Job 38:21

In close connection with the all-revealing power of the light, God probes Job further. Does he know secret things? — "which belong to God." What is the "home," or origin, of light, or of darkness? Whether we regard verse 21 as a question, as in our version, or as a statement in divine irony — "You know it, for then you were born" — the meaning is obvious.

"Where is the way to the dwelling of light, and where is the place of darkness?" (v.19). God had said, "Let there be light" on the first day of the remaking of the earth (Gen. 1:3), before the sun was set in its place on the fourth day. Some scientists thought the sun was the source of light. Further study has convinced them that light exists apart from the sun. Where does it come from? We do not know any more about this than Job did. So the origin of light and the origin of darkness are matters of which mankind is totally ignorant.

Could Job take the light or the darkness back to its original place of dwelling? (v.20). The very question would not have arisen in men's minds. God raises it only to show how limited man's knowledge is. The irony of verse 21 is striking. Was Job born when light was introduced? Had he lived so many years? Of course these words of God are simply intended to put Job in his place.

And yet let not modern science claim the ability to answer where Job could not. Outward knowledge has advanced. Men have discovered great laws and principles of nature. But can today's scientist give truer and more satisfying replies to these questions from God than Job could? What, after all, is human knowledge but a knowledge, as Socrates said, of our ignorance? What is the key to all these questions? It is God, the true knowledge of Himself. Knowing Him, we know the Author and Source of all knowledge. Leave Him out of account, and the sum of all science is a blank wall, beyond which the hidden truth still lies.

What questions these are. They cover every department of what man calls "natural sciences" — geology, meteorology, geography, oceanography, astronomy. Job had not a single answer to these questions, and if he had spoken, his words would have been folly. But what is the Lord's aim in putting these questions? To show that God is greater than man and to humble man, to bring Job to the needed true knowledge of himself and to deliver him from the pride of his heart.

And after all, what was God speaking about? Earthly things. Every one of these things is merely natural, and has to do with what is visible, what is seen and temporal. And Job is completely unable to answer even one of these questions. In fact they are not answered to this day, for all the boasting of science. If that is the case about earthly things, what about the heavenly? What about the eternal things? There we are entirely and absolutely dependent upon God. We know nothing but what He tells us, and this is all our blessing.