Job 9:26

Job felt he need not go beyond his own case. God does afflict the blameless as well as the wicked. Job's days had slipped away so that he had scarcely tasted what good is: no runner on land, no light skiff on the waters, no eagle in the air, is faster than they. And not only this, but with the painful dread that God could hold him guilty if He wished.

Job identifies himself with the innocent sufferers at whose passing away God laughs. He describes his own utter weakness and the shortness of his life. He has forgotten all his former prosperity, and draws his comparisons for the fleeting nature of life from earth and sea and sky. His days are like the swift postman who runs with his message. They are like the ships passing along the horizon, or like an eagle dashing out of sight after its prey. Bildad had urged him to forget his troubles and look bravely forward. At that suggestion he can only shudder at his sorrows and his pains, for he knows God will not hold him innocent. So his misery holds him as in a vice.

He began by acknowledging the rightness of God's disciplinary ways, but raised the all-important question: how could a man be right with God? In our day people have used the short sentence "Get right with God" to awaken interest in the gospel message. It might well provoke the reply, "Yes, but how can that be done?" That is exactly what Job asked in verse 2. The rest of the chapter shows how earnest and sincere he was in asking it.

How clear it is that Job knew he was a sinful creature before his holy Creator, and that he had in himself no means of getting right. That being so, his only hope was for a third party to step in; but he knew of no such third party, or "daysman." His three friends could not play the part, and no other man could either. The daysman must be great enough to lay one of his hands on Almighty God, and gracious enough to lay the other on poor diseased and sinful Job.

Both Job and his friend Bildad long ago raised the question, "How can man be just with God?" (Job 9; 25). Both had in mind that man is fallen and guilty. Their question found no definite answer in Old Testament times. For this, as for the answer to many another riddle, men had to wait until God sent forth His beloved Son. "But now," says the apostle, "the righteousness of God has been manifested" (Rom. 3:21).

"As the swift ships," so is your life. Old and young, rich and poor, are all sailing over the waters of Time. We put the trumpet to our lips. With earnest and friendly voice we cry, "Men and women, youths and maidens, where are you bound?" Will the voyage you have started on end in harbour and home, or in storm and wreck and ruin?