Job 38: 1 – 41
The Judge Always Gets The Final Word
1 Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said: 2 “Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge? 3 Now prepare yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer Me. 4 “Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell Me, if you have understanding. 5 Who determined its measurements? Surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? 6 To what were its foundations fastened? Or who laid its cornerstone, 7 when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy? 8 “Or who shut in the sea with doors, when it burst forth and issued from the womb; 9 When I made the clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band; 10 When I fixed My limit for it, and set bars and doors; 11 When I said, ‘This far you may come, but no farther, and here your proud waves must stop!’ 12 “Have you commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its place, 13 that it might take hold of the ends of the earth, and the wicked be shaken out of it? 14 It takes on form like clay under a seal, and stands out like a garment. 15 From the wicked their light is withheld, and the upraised arm is broken. 16 “Have you entered the springs of the sea? Or have you walked in search of the depths? 17 Have the gates of death been revealed to you? Or have you seen the doors of the shadow of death? 18 Have you comprehended the breadth of the earth? Tell Me, if you know all this. 19 “Where is the way to the dwelling of light? And darkness, where is its place, 20 that you may take it to its territory, that you may know the paths to its home? 21 Do you know it, because you were born then, or because the number of your days is great? 22 “Have you entered the treasury of snow, or have you seen the treasury of hail, 23 which I have reserved for the time of trouble, for the day of battle and war? 24 By what way is light diffused, or the east wind scattered over the earth? 25 “Who has divided a channel for the overflowing water, or a path for the thunderbolt, 26 to cause it to rain on a land where there is no one, a wilderness in which there is no man; 27 To satisfy the desolate waste, and cause to spring forth the growth of tender grass? 28 Has the rain a father? Or who has begotten the drops of dew? 29 From whose womb comes the ice? And the frost of heaven, who gives it birth? 30 The waters harden like stone, and the surface of the deep is frozen. 31 “Can you bind the cluster of the Pleiades, or loose the belt of Orion? 32 Can you bring out Mazzaroth in its season? Or can you guide the Great Bear with its cubs? 33 Do you know the ordinances of the heavens? Can you set their dominion over the earth? 34 “Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, that an abundance of water may cover you? 35 Can you send out lightings, that they may go, and say to you, ‘Here we are!’? 36 Who has put wisdom in the mind? Or who has given understanding to the heart? 37 Who can number the clouds by wisdom? Or who can pour out the bottles of heaven, 38 when the dust hardens in clumps, and the clods cling together? 39 “Can you hunt the prey for the lion, or satisfy the appetite of the young lions, 40 when they crouch in their dens, or lurk in their lairs to lie in wait? 41 Who provides food for the raven, when its young ones cry to God, and wander about for lack of food?
In most disputes the strife is who shall have the last word. Job's friends had, in this controversy, tamely yielded it to Job, and you might say that Job yielded the final word to Elihu. However, in truth, how was he to know that our Holy Maker and Supreme Judge El Shaddai would actually show up. If you are aware of the court system then you also are aware that after all the wrangling of the counsel at bar, the judge upon the bench must have the last word; so our Great God had here, and so He will have in every controversy, for every man's judgment proceeds from Him and by His definitive sentence every man must stand or fall and every cause be won or lost.
Job had often appealed to God, and had talked boldly how he would order his cause before Him, and as a prince would he go near unto Him; but, when God took the throne, Job had nothing to say in his own defense, but was silent before Him. It is not so easy a matter as some think it to contest with the Almighty.
That which our Holy and Majestic Supreme God designs in this interaction with His creation is to humble Job, and bring him to repent of, and to recant, his passionate incorrect expressions concerning our Holy Master’s providential dealings with him; and this He does by calling upon Job to compare God's eternity with his own time, God's Omniscience with his own ignorance, and God's Omnipotence with his own impotency. If, in these ordinary works of nature, Job was puzzled, how did he think he could dive into the counsels of God's government and to judge them?
1 Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said: 2 “Who is this who darkens counsel by words without knowledge? 3 Now prepare yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer Me.
Our Holy God charges Job with ignorance and presumption in what he had said. Let us in a way visit our Lord’s interaction with His servant. "Who is this that talks at this rate? Is it Job? What! a man? That a weak, foolish, despicable, creature-shall pretend to prescribe to Me what I must do or to quarrel with Me for what I have done? Is it Job? What!- My servant Job, a perfect, and an upright man? Can he so far forget himself, and act unlike himself? Who, where, is he that darkens counsel thus by words without knowledge? Let him show his face if he dare, and stand to what he has said.'
Darkening the counsels of God's wisdom with our foolishness is a great affront and provocation to God. Concerning God's counsels we must own that we are without knowledge. They are a deep which we cannot fathom; we are quite out of our element, out of our aim, when we pretend to account for them. Yet we are too apt to talk of them as if we understood them, with a great deal of niceness and boldness; but in truth we darken them, instead of explaining them. We confound and completely baffel ourselves and one another when we dispute of the order of God's decrees, and the designs, and reasons, and methods, of his operations of providence and grace. A humble faith and sincere obedience shall see further and better into the secret of the Lord than all the philosophy of the schools, and the searches of science, so called.
These first words which our Holy God spoke are the more observable because Job, in his repentance, fastens upon it as that which silenced and humbled him which we learn in chapter 42 verse 3. This he repeated and echoed as the arrow that stuck fast in him: "I am the fool that has darkened counsel.'
Our Holy Lord challenges Job in verse 3 to give such proofs of his knowledge as would serve to justify his enquiries into the divine counsels
Those that go about to call God to an account must expect to be interrogated and called to an account themselves, that they may be made sensible of their ignorance and arrogance. God here puts Job in mind of what he had said back in chapter 13 verse 22, ‘Call thou, and I will answer’. Our Holy Supreme Lord now responds, "Okay Job now make your words good.'
4 “Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Tell Me, if you have understanding. 5 Who determined its measurements? Surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? 6 To what were its foundations fastened? Or who laid its cornerstone, 7 when the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy? 8 “Or who shut in the sea with doors, when it burst forth and issued from the womb; 9 When I made the clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band; 10 When I fixed My limit for it, and set bars and doors; 11 When I said, ‘This far you may come, but no farther, and here your proud waves must stop!
For the humbling of Job, Adoni Yahweh here shows him his ignorance even concerning the earth and the sea. Though so near, though so bulky, yet he could give no account of their origination, much less of heaven above or hell beneath, which are at such a distance, or of the several parts of matter which are so minute, and then, least of all, of the divine counsels.
Concerning the founding of the earth that is mentioned in verse 4 our Holy God asks Job, "If you have such a mighty insight, as you pretend to have, into the counsels of God, then give some account of the earth that you walk upon. Were you around when I created the earth?’
We see in verse 5 that Job is questioned to see if somehow he was the architect that formed the model and then drew the dimensions of the earth for God to use. The vast bulk of the earth is molded as regularly as if it had been done by line and measure
Though the earth is hung upon nothing, yet it is established, that it cannot be moved. Who can tell upon what the foundations of it are fastened, that it may not sink with its own weight, or who laid the corner-stone
In verse 7 we see our Lord asks, ‘by the way Job can you sing or tell me the words the angels sang after I completed My Creation.’ To me and hopefully for you it is quite amazing that the angels shouted for joy when they saw the foundations of the earth laid, because, though it was not made for them, but for the children of men. Although they knew that it would increase their work and service, they took pleasure in knowing that it pleases Almighty God.
In the book of Genesis chapter 1 verse 9 we read this action on the third day, ‘Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and it was so.’ Out of the great deep or chaos, in which earth and water were intermixed, in obedience to the divine command the waters that had covered the deep, and stood above the mountains, retreated to where He had ordained.
Our Holy Maker considered the earth as how a newborn baby is clothed and wrapped tightly, ‘The cloud is made the garment thereof, with which it is covered, and thick darkness (that is, shores vastly remote and distant from one another and quite in the dark one to another) is a swaddling-band for it
Look at the love and care our Great God displayed in the creation of His earth. There is a cradle too provided for this baby: I broke up for it my decreed place. He set bars and doors on the crib. Like a great parent that He Is, He informs the earth as his baby that you cannot get out of your safe crib. Valleys were sunk for it in the earth, large enough to receive it, and there it is laid to sleep; and, if it be sometimes tossed with winds that is but the rocking of the cradle, which makes it sleep the better.
The Lord here proceeds to ask Job many puzzling questions, to convince him of his ignorance, and so to shame him for his folly in challenging God’s Authority.
’ 12 “Have you commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its place, 13 that it might take hold of the ends of the earth, and the wicked be shaken out of it? 14 It takes on form like clay under a seal, and stands out like a garment. 15 From the wicked their light is withheld, and the upraised arm is broken.
There is none which we are more puzzled in describing, nor more doubtful in determining what it is, than the light. The constant and regular succession of day and night was no contrivance of ours; it is the glory of God that it shows, and His handy work, not ours.
It is God that has appointed the day-spring to visit the earth, and diffuses the morning light through the air, which receives it as readily as the clay does the seal, immediately admitting the impressions of it. In addition the earth puts on a new face every morning, and dresses itself as we do, puts on light as a garment, and is then to be seen.
The light is made a terror to evil-doers. Nothing is more comfortable to mankind than the light of the morning; it is pleasant to the eyes, it is serviceable to life and the operations of business. But God here observes how unwelcome it is to those that do evil, and therefore hate the light. God makes the light a minister of His justice as well as of His mercy. It is designed to shake the wicked out of the earth, and for that purpose it takes hold of the ends of it, as we take hold of the ends of a garment to shake the lint particles and wrinkles out of it.
Job had observed what a terror the morning light is to criminals, because it discovers them and God here seconds the observation, and asks him whether the world was indebted to him for that kindness? No, the great Judge of the world sends forth the beams of the morning light as His messengers to detect criminals, that they may not only be defeated in their purposes and put to shame, but that they may be brought to appropriate punishment. In effect wicked people may lose their comfort, their confidence, their liberties, their lives and that their high arm, which they have lifted up against God and man, may be broken, and thereby deprived of their power to do evil.
16 “Have you entered the springs of the sea? Or have you walked in search of the depths?
Vapors are continually exhaled out of the sea. Rivers are constantly poured into the sea. Art thou acquainted with the secret subterraneous passages by which the waters circulate?' God's way in the government of the world is said to be in the sea, and in the great waters. We read in Psalm 77 verse 19 this, ‘Thy way is in the sea, and thy path in the great waters, and thy footsteps are not known.
17 Have the gates of death been revealed to you? Or have you seen the doors of the shadow of death?
One question I almost felt that our Lord would ask is about death. Man does not know when his time is up. We do not know beforehand when, how, and by what means, we or others shall be brought to death, or by what road we must go the way of no return, whether it be by disease or some kind of disaster.
18 Have you comprehended the breadth of the earth? Tell Me, if you know all this.
The divine perfection of our Awesome Holy God is longer than the earth and broader than the sea; it is therefore presumption for us, who perceive not the breadth of the earth, to dive into the depth of God's counsels.
19“Where is the way to the dwelling of light? And darkness, where is its place, 20 that you may take it to its territory, that you may know the paths to its home? 21 Do you know it, because you were born then, or because the number of your days is great?
Our Holy Creator had spoken before of light and darkness and He returns to speak of it again. He challenges Job to describe how the light and darkness were at first made. When God, in the beginning, first spread darkness upon the face of the deep, and afterwards commanded the light to shine out of darkness
22 “Have you entered the treasury of snow, or have you seen the treasury of hail, 23 which I have reserved for the time of trouble, for the day of battle and war?
In the clouds the snow and hail are generated, and then they come in such abundance that one would think there were treasures of them laid up in store. Sometimes they come so opportunely, to serve the purposes of Providence, in God's fighting for His people and against His and their enemies, that one would think they were laid up as stores of arms, ammunition, and provisions, against the time of trouble, the day of battle and war
24 By what way is light diffused, or the east wind scattered over the earth?
It is a marvelous change that passes over us every morning by the return of the light and every evening by the return of the darkness; but we expect them, and so they is no surprise nor uneasiness to us. We cannot so much as tell when light and darkness come or where they go. By what way is the light parted in the morning, when, in an instant, it shoots itself into all the parts of the air above the horizon, as if the morning light flew upon the wings of an east wind, so swiftly, so strongly, is it carried, scattering the darkness of the night, as the east wind does the clouds
Our Holy King and Master had put such questions to Job as were proper to convince him of his ignorance and short-sightedness. Now He comes, in the same manner, to show Job his impotency and weakness. As it is but little that he knows, and therefore he ought not to arraign the divine counsels, so it is but little that he can do. Let him consider what great things God does, and try whether he can do the like, or whether he thinks himself an equal match for Almighty God.
25 “Who has divided a channel for the overflowing water, or a path for the thunderbolt, 26 to cause it to rain on a land where there is no one, a wilderness in which there is no man; 27 To satisfy the desolate waste, and cause to spring forth the growth of tender grass? 28 Has the rain a father? Or who has begotten the drops of dew? 29 From whose womb comes the ice? And the frost of heaven, who gives it birth? 30 The waters harden like stone, and the surface of the deep is frozen. 31 “Can you bind the cluster of the Pleiades, or loose the belt of Orion? 32 Can you bring out Mazzaroth in its season? Or can you guide the Great Bear with its cubs? 33 Do you know the ordinances of the heavens? Can you set their dominion over the earth? 34 “Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, that an abundance of water may cover you? 35 Can you send out lightings, that they may go, and say to you, ‘Here we are!’? 36 Who has put wisdom in the mind? Or who has given understanding to the heart? 37 Who can number the clouds by wisdom? Or who can pour out the bottles of heaven, 38 when the dust hardens in clumps, and the clods cling together? 39 “Can you hunt the prey for the lion, or satisfy the appetite of the young lions, 40 when they crouch in their dens, or lurk in their lairs to lie in wait? 41 Who provides food for the raven, when its young ones cry to God, and wander about for lack of food?
God has thunder, and lightning, and rain, and frost, at command, but Job or any other human being has not, and therefore let him not dare to compare himself with God, or to contend with him. Nothing is more uncertain than what weather it shall be, nor more out of our reach to appoint,
Our God Is Great. He has a sovereign dominion over the waters, has appointed them their course. He has divided a water-course, directs the rain where to fall, even when the shower is most violent, with as much certainty as if it were conveyed by canals or conduit-pipes. Thus the hearts of kings are said to be in God's hand; and as the rains, those rivers of God, he turns them whithersoever he will.
He has dominion over the lightning and the thunder, which go not at random, but in the way that he directs them. They are mentioned here because he prepares the lightning for the rain.
In directing the course of the rain he does not neglect the wilderness, the desert land, where no man is. As you know our Holy God cares for His creation. If you remember He even gave the land rest. What did man do with that order for the Almighty? They ignored it. Hence we learned how the people were taken out of the land for 70 years because they did not hearken to the Lord’s direction.
He is, in a sense, the Father of the rain. It has no other father. He produces it by His power; He governs and directs it, and makes what use He pleases of it. Even the small drops of the dew He distils upon the earth, as the God of nature; and, as the God of grace, He rains righteousness upon us and is Himself as the dew unto His people Israel which we learn in the book of Hosea chapter 14 verses 5 and 6.
Frost and snow come from him, and therefore should lead our thoughts and meditations to him who does such great things, past finding out. What created power could produce such a wonderful work?' No power but that of the Creator himself.
So then the question to consider is ‘how weak is man?’. Can he do such things as these? He cannot command one shower of rain. They only listen to their Creator’s commands.
God has the stars of heaven under his command and cognizance. So, let’s take a look at the unique listings brought out by verses 31 through 33 -Can you bind the cluster of the Pleiades, or loose the belt of Orion? 32 Can you bring out Mazzaroth in its season? Or can you guide the Great Bear with its cubs? 33 Do you know the ordinances of the heavens.
While I think there are good reasons why God might not reveal advanced scientific details in Scripture, I do expect God’s Word to be scientifically consistent with the world we experience. One interesting scientific consistency seems to exist in the ancient book of Job. I am obviously not a scientist or astronomer yet what amazes me that these people who lived so long ago knew of these star systems.
The Pleiades also known as M45 or the Seven Sisters, is the name of an open cluster in the constellation of Taurus. It is among the nearest to the Earth of all open clusters, probably the best known and certainly the most striking to the naked eye.
Orion's Belt or the Belt of Orion, also known as the Three Kings or Three Sisters, is an asterism in the constellation Orion. It consists of the three bright stars Alnitak, Alnilam and Mintaka. Looking for Orion's Belt in the night sky is the easiest way to locate Orion in the sky.
Mazzaroth refers to "the twelve signs" of the zodiac
The great bear with its cubs is also listed in some manuscripts as ‘thou guide Arcturus with his sons?’ While Arcturus certainly appeared in antiquity to be a single star, in 1971 astronomers discovered there were 52 additional stars.
Our God Is the author and giver, the father and fountain, of all wisdom and understanding. The souls of men are nobler and more excellent beings than the stars of heaven themselves, and shine more brightly. The powers and faculties of reason with which man is endued with the wonderful performances of thought
The rational soul itself, and its capacities, come from him as the God of nature; for he forms the spirit of man within him. We did not make our own souls, nor can we describe how they act, nor how they are united to our bodies. He only that made them knows them, and knows how to manage them. He fashions men's hearts alike in some things, and yet unlike in others.
The power and goodness of God are here to be acknowledged, that he gives the earth enough rain, but does not excessive. The rain, softens it, but does not drown it, makes it fit for the plough, but not unfit for the seed. As we cannot command a shower of rain, so we cannot command a fair day, without God; so necessary, so constant, is our dependence upon Him.
Here is another great thought to ponder. For all mankind and animals God continually provides food. It sometimes becomes scarce but never has run out. To me this is amazing. Our Holy Lord gets Job to ponder the fact that Job in his better times was wealthy with livestock. He took care of them. So, our Holy God asks him about who takes care of all the other animals, even the vicious animals?
Our Holy God tells Job that he would not even attempt to take care of the wild beasts such as lions because his life could be in danger.
As ravenous beasts, so there are also ravenous birds, who are also cared for and fed by the divine providence of the Lord. Who but God provides for the raven his food? Man does not; he takes care only of those creatures that are, or may be, useful to him. But God has a regard to all the works of his hands, even the meanest and least valuable.
What God does for them some way or other is that He provides for them, so that they grow up, and come to maturity. And He that takes this care of the young ravens certainly will not be wanting to His people or theirs. This, being but one instance of many of the divine compassion, may give us occasion to think how much good our God does, every day, beyond what we are even aware of.
