Behold, I go forward, but he [is] not [there]; and backward, but I cannot perceive him:
Ver. 8. Behold, I go forward] Heb. Eastward, which is reckoned the forepart of the world; because that eye of the world, the sun, riseth there; and every man looketh to the rising sun.
But he is not there] sc. In that sort, as I desired to find him, Job 23:3, he is not visible to me; he is too subtile for sinew or sight to seize upon; his judgments also are unsearchable, and his paths past finding out. True it is, that the whole world is nothing else but Deus explicatus, God expounded, a mirror or theatre wherein God may he seen; yea, felt and found out by those who are blind, Acts 17:27. If a man hear a sermon by night, and in the dark, though he see not the preacher, yet he knows he is there. So Job questioned not God's omnipresence; but complaineth that himself was benighted, and forsaken of his hopes to be eased of his troubles, outwardly in body, or inwardly in mind; this is the judgment of the flesh, when under affliction.
And backward, but I cannot perceive him] For indeed he is imperceptible by bodily eyes, neither sitteth he anywhere in this world to decide controversies, as he shall do in the clouds at the last day, when the righteous shall look up, for their redemption draweth nigh, Luke 21:28, and the wicked shall look on and wail because of him, οψονται κοψονται, Revelation 1:7, they shall look and lament, yea, be mad for the sight of their eyes which they shall see, as Deuteronomy 28:34 .