Are not my days few? Then cease, and leave me alone, that I may find a little cheer
Job has stopped arguing and started begging. His days are nearly over, he says, so let God stop and leave him alone long enough for a little comfort before the end. Was he right about how short his time was? And was he right about what he asked God to do with it?
A worn-out man asking God to stop
Job's "cease" means: stop, leave me alone. One writer weighs how a man could say that to God:
Leslie M. GrantHis days were few enough without having troubles multiplied. So he tells God to "cease," that is, to leave him alone (v.20). Did he not stop to think this was an insolent way to speak to his Maker? But he was too distressed to think soberly.
Notice how small the request is. He asks only for a pause before the end:
Samuel RidoutThe wailing passes from blaming God for His injustice to lamenting his birth. Pitifully, Job asks a brief respite, a break from sorrow before he goes and is no more. It is the lament again of chapter 3.
Asking the wrong thing of the right Person
The pain of this request is in who Job is speaking to. One writer marks the gap between despair and confession:
Arno C. GaebeleinPoor, suffering, despairing Job! He was treating as his enemy the One whose love had been so fully shown in the past. To pray to Him, "Let me alone," was horrible despondency indeed. And if he has sinned, why does not God pardon and take away his iniquity? But this is not confession of sin. It is a different thing when at last he cries out, "Behold, I am vile, I abhor myself."
Why he expected so little
Job asks for only "a little" cheer, and the reason is what he expects on the other side of death. He has no light there at all:
F. B. HoleYet, on the other hand, he knew that God's standards were far higher than his. So trouble would come upon him if he were wicked. And even if he were righteous, he could not lift up his head in the presence of God. He was filled with confusion. His affliction increased. Again he complained that he had ever been born. As to the future, he had no light. Death was to him as "a land of darkness," as we see in verses 21 and 22. Only in New Testament days do we get such a word as this: "the true light is already shining."
Another writer looks at the same darkness and sees that Job's trust in God had not gone:
Frederick W. GrantWell, but to everything that made Job weary, the grave would be rest. And for anything else, Job was a saint of God after all, and had confidence in God. He was not thinking about the portion of the wicked, but about what his own would be. In death a "land of darkness" stretched before him, and his eye could hardly see into it. Even so, he had something of the Psalmist's confidence in One who would be with him there.
God's refusal to leave him alone
Job asks God to look away. God does not — and one writer explains why that refusal was love:
C. H. MackintoshIt 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 put him through it. It was not for nothing that He let Satan loose upon His dear servant. We may say, with full confidence, that nothing but the most pressing necessity would have led Him to take such a course. God loved Job with a perfect love. But it was a wise and faithful love. It was a love that could take account of everything. Looking below the surface, it could see the deep moral roots in the heart of His servant — roots which Job had never seen, and therefore never judged.
Far more than "a little"
Job set the size of his own request. The answer overshot it:
Leslie M. GrantShould he not have a little comfort before he went to the place from which he would not return? That place was the land of darkness and the shadow of death, where even the light is like darkness. Little did he realise that God would give him more than a little comfort in this present world. He did not know that in the end he would go to a land of pure light and unspeakable joy.
Summary
- Few days. Job's starting point is that his life is nearly over, so troubles piled on top of it feel pointless.
- Wrong request. Out of that despair he tells his Maker to leave him alone. One writer calls that insolent. Another calls it despondency. Neither calls it confession.
- Dark view. He asks for only "a little" comfort because death looked to him like a land of darkness; he had no light on the future.
- Loving refusal. God did not look away, because a wise and faithful love saw roots in Job that Job had never seen or judged.
- Larger answer. God gave far more comfort than the little Job begged for. The dark place he dreaded turned out to be pure light.