Job 14:16-22 - Homiletics

Job to God: 4. Falling back into the darkness.

I. BROODING OVER HIS MISERY .

1 . A sudden transition. Job's anticipation of the future resurrection-life was a momentary inspiration; not a calm, clear, steady light, diffusing a cheerful radiance within his soul, and shining on his onward progress to the grave, but a bright meteoric flash shooting up before his mind's eye, dazzling it for an instant by celestial splendours, and then plunging across the firmament of his soul into darkness. Like Moses on the summit of Mount Pisgah, looking out over Jordan towards the promised land; like Christ upon the snowy crown of Hermon, gazing far beyond the cross to the glory that was to follow, this great prophetic soul, with his vision clarified through suffering, having been set down by the grave's mouth, looked across the dark Hadean world, and descried the resurrection-life beyond. But, alas! like the Pisgah-glimpse of Canaan and the transfiguration-glory of Mount Hermon, the beatific vision was not of long duration. It was a momentary parting of the veil before the undiscovered country—nothing more. It came, it paused not, it passed, it vanished. The old stream of sorrowful emotion, out of which Job had been lifted for a season, as St. Paul was caught up into the third heaven, resumed its course. He was once more in the full current of his misery. Such transitions are not infrequent in the Christian life—from light to darkness, from joy to sadness, from peace to trouble, from delightful anticipations of heaven to sorrowful forebodings of impending disaster.

2 . An extraordinary misconception. Losing sight of the light from beyond the tomb, he is once more a wretched creature whose steps are watched, and whose sins are marked by an angry Judge. God appears to be dealing with him as a criminal, lying in wait, as it were, to detect his sins, preserving a careful enumeration of them, storing them up in a bundle as legal documents; or, better, in a purse as money or precious stones, and sealing it to ensure their production on the day of trial—nay, for that purpose, sewing them up in a sort of interior scrip (Cox), or tying them up together (Fry, Good), or stitching on to them additional charges (Gesenius, Delitzsch). The experience through which Job here passes was not new to himself ( Job 7:18 ; Job 13:27 ), and has sometimes been approximated to by believers under the Law ( Psalms 38:1-4 ; Psalms 88:7 , Psalms 88:16 ), though, in the case of Christians, it should for ever be impossible, proceeding as it does upon a total misconception of the character of God as revealed in Jesus Christ. Even under the Law such a picture as Job here sketches of the Divine treatment of a believing sinner should scarcely have been possible. As discovered to Moses , the character of Jehovah was "merciful and gracious" ( Exodus 34:7 ); as known to David, "ready to forgive" ( Psalms 86:5 ); as proclaimed by Micah, "delighting in mercy" ( Micah 7:18 ) Much more as published by him who is the Image of the invisible God ( Colossians 1:15 ), and who came to declare the Father ( John 1:18 ), it it essentially love. The only being whom God ever treated as a criminal on account of sin was his own Son ( Isaiah 53:6 , Isaiah 53:10 ; Romans 4:25 ; 2 Corinthians 5:21 ). In view of Christ's propitiatory work he dealt with men in a way of mercy even before the advent; since the sacrifice of Calvary God is in Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing unto men their trespasses ( 2 Corinthians 5:19 ). Yet the language of Job is true in the case of sinners who are wilfully impenitent. Their iniquities are all observed by God, remembered by God, and, unless repented of and forgiven, will eventually be produced by God for their condemnation.

3. A strange contradiction. A moment before exulting in the thought that God's affection for him when dead would be so great as to require the resuscitation of his lifeless body (verse 15), Job now pictures the same God as a malignant Adversary and an angry Judge. The two conceptions will not hold together. A little calm logic would have enabled Job to see this ; but men are seldom logical at the grave's mouth or in the grasp of an awakened conscience. It were well for Christians, and for men generally, to be distrustful of those representations of the Divine character which are cast up before the mind's eye by either the soul's fears or fancies. Pictures of the Deity evolved from the inner consciousness, whether by philosophers or theologians, are seldom congruous with one another, but are as variable as the passing moods of the changeful spirit. In the face of Jesus Christ alone can God be either fully or clearly seen; and there he is "without variableness, or shadow of turning."

II. DESPAIRING OF HIS LIFE . Job foresees nothing for him but the early extinction of that hope of life which has hitherto sustained him; and that for two reasons.

1 . Decay appeared to be the universal law of nature. The most stable thinks on earth were incapable of resisting this inherent tendency to dissolution. Mountains. rocks, stones, the very soil, yielded to the well-nigh omnipotent forces of nature (verses 18, 19); how much less could weak and frail man overcome that all-pervading vim disintegrationis by which he was assailed, or escape that slow but inevitable destruction which engulfed all mundane things! "The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces," etc. ('Tempest,' act 4. so. 1).

2 . God seemed to have decreed his destruction. The consideration of man's frailty, which might have been expected to move God to pity, in Job's estimation had rather stirred him to relentless severity. He had instituted laws against which even the most durable things of earth were unable to stand; "and," as if these same laws were not sufficient of themselves to accomplish his destruction, "thou destroyest the hope of man" (verse 19). The hope of eluding death is a delusion ( Hebrews 9:27 ). But it God destroys man's hope of life, he mercifully supplants it, in the cause of believers, with a hope of immortality ( 1 Peter 1:3 ).

III. ANTICIPATING HIS DEMISE . This Job expected would be:

1 . Irresistible. "Thou prevailest for ever," either overpowerest (Gesenius, Davidson, Carey) or seizest him (Delitzsch) "for ever" (verse 20). The struggle of life against death, represented as a contest of man with God, who always proves the Victor ( Ecclesiastes 6:10 ), so that "no man hath power over the spirit to retain the spirit, neither hath he power in the day of death ' ( Ecclesiastes 8:8 ), but from all men equally their breath is taken away, and they return to the dust ( Psalms 104:29 ).

2 . Speedy. "And he passeth '" literally, " he goeth '" i.e. into the unseen world. Notwithstanding all man's attempts to resist the decree of dissolution, not much is required to complete his subjugation. His removal is easily effected. Simply God speaks to him ( Psalms 90:3 ), or breathes upon him ( Isaiah 40:7 ), and he moveth on, his valour overcome, his wisdom defeated, his strength paralyzed, his noble form prostrated in stillness and decay.

3 . Humiliating. "Thou changest his countenance." Time writes wrinkles on the brow, cute ploughs furrows on the cheek, affliction ages and enfeebles the most stalwart frame; but, O Death! for rudely marring and disfiguring the fair temple of the body, man accords thee the palm. Death, which is exaltation to the spirit, is degradation to the body. To the one the gateway of glory, it is also to the other, though only for a time, the door of dishonour.

4 . Final. "Thou sendest him away," as it were into perpetual banishment. If the language implies that man continues to preserve a conscious existence after departing from the earth, it as emphatically bars the way against any return to the present life.

IV. REALIZING THE DISEMBODIED STATIC .

1 . A complete severance from mundane things. When man vanishes from this mortal scene, not only does the place which knows him now know him no more for ever ( Job 7:10 ; Job 20:1-29 . '9; Psalms 103:16 ), but he himself has no more knowledge of the place. His connection with the world is completely at an end ( Ecclesiastes 9:5 ). He returns no more to his house ( Job 7:10 ), neither is he more concerned with the fortunes of his family (Verse 21). How far this correctly represents the Hadean world it is impossible to say. That disembodied spirits should retain the power of apprehending what transpires on earth is neither impossible nor inconceivable; and that they do may seem to derive countenance from Scripture ( Luke 15:7 ; Luke 16:27 ; Hebrews 12:1 ). Still, it is doubtful if as many and potent arguments cannot be adduced against it; while it is certain that, even if departed souls are cognizant of mundane affairs, they will not be profoundly interested in such things as the temporal prosperity or adversity of their families.

2 . An exclusive occupation with the interests of self. "But," or only, "his flesh upon him," or on account of himself, "shall have pain, and his soul within him," or on account of itself, "shall mourn" (verse 22). The dead man's body is regarded as a sentient creature suffering extreme physical tortures while undergoing the process of dissolution; the dead man's soul is depicted as filled with inconsolable sorrow on account of its unhappy lot. Scarcely removed from the conceptions entertained by heathen writers, such a picture as Job here outlines of the realm of departed saints is only true of the impenitent who die unsaved, but is as widely astray as possible from the truth concerning the spirits of just men made perfect, who, if they are occupied exclusively with their own affairs, do not bemoan an undone eternity, but exult in an exceeding, even an eternal, weight of glory, and who, if they do grieve over their absent bodies, lament not the pains they are suffering, but long for their emancipation from the power of death—"waiting for the adoption, even the redemption of the body" ( Romans 8:23 ).

Learn:

1 . To think of God's mercy as beyond disputation.

2 . To contemplate death's approach as inevitable.

3 . To reflect more upon the glory of heaven than upon the gloom of the grave.

4 . To keep the soul as much as possible disengaged from the affairs of time.

5 . To seek for ourselves and children that honour which cometh from above.

6 . To realize that a saint leaves all pain and mourning behind him when he enters the unseen world.

7 . To thank God for all the light which has been shed around the grave and upon the future world by the gospel of Christ's resurrection.