Job 1:4 Commentary and Bible Study

Job’s sons and daughters came together to celebrate in a wholesome way. The phrase ‘everyone his day’ is generally understood to refer to their birthdays (Job 3:1). Job was not a weak father, but one whom men respected (Job 29:8-9), and who instructed many (Job 4:3). He would not have allowed his children to engage in revelry, and then try to repair the situation by offering a sacrifice subsequently. He would not have tolerated licentiousness and his family, but would have prevented their meeting altogether. God does not deny us natural joys and times of happiness together, and although Job himself does not appear to have joined in – for this was an occasion for the young – his sacrifice should be seen as a sign of his approval of the feast rather than disapproval.Being spiritually concerned for his children, Job (like Abraham) offered burnt offerings, signifying his faith in an atonement and his belief in forgiveness through grace alone. Such practices were, it is emphasised, his faithful, unfailing habit, which he did with alacrity, ‘and rose up early in the morning’. Not only does he maintain personal holiness, but he knows that sin is the greatest possible cause of harm to his children and that there is only one remedy for it – an atonement made to God. It is clear that God had revealed to his people the way in which propitiation was to be made, and although Job lived in the age of symbolic animal sacrifice, and not the real sacrifice of the Lamb of God, he carried out this duty diligently. Job offered these sacrifices regularly and formerly and on a presumptive basis without any evidence that this had actually taken place. He knew fallen human nature well enough to be sure that there were sins in the heart which he could not see, but which God could see and would take notice of. This too was a category of sin for which atonement needed to be made.He is a strident witness to the true God in a land of idol worship, and reminds us that God has his enlightened messengers in places and times of apparent total darkness. How many other regenerate Gentile patriarchs might there have been? How many Jobs stood (like Alfred the Great in Saxon England) in times and places thought by us to be without a witness?The word ‘cursed’ is the word normally translated ‘bless’ but which surprisingly can also have this meaning, and in 1 Kings 21:10,13 is translated ‘blaspheme’. This includes denying God the praise and worship which is his due, and need not be understood as literally uttering a curse. This was a silent departure from God which Job understood to be very serious and which required sacrifice. It was not their normal way of life – he knows them to be godly children – but I may have happened. He looked over the spiritual welfare of his children with all the care and concern of a godly loving father.