Yesterday we left Job with his advocate in heaven and his body in ashes. Today, something breaks open. In the middle of four chapters of continued suffering and continued argument and continued silence from the God he is crying out to, Job says something that has been carved into the walls of cathedrals, set to music by Handel, and whispered over the graves of the dying for thousands of years.
But we have to sit in the darkness first before we get there. Because that line only means what it means because of what surrounds it.
Yesterday we left Job with his advocate in heaven and his body in ashes. Today, something breaks open. In the middle of four chapters of continued suffering and continued argument and continued silence from the God he is crying out to, Job says something that has been carved into the walls of cathedrals, set to music by Handel, and whispered over the graves of the dying for thousands of years.
But we have to sit in the darkness first before we get there. Because that line only means what it means because of what surrounds it.
Chapter 17 is desolation. Job’s spirit is broken. His days are cut short. The grave is waiting. His friends have failed him so completely that he turns to the grave itself as more honest company than the men sitting around him. He says his eyes have grown dim with grief. He says everything he had hoped for has gone down into the dust.
— There is no shortcut through this chapter. Some of it just has to be felt.
Bildad responds in chapter 18 with his most vivid speech yet — a long, detailed portrait of the fate of the wicked. The light of the wicked is snuffed out. His roots dry up. His memory perishes from the earth. He is torn from his tent, driven from his home, forgotten. Bildad is painting this picture to make Job see himself in it. To make him confess.
Job hears every word. And in chapter 19, he answers.
You cannot shame a man into the truth when he is already living inside it. Job knew his own innocence. No friend’s eloquence could argue him out of what he knew.
Chapter 19 begins with Job asking his friends a question that lands like a stone in still water: “How long will you torment me and crush me with your words?” He has counted the times they have attacked him. Ten times, he says. Ten times. And still they keep coming.
He describes his isolation in terms that are almost unbearable. God has alienated his family from him. His relatives have gone away. His guests have forgotten him. His servants do not answer when he calls. His wife finds his breath repulsive. Even children despise him. He has been stripped of everything — every relationship, every comfort, every dignity.
“I am nothing but skin and bones;”
I have escaped only by the skin of my teeth.”
— Job 19:20
Raising altars of prayer, worship and the Word across the nations.
