There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job.
The character of Job
There are serious and devout persons who regard the Book of Job as a work of imagination, and refer it to the age of Solomon. They point out that the subject discussed is precisely that which agitated the mind of Solomon, and that nothing but a wide contact with the Gentile world could have admitted a subject or a scene so remote from ordinary Jewish thought. Luther says, “I look upon the Book of Job as true history, yet I do not believe that all took place just as it is written, but that an ingenious, learned, and pious person brought it into its present form.” The poetical character of the work is manifest, and this poetical character must be taken into full account in any attempt to explain the contents. That is admissible in poetry which would not be proper in prose. Poetry may suggest, prose should state. Whether the poem be historically based or not, there is certainly set before us a very distinct and well-marked individuality. It is not possible for us to understand the discussion in the book until we are adequately impressed with the character of the hero, because the whole turns, not as is usually assumed, upon his patience, nor upon his absolute innocence, but upon his religious sincerity and moral uprightness. Job is presented in the characteristics of his conduct, his attractions, and his repulsions. “Perfect and upright.” “Fearing God.” “Eschewing evil.” A man may be delineated very minutely; a photograph in words may be presented of his features, his bodily form, his gait, his tone of voice, and even of his qualities of mind and disposition, and yet no adequate idea of him may be conveyed to the minds of others. Genius is shown in some brief, sententious striking off of the essential peculiarities, the things in which the man stands out from other men. This hand mark of genius is on the description that is given of Job. It is brief, but it differentiates him precisely. We feel that we know the man.
I. It presents the characteristics of his conduct. Our Lord taught--what reason also affirms--that a man’s life and doings form the proper basis of any judgment that is made concerning him. “By their fruits ye shall know them.” That ground of judgment is universally acknowledged to be quite fair. We ought to be willing to lay our life and conduct open before our fellow men, and to say, “Judge me according to my integrity.” Many, even religious men, prefer to say, “Judge me according to my professions.” The world is right in persisting in judging us by our conduct. And it may be questioned whether, on the whole, its judgment is harsh and unfair. It does not look for perfection in us, but it does expect to find that ours is a higher standard of honesty and charity than theirs. We would like to be described by our beliefs. Our Lord was described by His doings. “He went about, doing good.” It says much for Job that he can be set before us in the light of his conduct. He was a sincere, upright, kind, and good man. How are we to explain these words, “perfect and upright,” as descriptions of human life and conduct? The word “perfect” has in Scripture this idea in it. The thought of the absolutely perfect is cherished in a man’s soul, and he is ever trying to work his thought out into his life and conduct. Taking the two words together, “perfect” refers to the ideal in the man’s mind; and “upright” describes the moral characteristic of his human relationships. And we may glorify our Father in heaven by cherishing high ideals, and by bringing forth, in our daily life, much fruit of common honesties, common purities, and common charities, and so grow towards the standard of the perfect.
II. It presents the characteristic of his attractions. Tell us what a man loves, and we can tell you exactly what the man is. Everyone is disclosed by his favourite pursuit. Do you love truth and goodness? Then a blessed revelation is made concerning you. The Godward side of your nature is alive, healthy, and active. But is it the same thing to say of Job that he “feared God,” and to say that he “set his love on God”? Yes. A man can never worthily love, if he does not fear,--fear in the deeper sense of respect, admire, and reverence. Fear and love grow together, and grow so like each other that we find it difficult to tell which is fear and which is love. Job, on the side of his attractions, was drawn to God. The purity of the waters that lie full in the face of the sun is drawn out, and caught up by invisible forces into the sky, by and by to serve ends of refreshing on the earth. And all the noblest and best that is in a man may be drawn out by the invisible forces of Divine love and fear, if the soul do but lie open to God, the Sun of Righteousness.
III. It presents the characteristic of his repulsions. “He eschewed evil.” The word employed is vigorous, but not exactly refined. We cannot pronounce it without discerning its precise meaning. “Escheweth” means, “finds it nauseous, and spits it out.” The clean is repelled from the unclean, the kindly from the cruel, the gentle from the passionate, the pure from the vicious. A good man is characterised by an acute sensitiveness to everything that is evil. What then was the leading idea of Job’s life? It was a life lived in the power of principle. Some central idea ruled it, gave it unity, steadied it. He believed that, in righteousness, Divine communion may be enjoyed. He saw that God, happiness, truth, peace, the only worthy idea of living, all belong to righteousness. So his conduct was right. “Righteousness tendeth unto life”; and “God blesseth the generation of the righteous.” Whatever may happen to this man, we may be sure that God was on his side. God declared him to be a pure, upright, and sincere man. (Robert Tuck, B. A.)
Job, the model of piety
Job must have lived not very long after the Deluge. Somewhere between the time of Noah and of Abraham. Five things in this model which we shall do well to imitate.
I. Job was a model of home piety (1 Timothy 5:4). Some persons pretend to be very good and pious when among strangers, but they are not careful how they act at home. If we are really trying to be good Christians, and to love and serve God, then home is the place in which we should let our religion be seen. It should make us more respectful and obedient to our parents, and more kind and loving and gentle to our brothers and sisters, and to all about us in the home, than those are who do not profess to be Christians. Job’s sons were in the habit of having social gatherings at each other’s houses. When their feasting was over, their father was accustomed to gather them all together for special religious services, when he prayed that God would forgive them if any of them had said, or thought, or felt, or done anything that was wrong while the feasting was going on. It was in this way that Job was a model of piety at home.
II. Job was a model of intelligent piety. He lived so long ago that we could not expect him to have had very clear views about the character of God, and the way to serve Him. But he had. It is wonderful how much he knew about these things. He lived before any part of the Bible was written. But he got his knowledge from the God of the Bible. We get our knowledge from the Bible. If we come to the Bible to find out what true piety is, and how we are to serve God, we shall understand this matter as Job did, and our piety, like his, will be intelligent piety.
III. Job was a model of practical piety. His piety did not show itself in what he said only, but also, and mainly, in what he did. He carried his religion with him wherever he went (chap. 29). We have some examples of good Christian men and women who are like Job in this respect. But there ought to be many more of the same kind. If, from the example of Job, we look up to the example of Jesus, we shall find them both very much alike in this respect. When Jesus “went about doing good,” He was making His piety practical.
IV. We have is joe a model of patient piety. The apostle James says, “Ye have heard of the patience of Job.” This is the first thought that comes to us when the name of Job is mentioned. Think of his terrible calamities. We should have been tempted to say some very bitter things against the providence of God for permitting so great and crushing an affliction to come upon us. But Job said nothing of the kind. All he did is told thus: “Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head.” This was the way in which people in that Eastern country were accustomed to express their feelings when in great sorrow. But what a much more wonderful model of patience was Jesus! The patience of Job was beautiful at the beginning, but it did not last. He got discouraged, and said some very impatient things. He failed in his patience before he got through his trials. And so it is with all the examples of piety and patience that we find among our fellow creatures. They fail, sooner or later. The example of Jesus is the only perfect one.
V. Job was a model, or example, of rewarded piety. When Satan said, “Does Job serve God for nought?” he meant to say that Job was selfish in his religion, and only served God for the pay or profit he expected from it. But he was mistaken here. Job knew that there was a reward to be found in the service of God. But this was not the only thing he thought of in that service. “In keeping God’s commandments there is great reward.” All who serve God as faithfully as Job did will find themselves richly rewarded. (R. Newton, D. D.)
The character of Job
1. Beginning with the opening verses, we are led to contemplate Job in his family relations; in his tender solicitude for the spiritual welfare of his children, causing the light of daily worship to shed its rays upon the domestic tabernacle,--his house a church, and himself the ministering priest at its altars. This whole passage brings out in strong relief the depth of Job’s personal piety, and his fervent intercessions for his family. “According to the number”--that is, according to the needs, and necessities, and particular circumstances of them all, the ungovernable pride and passion, perhaps, which he had observed in one son, the worldly spirit and pleasure seeking which he knew to be the besetting sin of another. One by one, each son’s infirmities and temptations shall have its remembrance in a pious father’s prayers. The whole scene brings out an example of that household piety which is the strength of nations, the seed of the Church, the best conservator of God’s truth in the world, and that on which the Almighty has declared shall ever rest His heavenly benediction. “For I know him,” it is said of Abraham, “that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment.” Thus, for his exemplary character and conduct in all the relations of home life, we can understand why it is witnessed of Job that he was a perfect and an upright man.
2. Again, in the entire submissiveness of his will to the Divine will, we see a reason why it should be witnessed of Job that he was “a perfect and an upright man.” His preeminence in this virtue of patient resignation we find recognised in the Epistle of St. James, who, after bidding us “take the prophets for an example of suffering affliction and of patience,” cites, as worthy of special imitation, the “patience of Job.” Nor have we need to go further than this first chapter for evidence of the patriarch’s absolute and beautiful self-abasement. For we see a man before us who is a very wreck of wrecks--under the pressure of bodily suffering unexampled. And yet, amidst the wild and wasting havoc, no murmur of rebellion escapes his lips, neither does any hard thought of God find any place in his heart. Still, as we know, it was not always thus with Job. This model of suffering patience was at times tempted to expressions of almost blasphemous impatience--imprecating darkness upon the anniversary of his birth, as a day not worthy to be joined unto the days of the year, or to come into the number of the months. It was the yielding to this temper of mind which drew forth against him the stern and just reproof of Elihu, “Should it be according to thy mind?” Is it for thee to say how God should correct, and when God should correct, and in what measures He should correct? Art thou a competent judge of what the Almighty may have in view in His corrective dispensations; or whether shall tend to promote them, this form of chastening or that? “Should it be according to thy mind?” No doubt this form of insubmissiveness is often to be found in God’s children when lying under His Fatherly corrections. Chastening, we know, we must have; and chastening we expect. But, as with Job at the time of this reproof being administered to him, there is often a disposition in us to dictate to our heavenly Father in what form the chastening should come. Under any great trial there is a constant tendency in us to say, “I could have borne any trial rather than this.” Far otherwise was it with Job--at least, when he was in his better moods: He desired to be conformed to the will of God in all things. He had no selective submissions, taking patiently the thorn in the flesh one day, and withstanding proudly the angel in the path of the vineyards the next; now bowing in all lowliness under the imposed yoke of the Saviour, and now refusing to take up his appointed cross. Job knew that submission to the Divine will was not more the discipline of life than it will be the repose and bliss of immortality. “In all this Job sinned hot, nor charged God foolishly.” In the yielded captivity and surrender of every thought to the will of God, he would vindicate his claim to be considered “a perfect and an upright man.”
3. Furthermore, among personal characteristics of Job justifying the honourable mention made of him in our text, we naturally include the strength and clearness of his faith. As a grace of character, no virtue stands higher than this in the Divine esteem. It was that royal gift from above which procured for Abraham the distinguishing title of “the Friend of God.” And there are points of resemblance between his faith and that of this perfect and upright man in the land of Uz. Both were beforehand of their dispensation in their views of the doctrine of an atoning sacrifice; both, with a clearness of vision beyond that of men of their own age, saw the day of Christ; saw it, and were glad. Even in those family burnt offerings recorded in this first chapter, there was, on the part of Job, a distinct act of faith. He saw in that sacrifice and oblation a type of the coming propitiation; saw his own sins and his sons’ sins laid on that slain victim, and believed that they were blotted out in the cloud that curled up from that sacrificial fire. This, indeed, was the only answer to be returned to his own question--the question which had perplexed him, as well as thousands of minds besides: “How should man be just with God? How should God and man come together in judgment?” Clearly in no way except by means of that Divine and ineffable mystery so beautifully foreshadowed in his own striking language: “Neither is there any daysman betwixt us that might lay his hand upon us both.” And then see how this strong and eagle-eyed gaze into the far-off future comes out in the nineteenth chapter, when describing his faith in the God-Redeemer, the Divine and everliving Mediator. Job knew, as well as David knew, that, in the higher sense for which a Redeemer is needed, “no man can redeem his brother, or make atonement unto God for him; for that it cost more to redeem their souls: so that he must let that alone forever.” See, then, how great is Job’s faith. This Redeemer, who can do for us what no created being could do--living, and all through the ages, ever living--must be Divine. Yet not Divine only; for He is my kinsman, of the same race and blood with me, bound over by Divine appointment to do for me the kinsman’s part. Mystery of mysteries! yet shall my faith embrace it. “I know that my Redeemer liveth.” And this faith, in Job’s case, like all true faith, was an intensely practical thing; a working factor in the shaping of his whole life and character. See how this comes out in the thirteenth chapter. Things are at their worst with Job. The taunts and reproaches of his so-called friends had irritated him beyond endurance, and he spake unadvisedly with his lips. And no wonder. “Hold your peace,” he says to them. “Let me alone, that I may speak, and let come on me what will. It does seem as if God had set me for His mark; the looming wrath cloud does seem as if it would discharge itself upon me every moment. Yet think you that on this account I am going to doubt my God, distrust my God, see shadow of change in the Unchangeable? Nay, verily; though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” Oh! wonder we to find it written of such an one, “That man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God”?
4. One other aspect of Job’s character remains to be taken, as supplying a reason for the high commendation of the text; I mean that view of his life which brings him before us as a man of prayer; a man of devout and heart-searching communion with his own spirit; a man able to bear anything rather than the thought of estrangement, and coldness, and a cloud of fear and unlove coming for a moment between his soul and God. Take a few passages only from his book, showing the intense fervour of these spiritual longings: “Oh! that I knew where I might find Him; that I might come even unto His seat! Oh! that one might plead for a man with God, as a man pleadeth for his friend! Oh! that I were as in months past; as in the days when God preserved me; as I was in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle!” “That man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God.” Still, we must be careful that these searchings of heart are not carried too far; are not, in the hands of Satan, made an occasion of driving us from our hope. We must not forget that the occasional intermission of our spiritual comforts is often a part of a necessary sanctifying discipline. It is possible that God sees us depending too much on these tokens of His favour, this abiding of His secret upon our tabernacle, Insensibly we had come to look upon those happy experiences as our righteousness; we had almost made a Christ of them, to the disparagement of the a insufficiency of His atonement, and to the casting of a shadow on the glory of His Cross. But this must not be. In all our self-examinations we must not shrink from looking back, and must not be afraid to look within. But if we can honestly discern in ourselves the signs of present desires after holiness, and yet are disquieted and cast down, then, instead either of looking back or looking within, we must look out and look up; out of self, up to Christ; out of the light upon the tabernacle, up to the light of heaven; out of all thought, of what we may have done or not done for Christ, up to the grateful contemplation of what Christ has done for us. (Daniel Moore, M. A.)
A good man in great prosperity
I. A good man. He was “perfect.” Not sinless, but complete in all the parts of his moral and religious character; he did not attend to one class of duties to the exclusion of others, cultivate one attribute of virtue regardless of the rest. He was complete. All the parts of the plant of goodness within him grew simultaneously and symmetrically.
1. In relation to his general conduct he was “upright.” He pursued the straight road of rectitude, turning neither to the right nor left hand; he did what his conscience believed was right, regardless of issues.
2. In relation to his God he was devout. He “feared God,” not with a slavish fear,--his fear was a loving reverence. He was far removed from all irreverence of feeling, he was profoundly religious. God filled the horizon of his soul, he looked at all things in their relation to the Divine.
3. In relation to evil he was an apostate. He “eschewed evil”; he departed from it; he hurried from it as from the presence of a monster. However fashionable, gorgeously attired, institutionally and socially powerful, he loathed it, and fled from it as Lot from Sodom.
4. In relation to his family he was a priest. “He offered burnt offerings.” He interposed with God on their behalf; he was a mediator between his own children and the great Father of spirits. Like a good father he sought the moral cleansing of his children and their reconciliation to the Eternal.
II. Here is a good man very prosperous.
1. He was prosperous as a father. “There were born unto him seven sons and three daughters.” In ancient times, to be destitute of children was esteemed a great calamity: the greater the family the greater the parental blessing. Things have changed now: here in our England, a large family is regarded as a terrible infliction. What greater blessing in this world can a man have than a large number of loving hearts to call him father?
2. He was prosperous as a farmer. The stock here described has been estimated to amount in our money to the sum of £30,000. Here, and now, this is a good fortune, but yonder, and then, it stood for at least fifty times the amount.
3. He was prosperous as a citizen. “For this man was the greatest of all the men in the east in those days, no doubt, men whose names would strike awe into the soul of the populace, but Job was the greatest of them all. Elsewhere he describes the power which he wielded over men. “When I went out to the gate through the city, when I prepared my seat in the street! the young men saw me, and hid themselves,” etc. (Job 29:7-8).
In conclusion, two remarks--
1. That a good man in great prosperity is what antecedently we might have expected to find everywhere in the world.
2. That a good man in great prosperity is not a common scene in human life. Generally speaking, the best men are the poorest, and the worst men hold the prizes of the world. (Homilist.)
Job’s life of prosperity
Now let us judge this life from a point of view which the writer may have taken, which at any rate it becomes us to take, with our knowledge of what gives manhood its true dignity and perfectness. Obedience to God, self-control and self-culture, the observance of religious forms, brotherliness and compassion, uprightness and purity of life, these are Job’s excellences. But all circumstances are favourable, his wealth makes beneficence easy, and moves him to gratitude. His natural disposition is towards piety and generosity; it is pure joy to him to honour God and help his fellow men. The life is beautiful. But imagine it as the unclouded experience of years in a world where so many are tried with suffering and bereavement, foiled in their strenuous toil, and disappointed in their dearest hopes, and is it not evident that Job’s would tend to become a kind of dream life, not deep and strong, but on the surface, a broad stream, clear, glittering, with the reflection of moon and stars, or of the blue heaven, but shallow, gathering no force, scarcely moving towards the ocean? No dreaming is there when the soul is met with sore rebuffs, and made aware of the profound abyss that lies beneath, when the limbs fail on the steep hills of difficult duty. But a long succession of prosperous years, immunity from disappointment, loss, and sorrow, lulls the spirit to repose. Earnestness of heart is not called for, and the will, however good, is not braced to endurance. Whether by subtle intention or by an instinctive sense of fitness, the writer has painted Job as one who with all his virtue and perfectness spent his life as in a dream, and needed to be awakened. He is a Pygmalion’s statue of flawless marble, the face divinely calm, and not without a trace of self-conscious remoteness from the suffering multitudes, needing the hot blast of misfortune to bring it to life. Or, let us say he is a new type of humanity in Paradise, an Adam enjoying a Garden of Eden fenced in from every storm, as yet undiscovered by the enemy. We are to see the problem of the primitive story of Genesis revived and wrought out afresh, not on the old lines, but in a way that makes it real to the race of suffering men. The dream life of Job in his time of prosperity corresponds closely with that ignorance of good and evil which the first pair had in the garden eastward ill Eden while as yet the forbidden tree bore its fruit untouched, undesired, in the midst of the greenery and flowers. (Robert A. Watson, D. D.)
Job
Job may be called “the first of the Bible heathens.” He was not a Jew, he was one “outside the pale of the visible Church.” The problems of the book are of interest to man as man, and not as either Jew or Gentile. There is no allusion in the book to Jewish traditions, customs, or modes of thought,. The sacrifices mentioned are primitive, not Mosaic. There is a striking breadth and universalism in its pictures of life, manners, customs, and places. There is a variety about the local colouring that we find in no book that is undoubtedly Jewish in its origin. There is a marked absence of the strong assertion of God as Israel’s God which we elsewhere find. The picture of Satan is very different from that which we have elsewhere in Scripture. Many considerations point to the very high antiquity of Job’s time,--such as his own great longevity; the primitive and patriarchal simplicity of life and customs; the reference to sacrifices, but to neither priest nor shrine; the fact that the only form of idolatry spoken of is the very primitive one of the worship of the sun and moon; and the total silence of the history to such striking and momentous events as the destruction of Sodom, and the giving of the law. When or by whom the book was written we have not sufficient evidence to warrant even a guess. The presence of the book in the Canon ought to be a standing marvel to those who can see in the Old Testament only a collection of Jewish literature, a store house of national thought, history, poetry, or theology. The book stands by itself, sublime in its solitariness, suggestive in its isolation. Not less remarkable is the book if regard be had to its literary character, its poetic elevation, its dramatic daring, its full-blown magnificence of imagery. Carlyle says, “There is nothing written, I think, in the Bible or out of it, of equal literary merit.” The form is essentially dramatic. The problem presented is one phase of the world-old and worldwide one of human suffering. It is the most inscrutable side of the mystery that is presented and treated--the suffering of a righteous man; not of one made righteous, purified, by the discipline of pain, but righteous prior to the assault of affliction. There is brought before us a figure of piety and fame, public repute and private virtue. Then follows the charge of selfishness, preferred by the accuser, and the Divine permission that he be put to the test. The working out of this test, its effect upon him and upon his friends, constitute the body of the drama. The theory of the friends is this; in this life pain is proportioned to sin, and joy to righteousness; suffering to transgression, and reward to innocence. It makes no provision for a mystery of suffering; all pain, whilst it may be made to be disciplinary or corrective in its consequence by being rightly used, and by learning what it is fitted to teach, is yet, in its primary character, penal. When, therefore, you see suffering, you may be sure there has been sin. Job indignantly repels this explanation of his sufferings. He touches the very borders of blasphemy in his declarations of innocence, and his demands that the Almighty should show why He causes him thus to suffer. As the argument develops, the parties change places. The friends, at first calm, dispassionate, and even, from their standpoint, considerate and forbearing, deteriorate. They lose temper in presence of what they deem to be Job’s obstinacy and sinful determination not to admit his sins. Their theory is not broad enough to cover all the facts of the case: this they feel, and naturally they become irritated and irritable. The episode of Elihu may be passed by as not essential to the development of the drams,. In a few sentences may be stated the position which is assumed by the Divine voice. He ends the controversy, but not by explaining the difficulties which had perplexed them all. He asks, Is it the Creator God of this universe that man dares to arraign at his bar, and is it of Him that he dares to demand a self-vindication? The true attitude of man ought to be one of confidence in the God whose works proclaim Him to be infinitely great and wise. Man is crushed out of the last semblance of self-complacency. The effect of this self-manifestation by the Almighty, and of the revelation of what His own real image is, strikes Job into nothingness. But whatever had been his faults, those of his friends had been deeper and deadlier. Their presumption had been more than his. So the Almighty vindicates the sufferer, and condemns, though He spares the mere theologians, who set their own orthodoxy as higher than His charity, and a human theory above a Divine sympathy. (G. M. Grant, B. D.)
In the land of Uz.
God’s servants in unfavourable surroundings
I. God hath His servants in all places, in the worst places. There was never any air so bad but that a servant of God might breathe in it. Here God had a choice piece, even in the land of Uz, a place of profaneness; here was Bethel in Bethaven, a house of God in a land of wickedness. Lot dwelt in Sodom, Joseph in Egypt.
II. It is a great honour and a high commendation to be good, and do good amongst those that are evil.
III. Grace will preserve itself in the midst of the greatest opposition. It is such a fire as no water can wholly quench or put out. True grace will keep itself sound and clean among those who are leprous and unclean; it is such a thing as overcomes all the evil that is about it. As all the water in the salt sea cannot make the fish salt, but still the fish retains its freshness; so all the wickedness and filthiness that is in the world cannot destroy, cannot defile true grace; that will bear up its head, and hold up itself forever. (J. Caryl.)
Perfect and upright.--
The perfection of the saints
There is a two-fold perfection ascribed to the saints in this life; a perfection of justification, a perfection of sanctification. The first of these, in a strict sense, is a complete perfection. The saints are complete in Christ, they are perfectly justified; there is not any sin left uncovered nor any guilt left unwashed in the blood of Christ, not the least spot, but is taken away. His garment is large enough to cover all our nakedness and deformities. Then there is a perfection of holiness or of sanctification.
1. The saints even in this life have a perfect beginning of holiness, because they are begun to be sanctified in every part (1 Thessalonians 5:23). When the work of sanctification is begun in all parts, it is a perfect work beginning.
2. They are likewise perfect in regard of their desires and intendments. Perfect holiness is the aim of the saints on earth; it is the reward of the saints in heaven. The thing which they drive at here, is perfection, therefore they themselves are called perfect.
3. He was perfect comparatively, comparing him with those who were either openly wicked or but openly holy; he was a man without spot, compared with those that were either all over spotted with filthiness, or only painted with godliness.
4. We may say the perfection here spoken of is the perfection of sincerity. Job was sincere, he was sound at the heart. He did not act a part, or personate religion, but was a religious person. He was not gilded, but gold. When Job bought or sold, traded or bargained, promised or covenanted, he stood to all uprightly. As a magistrate he gave to all their due. (J. Caryl.)
Grace the best of blessings
The first thing which God takes notice of is His grace.
I. Gracious habits and spiritual blessings are the choicest of all blessings. If God has given a man grace, he hath the best and the choicest of all that which God can give. God hath given us His Son, and God hath given us His Spirit, and God hath given us the graces of His Spirit; these are the finest of the flower, and the honey out of the rock of mercy. Though you should not come to children, though you should not come to the other part of the inventory, to sheep, and camels, and oxen, and asses; if you are in the first part of the description, that you have a perfect heart, and upright life, and the fear of God in your inward parts, and a holy turning against every evil, your lot is fallen in a fair place, and you have a goodly heritage: they that have this, need not be discontented at their own, nor envious at the condition of any other; they have the principal verb, the one thing necessary.
II. Where one grace is, there is every grace. Grace is laid into the soul in all the parts of it, and there is somewhat of every grace laid into the soul. We have not one man one grace, and another man another grace; but every man hath every grace that hath any grace at all. All grace goes together. Particularly, this man was perfect. That is, he was sincere and plain hearted. Observe from hence--
1. It is sincerity that especially commends us unto God. As Job’s graces are preferred in his description, before his riches, so sincerity is preferred before all his other graces. Sincerity is that which makes us so acceptable and pleasing unto God.
2. Sincere and sound-hearted persons are in God’s esteem perfect persons. Truth of grace is our perfection here; in heaven we shall have perfection as well as truth. Further, in that upon this perfectness and plainness of heart, there is presently added uprightness:
Observe from thence--
1. Where the heart is sincere towards God, the ways are just and honest before men.
2. It is a great honour and an ornament unto our profession of godliness, to be just and upright in our dealings toward men. (J. Caryl.)
One that feared God.--
Holy fear
Here we have fearing God added to perfect and upright. Observe hence--
I. Moral integrity and moral honesty, without the fear of God, can never render us acceptable unto God. God delights in nothing we do, unless we do it in His fear. Not to wrong man because we fear God, is an argument of more than man.
II. Holy fear contains in it every grace we receive from God, and all the worship we tender up to God. Fear containeth faith, and fear containeth love too.
III. Holy fear keeps the heart and life clean. The fear of the Lord is clean (Psalms 19:1-14). Clean not only in itself, formally clean, but effective: it makes clean, and keeps clean the heart and life. Fear is an armed man at the gate, which examines all, and stops everyone from entering that is unfit. It stands as a watchman on the tower, and it looks every way, to see what is coming to the soul; if evil come, fear will not admit it. (J. Caryl.)
And eschewed evil.--
Hatred of evil
1. Godly persons do not only forbear sin, but they abhor sin. They have not only their hands bound from it, but they have their hearts set against it.
2. A godly man’s opposition of sin is universal; it is against all sin.
3. Godly persons do not only avoid the acts of evil, but all the occasions of evil. (J. Caryl.)
The upright eschew all evil
If sin be evil, and displease God, and deserve damnation, he that most fully and carefully avoideth it, is the honestest and the wisest man. You will not blame your child or servant for being loath to offend and disobey you even in the smallest matter. You like not him that offereth you the least abuse, so well as him that offereth you none. You had rather be well than have the least disease. You will not take a little poison, nor would you feel a little of hell. Why then should we not avoid the least sin so far as we are able? (R. Baxter.)
Revert sons and three daughters.--
Children a blessing
There are some who account their children but bills of charges; but God puts them upon the account of our mercies. (J. Caryl.)
His substance also was seven thousand sheep.--
A great estate
A question may here be raised, Why the Holy Ghost spends so many words, and is thus accurate in the setting forth of Job’s outward estate?
1. He is described to be a man of a very great estate, to the end that the greatness of his affliction might appear afterward. The measure of a loss is taken by the greatness of a man’s enjoyment. If a man have but little, his affliction cannot be great. After great enjoyments, want is greatest.
2. The greatness of his estate is set forth, that the greatness of his patience might appear.
3. It was to give all the world a testimony that Job was a thorough godly and holy man; that he was a man of extraordinary strength of grace. Why? Because he held his integrity, and kept up his spirit in the way of holiness, notwithstanding he was lifted up with abundance of outward blessings. To be very great, and very good, shows that a man is good indeed. Great and good, rich and holy, are happy conjunctions, and they are rare conjunctions. Usually riches impoverish the soul, and the world eats out all care of heaven; therefore Job was one of a thousand, being at once thus great in riches, and thus rich in goodness. How often do riches cause forgetfulness of God, yea, kicking against God? How often are they made the bellows of pride, the fuel of uncleanness, the instruments of revenge? How often do rich men contemn, despise, and oppress their weak and poor brethren? From the whole, take these observations.
We see here Job a holy man, very full of riches: thence observe--
1. That riches are the good blessings of God. To hold and possess great riches, is not evil; it is evil to set our hearts upon them.
2. Plain and honest dealing is no hindrance to the gaining or preserving of an estate. Honest dealing is no stop, no bar to getting. The nighest and the safest way to riches, is the way of justice. Woe to those, who by getting riches, get a wound in their own consciences.
3. In that Job, a man fearing God, was thus rich, thus great; see here the truth of the promises. God will make good His promise concerning outward things to His people (1 Timothy 4:8).
4. Here is another observation from this place: Job was frequent in holy duties; he was a man fearing God, he was much in the way of holy worship; he did not serve God by fits, or at his leisure, but “continually”; yet he was very rich. Time spent in holy duties is no loss, no hindrance to our ordinary callings, or to our thriving in them. The time we spend in spiritual duties, is time gained for secular. The time we spend in prayer, etc., whets our tools, and oils our wheels, promotes all we go about, and getteth a blessing upon all. (J. Caryl.)