Job 17:1-16 - Homiletics

Job to God: 3. The requiem of a dying man.

I. ANTICIPATING HIS IMMEDIATE DISSOLUTION . With three pathetic sighs the patriarch bemoans his dying condition.

1 . The total collapse of his vital powers. Indicated by the shortness and offensiveness of his breath, announcing the approach of suffocation and decay. "My breath is corrupt." And to this at last must all come. The most vigorous physical health, as well as the feeblest, contains within it germs of putridity. Essentially, notwithstanding all its strength and beauty, the corporeal frame is "this corruptible." Therefore, " Thus saith the Lord … let not the mighty man glory in his might" ( Jeremiah 9:23 ).

2 . The speedy termination of his life. The complete extinction of the already feebly burning taper of his terrestrial existence was at hand. "My days are extinct." Life is fittingly compared to a candle ( Job 21:17 ; Proverbs 24:20 ; cf. 'Macbeth,' act 5. sc. 5), in respect of its definite extent, the rapidity with which it burns, the facility with which it can be extinguished, and the certainty that it shall at lest burn out.

3 . The actual opening of his grave. Contemplated as having already taken place. "The graves are ready for me." Job's wasted skeleton made it all too evident that he was prepared for them, and could with propriety exclaim, as afterwards the aged Gaunt—

"Gaunt am I for the graye, gaunt as a grave,

Whose hollow womb inherits nought but bones."

It is well betimes to contemplate the narrow house appointed for all the living; to "sit upon the ground," and "talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs;" to reflect that—

"Nothing can we call our own, but death:

And that small model of the barren earth,

Which serves as paste and cover to our bones."

('King Richard II .,' act 2. so. 1; act 3. sc. 2.)

It is well to realize that the tomb is but a step from the youngest, the fairest, the wisest, the strongest of Adam's children, and prepare ourselves for it, as already it is prepared for us.

II. BIDDING FAREWELL TO HIS FRIENDS .

1 . Describing their character. He calls them mockers, who had trifled with his misery, laughed at his innocence, openly accused him of flagrant wickedness, consummate hypocrisy, and daring impiety (cf. Job 12:4 ). This vehement reassertion of Job's estimate of their behaviour would fall with the greater force and impressiveness upon their ears, because of proceeding from the lips of a dying man (cf. 'King Richard II .,' act 2. sc. 1, and 'King Henry VIII .,' act 2. sc. 1, in which John o' Gaunt and Buckingham call attention to the weightiness of dying men's words). It would sound like the malediction of an expiring prophet.

2 . Brooding over their calumnies. Their wicked insinuations had stung him to the quick, and were still rankling in his bosom. Not even death's shadow or the grave's gloom could hide them from his mental vision. As if with an evil fascination, his soul's eye fastened on them, found a lodging with them, and could not shake them off. Easily had they been spoken, but not so easily could their remembrance be effaced. "Cutting words and cruel reproaches are not easily banished," especially when spoken by those from whom sympathy and kindness were expected. Hence the care which should be exercised not to inflict with the tongue wounds that only death can heal.

3 . Predicting their discomfiture. "Therefore thou shalt not exalt them" (verse 4). Job means that in the hotly waged controversy between himself and his friends they will not be allowed to triumph, but be utterly routed and put to shame. And of this he points out the premonitory symptom, in that moral and spiritual blindness with which God had suffered them to be overtaken—"for thou hast hid their heart from understanding" (verse 4). Either they had wilfully called good evil, and put darkness for light, or they were wholly incapable of understanding true religion or appreciating spiritual integrity. Hence, in either case, it was impossible that they could be right. Apart altogether from their applicability to the friends, Job here lays hold of important truths; as e.g.

4 . Announcing their punishment.

5 . Proclaiming their folly. With contemptuous disdain he invites them to renew their efforts to establish his guilt, to attack him with another round of arguments, telling them he has no fear of their success, knowing them, as he does, to be essential fools (verse 5). If the language evinces

III. SEEKING REFUGE IN THE MERCY OF GOD .

1 . The bold request. Turning from his friends and confronting death, Job entreats with a sublimely daring faith, which rises clear above the mists of despondency and the hurricanes of passion that alternately fill his breast, that God himself would strike hands with him, and engage to be Surety for his innocence against himself (verse 3). It is a by no means dim anticipation of the fundamental notion of the gospel, that, for the answering of all that God, as a righteous Lawgiver, can lay to the charge of man, God has himself become the Sponsor or Bondsman. What Job's faith, standing as it were on the headlands of human thought, and looking out with prophetic eye into the vast terrain incognitam that spread out before him, craved for himself, that God would undertake the task of replying for him, not alone to the aspersions of his human calumniators, but also to the accusations and charges preferred against him by his Divine assailant, viz. God himself—this astounding entreaty on the part of poor, feeble, sinful humanity, as represented by Job, has been answered by the gospel of Jesus Christ, who came in the fulness of the times as God incarnate to champion the cause of lost man, and vindicate, not his innocence, but his righteousness before God.

2 . The fourfold reason. Job bases his supplication on a variety of grounds.

"Vain is all human help for me:

I dare not trust an earthly prop!

My sole reliance is on thee;

Thou art my Hope."

(Elliot.)

IV. EXULTING IN FINAL VICTORY . Job's life is seemingly about to expire in gloom. Job himself, nevertheless, avows his confident expectation that the righteous and pure-handed man, like himself, shall be ultimately vindicated (verse 9). The words suggest:

1 . The purity of the righteous. They are a people who have "clean hands." Not that they are righteous or justified because of their clean hands. Even Job ( Job 9:2 ), as well as David ( Psalms 143:2 ) and St. Paul ( Galatians 2:16 ), proclaimed that a man could not be justified by works before God. But clean hands are evidence of a pure heart. And holiness is a sure mark of faith. Nay, if purity of life be absent, the spirit of piety is not present. Faith without works is dead. Hence we are justified (as to the sincerity of our faith) by works; hence also "without holiness no man shall see the Lord."

2 . The progress of the righteous. They shall "wax stronger and stronger;" "They shall go from strength to strength." They shall progress:

3 . The perseverance of the righteous. They shall hold on their way

V. PLUNGING AGAIN INTO DARKNESS . Descending from the lofty altitude upon which his faith had for a moment stood, the patriarch a second time takes his stand beside the opened tomb, and finishes his requiem where he began it, by contemplating:

1 . The approach of death , as:

2 . The descent into Sheol , which he regards as:

Learn:

1 . That death is never more than a step from any man.

2 . That those who are daily travelling towards the grave should begin betimes to prepare for their future homes.

3 . That the whips and scorns of time, the mockings and calumniations of friends or foes, can pursue a man no further than to the bounds of life.

4 . That God's people have already been delivered from their greatest adversary by the willing suretyship of Christ.

5 . That the royal road to heavenly exaltation is the inward illumination of the mind.

6 . That good men should never rejoice in, though they may sometimes foresee, and even foretell, the punishment of their enemies.

7 . That the best safeguard of a saintly man in trouble is to trace every affliction to the hand of God.

8 . That Christ's followers should not now be astonished at the tribulation of themselves or others.

9 . That the just man who perseveres in holiness will attain to everlasting life.

10. That if death terminates the life of man on earth, it begins the existence of a saint in heaven.

11. That man possesses nobler relatives than the worms and corruption.

12. That death may finish all terrestrial hopes, but it cannot injure the hope of everlasting life, laid up for us in heaven.