Job 23:15 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters

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Job 23:15

Comments

A fresh spasm of fear gripped Job’s mind as he considered this: he was in the hands of an Almighty Being who can do anything, who is answerable to no one but himself, and who does not hesitate to take his children through deep experiences whether they agreed to go through them or not; Job was not in control. Furthermore these experiences involved the removal of the conscious assurance that the Lord was with him so that he appeared to be on his own and only his faith in God could sustain him. These trials went on longer than Job would have wanted and brought him to the point where he was overwhelmed, and yet still God did not appear for him. How could Job face such a God, and yet what alternative did he have? He felt like one who had been brought to the end of his endurance and yet could not cry, ‘Stop, I cannot bear anymore.’ Job’s heart was made soft by the realisation that he was in the presence of one who could do anything to him. His heart melted within him.Christ had to endure the cross and to experience – as no other man has ever or will ever experience – the ferocity of God’s anger against sin, and yet he was sustained by the knowledge that God was his heavenly Father. Under the most extreme trial possible his faith was perfected. The cross demonstrates the most perfect faith that there has ever been: that of the Lord Jesus Christ in overcoming all enemies and in facing the eternal wrath of his Father against our sin and yet believing that eventually God would be merciful, saying, ‘I have been cast out of Your sight; Yet I will look again toward Your holy temple' (Jonah 2:4).

Application

Why was Job so troubled? Not only because his trials were severe, but because behind those trials he saw the hand of God. That, as Calvin says, was the cause that he was so afraid. He was deeply aware of the majesty of God in all that happened to him, and he was more in awe of God’s majesty than he was of the immediate trials he faced. He could see in God and infinite power to do whatever pleases him, and Job could put no restraint on what God would do. That does not mean that God ever acts in an unrighteous way, but we are dependant on his good will towards us, and it is only because of the grace of God in Christ Jesus that we dare approach him.

‘We must not be so afraid of God as to shun his power as a terrible thing to us, or to go about to hide ourselves from him, but when we have conceived due fear of him, we must also receive comfort, assuring ourselves that God’s intention is not to repel us from him, but to draw us to him. But we need to be beaten down in this way, considering the presumptuousness that is in our nature, for there is such a pride within us that we will never yield God his due honour until our flesh is subdued and tamed. How must that be done? Even by sheer force. For out of our own good will we would never be humble and meek. God is therefore obliged to use violence, and to mortify all that is in our flesh, that it may be broken and bruised to stoop before him’ (Calvin – in modern English).

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Job 23:15 Commentary and Bible Study