I KNOW THAT MY REDEEMER LIVETH.
Job 19:23-27.
JOB 19:23-24. “Oh that my words were now written! Oh that they were printed (literally, ‘inscribed’) in a book! That they were graven (literally, ‘engraved’) with an iron pen and lead in the rock for ever!”
Something written on a scrap of paper is often lost. Something published in a book may last longer. But something written on a rock may endure, it seems, for ever.
And, in a way, Job’s words have been “written on a rock” – they have been inscripturated in the Bible. Now everyone can know what extremes of suffering a man of God may have to go through, and still maintain his faith!
JOB 19:25. “For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth.”
Whenever I read this, I hear a wonderful soprano voice singing an aria from Handel’s oratorio, ‘Messiah’: ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth.’
The Hebrew word translated “redeemer” referred to a kinsman empowered to redeem the property of a brother who had fallen upon hard times (Leviticus 25:25-28), or to redeem a brother from slavery (Leviticus 25:48-49), or even to marry a brother’s widow to give her deceased husband children to inherit his land (Ruth 4:3-6).
In this verse Job pauses a little from complaining against his friends, and perhaps even against God, to acknowledge God as his Redeemer (cf. Exodus 6:6; Psalm 72:14). Job’s vision is vivid. He had looked for a ‘daysman’ – a ‘go-between,’ if you will - with the ability to ‘lay his hand upon us both’ (Job 9:33). Now he catches a view - if we can but see it - of Jesus, who is both God and man and therefore perfectly qualified to be the only Mediator between God and man (cf. 1 Timothy 2:5-6).
The book of Job is one of the oldest in the Bible. A long time before the 18th century composer! Yet here Job reaches out of the depths of despair to grasp a truth which will yet find its fulfilment, for all of God’s people, when Jesus, our kinsman-redeemer, shall stand “at the latter day” upon the earth.
JOB 19:26. “And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God.”
This prophet is on a roll! Job knows he is going to die, and that after death his body shall face decay. But he appears here to anticipate his bodily resurrection. Furthermore, he knows that he shall see God!
JOB 19:27. “Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed within me.”
This is going to be a personal experience. ‘I, even I,’ shall see Him. “Mine" eyes shall “behold” – look upon Him. “Not another” (not a stranger)! Even though “my reins” (literally, ‘kidneys’) be consumed “within me.” ‘Yet in my flesh shall I see God’ (Job 19:26).
Jesus said, ‘I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. And whosoever liveth and believeth on me shall never die. Believest thou this?” (John 11:25-26).
The Apostle Paul wrote, ‘Behold I show you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump; for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed’ (1 Corinthians 15:51-52).
This is the hope of the Christian. Even if we die, death is not the end.
