Oh that I had given up the ghost!
The effects of Job’s sufferings
The patriarch had already in the previous verses expressed to the Almighty that his sufferings were--
(1) Too great to render any efforts at self-consolation effective,
(2) Too deserved to justify any hope of relief,
(3) Too overwhelming to check the expression of his complaint, and now as
(4) Too crushing to give to existence anything but an intolerable curse, His sufferings, judging from his language here, had destroyed within him for a time three of the primary instincts of the soul.
I. A sense of duty. Sense of obligation to the Supreme is an instinct as universal as man, as deep as life itself; but the patriarch, in wishing that he had never been, or that his first breath had been extinguished, had lost all feeling in relation to the wonderful mercies which his Creator had conferred upon him during the past years of his existence.
What were those mercies?
1. Great material wealth.
2. Great domestic enjoyment.
3. Immense social influence.
II. A love of life. Seldom do we find, even amongst the most miserable of men, one who struggles not to perpetuate his existence. But this instinct Job now seems to have lost, if not its existence, its power. Existence has become so intolerable that he wishes he had never had it, and yearns for annihilation. Two thoughts are here suggested.
1. There may be something worse for man than annihilation.
2. This annihilation is beyond the reach of creatures.
III. Hope of a hereafter. Hope for future good is another of the strongest instincts of our nature. “Thou didst make me hope when I was upon my mother’s breasts.” Indeed it is one of those powers within us that, like a mainspring, keeps every wheel in action. Man never is but always to be blest. Job seems to have lost this now. Hence his description of the future. “Before I go whence I shall not return, even to the land of darkness, and the shadow of death; a land of darkness, as darkness itself; and of the shadow of death, without any order, and where the light is as darkness.” He saw a future, but what was it?
1. Darkness. A starless, moonless midnight, a vast immeasurable abyss--“the land of darkness.” His hereafter was black, not a ray of light streamed from the firmament.
2. Confusion. “Without any order.” Small and great, young and old, all together in black chaos.
Conclusion--
1. That great suffering in this world in the case of individuals does not mean great sin.
2. The power of the devil over man.
3. The value of the Gospel. This man had no clear revelation of a blessed future. Hence one scarcely wonders at his frequent and impassioned complaints. How different our life to his! (Homilist.)
A good man’s distempers
This passage teaches--
1. Saints’ highest fits of passion will not last, but mercy will reclaim them, and give them a cool of that fever.
2. As the fevers and distempers of saints may come to a very great height, so, ordinarily, that height or excess of them proves the step next to their cool.
3. Humble, sober prayer is a notable evidence and mean in calming distempered spirits; it is as the shower to allay that poisonous wind.
4. As man’s life is but uncertain and short, so the thoughts of this should make men employ their time well, and to be very needy and pressing after God, and proofs of Him.
5. Such as are excited with much trouble, and have their exercises blessed to them, will be sober, and esteem much of little ease, to get leave to breathe, or to comfort and refresh themselves a little, with a sight of God, or of His grace in them, and not their own passions which they ought to abhor.
6. The least ease, breathing, or comfort, under trouble, cannot be had but of God’s indulgence.
7. It is the duty of men to acquaint themselves with death beforehand; and especially in times of trouble they should study it in its true colours.
8. Death and the grave in themselves, and when Christ’s victory over them is not studied, and men are hurried away to them in a tempest of trouble, are very terrible, and an ugly sight, as bringing an irreparable loss as to any restitution in this life.
9. The consideration of the ugliness of death and the grave, doth call upon all to provide somewhat before they lie down in that cold bed, wherein they will continue so long, and somewhat that may light them through that dark passage. (George Hutcheson.)