“I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted.
For many chapters Job has argued, protested, and demanded a hearing. Then God answers out of the whirlwind, and Job's reply confesses the two things he had questioned: God's power and God's plans.
A man who has stopped arguing
Job does not keep this to himself. He says it out loud, and the complaining is over.
William KellyThe friends are silent; Job does not believe in his heart only but makes confession with his mouth. He murmurs no more, he resents no more, he questions no more. He now admits openly, as something he knows in his soul, that the Lord is able for all things, and that no purpose is withheld from Him. Evil in men or Satan, ruin everywhere in this fallen world, had touched Him in no way at all.
"You can do all things"
Job's earlier speeches came out of a gap in his knowledge of God. Another man in the Bible had to learn the same thing.
Leslie M. GrantHe now realises that ignorance of God had driven his earlier words. God "can do everything." This reminds us of Peter's words to the Lord Jesus, "Lord, you know everything" (John 21:17). Peter needed the same lesson Job needed. He too had shown too much confidence in the flesh when he insisted that he would not deny the Lord Jesus, even if all the others did.
No purpose thwarted
Job had spoken against God. Now he takes all of it back, and he sees more in God's purposes than raw strength.
Samuel RidoutHe acknowledges God's omnipotence, and that He cannot be thwarted in His purposes, which exhibit His power, wisdom and goodness as fully as do His works. There is a complete surrender and reversal of all that he had previously said against God.
One writer takes the same truth beyond Job's own life. God's purpose settles what is coming for the whole world.
An Outline of Sound WordsHis counsel will stand, and He will do all His pleasure… God will show His supremacy. He will secure, for His own glory and pleasure, all that He has purposed for the blessing of this poor world.
Two ways of reading the second line
Commentators differ here, because translators render the Hebrew in two ways. Some read the line as God's purpose being unstoppable. Others follow an older translation, "no thought can be withheld from You," and read it as God knowing every thought a man has.
H. H. SnellIn God's presence, as it were under God's eye, Job learned by experience that He was Almighty. He learned that God searches every thought of the heart.
Hearsay turned into sight
Job's "I know" is not new information. What changed is the way he holds it.
William Kelly"Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?" Why, it was himself; he owns it. Then comes his great confession: "I had heard of You by the hearing of the ear." I knew it as a report outside myself. But now I have made it my own. I have applied it to my own soul, my own circumstances, my own state — "but now my eye sees You. Therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes." That was the great moral victory God had won.
Where the confession leaves the questioner
Once someone admits that God can do all things, putting God on trial has nowhere left to stand.
C. H. MackintoshIf man could fathom the government of God, he would no longer be man, but God… If God is to be God, then His ways, the workings of His government, the mysteries of His providence, His purposes, His counsels and His judgments must lie far beyond the reach of the greatest human or angelic mind. No angel, no man and no devil can comprehend God… When the soul takes this place, all unbelieving questions come to an end. Until then there is little use in discussion.
And the same confession, held by anyone, becomes a resting place rather than a defeat:
F. A. HughesWhatever may happen in this world, we can confidently rest in the knowledge that God can "do everything, and that no thought can be withheld from You."
Summary
- Cause — Job's wrong words came from not knowing God. Here he admits that the real problem was his ignorance, not God's injustice.
- Knowledge — He had heard of God by report; now his eye sees Him, and second-hand knowledge becomes his own.
- Power — God can do all things, so nothing stops His purposes. They show His wisdom and goodness, not just His strength.
- Reach — The purpose that ruled Job's life rules the world too. God will secure everything He has planned for it.
- Result — Take this place, and the arguing with God ends.