HOMILETICS.-The grand object of the whole of this magnificent address of Jehovah to Job is to impress him with his utter ignorance of the world in which he lived, and his incompetency therefore to interpret God's moral administration. He gives him to understand that, as he cannot explain the phenomena of His natural government, it is useless for him to attempt understanding His moral; and, therefore, he should submit, and not contend. The moral of the whole sublime communication appears to be this, Be concerned, Job, for a moral trust in My character, rather than for a theoretical knowledge of My ways. In this chapter and the following we have a series of Divine challenges to Job, in order to hush his disputations, and in this section He seeks to impress him with his ignorance as to the origin of the material world. In the text there is a Divine challenge in relation to the when and how of the origin of the world. I. The WHEN. Did he know when He began His creation? "Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?" (1) The world had a beginning. There was a period when this world did not exist, when no world existed, when not an atom floated in infinite space. An eternal creation is a contradiction. (2) Its beginning is very remote. Geology teaches that it has been in existence for innumerable ages, that its commencement is lost in the awful abysses of the past. (3) Though remote its beginning, it commenced with God. Where wast thou, then, when it commenced? A few years ago and thou wast not. I wrought innumerable ages before thou appearedst on the stage of life. How canst thou judge, then, of My government? What is thy intellect to Mine? A dim spark to the central fires of the universe. What is thine experience to Mine? "From everlasting to everlasting I am God." Thou art the mere child of an hour; do not contend, but submit. Do not criticize, but trust. II. The HOW. Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? or who hath stretched the line upon it?" How was it brought into being? How were the first primary elements produced? How were they brought into their endless combinations? How were globes by millions rounded, burnished, balanced, and set agoing? How came the myriad forms of life from the frail blade to the majestic cedar, from the animalcule to the leviathan, from the babe to the archangel? Who shall tell how? Some scientists. speak of the universe as a clock; but how is the clock constructed? Some, as a tree. But who planted the tree? Who formed it? Who struck its roots into infinite space? As to the how as well as the when of the origin of the world, men are as ignorant to-day as ever. CONCLUSION. The subject serves (1) To rebuke all disposition to pronounce an opinion upon the ways of God. What captious questions the sceptic is everlastingly propounding -questions about the introduction of sin, the reign of wrong, the suffering of innocence, the tardy march of Christianity. To all such questions we have one answer: "Who art thou that repliest against God?" What is thy intellect to His? what is thy experience to His? what is thy sphere of observation to His? Where wast thou when He laid the foundation of the earth? This subject serves(2) To suggest that our grand effort ought to be to cultivate a loving trust in the Divine character, rather than to comprehend the Divine procedure. To comprehend Him we never can. "Who by searching can find out God?" &c. He will always be the Infinite Unknown. "A climbing height it is without a head, Depth without bottom, way without an end; A circle with no line environed, Not comprehended-all it comprehends; Worth infinite, yet satisfies no mind, Till it that infinite of the Godhead find."-Greville. But even a child can trust Him. To trust is natural and easy; and the greater, the truer, the kinder, the holier the being, the more easy to trust him. "Trust in Him" therefore "that liveth for ever." This subject serves-(3) To enable us to appreciate the glorious service of Christianity. The question, "Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?' confounds and crushes me. I feel powerless before it; it overwhelms me with a sense of my own insignificance. I feel that God is too great to notice me; that my existence is only that of a wretched atom, to be tossed about by the furious winds or trodden down by the iron heel of resistless fate. Before the voice of God I am all dark; I tremble in horror with the feeling of my own nothingness. Blessed be His name! Christianity comes to my relief. It tells me that although I am insignificant, I am still a child, a beloved child of the Everlasting, and that it is not the will of my Father that any, even of His "little ones," should perish; nay, that it is His good pleasure that I should have a kingdom. It speaks to me in tones of inspiring, bracing, uplifting, music. "Let not your hearts be troubled, ye believe in God, believe also in me: In my Father's house," &c. Like the force which links the floating atom to the Sun, the Cross, the blessed Cross, binds my poor spirit to the heart of God. HOMILY No. LXXXI. JEHOVAH'S ADDRESS. (Continued.) (2.) A CHALLENGE TO JOB'S POWER IN RELATION TO THE WORLD OF WATERS AND THE INTERCHANGE OF DAY AND NIGHT. "Or who shut up the sea with doors," &c.-CHAP. Xxxviii. 8–15. EXEGETICAL REMARKS. Ver. 8. "Or who shut up the sea with doors?" This is a poetic representation of the Creator's agency in relation to the great world of waters. To the vast and tumultuous mass He allotted a space on the globe, and shut it in with doors, lest it should break forth and deluge the world. "When it brake forth, as if it had issued out of the womb?” All the images are taken from child birth. The ocean is represented as being born. Ver. 9.-" When I made the cloud the garment thereof, and thick darkness a swaddling-band for it." This huge child of God, carrying out the figure, is represented as being wrapped up in clouds and enfolded in the swaddling-band of darkness. The image is one of great beauty. "It is that of the vast ocean just coming into being, with a cloud resting upon it and covering it. Thick darkness envelopes it, and it is swathed in mists." Ver. 10.-" And brake up for it My decreed place, and set bars and doors." Margin, "and established My decree upon it." The idea is, God fixed the boundary, settled the exact space it should occupy, and barred it up within that space. Ver. 11.-" And said, Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further: and here shall thy proud waves be stayed?" Who has not felt the force of this majestic utterance, as he has stood upon the beach when the ocean, lashed by the tempest, came rolling in, and threatening to overflow the earth? The rocky barriers drove its billows back. The Divine voice seemed to say as they approached, "So far shalt thou come, and no further." Ver. 12. "Hast thou commanded the morning since thy days?" Or, as Delitzsch renders it, "Hast thou in thy life commanded a morning?" "And caused the dayspring to know his place ?" This perhaps may mean the exact place in the heaven where the sun would appear in the morning. Ver. 13.-" That it might take hold of the ends of the earth." That is, "spread itself over the earth to its utmost bounds." "That the wicked might be shaken out of it." The idea is, that the wicked perform their deeds in the night, and when the morning breaks upon them, for fear of apprehension, they flee away. Ver. 14.-" It is turned as clay to the seal; and they stand as a garment." "As the plastic clay presents the various figures impressed on it by a seal, so the earth, which in the dark was void of all form, when illuminated by the dayspring, presents a variety of forms -hills, valleys, &c. Turned ' (turns itself, Hebrew) alludes to the rolling cylinder seal, from one to three inches long, such as is found in Babylon, which leaves its impressions on the soft plastic clay, as it is turned about: so the morning light rolling on over the earth." -Fausset. See also Barnes and Canon Barry on this verse. Ver. 15.- -" And from the wicked their light is withholden, and the high arm shall be broken." The idea perhaps is, that the wicked, frightened in the light lest they should be detected, hurried into darkness, and thus the "high arm" of their purpose was broken. Cheerful as is the light, and beautiful as the objects which it reveals, the wicked cannot enjoy it, because they must hide themselves in dark ness. HOMILETICS.-Here is a challenge to Job's power in relation to the world of waters, and to the interchange of day and night I. THE WORLD OF WATERS. Who shut up the sea with doors, when it brake forth?" Perhaps there is no object in nature so calculated to impress man with his utter insignificance and feebleness as the mighty ocean. How vast its area, covering two-thirds of the surface of the globe! How fathomless its abysses, and how incessant its motion! How savage its aspect, how terrific its roar, how gigantic_its billows in the storm! Yet its mighty mass, even when wrought to the highest fury, is kept within bounds, like a lion in his cage. Man, if thou wouldst feel thy utter insignificance and thy impious folly in contending with thy Maker, climb some lofty cliff, and behold the ocean in the wild grandeur of a tempest. "Thou vast ocean! ever-sounding sea; Thou symbol of a drear immensity! Thou thing that windest round the solid world, Fleets come and go, and shapes that have no life Here is a Divine challenge to Job's power in relation to "Hast thou II. THE INTERCHANGE OF DAY AND NIGHT. commanded the morning?" What power hast thou over the morning? Thou hast never been able during thy life to quicken or retard the march of the sun as he comes rolling up the East, runs his circuit, and sinks beneath the horizon. Day and night, light and darkness, are all independent of thee. In thine agony thou mightest long for the morning; but thou canst do nothing to bring it on. Not a beam will fall in thy chamber one moment before the time. In the perpetration of nocturnal crimes thou mightest desire the darkness to continue until thy depredations are completed ; but the sun will not tarry. He will pour his rays upon thee not a moment later on thy account. How powerless we are in relation to this interchange of day and night, and the revolution of time! We cannot prevent the day coming, nor the night departing. Thus our days come and go, bear us away to the awful future, and we can neither hasten nor |