Job Chapter 12



Job answers in the next chapters (12-14) and no doubt he repays them too much in their own coin. "And Job answered and said, No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you." Well they deserved that rebuke. "But I have understanding as well as you." Now there he was far more considerate than they; because he did not take the place of being so superior. "I have understanding as well as you" - "I am not inferior" - he does not say, "I am superior" - "I am not inferior to you." "Yea, who knoweth not such things as these?" They were only talking platitudes, moral platitudes, that every person of the slightest acquaintance with God already knew. They were not giving any light upon this very difficult question, how it was that a pious God-fearing man fell under such tremendous sorrow and affliction. They did not contribute one atom to that question. They merely let out all their bad thoughts and feelings, and consequently they were really heaping up wrath, if it had been the day of wrath; but it was the day of mercy, and God humbled them, by their being indebted to Job for His not taking them away by a stroke that would have been perfectly just. "I am as one mocked of his neighbour" - they talked about his mocking - "who calleth upon God, and he answereth him; the just upright man is laughed to scorn. He that is ready to slip with his feet is as a lamp despised in the thought of him that is at ease."

Now that phrase exactly gave the position; they were all at ease, these three men; there was nothing the matter with them; they had not, as Job, been taken up by God to allow the devil to do all the evil he could, and finally to allow that pious men should be the persons that would provoke them as they provoked Job. "He that is ready to slip with his feet" - that is what Job felt he was - "is as a lamp despised in the thought of him that is at ease" - because if he gives way - the lamp requires to be held steadily - if a man is slipping with his feet, what is the good of a lamp? It waves and waves down into the mud. But they were all at ease sitting in judgment upon him. "The tabernacles of robbers prosper, and they that provoke God are secure; into whose hand God bringeth abundantly." Nothing could more completely upset all their arguments.

There had been that great robber Nimrod - that man who first began to hunt beasts, and then to subdue men to his own purpose without God giving him authority. And yet God allowed it. Nimrod built great cities and became a great man. "The tabernacles," therefore, as Job says, "of robbers prosper, and they that provoke God are secure; into whose hand God bringeth abundantly." That is the present state of the earth, and any state of the earth since man fell is no adequate testimony of what God thinks of people. It is not bringing out His judgment of men yet. There may bean occasional dealing of God in a particular case, as an exception to His ordinary way of leaving things apparently to their own course. But that is just the reason why there is to be a judgment - because things have not been judged according to God, but they will be.

"But ask now the beasts" - there is a very triumphant thing. "Why," he says, "the very beasts know more than you, and prove more than all your speeches! Ask now the beasts, and they shall teach thee; and the fowls of the air, and they shall tell thee; or speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee; and the fishes of the sea" - who have got practically no voice, and do not know how to talk - "shall declare unto thee." That is, the whole creation - the lower creation of God upon the earth - is a proof that things are not yet according to God. Do they not prey upon one another; do not the great swallow up the small; and is not man the great executor of death upon beasts and birds and fishes, and everything, for his own gratification? I do not mean merely for food, but to please himself at all costs. In short, it is not merely what the Lord allows, but man makes it for his lusts, for his luxury, for everything except God. "Who knoweth not in all these that the hand of Jehovah hath wrought this?" He cannot deny that the Lord has left it in this way. "In whose hand is the soul of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind" - and yet He allows them to break forth in this lawless way. "Doth not the ear try words?" - do you think I cannot hear? - "and the mouth taste his meat?" - that I cannot discern my palate? "With the ancient is wisdom." There again he shows how little he was for condemning where there was wisdom. He allows that with the ancient there is wisdom - "and in length of days understanding" - because there is experience that nothing else can give.

"With him is wisdom," he says. He turns to God; for, after all, it is only in a little measure a man profits. "With him is wisdom and strength" - whereas as the ancient gets wiser he becomes weaker - "he hath counsel and understanding." "Behold, he breaketh down, and it cannot be built again; he shutteth up a man, and there can be no opening. Behold, he witholdeth the waters, and they dry up" - and what a wretched state the world is in when there is no water. But then in another way it comes, and He gives them too much water; "also he sendeth them out, and they overturn the earth." The waters carry everything before them. "With him is strength and wisdom: the deceived and the deceiver are his." That is the present state. "He leadeth counsellors away spoiled, and maketh the judges fools." Undoubtedly those counsellors and these judges were persons eminent for their knowledge, and, were supposed to be, for their wisdom. But there is always a limit in this world, and there is often a disappointment where you most rest.

"He looseth the bond of kings, and girdeth their loins with a girdle. He leadeth princes away spoiled, and overthroweth the mighty. He removeth away the speech of the trusty, and taketh away the understanding of the aged. He poureth contempt upon princes, and weakeneth the strength of the mighty. He discovereth deep things out of darkness, and bringeth out to light the shadow of death. He increaseth the nations, and destroyeth them; he enlargeth the nations, and straiteneth them again." There are all kinds of change. There is nothing therefore that shows the settled judgment of God. Everything among men is in a flux - a constant flow and change; and therefore nothing could be more foolish than the groundwork of the three friends in their attack on Job. "He taketh away the heart of the chief of the people of the earth, and causeth them to wander in a wilderness where there is no way. They grope in the dark without light, and he maketh them to stagger like a drunken man." And that is the way where people trust in men.