Refuge from trouble in the thought of God.
Conclusion of Eliphaz's address. His language suddenly changes into a gentler strain. It is like the clearing of a dark sky, revealing once more the deep blue; or the bend of a stream which has been flowing through a stern gorge, now broadening out into a sunlit lake.
I. THE GREATNESS AND BENEFICENCE OF GOD. (Job 5:8-16.) Let men turn to him for comfort and for strength. It is a bright gem of description.
1. God is the Supreme. (Job 5:8.) Let men look no lower than to the Highest. With him is the final appeal. He is Judge of all the earth. Clouds and darkness are round about him; but justice and judgment are the habitation of his throne.
2. He is the great Worker. His scale and sphere of operation is vast, immeasurable, unsearchable (Job 5:9). His mode of operation is wonderful, past finding out. "His way is in the sea, his path in the great waters, his footsteps who has known?" The grandeur and marvel of his deeds are seen:
3. The object of Divine operation. (Job 5:15, Job 5:16.) In both nature and human life it is one—to lessen suffering, to protect innocence, to deliver from violence and persecution.
II. THE BLESSING OF DIVINE CHASTISEMENT. (Job 5:17-27.) From the general evidences of the beneficence of God, we come down to one special and peculiar form of it, He is good to us in our pains as well as in our pleasures. His power is exercised to purify and chasten as well as to destroy. The recognition of this truth is one of the leading features of Scripture revelation. How different from the gloomy creed of the most enlightened heathen concerning suffering sent from heaven! He felt the wrath of his gods, but he never knew their blows as signs of a secret and remedial love. Where there is no belief in supreme righteousness, suffering must always be without relief. The blessedness here described is both internal and external.
1. Internal. The man is blessed
2. External. The man at peace with himself and with God seems to bear a charmed life (Job 5:19).
"Whose edge is sharper than the sword; whose tongue
Outvenoms all the worms of Nile; whose breath
Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie
All comers of the world—kings, queens, and states,
Maids, matrons—nay, the secrets of the grave
This viperous slander enters."
From this fearful scourge the blessed man is hidden, protected. Good men are often attacked, but cannot be destroyed, by slander. They do not feel it as do the consciously guilty. They, in the beautiful words of the psalm, are kept "secretly in a pavilion from the strife of tongues." The slanderer does service to the upright man in the end by forcing him into a position of self-defence, or of silent dignity, which brings the true qualities of his character into a clearer light.
HOMILIES BY R. GREEN