Job 35:9 Commentary - Dr Peter Masters | Metropolitan Tabernacle

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Job 35:9

Comments

The subject turns to prayer. This is part of Elihu’s answer as to why God doesn’t have a policy of dealing with sin immediately. Oppressions make the oppressed to cry; they cry out in anguish, but not to God. Elihu perhaps refers back to what Job had said previously. Job had been troubled by the fact that oppression takes place in the world and the poor and need are trodden down and yet God does not answer their cries for help (Job 24:1-17, especially 24:12). It is Job’s example of a case in which God appears indifferent. This is a strong accusation which Elihu cannot allow to remain unchallenged. More accurately he points out that although the oppressed cry out, they are nor crying out to God or directing their prayers in particular to him. They do not consider the God who is able to give joy within at the least favourable time. Instead they emit a general cry of suffering which is without faith, or is really aimed at fellow human beings. They do not pray as those who look to God as their only helper and who believe he has the power to answer and to change their circumstances. Elihu here defends prayer and denies Job’s contention that it may be offered in vain. There is a great difference between someone who makes a general complaint and has little hope of finding any relief, and another who earnestly engages with God and seeks him in a time of distress. God will only answer those who call in earnest, for he wants us to put all our trust in him. But Job too is among the oppressed, and Elihu in effect says, ‘All I have heard from you, Job, is a lament (plus a defence), but not one word of humble prayer.’ Job has tried to work it out, remonstrated with God, but he hasn’t really prayed. We wonder about our problems but it takes us far too long to come to prayer.Man overlooks the fact that God has already done such a tremendous work in his nature by making him to be vastly greater than the beasts of the field. It is far beyond the power of man to raise himself up so high, and he ought to appreciate the work of God in proportion to his own inability to make himself what he is. God teaches man in his nature that he values him above many sparrows. Wisdom, that incalculable gift, is given to human beings as a mark of God’s kindness, yet they take it for granted and return no thanks to him for it.

Application

He who truly approaches God calls on God as his Creator, and as one who can transform the gloomiest situation. He is deeply concerned for the honour of God in all that he says. A song is the overflowing of joy from the heart and it cannot come forth unless there is genuine happiness and victory within. But the night is a time when fears oppress men, whether that night be metaphorical or literal. Yet so powerful is the help of God that he can cause us to cast away our fears and to triumph over all evil even when it is at its strongest. Job is behaving like an unbeliever. Someone who is suffering pain on a bed of sickness, can pray because God has power to give songs and happiness even in sickness – ‘in the night’. He gives songs in the night. But sadly man won’t respond to the consequences of his own sin, to God who alone could answer.

Questions

God permits even these things, for he brings this rebel human race under trials that result from the fall. He does not take away the consequences of sin is immediately, and therefore man is under pressure to cry out for help. It is in man’s interest that God does not take away all the effects of sin immediately. We would be like spoiled children, and never ask why our fellowship with the Lord has been fractured. God permits trouble so that the human race experiences the consequences of sin: the lawless, the violent, and the wicked continue to operate, and so man feels the consequences of rebellion, and this should lead to men crying out to God for help. This is a tender approach. God is kind in explaining things, and answers Job’s questions (through Elihu) before he deals with Job’s sin. Of course we lose communion if sole reason we pray is that we are hurt. Some churches evangelised by ministering to people’s hurt.

Outline

Purpose

Introduction

Job 35:9 Commentary and Bible Study