The Lord’s First Speech, Part 2: Nature, Red in Tooth and Claw? [Job 38:39-40:5]

[Pray]

The American poet Robert Frost described in one of his poems the hideous sight of a bloated spider and a dead moth, perched on a beautiful flower. He meditates on this strange state of beauty and ugliness and asks what caused it. He said is this design of darkness to appall? It’s a good question. By what design or plan is the world governed??? Is it even governed at all?

Is the counsel of God a good counsel? Do we live in a well run world? Or is it a design of darkness to appall? Or is it just chaos? These questions lie behind the whole of God’s first speech in Job.

So far as Job can perceive it, the purpose of the Almighty is a terrible, even an appalling purpose. In this first speech God begins his gracious work of bringing Job to repentance about the words he has spoken, which have shrouded the good purposes of God in darkness and made it impossible for himself, or for others, to see in creation the goodness of God.

Last week we looked at the first half of God’s speech with the focus on the inanimate aspect of creation. We now move to the second half of the speech. I put in your bulletins the outline of the first half of the speech and inserted the second half which starts on (II) God’s counsel is revealed in the animals and birds.

Before we immerse ourselves in this wonderful poetry and lose ourselves among this myriad of creatures, it is worth pausing to note two motifs [reoccurring theme] about this second half of the speech.

First, and perhaps most obvious, what God describes here is deeply wild. These creatures were not expected to be found on Job’s farm. They represent animals and birds that are not tame, not domesticated, not under human control; they are “outside man’s care and control.” Here is a tour of the part of the created order that lies outside the limits of the world that is domesticated and ordered by human beings.

They will help answer the question, how do you and I respond when the wild world breaks into the farm, when the disorder and chaos of a dark world invades our ordered world and makes mincemeat of our plans and hopes? Come outside the farm, says the Lord to Job, and have a thoughtful tour of the wild world outside.

The second motif is that of life and death. All the descriptions here live between the polarities of birth, sustenance, and life on the one hand and death and decay on the other. There is a particular emphasis on the vulnerable and defenseless young—whether it be the young lions (38:39), the young ravens (38:41), the young goats (39:4), the ostrich eggs and young (39:14–16), or the young eagles (39:30). And as we shall see, the two poles are tied in to one another; it is not possible to conceive of life as we know it with one of these but not the other. i.e. life and death go hand in hand.

God’s Counsel Is Revealed in the Animals and Birds (38:39–39:30)

Predator and Prey in the Wild (38:39–41)

Can you hunt the prey for the lion,

or satisfy the appetite of the young lions,

when they crouch in their dens

or lie in wait in their thicket?

Who provides for the raven its prey,

when its young ones cry to God for help,

and wander about for lack of food? (vv. 39–41)

Picture a nature program on TV. First, there is a shot of lion cubs. They look sweet, soft, beautiful, even cuddly. I remember when the boys were little there was a circus that came through and they had these lion cubs you could pet and get your picture with, they were cute…but give them a few months to grow and you wouldn’t be petting them.

But in this nature program there are these sweet lion cubs and they’re hungry…if they are not fed they will starve. Next there is a shot of young ravens calling out for food; they too will die if they are not fed. Our hearts go out to these defenseless little creatures. Also in the scene there are some shots of families of beautiful animals, perhaps antelope, zebras, etc. Young and parent animals grazing happily together; we admire their beauty and grace.

But then we see the lioness lying in wait, stalking her prey. At the critical moment the lioness chases with unbeatable speed, separates one of the animals from the family, and tears it apart with ruthless power. There is blood and flesh everywhere. The final shot shows the lion cubs satisfied with plenty of meat, and then afterward vultures and ravens feed on the abundant leftovers (ravens, like vultures, do not kill their prey but feed on prey killed by others).

How do we feel about a sequence like that? It is hard to feel either pleasure or distaste. There is here a tension that cannot be reconciled in a world of food chains, of predators and prey. If the beauty of the deer is to be unspoiled, the beauty of the lions and the helplessness of the raven chicks will end in starvation and death.

The survival of the one must be at the cost of the other. In our world if the lion were to lie down with the lamb, there would be a lot of starving lion cubs. We live in a world in which predator or prey are the only alternatives.

We may be shocked, but God says (by implication) to Job that he himself is the one who “hunts the prey for the lion,” who “satisfies the appetite” of the lion cubs (v. 39), and who “provides for the [young] ravens” the “prey” they need to live (v. 41). Psalm 147 says the same: “He gives to the beasts their food, and to the young ravens that cry” (Psalm 147:9). Indeed, when the deer (or whatever) is torn limb from limb, this is an answer to prayer, for the young ravens “cry to God for help” (Job 38:41). Psalm 104 echoes this: “The young lions roar for their prey, seeking their food from God” (Psalm 104:21).

Is it possible that in the counsel of God, this age is so ordered that suffering for some is necessary for the survival of others?

Is this process of predator and prey also a pointer to a deeper truth, perhaps even the truth of redemptive suffering, that the day will come when the suffering of one innocent man will be God’s means to bring life to a whole redeemed humanity? sacrifice of innocence to sustain life. If we look close enough we’ll see that nature often screams gospel truth as well.

God’s Time for Life in the Wild (39:1–4)

Do you know when the mountain goats give birth?

Do you observe the calving of the does?

Can you number the months that they fulfill,

and do you know the time when they give birth,

when they crouch, bring forth their offspring,

and are delivered of their young?

Their young ones become strong; they grow up in the open;

they go out and do not return to them. (vv. 1–4)

The second cameo directs Job to the questions of times and of existence. God invites him to think about a particular “time,” a significant time, a time when life begins. He is asked “when” (v. 1a) the shy, elusive mother goat gives birth, to “number the months” (v. 2a) of her pregnancy, to “know the time” (v. 2b) when she gives birth, “when” (v. 3) she crouches in labor and is delivered of her calves. Here is a time that is beyond Job’s knowledge, a time that is months of waiting, then a crisis of pain, and finally the fulfillment of joy and new life. What is more, this new life will grow to strength, independence “in the open,” and will soon leave the mother’s care to be cared for in the wild by God’s generous hand alone (v. 4).

The God who brings “the time of trouble” (38:23) also brings the time of birth and life. As “the Preacher” (Ecclesiastes 1:1) will say, “For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die …” (Ecclesiastes 3:1–8). One of the concerns Job has voiced has been God’s mishandling of times. Human beings are given “days like the days of a hired hand … months of emptiness, and nights of misery” (7:1–3). Indeed “every morning … every moment” God watches and visits misery on Job (7:18). The “set time” for vindication that Job longs for never seems to come (14:13). If only God were the righteous Lord of time!

In reply God says he is. He is the one who knows, not only with head knowledge but with personal caring oversight, “when the mountain goats give birth” (v. 1); he observes the calving, not watching with the dispassionate eye of a mere observer or student, but watching and caring in love as she calves. He has “numbered the months” of pregnancy, not merely counting, but loving and watching (v. 2). These “shy elusive creatures of the mountains” are the objects of his tender care; their times are in his hands.

The problem with time is the waiting. As every human mother who has been granted a safe birth knows, there is a waiting for conception, there is waiting and hoping during pregnancy, there are all manner of pains in labor, but in the end there is life and joy.

If this is true for mountain goats that God watches with love and care, how much more is it true for human beings in pain struggling to remain believers.

As on commentator put it “The Lord’s veiled answer” to Job “is that the rhythm of times which governs the perilous birth cycles of shy creatures also operates for human beings. If Job does not know the function of regular times in the natural cycle of things, he can scarcely appreciate the implications of proposing a time out of time when a mortal would return from the dead for personal vindication.”

And yet the time would come when days, months, and years of hatred and evil, indeed the apparent ultimate victory of that evil, will be reversed in one glorious morning of new life when Jesus would burst out of the grave. A time of waiting, pain and suffering, but then ultimate joy in life. Again gospel truth in creation. Job needs to learn—and we need to learn—to entrust ourselves to the righteous Lord of time.

Freedom and Provision in the Wild (39:5–8)

Who has let the wild donkey go free?

Who has loosed the bonds of the swift donkey,

to whom I have given the arid plain for his home

and the salt land for his dwelling place?

He scorns the tumult of the city;

he hears not the shouts of the driver.

He ranges the mountains as his pasture,

and he searches after every green thing. (vv. 5–8)

The third cameo shifts the focus onto wild freedom. Here is a “wild donkey” who has been set “free,” whose “bonds” have been “loosed” and who can run “free” and “swift” (v. 5), who lives in “the arid plain … the salt land” (v. 6), perhaps that dead region south of the Dead Sea. Job is to picture him mocking at his poor domesticated relations as they are whipped and driven by cruel drivers in the hubbub of the city (v. 7); by contrast, he roams free and “ranges the mountains” looking for food—“every green thing” (v. 8).

He has this strange, wild, fast, freedom. And yet—and this is the point—this freedom is the precise gift of God. It is God who has “let the wild donkey go free” and “loosed” his “bonds” (v. 5); it is God who has “given” him the dry salty land as his “dwelling place” (v. 6). He is “free” and “wild” (v. 5); he lives in a deeply inhospitable place, a place of death rather than life.

And yet his freedom and his survival do not in any way compromise the absolute providential control of God over all of life; rather they express the wild wonder of God’s providence right to the margins of life. There is not one inch of strange wildness that lies outside the counsel of God.

Power and Danger from the Wild (39:9–12)

Is the wild ox willing to serve you?

Will he spend the night at your manger?

Can you bind him in the furrow with ropes,

or will he harrow the valleys after you?

Will you depend on him because his strength is great,

and will you leave to him your labor?

Do you have faith in him that he will return your grain

and gather it to your threshing floor? (vv. 9–12)

This fourth cameo speaks of dangerous power. The “wild ox” (v. 9) was a two-horned creature, some bulls more than six feet across at the shoulders, and a legendary terror. In Psalm 22 David puts being rescued “from the horns of the wild oxen” alongside being saved “from the mouth of the lion” (Psalm 22:21). When Balaam needs to speak forcefully about how God fights with overwhelming power for Israel, he says that God “is for them like the horns of the wild OX” (Numbers 23:22; 24:8).

There is therefore a wild irony in this description. “Why not try this?” God asks the farmer Job. “Go out into the wild and find a wild ox. Walk up to it, pat its head, let it eat some food out of your hand, talk to it, be an ‘ox-whisperer,’ lead it quietly back to the farm to feed overnight at your feeding trough. Then watch as it bows its meek head to let you put a harness on it and willingly trots with its docile strength ‘after you’ (that is, he is subservient to you) through the fields.

In fact it is so docile you can entrust it to pull safely after the youngest farmhand. And you know you can trust it to do the job.” The whole scenario is absurd! Job knows perfectly well that even to try it would be suicidal. The most stupid farmer in the world knows better than to seek to domesticate this fierce creature. “This challenge to domesticate and humanize the wild ox anticipates Yahweh’s challenge for Job to control Behemoth and Leviathan.”

God is saying to Job, “You know there is some wild stuff out there, beyond your control, outside the farm, and some of it is deeply dangerous.” It would be wonderful to be able to harness the strength of the wild ox in the service of agriculture; here is a power to be envied and desired.

But—and this is the point—it will take a wisdom and counsel wider and deeper than Job’s to achieve this. And by implication such counsel lies with God alone. Job is to bow before the wisdom that can take the wild dangerous power of the wild ox and subdue it to his own purposes.

This pictures the wisdom of God that use the death of Jesus to defeat the one who has the power of death the devil (Hebrews 2:14). Only God has the power to do that.

Foolish Wonder in the Wild (39:13–18)

The wings of the ostrich wave proudly,

but are they the pinions and plumage of love?

For she leaves her eggs to the earth

and lets them be warmed on the ground,

forgetting that a foot may crush them

and that the wild beast may trample them.

She deals cruelly with her young, as if they were not hers;

though her labor be in vain, yet she has no fear,

because God has made her forget wisdom

and given her no share in understanding.

When she rouses herself to flee,

she laughs at the horse and his rider. (vv. 13–18)

In some ways the fifth little portrait is the odd one out. There are no rhetorical questions (the translation of verse 13b is very uncertain), God refers to himself in the third person (v. 17a), and the ostrich is the only creature portrayed in a mainly negative light.

Here is a creature with “wings,” but it cannot fly (v. 13a), a creature with the reputation of leaving her new-laid eggs vulnerable and defenseless on the warm ground (v. 14), not caring about the danger of their being trampled upon (v. 15)—perhaps by a “wild beast” (v. 15) like the lion, the mountain goat, the wild donkey, or the wild ox in the previous cameos. Although she has gone through pregnancy, labor, and the laying of the “eggs” (v. 14), she doesn’t seem to care if “her labor be in vain” (v. 16).

Indeed, she is a very stupid creature (v. 17)! And the reason she is so stupid is that God, in his sovereign counsel, “has made her forget wisdom” (that is, he has not endowed her with wisdom) and has chosen not to give her the expected share of common sense!

Here is a creature whom God has created stupid! And yet—and here is the surprising punch line—although she flaps her wings without being able to fly, she can run so fast that even a horse spurred on by a rider cannot catch her (v. 18)! God has made a creature with an amazing burst of speed and a comical lack of common sense.

I am not sure there is meant to be a precise point for Job to learn except that there is in the universe much unintelligible strangeness and paradox. If there is a strange paradox with the ostrich, how much more ought Job to admit that there may be stranger and more paradoxical matters in the way the world is ran. And who knows, God may make it clear in the end.

When Jesus walked this earth with extraordinary and surprising abilities to heal, to walk on water, to raise the dead—abilities no one would have guessed when they looked at his very ordinary appearance (Isaiah 53:2b)—and yet ended his life being treated as if he was an utter fool. And yet in this mysterious paradox lies the key to the universe.

Terror from the Wild (39:19–25)

Do you give the horse his might?

Do you clothe his neck with a mane?

Do you make him leap like the locust?

His majestic snorting is terrifying.

He paws in the valley and exults in his strength;

he goes out to meet the weapons.

He laughs at fear and is not dismayed;

he does not turn back from the sword.

Upon him rattle the quiver,

the flashing spear, and the javelin.

With fierceness and rage he swallows the ground;

he cannot stand still at the sound of the trumpet.

When the trumpet sounds, he says “Aha!”

He smells the battle from afar,

the thunder of the captains, and the shouting. (vv. 19–25)

It is important for us to feel the grim, dark terror of this portrait of the warhorse. It is “an eerie and haunting picture.” We begin with “his might” (v. 19a); he is a massively powerful creature. For many centuries a warhorse, whether carrying a warrior rider or pulling a chariot, was the epitome of ultimate power; it was the nuclear weapon of most past centuries.

We must remove from our minds all pictures of domestic or tameness. His neck is clothed “with a mane” (v. 19b). The word “mane” is normally derived from the root “to thunder”; his mane speaks of almost divine power. He can “leap” and jump with astonishing power; picture a “locust” scaled up many times (v. 20a)!

When he snorts in anger, there is a dark majesty that “is terrifying” (v. 20), giving to those watching a foretaste of the terror that comes from being in the presence of death and the God who can send body and soul into Hell. The word “majestic” is associated with God (v. 20). “O LORD my God, you are very great! You are clothed with splendor and majesty” (Psalm 104:1). The word “terrifying” is associated with God in his anger, not least by Job himself (Job 39:20; e.g., 9:34, “let not dread of him terrify me”; 13:21, “let not dread of you terrify me”). Here is a dark, dangerous, Godlike creature. Those familiar with J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings might think of the Dark Riders.

Then in verse 21 we see him on the verge of battle, ready to charge, pawing the ground eagerly with his front feet, hyper-confident in his strength, itching to be let loose against the weapons of the enemy. He has no fear and experiences no terror or dismay (v. 22a); you will not see him fleeing from “the sword” of the enemy (v. 22b). Picture him as he charges, with “the quiver” rattling against his flanks, “the flashing spear” and “javelin” against his side (v. 23). Feel the power of his “fierceness and rage” as he metaphorically eats up the ground in his charge (v. 24a). When “the trumpet sounds” for war, you cannot hold him back (v. 24b), for he cries “Aha!” with joy that now, at last, he can do what he was created for, which is to bring death and destruction (v. 25).

Here is a quasi-divine, supernatural, eerie, terrifying creature whose business is killing, who loves nothing more than the shrieks of battle. And yet—and we ought to be getting used to this by now—there is one who has given him his might (v. 19a), clothed him with his warlike “mane” (v. 19b), and has given him the nature and strength to “leap like the locust” (v. 20).

Here, as with the wild ox, is a creature who is a threat to Job, who symbolizes the dangers and the destruction experienced by Job. Perhaps the Sabeans and the Chaldeans had ridden upon just such warhorses when they devastated Job’s life (1:15, 17).

And yet this warhorse has a Master; there is one to whom it owes its strength, its nature, and its victories. And therefore there is one to whom it must one day give an account and who is sovereign over all its warlike acts. Job cannot hope to overcome this ultimate weapon of war; he must bow and entrust himself to the only one who can.

Predator and Prey in the Wild (39:26–30)

Is it by your understanding that the hawk soars

and spreads his wings toward the south?

Is it at your command that the eagle mounts up

and makes his nest on high?

On the rock he dwells and makes his home,

on the rocky crag and stronghold.

From there he spies out the prey;

his eyes behold it from far away.

His young ones suck up blood,

and where the slain are, there is he. (vv. 26–30)

In our final cameo we return to the food chain, to predators and to prey, with a truly awful (in the proper sense) description of birds of prey. We see “the hawk” (perhaps sparrow hawk, falcon, or kestrel) soaring into the sky and migrating to “the south” in the autumn (v. 26) and then “the eagle” mounting up (literally, on eagles’ wings) to his eyrie high on an inaccessible cliff face (v. 27). We see him there, making his home “on the rocky crag and stronghold” (v. 28), a place utterly impregnable and invincible. As we read this description from the world of nature, we can’t help but think about how often the eagle has been used as a symbol for human empires.

But instead of admiring his beauty or the grace of his flight, our attention is fixed on what he does. From the great height he attains “he spies out the prey … from far away” (v. 29) with the legendary sharpness of eye that birds of prey have, perhaps seeing a field mouse hidden in the long grass of a field from many hundreds of feet above. Between verse 29 and verse 30 he has dived, pounced, carried his prey back to his perch, and torn it piece from piece for his young. The poetry spares us no detail. We are not told blandly that the young eagles eat their dinner; they “suck up blood,” and the nest is a place “where the slain are” (v. 30).

In case we were in any danger of forgetting, it is by the “understanding” (which includes plan and purpose) of God that all this happens and by his “command,” not by Job’s (vv. 26, 27). God does not permit predators to kill their prey; he commands them to do it! Verse 30 is a shocking end to the seven animal and bird cameos as we watch the young eagles around a dead body with blood dripping from their lips—and all at God’s “command” (v. 27).

The Lord’s defense of his “counsel” (38:2) is not like so many Christian celebrations of the wonders of creation, in which our calendar photos are carefully chosen to be beautiful, full of grace and majesty, showing no violence or death. Rather, the Lord gives Job a brutal, in-your-face portrait of death and danger, as well as of birth and life.

There is in the universe a great deal of death, violence, predators (both among animals and, metaphorically, humans), danger, and terror, he says. “You know that, Job. You know that all this is entwined in the world you know; you cannot take out the death and leave just life alone, for there would be no life without death.”

Any plan, any government of this world in which good is ultimately to triumph, must necessarily have within it a plan to overcome evil with good.

Job could not expect, we cannot expect, a shallow, trite, simple solution to the problem of evil. We must not be surprised if the counsel of God is inscrutable; we must not challenge his counsel with the arrogance of human claims to superhuman knowledge. This leads to the concluding challenge.

Concluding Challenge (40:1, 2)

And the LORD said to Job:

“Shall a faultfinder contend with the Almighty?

He who argues with God, let him answer it.” (vv. 1, 2)

With a fresh introduction for emphasis and calling for a response (“And the LORD said to Job …” [v. 1]), the concluding challenge is given. Job is “a faultfinder” (that is, one who finds fault with the way God runs the world); he is one who “argues with God,” a man who has spoken and thought above himself and has seriously suggested that he could have given some useful hints to help God run the world better (v. 2). Job has no secret sins of which he has not repented; the comforters were wrong about that. But he has spoken sins, sins of arrogance, of which he does need to repent. Elihu was right about that.

Amazingly and soberingly, to the man whose wealth God has confiscated, whose family God has taken away, whose greatness God has removed, and whose health God has ruined, God says in summary, “I have made no mistake. I know exactly what I am doing in your life and in every detail of the government of the world. My counsel is perfect; I have got nothing wrong.”

How will Job respond?

Job’s Response [Job 40:3-5]

Then Job answered the LORD and said:

“Behold, I am of small account; what shall I answer you?

I lay my hand on my mouth.

I have spoken once, and I will not answer;

twice, but I will proceed no further.” (vv. 3–5)

At the start the Lord challenged Job to give an answer (38:3); now he does. Or does he? He makes one admission and one declaration. The admission is that he is “of small account” (v. 4). This has the sense of being small or light and hence metaphorically unworthy relative to God.

Implicitly he is beginning to bow before the greatness of God, although he still focuses on himself. It will not be until after the second speech that he explicitly makes a confession about God. Still, it is a start.

After this admission he makes his declaration—namely, that he will make no further declarations. He puts his hand over his mouth as if to discipline his unruly tongue and lips and prevent them from saying anything else that they ought not to say. He admits he has already spoken “once … twice” (v. 5), which has the sense of “time and time again.” Now he will stop.

God sometimes wants to say that to us, as he did here to Job: “My dear Job, thank you for all your twenty chapters worth of letters telling me how to run the world and suggesting I could do it better than I am. A period of silence from you would now be most welcome.” And Job gets the message. He is utterly awed.

“Oh, yes, I’ll shut up. In the presence of the Creator of the world, I’ll shut my big mouth” (40:3–5). As Derek Kidner has written, God’s speech “cuts us down to size, treating us not as philosophers but as children—limited in mind, puny in body—whose first and fundamental grasp of truth must be to know the difference between our place and God’s, and to accept it.”

But we have still left with at least two loose ends.

First, does God’s speech answer Job’s question? The question is, “Why do I, Job, who do not deserve it, suffer as I do?” The answer so far seems to be, “Look around and you will understand that I the Lord am the creator and sustainer of life. I am in control of all the world, and therefore you may trust me with your life and your unanswered questions.” Is this an answer? Yes and no.

Of course, we know Job has always been a true worshipper. He has never denied that the Lord is God, really God, in control, supreme, sovereign, all-powerful. And yet somehow this first speech forces him to look around and admit that the Lord really is God, who made and who sustains all the created order. And as the Lord speaks this word to him, Job bows down deeper than ever, and somehow his questions may be left safely at the feet of this Almighty God.

And yet there is still a problem. And this is something Christians always face when we say, in the words of that classic Louis Armstrong song, “What a wonderful world.” The problem is this: yes, it is a wonderful world, and yet it is also a world touched by terrible evil.

It is a world where a cultured man may listen to Mozart while being commandant of an extermination camp at Auschwitz Germany during WWII

It’s a world where the beauty of sex may be twisted into infidelity and abuse

It’s a world where the wonder of man’s technological wizardry is used in the service of mass destruction.

And it is a world in which blameless Job suffers.

So the puzzle is this: what about the evil in the world? It is all very well for the Lord to be the good Creator of a good world. But what about the world we actually have to live in, a good world touched by darkness and death?

And this is the world we have to live in. It is the world Job lives in. It is the world any honest believer lives in. A world with pain, injustice, perplexity, and sorrow. What about that world, the real world? As we have seen, there have been hints of an answer in the first speech. There will be more in the second.

The other loose end concerns Job himself. Although Job has admitted something about himself, that he is “of small account,” he has not yet said anything—or at least nothing explicit—about God. “He has acknowledged his own insignificance, but has not exalted the Lord’s knowledge and wisdom.” He is therefore “only sobered but not humbled.”

And so, with these two loose ends on our hearts, we move to the Lord’s second and climactic speech. And my prayer is we would not just be sobered by the Lord’s words but humbled by them and therefore bow down before Him in adoration for His control. Bow before the God who is in control of this good yet very wild world.