Job 22:1-4 Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said,… It is a matter of no small moment for a man to be rightly informed upon what terms and conditions he is to transact with God, and God with him, in the great business of his salvation. St. Paul tells us that eternal life is the "gift of God." Salvation proceeds wholly upon free gift, though damnation upon strict desert. Such is the extreme folly, or rather sottishness, of man's corrupt nature, that this does by no means satisfy him. When he comes to deal with God about spirituals, he appears and acts, not as a supplicant, but as a merchant; not as one who comes to be relieved, but to traffic. This great self-delusion, so prevalent upon most minds, is the thing here encountered in the text; which is a declaration of the impossibility of man's being profitable to God, or of his meriting of God, according to the true, proper, and strict sense of merit. Merit is a right to receive some good upon the score of some good done, together with an equivalence or parity of worth between the good to be received and the good done. I. IT IS IMPLIED THAT MEN ARE NATURALLY VERY PRONE TO ENTERTAIN AS OPINION OR PERSUASION, THAT THEY ARE ABLE TO MERIT OF GOD, OR BE PROFITABLE TO HIM. The truth of this will appear from two considerations. 1. It is natural for men to place too high a value both upon themselves and their own performances. That this is so is evident from universal experience. Every man will be sure to set his own price upon what be is, and what he does, whether the world will come up to it or no; as it seldom does. 2. The natural aptness of men to form and measure their apprehensions of the supreme Lord of all things, by what they apprehend and observe of the princes and potentates of this world, with reference to such as are under their dominion. This is certainly a very prevailing fallacy, and steals too easily upon men's minds, as being founded in the unhappy predominance of sense over reason, No marvel then, if they blunder in their notions about God, a Being so vastly above the apprehensions of sense. From misapplied premises, the low, gross, undistinguishing reason of the generality of mankind, presently infers that the creature may, on some accounts, be as beneficial to his Creator as a subject may be to his prince. Men are naturally very prone to persuade themselves that they are able to merit of God, or be profitable to Him. II. SUCH A PERSUASION IS UTTERLY FALSE AND ABSURD, FOR IT IS IMPOSSIBLE FOR MEN TO MERIT OF GOD. Show the several ingredients of merit, and the conditions necessary to render an action meritorious. 1. That an action be not due; that is to say, it must not be such as a man stands obliged to the doing of, but such as he is free either to do or not to do, without being chargeable with any sinful omission in case he does not. But all that any man alive is capable of doing, is but an indispensable homage to God, and not a free oblation; and that also such an homage as makes his obligation to what he does much earlier than his doing of it, will appear both from the law of nature, and that of God's positive command. 2. It should really add to and better the state of the person of whom it is to merit. The reason of which is because all merit consists properly in a right to receive some benefit, or the account of some benefit first done. (1) God offers Himself to our consideration as a Being infinitely perfect, infinitely happy, and self-sufficient, depending upon no supply or revenue from abroad. (2) On the other hand, is man a being fit and able to make this addition? Man only subsists by the joint alms of heaven and earth, and stands at the mercy of everything in nature, which is able either to help or hurt him. Is this now the person to oblige his Maker? 3. That there be an equal proportion of value between the action and the reward. This is evident from the foundation already laid by us; to wit, that the nature of merit consists properly in exchange; and that, we know, must proceed according to a parity of worth on both sides, commutation being most properly between things equivalent. Can we, who live by sense, and act by sense, do anything worthy of those joys which not only exceed our senses, but also transcend our intellectuals? 4. He who does a work whereby he would merit of another, does it solely by his own strength, and not by the strength or power of him from whom he is to merit. III. THIS PERSUASION IS THE SOURCE AND FOUNDATION OF TWO OF THE GREATEST CORRUPTIONS OF RELIGION THAT HAVE INFESTED THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH. These are pelagianism and popery. Pelagianism is resolvable into this one point, that a man contributes something of his own, which he had not from God, towards his own salvation. IV. REMOVE AN OBJECTION NATURALLY APT TO ISSUE FROM THE FOREGOING PARTICULARS. Can there be a greater discouragement than this doctrine to men in their Christian course? Answer — 1. It ought not to be any discouragement to a beggar to continue asking an alms, and in doing all that he can to obtain it, though he knows he can do nothing to claim it. 2. I deny that our disavowing this doctrine of merit, cuts us off from all plea to a recompense for our Christian obedience from the hands of God. It cuts us off from all plea on the score of strict justice. But God's justice is not the only thing that can oblige Him in His transactings with men. His veracity and His promise also oblige Him. (Robert South, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said, |
    |