Walled Off From God's Belssing
Notes
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Job finally speaks. He gives voice to his anguish and his grief and his pain. After weeks or months of loneliness, agony, and despair; after sitting in silence for seven days since the arrival of his three friends- Job, like a torrential rain, opens his mouth and with broad heavy brush strokes paints a picture of his despair.
Our cat is an outdoor cat. Most animals sit at the door and beg to go out. Our cat sits at the door and begs to get in. She sits at our back deck door, we have the quality glass door from Ben and it is completely sound proof, so she meows but you can’t hear anything coming out of her mouth. She ends us look like some strange kind of cat mime. She is walled out. She wants to get in, but she cannot. There is a door or a window at ever turn, and no matter what she does she is walled off from getting inside. This is how Job feels right now. He is on the outside looking in the window wondering where God is, but there is no one there for Job to see, or to make any kind of sense out of this situation. He is simply on the outside completely walled off from God’s blessing. He is in anguish.
But the source of Job’s anguish comes from an unlikely location. After loosing everything, his possessions, his honor, his family, one would think that Job despairs entirely because- the lose of these things just hurts too much. But in Job 3 we discover that he is ultimately grieving because of the loss of the favor of his God.
Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job Breaking the Silence (Job 3:1–2)
He is not saying, “I wish I was never born because this hurts so much,” but “I wish I was never born if I have to live without God.”
Doesn’t suffering of such magnitude signify something? It is not merely the affliction itself that Job finds so hard to bear; it is the sudden and inexplicable change in God’s posture toward him that circumstances seem to signal. How can anyone endure such disaster and not assume that God has turned against him?
Look at Job 3:23:
Why is light given to a man whose way is hid,
And whom God hath hedged in?
Light here is synonomous with life or existence. Why is light given (by God) to anyone whose way is hidden? (What does Job mean when he says “whose way is hidden?”) This is a type of Hebrew parallelism, and specifically it is a focused parallelism. Two phrases are similar in meaning to each other, but the second phrase carries the thought forward, and is more specific.
1) whose way is hid 2) whom God has hedged in
So someone whose way is hidden, more specifically is someone whom God has hedged in.
For Job to say that his way is hidden means that his future is without purpose. Just as he cannot see the correct way on a path, so his life has no purpose, and why is this? Because we discover that Job believes that God has hedges him in.
The word “hedged” means to enclose or surround completely as with a fence or a wall.
He hath fenced up my way that I cannot pass,
And he hath set darkness in my paths.
He hath hedged me about, that I cannot get out: he hath made my chain heavy.
The Book of Job B. A Lament (3:14–26)
But now an anguished Job complains that God has fenced him about to keep any help from reaching him. To Job it appears that God has locked him into turmoil and thrown away the key.
This is an ironic twist from Satan’s earlier accusation of God.
Hast not thou made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side? thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land.
Satan’s complaint was that God had walled Job off from any kind of trouble and had blessed him at ever turn. Now Job laments that God’s favor had fled far from him, and it seems that God has walled him off from blessing or aid of any kind.
The key to note in v. 23 is that Job is lamenting the loss of God favor above all else.
Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job Breaking the Silence (Job 3:1–2)
Job’s lamentation ultimately magnifies God by articulating the immeasurable value of His favor and the irrelevance of life without it. If God means this much—that man is better off not to have lived at all than to live without Him—then this God must be supremely desirable above life itself. Securing His pleasure must be the single worth-while ambition in life
So to Job securing the pleasure of God was the “single worth-while ambition.” Satan first accused Job that his single worth-while ambition was what? His possessions, his family. Then secondly Satan accused Job that his single worth-while ambition was what? His health.
And Satan answered the Lord, and said, Skin for skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life.
But Satan was wrong on both accounts and God was right. Job ultimately laments God’s favor. God meant that much to Job. Oh that God would mean that much to me as well!
In Job’s agony over losing God’s favor Job asks a series of questions in an attempt to deal with his suffering.
I. Why Was I Born?
I. Why Was I Born?
A. His Wish
A. His Wish
After this opened Job his mouth, and cursed his day. And Job spake, and said,
Let the day perish wherein I was born,
And the night in which it was said, There is a man child conceived.
V 3. Mirrored word pair- day and night. Job wants to eradicate all nine months of his existence in the womb.
Let that day be darkness;
Let not God regard it from above,
Neither let the light shine upon it.
His wish is very strong it is on a cosmic scale. Job forms his wish that he had never been born in contrast to the original creative act of God- light.
God’s first creative act on day one (after creating matter in general) is to make light, that which differentiates between day and night (Gen 1:3).
Darkness, indicates undoing God’s original creative act to remove his existence from memory.
Job formulates his wish that he never exist in terms of that original creative day – as a total envelopment that day by darkness.
Vv. 5-9 are an intensification of Job’s wish to show us the depth of Job’s emotion.
Let darkness and the shadow of death stain it;
Let a cloud dwell upon it;
Let the blackness of the day terrify it.
As for that night, let darkness seize upon it;
Let it not be joined unto the days of the year,
Let it not come into the number of the months.
Lo, let that night be solitary,
Let no joyful voice come therein.
Let them curse it that curse the day,
Who are ready to raise up their mourning.
V. 8 “Their mourning” could also be translated at “Leviathan” Oddly, he invokes cursers who may rouse Leviathan in support of his wish (vs. 8).
Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark;
Let it look for light, but have none;
Neither let it see the dawning of the day:
B. His Reason
B. His Reason
Because it shut not up the doors of my mother’s womb,
Nor hid sorrow from mine eyes.
Regarding the content: he is effectively wishing that the primordial chaos of Genesis 1:2 would continue as it related to him, and that there was no statement “Let there be light,” at least as it applies to Job himself.
Regarding the strength of his emotion. It is one thing to say that I wish God had never created me. It is another thing to state that wish so strongly in terms of an undoing of God’s creative activity during the creation week.
All because that day, the day of his birth, did not close his mother's womb- which ultimately meant that Job now has to endure all of this suffering- this loss of God’s favor- therefore sorrow was not hid from his eyes.
Application:
1. Most people who go through something like this, there is a desperate wish to undo the events so that they never happened.
This is a wish that at some point along the line, he would never had to endure this.
But who is the one that allowed this to happen in Job’s life? God did. So even though it hurts, and we don’t understand it, and we feel lost and alone- we must not wish that the things God brings into our lives would have never happened, rather as difficult as it is- we must trust in the mysterious wisdom of God.
2. Should we follow Job as a pattern for how to grieve?
We are privileged to see behind the scenes of Job’s suffering, but Job doesn’t see and he doesn’t understand, and so Job grieves. This is surprising to us. Job, by God’s own admission, is a spiritual giant. His initial responses to suffering were amazing, and even here what Job mourns most (the loss of God’s favor) is commendable. We hardly expect less from such a man. And then we hear Job cursing the day of his birth, and wishing that it be eradicated from the creation event. And suddenly Job no longer sounds so much like a super saint.
Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job Is Job a Good Example of Grieving?
He unleashes a spirit of anguish that threatens to contradict his earlier resolve. As the dialogue progresses, Job expresses both anger (18:4) and despair (6:26). “Grief is an almost unavoidable consequence of bereavement, maltreatment, or pain.”19 Is Job, then, a positive or negative example of grieving? Neither, really. Job is a realistic example of grieving by one of the godliest men in Old Testament history. This is what grief looks like, sometimes even for spiritually mature saints, because even spiritually mature saints are human.
Andersen, 101, summarizes: “The grammar is difficult, almost to the point of incoherence. Translators spoil the art by making it smooth. These features, which present themselves as difficulties to the purist, probably preserve the intentional effects of the author, and are not to be blamed on later deterioration in the text.”
Do not underestimate the severity of the emotional pain that some people experience. The severity of the pain is usually not understood by those who haven’t experienced it.
3. As we will see as we develop the rest of chapter 3, Job is going to continually ask God, why? why? why? This is the question hunting people want answered. Guess what- Job never does get an answer. The better question for hurting people to ask is, who? Who allowed this in my life? God did. And as painfully difficult as it may be we must learnt to trust God. Did God make this right in Job’s life in the end? Will God always make things right in the end for those that love Him? The hard part is trusting in the some times mysterious ways of God in the middle. God is wise enough, God is powerful enough to trust even when we don’t know the whys.
Why Did I Live?
Why Did I Live?
A. His persistent question
A. His persistent question
Why died I not from the womb? Why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly?
There is a progression to Job’s despair. First Job wished that the day of his birth and his conception had been eradicated from the creative event. Now Job wishes that he could have expired in his mother’s womb. Well, if the idea of casting darkness on the day of his birth is too much of an impossibility, then at least why didn’t he die prematurely?
Job asks this in the form of a rhetorical question, and he does not get an answer. Even at the end of the book when God finally speaks to Job, God did not give him the answer he was looking for.
The New American Commentary: Job 3. Longing for Death (3:11–19)
In this question are wrapped up all the questions of all sufferers throughout the ages. “Why me?”
If I would have just died prematurely then I could have skipped all of this suffering.
Why did the knees prevent me? Or why the breasts that I should suck?
The word “prevent” is better translated as “to receive.” It has the idea of greeting something or someone, or of coming into possession of something.
So Job is asking why did the knees greet me, or receive me?
The knees may be referring to the mother’s knees, and describing the process of child birth. Or they may be a depiction of the father joyfully accepting his new born son and holding him on his knees.
In the second line, Job is making a reference to one of the first acts of joy and love expressed by a mother to her newborn- nursing a brand new baby.
Both of these acts greeting on the knee, and nursing express love and acceptance and joy of this new little one.
So Job is wishing that if could not simply die in his mother’s womb, then upon his birth that his mother and his father would reject him utterly and leave him for dead.
Or as an hidden untimely birth I had not been; As infants which never saw light.
Returning to the concept of a miscarriage, Job wishes to be hidden as one of the infants who never saw the light. Where does one “hide” a baby who has been miscarried? In the grave. This is another way Job uses imagery and parallelism to express the utter emotional depth of his anguish.
B. His problems erased
B. His problems erased
For now should I have lain still and been quiet, I should have slept: then had I been at rest,
The reason Job longs for death is so he can lay down and be still and quiet, so he can sleep and be at rest. Death would have meant a peaceful existence.
The New American Commentary: Job 3. Longing for Death (3:11–19)
To the once-noble man from Uz—weary with grief, spent from scratching his sores, and completely befuddled with why God should allow these tragedies to happen to a “blameless and upright” man—such alternatives were welcome indeed.
With kings and counsellers of the earth, Which built desolate places for themselves; Or with princes that had gold, Who filled their houses with silver:
To Job death is a great equalizer. Even if he would have been a stillborn, in death he would have been in the company of kings and counsellers, and princes.
There the wicked cease from troubling; And there the weary be at rest. There the prisoners rest together; They hear not the voice of the oppressor. The small and great are there; And the servant is free from his master.
To Job, Sheol or the grave was a place where all earth-bound evils ceased. In Sheol the wicked no longer trouble you, the weary can finally find rest.
The prisoners- those conscripted into forced labor, find a rest from their toil. The taskmaster’s voice is silenced.
The same restful conditions apply to both the small and the great, servant or master, all find and end to turmoil. This is exactly what Job longs for- an end to his earthly suffering. Job does not care how he gets there, weather the day of his birth is removed from existence, or he is miscarried in the womb, he just wants his trouble to end and to be at peace.
Illustration:
Wow, Pastor Jon how is it that Job got this bad? He is seriously messed up right now.
Job’s possible appearance slide.
a) Sores on every part of his body (2:7b)
Job 2:7 Satan...smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown.
b) Painful sores that would scab, crack, and ooze (7:5)
Job 7:5 My skin is broken, and become loathsome.
c) Infection (7:5)
Job 7:5 My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust;
d) Incessant itching
Job 2:8 And he took him a potsherd to scrape himself withal
e) Insomnia (7:4)
Job 7:4 When I lie down, I say, When shall I arise, and the night be gone? And I am full of tossings to and fro unto the dawning of the day.
f) Dis-figuration (2:12)
Job 2:12 And when they lifted up their eyes afar off, and knew him not
g) High fever with chills (30:30)
Job 30:30 my bones are burned with heat.
h) Darkening and shriveling of skin (30:30)
Job 30:30 My skin is black upon me,
i) Bad breath (19:17)
Job 19:17 KJV 1900 My breath is strange to my wife,
j) Extreme weight loss (19:19-20; 33:21)
Job 19:19–20 My bone cleaveth to my skin and to my flesh
Job 33:21 His flesh is consumed away, that it cannot be seen; And his bones that were not seen stick out.
On top of all of this, he has lost all his possessions, his home, his children. All that was left for him was his wife, and she is tempting Job to sin- to curse God and die.
He is sitting alone as an outcast in the ashes of the city dump- like a leper, lower than the worst members of society. And worst of all he has lost the favor of his God. God is seemingly against Job, he has been walled of from the blessings of God and Job has no idea why. Job is innocent, yet he still suffers.
Can you being to understand why Job would long for death? Why he would wish that the day of his birth and the night of his conception would be eradicated from the creation event, or failing that- that he would have died at birth. All Job can think about at this point of his suffering is to be finally at peace, at rest- and the only option Job can see that would provide him with that kind of rest is the grave.
Refutation:
What do we do with Job’s statements about the afterlife? There is no thought given to a heaven or a hell that we might discuss today? Job simply speaks about Sheol, or the place of the dead. What doe we do with that?
It is best to see Job as an example of progressive revelation.
a) Job and his friends do not have the more complete picture of heaven and hell that we currently have, but what they do say seems generally consistent with it.
b) His statements in vs 17-19 suggest that he thinks people continue to exist, but that the evil cannot cause trouble and that the oppressed are now free.
c) As Anderson explains: “In spite of the vagueness with which the living conditions of Sheol are described, the continuation of conscious personal existence and identity after death is clearly believed. The book knows nothing about the heaven of bliss or the hell of torment in later eschatology, but there is never a thought that death means extinction. In fact, Job provides a long list of the denizens of Sheol, ranging from those who had achieved the highest eminence ... to those who had achieved nothing. ... He envies them all, for nothing happens in the grave.”
Application:
How might a modern day Christian express the sentiments that Job is describing?
I think if Job had the fullness of the NT revelation as we do, he would have had a passionate desire for the rapture, the second coming, and the eternal state to happen.
Is there anything wrong with wanting the rapture to happen? On the surface- no. It may be that a believer has a genuine desire to be with the Lord.
For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better:
On the other hand there are those people that do not want the rapture to occur at this very moment- the young couple who are about to be married and start a new life together) This life does have things to enjoy and most people have a desire to live. And therein lies the problem. Job did not have to go to the grave because of his intense desire to be with the Lord, rather he wanted an end of all of the negative associated with his situation- the pain, the shame, and the silence of God.
So such desires may actually reflect a desire to be free from pain outside of the will of God for you at that time.
It may be God’s will for you to live in pain for the time being. And a desire to be free from that pain may masquerade itself as a desire to be free from the will of God for your life.
Saying, Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me: nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.
And the Lord said unto him, Who hath made man’s mouth? or who maketh the dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? have not I the Lord?
Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.
Nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful for you.
That your rejoicing may be more abundant in Jesus Christ for me by my coming to you again.
The book of Job fleshes out the value of transparency before God.
Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job Is Job a Good Example of Grieving?
“Job is determined to be absolutely honest with God. Job tells God everything, every fear and every doubt.… God prefers we speak with him honestly, even in our moments of deepest gloom, than that we mouth innocuous clichés far removed from reality.”
God is not impresses with our “spirituality” if we are just making ourselves say and pray all the right things. While all along we are just ignoring or pretending away the questions, doubts, confusion, and pain. There is virtue and healing in honesty with God.
Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job Is Job a Good Example of Grieving?
God does not blame us if in our suffering we frankly vent our despair and confess our loss of hope, our sense of futility, our lamentations about life itself.… Of course, it is possible in grief and misery to say the wrong things, to say blasphemous things.… But within certain boundaries, it is far better to be frank about our grief, candid in our despair, honest with our questions, than to suppress them and wear a public front of puffy piety. Whatever “resolution” the Book of Job provides turns on Job’s questions and God’s responses. Without the questions, there would have been no responses.
What do we call saying one thing and thinking or feeling something quite differently? We call it hypocrisy.
He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.
Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job Is Job a Good Example of Grieving?
Hypocrisy masquerades in many guises. You may think it a noble thing not to want to offend God with your faltering faith, nagging doubts, or disturbing questions. So you put on a false bold front, say and pray all the right spiritual things, and teach your soul to bite its lip. But hypocrisy in any form is not noble or helpful.
There is a wondrous remedy in knowing that you can set aside all of you pretenses and bare openly you soul before God. How foolish to do anything else! God already knows your heart. He has read you spiritual MRI- he knows every thought and doubt, every disgruntlement and question. Only when we are honest with ourselves and the Lord can He begin to minister to our diseased hearts and heal whatever He finds there, whether pain or bitterness, doubt or anger, confusion or lingering questions.
Imagine you go to the doctor with intense internal pain, and as you are sitting there on the exam room table he asks you if everything is OK. And even though you are in agony on the inside you cross your arms and say, “everything is fine.”
Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job Is Job a Good Example of Grieving?
The divine Physician cannot treat us if we pretend everything is fine and refuse to open up to Him. Hypocrisy hinders healing and denial is therapy resistant.
So how about you? Do you feel walled off from God’s blessing in your life? Do you have a desire to just get away from the pain- even if it means living outside of the will of God? Are you being open and honest with God and others? Or are you living in some for of hypocrisy?
God has a remedy for every pain and hurt- He is the One that we must put our trust in.
III. Why Can’t I Just Die?
III. Why Can’t I Just Die?
A. What Job longs for
A. What Job longs for
Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, And life unto the bitter in soul;
Wherefore or Why is light given to the one in misery, and life to the bitter in soul?
Job continues his progression. First, why can’t the day of my birth be erased, then why can’t I die prematurely in the womb, and now if those things can’t be true- why can’t I die soon?
Which long for death, but it cometh not; And dig for it more than for hid treasures; Which rejoice exceedingly, And are glad, when they can find the grave?
The one’s in misery and in bitterness of soul now long for death. They search for it as one would dig for hidden treasure. Normally in wisdom literature- wisdom, not death, is compared to treasure.
How much better is it to get wisdom than gold! And to get understanding rather to be chosen than silver!
For wisdom is better than rubies; And all the things that may be desired are not to be compared to it.
But here all Job wants is rest from his misery. So he gladly exchanges treasure for death. While, most would spend their efforts and time looking for treasure Job looks for death. While most would shout and rejoice upon finding choice rubies, Job would rejoice upon finding his grave.
This is what Job longs for at the moment- and end to his earthly suffering and pain.
B. What Job fears
B. What Job fears
Why is light given to a man whose way is hid, And whom God hath hedged in?
From our introduction, Job here is lamenting above all else the fact that God has hedged or walled him off from His favor or blessing. It appears to Job that God has hidden his way (obscured any possible way out of his suffering), and has walled him off from the favor or help he desires. This Job grieves most of all. God has seeming turned against Job, and Job has no idea why.
For my sighing cometh before I eat, And my roarings are poured out like the waters.
Literally Job has exchanged his daily food (bread) for sighing, and has exchanged his daily water for groanings.
You have heard the phrase, “You are what you eat.” If Job feeds on sighs and drinks groanings, then his life becomes nothing but one mass of trouble and bitterness.
For the thing which I greatly feared is come upon me, And that which I was afraid of is come unto me.
Job feared evil befalling his household (loosing God’s favor) and took all necessary steps to prevent it (note the reason he sacrificed for his children.). But it happened, and he had no idea why.
Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job Why Can’t I Just Die? (Job 3:20–26)
Perhaps Job is saying that the one thing he dreaded ever happening—the loss of God’s blessing and favor—and which he took pains to avert, even for his own children (1:5), has now happened; and what is worse, “he has no idea why.”
I was not in safety, neither had I rest, neither was I quiet; Yet trouble came.
Andersen, 110, captures Job’s mood at this point quite well in his translation of vs 26. Each line of the verse “stabs like a knife:”
“I cannot relax! And I cannot settle! And I cannot rest! And agitation keeps coming back!”
Illustration:
A few years ago dad and I decided to build the kids a new play set. And for some reason we decided to do it in November. He was still in Chippewa Falls at the time, so he had to dive down for the weekend and we were determined to get it done. I went and rented one of those two person post hole diggers to drill the 6 posts into the ground for the foundation. It was cold and windy and miserable the day we started drilling the posts. At the start I was excited to get the project done, to do a good job. I figured it would only take a couple of hours to get the holes drilled. Little did I know- it took the entire day to drill just four holes. Now our soil is mostly gravel and rock so it was very slow going. We would have to stop constantly to clear large rocks away, and every so often you would have to lift the auger free of the hole to clear the dirt. The digger was by itself very heavy, but add the weight of dirt and rock and gravel and it was an intense effort. Now multiple that by one hundred. Because it seemed like we had to lift that thing out of the hole a hundred times. Mid way through your fore arms are burning, your back is aching, your lungs are strained, but you still have more holes to dig. By the time we reached the last hole, we could have cared less if the holes were straight, or square, or deep enough- we just wanted to be done. We had had enough. We were completely spent and all we could think about was getting cleaned up and taking a rest.
That is were Job is right now. He is done, he has had it, the agony is too much to bear and all he wants is to rest. Except he can’t. “I cannot relax! And I cannot settle! And I cannot rest! And agitation keeps coming back!” The only thing Job now longs for is the grave to at last give him some peace.
Refutation:
Was Job Suicidal?
Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job Was Job Suicidal?
No one should conclude that Job 3 suggests or condones suicidal tendencies. Job was not suicidal. He never contemplated taking his own life. Suicide was not an option. The closest brush with suicide in the story was his wife’s suggestion that he “curse God and die”—that is, commit a willful act of blasphemy to provoke God’s instantaneous judgment. Job recoiled in horror at this suggestion from his would-be “enabler” (2:9–10).
Suicide has a number of secondary reasons. Job’s secondary reasons were his loss of possessions, family, status in the community, and his health.
However, there is always one primary reason for suicide and it is theological: a failure to trust God to manage my life.
The primary and secondary influences taken together will produce a suicidal person.
Suicide results from a combination of factors and a failure to recognize the Lord’s role is the foundational one since we know he will not allow a believer to be tempted beyond what he can bear.
Therefore we can always help a person with the theological aspect of their desire to commit suicide.
Beyond Suffering: Discovering the Message of Job Was Job Suicidal?
Even amid torturous grief and bodily pain, Job was not suicidal but submissive to the will and timing of a sovereign God. In despair over what he assumed was incurable misery, Job wanted God to kill him outright (see 6:8–10). As it turned out, his assumption was shortsighted and entirely mistaken. “Despair is only for those who see the end beyond all doubt.” Job did not, and neither do we. Yet even Job’s “death wish” was just that—a wish, a request, a prayer ultimately resigned to the wishes and purposes of the Lord of life.
Application:
Even in Job’s darkest hour he never stops viewing God as the answer to his problems.
He does curse his own life, but he never curses God, nor does he take his own fate into his hands.
He does mourn the loss of the favor of God, but at least he continues to talk.
People that stop talking to God because of their pain are in serous trouble.
If I am praying and searching God’s word, I still view him as the answer to the problem. Not praying is another way of not submitting to God or distrusting him because he will not answer in the way I wish.
Even in our darkest hour we must continue to see God as the solution to my problems. We must continue to trust Him even though we don’t know the why’s of our situation. Be honest and sincere with God, tell Him your pains and your sorrow. Ask God to remove your pain- to take your cup away from you, but always be willing to submit to God’s ultimate plan- nevertheless, not my will but yours be done.