Job 5:8

Every word may be true in itself. He says it all with great dignity and force. Yet it is misapplied and one-sided, and so, in effect, wrong as a whole. Eliphaz assumes that God is running the world right now, and measuring each man's prosperity or trouble exactly to what he deserves. This is false ground, and it spoils the application. It fits worst of all a man like Job, who was handed over to Satan's attacks and tried to the end by God.

For my part, then, I would turn to God (El), and to God (Elohim) would I commit my cause. He does great things that no one can search out. He gives rain on the face of the earth, and sends water on the face of the fields. He sets the low on high, and raises up those who mourn to prosperity.

It is always good to advise men to trust in God; for He never fails those who trust in Him. "Trust in Him at all times, O people; pour out your heart before Him." "Cast your burden on the Lord." He is powerful, good and kind. He can lift up those who are bowed down. He refreshes their dried-up spirits, as rain refreshes thirsty land. So, taken in itself, this counsel is good; but remembering the underlying principle that Job is suffering for his sins, it can only irritate. It is as though he were saying, "Sin is common to all, as trouble is. So humble yourself as a sinner before God, and He will exalt you." It is all the more subtle because it comes so near the truth.

Of course it is good to do this, but Eliphaz says it as though he was above Job's level. He speaks rightly of how great God is, lifting the lowly to places of dignity. But Job at the time was not lifted up, so Eliphaz thought Job was not right with God!

Does God not sometimes test people? The rains are not only for fruitful seasons; they can also destroy the fruit, and greatly try the poor farmer. What we find in these men is entirely one-sided pleading. It is not the whole case at all; it is never the full case. It is not the judge; it is the mere advocate; and in this case Job was the poor defendant. They were all set on hunting Job down. They wanted to find the secret wickedness that they believed lay behind all his trial. They were all wrong.

The apostle Paul quotes the words of Eliphaz in the New Testament. God Himself says that what they had spoken was not right. Yet the Holy Spirit gave the whole book by inspiration, and uses the words of one of them as Scripture. Certainly the two things fit together, and very simply. Look at the words of Eliphaz on their own, and they contain nothing but truth. Weigh them as applied to Job, and they are inexcusably wrong. In the New Testament the application is as right as the words themselves.

It is surely right to lay up God's words in our heart, but to accept the words of Eliphaz as God's word is a different matter. Job had not left the Almighty, so to tell him to return was insulting. Let us never treat a suffering believer as an unbeliever.