And there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before Jehovah, and Satan also came among them to present himself before Jehovah.
Heaven's court opens a second time, with the same assembly and the same accuser among them. Job knows nothing of it, which leaves three questions: who are these "sons of God," why does the accuser get in, and why was one round of testing not enough?
The title in this verse belongs to a class of creatures who owe their existence to God.
Taken in the sense of derivation by creation, "son" is elsewhere applied to the angels (Job 2:1; Job 38:7). God made them intelligent beings and "ministering spirits," appointed to serve heaven (Ps. 103:20). Because of that origin, as a class they are called the sons of God, Who "is a Spirit." … The angels are sons because of the standing and work God gave them as created spirits in the plan of creation. As sons to a father, they owe their intelligent existence to God, as creatures to the Creator.
The accuser is not an intruder who slipped past the door. He must appear like the rest, and he still comes today.
From this passage we may gather that at certain times all heaven's inhabitants, good and evil, must assemble before the Lord. … Satan means "adversary." The last book of the Bible shows him in this same character, as the accuser of the brothers. According to Revelation 12 he is still at work as he was in the days of Job. He still has access to the throne of God. That lasts until the hour when his downfall begins and he is thrown out of heaven.
But does that make him one of them?
The sons of God here appear to be unfallen angels, for fallen angels are not sons of God. Satan came among them, though not one of them.
Job never learned what happened in this scene.
Much of the profit this book reveals depends on one fact. Heaven alone knew both God's estimate of Job and Satan's trial of him. The reason for the trial stayed a secret for the present — a secret not there, but here. Neither Job nor his friends knew anything of what God had said about him. Satan knew well, but he could not imagine unselfish suffering integrity.
Both scenes in heaven end the same way — with a boundary.
With Job we see Satan, by God's permission, using various means to afflict him terribly. But even here Satan is strictly limited. He may not touch Job himself (ch. 1:12). Then at the second trial, when allowed to afflict Job's body, he may not touch his life (2:6). It is a mistake, therefore, to credit Satan with absolute power to do as he wants.
Satan lost the first round, and it changed nothing in him.
Again Satan presents himself before God as at the first. Again the Lord asks about Job, still faithful despite the afflictions he had been through. Satan failed to move Job, but he is not put off. He makes fresh demands, along with fresh accusations.
Between the two scenes there was a pause.
Someone has said that if the Lord had eased His hand when the first trial ended, Job would have fallen short of the blessing. There was a respite, and it might have been thought that everything had ended. But God's purpose in grace was not yet reached, and we may be sure that Satan's malice was not yet satisfied. The tireless adversary begins again, the Lord gives him room again, and Job is visited a second time.
God had His own object in allowing the second trial.
God's object was to show Job the depths of his own heart. Then he would learn to delight in the grace and mercy of God, and not in his own goodness. That goodness was like a morning cloud and the early dew that passes away. Job was a true saint of God, and all Satan's accusations were flung back in his face. But all the while Job was unbroken material, and so unprepared for "the end of the Lord."
- Heaven convenes. The "sons of God" are created spirits who come before God. The whole scene of chapter 1 opens again.
- Heaven admits the accuser. Satan comes among them without being one of them, and he keeps his access to God's throne until his downfall.
- Heaven keeps the secret. God's verdict on Job and Satan's challenge were known above; on earth, neither Job nor his friends knew a thing.
- Heaven sets the limit. First his goods but not his body, then his body but not his life. The adversary never moves one step past permission.
- Heaven has an end in view. The pause was not the end. A second visit came, because God's purpose in grace, not Satan's malice, decides where the story stops.
And Jehovah said to Satan, From whence comest thou? And Satan answered Jehovah and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it.
Heaven's door opens a second time, and God questions the accuser again. Satan must say where he has been — and he answers after Job has already lost his possessions and still held on to God.
One writer points out what is missing from Satan's reply — any admission that his first prediction about Job had failed:
Another day comes. Satan presents himself to God among the sons of God, and his answer to God's first question was the same as in Chapter 1. Then God faces him with the fact that Job had not done what Satan said he would if deprived of his possessions (v.3). Satan should certainly have admitted he was wrong and apologised for his obvious error. But Satan is like too many people. Instead of admitting they were wrong, they prop up their pride. They bring up another possibility, and it is just as faulty as Satan's first claim.
Satan's work has two faces, depending on where he stands:
In the dialogue between the Lord and Satan, we have God's challenge and Satan's accusation. The answer to the first question shows where Satan is carrying on his work. Like the restless raven flying over the flood waters, he prowls around "like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour." In heaven he is the accuser. On earth he is the destroyer. Wherever he is, he is always and only Satan — the enemy of God and of good.
God asks him where he has come from, and he must answer. That settles a common confusion about where the devil is now:
He has to give an account to Jehovah. He walked to and fro in the earth and walked up and down in it. He therefore is not in hell. The New Testament tells us that he is "the god of this world" and that his throne is here on earth. He still walks up and down and to and fro.
This scene also shows the place Satan holds in God's government:
He is a mere instrument. He is always ready to accuse the Lord's people, yet he can do nothing except as God allows. So far as Job was concerned, Satan's efforts proved useless. Having done his utmost, he goes away, and we hear nothing more of what he does.
That double truth — genuine danger, and a leash — is meant to produce two responses at once, not one:
Observe, when Satan is described as going "to and fro in the world," "going about seeking whom he may devour" — under such circumstances we have need of great caution. But let the saints of God feel it is a permitted power, restricted, restrained, and subdued at God's will.
The picture of travelling about also corrects an inflated view of the enemy:
This shows that Satan is not omnipresent, as God is. Satan can be only in one place at a time, however quickly he may travel. Yet he has many agents, evil spirits, who carry on his wicked work throughout the world... Some have questioned too whether Satan knows our thoughts. Absolutely not! Only God knows the hearts and the thoughts of mankind.
Job had already passed one test. Behind the second round stands God's own purpose, not just the enemy's persistence:
We may be sure that divine love, as well as divine wisdom, subjected this afflicted child of God to fresh assaults at the hands of Satan. The enemy is to do all, and so prove that his own charge is false... And through the very trials he must pass through, Job will learn the lesson of all lessons, for all eternity: God is all in all. As a step toward that knowledge, he will see that he is nothing.
These words are picked up in the New Testament and applied directly to believers now:
Though the cross has broken the devil's power, he is not yet cast into the lake of fire. As a restless and roaring lion he is still "going to and fro on the earth … walking up and down on it" (Job 1:7; Job 2:2)... Peter can speak from experience, for the time was when Satan desired to have Peter. He was allowed to sift Peter like wheat, but he could not touch Peter's faith. The Lord said, "I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail." Now Peter can tell others the secret of resisting Satan: stay "firm in your faith."
- Unchanged. He gives the same answer as before and never admits he was wrong. Pride invents a new charge instead of owning an old failure.
- Unconfined. He still reports back from roaming the earth, so he is not in hell. He is loose now, and the earth is where he works.
- Unequal. He walks from place to place, so he is not everywhere at once, and he does not read your thoughts — only God knows hearts.
- Under orders. He is only an instrument in God's government. He can do nothing unless God allows it, and against Job his utmost efforts failed.
- Undone. God allows the second attack in love as well as wisdom. The accuser disproves his own charge, and Job learns that God is all and he is nothing.
And Jehovah said to Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God and abstaineth from evil? and still he remaineth firm in his integrity, though thou movedst me against him, to swallow him up without cause.
Between the two waves of Job's suffering, heaven speaks again. God repeats His earlier praise of Job, adds that Job still holds on, and then says something startling: Satan had moved Him to ruin a man for no reason.
God repeats the same four-part description He gave at the start. Where the ESV says "blameless," older translations say "perfect." One writer takes the words apart:
"That man was perfect." This does not mean there was no evil in him. That is not what "perfect" means in Scripture at all. In the Old Testament it is the word for a man who is completely sound — a sound man, not just a moralist, but a man who was right with God. He was also "upright" with people. "Perfect and upright" showed two relations, one to God, and the other to people. Both ought to go together. The great feature of it was, "fearing God." Another great feature matched these other words — refusing or turning away from evil.
Notice who raises Job's name. It is not Satan hunting for a target. It is God pointing to a man He delights in.
"Have you considered my servant Job?" asks the LORD, taking up for Himself the description of Job already given. God delights in His beloved people, and in their righteous ways. If Satan accuses, He will commend. It is always this way. Judgment is His strange work. He would rather be taken up with good, and "if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise," He thinks about that.
The one new clause is that Job still holds his integrity. The first wave of loss has passed, and God's verdict has not changed.
How very surprised Satan must have been when he saw Job! He had lost all his property and his sons. Yet there he was, with his torn robe and shaved head, worshipping before God. Satan had predicted that Job would curse God to His face. Instead, Job stayed subject to God in his troubles, and worshipped Him. What a triumph it was for God, and what a defeat for Satan.
"You incited me against him" points to what Satan had been doing before God. One writer traces that same work of accusation through Scripture:
The last clause of this scripture shows that Satan accuses God's people before God. The Old Testament gives another hint of this work of Satan, which is the opposite of a priest's work. Joshua the high priest once stood before the angel of the LORD, and Satan stood at his right hand to oppose him (Zech. 3:1). Our Lord also tells Peter that Satan wanted to have him and his fellow disciples, so that he might sift them like wheat (Luke 22:31). And the book of Revelation shows that he will carry on his wicked work of accusation until a loud voice in heaven says… "the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God" (Rev. 12:10).
God does not say Satan destroyed Job. He says Satan moved Him to do it. That settles who held the power.
About every outward form of Satan's activity we can use our Lord's words: "You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above" (John 19:11). In other words, it was not Satan's lightning that struck Job's property, but God's. It was God's whirlwind, not Satan's, that destroyed his family. Job sees only God's hand in his affliction — "the LORD has taken away" (v. 21). And God Himself says to Satan, "you incited me against him to destroy him without reason" (Job 2:3).
If Job was innocent and Satan was beaten, the story could have closed at this verse. One writer argues that stopping here would have left Job worse off than God intended:
Job was able to hold fast his integrity. Had matters ended here, his patient endurance would only have strengthened the platform of his righteousness and fed his self-satisfaction… God's aim was to show Job the depths of his own heart. He wanted Job to learn to delight in the grace and mercy of God, and not in his own goodness… Job was a true saint of God, and all Satan's accusations were flung back in his face. But all the while, Job was unbroken material.
So the trial went on, and the danger to Job lay somewhere Satan could not touch:
He knew all along where Job was weak and in danger. Satan attacked, but he could not reach it. The LORD reached it through Job's friends.
- Commended. God repeats His own description of Job: sound with Himself, upright with people, fearing Him, refusing evil. "Perfect" never means a man without sin.
- Accused. "You incited me" points to Satan's steady work as accuser of God's people. He opposed Joshua the high priest, he asked for Peter, and he keeps on until heaven throws him down.
- Answered. When Satan accuses, God commends. God raises Job's name Himself, because He would rather be taken up with good.
- Owned. God does not blame the lightning or the whirlwind on Satan. He takes the act as His own, and Job saw only God's hand in it.
- Unfinished. Satan is beaten, yet the story goes on. Satan could not reach Job's weak point, but God reached it through Job's friends, so that Job would rest in grace and not in his own goodness.
And Satan answered Jehovah and said, Skin for skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life;
Job has already lost his wealth and his children, and he has not turned against God. Satan now stands before God a second time with a sharper charge: a man will give up anything, even his fear of God, to stay alive.
Commentators read the phrase in more than one way.
Satan asks for one more trial: "Skin for skin! All that a man has he will give for his life." Many take "skin for skin" to mean like for like. Or he may be reducing all that had happened to a surface trial, one that had only touched the outside of things. But he says: let there be something deeper now, and we shall see.
Another writer presses the trade to its end.
"Skin for skin" — to save part of his skin a man will give up another part; yes, to save his life he will surrender everything he has, including his fear of God.
Satan talks about Job, but he aims the words at God. The first charge was that Job's possessions meant more to him than God. Now the charge is that Job himself does.
That is what the great adversary said to God. He repeated his accusation against Job and threw his taunt at God: "You have made this man. Though You are more to him than his possessions, You are not more to him than himself; he loves himself better than he loves You."
Scripture records these words, but the speaker is Satan. People often quote a verse as if every line in the Bible carried God's approval.
How often do we hear people say that the Bible says, "Stolen waters are sweet," when in fact Scripture says that a wicked woman said it! Mr. Jay preached from Job 2:4, "All that a man has he will give for his life." … It was the devil who was speaking. This was one of those half-truths which are worse than whole lies. Millions of men have refused to give up their principles to save their lives. Job himself proved how false that cynical statement is.
One writer tells how a lawyer made that mistake in court.
This remark of the devil was once quoted in court by a barrister who wanted to strengthen his case. He introduced it by saying, "As a great authority has said …" He felt quite safe in his authority, since he was quoting from the Bible! But the judge knew his Bible better than the lawyer did. He quietly said, "I am interested to observe whom the learned counsel quotes as 'a great authority'!"
The saying is not a flat lie. It describes one kind of person exactly, and misses another.
Satan's words, "Skin for skin! All that a man has he will give for his life," are sadly true of an unbeliever. But faith is something that Satan does not understand. He confidently claimed that if God struck Job's body, Job would curse God to His face.
God hands Job over to Satan, but draws a line at his life. He does not draw that line to soften the ordeal.
The LORD said to Satan, "Behold, he is in your hand; only spare [literally, abstain from] his life." Sparing his life was not meant to lessen the trial. It was so that God might triumph for the good of the afflicted — the moral of the book.
Satan's saying treats life as the one thing nobody gives up. Christ gave His.
The fullest possible proof of love is to lay down one's life. No sacrifice can go beyond this. "Skin for skin! All that a man has he will give for his life" (Job 2:4). But Christ laid down His life, as He said, "I lay down my life for the sheep" (John 10:15). Among men, though, we can hardly imagine anyone making such an extreme sacrifice for someone who is not a friend or benefactor. Yet "God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" (Rom. 5:8).
- Skin. The phrase may mean "like for like," or it may be Satan calling round one only skin-deep and demanding a deeper cut.
- Slander. The charge lands on God as much as on Job: You outrank Job's property, but not Job himself.
- Speaker. It is the accuser talking, and it is a half-truth — worse than a whole lie — which Job's endurance refutes.
- Scope. It fits the man without faith. It misses the man of faith, because Satan cannot understand faith.
- Surrender. God spared Job's life to win a victory, not to lighten the test. And Christ broke the saying: He gave His life for people who were not His friends.
but put forth thy hand now, and touch his bone and his flesh, [and see] if he will not curse thee to thy face!
Satan's first attack has failed. Job has lost everything and still holds on to God. So the accuser asks for Job's body itself, sure that every man has a price.
Satan answers with a proverb. One writer reads it as a trade: a man gives up one part to save another.
Unabashed by his failure to move Job, Satan makes fresh demands, coupled with fresh accusations. "Skin for skin" — to save part of his skin a man will give up another part. Yes, to save his life he will surrender everything he has, including his fear of God. Until now God had not let anyone touch Job's body. Let God lay His hand on that, and how quickly Job's boasted piety will disappear.
Notice who Satan asks to strike. His real target stands higher than Job.
So said the great adversary to God, repeating his accusation against Job and casting his taunt at God. "You have made this man. You are more to him than his possessions. But You are not more to him than he is to himself; he loves himself better than he loves You."
Satan's proverb is not nonsense. It fits man without God. But it leaves out one thing.
Satan's words, "Skin for skin! Yes, all that a man has he will give for his life" are sadly true of an unbeliever, but faith is something that Satan does not understand. He was sure that if God struck Job's body, Job would curse God to His face.
Where did Satan get this rule? From watching people since the fall.
Satan understood well the character of the fall. He knew that men were utterly selfish; that they would sacrifice everything, even their God, to save themselves.
The whole verse is a request. Satan must ask, and God sets the limits of what he gets.
In Job's case we see Satan, by God's permission, using different means to bring extraordinary affliction on Job. But even here Satan is under strict limits. He may not touch Job himself (ch. 1:12). Then at the second trial, when God allows him to afflict Job's body, he may not touch his life (2:6). It is therefore a mistake to attribute to Satan absolute power to do as he will.
God says yes to Satan, but He sets a limit. One writer finds love in that limit.
We may be sure of this: divine love, as well as divine wisdom, gave this afflicted child of God over to fresh attacks from Satan. We see the tenderness in the words, "Save his life." The enemy may do everything, and so prove his own charge false. Every prop must go, every earthly joy must be taken away, and still Job will cling to the God he has trusted, even though dimly.
Satan wanted a collapse. God wanted something else: a work inside Job's own heart.
God's object was to show Job the depths of his own heart. Then he would delight in the grace and mercy of God, and not in his own goodness... Job was a true saint of God, and all Satan's accusations were flung back in his face. But all the while Job was unbroken material. So he was not ready for "the end of the Lord" — that blessed end for every contrite heart. God, blessed and praised be His name, will not allow Satan to accuse us. But He will expose us to ourselves, so that we may judge ourselves.
God grants the demand. After that, Satan never appears again in the book.
From here on the enemy disappears. His fresh attack had failed just as completely as before. What a comfort to learn this in a scene where, then as now, he seems to win! But so it always is, whatever it looks like: God has His way, as the end proves beyond answer.
- Accusation — Satan puts a price on Job's faith: a man will give up anything, even his fear of God, to save his own skin.
- Aim — the taunt lands on God as much as on Job: You are not more to him than he is to himself.
- Ask — Satan must ask for the blow. He may strike the body, but he may not touch the life.
- Aftermath — God aims deeper than the accuser: not to break Job, but to show Job his own heart and lead him to grace.
- Absence — Satan gets what he asks for, fails, and disappears from the book. God has His way, whatever it looks like at the time.
And Jehovah said to Satan, Behold, he is in thy hand; only spare his life.
Job has already lost his wealth, his servants and his children — and he still worshipped. Now Satan comes back and asks for Job's body. God's answer gives him permission and a limit in the same breath.
Satan does not act on his own here. He has to ask. What he gets is permission with a fixed limit at each stage.
In Job's case we see Satan using many means to bring extraordinary affliction on Job, and always under God's permission. Even here Satan is strictly limited. In the first trial he may not touch Job himself (ch. 1:12). At the second trial he may afflict Job's body, but he may not touch his life (2:6). So it is a mistake to credit Satan with absolute power to do as he likes.
Before any of this, Satan had complained that God kept Job fenced in. The hedge did not come down; God opened a gap in it.
He had long wanted to crush Job, but he had to admit that God had "put a hedge around him … on every side." He could not reach him until God made a gap in the hedge and let him go so far. He went as far as God allowed, and brought almost unspeakable suffering on Job. But his power had a limit.
God keeps one thing back: Job's life. The reason may not be the one we expect.
And the LORD said to Satan, "Behold, he is in your hand; only spare [literally, abstain from] his life." God held Job's life back from Satan, but not to lessen the trial. He did it so that He might triumph for the good of the afflicted man — and that is the moral of the book.
Commentators differ here. Others read the same words as tenderness, and see what the trial would teach Job.
We may be sure that divine love, as well as divine wisdom, brought this afflicted child of God under fresh attacks from Satan. We see the tenderness in the words, "spare his life." The enemy is to do everything he can, and so prove his own charge false. On the other hand, through the very trials he must face, Job will learn the lesson of all lessons, for all eternity: that God is all in all. As a step to that knowledge, he will see that he is nothing.
God grants what Satan asks. To us that can sound cruel.
God gave Satan permission to do as he pleased with Job's body, while sparing his life (v. 6). It may seem heartless of God to give such permission. But God's pure love was in it, in a way that unbelief cannot understand, and in the end it worked for greater blessing. Satan, though, did show himself heartless, for all he wanted was Job's downfall.
There is comfort in what this verse shows about Satan's reach.
And God tells Satan, "Behold, he is in your hand." What proof that Satan can do nothing against the saints of God without His permission! What a comfort this is! Satan is under God's complete control. And if God permits him to do his evil work, God has His own wise design in it. God's own love and power are on the side of His afflicted people. His own gracious faithfulness will show itself in the trial. But there is a gracious restriction. The Lord said, "Only spare his life." Satan might sift Job, but he could not touch his life, for the lives of God's people are in the hand of the Lord.
One writer sets Job beside the believers at Smyrna, a church facing death for their faith.
Satan might test Job, but God set a limit: "Behold, he is in your hand; only spare his life." (Job 2:6.) Here there is no such limit. They were to be "faithful unto death." God promises them no rescue on this side of the grave. And why? Because a believer now knows Christ not only as able to save from death, but as having triumphed over death. … The death of the body is only a door leading into Christ's presence.
Satan asked for this second round to prove that Job's faith was a pretence. He got everything he asked for and lost anyway.
So I get this fact: everything Satan did against Job failed. The one thing it did was clear Job of Satan's accusation and the charge of hypocrisy. Satan did all he could do, but he could do no more than God allowed.
- Permitted — Satan reaches Job only because God allows it. He never breaks through the hedge; God opens it.
- Limited — the permission stops at Job's life. Satan can do his worst and still no more.
- Purposeful — sparing Job's life keeps him in the trial, so that God may triumph for the sufferer's good.
- Loving — what looks heartless is God's love working toward greater blessing. Satan wants only Job's ruin.
- Defeated — every blow Satan struck failed. It only cleared Job of the charge that his devotion was a pretence.
And Satan went forth from the presence of Jehovah; and he smote Job with a grievous botch from the sole of his foot unto his crown.
This time the blow falls on Job's own body, not on his property or family, and it comes from Satan's hand — but only after God has spoken. Why would God hand His own servant over to the accuser, and what is left of Job once even his health is gone?
Satan looks like the one who starts all this. One writer points further back:
Note carefully here that the spring and source of all these dealings is not Satan's accusations, but God Himself. God knew what His servant Job needed. He Himself brings forward Job's case and sets everything in motion. If He asks Satan whether he had considered His servant Job, it is because He Himself had. Satan is only an instrument, ignorant though clever, and God uses him to bring about His purposes of grace.
The blow is severe, but it stops where God set the limit. Both rounds of Job's suffering had a boundary fixed in advance:
In the case of Job we see Satan, under God's permission, using various means for Job's extraordinary affliction. But even here Satan is strictly limited. At first he may not touch Job's body at all (ch. 1:12). Then at the second trial, when God allows him to afflict Job's body, he may not touch his life (2:6). It is therefore a mistake to credit Satan with absolute power to do as he pleases.
The text names the sores but not the disease. Commentators differ on what it was, and every guess is grim:
It is not necessary for us to know the exact nature of the disease that fell upon Job. Some have thought it was leprosy, the most hopeless, loathsome and deadly of all human afflictions. Others have named it elephantiasis, a repulsive and terrible disease in which every part of the body is affected. It twists and swells the limbs, which is how the disease got its name. It also spreads rotting inflammation through the whole body.
The next verse shows him sitting in ashes, scraping himself with a piece of broken pottery. One writer finds meaning in both details:
Apart from what God has revealed, how wretched and hopeless Job's condition was! Anyone who knew him in his days of prosperity would not have recognised him in the utter misery of his present state, sitting in ashes and scraping himself with a piece of broken pottery? The ashes suggest his mourning for his losses, especially his bereavement. The broken piece of pottery might well picture his own broken condition.
The reader watches the exchange in heaven; Job never does. One writer says much of the book's value rests on that silence:
A main part of the profit this book gives depends on this: God made both His own estimate and Satan's trial known only in heaven. The reason for the trial stayed a secret for the present — a secret not there, but here. Neither Job nor his friends knew anything of what God had said about him. Satan knew well, but he could not conceive of suffering integrity that had no self-interest in it.
Job holds firm under the sores, and Satan's charge collapses. Yet the story does not end there. God had a deeper aim in the trial:
This point is, to a very great extent, the key to the entire book of Job. The Divine object was to expose to Job's view the depths of his own heart. In that way he might learn to delight in the grace and mercy of God and not in his own goodness. His own goodness was like a morning cloud and the early dew that passes away. Job was a true saint of God, and all Satan's accusations were flung back in his face. But all the while Job was unbroken material, and so he was not ready for "the end of the Lord" — that blessed end for every repentant heart, an end marked by pity and tender mercy.
Satan can reach the body itself. But this is the last we see of him in the book:
We may wonder how Satan has the ability to strike a man with painful boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head (v. 7). But this does show that Satan can cause physical illness as well as spreading spiritual falsehood. He will use all of these to the fullest advantage he can. But thank God, Satan cannot steal away the faith of the child of God! In fact, when Satan has done his worst, he vanishes from the scene, for we read no more about him in this book.
- Source — The dealings begin with God, not with the accuser; Satan is an instrument, and an ignorant one.
- Limit — God fenced that instrument in both times: first Satan could not touch Job's body, then he could not touch Job's life.
- Body — Within that fence the blow is total, from sole to crown, leaving him in ashes with a piece of broken pottery.
- Silence — Job is never told the reason; the heavenly conversation stays a secret to him and to his friends.
- Purpose — Endurance alone would only have fed Job's self-confidence. God's aim was to show Job his own heart, so that he would rest in God's mercy and not in his own goodness.
And he took a potsherd to scrape himself with; and he sat among the ashes.
Boils have struck Job from head to foot. The great man of the east now sits in the ash heap with a broken piece of pottery in his hand. It is the lowest point of his suffering. Who put him there? Why? And were the ashes the end of his story?
The picture is one of total reversal. A rich and powerful man now sits where the town burns its rubbish.
What a sad transformation! He was the great chief of the east, once so rich and influential. Now he has lost all his possessions and is reduced to the most complete poverty. A vile and extremely painful disease afflicts him. He takes his place on the rubbish heap, among the ashes of the burnt refuse. He considers himself an outcast, unfit for a human home.
Both objects in Job's hand and under him carry meaning. One says something about grief; the other says something about the man himself. And the writer notices that scraping his skin achieved about as much as his thinking achieved for his soul.
Who that knew him in his days of prosperity could have recognised him now, sitting in ashes and scraping himself with a piece of broken pottery, in such wretched misery? The ashes suggest his mourning for his losses, above all for the loved ones he lost. The broken pottery may well picture his own broken condition. He tries in vain to relieve the unbearable pain and itching of his festering sores. His self-examination is just as powerless to relieve the sufferings of his soul.
The boils were Satan's work. But God set a fence around them, and that fence explains why Job is scraping himself instead of dying.
Job therefore was beyond harm; no one could touch his person. But after this the almighty power of God extends Satan's power further, though still with a boundary he could not pass. God allowed Satan's power to afflict his body. "But," says the Lord, "only spare his life." At once we hear that sore boils cover Job from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head. Yet God spared his life. And when his afflictions had done the work for which the Lord permitted them, He took them away. For we read that the Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning.
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Satan struck the blow, but God permitted it. The reason lay below the surface, where Job could not see.
It is very clear that Job needed a severe sifting. Had he not needed it, we may be sure the gracious, loving Lord would not have passed him through it. It was not for nothing that He let Satan loose on His dear servant. God loved Job with a perfect love. But it was a wise and faithful love. It took account of everything. It looked below the surface and saw the deep moral roots in the heart of His servant — roots Job had never seen, and so had never judged.
Here is the point that is easy to miss. Job's endurance in the ash heap was genuine, yet the same writer insists that a man can be flattened by loss and still be untouched where it counts.
If it had only been a question of Job's patience, that patience would have become another ground for self-confidence. Then the Lord would never have reached the end He had in view. Always remember this: only the truly repentant and broken-hearted taste the Lord's pity and tender mercy. Now Job was not this, even when he lay among the ashes. He was not yet thoroughly broken down before God. He was still the great man — great in his misfortunes as he had been in his prosperity.
Satan puts Job in the ashes here. At the end of the book Job chooses the same place for himself, and for a different reason.
He takes hold, as it were, of his own righteousness, strength, and imagined goodness, and condemns it all. More than that, he sets self completely aside as vile and worthless: "I despise myself." In this self-loathing state he confesses a change of mind: "I repent." He lies down in the dust in self-abhorrence, because he admits that self is only fit to lie low in the dust, and buried out of God's sight... and he takes the place of ashes, as withered up under the trial of the searching fire of an infinitely holy God.
- Ashes given. Satan strips Job to the rubbish heap, where he counts himself an outcast, unfit for a human home.
- Ashes measured. The blow stays inside God's boundary: his flesh, not his life, and only until it has done its work.
- Ashes explained. The sifting came from a wise and faithful love that saw roots in Job's heart he had never seen or judged.
- Ashes endured. Patience alone would only have fed his self-confidence. A man can lie in ashes and still be unbroken before God.
- Ashes chosen. The change comes when Job takes the place of ashes himself, despises self, and repents — and God blesses his latter days more than his beginning.
And his wife said to him, Dost thou still remain firm in thine integrity? curse God and die.
Job has already lost his children, his wealth and his health. Now the last person left to him speaks, and she urges the very thing Satan predicted Job would do.
Job's wife appears once in the whole story, at the moment sores cover his body. Her words are not her own.
Then his wife makes her only appearance in this drama. She speaks only once. She must have followed him out to the ash-heap, weeping and wailing. And now she speaks, but not of herself. Satan uses her as his instrument. He speaks through her. "Do you still hold fast your integrity? Curse God and die." That is exactly what Satan had said in God's presence, that Job would do this very thing. And now he uses the woman to suggest suicide to Job.
The blow lands harder because of who delivers it. The person closest to Job becomes the voice against him.
Job himself was struck as severely and mercilessly as he had earlier been stripped of children and possessions. Everything was completely gone. And the one who was nearest to him, instead of being a helper, tempts him in despair, but in vain.
Two words here need care: the word translated "curse," and the word "foolish" in Job's reply.
"Curse [literally, bless] God, and die." It was a dreadful speech. Satan drew it out of her, and her failure to look up to God was just as truly behind it… He does not say, "You speak as a foolish woman"; he goes no further than, "You speak as one of the foolish ones." It is well known that the word "foolish" has a morally bad sense in Scripture. This is not a question of weak intellect. It is the worst kind of moral corruption — the kind that blots out God, and so makes nothing of His word.
Her advice asked Job to give up the one thing he still had.
Curse God! That would have meant giving up his God. Could he do that? Never. He could lose everything, but not his God. Many things may have seemed essential to him in earlier days. But he had reached this point now: he could do without everything but God. God alone was essential to Job.
One writer refuses to judge her, but he does not soften what she said.
We will not be dogmatic about Job's wife. The root of the matter may have been in her, and she may have been only for a time overwhelmed by her grief. But her words are very evil… Some have thought that her love for Job prompted these words. On that view, she could not bear to see one so dear to her in such torture, and so she was in effect advising suicide. We can leave her case with Him who searches the heart… She was placing herself among the godless who despise God. She had been quite willing to enjoy good things from the hand of God. Now that He sees fit to send trial, shall we refuse to take it as meant for good? It was God who was the giver in each case.
After this attempt Satan goes away. But holding out is not the same as being changed.
So far as Job was concerned, Satan's efforts proved useless. Having done his utmost, he goes away… God enabled Job to hold fast his integrity. Had matters ended here, his patient endurance would only have strengthened the platform of his righteousness and fed his self-satisfaction… Yet even as he lay among the ashes, Job was not truly penitent and broken-hearted. He was not yet thoroughly broken down before God. He was still the great man — great in his misfortunes as he had been in his prosperity.
The attack aimed at Job's confidence in God's goodness, and it arrived through someone he loved.
The very worst thing that can happen to any one of us is to allow the enemy to plant any doubt in our minds about the love of God. That love lies behind ALL His dealings with us… Then the enemy shot a flaming arrow at Job. In Job's case it was his wife. This shows us something: although we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, the enemy sometimes uses flesh and blood when he attacks us… but Job met that thrust with the shield of faith… and the flaming arrow fell to the ground.
- Source. The words are Satan's prediction placed in a human mouth; he speaks through the one person Job has left.
- Aim. The target is not Job's comfort but his grip on God — to curse would have meant giving God up altogether.
- Weapon. The enemy sometimes attacks through flesh and blood — here through the person closest to Job.
- Shield. Job holds that the same hand gives good and sends trial, and the arrow falls to the ground.
- Limit. Holding out is not the same as being broken; Job was still the great man, not yet broken down before God.
But he said to her, Thou speakest as one of the foolish women speaketh. We have also received good from God, and should we not receive evil? In all this Job did not sin with his lips.
Job has already lost his children, his wealth and his health, and now the one person left to him urges him to give up on God. His reply traces both the good and the trouble back to God's hand, and the verse ends with a careful note: he did not sin with his lips.
Job answers the person closest to him, and he answers with restraint. One writer notes how carefully Job words the rebuke, and what "foolish" means in the Bible.
It made his suffering much worse that she should fall, though Job did not. She should have been his helper, but the strain wore her out... He does not say, "You speak as a foolish woman." He goes no further than, "You speak as one of the foolish ones." In Scripture, as is well known, the word "foolish" carries a morally bad sense. This is not about a weak mind. It is about the worst kind of moral corruption, which blots out God and so makes nothing of His word.
Job's question exposes an inconsistency. A person glad to take pleasant things from God cannot then refuse what God sends next.
She was associating herself with those who despise God. She had been quite willing to enjoy good things from the hand of God. Now that He sees fit to send trial, shall we refuse to take it as meant for good? It was God who was the giver in each case.
Fire, wind, violent men and Satan all had a hand in Job's ruin. His words look past every one of them to God.
We can see three causes. The third causes were fire from heaven, whirlwind and evil men in Job's case. Behind these lay the power and hostility of Satan. But behind him, as the first cause, there was the hand of God. Job's safety and blessing lay in turning away from the third causes, and even from the second cause. Then he could accept everything from the hand of God.
The suggestion "curse God and die" aimed at Job's confidence in God's goodness. The same attack still comes through hard circumstances.
A fiery dart is not a sudden desire to satisfy some craving that rises from within. It is a suggestion from outside that would raise a doubt about the goodness of God... Job quenched this fiery dart with the shield of faith. He said, "Shall we receive good from God, and shall we not receive evil?" The devil still uses the hard circumstances of life to shake our confidence in God and drive us away from Him. Faith uses those very circumstances to draw nearer to God, and so triumphs over the devil.
His answer weighs what cursing God would cost him. Everything else had already gone.
Curse God! That would have meant giving up his God. Could he do that? Never. He could lose everything, but not his God. Many things may have seemed essential to him in earlier days. But he had now reached this point: he could do without everything but God.
The words "with his lips" appear here and not earlier. One writer weighs what that limit means.
Notice, however, that here, and not before, Scripture says, "In all this Job did not sin with his lips." This was much, but it was not all. No flesh shall glory before God.
Another writer names what God was after in the whole trial.
God's aim was to show Job the depths of his own heart. Then he would learn to delight in the grace and mercy of God, and not in his own goodness... God will not allow Satan to accuse us. But He will show us to ourselves, so that we may judge ourselves. Then we learn to mistrust our own hearts and rest in the eternal stability of His grace.
With this reply the accuser has nothing left to try.
It was the power of God that produced such wonderful submission. His grace enabled him to pass through it all without sinning. What a record — "in all this Job did not sin with his lips!" Satan's defeat is complete. His mouth is stopped. If he appears before the LORD again he must stand in silence. The last word does not belong to him, but to God.
- One hand. Job had gladly taken good from God. The same hand now sends trial, and he takes that too.
- One target. The suggestion aimed at his confidence in God's goodness. Faith quenches that dart by drawing nearer to God, not by pulling away.
- One look. He looked past fire, wind, violent men and Satan to the first cause, and took everything from God.
- One treasure. Stripped of all else, he could do without everything but God.
- One limit. He did not sin with his lips — much, but not all. God's aim went deeper: to reach the heart and settle him in grace, not in his own goodness.