Job 25:4 How then can man be justified with God? or how can he be clean that is born of a woman? I. THE ALL-IMPORTANT QUESTION WHICH OUR TEXT PROPOSES. "How can man be justified with God?" It is a matter of some consequence to stand well with our brethren, to bear what is called a good character before our fellow men; but to stand right with God is a point on which our heaven depends. II. THE DIFFICULTIES IT SUGGESTS. 1. The extreme holiness of God. The text says that there is not in any of the shining orbs of heaven, there is not to God the beauty that we see. So it is also with respect to moral excellency and spiritual perfection. Characters that we call shining actions that we count pure, exalted, are not in His eyes what they are in ours. In this Book it is said God "chargeth His angels with folly," and "the heavens are not clean in His sight." How can man be justified before that God who is so pure, so holy, so requiring — who sees dimness in the moon, imperfection in the stars, folly in His saints? 2. Then another difficulty is the extreme unholiness of man, his miserable baseness and corruption. Man is here called a worm. It is the very proverb in our lips for weakness and for helplessness; a thing that every foot may crush. But look at the place — the dunghill — where the worm is found. Look at its vile habits and propensities. It is the emblem of spiritual baseness and corruption. Man is spiritually vile in the sight of the most holy God. Put the two statements of the text together. God so holy that the very moon and stars have no glory in His eyes. Man so polluted that the filthy worm which crawls upon the dunghill is considered a just emblem of his case and character. Then how can man be justified with God? III. THE ONLY WAY IN WHICH SO DIFFICULT A QUESTION CAN BE ANSWERED. The Gospel supplies it. In Christ alone is the question entirely satisfied. The answer is ready — by coming unto Jesus; by casting the whole soul upon the Saviour's merits; by ceasing from that hopeless work of endeavouring "to establish our own righteousness," and by submitting ourselves unfeignedly to that which Christ hath wrought for us. Are we doing this? Are we making Christ the "Lord our Righteousness," by looking only unto Him for recommendation in the sight of God? (A. Roberts, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: How then can man be justified with God? or how can he be clean that is born of a woman?WEB: How then can man be just with God? Or how can he who is born of a woman be clean? |
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