppressed and calmed it is better to go to God with it then to mâ—â—â—â—ur and complain of him as it were behind back and albeit there may be much failing and dross in the way of such addressâ—s yet it is faith that goeth God with them and it evidenceth a man to be given to Prayer when even his very complaints run in that channel For albeit this address be full of distemper and passion as we may observe all along yet in so far Job is right that when he must speak v. 1. I will say it unto God saith he 2. To be condemned as a wicked man is sad to a Saint Any dispensation will be tolerable but that seeing therein a sight of mens own wickedness hides a sight of Gods favour and love in their lot Therefore Job deprecates his being condemned as a wicked man as the word imports when it is suggested by sense that it was so with him 3. A justified man whose sin is pardoned and who walks with God may plead against condemnation as a lot he cannot in reason expect seeing there is no condemnation to any that are in Christ Rom. 8.1 Therefore doth Job plead against that when suggested by sense and tentation as a thing that could not be and for which there was no cause according to the tenour of the Covenant of Grace Do not condemn me shew me wherefore thou contendest with me as such a one
in oppression especially of his own people He will not imploy his great power to crush his own people Job 23.6 37.23 but his strength loveth judgement Psal 99.4 Nor doth he afflict willingly or deny unto men their just claims and defences Lam. 3.33 34 35 36. Therefore Job questions this as not to be yielded that it is good or pleasing unto God to oppress 2. An interest in God whether more general as we are his creatures or more specially as we are renewed and made of new to him as it calls for our reverence and respect to him Psal 100.2 3. So it is a ground of confidence that he will deal favourably and tenderly For Job pleads aganst the evils apprehended by his sense upon this accout that he is the worke or labour of Gods hand And albeit this conclude more strongly upon the account of his being a new creature renewed by God yet even his being one of his creatures hath its own weight in the plea as he afterward distinctly vrgeth it ver 8 9. c. 3. One of the saddest sights a Saint gets of his trouble is when he misseth Gods affection in it and it seemeth to speak wrath For Job cannot digest this that his stroak seemed to be such as if it were good and pleasant to God to oppresse him and as if he despised him See Job 13.24 Others will not much miss this if their lot be otherwise tolerable But Saints will resent this in most easie tryals 4. Zeal to the honour of God when it seems to be reflected upon by his afflicting of Saints will not a little grieve their spirits For this also affects Job that the counsel of the wicked should seem to be shined upon or get a favourable aspect See Josh 7.8 9. Our forgetting of this is the cause why we speed so ill in our particulars before God 5. It is the property of real and lively Saints to love Piety so well that it will exceedingly afflict them when Gods dealing to his people seems to harden men in impiety and to introduce Atheism and open ungodliness For this also was his affliction when he apprehended the counsel of the wicked to be thus shined upon as hath been explained See also Mal. 3 14 15. Eccl. 8.11 This afflicted David and put him to his Prayers Psal 7.6 7. 69 6. Thirdly I come in the last place to consider Job's mistakes his weakness and reckoning by sense which are most predominant in this Argument Wherein as his speech implieth that he was so far over powered as not only to think but even to utter those apprehensions of God though with some reluctancy and opposition made by faith So his questions about them imply that they were false and not to be yielded unto but the contrary maintained Hence from his failing and weakness we may learn these Cautions for our Instruction 1. It is an ill way of pleading our righteousness under trouble to reflect upon the Righteousness of God who afflicts us as Job's sense suggested to him that he being a righteous man Gods afflicting of him could be nothing else but oppression 2. It is a great fault to censure Gods sharp dispensations toward his people as oppression seeing he is Soveraign Lord of our being not accountable to any for what he doth and doth by no affliction deprive them of their righteousness nor of any benefit they can claim by it Therefore Job was in a mistake when he complained of oppression 3. It is injurious to God when his people think he respects any profit whereof he reaps none or pleasure without an eye and respect to their good For Job did mistake when his sense judged that it was good unto God to oppress or ruine him 4. It is also a wrong to judge of Gods affection by our sense of his external dispensations As if because he afflicted his people therefore he thought it good or took pleasure in it and despised and contemned them Whereas when God doth afflict them he proceeds so to say with much aversion if their good could be otherwise promoted Jer. 9 7. Lam. 3.33 he doth affectionately remember them under it Jer. 31.20 yea he honours them by taking so much pains upon them and setting them upon such a stage whence his grace in them may eminently shine and appear 5. It is an act of rash judgment to think that God despiseth his creatures because he tryeth and exerciseth them or despiseth his own work in his people when he giveth it a shake that it may stand more firm and casteth dust upon it that he may scour it better Job 23.10 For Job failed in thinking God despised the work of his hands 6. It is not only weakness but wickedness if persisted in to think That God approves of wickedness as Mal. 2.17 See Eccl. 8.11 12 13. That his favourable and smiling Providences do import any approbation of wicked men and not rather a snare upon them Psal 11.6 Or That God cannot take ways to vindicate his own honour and commend Piety though he do not take our way but let our tryals whereby the wicked may take occasion to stumble and be hardened go on For herein Job failed exceedingly in thinking God shined upon the counsel of the wicked in any of these respects formerly mentioned in the Explication And particularly in thinking there was no way to discountenance the wicked in their impiety but by delivering of him whereas the wicked had some knowledge of Gods will as it was then made known and we have it more clearly in the written Word whereby they might judge of Gods thoughts of their way and God should in due time manifest his mind yet further to them though Job's tryal continued for a while Vers 4. Hast thou eyes of flesh or seest thou as man seeth 5. Are thy days as the days of man are thy years as mans days 6. That thou enquirest after mine iniquity and searchest after my sin The fourth Argument wherein he enlargeth that apprehension of oppression v. 3. is taken from this That there was no necessity why God should thus torture him to find out or pursue his sin but it looked rather like ignorant and passionate man then the Holy and Omniscient God to keep this way of procedure Here eyes and days and years are attributed to God to express his knowledge and eternal duration in terms borrowed from among men because of our incapacity And the meaning of the Argument is as if Job had said Lord thou art not like a man that thou should need thus to put me upon the rack A man might possibly do thus to an innocent man in regard his eyes see but what is outward and he is oft times led with suspicions passions and malice and therefore he may be induced to torture an innocent man that he may draw out a confession of what he suspects he is guilty of v. 4. And man is born to learn somewhat every day in the
passion that is not afraid of any hazard from God as to his eternal happiness and the language of submission to what the Lord shall be pleased to do otherwise And so it hints at that Argument which is more fully prosecuted in the following verses Hence Learn 1. It is the duty of Saints when any thing grieves them not to smother it within them but to speak it out to God as here Job resolveth See Gen. 25.22 This is the way to ease our spirits by laying our pressures upon him 1 Sam. 1.15 1 Pet. 5 7. And it is sad when our anxieties and pressures do out-grow our diligence Dan 9.13 Ezek. 24.23 2. It is a great sin to be an hinderance and disâ—â—â—â—gemâ—nt to oppressed minds in pouring out their 〈…〉 God Therefore when they who came to câ—â—foâ—t him would have terrified him fâ—om this Hold your pâ—ace let me alone saith he that I may speak Had they advised him to be more sober and meek in his addressâ—s it had been his fault not to have hearkened unto them But when they will not at all 〈◊〉 him come to God as a sincere man they had better 〈◊〉 nothing And hereof not only those are guilty who hinder others by their own example or disswade them by their counsel from going to God in trouble but they also who discourage men in their approaches unto God under trouble by aspersions on themselves or on their way without cause 3. Job's peremptory resolution to speak come on him what will laying aside his passion sheweth That honest hearts will not stay away from God for any hazard For 1. They will not readily suspect any evil at his hand having his Promises to the contrary 2. Be the consequents what they will they will hazard upon them rather then stay away from God and rather then bear what they suffer in staying away under pressures In such a case mens Lot may appear to them to be sad enough whatever they do and therefore they will hazard on God as the Lepers did upon the Camp of the Syrians 2 King 7.3 4. 3. They will have much submission to what befals them in the way of their duty so that if they cannot reckon that they will get no hurt they will study to submit to it and see love in it if it come Vers 14. Wherefore do I take my flesh in my teeth and put my life in mine hand Job's Arguments further confirming and justifying his resolution may be reduced to two The first whereof which is largely prosecuted to v. 19. may be taken up in this short sum His going to God with his complaint flowed from no despair but from the Conscience of his integrity and his confidence in God and assurance that he could be approved and therefore he might lawfully set about it nor was there any hazard in it as they feared This Argument doth indeed evidently conclude both the principal point in controversie that he was not a wicked man as also that he might lawfully go to God with his case though it justifie none of his imperfections in the way of his address which himself did also condemn when God laid them to his charge In this verse he proves Negatively that it was not despair that drave him upon this course He looks upon such a desperate course no otherwise then as if a man should tear his own flesh with his teeth and expose his life to a manifest danger as a thing in a mans hand which is ready to fall out or which he hath there ready to resign and deliver it up See Psal 119.109 Now saith he as the words should be read Wherefore would I take my flesh in my teeth c. He would not have them think he is so mad as to slay himself or to run upon his own ruine by coming so confidently to God without a ground And so his very hazarding to come to God proves his integrity Hence Learn 1. Men are very ready to add to their own great troubles by miscarriage and distemper under them especially by heartless and wicked despair when by discouragements they break their own spirits and lay them on as a load above their burden when they weary of their life and suspect Gods love and favour to them when they cast away confidence as useless Heb. 10.35 2 King 6.33 or let their spirits fly out against God in passion Rev. 16.9 For this was the evil whereof they suspected Job that he took his flesh in his teeth c. in this his way 2. Such distempers are madness and folly if examined by the Principles of right Reason For Wherefore saith he would I be so mad as take my flesh in my teeth c And indeed such a course helps us nothing it speaks us rather irritated then humbled by our afflictions it hinders better exercise Lam. 3.39 40. it provokes God to add to our trouble and as it is in the Text it eats our flesh and wasts our bodies as if we did eat them with our teeth and hazardeth our life befoâ—e God 3. Faith in a strait may seem to venture so much as to be full of presumption when yet it hath a sure ground For he disclaimeth that his faith was desperate presumption as they judged it to be and reckoned that he was running upon his ruine when he was bold in his addresses to God Faith in a strait must not stand upon misconstruction from on lookers So also in other things Mordecai must not bow to Haman nor Daniel shut his window nor Moses leave a hoof however others look upon them for it 4. Albeit men can give no other convincing grounds of their faith in a strait yet their very confident going to God with their distress proves their honesty and that there is a ground for their faith For so doth Job argue from his own practice He will go to God and if there were not a ground to go upon he would not be so mad Thus ought Saints to refute their tentations and prove they have grounds of confidence though themselves or others cannot see them by their going to God Vers 15. Though he slay me yet will I trust in him but I will maintain mine own ways before him In this verse he proves Positively that he went upon grounds of confidence and the testimony of his integrity when he adventured thus to go to God For albeit the Lord should not only afflict him as hitherto he had done but should even slay and cut him off yet he would not quit his adherence to him nor the maintenance of his own integrity For clearing of the words Consider 1. His Assertion I will trust in him may be read by way of question Shall I not trust or hope To intimate his firm resolution that certainly he will trust and hope and That they if they would open their eyes might see it was his duty 2. As for this trust or hope whether we read it affirmatively I will trust or hope
troubles yet it is God only to whom they go for ease of them For though Satan had an hand in Job's afflictions yet his recourse is to God for ease 4. As troubles lying on may give a sore dash to confidence and to mens courage in maintaining of their integrity See on Chap. 9.34 So trouble may so crush their spirits that when it is removed the very fear of its returning will dash confidence and discourage For Job would have Gods hand removed far from him We should beware to give way to crushing lest that be a crosâ— when other crosses are gone 5. As God may seem terrible to his own in trouble much more is he so to the wicked So this being too much dwelt upon may add to their disadvantages in coming to God For he propounds this as another caution let not thy dread make me afraid This calls upon them who would comfortably come to God in trouble to pray that God may not be a terrour Jer. 17.17 and not to entertain only terrifying apprehensions of God as a party to their honesty which he is not and Job mistook in thinking Gods terrour would not allow him to avow his integrity though it be one blessed fruit of trouble to be made so sensible of his dreadfulness as to be afraid to offend him Psal 90.11 Neh. 9.32 6. Whatever discouragements afflicted Saints find in their approaches to God Yet the more humble they are they will find the fewer For Job premits all those cautions to his speaking to God only when he is to plead with him in a contentious way as a Plaintiffe or Defendant whereas had he been more patient and submissive he needed not have apprehended either Rods or Terrour to affright him in his humble addresses 7. Faith and the Testimony of integrity will make a man very bold in great hazards For in this offer Call thou and I will answer or let me speak and answer thou me albeit his spirit did overdrive him Yet herein the greatness of his faith and courage appears that being sure of his own honesty he fears not guilt so he be secured against Gods Power and that he will debate his cause on any terms In this his miscarriage is not to be imitated yet it may teach men to be serious and to know what they are doing in the matter of Piety that so they may stand it out in a storm 8. Saints are very ready to miscarry in their dealing with God under trouble As here Job did For it is difficult under trouble to speak aright to God humbly and without reflection Mark 4.38 And as Satan may make a snare of mens real honesty to cause them miscarry in evil times by deceiving them with fair shews of good things or by their own presumption that they must be right because truly honest and godly So the testimony of a good Conscience may be ill to guide under cross-dispensations and the man that hath it being hard put to it may be so much the more unruly under the cross that his own Conscience doth not condemn him as Job was here And albeit it be their sin and folly so to do seeing the advantage of a good Conscience might sweeten all their trouble and it were a bitter ingredient in their cup to have an ill Conscience Yet such is mens weaknâ—ss in tentation that they cannot esteem aright their own mercies Vers 23. How many are mine iniquities and sins make me to know my transgression and my sin 24. Wherefore hidest thou thy face and holdest me for thine enemy Followeth his complaint and actual reasoning with God wherein he discovers the greatness of his distress and passion in that albeit his former desires and cautions be not granted yet upon any terms he proceeds to complain and expostulate with God And since God doth not call to make him Defendant as afterward he did he turns Plaintiffe and argues against Gods proceedings The scope of this Discourse as may be gathered from v. 24 25 26 27. Chap 14 3 6. and elsewhere is humbly to expostulate with God about his severe dealing with him to propound his tentations arising upon his condition and to offer reasons why he thought God should not so sharply afflict and exercise him His first Argument in these verses is taken from his innocence and integrity The Antecedent whereof we have v. 23. And the consequent v. 24. The meaning in sum is That being conscious to himself of no gross provocation or reigning sin which might provoke God to deal thus with him he desires God would shew him if there were any such whether more of them or any gross one for he alters the number from the plural to the singular vers 23. And supposing there was none such to be found he humbly argues against Gods deserting of him and by his deserting of him and the sad stroaks inflicted upon him dealing with him as with an Enemy seeing this was not agreeable to his way of proceeding with justified persons v. 24. For further clearing of this Argument Consider 1. Job is not here simply denying that he was a sinner for so he should lie and contradict his own Profession Chap 7.20 But he only denies that he was guilty of gross wickedness or reigning sin and particularly of hypocrisie wherewith they had charged him And this question is in substance the same with that Assertion Chap. 10.7 Thou knowest that I am not wicked Only the way of propounding it may be conceived with some reference to what Zophar had said Whereas he Chap. 11.5 6. had asserted that if God would speak to Job he would convince him that he had much more sin then himself knew Here Job puts the matter to God that he would determine that point debated betwixt them not whether he had more sin then himself knew for Job was too honest deny that but whether he had more or any of those gross wickednesses for which God useth to plague men as he did him 2. Job's Inference and Expostulation v. 24. upon the Supposition that he was no such man doth not import that he thought the sins whereof he was guilty though a Saint did not deserve all the afflictions that were upon him if God should proceed as a severe Judge according to the rigour of the Law But his scope may be thus conceived Partly He looks on God here as a Father who useth not to pursue such failings in his people in severe indignation and wrath and he looks upon his own sins as pardoned and therefore not to be remembered and therefore expostulates that God dealt otherwise Partly it may be conceived that Job did indeed fail in this reasoning For as he usually maintained against his Friends that God might afflict a godly man as he did him without any imputation to his holiness and righteousness and yet he expostulates with God about it here So he is indeed so hot in justifying himself against their imputations that he fails through weakness
his strange with and conflicts about it from whence the Consequent may be drawn from the scope of the whole discourse iâ— He thinks God should pity him under his afflâ—ctions considering how hardly they pinched him and did put him upon strange and irregular desires which he could hardly wrestle against or get suppressed For clearing of the words wherein this Argument is contained if we put v. 14. in a Parenthesis and read v 15. thus which the Original will bear as well as the present Translation Thou shouldest call and I would answer Thou shouldest have a desire to the worke of thine hands If I say we thus read the words the sense will run very clear and smooth For the words contain these three 1. The wish to which his trouble did drive him v. 13. The meaning whereof is in sum The apprehension of Gods displeasure at this time was so dreadful to him that it would be sweet unto him and was his earnest desire he might he hid even in the grave till it were past and till a set time should come wherein God would remember him with favour and bring him out again 2. The correction of this wish interjected v. 14 as being absurd that a man should expect after death to return to this life again And therefore he not only condemneth that wish in his judgement but in his practice resolves submissively and patiently to wait for his ordinary change by death 3. The resuming and prosecuting of his wish again v. 15. For albeit the words as they are translated may be understood of his expectation of favour at the Resurrection after that change by death v. 14. Yet considering that he doth not abide by that submission v. 14. but returns to his complaint v. 16. where he regrets what God doth now in opposition to what he desired I encline according to the other reading to joyn it with v. 13. as being a prosecution of what he had there propounded which his reflexion upon the absurdity thereof had made him reject v. 14. and now his present distress makes him resume it again In the proposal of his wish v. 13. as he had insinuated the greatness of his trouble and his sad apprehension of Gods displeasure in that it made him wish to be hid from it for a time in the grave So he had insinuated his faith in that he could not but wish and expect that his hiding should be but for a set time after which God would remember him Now here he prosecutes this his confidence and dwells upon the thoughts of his sweet and comfortable condition if his desire were granted For whereas now his steps were numbered and his sin watched over v. 16. if he were hid till that tempest were over it would be far otherwise Then God would certainly respect him as his own workmanship not only by Creation but especially by grace and consequently would miss and desire after him and seek and call for him to do him good And he should come out of his grave and answer and partake of the sweet fruits of that reconciliation Compare Chap. 7.21 where we have some expressions of his confidence like unto those though uttered to another purpose In his wish and desire v. 13. it cannot be denyed that there is much passion and distemper and weakness yet much honesty and that which is sound appears in it also And therfore I shall remark both what is commendable and worthy of imitation in it and what may be gathered for instruction and caution from his weaknâ—ss and failings And so we may Learn 1. Wrath from the Lord is very terrible especially to them who have tasted of his love and do feel and know the power of his anger Psal 90.11 For Job reckons That to be hid in the grave and keept secret there till wrath were past were a sweet lot See Psal 6.1 2 c. 38.1 2 c. And if wrath be thus sad to Saints what shall be the condition of the wicked who are Trees dried to be fewel to the fire See Isai 2 19. Rev. 6.15 16 17 It is our duty to fear the displeasure of God and it is a good evidence of honesty in men to attain it provided it be done in time and they do so fear and apprehended it as they endeavour to get out of its way 2. Such as have obtained grace to believe that God is not dealing in wrath when he afflicts them may yet be driven by sense and extremity of trouble to fear it again For notwithstanding Job's confidence Chap. 13.16 17. and elsewhere he is now driven upon the apprehension of wrath Then he would appear now he would be hid We should not stumble though we be thus tossed after believing and from his example we should learn to beware of complaining which wakened his tentations and apprehensions 3. Trouble and apprehensions of Gods displeasure will bring out great weaknesses and will much distemper Saints in their Prayers and draw them to very passionate and irregular desires As here Job is driven to press an absurd desire that he might be hid and keept secret in the grave till a set time We have have need of much caution and sobriety in our Prayers and Desires when we are in trouble And particularly those weaknesses may be observed in Job's propounding of this desire for our admonition 1. It distempered him that he apprehended God angry when he was not As ordinarily it is our fault that our own spirits become a spirit of bondage to us when the Spirit of Adoption is our allowance 2. It was his weakness to think that any condition even the granting of this strange wish were better and more fit for him then his present lot which was carved out by God It is our presumption ordinarily to reflect upon Gods guiding of us and to reckon that any thing were better then what he doth 3. It was his mistake to think that such a change of his condition was needful to bring him ease and relief seeing a change of his condition within like that v. 14. would afford him more certain and speedy help We often toil our selves seeking ease in the change of our outward lots when it might be found nearer at hand in getting our spirits in a right frame 4. It was his fault to wish this out-gate which was impossible by the ordinary course of Nature established by God as himself judgeth of it v. 14. and that ordinary appointed comforts will not satisfie him It is a sure evidence that we are in a distemper when the Consolations of God are small with us and we cannot be satisfied unless God do some extraordinary and singular thing for us Doct. 4. In the saddest conflâ—cts of tentation and sense faith and honesty will still kyth in some measure in Saints As appears from this very wish of Job wherein 1. All his apprehensions of wrath make him not quit his confidence that it shall not be thus for ever
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
they aim at a mark in shooting so this winking seems to be noticed in Scripture as a sign of a mans driving some pernicious or foolish design Prov. 6.13 10.10 And so he would charge Job that not only he was full of Perturbation but was upon some mischievous or foolish design in the course he took which he wisheth him to consider what it might be This verse thus explained may have some reference to what is spoken v. 11. as if Eliphaz had said If thou knowest not better Consolations nor any secret thing beside these Consolations of God which we tender to theâ— Why suffersâ— thou thy heart thus to rage Why shuttest thou thine eyes upon Truth and scornfully rejectest it through prejudice What design canst thou be driving in all this But it hath more express reference to that which followeth v. 13. as if had said Why sufferest thou thy heart thus to be pestered with rage and passion How great is thy insolent contempt And what can thou mean or design in this that not only thou shouldest thus miscarry toward us but even toward God That thou shouldest not only reject his Consolations but set thy spirit on edge against him and speak so presumptuously and irreverently to him and of him In this Branch of the Accusation as the fault challenged is in it self gross and hainous so it cannot be denyed that Job was much guilty of it his disordered expressions witnessing how much he was distempered in spirit Only it flowed not from any principle of wickedness as his Friends alleaged But from his weakness which drave him upon those sits of passion through the vehemency of tentation And therefore God constructeth more tenderly of this his way then they did accounting those to be though faults but friendly complaints in his distemper which they censured as hostile accusations So hard is it to judge wisely and tenderly of the afflicted and of their failings under trouble that godly men would oft-times be in a sad plight if God were not more favourable to them then even their godly friends are The General Doctrine passing their severe censure doth teach 1. Mens hearts being filled with passion will strangely precipitate them through perturbations and distempers so that they will not be themselves For saith he thy heart carries thee away 2. Where the heart is thus disordered mens carriage will be strange and odd insolency will not be wanting and strange projects will then be set on foot For upon the former it followeth thine eyes do wink at somewhat 3. Men themselves will be the severest censurers of such perturbations if they will soberly reveiw them Therefore he propounds it by way of question Why doth thine heart carry thee away and what do thine eyes wink at Whatever be passions verdict yet those distempers are unjust and unreasonable as the Lord insinuates in his challenge and questions to Jonah Jon. 4.4 9. And our inconsiderateness and not reflecting upon our way doth hold us in many wrong courses which if we seriously examined we would abhor Jer. 8.6 4. When men despise the Consolations of God they will readily fall in an ill frame of spirit against God For upon this that the Consolations of God are small v. 11. it followeth v. 13. thou turnest thy spirit against God c. 5. It is a very sad and lamentable case when mens spirits are against God when they oppose their wit and counsels to his will and when in trouble they are imbittered at his dealing and alienated from him For it is here a sad charge that his spirit is against God See Zech. 11.8 To love and adore God brings sweet ease under saddest dispensations 6. This condition is so much the sadder when men turn their spirits thus against God when they are not so much driven upon this through the strength of tentation as voluntarily they run to this course as their choice and are not careful to entertain a meek frame of spirit For it heightens the challenge here that thou turnest thy spirit against God He reflects upon Job's abandoning that patient way of bearing the Rod wherewith he had begun Chap. 1.21 2.10 in place whereof he had turned him to impatient complaining And albeit Job was not wicked in this and was under more pressing tentations to miscarry then Eliphaz did well consider Yet he was not wholly free of blame in his activity to distemper his own spirit 7. Distemper of spirit is at a great height when it is not smothered within but breaks out in expression For that is added to the former here and lettest such words go out of thy mouth He seems to point at those expressions Chap 7.20 10.2 3 c. 13.27 and others the like of which in their proper places 8. When men are in such a distempered frame they ought to consider well what it is and what is in it For Eliphaz thinks it not enough to charge it upon him v. 13. but premits questions v. 12. Why doth thine heart carry thee away and what do thine eyes wink at that thou turnest thy spirit against God c. which implieth according to the Exposition formerly given 1. Men should consider what reason they can pretend for such a carriage For they will never be able to produce any that is relevant let them muster up never so many 2. They should consider what pride and insolency there is in it especially if they will not be admonished of it We may think our selves crushed with trouble when yet pride is much aloft 3. They should consider what design they can drive by such practices and what they will do next if they behave themselves thus For it will be with men in such a case as with peevish Children who do embrace at last what they have often rejected so must they abandon such ways when they have at last found they are in vain and to no purpose Vers 14. What is man that he should be clean and he which is born of a woman that he should be righteous The fourth fault charged upon Job in his Discourse which makes way to the Second part of the Chapter is that he maintained Errour in justifying himself and his cause before God The charge is propounded here and amplified and illustrated v. 15 16. The sum of the Proportion is That however Job laboured to justifie himself yet it was impossible that frail Man as his Name here signifies born of a Woman should be righteous This Charge is sound Doctrine in the Thesis and Job was guilty of contradicting this Truth in some respects and therefore is checked by Elihu Chap 33.8 9. 34.7 of which in its own place Yet as for Eliphaz's Application of it to his purpose it is to be considered 1. In the Truth here asserted Job and he did not controvert For however he asserted his righteousness too much and too violently and by way of indirect reflection on God and is therefore challenged by Elihu
the Ancients true observation of the lot of some wicked men as if it were universally true of all wicked men even in the extremity here recorded For many of the wicked may live in great case as experience verifies and Job often asserts See Chap. 21.13 and frequently 2. In that he reflects upon and misconstructs the exercise of Job's Spirit and Conscience as if it were like unto the wiâ—â—â— lot when yet the difference is very great and wide For though he was under sad tentations and much vexed in spirit yet he still drew near to God and clave to him which wicked men do not This being his great mistake in this matter doth Teach That not only natural men but even such as are truly godly may through want of experience mistake the exercise of mind and the vexations which assault others and may judge of them as unlike the lot of Saints Thus David complains that he was a fear to his acquaintance Psal 31.11 Hence it followeth 1. That men ought wisely to consider the case of the afflicted and poor that they add not to their afflictions by their misconstructions 2. That godly men being exercised in spirit should be armed against such hard measures from their friends not expecting still to be dandled nor stumbling at it when some of their friends who should comfort them do pass by and others do pour Vinegar into their sores and add to their sorrow 3. That since other godly men may mistake such exercises they who are under them should guard lest themselves also stumble at them and for that end should study how useful and necessary they are Having premitted those Generals I shall â—ow explain the parts of this misery as it is branched out in the several verses and draw some general Observations accordâ—ng to those former Rules and Cautions without insisting any more upon Eliphaz his mistakes and reflections in them And first in this verse it is declared that the wicked man hath a miserable life of it being like a woman in travail as the word signifieth throughout his time and that not only through Gods making it to be so with him by afflictions but as the form of the word beaâ—s He makes himself to travel with pain through discontent and anxiety As for that which followeth in the end of the verse Some read it only as an Explication or other expression of all his days thus The wicked man travelleth all his days even the number of years which is â—id or determined by God to the oppressour or wicked man But leaving this and other readings not so apposite as our Translation it contains an Explication and Instance of the wicked mans vexation Wherein 1. Having more generally designed the person he speaks of that he is a wicked man he more particularly restricts what he is to say to the oppressour That so he may reflect upon Job whom he supposeth to have been guilty of that sin when he was in eminency and power 2. He instanceth this as a cause of the oppressours vexation and pain that the number of years is hidden to him Whereby we may understand either That it breeds him great vexation that the time of his death is kept hid by God so that he knows not when it shall arrest him the consideration whereof maâ—â—s all his present mirth or That his vexations are so bitter to him and his mind is so little at ease that he never desires to think on death but hides from himself all thoughts of that subject Both those come to one purpose and may agree in one as shall be marked in the Doctrines From this verse thus explained Learn 1. Whatever wicked men promise to themselves in their way yet if they considered matters well they will find they have but a miserable Dogs-life of it For so much may be gathered in general from this that the wicked man travelleth with pain and from the rest of the Text. Not only doth God make the life of some of them to be visibly miserable but even all of them bear some prints of the truth of this in some measure The best of it is but a drudgery in serving sin and lusts and many times it is seen they do but weary themselves Isai 57.10 Jer. 9.5 Ezek. 24.12 and pierce themselves thorow with many sorrows 1 Tim. 6.10 This may keep us from complaining of Gods service seeing Satan is a most cruel Task-master 2. It adds to the misery of wicked men that their vexations are endless That he travelleth with pain all his days not as women who travel but some days Albeit they have intermissions of visible troubles yet their anxieties and drudgeries continue and whatever they get yet they are far from that sweet issue of trouble which is promised to the godly Psal 30.5 This may warn all to beware of provoking God to imbitter all their moment of time And it teacheth Saints to bless God for any real vicâ—ssitude or change to the better which they find in their condition 3. It adds also to the misery of the wicked that God gives them up to be their own tormenters That he makes himself to travel with pain as the word in the Original bears His own â—theism diffidence love of this present life and the things thereof his fears about them his envy that others speed better than himself c. le ts him never be at quiet And albeit the spirits of godly men may make them very sad exercise which thâ—y should guard against and so this will not always prove a man wicked that he breeds himself vexations yet the point should teach all to try what is real and done by God in their vexations and what is only apprehended and made a vexation by themselves And when men find that they do thus vex themselves they ought to search into the grounds and causes of it whither Idols or unbelief and avoid them lest the increase of their vexations be a just punishment thereof 4. To be an oppressour is a particular evidence of a wicked man whatever he pretend unto otherwise as he may pretend to Piety and an acknowledgment of God Zech. 11.5 There he instanceth that General Assertion concerning a wicked man in the person of an oppressour intending but unjustly to reflect upon Job 5. Albeit Oppressours seem to be the men who should have most quiet since they heap together so many outward delights and think to secure themselves in the enjoyment thereof by the bearing down of others Yet in Gods judgment they are oft times plagued with greatest vexations and sorrows For they in particular are the wicked who travel in pain and of whom the following particulars in this and the rest of the verses are verified And albeit the point hold not fully true in the sense of Eliphaz yet they have their own vexations in purchasing and in keeping their purchase whâ—rewith they dare not trust God And sometimes their Consciences also do vex them Which should keep
is a sin wherein Hypocrites may fall as well as the profane They are not sound in their Religion nor are they mortified to their interests and therefore they are ready to seek after the things of the world in a wicked way and it is an evidence of their unsoundness that they do so Therefore is bribery here subjoyned as a sin that may go hand in hand with the former 4. Though men may gather much wealth by bribery yet wrath followeth it which will consume all that purchase and all that the taker of bribes hath For fire shall consume the Tabernacles of bribery or their whoâ—e House and Family which shall prove but like a flitting Tabernacle before the Indignation of the Lord See Hab. 2.9 10 11. Vers 35. They conceive mischief and bring forth vanity and their belly prepareth deceit In this verse he pitcheth upon another sin procuring these judgments and that is malicious hatching of wickedness which provokes the Lord in justice to cause their plots miscarry and resolve in vanity As for that which is subjoyned that their belly prepareth deceit it doth not only point out that after one plot miscarries they set on again to project new deceits But it may be taken more generally that in those words he resumes and repeats what he had said before shewing that as they prepare and intend deceits for others so God makes them prove deceits and disappointments to themselves Hence Learn 1. Wicked men are put to much toil and pain in sinning and it is a punishment to it self For it is a conception and a birth prepared in the belly 2. As sin hath its degrees of growth for there is a conceiving a preparing in the belly and a bringing forth so mischeivous and malicious sins are so much the more hateful that they are not the result of a sit of tentation but are so long in breeding and bringing to maturity For all these steps of their malicious plots are marked to shew how hateful they are 3. The Lord abhorrs not only deliberation but affection in projecting of sin That not only they conceive and then bring soâ—th but that their belly which in Scripture is made the Seat of affection prepareth deceit 4. As all mischief greedily committed is abominable so also deceitful plots mischeivously contrived against others in special Therefore the general of mischeifs is instanced in the matter of deceit as a mischief specially hateful to God 5. It is Gods just judgment upon wicked men that their assiduous projecting of sin tends to their own sad disappointment at last For whatever they conceive the birth is vanity and their Preparations to deceive others prove deceit to themselves also at last CHAP. XVI In this and the following Chapter we have Job's Reply to Eliphaz and his other Friends wherein he reprehends them for their Discourses enumerates his miseries and yet proves that he was righteous for all that prosecutes his wish to debate his Cause with God and rejects all the Consolations they offered to him upon his repentance In this Chapter 1. He premits a Preface wherein he reprehends them more generally for their Discourses as being but trivial and nothing to the purpose ver 1 2 3. such as would be bitter to them were they in his case and such as he would be loath to propound to them were they in distress ver 4 5. 2. He refutes Eliphaz's former Discourse that only the wicked were sadly afflicted by shewing that himself was under sad â—fflictions ver 6 16. and yet was not wicked ver 17. as he proves by several Arguments ver 18 19 20. 3. He repeats his former wish that he might plead his Cause with God before he die ver 21 22. Vers 1. Then Job answered and said 2. I have heard many such things miserable comforters are ye all 3. Shall vain words have an end or what emboldeneth thee that thou answerest IN these verses we have the first part of Job's Preface and the first fault he finds in their discourses Namely that they were but light and trivial and nothing to the purpose And First He propounds this censure v. 2. that Eliphaz had said nothing concerning the miseries of the wicked but what he had often heard not only from others long ago as he speaks of other their discourses before Chap. 12.2 3. 13.1 2. but from themselves also His Discourse was to the same purpose with what he and the rest had said before and contained nothing but a tautologie and idle repetition of what he had often heard from them Secondly He amplifieth and presseth this censure by several Inferences from it 1. That however Eliphaz pretended that he propounded the Consolations of God to him Chap. 15.11 Yet in effect he and all the rest were but cruel comforters while they augmented his grief by such idle and useless tautologies v 2. 2. That it was a wonder they would never end nor give over those vain and superfluous discourses that were so little to purpose v. 3. 3. That he could see no cause wherefore Eliphaz should thus repeat those things which had been so often refuted And therefore he puts him to it to consider what vain presumption was in it what reason he had for it what encouraged him to it and what spirit he was of in doing of it v. 3. It is to be marked that though sometime he direct his speech to Eliphaz who spake last in the singular number v. 3. as he did also to another before Chap. 12.7 8 and though his scope in the second part of the Chapter v. 6 c. be to refute particularly what Eliphaz intended in his Narration concerning the miseries of the wicked Chap. 15.20 c. Yet he directs his speech also to all of them in the plural number v. 2 4 5. Chap. 17.10 because they all agreed in one opinion and when one of them spake it made him resent the like injuries done to him by all of them From v. 1 2. Learn 1. Saints must not be weary to bear out under never so many assaults and renewed conflicts whether from men or from tentations within suggesting the same things which men through mistake do utter and the Conscience of mens integrity will bear them out under all this For notwithstanding this renewed opposition Job answered and said 2. Men may be very much in love with their own conceptions and opinions which yet are very trivial and common For notwithstanding the estimation Eliphaz had of his Doctrine Chap. 15.11 17 18 19. yet saith Job I have heard many such things Thus many things which men cry up as new Lights are in effect but old Errours 3. Albeit there may be much precious excellency in common and obvious Truths which is not to be sleighted Yet oft-times the ordinary method of curing afflicted souls will not prevail in extraordinary cases For saith he I have heard many such things as being common notions and yet am not the better What
Eliphaz had spoken â—as as hath been said the ordinary observation concerning the lot of wicked men and such Doctrine was fit for them Yet it did not sute with his extraordinary case Saints must submit to be led in extraordinary paths 4. Impertinent remedies the oftener they are inculcated are the more grievous to troubled minds For it grieves Job that he had heard such things so often from them and this is a part of his tryal 5. Men ought still to eye their chief scope in their work and undertakings that so they may ponder how they act sutably so as they may reach it Therefore he puts them in mind that they came to be comforters Chap. 2.11 that they might consider how they dealt not so with him as might reach that end 6. It is no new thing for Saints in trouble to meet with Physitians of no value Chap. 13.4 and with comforters who in stead of mitigating do increase their grief and sorrow For they were miserable comforters or comforters of trouble and vexation who troubled and vexed him This the Lord ordereth to come to pass for tryal of the faith of his Children and that he may draw them to himself for Consolation 7. They are but sorry comforters who being confounded with the sight of the afflicteds trouble do gratâ— upon their real or supposed guilt weaken the testimony of their good Conscience that they may stir them up to repent and let them see no door of hope but upon ill terms For by these means in particular were they miserable comforters to Job 8. It may please the Lord for the tryal of his own Children under affliction not only to let loose one discouragement and discourager upon them but to shut all doors of comfort under Heaven upon them and make every person or thing that should comfort add to their grief For they were all miserable comforters and elsewhere he regrets how every person from whom he might have expected comfort sleighted him Chap. 19.14 c. 9. As one trouble may waken many upon a Saint so when any are a grief to any of them all will be put upon their account which that grief may waken upon them For upon Eliphaz his Discourses this vexeth Job that they all were miserable comforters and this he layeth upon Eliphaz's score From v. 3. Learn 1. Gods people may mutually charge and load one another with heavy imputations whereof though one party only be guilty yet who they are will not be fully cleared save in mens own Consciences till God appear For there is a mutual crimination that vain words were uttered in this debate as is clear from Chap. 8.2 15.2 compared with what Job saith here and as Job is not simply free of this fault though he was not so guilty as they judged so they were indeed guilty of it and yet none of them take with it till God come to decide the controversie 2. Mâ—n may sadly charge that upon others whereof themselves are most guilty For they charged him to have spoken vain words or words of wind and yet he asserts themselves were guilty of it having no solid reason in their Discourses but only prejudice mistakes and passion 3. Men may teach Doctrine true and useful in its own kind which yet is but vain when ill applyed For the Doctrine of the Ancients rehearsed by Eliphaz was good in it self but vain and wind when applied to Job's case Thus Satan may abuse and pervert Scripture 4 Vain and useless discourses are a great burden to a spiritual and especially to a weary spiritual mind that needs better For Job wearies that they have not an end 5. When men are filled with passion prejudice or self-love they will out-weary all others with their discourses before they weary themselves Yea they may think they are doing very well when they are a burden to them that hear them For so blind was Eliphaz's passion and conceit of himself that he insists on that he hath to say as excellent when Job is quite wearied with it as he was also with the discourses of the rest 6. Men are not easily driven from their false Principles and Opinions when once they are drunk in For so did Job find by his Friends here Shall vain words have an end saith he or how long will ye persist to multiply them 7. As men may be bold who have Truth and Reason upon their side so oft-times Passion will hold men on to keep up Debates when yet they have no solid reason to justifie their way but they will still inculcate their passions prejudices and will For Eliphaz is imboldened or confirmed and strengthened or smart and vehement to answer what had been before refuted without producing any new reason 8. Mens Consciences will be put to it to see upon what grounds they go in debates And it will be a sad challenge if either they start or continue them without solid and necessary causes but only out of prejudice interest or because they are engaged Therefore Job puts the question to Eliphaz What emboldeneth thee that thou answerest as a question which would be sad to answer if he considered it seriously in his Conscience 9. Men ought also seriously to consider what spirit they are of and what sets them on work in every thing they say or do so much also doth this question import Vers 4. I also could speak as ye do if your soul were in my souls stead I could heap up words against you and shake mine head at you 5. But I would strengthen you with my mouth and the moving of my lips should asswage your grief In the rest of the Preface wherein he speaks to them all in common we have another fault which he finds in their discourses Namely that they were cruel to him who needed no such usage as they would find were they in his case and who would not deal so with them He convinceth them of the truth of the former censure and of their unkindness to him by shewing that if they were in his case and if he dealt with them as they dealt with him by multiplying uncharitable words and scornful gestures they would soon know how grievous their carriage was and how miserable comforters they were to him v. 4. whereas he being more tender and knowing his duty would labour to encourage them v. 5. We may read v. 4. by way of Intterrogation Would I speak as ye do Would I heap up words against you c and so it imports a denyal that he would deal so with them but would rather endevour to strengthen them and asswage their grief as he expresseth his purpose v. 5. But as we read it in v. 4. he declares what he would do and what were very easie to be done if he took as light a burden of such a condition as they did But in v. 5. he declares what indeed he would do in such a case By all which he insinuates 1. That they
2 Tim. 4.2 For thus did Bildad fall short in charging Job with impatience Hence we may inferr 1. That when men are called to reprove others even for real faults they should not look upon it as an easie task to get them well charged home 2. That upon the other hand though men be able to avoid challenges as they are given them by men and upon their grounds yet they should try narrowly whether God may not have the fault it self to charge upon them upon another account And for this end every imputation just or unjust should be looked on as saying somewhat from God And it should be considered that God oft-times le ts men pitch upon false challenges or false grounds of accusation wherein we may hold up our face that we may the more seriously take with true challenges upon true grounds before him Herein Job was deficient who looked so much to the unjust grounds upon which his Friends charged him with passion that he forgot to take with the fault at all till God came and put him to it Obs 2. Though Bildad speak soundly in the General that Gods fixed way of Providence should not be altered to gratifie the humours of men yet he erred in the Application thinking that which he asserted that God afflicts only the wicked as he did Job to be the fixed course of Gods Providence unalterable as a Rock It is true Gods order is firm so as not to be altered at mens pleasure yet it is not true that this is Gods order It teacheth That Errour may be very powerful and effectual upon men and may cause them to look upon that as a very certain truth which is indeed a very gross mistake and errour Such as is Bildad's Opinion here Which warns men to try and examine their Opinions well even those wherein they think they have a firm perswasion Having thus cleared these mistakes if we look upon this purpose in general and in it self abstracting from his mis-applications and from his particular Opinion concerning Gods Providence it may afford us these sound Instructions 1. The ordinary result of sharp afflictions is passion and impatient fretting at our lot For Bildad supposeth that anger was Job's frame whereof too many are guilty under afflictions as he was also in part Pride want of submission and unwillingness to be afflicted fulness of lusts carnal discouragements and even weakness in Saints and the irritations they meet with are apt to breed much passion instead of other exercise and to break the spirit when it should stoop and bow Thus was it with Jonah Jon. 4.1 9. and thus is it especially with the wicked as is foretold Rev. 16.9 and implyed Rom. 9.20 and therefore we would especially guard against this distemper in trouble for it is an exercise easily attained whereas right exercise under the Cross is not attained without difficulty and wrestling 2. Passion and Impatience is an evil very hard to deal withal and they who would oppose and cure it in others will hardly know to what hand to turn them or where to begin For in this challenge Bildad begins with complaining of Job to his Friends Ho teareth c. and then turneth to complain of this fault to himself Shall the Earth be forsaken for thee as hardly knowing what course to take or how to get in upon him See Chap. 4.2 It is true Bildad mistook Job in part yet this is a certain Truth That men in passion should consider that they are under a distemper and therefore when any thing spoken to them pleaseth them not they should consider that the cause of it may be their own distempered taste They likewise who have such to deal with would remember that it is a task too hard for them till they put themselves in Gods hand 3. When men look aright upon their lots and conditions they will find that the sting and bitterness of their crosses lieth in their own impatience which distempereth their souls and spirits For saith he He teareth himself or his soul in his anger Many things we fret at in our impatient fits and distempers which are not real afflictions but how ill soever we relish them real mercies tending to our own and others good and which it would be in so far a misery to want Thus Jonah is angry at his own lot and Gods dealing with Niniveh when yet it wa◠〈◊〉 singular mercy that so many souls were perserved from the stroke of justice and his mercy that he was imployed as an Instrument in that Preservation Further Such things as are real afflictions and sad would be most easie if Pride Impatience and Murmuring were laid aside and Humility stooping and meekness studied as Psal 39.9 Withal Whatever use or fruit the Lord call for or intend in our affliction impatience hinders it all like a boisterous wind that brings no rain and so we prolong our own tryal A man that is impatient possesseth not his own soul Luke 21.19 and so cannot rationally improve his tryal Yea thereby he makes shipwrack of more then trouble could deprive him of If this were well studied we would find that Patience and Submission is a compendious way to get ease and a remedy of all that ails us And for attaining thereof the following Instructions concerning the Providence of God will afford some help and direction 4. God hath a Providence in the Earth As here is implied That he forsakes not the Earth See Acts 17.28 Men should still remember and fix their eye upon this Providence in all things which may keep them from barking at God in their impatience as indeed impatience reflects upon God whatever we pretend in it Exod. 16.2 3 7 8. Isa 45 9. And being at peace with him may secure us of all Providential Dispensations be what they will that they shall do us no hurt 5. The Providence of God is Universal on the Earth See Matth. 10.29 30. and 6.26 28 29. and constant and perpetual The Earth is not forsaken as Atheists reckon Ezek 9.9 This teacheth us to see God in every thing and not in things which please us only and to acknowledge his mercy who though he be provoked ceaseth not to uphold and govern the Earth yea and to bring about that which may be for the good of his people And if he have an hand in all things we are bound to believe that the most cross dispensations do very well beseem his Goodness Holiness Justice Wisdom c. seeing he doth nothing but what is like himself and that when he hath tryed purged and humbled his people he can bring about good out of the bitterest of them even meat out of the eater Such Principles as those being fixed and seriously studied may prevent many mistakes and fears 6. The Dominion and Providence of God is ordered and fixed at his own pleasure and not to be altered at the pleasure humours and arbitrement of ment of men whose passions are very inconstant and
that it should dayly represent it self to him ready at his side in its ghastly colours For though he did indeed apprehend approaching death yet it was with so much confidence and courage that he did familiarly look upon the worms and corruption as his nearest Relations Chap. 17.14 Which sheweth how little others may be acquainted with the courage God may afford to his own people in deadly difficulties For Bildad could not discern what Job found in this tryal 2. He did mistake also in looking upon this part of Job's affliction as a proof his wickedness For hunger sickness and apprehended death have been and may be the lot of Saints As is not only to be seen in Job here but in David Psal 6.2 30.9 in Paul 2 Cor. 1.8 9. 11.27 and diverse others Hereby the Lord doth mortifie his people and fit them for Eternity and other tryals that may be before them Also by these he fits them for receiving more proofs of his love in strengthening them to bear want providing supplies for them fitting them that they shall not abuse mercies Phil. 4.11 12. and in causing them meet with many blessed disappointments of their fears But passing his Reflections the General Doctrine as it is understood of the wicked according to the tenor of the Law-sentence may teach 1. To flee or seek to shift the terrours of God will be to no purpose For he who is driven to his feet v. 11. is here supposed to be taken and in Prison See Am. 9.2 3 4. They flee only best from Gods judgments who flee into his own bosom and who-so neglect this they do but multiply their own sorrows Isa 24.17 18. 2. Albeit wicked men may have much strength not only bodily strength but strength of spirit beside the strength of their corruptions and humours when they engage in troubles So that not only their pride and height of spirit doth ripen them for the snare which doth surprize them when in the pride of their heart they puffe at trouble But it contributes to make their trouble more grievous and bitter that it hath strength of spirit and strong corruptions to work upon whereas it would be easie to subdued men Yet created strength can neither preserve from trouble nor subsist under it but the godly must renounce it and the wicked will succumb because they do not renounce it For his strength shall be hunger-bitten 3. Albeit even the godly when they are under one trouble should be looking for another and they should not limit God who if he please may send destruction to cut them off the world for such limitations are the sting of our crosses and do provoke God to encrease our sorrows yet it may be terrible to the wicked that for all that is come upon them God hath not done with them but hath only given them an earnest of yet sadder things to come upon them For after his strength is hunger bitten destruction followeth upon that If once God begin to reckon with them they cannot expect bounds to be set to their tryal as the godly are warranted to pray Jer. 10 24. but they may fear it will grow till they be cast into the pit whereas the godly may know there will be an end Prov. 23.17 18. 4. God hath calamities in readiness whereby to cut off the wicked albeit he do not always or for a time execute them For here he lets the wicked see destruction ready at his side though for a time he be kept alive in Prison And this serves to refute their own presumptuous brags and the godlies fears who see not how they can be reached God who hath issues prepared for his people 1 Cor. 10.13 hath also judgments ready for the wicked Deut. 32.34 35. 5. How presumptuous soever the wicked be before trouble come upon them or under lesser troubles Yet when trouble cometh to an height they run as far upon the other extremity of discouragement and dispair For now this arrested wicked man apprehends sadly of his condition as if destruction were ready at his side to cut him off every moment And this is the just fruit of their presumption Hearts broken with pleasure and sinful delights wherein men are imperious and presumptuous Ezek. 16.30 will make weak hearts when trouble comes to an extremity Ezek 22.14 6. Albeit even the godly ought to foresee troubles and to look out to what may probably come upon them that they be not surprized Yet it is a plague upon the wicked that they die often in their apprehensions and fears before they die really and it is a snare to all who are obnoxious to it to be anxiously tortured about future events As here the wicked man hath destruction standing ready at his side to torture him before he be actually destroyed See Matth. 6.34 And therefore when the godly are vexed with apprehensions of future events they should reckon that God can disappoint them if he will 2 Cor. 1.8.9 10. and that if they come pass and they renounce their own strength God will enable and teach them how to beat them when they are put to it Vers 13. It shall devour the strength of his skin even the first born of death shall devour his strength In the third Branch of this Similitude in this and the following verse somewhat in Job's case is reflected upon as resembling the execution and violent death of this Malefactour In this verse Job's present dead-like condition and his apprehending to be cut off in this extremity Chap. 17.13 14. are reflected on as resembling this Malefactour who being wasted in Prison and apprehending destruction v. 12. at last It or that destruction which he apprehended shall devour the strength of his skin or his body and flesh and bones which are as the word is in the Original as bars to uphold his skin And this death which devours his strength shall not be ordinary but the first born of death that is a singularly violent death which carries away the principality and preeminence from other kinds of death as the first man did from the rest of his brethren and so to say a most deadly death as the first born of the poor significe them who are most poor Isa 14.30 Here albeit both Job and Bildad did mistake in expecting that a violent and odd way of death should be the issue of this trouble and Bildad did fâ—ther err in judging that such a death should be the reward of Job's wickedness seeing godly Josiah Jonathan and others have died a violent death and all things of that kind come alike to all Eccl. 9.2 Yet this Doctrine understood of the wicked may teach 1. It is a plague upon the wicked that their fears prove real at least they may do so for any security they have against them whereas the godly meet with many blessed disappointments Isai 51.12 13 2 Cor. 4.8 9. For after that destruction hath been ready at his side v. 12. it
It is not easie to believe the misery that hangs over the head of the wicked For it must be gravely asserted Surely such are the dwellings and place of the wicked or those things formerly mentioned do befal only them and their families and that certainly And though he erred in the particular yet it is true that what they deserve is hardly believed see Deut. 29.18 19 20. Nor ought we to stumble though their ruine be object of faith only and not of sense and though we find themselves crying peace and safety 4. It is an undeniable truth that the state of the wicked is miserable and will prove so in end For though matters go not as Bildad asserts yet this General is surely true That they are miserable and obnoxious to all this See Eccl. 8.11 12 13. Isa 3.10 11. and it is our sin to doubt of it Mal. 3.15 5. The wicked do meet with a just recompence from God in that as they will not know nor acknowledg him so they are deprived of the Protection of his Providence For they know not God and their dwellings and place either come or deserve to come to that issue which he hath formerly mentioned And we should read our not acknowledging nor depending upon God in any crosse dispensations of Providence we meet with 6. Men ought to try their perswasions well seeing good men may have strong perswasions in an Errour As here Bildad asserts all this to be surely true when yet he erred in some respects in what he taught And here we are to guard that sound General Principles against wickedness and concerning the desert thereof do not occasion our erring in particular Applications as it was with him and his Associates CHAP. XIX This Chapter contains Job's Reply to Bildad together with the rest of his Friends Wherein his chief scope is to reprehend their uncharitable and cruel dealing with a man so afflicted which yet he manages so as he takes occasion to ease himself by venting his Complaints and withal handleth the main Controversie debated betwixt them and proveth that he was righteous though thus afflicted The Chapter may be taken up in two Principal Parts First A Challenge for their Miscarriage or a General Proposition of their fault ver 1 2 3. Secondly Some Arguments fortifying and pressing home this Challenge Namely 1. That they should not rail upon him instead of convincing him if so be he were in an Errour ver 4. 2. That they should not have been so cruel in vexing him who was so sadly afflicted by God ver 5. 22. 3. That it was yet greater cruelty to deal so harshly with a man under affliction who is a righteous man as he was ver 23. 28. 4. That if none of these Considerations did move them yet they should be afraid to provoke the wrath of God to break out upon themselves for their miscarriage ver 29. Vers 1. Then Job answered and said 2. How long will ye vex my soul and break me in pieces with words 3. These ten times have ye reproached me you are not ashamed that you make your selves strange to me IN these verses beside a General Intimation that Job did answer v. 1. we have 1. A General Proposition of the Challenge v. 2. that by their alleaging of untruths and brangling his peace and driving him to despair they had grieved and vexed his soul and that for a long time 2. An Explication of the Challenge v. 2. that they did not only vex but even crush and break in pieces his strength and courage of mind by their impertinent untrue and cruel language 3. An instructing of this Challenge v. 3. that those ten times or very many times a definite number being put for an indefinite as Gen. 31.7 Lev. 26.26 and elsewhere they had reproached him and slandered his integrity 4. An aggravation of this their fault v. 3. That they who ought to have proved friends and professed to do so yet without shame dealt so strangely and left off all tenderness toward him In General Learn 1. As Controversies are not easily ended when once they are begun So it doth commend a mans honesty and zeal for truth that many renewed assaults do not make him quit it Both these may be gathered from this that Job after all the former debates yet answered 2. A good way to put an end to Controversies is not always to jangle about Questions debated but sometime to put the matter roundly home to the Consciences of Debaters that they may consider whether in cold bloud they be not refuted and self-condemned in their own bosomes For such is the strain and scope of Job's Reply at this time to charge home their cruel and uncharitable carriage upon their own Consciences Where Conscience interposeth not in Debates mens parts and their delight to make a shew of them their interest and credit being engaged and their heat and passion kindled and increased by debating may keep strife long on foot In Particular From v. 2. Learn 1. Afflictions are sad and mens carriage cruel in so far as they reach the souls and spirits of men to vex and grieve them When either afflictions and mens way of dealing get in upon their spirits and cause a breach and wound there or men do fall upon the afflicteds inward state and condition to question the goodness thereof For this is his complaint that they vexed his soul and brake him in pieces by one or other of these means 2. Affliction is so much the sadder when it is added to former afflictions For saith he ye vex my soul who am already afflicted in my outward condition They either added the breach of the peace of his soul to his outward crosses or his inward peace being already disturbed by desertion and tentation they contributed to the continuance and increase of that vexation 3. The longer men continue in an ill course it is so much the worse in regard they do more hurt thereby and do witness that it flows not from a fit of weakness but from a fixed resolution For he points at this as a great aggravation of their fault How long will ye vex my soul c. 4. A small thing may hurt one that is already crushed and particularly impertinent words may do much hurt to one who is tender and broken with afflictions For Job who had born all his other losses could not bear such language but words brake him in pieces 5. Men who have the testimony of their integrity and get grace to stick by it may yet expect to meet with many rubs in going through a time of tryal their corruptions may be irritated and God may try and humble them thereby For Job who who was honest and would not quit the testimony of it yet is vexed and broken with irritating words Such distempers should not be looked upon as a proof that men have no integrity 6. Men intending most good to others may yet prove most hurtful unless
had been so largely enumerated in the former Chapter Nor doth he regard Job's ample confession of his faith Chap. 19.25 c. Nor the intimation of the hazard of wrath which he had made unto them Chap. 19.29 But the more Job spake of those things he falls the more fiercely upon him Whence Learn 1. It is not easie to change learned and witty mens Opinions when once they are engaged in dispute For Job's Friends have still somewhat to say and answer And therefore God should be much imployed in such cases who ends this Controversie by his Word Chap. 42. and without whose presence and operation disputes will not put a close to Controversies 2. Afflicted Saints ought not to build upon most rational and likely means for ending of their tryals till God come and interpose For albeit Job had said so much for himself as might make men in reason think it were a thousand pities to use him harshly any longer yet all this is but Oyl cast into the flame with his Opponents who deal the more harshly that he pleads pitifully and yet confidently under his pitiful case And herein 1. Men ought to look to God who hath the inflicting continuance and ending of tryals in his hand and will permit none to sacrifice to their ownner in this business But in the use of all means will have them submit intirely to his will and will have them see that he may justly continue that tryal which they can shew just reasons why men that are his Instruments should not continue it 2. Men ought also to look on this as a great part of their tryal if they will continue to hold fast by their Grounds and Principles after they have asserted them and yet God permits men to continue unjustly in opposition to them For every new Reply of Job after these unjust assaults of his Friends is a further tryal and proof his constancy and integrity and a mirrour wherein his patience and faith do shine for the Edification of others in all ages 3. Men should look what God may have to say in the unjust continuance of their tryals from men For in all this long debate though Job had the better cause and the better of them in the dispute yet he failed much toward God And therefore an exercise of one kind or other never left him till he took with these and was humbled for them 4. Men should also read in this instance how far passion kindled through the heat of contention especially when joyned with ill Principles may mislead them For Zophar's unsound Principles and his Passion did necessarily ingage him to condemn Job let him say for himself what he would Which should warn men to take good heed to their Principles what they are and to the frame of their spirits Observe 2. In the next place we are to consider the manner and way of his going about to answer My thoughts saith he cause me to answer or cause me to return and bring me back into the lists again and make me interrupt my resolved silence and I make haste or my haste it in me The word here rendered thoughts doth properly signifie the branch of a Tree and is figuratively applyed to signifie the clefts of Rocks and mens cogitations or thoughts And so it may import high unsettled and turbulent thoughts like branches tossed with the wind as accordingly we find it made use of to signifie unsettled Opinions 1 Kings 18.21 thoughts and fancies in a mans sleep Job 4.13 and ill and vain thoughts Psal 119.113 But It is not to be conceived that Zophar makes use of this word to express any bad opinion of his own thoughts conceptions but only that they were his thoughts issuing from his heart as branches from a tree This is certain that by those words he intimates that his thoughts were burning within him he was in so great haste to get a vent to his conceptions that he had no patience to hear Job any longer And albeit his design in all this haste and perturbation of mind was to vindicate the Righteousness and Justice of God and to reclaim Job whom he supposed to have miscarried grossly in this matter yet the sequel cleareth that he was wrong in this which he is so hasty to see about It teacheth 1. Mens spirits when they suffer themselves to be over-driven with haste and perturbation do readily miscarry For Zophar in this his haste is found to be in an Errour Thus David's expressions in his haste prove to be unsound and such as he finds cause to retract them in cold blood And ordinarily mens haste and passion which is but a short madness furnisheth them with matter enough of sorrow and repentance when they seriously reflect upon it And therefore in all actings mens first and chief care would be ever their own spirits which are their chief opposites in doing duty and particularly in managing Controversies as they ought 2. Men even when their designs and intentions are good may yet miscarry in the prosecution of them through haste and passion For Zophar had a good design in this his hastie undertaking to reclaim a man whom he judged to be in an Errour and yet his haste made him to miss his mark so that he was not able to discern what was right or wrong in Job nor to hit upon his real miscarriages in this Controversie Even a good Cause may be marred by mens managing of it with passion and haste and therefore much less are men to make use of a pretence of zeal or good intentions to break out in passion for who so give way to that distemper of spirit cannot readily but go wrong Observe 3. As for the General account of his Reasons moving him to answer and to make haste in it Therefore my thoughts cause me to answer and for this I make haste Though this therefore and for this may be looked on only as a General which is particularly expressed and instanced in the next verse Yet if we consider more narrowly there may be more found in it For in the former Chapter Job had closed his discourse with a threatning of Judgments against them because of their miscarriages towards him And Zophar begins and possibly interrupts Job with this Therefore I answer and for this I make haste as if he had said The fear of that same wrath wherewith thou threatenest us for speaking as we do causeth me speak yet more to the same purpose lest by my silence and suffering thee to go in in thy course I should indeed draw on that wrath upon me It teacheth 1. Men should be well advised and maturely ponder the grounds upon which they speak and particularly upon which they either engage or persist in a debate they should first think well and then speak For so much doth his pretending to this ground and reason of speaking teach in general though he â—â—red in the particular Therefore do I answer c. 2.
And as he doth hereby insinuate that they had formerly mocked him rather then answered to what he said So this Ironical concession mock on doth further imply that if they heard him as they ought they would not persist to mock him or if they did he would bear it the more patiently if once he were heard and therefore he thinks they ought to hear him seeing it might prevent their further miscarriage or at least they should allow him this poor case to get leave to speak his mind let them make of it what they pleased when he had done Doct. 1. Godly men may be so much mistaken by others that they will not so much as patiently hear them speak for themselves For Job implieth here that he was interrupted and not suffered to speak Men should be prepared for such a lot as this and it points out how much they need to study sincerity and to approve themselves to God seeing they may meet with such usage from men And self-seekers and such as hunt after the praise of men should consider how unsure a foundation mens opinion and approbation are and how loose a grip they have thereof even when they think they are most esteemed 2. Not only may godly men be thus misconstructed but their laddest complaints may be but matter of mockage even to their dearest friends as Job here found who had been but mocked by them which is the construction he puts upon all their discourses and the consolations they had offered to him See Chap. 12.4 Men will be more ready to mock and insult over godly men especially in affliction than either to answer their Arguments or recover them out of their supposed Errours And it is but in effect mockery to deal with an afflicted godly man as they dealt with him 3. Were the condition of godly men under affliction well considered it would be found no matter of sport and that it is not Childrens play wherewith they are exercised For Job's discourse imports that they would not mock on and would find that he spake nothing that might procure their scorn if they hearkened to it attentively 4. Men who get their consciences discharged and their mind spoken in behalf of truth may enjoy peace whatever be the miscarriage of others For if they will suffer him that he may speak it will not trouble him though they mock on 5. It is a poor advantage were it well considered when men get liberty to go on in their sinful courses As here Job supposeth they gain nothing when they are permitted to mock on Vers 4. As for me is my complaint to man and if it were so why should not my spirit be troubled In the third Argument pressing attention in this verse he obviates the exception which might be taken at his complaints and asserts that his complaints were not directed to man but to God and if it were otherwise he might have much cause of grief and trouble And as to his scope in this The words may be looked upon as a justification of his complaints from the consideration of the cause of them That his complaints being not for ordinary strokes inflicted by men such as they saw but for strokes inflicted by Gods immediate hand in an extraordinary way it was no wonder he could not keep a measure in them Yea had he but to complaint of strokes inflicted by men such as they saw and were they only his party it were no wonder if his Spirit were troubled or shortned as the word is in all his resolutions to be patient This Interpretation doth import That men in trouble should not be too severely censured though their passions and distempers put them to grief and complaints And especially when God is a party in trouble and menâ—ly under more pressures than only outward trouble it is no wonder they get it not so well born but some weaknesses do appear But it seems rather that the words are to be understood of his complaint in it self That his complaints were directed to God and not to them And therefore since God heard him they were bound to hear him also And to excite them to ponder this the more he adds that if he had not God to complain unto but men only to deal with it might have added much to his trouble considering how cruelly they dealt with him Whence Learn 1. It doth beseem the Children of God and is an evidence of his grace in them that they prove not Rebels under their afflictions and grievances nor do rest upon what may be expected from men but do go to God with them For whatever were Job's failings in these his complaints yet it is commendable that his complaint is not to man 2. Saints may be so far mistaken and neglected by all others that they will be driven to this blessed necessity that they must go to God with all their grievances For so was Job necessitated to make his complaint not to man See Psal 142.4 5. 3. When Saints are thus hemmed in it is a call to go to God who will respect them when all sleight them For so Job looked upon it when in that case he made his complaint not to man but to God See 1 Sam. 30.6 4. God is so compassionate to his own Children when they come to him in affliction as may make the best of friends ashamed of their short coming in duty to them And Saints will find that in him which they will find no where else For so much doth the force of Job's Argument import that since his complaint is not to man they might well give attention to what God suffered him to speak to himself 5. Saints in their trouble would readily find their case intolerable were they left upon men and had not God for a refuge For so much doth Job here suppose If it were so Why should not my spirit be troubled Vers 5. Mark me and be astonished and lay your hand upon your mouth The fourth Argument pressing attention is That if they would look to him or consider his condition and what he was to say of the various dispensations of Divine Providence it might astonish them to think upon them and their own mistakes about them and might make them silent and not speak as they did Whence Learn 1. Before men judge of Gods dealing in any particular or of the afflictions or lots of others they ought to consider and mark them narrowly As here Job requires of them Mark me or look unto me my condition and my doctrine concerning Gods Providence 2. Men may see and heare much of that which yet they consider and mark but little For they both saw his condition and heard what he is now to say from his former discourses and yet saith he mark me or look to me as calling for more accurate attention Men do see many things and yet observe them not Isa 42.20 And it is a plague upon them when they see and perceive nor Isa 6.9
against sinners as the word threatens Jer. 12.4 Or that God doth not send his messsengers with all these hard messages they hear Jer. 5.12 13. So others fear not him nor his Word at all do what they will Exod. 5.2 Isa 36.20 Jer. 17.15 Isa 5.19 2 Pet. 3.4 7. When men have most low thoughts of God and of the advantage of Piety and are most presumptuous judgments may be nearest to them as in the like case it was with the old world And it is indeed true that such insolency in sin highly provokes God to plague though yet he may spare as Job cleared in the former Chapter 8. Men may be equal in sin who yet meet with different lots in the World For those who were overthrown by the floud and these whom Job asserteth to have been spared Chap. 21.13 14 15. are guilty of the same sins Vers 18. Yet he filled their houses with good things but the counsel of the wicked is far from me In the Fourth Branch of the Argument He subjoyns a caution to these corrupt Principles of the wicked as Job had done before him Chap. 25.16 And 1. He asserts that though they sleighted God as an unprofitable Master Yet he had for a time given them prosperity which gave the lie to the insolent undervaluing of him 2. Lest he should seem to be taken with that he had spoken of their impiety he expresses his abhorrency thereof in these same words that had been used by Job Chap. 21.16 Hereby intimating that he might more justly say their counsel was far from him who believed their speedy ruine than Job who flattered them with hopes of prosperity till their death Doct. 1. Though wicked men have low thoughts of God yet his bounty may for a time follow them to refute their ingratitude and contempt of him For though they saw not what the Almighty could do for them v. 17. Yet he filled their houses with good things See Matth. 5.45 2. The things of this present life are not only good in the wickeds esteem who have no other portion but they are good in themselves and ought so to be esteemed of and God praised for them and however the wicked abuse them which will heighten their guilt they are given for good ends not only to supply mens pressing necessities but to draw them to repentance Rom. 2.4 Therefore are they here called good things as also Job 2.9 Luke 16.25 though other things be comparatively far better Luke 10.41 42. 3. God may heap prosperity upon wicked men and may fill their houses with his good things that so he may give a large proof of his bounty and long suffering toward them who sin against so much mercy and that in his righteous judgement it may prove a snare whereby wicked men harden themselves in sleighting of him For he filled their houses with good things 4. All the favours that wicked men get are but temporary For they are only good things filling their houses in this life For they seek after no more and by this the godly are warned not to think too much of these things but to leave them to the wicked who have there Portion in this life Psal 17.14 5. The more kind God hath been mens sin in despising of him is the more hainous As here their impiety v. 17. is aggravated from this that he filled their houses with good things See Jer. 2.2 3 4 31. Mic. 6.3 4. 6. They may receive great heaps of temporal mercies who will be sadly plagued ere all be done As here these who thus prospered were overthrown with the floud 7. In all debates amongst godly men it is commendable to emulate who shall be most opposite to impiety As here he contends with Job about that which of them put the counsel of the wicked far from them 8. Men may pretend to be most against impiety and for godliness and may look upon others as hypocrites in that matter when yet it is nothing so but themselves have the worst cause For Eliphaz thinks he may better say The counsel of the wicked is far from him than Job might who as he judged said he hated the wicked when yet he continued in his wicked course and strengthned the hands of the wicked by his principles and discourses and yet Job was a godly man and maintained nothing but what was truth in that matter Vers 19. The righteous see it and are glad and the innocent laugh them to scorn 20. Whereas our substance is not cut down but the remnant of them the fire consumeth The sixt and last Argument and an Amplification of the former is taken from the estate of godly men contrary to what befals the wicked This is first propounded more generally v. 19. That the righteous shall have cause of joy and of deriding the wicked when they are afflicted 2. The ground of this their carriage is more particularly subjoyned v. 20. which is Gods different dealing with the wicked and them the one being preserved from ruine and the other consumed even to their very least remnants As the former Argument pointed chiefly at the time of the general deluge So this may point at the lot and practice of Noah who was preserved and had occasion to sing that Song v. 20. yet so as the godly may make use of it in all ages when they meet with such a dispensation And as Eliphaz and the rest did look upon Job as the instance of a wicked man consumed by God while themselves were preserved so it is like he repeats this Song even in reference to that As for the strength of this Argument it contains a truth of the preservation of some godly men at sometimes when the wicked were destroyed as we see in Noah Lot c. yet it is not so universally or frequently true as to contradict Job's Doctrine And as for this joy and laughing at the wicked it is not to be approved if it flow from the want of humanity or from a spirit of private revenge Job 31 29 30. Prov. 24.17 18. Yet it is lawful and right when it flows from love to the glory of God whose justice shines in these acts of vengeance See Psal 58.10 11. 107.42 Doct. 1. God when he pleaseth can make the plagues of wicked men remarkable For the righteous shall see it So also Psal 58.10 Men should make use of more secret and hid tryals blessing God that they are not made Beacons much more are they called to be fruitful when the world may see their calamities 2. As the prosperity of the wicked and especially their insolent profanity and cruelty when they prosper do sadden godly men so their calamities will revive and make them glad Fot this in particular is the cause of joy here The righteous shall see it or what befals such insolent profane men as have been above described and be glad As the godly may find matter of comfort in all their tribulations James 1.2 Rom.
the duty of men and especially of Saints to delight much in him his fellowship comforts and service which will compose their minds as to other things For it is propounded here as a thing to be pursued after to have delight in the Almighty See Psal 37.4 3. It is both the Touchstone and evidence of mens Conversion when they delight themselves in God and his favour in opposition to other things Psal 4.6 7. and are much in his company and it is their reward also that they are allowed to delight in God if they could follow it forth and improve it For it is here propounded as an encouragement For then shall thou have thy delight in the Almighty 4. It contributes to the heightening of our satisfaction in God that he is Almighty or Alsufficient as here he is designed Which imports that it is comfortable that the terrour of his Almighty power needs not affright us Jer. 17.17 and that his Infinite fulness and free communications thereof as the Alsufficient God may satisfie and refresh us and comfort us over all our sorrows 5. It is also the great and inriching advantage of godly men that they may look up to God in all extremities with humble confidence without blushing and running away from him as Adam did And that they may confidently make their addresses and pour out their hearts before him in all their distresses For thou shalt lift up thy face unto God See Job 33.26 Vers 27. Thou shalt make thy prayer unto him and he shall hear thee and thou shalt pay thy vows The Second Branch of this Encouragement is that he shall receive such a comfortable return of his Prayers as shall excite him to praise and pay his vows unto God Wherein Obs 1. Somewhat is here proposed and implyed of a converted mans duty that he prayeth and makes vows which he payeth when God hears him as it is in the end of the verse It teacheth 1. Conversion to God and delight in him will not take away nor hide a godly mans wants from him nor his need of Prayer For he insinuates that when Job is converted and delighting in the Almighty he will yet be praying So also the Disciples when they are abiding in Christ must yet be praying John 15.7 The nearer men draw to God their necessities and wants will be the more discovered to them The more they have of Communion with God and partake of the sweet fruits of his friendship they cannot but thirst after more and It pleaseth God to keep the issue of his peoples necessities still running that they may live in a constant course of dependence and communion with him and may abide still in him All which upon the one hand may give a check to these who pretend to Communion with God and yet are filled with a conceit of their own fulness See Rev. 3.17 And upon the other hand those who grow in the sense of their necessities and who the more earnestly they pursue find their necessities the more discovered have no cause therefore to suspect that they have no fellowship with God since such a condition is a sure evidence they have it 2. As a man reconciled to God will be kept in a lively sense of his wants so Prayer unto God is the course he follows for the supply of his wants and relief of his necessities Thou shalt make thy Prayer unto him saith he The Spirit of God which is given to a reconciled person is a Spirit of Supplications Zech 12.10 whereby he cries Abba Father Rom 8.15 Gal. 4.6 The reconciled man is not so much satisfied with the receipt of such a particular mercy as that he receives it out of the hand of God in answer to his Prayers And he is so discerning as to know that without employing of God no other mean how promising like soever can do him good and that however a wicked man may neglect God and yet prosper yet his expectations cannot but fail him if he presume to follow such a course This should put men to try their state and condition by the courses to which they betake themselves when their necessities press them 3. Saints engaged in Prayer will find oft-times a necessity of joyning vows therewith or to engage themselves with their own consent to their duty and to perform what is enjoyned by the Authority of God For paying of vows when Prayer is heard presupposeth the making of Vows in Prayer See Gen. 28.20 21 22. Now this joyning of Vows with Prayer imports 1. That such as pray aright have an high estimation of what they seek For the granting thereof of engages them to God with their own consent And it is no smal evidence of our sincerity in Prayer when we set a value upon what we seek and when delays in answering do heighten our estimation thereof and our affection in seeking of it 2. That right supplicants have also an high estimation of Gods favour evidenced in his answering of their Prayers that his love comes over their ill Deservings and his Power and Wisdom break thorow all difficulties and improbabilities to do them good This cannot but engage them to God Psal 116.1 2. c. 3. That they who seek God aright will also be sensible of much short coming and lasiness in ordinary which needs those new resolutions and vows to excite and engage them And when the Children of God come to be in any particular distress they will be put to look upon their ordinary negligence with sorrow 4. That Supplicants who know themselves well will also be sensible of their own inconstancy and how ready they are to shake off all these convictions and resolutions they have in a day of trouble unless they secure themselves by these engagements and vows Obs 2. The Promise concerning the success of the godly mans undertaking in Prayer is He shall hear thee It teacheth 1. That reconciled men do not pray for the fashion and sit down upon the work wrought but do need the Answer of their Prayers and will be put to look what account they get of them For so is supposed here that he needs a promise of Audience 2. A reconciled man making his Prayer to God for things agreeable to his Will will get an answer in Gods due time and way For thou shalt make thy Prayer unto him And he shall hear thee See Psal 50.15 Isa 45.19 Joh. 15.17 1. Joh. 5.14 Psal 65.2 And though it be the frequent exercise of godly men that God hears not their Prayers Yet for clearing of this it would be considered 1. When Answers of Prayers are withheld oft-times the Spirit of Prayer or liveliness in Prayer is wanting though the form and fashion of it be kept up and that it may be also with some ingredient of sincerity Men may lust and long but not pray Jam. 4.2 And if they pray as no doubt the Jews did during the time of their captivity yet that life in prayer which their
language to be spoken to him The sixth and last fault is That he considered not whose spirit came from him This may be understood of the Spirit that acted him that he considered not that it was not Gods Spirit but his own spirit and his blind zeal for Gods glory which he conceived was reflected upon by Job that prompted him to speak And it is indeed a fault incident even to Christs Disciples that they know not what manner of spirit they are of Luk. 9.55 And godly men may have many ignorant and fiery motions flowing from their own spirits which they think are from the Spirit of God And therefore men should seriously consider what spirit acts them as in their walking so especially in their doctrine For every doctrine hath a spirit accompanying it either the Lords or a lying spirit Joh. 4.1 And this spirit is not easily discerned without tryal for our passions may darken our minds and an evil spirit may be masked and disguised 2 Cor. 11.13 14. But the Original word rendered Spirit which properly signifieth the Soul or breath of life in man and other living creatures though by a metaphor it be sometime made use of to express Gods inspiration Chap. 32.8 and the cold air Chap. 37.10 leads me rather to understand it thus That his discourse contributed nothing to recover his swounding and dying spirit and to help it to breath again nor did it teach him how his spirit now shut up under perplexities might be recovered and set at liberty again From these two challenges Learn 1. Such as would publish the mind of God as they ought must not only consider the matter and what they speak but those of their charge also and to whom they speak that so they may apply the word aright and may give milk to babes strong meat to grown up men reproofs to some and consolations to others as their need requires For this was Bildad's fault that he considered not to whom he uttered words See 1 Cor. 9.19 22. 2 Tim. 2.15 Jude v. 22 23. This presupposeth that faithful Preachers should not content themselves with speaking general truths but they must make application thereof however it may be unpleasant when it toucheth the sore And for this end it is their duty to be men of prudence and to study the temper and condition of their charge well 2. It is an imprudent and unjust application of Doctrine to look upon godly men as graceless ignorants or to crush them because they are afflicted by God For in those Bildad erred in uttering these words to him Such harsh dealing as it may be but feeding the afflicteds own inward tentations so it will draw to a sad account and men may expect to pay dear for all the sad effects and consequences thereof 3. Afflictions and tryals may reach even to mens spirits and breath to cut them off and put them in peril of fainting and swounding For so is here supposed that his spirit or breath was to come again to him or to go out of some prison 4. Seasonable and sound Doctrine even in the mouths of weak men is able to reach and recover a swounding spirit For he implyeth that if Bildad had spoken right his spirit had gone out from him or his Doctrine would have recovered his fainting spirit as if the speech had brought it along with it from the speaker Thus faithful Ministers by their Doctrine do pluck up and plant Nations Jer. 1.10 and save souls 1 Tim. 4.16 5. Whatever men think yet unsound Doctrine will never refresh nor recover a soul or spirit For saith he of Bildad's Doctrine Whose spirit came from thee Verse 5. Dead things are formed from under the waters and the inhabitants thereof Followeth the second part of the Chapter wherein Job shews that he thinks highly of God His scope wherein is partly to shew that he is far from scorning what Bildad had spoken to the commendation of God when he rejects it as impertinent to the purpose and debate in hand Partly to shew that he is not wicked and ignorant of God nor will he deny and contradict that commendation of him uttered by Bildad but will outstrip him on that subject And therefore he concedes and amplifieth all his positions concerning the Majesty Dominion and universal Providence of God and produceth proofs and evidences thereof not only in the high places or in the light or visible things which Bildad had chiefly mentioned but in things both in Heaven and Earth Sea and dry Land and in things which we see not how they are formed and sheweth how his providence condescendeth even to the ordering of the drops of rain that by all these he may give proofs how much he observes God his dominion and providence as shining in all his works even from the highest to the lowest of his creatures In describing the greatness of Gods dominion and his universal providence he produceth nine evidences and effects thereof to v. 14. and then summs up all in a conclusion v. 14. The first evidence and effect in this Verse is by some understood of the general resurrection when the dead shall be raised out of the earth which is under the waters and the Sea shall renâ—er its dead Rev. 20.13 which were as the inhabitants thereof But it is clearer and safer to understand it thus That Gods providence reacheth even to the depths of the Sea to form not only the Fishes and quick monsters which inhabite there but even dead and lifeless things also such as Pearls and other precious and useful things which are found there Doct. 1. It is the duty of all and particularly of godly men to have reverend high and frequent thoughts of the providence and dominion of God Therefore Job gives proof that he is versed in that study as well as Bildad yea more than he 2. Godly men may be very much mistaken in things wherein they are very sound and right For Bildad speaks to Job as an ignorant in these things when yet he outstrips himself in the the knowledge of them 3. Gods dominion and providence should be not only studied and acknowledged in general but notice should be taken of the particular acts and effects thereof to cause that knowledge sink into our mind Therefore doth Job instruct his knowledge by particular instances 4. Much of the glory of God lyeth hid as under a vail from us who could not overtake or comprehend it all though we saw it Therefore Job instanceth the glory of Gods dominion and providence as shining in these things under the waters and formed there by him 5. As the glory of God shines much in all places so also in the depths and Seas as being in themselves a wonder and full of wonders the inhabitants thereof being demonstrations of his glory in their numbers variety of kinds greatness c. Therefore doth Job instance these things which are formed from under the waters and or with the inhabitants thereof
of Heaven See Jer. 9.12 with 12.4 And therefore wicked men should look upon themselves as great burdens and disturbers of the World 2. No creature is able to abide the anger and reproof of God As here he gives instance in the firmest even the Pillars of Heaven which tremble and are astonished at his reproof Ps 18.7 Hence 1. Much more cause have frail men to tremble before him Jer. 5.22 1 Cor. 10.22 2. This may encourage men to serve him who will thus reprove all the creatures for his peoples behoof Psal 18.6 7 16. and 114.5 6 7 8. Hab. 3.8 9 3. His mercy shines in that he doth not overturn the fabrick of the World as he might do in his anger when he is provoked by our sins Doct. 3. When Gods anger is apprehended without any sight of mercy it will never produce any saving effect As here his reproof produceth trembling accompanied only with astonishment Verse 12. He divideth the Sea with his power and by his understanding he smiteth thorow the proud The eighth evidence and effect of Gods Dominion is That by his power and understanding he divides the Sea and strikes through the proud The word Rahab here rendered the proud or pride is a name sometime given to Egypt Psal 87.4 and 89.10 Is 51.9 And this name is either given to all Egypt because they were a proud and potent Nation Is 30.2 3. Ezek. 30.6 Or to the lower part of Egypt only the upper part of it being called Pathros Jer. 44.1 where the River Nilus divides it self into many Channels and then the name signifieth either that that was the strongest part of the Country which made the Inhabitants thereof more proud than the rest Or the name Rahab is only an Hebrew pronunciation of the name Rib or Riph which signifieth a Pear and which the Egyptians and Arabians gave it because it resembled a Pear in its form and situation as the Grecians called it Delta because it resembled that Letter in the Greek Alphabet being of the form of a Pyramid Or the Hebrew name may also be given it from its shape because from its narrow top it dilated and enlarged it self as the word Rahab signifieth into a broad bottom as doth a Pear and the Letter Delta If thus we understand it of Egypt the words might be very fitly applyed to what God did to the Egyptians when he divided the Red Sea Exod. 14. if it were clear that Job lived after that time But it being more likely that he lived before that time the whole Verse may more safely be understood of the proud and boysterous Sea it self which God sometimes divides into waves and ridges in tempests and scattereth some of it into the air and sometime again calms those proud waves or exaltings as the word will read and makes them still like a man stricken through and slain Whence Learn 1. The most outragious unruly and restless of all the creatures are in Gods Hand to raise storms and give calms as he pleaseth For so are we here taught See Psal 107.25 2â— Jon. 1.4 15. Matth. 8.23 27. This should invite us to employ him in hopeless conditions and impassable difficulties Is 50.10 remembring that it is he who raiseth and calmeth stormes Job 34.29 and who can come walking on the Sea to his people in greatest tempests Joh. 6.19 2. The pride of creatures will not make void Gods dominion over them For he strikes through the proud Sea It is Gods Prerogative to take such to task and to calm them when he will were it even when they are at the height of their pride Job 40.11 Exod. 18.11 3. In every work of God we are to adore not only his power but his wisdome also For both power and understanding are implyed here And therefore when we expect proofs of his power or love we must submit to let his wisdome carve them out for us And we must believe that there is infinite wisdome in every act of his Soveraign dominion wherein he will give us no account of his matters and that even in the most common act of Providence such as this here his wisdome is the orderer of all as his mercy also shines in these common acts Psal 136.7 8 9 25. and he knoweth what he is doing though we cannot see nor comprehend it Verse 13. By his Spirit he hath garnished the Heavens his hand hath formed the crooked Serpent The ninth and last evidence and effect of Gods Dominion here mentioned is That he garnisheth the visible Heavens by his Spirit or skill or it may be understood of the Holy Ghost who from the Father and the Son was a worker in the creation of the World Gen. 1.2 adorning them with lights and variety of Constellations and that his hand also formed the crooked Serpent Which as it is to be understood of Satan in Hell So it might well be understood of the Circles and Orbes in the Heavens or rather that Constellation called the Dragon if it were certain that as they were Astronomers in those dayes so also that all the names of Constellations now in use were then invented But that being uncertainâ— and seeing the forming of all these Constellations may be comprehended under his garnishing of the Heavens nor can any reason be given why he should particularly mention that Constellation rather than any other it is more clear to understand the words of some monstrous Serpents in the Sea or on the Earth See Is 27.1 And by the conjunction of these two instances in the close of this Narration he sheweth that there are none of Gods works from the high Heavens even to the low Earth or deep Sea which do not evidence his glory and dominion Doct. 1. We are to adore the Holy Spirit 's concurrent operation with the Father and the Son in the work of Creation For here God acted â—n it by his Spirit See Gen. 1.2 Psal 104.30 This we should study that he may ascribe unto him the glory of his Godhead equal and the same with the Father and the Son and may in that mirrour read his fulness to communicate to empty sinners in his operations of grace and his sufficiency to cherish what he communicates and to adorn their souls with it â—â— as here he garnished the Heavens 2. The visible Heavens in their beauty and light are demonstrations of the glory of God For this is an instance of it that by his Spirit he garnished the Heavens See Psal 19.1 This is a brâ—ad Book for Ignorants a check to the carnal minded and a conviction of Atheists And from this also we may learn How much more glorious and beautifull the third Heavens or celestial habitations are these visible Heavens being but the outside of that stately Palace There will be no need of a Sun there but God will be all in all Yea there it will be eminently true whatever accomplishment it have in time which is foretold of the Moons being confounded and the
before Elihu interpose may point out 1. A mans integrity is a very grave and weighty business wherein he is not a little concerned For Job judgeth it so weighty that he may very lawfully take an oath about it 2. A man should guard not only that he really be not but that he seem not to be vain-glorious Therefore Job speaks all upon oath when he speaks to his own commendation to avoid that imputation 3. Men in matters of controversie betwixt them and others ought to speak seriously and not out of spleen or passion Therefore also he takes an oath in this matter to shew that he will speak truth exactly and will not condemn them and their opinions in passion 4. Men had need to be fixed in tryals against all tentations and assaults Therefore doth Job by this oath fix himself against all tentations which might assault him to cause him quit his integrity 5. As men upon oath ought to keep themselves within the bounds of truth as here is insinuated and some Heathen States appointed no punishment for Perjury as supposing none durst hazard upon that sin and sad will be the account of them who swear falsely So an oath should put an end to controversies Therefore doth Job take an oath to put an end to this debate See Heb. 6.16 Doct. 4. His swearing As God liveth doth teach That God liveth most certainly and to live is proper to him in a peculiar way And this as it sheweth that he liveth for â—ver to avenge perjury So further 1. It distinguisheth him from all dead Idols whom men serve 1 Thess 1.9 Jer. 10.8 9 10. 2. It sheweth that all hold their lives of him and therefore should employ them for him 3. It may encourage dead souls to go to him who is the fountain of life and may comfort godly men in all their troubles Ps 18.46 4. It calls for living service Rom. 12.1 Heb. 9.13 14. Secondly in this Verse also unto his oath he subjoyns a description of God by whom he sweareth where he describes him from what he had done to him that he had taken away his judgement and vexed his soul or made his soul bitter as it is in the Original By which we are not so much to understand that God had taken away his sweet way of walking with him imported in his judgement or composed and well ordered frame of spirit and in stead thereof had filled him with bitterness which is a sad change and matter of sad complaint Lam. 3.9 11 15. Job 9.18 As that God had not righted him in his quarrel by judging his cause and delivering him from misconstructions nor had he eventually cleared his integrity by removing the rods that were upon him But by all those calamities misconstructions and other tentations had vexed his spirit and made him bitter of soul This is an expression which is challenged as irreverent and passionate Chap. 34 5. yet not as proving him to be wicked Doct. 1. The best of Saints get not readily through their tryals without some discoveries of weakness which may humble them as here Job's experience may teach who stumbles often by the way though the close of all was sweet So was it also with David Psal 31.22 and 73.1 2 c. and 116.11 12. This teacheth That any good we have received should not hide our miscarriages in managing thereof That we should resolve so to get through tryals as we shall have no ground of gloriation Psal 73.1 with 2. That our corruption defiles our best things as it did Job's necessary defence of his Integrity That humility must be very needful that in all conditions God keeps us so at the study of it and inculcates it upon us from the consideration of our failings and That such as do fail in an hour of tryal may yet get a good issue of all though God humble them by the way as it befel Job 2. Mistakes and hard thoughts of God and of his dealing are the ordinary failings of godly men in affliction For in those Job failed here We should guard especially against that evil in a day of tryal neither carping at his dispensations Psal 22.1 2. with 3. Neh. 9.33 nor looking upon his service as unprofitable Mal. 3.14 15. Psal 73.13 with 28. For right constructions of God will keep our souls in life and cherish hope and love in hardest lots whereas contrary apprehensions breed alienation Zech. 11.8 And for attaining right thoughts of God and his dealing We ought to study his absolute Soveraignty to which we ought to submit in every thing without any debate or contradiction We ought to mind much our guilt and ill deservings which will justifie God in all he doth Psal 51.4 with Rom. 3.4 Lam. 1.18 We ought to judge of his dealing not by our humour or according as it is pleasant to our sense but by its profitableness though it be bitter and we ought to be sensible of our own blindness that cannot discern the depth of wisdom which ordereth our lots whence it cometh to pass that oft-times we forsake our own mercies and quarrel these lots whereby God communicates greatest advantages to us 3. It may please the Lord to suffer the righteousness and integrity of his children to be over-clouded for a time that so both themselves and others also may be tryed For so Job's Judgement or the righteous decision of his cause and the matter of his integrity was with-held for a time and he lay under sad imputations This tryal is supposed in that promise Psal 37.6 and is expressed in that lot of Paul 2 Tim. 2.9 And it should warn others to beware of putting others to that tryal by rash censures especially of the afflicted So godly men should arm themselves against such a tryal which may be the more easily born so long as the truth of their good condition is cleared by the word of God and it may be even in the consciences of these who are most ready to traduce them 4. As God is the orderer of this tryal so it is not for want of power but for other wise reasons that he suffers his children to lye under such a cloud in the matter of their integrity For Job acknowledgeth that he is the strong God as his name in the beginning of the Verse imports and the Almighty though he leave him under this tryal As sin obstructs proofs of Gods power for the good of wicked men Isa 59.1 2. So it is good for Saints to see themselves in Gods hand in this tryal that so they may adore his wisdom in the continuing of it when he could easily remove it And if they were walking tenderly and shunning guilt Is 59.1 2. and were studying his power and love they might have sweet exercise about the saddest of their lots and a comfortable look of them 5. Albeit in many cases godly men are fortified to bear reproaches and misconstructions yet if they be hard put to it and be not
For so Job can onely now say it was thus and thus with him Which may warn all what they ought to be preparing for Verse 21. Vnto me men gave ear and waited and kept silence at my counsell 22. After my words they spake not again and my speech dropped upon them 23. And they waited for me as for the rain and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain Job proceedeth more particularly to instance the greatness of this his glory and power And First in these Verses he instanceth it in the great opinion all had of his wisedom so that they waited for his counsell and gave silent attention when he spake v. 21. And when he had spoken they acquiesced in his opinion as good and profitable v. 22. And finding it so profitable as rain is to the dry ground they greedily waited for more of it v. 23. Doct. 1. As it is a great mercy to be sharp-sighted in affairs and able to give advice and counsell unto others So Magistrates ought in a special manner to be endowed with abilities that they may direct and advise the people committed to their charge For Job was a man able to give counsell It is an evidence of Gods love to a people when he gives them such Rulers 2 Chr. 2.11 And it is an evidence of his displeasure and a fore-runner of many miseries when it is otherwise See Prov. 11.14 Eccl. 10.16 17. Is 3 4. 2. It is the duty of men especially of these whom God hath placed in a publick station to communicate unto others the gifts and talents which are bestowed upon them For so did Job here Men will finde that it is no thrift to be selfish and lay up their abilities as in a napkin 3. Good and faithfull counsell and advice is so precious and great an advantage that right discerners will prize it For they counted it no lost time to give ear and wait and keep silence at his counsell Whereby they witnessed that they were free of that carelesness whereby men do proclaim their contempt of precious truths and instructions and of these who impart the same 4. As it is commendable in men to keep silence in many cases Jam. 1.19 Prov. 10.19 especially when men better and wiser than themselves are speaking So much more is it commendable when men do not contradict truth and sound counsels merely out of an humor of contradiction and that they may decry others For their silence and that after his words they spake not again was their commendation in that hereby they witnessed their own prudence their respect and high esteem of Job and that they were not ambitious to contradict all advices how sound soever whereof themselves were not the most eminent authors 5. Good counsel and every precious instruction is refreshfull to discerning hearers as the rain is to the dry ground For saith he my speech dropped upon them Much more should we try whether Divine instruction in matters which concern our eternal happiness be so esteemed by us See Deut. 32.2 6. Such as have experimentally found the good of Instruction will finde their desire and appetite increased after more of it For since his speech dropped upon them They waited for him as for the rain and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain See 1 Pet. 2.2 3. 7. Not onely mens estimation among others but even their eminent parts and usefulness bottoming that estimation are not a sure enough foundation upon which they may build For all these failed Job in the matter of his confidence and expectation v. 18. Yea it is a wonder if such a tide do not turn upon men for their tryal Verse 24. If I laughed on them they believed it not and the light of my countenance they cast not down Next in this Verse Job instanceth the greatness of this his glory and honour in the great distance that others kept at with him even in his relaxations of minde and his condescending affability They did so reverence him that when at any time he gave a relaxation to his Spirit and seasoned his gravity with some chearfulness They not onely were so glad to see him merry that they scarce believed it was so but they could scarce believe but he was still serious and were sure that his mirth proceeded from no levity of Spirit So that although he condescended sometime to be familiar and merry among them yet they had not the confidence to grow familiar with him as with an Equal nor did they so encroach upon him as might give him cause to think that his familiarity had rendered him contemptible and so make him blush and be ashamed that he had condescended to it Doct. 1. It is lawfull even for godly and grave men and men of authority sometime to be chearful and give a relaxation to their own Spirits from their serious and weighty affairs For Job sometime laughed upon them or was cheerfull and affable in his carriage laying aside austerity There is a faculty of laughing given to men which certainly is given for use at least at sometimes and diversions are sometime needfull for men who are serious and employed in weighty affairs It is true we read not that Christ who bare our sins and sorrows did ever laugh though sometime he rejoyced in Spirit that so he might fill his peoples mouths with laughter and we finde laughter condemned Luke 6.25 And some sort of it declared to be madness Eccl. 2.2 Namely When we think to cure all our evils and dispel all our sorrows by carnal mirth and to finde an happiness in it Eccl. 2.1 2. When our laughter is untimous and unseasonable For there is a time to weep as well as to laugh Eccl. 3.4 When we please our selves with laughter while the consciences gnawing within as not being purified by the blood of sprinkling Pro. 14.13 And when our laughter proceeds from carnal levity and sensuality Amos 6.4 5 6. from prophane Atheism 2 Chr. 30.10 or from unbelief Gen. 18.12 13. Yet laughter is lawful in the expression of joy and thankfulness for mercies received Gen. 21.6 Ps 126.1 2. In expressing holy confidence Job 5.22 and in lawful recreation as here And particularly Laughter is sometime lawful for Magistrates and others in publick charge not only that they may recreate themselves but that thereby and by the like insinuating carriage they may gain the affection of the people So that it is not to be accounted Religion and Piety for men to become Stoicks for Religion doth teach no such thing Nor need men to scarre at Religion for fear of that Seeing Religion warrants and allows unto men all lawful liberty in these things and furnisheth them with surer grounds of chearfulness than they can find any where else 2. Godly and grave men will be very sparing and moderate in the use of mirth and recreation For Job insinuates that it was his ordinary to be grave and that he was so sparing in
up against him as a prank that would be committed by none but those who were young either in years or in their dispositions and humours 4. When God exposeth a man to trouble very weak Instruments will be able to prevail against him For even the youth rose upon the right hand 5. It is a piece of tryal to a great Spirit to be trod upon by his inferiours As here it was to Job that the youth should rise upon the right hand as better than he and able to prevail against him 6. Insolency and cruelty will pursue men even when they are in a low condition with new indignities and troubles For to push away his feet now when he was afflicted was a great indignity and an evidence of their insolency and cruelty whatever way we understand it 7. It aggravates mens cruelty and violence yet more that they goe about it deliberately and with resolution As here they made as it were a formal siege about Job and raise up against him the wayes of their destruction as resolving to ruine him 8. When Gods people are near-by spoyled and deprived of all they have and are thereby made objects of compassion they may yet resolve to have more tryals so long as any thing is left For so they pursued him with destruction upon the remainders of his estate as hath been explained From v. 13. Learn 1. When God is trying his people and while it is his pleasure that the tryal continue they may expect that all their endeavours to redress and relieve themselves will be in vain For they marred his path and shut him up that he could find no out-gate or means to be free of their violence 2. Disturbance of spirit by irritations provoking to impatience under trouble brings a great loss to the afflicted For thus also they marred his path and he resents it as a great prejudice 3. Crosses upon the back of crosses and cruel usage of the afflicted especially by unworthy persons will readily disturb these who otherwise are very calm For this marred his path and discomposed his spirit that the youth should so violently pursue him with new injuries who had already suffered so much 4. It is great cruelty in the sight of God to be obstructers of the comfort or ease of afflicted godly men For Job complains of it as a great cruelty that they marred his path 5. It is yet greater cruelty to help forward and add unto the calamities of godly men in affliction For he complains that they set forward his calamity It is a great sin to add to the affliction of the afflicted were it but by an insolent and untendâ—r look Ps 22.17 Obad. v. 12. or an insolent word Ps 69.26 But much more to add thereto by cruel deeds Is 47.6 Zech. 1.15 God will reckon with such not only for what they actually inflict themselves but for all the wounds which they cause bleed afresh by their super-added cruelties And it being the usual lot of Gods people to be exercised with such cruelty it may invite them who find any sympathizers in their troubles to esteem of it as a singular mercy 6. When God hides himself and leaves godly men to be tryed Instruments will be very eager and weak Instruments will need but little help to carrry on their tryal For though these were but the youth yet they have no helper in doing all this From v. 14. Learn 1. Wicked men are kept from doing evil by no inward principle but only by some external restraints For they are like waters that must be hemmed in by banks otherwise they will overflow the Country or like Souldiers that are only kept from entring a besieged place till a breach be made 2. God in his holy providence doth sometime minister opportunities to wicked men to discover themselves and bring forth these dispositions which at other times are restrained in them For now a desolation makes a breach upon Job and then they discover their cruelty 3. Gods people may find tryals very sad both in respect of the measure thereof and of their own crushed spirits which are not able to bear much For they came upon him as a wide breâ—king in of waters or at a wide breach numerously unanimously and with impetuous violence And they rolled themselves upon him when he is already desolate or made him feel their weight that they might overwhelm hâ—m both by calumnies and unjust censures of his former carriage and administrations and by violent oppression under pretext of seeking reparation It is not to be thought strange albeit much trouble and little inherent strength tryst together 4. God takes notice and will reckon with cruel persons both for the measure of their violence for their timeing of it and for the affliction it brings to godly men who are already crushed All these are imported in this complaint as aggravations of their cruelty to be noticed by God that they came upon him as at a great breach that they timed it in the desolation and that they rolled themselves upon him and overwhelmed him Verse 15. Terrours are turned upon me they pursue my soul as the wind and my welfare passeth away as a cloud 16. And now my soul is poured out upon me the dayes of affliction have taken hold upon me In these Verses we have the third Head or Branch of Jobs present miseries Namely the Soul-terrours or affrighting fears which pressed him This he propounds v. 15. That terrours are turned upon him or have taken hold of him after his peaceable frame of spirit and do frequently recurr to vex his Soul The sadness of which condition is amplyfied from a four-fold effect of these terrours 1. That they did impetuously drive and tosse his soul as an impetuous wind driveth chaff or stubble or a â—eeling cloud as it is afterward before it 2. That his welfare or his strength health and prosperity is gone not only so swiftly as a cloud is driven before the wind but so totally as a cloud is scattered by an impetuous wind so that there is no more hope of recovering it than there is of fixing a reeling cloud or of getting rain out of a scattered cloud 3. That hereby the remainder of his strength is so melted and exhausted and his soul the fountain of life and courage is so emptied of its strength that there is nothing left to support him but it is rather become a burden and himself ready to succumb and faint 4. That his afflictions and his thoughts of these evils do so gripe and hold him fast that he knows not whither to turn him From. v. 15. Learn 1. The dear children of God and even these who have a good conscience and assurance of reconciliation may yet in a day of trouble be assaulted with many terrours or affrighting fears about Gods dispensations towards them and the issue of them For Job who never quit his integrity hath terrours It is true Terrours are threatned to come upon the
touched and affected with his disease had no intermission of pain so as he could get no rest The words in me are in the Original from above me and so some read the Text thus He pierceth as the verb is singular my bones from above me that is God pierceth them by these diseases which he sends from above or so pieâ—ceth them as if he would pull them away from above or from out of his body All comes to one purpose that he had great pain inflicted by God as if his bones were broken and pierced and pulled out of his flesh 2. He points out the loathsomness of his disease v. 18. The Original in the beginning of the Verse hath onely thus By great force is my garment changed Whether we supply it thus as in the Translation By the great force of my disease or as others By the great force of God all comes to one purpose For God employed his force here by inflicting the disease which had so forcible effects And the meaning of the Verse is That the violence and loathsomness of his sickness was such as the ulcerous matter which ran out of his boyles and sores did foule and alter the garments which sometime had been an ornament and badge of his Dignity Yea the filthy matter drying upon his garments and making them staffe or before it dryed causing his garments cleave and stick to his skin did binde and straiten his body like the strait collar or neck of his coat where he alludes to their custome who had long garments open only at the neck and foot Which being strait above where they put it over their head could not but be very troublesome especially to these who had any bodily pain 3. He amplifieth this loathsomness of his disease v. 19. from the consideration of the hand of God in it and from the effects thereof Shewing that God had hereby cast him into the mire namely of this filthy matter running out of his sores and so had laid him low as if he had cast him upon the ground in a mire And That he was become like dust and ashes that is his dried scabs and filthy matter upon his body made him resemble a lump of dust and ashes And withall his wallowing in the dust in his trouble and his humbling of himself before God in dust and ashes as Chap. 42.6 made his contract more filthy upon his body Though it may also be understood figuratively that he was become base and vile in his own eyes remembering his base Original and that he was but dust and ashes as Gen. 18.27 All these may be joyned in one For it is not to be doubted but when godly Job considered his own filthy and loathsome body he was thereby led to minde his baseness From v. 17. Learn 1. Bodily pain and sicknesse is a very sharp tryal especially when it is joyned with other troubles upon a mans minde name and estate For here after he hath spoken of the contempt oppression and terrours under which he suffered it makes a new Branch of his Complaint that his bones are pierced in him and his sinewes take no rest Thus did Satan reckon that affliction upon Jobs body would try him to purpose chap. 2.4 5. See also chap. 33.19 So that we are to prize it as a great mercy if we have healthfull Bodies we ought to beware that we abuse not health and strength we ought to reckon that our tryals are not compleat so long as we want that tryal of pained and sick Bodies and we ought to pity these who are exercised with it 2. It may please the Lord to exercise his own dear Children whose Bodies will be eternally glorious with much bodily pain even amidst their other tryals As here befell Job This the Lord is pleased to do to his Children not onely that he may chasten some of them for their sin and folly Ps 6.2 and 32.3 But that hereby he may compleat their tryal and take proof of what is in them that he may give proof how much tryal he can support them under that he may let them see how much affliction may be consistent with his love to the afflicted that by the lot of some he may warn all to prepare for what may befall them being thankfull if their tryals come not to that height and extremity and that he may teach all that they ought not to judge what will be the condition of Saints in glory by what sometimes they are in this world 3. Nights rest is a sweet mercy which sometime God may with-hold from his Children For Job's bones were pierced in the night season See also chap. 7.3 4. and 17.12 Ps 77.4 As Saints who are at peace with God ought to observe it as a mercy if they get but nights rest amidst their other tryals and if God with-hold it they ought to reckon that God denyeth them that ordinary case and lenitive to the end their support and help may be seen to come intirely from himself So further Others and even Saints in their miscarriages may read divers things in this tryal of wanting rest As 1. That it is a check for their too much rest and quietness little regarding how matters go in the world which is ordinarily the disposition and practice of the most guilty persons as we finde guilty Jonah was fast asleep in the tempest when the Mariners are awake Joâ— 1.5 6. 2. That it is a check for their little disquietting of themselves with seeking of God but either neglecting it altogether or taking an easie way of it Whereas David used to be at it at midnight Psal 119.62 3. That it is a fruit of their sinfull disquietting of themselves about the world which oft times takes from them the nights rest See Ps 39.6 Eccl. 5.12 4. That it is a fruit of their attempting to disquiet God with their provocations See Is 1.24 and 43.24 Am. 2.13 5. That it is a fruit of their disquieting of themselves sinfully and excessively under trouble without endeavouring to encourage and compose their own spirits as 1 Sam. 30.6 Ps 42.5 11. From v. 18. Learn 1. Albeit the Lord be pleased to put beauty upon our bodies yet they are but composed of very loathsome and vile matter as he can easily discover by a touch of sickness For so doth here appear in Jobs ulcerous and loathsome Body which defiled his Garments See Proverbs 31.30 2. Saints whose dust will one day be raised in glory and incorruption may yet be very ugly and loathsome in this world As here Job was as also Lazarus the beggar Luke 16.20 3. Albeit it be little matter what be the condition of mens Bodies so the Soul be adorned with grace Yet it is an humbling tryal in its own kinde to have a loathsom Body Therefore Job here complains of it how the ulcers of his Body defiled his Garments and made them so stiffe that they hurt him And when God makes this the tryal of
any it is a Call to them to be humbled 4. Albeit men do ordinarily glory too much in their apparel yet as it is appointed to cover our shamefull nakedness So God may humble even his own Children with the scarcity thereof in time of need and by its being a witness to declare what Bodies it covereth For so Jobs garments proclaimed how vile a Body he had and his complaint that they hurt him doth seem to import that he had not variety of them wherewith to shift himself but was forced to wear the rayment he had even when it became stiffe and hard to his no small trouble and pain From v. 19. Learn 1. It is good to have constant thoughts of God's hand in all we meet with that we do not mistake and miscarry and of his design and purpose therein that we be not surcharged with groundless fears therefore doth Job over again after what he hath marked v. 11. observe that God did all this He hath call me c. and that he did it to humble him and make him know what he was 2. Gods end in humbling tryals is to cause men know their Original which is a needfull lesson to all especially to dignified Saints Gen. 18.27 So here God cast him into the mâ—re that he might know he was dust and ashes being so like it by reason of his trouble 3. It may assoile God from all challenges for afflicting of men that he layeth them no lower by trouble than they are indeed in their Original For Job becomes but like dust and ashes by this affliction the very thing which he is by his original constitution and which he will be at last when dust returns to dust Gen. 3.19 Eccl. 12.7 4. It is a very sweet and comfortable improvement of trouble when as God humbleth men thereby so they are humbled and diligent in learning that lesson For Job takes with the instruction and became like dust and ashes the thing which his present condition spake him to be 5. It is not little that will abase man and make him know himself but God must let him wallow in trouble that he may learn that lesson For he is cast into the mire and left to wallow there that he may become like dust and ashes Verse 20. I cry unto thee and thou dost not hear me I stand up and thou regardest me not The last Head or Branch of Jobs present miseries is his sense of Gods anger and heavy hand in all his calamities Of this he gives three Evidences to the end of the Chapter in recounting whereof he speaks sometime to God and sometime of him The first Evidence of Gods anger in his calamities in this Verse is the ill success of his prayers and that when he prayed he was not heard and when he insisted he was not the better but rather the worse handled For clearing of the words it is to to be considered That the negative particle Not is not expressed in the Original in the end of the Verse where it is only Thou regardest me or lookest upon me But though it be not expressed yet it is to be repeated from the former part of the Verse as is usual in this Language Compare Deut. 33.6 Ps 9.18 1 Sam. 2.3 Pro. 25.27 Isai 38.18 and other places where this particle must be repeated to make up the sense Others do read the words without the particle and that variously Some thus Thou lookest upon me and dost no more but art only a spectatour of my miseries but that reading doth not express the Emphasis of the Original word Some read them by way of Interrogation which must be resolved negatively thus Dost thou regard me Or Express any pity and compassion to me Surely none at all And some read them thus Thou markest me Or singlest me out to punish me yet more as is subjoyned v. 21. All these readings are to one purpose and do shew that when he persevered in prayer he was not noticed but instead of a comfortable answer his afflictions were continued and increased Doct. 1. Albeit in many respects it be sweet to Saints that they have to do with God in trouble yet sometimes through their weakness it wants not its own bitternesses that it is so For here Jobs having to do with God resolves in a complaint when he reflects upon his success 2. Whatever complaints our sense suggest to us of God yet it is our best not to run away from God but to goe to him and lay them out before himself For Job here tells God the bitterest of his resentments so also v. 21 22 23. It is a good errand to goe to God and tell him our tentations for that is a complaint of them and it is Child-like and an evidence that tentations have not quite overthrown us when we take that course with them 3. It is the blessed advantage of godly men that as their lowest condition doth not hinder them to pray so their trouble leads them to leave themselves upon God to see the need of prayer and of fervency in it if they will practice accordingly For saith he I cry unto thee as knowing that he was warranted to pray notwithstanding his deep distress and being careful to improve that liberty in fervent prayer and crying See Ps 50.15 4. Saints in trouble will not get resting on the work of prayer unless their prayers be heard also For so is here imported that he was put to look if God did here his cry See Ps 5.3 Yea it is the saddest of Saints afflictions under trouble if their prayers be not heard considering both their pressing need and that it seems to speak God angry when he doth not hear as will be after marked 5. Although it may seem strange to Saints not to be presently heard in trouble considering Gods promises Ps 50.15 and 55.17 Luk. 18.7 8. Yet God in his deep wisdome may seem not to answer or really delay to answer the cryes of his needy people For I cry unto thee and thou dost not hear me In the Original it is Thou dost not answer me For Job doubted not but he heard him though he did not evidence so much by granting his request But notwithstanding all his cryes let his Friends his Oppressours and Scorners of him deal as they pleased with him See Ps 22.1 and 69.3 Lam. 3.8 44. Of this see more on Chap. 22.27 Only when we get not satisfactory answers to our prayers in being delivered from our pressures let us labour to get it made up in quietness of spirit 1 Sam. 1.18 in strength and support to bear our pressures 1 Cor. 10.13 Ps 138.3 and the want of a deliverance from them 2 Cor. 12.8 9. in grace to make use of the delay and to reap good fruits of it such as quickening yet more to prayer humbling of us purging of our dross meekness under such a lot sense of our ill deservings c. which are better than many answers and
righteous and godly men Ps 34.21 3. Wicked men and particularly such as do oppose godly men may expect to be surprized with destruction and that they shall not be able to shift or avoid it when it cometh For this destruction and evil finds him when he little dreams of it 1 Thes 5.3 and finds him out in all his hiding places whether he thinks to flee for refuge See Num. 32.23 To be thus surprized with trouble is a sad addition to it and however wicked men seem confident enough before trouble come yet all refuge will fail them when it seizeth upon them Is 10 3. 4. Albeit the Pharisees thought that men might lawfully hate their enemies Mat. 5.43 And albeit some do look upon that injunction to love our enemies c. Mat. 5.44 as a Counsel only and not a Command Yet even in Jobs dayes a vindictive Spirit or to thirst after private revenge was looked upon as a sinful transgression of the Law of God For therefore doth Job purge himself of it as such in this and the following Verse where he sheweth That whatever the Lord was pleased to inflict upon his enemies yet he was not malicious nor revengeful against them See 1 Sam. 24.12 13. We find Christ and his followers very exact in this Luk. 23.34 Acts 7.60 And when the Disciples gave evidence of such a malicious frame of spirit they are very severely rebuked by Christ Luk. 9.54 55 56. Men might see the evil of such a disposition if they considered That thereby they encroach upon Gods Prerogative to take vengeance Rom. 12.19 and do take their cause out of his hand who can give them a better account of it than they can make to themselves Pro. 20.22 That they obstruct their own success with God in prayer by it Mat. 6.14 15. That they evidence they will be but cold in Gods matters while they are so hot in resenting injuries done to themselves and That they declare that they little consider Gods hand in their trouble and are little careful to improve it while they are so much taken up with thoughts about the instruments employed in it See 2 Sam. 16 1â— 11. 5. Not only to seek or procure the ruine of our particular enemies but even to rejoyce and insult when God brings them down is an evidence of maliciousness and of a vindictive Spirit For Job would not rejoyce at the destruction of him that hated him nor lift up himself or express his inward joy by any insulting speech or carriage when evil found him It is true godly men may rejoyce at the ruine of the publick obstinate and incorrigible enemies of God and his people Ps 52.5 6 7. and 58.10 Not at their destruction simply but because God is glorified in his justice and the Church of God fares the better that they are destroyed Yet it is unlawfull and an act of revenge to rejoyce at the destruction of mens private particular enemies Pro 24.17 18. Obad. v. 10 11 12 13. Withall it is to be considered that Job by asserting only that he did not rejoyce nor lift up himself doth not deny that he had these other evidences of a Spirit that is not vindictive which God requireth in his Word Such as mourning for enemies in their distresses as David mourned for Saul 2 Sam. 1.17 c. See also Ps 35.13 14. which may be comprehended under his not rejoycing and relieving of them when they are in misery and distress Rom. 12.20 Exod. 23.4 5. But he mentions this especially to shew that men are apt to fall in that evil of rejoycing upon such an occasion Mic. 7.8 Even albeit they should palliate it with some specious practices which might seem to speak the contrary and to shew that he made conscience of ordering his passions and affections as well as his external conversation From Verse 30. Learn 1. It is not enough that men pretend to sobriety and moderation when their tryal is over unless also they be sober when the tryal is incumbent and pressing For as Job did not rejoyce when evil found his enemy v. 29. So he did not wish him evil before it came Both of these are times wherein mens sobriety and meekness is tried 2 It is an evidence of maliciousness and an act of revenge for men to curse or wish the ruine of their particular enemies whom they ought to bless and to do them good and pray for them Mat. 5.44 Rom. 12.14 For Job durst not wish a curse to his soul or person or he durst not desire his soul or his life to be taken away by a curse or imprecation Whatever he thought such deserved yet he durst not use curses and imprecations as desiring them to be cut off We finde indeed many imprecations of godly men in Scripture But these are directed against the wicked courses of publike incorrigible enemies and flow from a prophetike spirit and so are prediction rather than prayers and consequently are not to be imitated by men in reference to their private enemies 3. As these who curse and wish evil to their enemies do sin against God as here Job intimates So the consideration of the sinfulness of a course is the most cleanly motive to disswade men from it For this was an argument which prevailed with Iob He would not sin by wishing a curse to his soul If men make not conscience of sin as sin abstracting from their interests or the consâ—quents that may follow upon it they will not be sufficiently armed against every evil course 4. Godly men want not corruptions pressing them to sinfull courses and particularly to maliciousness In which case it is their duty to resist their own inclinations and suppress them For Job would not suffer or give up his mouth to sin which is contrary to the practice of many who instead of wrestling or resisting what they might through grace avoid do suffer every tentation to carry them away Do tempt tentations by rushing upon snares do give themselves to evil Ps 50.19 Yea and fell themselves to work wickedness 1 King 21.20 5. Whatever boylings of corruption there be within Yet it is good if it be kept from breaking forth And particularly it is a great mercy if passion be not let loose to break forth in bitter and malicious speeches For Job did not suffer his mouth to sin in this whatever stirring of passion were within See Ps 39 1. 141.3 Not that men should approve themselves in any sinfull frame of heart so long as it breaks not forth in practice But that having mourned for and wrestled against that which they finde within them if they cannot get it totally subdued their care should be that it break not out publickly to the dishonour of God and the scandal of others And particularly men should take heed to their mouth or tongue Jam 1.26 3.2 c. as being the instrument of much evil in idle discourses Mat. 12.36 unseasoned and unsavoury language Coll.
blood which makes young men rash and precipitant and their zeal to out-strip their knowledge and light their youthful lusts want of experience c. will easily perceive that youth is not easie to manage aright Whereas to men of age many of these snares are broken Time and experience will let them see many things to be but folly and vanity which youth will not believe that they are such Those strong passions which do oft times master and over-power even true grace in younger persons may be more subdued and cooled in them c. This may let us see that it is a great mercy to be helped well through a time of youth and to be kept from the snares of it and the sad effects of these disadvantages which attend it 2. One great advantage of age above youth is in the matter of wisdome gathered by study and experience and in the cooling of their heat and passions which usually represent things to men through false Perspectives For this is the advantage intimated here On his own part he was afraid and durst not shew his opinion considering that he was young and they old Not only was he afraid lest he should goe without the bounds of his station in offering to speak before them but lest being but a young man he should miscarry in speaking to the matter it self And on their part he reckoned this their advantage That dayes or men of dayes should speak that is Not only is it their priviledge to speak when young men should be silent and hear but it is expected they should be able to speak to purpose on such weighty subjects and that multitude of years should teach wisdome that is their long life should be so improved as they may be taught much experimental knowledge by living long in the world which also they should teach and communicate to others It is true this difference betwixt age and youth doth not universally hold as Elihu afterwards tells them yet many times it proves true that age out-strips youth in these things as Rehoboam found by experience in the matter of his Counsellours 1 King 12. And however it hold eventually yet the characters here assigned of youth and old age do point out that it is a great defect in young men not to be well acquainted with their own precipitancy and want of experience And that it is a great shame for aged persons if as they have place to speak so they be not wise and able to speak to purpose and if the long time they have had hath not so taught them as makes them both able and willing to communicate their light to others who possibly are not so able or sensible of the good and evil of courses as themselves are But they themselves are no less rash and head-strong than if they were still children 3. It is an evidence of grace and a great mercy to young persons when they are made to discern and take notice of the disadvantages they lye under For so is Elihu sensible here of what might rationally be expected from his youth and their age Thus Solomon is sensible of the disadvantages of his youth 1 King 3.7 8 9. When young men are not sensible of their disadvantages they cannot but run headlong on snares while they think themselves wise enough and so prove in effect but mad fools Whereas these who are afraid lâ—st they do miscarry and so are not rash to do or speak any thing they prove themselves to be most able and do seldome miscarry 4. When God gives young men a blessed sight of their own disadvantages it will produce much sobriety As here it doth in Elihu See Tit. 2.6 And if we consider the words we will find these evidences of sobriety in young men 1. They who are sober will have no conceit of themselves For Elihu here is free of that And where conceit is it is an evidence that the weaknesses of youth are not well studied 2. Sober young men will have a good esteem of aged men and their opinions till they find very clear cause to judge otherwise For he judged that such should speak and teach wisdome 3. They will still be modest and respect age even when they are dis-satisfied with their opinion As here he waited till they had spoken out and reckoned that dayes should speak or had place to speak before him 4. They will be farr from presumptuous boldness and full of humble fears in their undertakings especially when they are called to oppose others who are elder than themselves As here he enters with much fear upon this undertaking Verse 8. But there is a Spirit in man and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding 9. Great men are not alwayes wise neither do the aged understand judgement 10. Therefore I said Hearken to me I also will shew mine opinion Followeth to v. 21. the second branch of this Preface wherein he gives five Reasons why he now interposeth to speak in this cause The first Reason in these Verses is more general containing this in summ That the fountain of wisdome not being in man himself but from God who giveth it to whom he pleaseth v. 8. And who doth not always give it to great men and men of experience v. 9. Therefore though he be a young man yet they having given over he will hazard to speak somewhat in that cause v. 10. Which he might well undertake being indeed inspired by God as he tells them v. 18 19. though here he speak of that inspiration only in general and abstractly v. 8. which might supply his want of years and experience For clearing of this purpose Consider 1. These tearms of Wisdome understanding and Judgement are here to be taken promiscuously for a gift of discerning to judge betwixt right and wrong and truth and errour in matters and opinions together with a gift of prudence or ability to speak rightly and pertinently to a cause For these are the particulars of which Elihu is treating which he expresseth by all these words 2. As for that Spirit which he saith is in man Some understand it of the reasonable Soul of man and take up the purpose thus That all men have a reasonable Soul which by the special inspiration of God may be so elevated that even young men by that assistance may comprehend these things which aged and experienced persons cannot know without it Others understand it of the Soul of man yet they take up the scope of the Verse thus That though there be such a Spirit in man yet it is not that but the inspiâ—ation of the Almighty which makes truly wise But it is clearer to understand it of the Spirit of God and so the latter part of the Verse is exegetâ—ke and explains the former That it is by that Spirit in man even by the inspiration of the Almighty that any attain to this understanding here spoken of 3. As for this Spirit or inspiration as it is not
matter and such a fervent inclination to speak that he could not without grief and trouble forbear And while he saith his belly is ready to burst like new bottles he means not new bottles for these are not so ready to burst Mat. 9.17 but bottles filled with new wine which by its working is ready to burst the bottles wherein it is put if they be not very strong From this we may not only gather that this Doctrine of Elihu slowed from the Spirit of God but further Learn 1. It must be the Spirit of God in men furnishing them with light and accompanying what they say that will clear Controversies and bring them to an happy close For the Spirit is given him here for that end 2. As men may certainly know that it is the Spirit of God and not a delusion that acts them So they have need to make it sure that it is so especially in debates wherein it is not easie for men to know of what Spirit they are In both these respects he confidently asserts That it is the Spirit of God and not the fury of a rash young man which moveth him to speak I will answer v. 17. For I am full of matter the Spirit within me constraineth me 3. Such as have the Spirit of God may without vanity assert that it is so in the maintenance of truth and of what is right For so doth Elihu assert of himself though a young man when he is to deal on Gods behalf with so eminent parties See 1 Cor. 7.40 4. Albeit the Spirit of God where he dwells keeps men humble and empty in themselves yet he doth not make an empty sound and noise only but supplyeth men with furniture for the work he calls them unto For saith he I am full of matter or of words that is of words pertinent to the purpose and not empty words only And he expresseth his furniture by being full of words to shew that the Spirit of God did not only furnish him with pertinent matter but with fit words whereby to express it As he must do to all those whom he assists 5. Though the Spirit of God do not lead men to be rash and furious yet he fills them in whom he dwelleth with an holy fervour in the cause of God and with an earnest desire and zeal to appear for it especially when others have wronged it For this is the Spirit within him or the Spirit of his belly that is the Spirit which hath taken his seat in and hath wakened up his zeal and affections which in Scripture-phrase are said frequently to be seated in the belly or bowels in behalf of God and his truth so much wronged by them And so this Spirit constrained him that he must appear and speak as wine in a bottle seeketh a vent See Psa 45.1 6. The Spirit of God leads men to look upon the want of an opportunity to serve God as their greatest burden and on his service as their greatest delight and refreshment For so much doth this similitude import Behold my belly or affections moved and excited by the Spirit of God is as wine that hath no vent it is ready to burst like new bottles I will speak that I may be refreshed or may breath as the bottle gets air when it is opened See Jer. 20.9 7. Whatever fervour men have yet it must not be their own case only farr less the setting out of their gifts in a way of ostentation but edification they should mind Therefore unto his own being refreshed he adds I will open my lips and answer or speak to the cause and on Gods behalf so as ye may be edified Verse 21. Let me not I pray you accept any mans person neither let me give flattering titles unto man 22. For I know not to give flattering titles in so doing my Maker would soon take me away These Verses contain the third branch of this general Preface relating chiefly to Job wherein he gives an account of the way he resolves to follow in managing this cause Some do take up the words as Elihu's wish and prayer to God that he may be helped to manage that cause well and impartially But it seems rather that he expresseth his resolution in a desire to Job and to the whole Auditory that he may have liberty and allowance to deal freely as in a cause of God and a cause concerning mans salvation And that it be not expected that he should yield to any mans humours and affections or authority in this matter but that he will faithfully and freely speak what he thinks of the whole cause or of any man concerned Which course he resolves to take not only because it is not his custome to flatter nor doth he approve of it but because he was restrained from such courses by the fear and awe of God As for the two expressions to accept mans person or face and to give flattering titles to men they may be taken for one and the same thing for the one is repeated for both v. 22. Yet it may be gathered from the same repetition that the giving of flattering titles is the evil he would avoid and the accepting of mans person is the cause or tentation which might drive him to commit that evil And so for clearing and applying this purpose I shall consider four Particulars in the words First Consider the evil which he declines and is careful to avoid he will not give flattering titles to men The word is only used in these Verses and Isa 44.5 and 45.4 and it signifies to give Titles Epithetes a By-name or Sir-name to things And so it is translated a Sir-name in the fore-cited places of Isaiah where it is taken in a good sense But here it is taken in a bad sense for flattering titles or designations which he declines not only in reference to their persons that he will use no Rhetorical or flattering compellations or insinuations to them by way of Preface to conciliate their attention to what he is to say but will fall roundly to his work But in reference to the matter it self he will not goe about the bush as we speak nor mince the truth but speak it out plainly and freely and give things their right names without flattery or circumlocution And in this respect also they are said not to be given to man because regard to their persons did not cause him flatter them in their sin And if he had done otherwise he had spoken rather to their persons to please them than to their condition as it was in it self Of which more will be spoken on the next word Some Learned men do take the word to signifie the naming of a thing obscurely as by some Enigmatical By-name or Epithete and not by its usual proper and known name And this notion suits well to this purpose That as he would not flatter them so he would not give a By-name to things nor change their names either by
be credited and heard As men ought to walk so uprightly as their word may be credited so it is a fault to be jealous of men who have given proof that they are such Thirdly To open the mouth in Scripture-language doth frequently import to speak like a wise man and gravely to a purpose So it seems to be taken Chap 32 20. See also Judg. 11 3â— Psal 78.2 Prov. 24.7 and 31.8 9 26. Matth. 5. â— A fools mouth is alwayes open but a wise man shuts his mouth and only opens it when there is just occasion to speak It teacheth 1. Men who would prevent alienation of mind in the afflicted ought to deal very seriously and gravely in handling and speaking to their condition As here Elihu resolveth to do that he may perswade Job to be attentive Whereas they who do but trâ—fle in dealing with such do justly breed alienations and bring themselves in contempt 2. The more seriously men deal with others about their condition their guilt will be the greater if they slight them For Elihu's Argument conclude this that since he was to speak so seriously Job could not in reason nor without guilt decline to hear and hearken attentively Fourthly We are also to remark how he doubleth his expressions and in the end of the Verse repeats the same thing in other words My tongue hath spoken in my mouth where he describes his speech from the Instruments employed therein his tongue and his mouth or palate This repetition or diversifying of expressions is made use of not only to make up the Verse for this Book is written in Poesie as we see Poets usually do or to shew Job that he is even now upon the very act of speaking and his tongue moving to bring forth what doth concern him and consequently that he should be careful not to lose the tyde and opportunity through his own inadvertency But further he would shew Job how considerate he was in this enterprize His doubled expressions serve to assure him that he had thought again and again upon it that he was now going to speak and to loose the tongue that unruly member in a weighty and important cause and therefore would be sure to speak advisedly and only that which he had tryed well as the tongue and palate tast meats before they let them down to the stomack It teacheth That wise men will not think it an easie task to order their speech well especially to afflicted persons and in weighty causes as here Elihu is again and again upon it And when we find men circumspect and humbled in such an undertaking upon the account of its difficulty we may hear them with the greater confidence As Elihu presseth this as one Argument of attention Verse 3. My words shall be of the uprightness of my heart And my lips shall utter knowledge clearly The next Argument of attention in this Verse is taken from his purpose to deal faithfully with him as he had resolved Chap. 32.21 He promiseth that he shall deal sincerely in speaking to him without passion or partiality and that he will speak truth clearly or without any dross or chaffe as the word may import like mettal that is purified or corn that is winnowed that is He will deal plainly and clearly with him without dissembling or going about the bush and will not speak upon conjectures and surmises but will speak demonstrative clear truths and things whereof he had certain knowledge It seems that in making this promise he reflects upon the three Friends who had dealt with Job out of passion and prejudice and made use of general ambiguous and parabolick sentences in their reflexions upon him and took surmises and false reports from others and charged them upon him as if he had been guilty of them Doct. 1. It is mens duty to deal sincerely and uprightly with others especially in speaking of matters which concern their Soul wherein it is great cruelty not to speak truly and uprightly to them For saith he My words upon this subject shall be of the uprightness of my heart or shall be the uprightness c. that is I shall speak sincerely my very heart in this business 2. Men have need of an upright heart who would speak sincerely and rightly to the condition of Souls and they should be careful that they be not byassed with prejudices or with fear to offend them with whom they have to do For he professeth uprightness of heart as the principle of his speaking right to him If many did examine themselves they would find that their hearts do not goe along with what they say They do not believe and then speak 2 Cor. 4.13 If they speak truth it is but from a false heart or coldly and not from the heart And their byasses and prejudices rather than their solid convictions make them speak what they speak 3. It is not sufficient that men be of upright hearts in what they say unless there be sound Doctrine and knowledge in what they say For saith he My lips shall utter knowledge See 2 Tim. 4.2 4. Men should also speak clearly in what they say and make the truth plain and clear not leaving people in the dark or publishing surmises in stead of verities For saith he My lips shall utter knowledge clearly 5. Men ought to examine well what they are to speak and ought to refine it in their own minds without taking every thing upon trust and without tryal that so their Doctrine may be pure and free of mistakes For thus also will he utter pure and refined knowledge as the Metaphor imports 6. Such as speak truth freely clearly and uprightly ought to be heard and attended unto For this is an Argument pressing attention upon Job If even good men consider that they may erre and need admonition they will allow of freedome and will account it an act of love and kindness not to let them goe away with their faults And they are cruel to themselves who cannot endure to be freely dealt with but would still be prescribing how others should teach and admonish them Verse 4. The Spirit of God hath made me and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life This Verse abstracting from what followeth may contain a third Argument of attention That being sensible that he is a Creature formed and quickned by the Spirit of God as the first man was he will be faithful to God his Maker and to him his fellow-creature and therefore should be heard Doct. 1. The Holy Spirit is a Worker with the Father and the Son in the creating and forming of man For as all the persons of the blessed Trinity concurred at the making of the first man and in breathing into his nostrills the breath of life Gen. 1.26 and 2.7 So Elihu here acknowledgeth The Spirit of God hath made me which seems to be understood especially of his Body and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life or a reasonable Soul
This is a work of God wherein much of him is to be seen Psal 139.14 2. A man sensible of his own infirmity when he goeth about a work of God is like to prosper and ought to be attended unto it being an evidence he will not despise them with whom he hath to do and that he will not provoke God For he propounds that he is sensible he is but a weak creature as an Argument why Job should hear him 3. Such as consider their obligations to God were it but upon the account of their being made by him will be faithful in their serving of him For this is his motive and an Argument that he will be faithfull in publishing the truth of God as he professeth Chap. 36.3 that he will ascribe righteousness to his Maker 4. Such as do consider how easily God makes man will from thence also gather how easily God can enable him and endow him with gifts if he please For this also is an Argument why Job should not despise him because of his youth seeing he was Gods workmanship as well as himself and the Spirit who made him and gave him life could as easily furnish him with abilities Verse 5. If thou canst answer me set thy words in order before me stand up The fourth Argument of attention and a consequent of the former is That being sensible they were fellow-creatures he would not take advantage of his afflictions nor quarrel at what he should say in his own defence so as to interrupt him as it seems his other Friends did but if he had any thing to say he will allow him to stand up and answer or to take courage and stand to it and reply if he can This his frank offer doth neither proceed from insolency nor from any doubt he had of the truth of his own cause but serveth to testifie his patience and meek condescendence to Job that thereby he may engage him to hearken more attentively Doct. 1. It is an evidence of honesty when men desire not to prevail in their cause unless it be just and right For here he desires not Job to be of his opinion unless he can convince him by reason in a fair dispute 2. Equity ought to be observed in all Disputes and whatever respect be otherwise due to mens eminency or gifts yet in Disputes Parties are Peers as in Games all are Equals Therefore he desires here that reason may only carry it and that neither Jobs advantages over him in respect of eminency in dignity or piety nor his advantages in having to do with an afflicted man might bear any sway 3. It doth evidence a sound and sober Spirit when men how clear soever their own light be are content to hear the judgement and light of others For though he doubted not of the truth of what he was to speak yet saith he If thou canst answer me set thy words in order before me or order them the best thou can to defend thy self against my accusations 4. A man that hath a good cause and an answer to return to what is objected against him may stand to it and take courage For saith he Stand up or be couragious and resolute intimating that he had cause so to do if he had truth on his side Verse 6. Behold I am according to thy wish in Gods stead I also am formed out of the clay 7. Behold My terrour shall not make thee afraid neither shall my hand be heavy upon thee Some read the first part of v. 6. thus I am as thou of God the same in substance with what followeth in the Verse and an intimation that he is his fellow-creature But our Translation rendereth it better and so it is the last Argument pressing attention and an amplification of the two preceding Arguments That Job could not now decline to hear him and plead his cause with him if he had any thing to say seeing in his appearing God had granted him that which he had so often desired For he had often desired to plead his cause with God himself provided that he would not appear terrible to him nor bear him down with his great power and sad afflictions See Chap. 9.32 35. and Chap. 13.18 22. And now he had his desire For he is ready to appear as a Champion for God and in his stead having his Commission for that effect from an impulse of the Spirit upon him and being of the same mettal and mould with himself being formed out of the clay in the creation of the first man as well as he he needed not fear his terrour nor would he crush him with his power Doct. 1. Men may obtain many of their passionate desires and yet be much humbled when they are granted For here Job gets his will Behold I am according to thy wish or mouth that which thou spake and desiredst with thy mouth in Gods stead and yet when all this is granted he loseth his cause as to any thing he had to plead against God and is humbled for his miscarriages however he prevailed in his cause against his Friends 2. God needs not except he please appear in terrible Majesty to put passionate men to silence seeing he can make a weak man like themselves beat them For however Job thought he might hazard to debate even with God and might expect to prevail yet Elihu a man like himself offers to put him to silence in Gods stead as indeed he did however God thought fit to appear himself at last that he might put the cap-stone upon what Elihu had begun to do 3. It is mans great mercy that seeing he could not endure that God should appear in glorious Majesty to speak to him Exod. 20.18 19. nor the more glorious ministry of Angels God is pleased to employ weak men in his stead For saith Elihu as a Messenger sent of God upon this business Behold I am in Gods stead Which should both teach these Messengers to deal with those with whom they have to do as in Gods stead 2 Cor. 4.17 and 5.20 And should teach others to reverence them as the Ambassadours of Christ 1 Cor. 4.1 Gal. 4.14 And not to despise them because they are men of like passions considering that God in employing such condescends to the weakness of men who cannot admit of other Messengers 4. Those who are employed in that eminent trust of speaking in Gods stead ought to be well ballanced with humility lest being puffed up they fall into the condemnation of the Devil 1 Tim. 3.6 For so is Elihu sensible what he is even formed out of the clay when he is thus employed in Gods stead 5. Men will be helped to humility by considering their base and vile Original common to them with all men and that however God put some lustre and beauty upon all men and more eminently upon some by conferring special gifts and employments upon them yet men are nothing else but as it were so many bitts and parcels
some Minister or man extraordinarily inspired who is present with the sick man as here Elihu was with Job 2. From the nature and scope of his Work that he is an Interpreter to expound the dispensations of God to the sick man and to be a trench-man both from God to him and from him to God as men who understand not one anothers language make use of Interpreters between them 3. From his Rarity that he is one among a thousand or a person rarely to be found even among many who are employed in that work as this phrase imports Eccles 7.28 Doct. 1. However trouble may contribute to humble man and lay his pride and may bring him to desire to know the mind of God concerning him Yet trouble its alone and without the Word will do no good For here another mean must be added to clear from the Word what God speaks by that affliction See Psal 94.12 We must not mistake albeit afflictions do not produce all the good effects we desire it is well if they send us to the Word and cause us study it better 2. Albeit mens own Spirits should be the Candle of the Lord to let them see what they are and ought to do Prov. 20.27 and especially it should be so in a time of trouble Yet ordinarily as afflictions cannot be read without the Word so men need help to read Gods dispensations aright and what God speaks in his Word concerning them For the godly man needs a Messenger for this end in his sickness 3. It is a great tryal of mens submission when they are put to stoop to ordinary means of comfort and instruction even when their need is greatest For now under affliction God sends not visions to the sick man himself as v. 15. nor doth himself immediately appear as Job often desired but reveals his mind by the ministry of his Messengers whom he sends and employes upon that errand 4. That these Instruments employed must be Messengers doth not seclude that assistance which every godly man is bound in charity to afford to the afflicted for his direction and comfort But it sheweth That none ought to act those things in a Ministerial and authoritative way but only they who have a Commission from God for that effect In no age of the Church was it lawful for men to intrude themselves upon the Ministerial calling Nor would any Prince endure that a man should behave himself as his Ambassadour without his Commission nor would a Master endure such Servants And withall it sheweth That they who are authorized by such a Commission should carry as the Messengers of God and should be received and entertained as such See 1 Cor. 4.1 2. Gal. 4.14 5. That this Messenger is an Interpreter or trench-man may teach 1. That Gods dispensations toward his own Children need oft-times an Interpreter or Commentary as having more in them than can be seen at first and some other thing than sense will easily discern 2. That such as are employed about this work have need of much skill and ability to interpret that which cannot so well be read even by those who are concerned See Is 50.4 3. That in their expounding of Gods dispensations by and according to his Word and generally in revealing the counsel of God we should seriously ponder their authority that they are Messengers sent of God to be Interpreters So that God speaks by them and they speak in Gods stead as his Ambassadours 2 Cor. 5.20 Upon which account they are rather to be made use of than private Professours Doct. 6. That this Messenger and Interpreter is one among a thousand may teach 1. That faithful Ministers are very rare The Ministry it self is a difficult task for which none are of themselves sufficient 2 Cor. 2.16 And beside it is Calling that brings small worldly profit and is attended with great opposition So that it is no easie task for men to acquit themselves faithfully in it 2. That it is bâ—t scarce one of many Messengers even though they be otherwise able and honest that is fit and able to deal effectually with troubled consciences and afflicted persons which is the work here to be undertaken by this Messenger So that it is a singular mercy when many of those are in a Land 3. That such Messengers ought to be esteemed of as rare Jewels Is 52.7 They are the fruit of Gods married love Jer. 3.14 15. and may sweeten bitter lots Is 30.20 21. And therefore should not be the object of mens contempt Doct. 7. This Supposition is also to be marked If he be with him Which doth not import That sick persons should not send for faithful Ministers and will make use of them only if they come of their own accord or be providentially present with them For the contrary is enjoyned Jam. 5.14 But it imports 1. That Ministers should be careful to attend persons in sickness and affliction to see what good they can do and whom of them they can get gained to Christ 2. That it is a mercy to have such faithful men near us in our distresses As Elihu was to Job The Church found it sad when she wanted her Signes and Prophets in the time of her trouble Ps 74.9 3. When God in his providence strikes a godly man he will be careful to provide comfort for him some other way As here he provides a Messenger to be with the afflicted man Secondly In this Verse Consider also the account that is given of what God speaks by his Rod and this Messenger and what this Messenger should speak as the mind of God in such a dispensation He should shew unto man his uprightness or his rectitude righteousness equity Where the great Question is Who is meant by this relative His or whose uprightness it is that this Messenger is to shew and declare The antecedent immediately preceding is Man which should seem to import that it is mans uprightness that is shewed and yet the context takes in God also as he in whose name the Messenger speaks and who in the following Verse gives him a further Commission and accordingly some do understand it of Gods uprightness and some of mans I conceive that where such things are left undetermined we may take the words in the fullest latitude so as we keep by the scope of the words and purpose And therefore if we consider that when what is here shewed and declared takes effect man is brought to need a ransome and God finds it for him v. 24. He is also brought to be sensible of his sin v. 27. upon which God renders unto him his righteousness v. 26. If I say we consider this we may make up the tenour of this Messengers errand in these particulars 1. He is to shew unto man Gods uprightness that he is just and upright in his afflicting of him 2. That man maybe convinced of this he must shew that he is a sinner who is afflicted which he may do
praise even for a promise or any ground of hope and Praise doth elevate mens spirits to believe yet more For here both of them have common grounds upon which they stand and are supported 13. It is one special act of mens prudence in expressing their faith and praise to remember in a day of trouble the special gift of reason bestowed upon them and to improve and make use of it accordingly For therefore is that special proof of Gods kindness mentioned that he teacheth us more than the beasts of the Earth and maketh us wiser than the fowls of Heaven to shew that men do never believe Gods kindness in that mercy nor praise him for it so long as they carry like bruit beasts under trouble being only troubled about that which affects beasts looking up no higher than the visible hand that hurts them and carrying under trouble as bruit beasts use to do Is 51.20 Jer. 31.18 Verse 12. There they cry but none giveth answer because of the pride of evil men In the third branch of this Discourse he subjoynes an inference That because of these faults God will not hear their cry Our Translation reads it so with a Parenthesis as if they cryed by reason of the pride of evil men or because of their oppression which flows from their pride but are not heard But if we set the Parenthesis aside it may as well be understood of their own pride who cry that though they cry yet they are not heard because of their pride And so the Verse contains not only an inference that they are not heard because of their faults formerly mentioned but an account of a new fault concurring with the former to obstruct their success Some fault may be hinted at in that indefinite expression None giveth answer which may intimate that they long after help and relief get it from whom they will or whatever way it come but do not look to God alone for it But the Original gives no ground for this where it is He that is God of whom he hath been speaking v. 10. and speaks of him v. 13. answereth not and therefore I shall take notice only of that one fault of pride which hindereth their success Doct. 1. Men may be bad enough under trouble though yet they make some cryes to God because of it and do neither neglect prayer altogether nor weary of it if they have used it formerly Yea men may be farr enough wrong though trouble for a time put them to cry whereas they had neglected it formerly For so is supposed of those who are here found faulty that there in their oppressed condition they cry See Psal 18.41 Hos 7.14.16 2. When men will not see the faultiness of their crying to God in the glass of the Word nor have they any checks and convictions of conscience to tell them of it God doth justly cause them read it in the want of an answer and relief under sad pressures For so is here intimated They cry but he doth not answer 3. Men may be under much oppression and yet continue proud their spirits being broken but not humbled and their evils crushed but not subdued For here there is pride though they be made to cry 4. Where-ever there is pride men are in so farr evil whatever they be otherwise For it is be where it will the pride of evil men 5. Unbelief Unthankfulness and irrational bruitish Carriage under trouble do evidence men to be proud For where-ever those evils are v. 10 11. there is pride 6. Pride thus evidenced in mens carriage under trouble is â—â—â—eat obstruction to audience and relief from God â—â—â—o respects the lowly Psal 136.6 Is 66.1 2. Jam. 4.6 For He doth not answer because of the pride of evil men Verse 13. Surely God will not hear vanity neither will the Almighty regard it In the last place This Discourse is summed up in this Conclusion That there being so much of vanity and emâ—â—â—ness in that exercise which he hath before described God will not hear nor regard it See Chap. 27.9 Prov. 1.28 29 c. Is 1.13 14 15. Jer. 11.11 Doct. 1. Vanity and emptiness is a great fault in mens exercises and addresses to God when they are frothy and not solid and hearty in what they do For here it is a sad character of mens exercise formerly described that it is vanity 2. Where Faith Thankfulness and Humility are wanting in mens exercises they are but empty seem what they will For it is because of those faults marked in the former Verses that this exercise is concluded to be vanity 3. It is not easie to drive men from a presumptuous conceit that they will come speed in a faulty way of addresses to God Therefore it must be asserted over again after what is said v. 12. that God will not hear Thus the visible Church are apt to rest secure in their worst condition Jer. 12.4 Mic. 3.10 11. 4. Let men presume as they will yet faulty addresses and particularly empty prayers will not be heard For Surely God will not hear vanity It is true he hears whatsoever men say yea and may give men what they desire in wrath Psal 78.29 30 31. and 106.15 Yet he doth not so hear as to grant their desire in love 5. It is the sad lot of those who are vain and empty in their addresses that as their desires are not answered so by this God evidenceth that he approves not of their way For neither will God hear nor regard vanity These two are distinctly mentioned because there is a difference betwixt them which is to be well observed in his dealing with his people who seek him in an approved way For he may delay to hear or grant their desires when yet he doth accept and regard them and their services and they are bound to believe that it is so and to comfort themselves in the faith and assurance thereof But men in their vain addresses need expect neither of them and Elihu mentions both here Partly to shew how uneasily such persons are driven from their delusions and that if God grant not their desires they may notwithstanding yet fancy that he accepts and regards them Partly to shew that the more lying refuges and delusions they run to they will get but the more disappointments if they look for hearing he will not hear if they fancy that he approves of them notwithstanding yet he will not regard 6. Who so take up God aright will see that as he needs none of their service and is above our best service so particularly he will not regard empty vain service For he being God a Spirit how can he relish carnal addresses And being Almighty or All-sufficient how should he accept vain and empty service when men presume to offer it to him Therefore is he thus designed here to enforce this Conclusion Verse 14. Although thou sayest thou shalt not see him yet judgement is before him therefore trust thou in
among the unclean or Sodomites who have their name here from Holiness either by an Antiphrasis because they are most unholy or because that abomination was committed among some Pagans upon pretence of Religion and so we find their houses near the Temple in the time of the defection of the Jews 2 King 23.7 And this phrase that their life is among the unclean doth not only point at the violent manner of their death as young men contracted violent diseases by that vile unnatural sin but at their being odious in the sight of God as the worst of sinners See Ps 125.5 10. It is not unprofitable that the godly under fits of tentation and tryal take a look of the hypocrites way and lot Partly that they may abhort their own distempers when they look so like the hypocrites ordinary way And partly that the fear of the hypocrites lot may terrifie them from what is like their way Therefore is this account concerning the hypocrite laid before Job here From v. 15. Learn 1. Whatever hypocrites do prove in trouble yet when they have discovered themselves and are gone there will be found truly godly men who will cleave to God in saddest times and will get a blessed account of all Gods dealing toward them For so much doth this Verse added by way of opposition to the carriage and lot of hypocrites teach us See Is 33.14 15 16. This imports 1. That it is not a thing simply impossible for men to bear out in saddest times and so to walk as they may sing that song Is 25.9 when God cometh with deliverance It is true it may prove very difficult so to do as is said in another case Numb 24.23 and Saints may make foul slips and come off humbled 1 Sam. 27.1 Psal 73.2 and 116 11. yet experience doth also witness that it is not impossible to get well through a sad tryal 1 Sam. 30.6 7. Hab. 3.17 18. Hence 2. When men do succumb and fail in an hour of tryal their faith failing them and their hands being weakened they ought not to blame the dispensations of God but their own weakness for it and therefore they should search out and mourn for this their weakness See Prov. 24.10 Psal 73.21 22 23. and 77.7 8 9 10. And this were a profitable way of refuting and curing tentations 3. Whoever do decline in a day of tryal they will not want witnesses who by their practice will testifie against them that Gods wayes are equal and his yoak easie Doct. 2. The property of the Children of God who are in the right way to be carried through troubles and do lye near mercies is their poverty and affliction As here they are called the poor or afflicted This is their designation v. 6. and frequently throughout the Scripture so that the followers of God are called the congregation of his poor Psal 74.19 And albeit external poverty and affliction have some hand in this of which afterward yet that is not only or chiefly meant here For however when people are otherwise humble their external miseries have their own weight with God Judg. 10.16 Yet all those of themselves do not signifie much without that poverty and affliction of Spirit which is chiefly noticed by God Matth. 5.3 And that we may find out what this is the Emphasis of the word especially as it is variously rendered in divers places of the Old Testament by the Greek Interpreters may be taken up in those particulars 1. A man truly poor is not puffed up with a conceit of his own worth and fulness but is acquainted with his own emptiness and indigence See 1 Cor. 4.8 Rev. 3.17 2. He hath nor only a contemplative notion of his poverty but is afflicted and exercised with it it is not a dreamed of but a felt poverty and being poor he is sorrowful Ps 69.29 3. The effect of this exercise is not to lye still sinking under it but to cause the poor man turn a beggar and supplicant to God Hence the poor become needy Psal 40.17 and are fervent in their addresses as they who may not want long Psal 70.5 4. In all these addresses the poor man is humble as the word also signifieth and is rendered His discovered and exercising poverty doth not irritate him or provoke his pride but layeth him in the dust So that as a really poor man in his prayers he useth intreaties or speaks supplications Prov. 18.23 and he is humble when he is put to attend and in entertaining the returns which he gets Where these properties are wanting it is no wonder that men do slide in an hour of tryal Doct. 3. The people of God do frequently need afflictions and even sore oppression to promove this their spiritual poverty As here they are the poor in affliction and oppression and the Scripture speaks frequently of their poverty in an afflicted and sorrowful condition See Psal 69.29 Zeph. 3.12 Godly men do frequently question why they are so much under affliction and especially sore oppression of which they complain Psal 44.24 25. But the question may be easily answered thus That as godliness doth not exempt men from necessary trouble So godly men may bear it best of any seeing they have an hope above it and their happiness lyeth not at the stake But in pursuance of the point in hand this may be further added That most ordinarily there is but little poverty of Spirit among godly men and therefore sharp afflictions are necessary to purge out their pride and folly And though it be granted that some are already poor Yet 1. Afflictions are necessary to keep them so and to prevent pride as Chap. 33.17 For preventing mercies are sweet however they be little observed by us 2. They are necessary to help their spiritual poverty to grow and if they love to be in that posture nothing will be bitter that may promove it 3. They are necessary to give them opportunities of evidencing their humility and spiritual poverty in eminent services whereby God is honoured and that is no small mercy and advantage to a right discerner Hence 1. This commends Gods mercy who will not spare to do us a good turn though we should carp at the means whereby he brings it about He is a Father who will not spare for our crying when we need the rod Prov. 19.18 And hence it is that our choicest mercies come oft-times to us in a way wherewith we are but ill satisfied 2. It doth also commend his mercy who gives us meat out of such an eater and who makes oppression which is ready to make a wise man madd a mean in his hand to work poverty and other blessed effects 3. We should be careful to mind this use and improvement of affliction for when it hath got its errand and done its work it will be removed And for tryal of our proficiency we may reflect on these characters of the poor man formerly mentioned and what may be after
he looked upon as an act of mans folly to think to measure Gods deep counsels by their shallow conceptions for that was their folly in particular 4. When men have their sin discovered to them and they do not flee to Christ they lie under great hazard of reaping the fruit of their folly for so is here intimated that if they will not do as he directs he will deal with them after their folly in that they have not spoken of him the thing that is right c. Verse 9. So Eliphaz the Temanite and Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite went and did according as the Lord commanded them the Lord also accepted Job The 3. last Branch of this part of the Chap. contains an account of their obedience to the former Direction with the issue of all Both they and Job do obey what was commanded and God accepts Job offering and praying for them and consequently accepts them also It is not needful to enquire how this acceptance was evidenced whether by Fire from heaven consuming the Sacrifice as was usual at other times Lev. 9.24 Jud. 6.21 1 King 18.38 1 Chron. 21.26 2 Chron. 7.1 or otherwise seeing the Scripture is silent Doct. 1. It is a Character of godly men that they are easily convinced and do tremble when God threatens as here they lay aside all their height of Spirit and do stoop and go to Job according as God had commanded And albeit it be hard to draw off men when they are engaged in a course yet if God interpose the stiffest will be made to stoop 2. God is still as good as his word to his people for he promised to accept Job v. 8. and here he performs accordingly 3. It sufficeth to assure poor sinners of acceptance with God if their Intercessor Christ be accepted in their stead and name as here Job is accepted for them Verse 10. And the Lord turned the captivity of Job when he prayed for his Friends also the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before Followeth the third part of the Chapter and the last part of the Book wherein a Close is put to Jobs sharp trials and an account is given of his prosperous estate afterward till his peaceable death This restitution of Job is spoken of in general in this Verse and then it is branched out in some particulars v. 11-17 In this general sum and account of his Restitution we have to consider First The substance and sum of the mercy The Lord turned the Captivity of Job Where the term Captivity doth not import as some of the Râ—bbins dream that all Jobs losses of Children Servants and Goods were only an Illusion of Satan blinding the eyes of the Messengers who brought him word of these Losses which they thought they saw really lost according as they represented to him And that those Persons and Goods were only carried away by Satan and his Instruments and kept in safety till now they are restored again But the plain meaning is That whereas Job had been delivered up to Satans power to afflict him Chap 1 2. who held him under the pressure of troubles as in a prison as himself complains Chap. 13.27 And David in the like case Psal 69.33 Now the Lord did liberate him and set him at freedom And albeit this General be afterward instanced only in his Restitution as to his external state yet it includeâ— more That his bodily sickness was healed that he was restored to serenity of mind after his perplexities that the aspersions of his Friends were wiped off and he was delivered from their bitter encounters These are all supposed here if not principally intended in this General Doct. 1. Whatever affection the Lord bear to the persons of his own Children and whatever be his ultimate design in afflicting them yet their afflictions will be sharp in their season and will hem in their spirits and humours and shut them up on every hand for Jobs Trouble was a Captivity See Job 36.8 Heb. 12.11 This is the way to make afflictions operative so that the sharpness thereof is no evidence that God doth not own his Children under it or that he will not deliver them from it 2. There is no sharpness in the affliction of Saints but God how long soever he continue it doth notice and ponder it for here after all this long tract of trouble wherein Job was ready to think he was forgotten the Lord noticeth that it was a Captivity His Sympathy doth not weary though we weary to look to it nor is his sympathy so fond as we desire but he can let them lie long under trouble with whom he doth sympathize all the while 3. As the Lord will give all his people proofs of his sympathy by putting an end to all their troubles sooner or later Psal 34.19 So sometime he seeth it meet visibly to deliver them in this life As here Job who had been a pattern of sharp trials is now made a publick and visible monument of Gods kindness and Gods dealing to him is a pledge to all that a good Cause and a good Conscience will still have a good issue See Jam. 5.11 And the Lord is pleased thus to deal with some of his people not that all of them should always expect the like But 1. To give some publick Documents to the world of the advantage of Piety Psal 58.10 11. 2. To humble them who obstruct the manifesting of such kindness to themselves by their not walking fruitfully under trouble 3. To excite us to guard against miscarriages and diffidence under trouble seeing God may humble us by refuting all those by his gracious dealing such as he shewed to Job 4. To assure tender walkers that whatever the Lord do for them in their particular trial yet he wants not power nor good will to do for them as he did for Job Doct. 4. Men are not warranted to cast away their confidence because there is no probable mean of their deliverance to which they may look for the Lord turned the Captivity of Job when nothing else could promise it See Esth 4.14 Dan. 3.16 17 18. 5. Albeit unbelief be the great fault of Saints yet God is so gracious as to send deliverance when they little expect it for Job looked for no such thing as this Chap. 17.13 14. It is of the Lords great mercy that he passeth over the unbelief of his people Psal 77.7 8 9 10. Isa 40.27 28 c. 64.3 Yet we should not presume because of this to cherish unbelief nor suffer our selves through want of hope of deliverance to be driven on such courses as may make us ashamed when deliverance cometh 6. The more sober men are in their expectations the more near are they to deliverance and the less weight they lay upon prosperity as a reward of piety they are the more like to get it For not only did Job in his siâ—s lay his account never to be restored