The above verse was the response of Job to his three friends—Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. By the time Job spoke these words, each friend had spoken. We remember that, at the very least, their purpose in coming to Job was to grieve with him and to comfort him. They each had come with an explanation of the miserable circumstances in Job’s life, and they each offered a solution for Job’s misery. They had come with their answers.
Why had Job lost all his oxen and asses to the Sabeans, his sheep to fire from heaven, his camels to the Chaldeans, and all these cattle together with his servants? Why had all his children gone to eat at their eldest brother’s house the same day that a great wind struck the four corners of his house, killing them all? Why, moreover, had Job been stricken with boils from the soles of his feet to the top of his head?
And lest we forget, Job was not ignorant of the fact that God had done those things. Sabeans may have stolen Job’s oxen and donkeys and slain his servants; Chaldeans, his camels; and the wind may have struck the four corners of the house of Job’s eldest son, and the crumbling house crushed Job’s children, but the hand of God was sovereign over it all. That was Job’s confession: “The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away” (Job 1:21). Moreover, that was Job’s answer to the folly that came from the mouth of his wife, when she told him to curse God and die: “What? shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?” (2:10).
Job knew that God had done these things to him. And Job did not even have the full picture as we do. The devil had moved all these things against Job. Nevertheless, God did them. God took away all Job’s cattle and servants. God put to death all Job’s children. God covered Job with boils. There is no power but God’s power. All that happened took place under the providential hand of God. Job was well aware. Why had God done all these things?
Job was not troubled by the philosophy of fortune or chance. After his response to his wife, scripture even says, “In all this did not Job sin with his lips” (Job 2:10). Job’s confession was correct. But those words are troubling. With his lips Job did not sin. That is scripture’s notice of what was going on in Job’s heart. Job’s lips confessed the goodness of God, but in his heart Job doubted it. He needed comfort. He needed the answer that would deliver him from all his sins. Job needed the answer that explained that all evil is subservient to his eternal good. Such is comfort. Comfort is that greatest good that does not merely alleviate the evil but is the perfect answer to all evil.
To comfort Job, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar had come. But Job likened their remembrances to ashes and their bodies to clay. What does that mean? We could slightly improve the translation as such: Your memorable sayings are aphorisms (or proverbs) of ash. Each friend had come with an aphorism of his own wisdom, saying, “Remember, Job.” They all brought wise sayings, sayings that Job was supposed to keep in mind, sayings bearing wisdom to be applied to Job’s life and circumstances.
Well, that is what the friends thought about their aphorisms.
But Job likened his friends’ aphorisms to ashes—things that were as vain and light as ash. The proverbs were fit to be forgotten, for they provided no wisdom at all. They gave no understanding that could stand before the blast of death. Like ashes in the wind, so were all the remembrances of Job’s friends. Folly.
And Job likened his friends’ bodies to those of clay. The word “bodies” does not refer to their human bodies. The Hebrew word refers to a convex surface that here is to be understood as a bulwark, something in which one can hide and find refuge. It is a place of defense. And here Job refers to their bulwarks figuratively and means their argumentation. Really, the ideas of aphorism and bulwark should be taken together. The friends’ wise words were meant to be sources of comfort for Job. Their words were meant to convey the wisdom that is the refuge of the soul.
A good example of a bulwark is what Jesus said: “They that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick: I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Mark 2:17). That is a truly wise saying to the people of God as they know themselves to be ungodly sinners who have no righteousness of their own. Lest they begin to doubt the mercy of God on account of their sins, they must remember that just as the sick, not the whole, need a physician, so also Jesus came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance. That is wisdom that is a bulwark against evil, a refuge in the valley of the shadow of death, and comfort in the midst of this valley of tears.
But Job likened the bulwarks of his friends to the bulwarks of clay. That picture is easily grasped. Imagine the day of battle. The enemy besieges the city. He employs his engines against the city and rains his arrows over the garrison. To the bulwarks the besieged fly for refuge. But lo, the bulwarks are clay. In the day of evil they cannot stand. They cannot provide the least defense from the onslaughts of the foe. They cannot give a moment of safety. But in an instant they are made a heap of rubble, crushing the sorry soul who flees to them for refuge.
What had the three men said to Job to warrant such a response? Let us hear from them.
Of the three, Eliphaz spoke first.
7. Remember, I pray thee, who ever perished, being innocent? or where were the righteous cut off?
8. Even as I have seen, they that plow iniquity, and sow wickedness, reap the same.
9. By the blast of God they perish, and by the breath of his nostrils are they consumed. (Job 4:7–9)
The wisdom of Eliphaz, the culmination of his years having beheld the children of men! What was he saying? He was arguing from the effect to the cause. The reaping of evil is because of the plowing of iniquity and the sowing of wickedness, just like the harvest of wheat is from the sowing of wheat. You reap what you sow. The miserable circumstances of Job’s life—the evil—were the fruits of what Job had plowed and sowed. They were the blast of God’s nostrils that consume the sinner. Remember, Job, who ever perished being innocent? Do you not know that you reap what you sow? Where were the righteous ever cut off?
Bildad spoke next.
3. Doth God pervert judgment? or doth the Almighty pervert justice?
4. If thy children have sinned against him, and he have cast them away for their transgression;
5. If thou wouldest seek unto God betimes, and make thy supplication to the Almighty;
6. If thou wert pure and upright; surely now he would awake for thee, and make the habitation of thy righteousness prosperous. (Job 8:3–6)
And later Bildad said, “Behold, God will not cast away a perfect man, neither will he help the evil doers” (Job 8:20).
Bildad’s answer was much the same as Eliphaz’s. Does God pervert judgment, and the Almighty, justice? Of course not! God is the God of strictest justice. Do you not see, Job, that God cast away your children for their transgressions, because they sinned against him? Do you not know, Job, that God neither casts away the perfect nor helps evildoers? If you would seek God and make supplication to him, God would awake to your help. If you are pure and upright, God will prosper the habitation of your righteousness. Bildad’s explanation? God was punishing Job for some sin in his life, and that is why God also killed Job’s children. Bildad’s solution? Fix your walk, walk in the way of obedience, cleanse your life from sin, and then you will be prospered.
What of Zophar, who finished the first round of wisdom?
2. Should not the multitude of words be answered? and should a man full of talk be justified?
3. Should thy lies make men hold their peace? and when thou mockest, shall no man make thee ashamed?
4. For thou hast said, My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in thine eyes.
5. But oh that God would speak, and open his lips against thee;
6. And that he would shew thee the secrets of wisdom, that they are double to that which is! Know therefore that God exacteth of thee less than thine iniquity deserveth. (Job 11:2–6)
Zophar spoke plainly. Job, God is exacting from you the wages of sin, albeit less than your iniquity deserves. And Zophar reminded Job who God is, “He knoweth vain men: he seeth wickedness also; will he not then consider it?” (Job 11:11). Remember, Job, God tries the hearts and the reins. He knows all the imaginations of the heart. He knows the vanity of men and sees man’s hidden wickedness. Zophar was calling Job a hypocrite because he had said that his doctrine was pure and that he was clean in the eyes of his friends. Job, you can hide your wickedness from us, but you cannot hide from God.
And because Zophar’s view was the same as the others, namely, that God was punishing Job for his sins, then Zophar’s solution was the same:
13. If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands toward him:
14. If iniquity be in thine hand, put it far away, and let not wickedness dwell in thy tabernacles.
15. For then shalt thou lift up thy face without spot; yea, thou shalt be stedfast, and shalt not fear. (Job 11:13–15)
Do you want to be steadfast, Job? Do you want assurance and not fear? Do you know what will cause you to lift up your head? Cleanse your heart, put all iniquity far away, and rid your life of all wickedness. To be brief, that was Zophar’s word. It was the same as the others.
It was repentance before forgiveness and blessing in the way of obedience.
Lo, the ashen aphorisms and clay bulwarks of the Protestant Reformed Churches!
All the friends’ proverbs were vain, and their bulwarks were corrupt. No wonder Job called his three friends “forgers of lies” and “physicians of no value” (Job 13:4). Moreover, they were speaking for God but wickedly and deceitfully (v. 7). They were contending for God, that is, they were acting like God’s prosecuting attorneys, but they were partial toward God (v. 8). They were acting like the Pharisees toward the woman caught in the act of adultery. They emphasized the law and the justice of God, but they left out God’s own word to his people. That is the idea of their partiality. They omitted God’s own defense of his people.
That word of God, the sure defense of God’s people, is Jesus Christ. That was the omission of Job’s three friends. The omission of Christ, the wisdom of God, makes every saying vain and every bulwark worthless. All Christian comfort is contained in the simple truth that the children of God are not their own, but they belong to Jesus Christ. That is God’s own word to them. That is the Rock that God gave to his people in which to hide. That is their only comfort.
But Job’s friends forged lies. They omitted Christ from the equation. They were physicians of no value. Who, belonging only to himself, can stand before their sayings? Who can find any refuge apart from Jesus Christ? Is not wickedness in all that man sows? Are not all man’s ways defiled with sin? Does not man daily transgress against the living God? Is there not in the flesh of man the very motions of sin? How shall he be covered in the sight of the Most High? Who shall stand when the Lord enters into judgment? Who, then, can prepare his own heart and cleanse himself of evil?
To be left alone, that is, apart from Jesus Christ under those sayings, you must necessarily wither. There is no hope. If the blessings of God wait for your repentance and obedience, then salvation will never come. If the good things of God indicate God’s attitude toward the Christian, then God must despise him, for God sends not only the good but also the evil. Then the Christian would be in constant despair and doubt concerning his justification, for every evil would be a witness of his condemnation.
But in Christ is the comfort, the answer over against all the evil. Who perished, being innocent? Christ did. Where was the righteous one cut off? At the cross. There the just suffered for the unjust as the sacrifice for sin. There Christ was cut off out of the land of the living and stricken for the transgressions of his people. And that was the justification of his people once and for all, so that God’s judgment of his elect in Christ is that they are perfectly righteous. That is the judgment that God will not reverse and the justice that the Almighty will not pervert. And that is why it is impossible that God ever will exact from his people what their iniquity deserves, nor even less than it deserves. To exact punishment twice is the grossest perversion of justice. The Almighty will not pervert justice!
Jesus Christ. The wisdom of God! The sure refuge!
Oh, it is true, we cannot explain why it was the good pleasure of God to take all from Job, just as we cannot know why it is the good pleasure of God to send to us good and evil, health and sickness, riches and poverty, fruitful and barren years, rain and drought, even life and death. It is not our place to ask or know God’s reasons. God is sovereign. But we do know that belonging to Jesus Christ, all things are made subservient to our salvation! Never does God punish his people. Never does God do anything to them that harms their salvation. Never does God send to them more than they are able to bear. Yea, rather, “our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory” (2 Cor. 4:17).
“Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding” (Prov. 3:13).
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