The News-Herald. [volume] (Hillsboro, Highland Co., Ohio) 1886-1973, 1893-04-20
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International Lssssn sor April ~, isss--
Jobs Confession and Restoration.-Joh
l2.1-10.

Jobs Confession and Restoration
l2.1-10.
GOLDEN TExr.-Ye have heard of the patience
Of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord: that
the Lord is very pitifuI, and OF tender mercy
James b:11.
The colloquy has ceased, and Job has
had the last word. No little light has
been thrown upon the problem, and
Job stands in the earliest dawning twi-
light of the truth. He is still surround
ed by clouds and darkness; but the rays
of the morning have touched the noun
tain tops, and shown glimpses OF the
silver lining on the Heavenward side of
the earthly clouds.
Now a new character enters. He has
listened to the discussion till his heart
burns within him. Then he speaks
His work is to sum up the clearest and
fullest light which the human intellect
can bring to the dark problem of sor-
row.
First. Although the three friends
manifest no hunger for direct
communion of spirit with God, and
are perfectly content with Teufels-
drockh's absentee God, sitting at the
outside of the universe and seeing itgo,
SO long as they secure an honorable
and prosperous way through life, and
although they state the fact much too
universally and with bitter dogmatic
exaggerations that turn it into a lie,
yet their main contention that even
here and now it fares well with the
good, and goes ill with the wicked, af-
fords very helpful clew to the mystery
which encompasses our life.
Second. Elihu sets in far clearer
light what was limited at in the previous
discussion, that God sends troubles as
discipline, as a healing medicine, as
merciful remedy to lead men to a
higher and better life. They are voices
of God, sent for fatherly chastisement,
as well as punishment, to refine away
the dross and purify the soul.
Third Deduct all the sufferings which
have the characteristics either of just
chastisement or of instruments of
education, there still remains in human
life certain number which cannot be
explained. Job himself, by his noble
provision of a Judgment and life to
come, in which all the wrongs of time
shall be redressed, and good shall come
at last to all who have loved goodness
and pursued it, throws the light of a
great and supporting hope into all the
darkness of earth and time.
THE STORM.
One of the most effective and beauti-
full features of the action of this poem is
the ecommingling, with exquisite tact, of
Elihu's closing argument with a descrip-
ton of the approaching tropical storm,
out of whose whirlwind Jehovah
speaks. At the 27th verse of the seth
chapter, he sees the signs of rain, and
hears the distant ''thunderings of his
pavilion" and the far-off shafts of
lightning. The hurricane approaches.
The lightnings fill the whole
heaven with vivid and continu-
Gus flashes which zigzag 'sto
the ends of the earth" ''God
thundereth marvelously with his
voice~ Showers of His mighty rain,''
snow and hail drive the wild beasts to
shelter. "The balancings of the clouds"
are marvellous The darkness is terri
BILE. At last the clouds clear away, 'sthe
light is bright in the skies" and ''out
of the north cometh golden splendor."
~ By "the clear shining after the
rain, and the new glory of the new
Heaven and the earth from which the
storm has swept all that darkens and
defles," he would convey to Job "the
hope that he too shall enter happier
day." (2) He sees and would have all
men see that kindred religious emotions
are aroused in us by the great convul-
sions Of nature and by the tribulations
which desolate the soul, both inducing
awe, humility, fear, the sense of weak
ness, and of our need Of Divine stay.
(3) In the spiritual as in the natural
world the very forces which seem most
irresistible and most adverse to us are
really Gods ministers for our good.
THE ANSWER FROM GOD.
Out of the whirlwind came Gods
voice. There was no form seen, but
only voice out of the great manifesta-
tions of nature. ~ The voice uttered
what nature taught in it's less clear
way. (2) The God of Revelation was
identified with the God of Nature, the
great Creator of all things (3) The in
visible, unaccountable, but very power
full wind was one fitting symbol of God
and HIS Providence. ''The wind blow
eth where it listeth, and thou nearest
the sound thereof but canst not tell
whence it cometh nor whittier it goeth.
So is everyone that is born of the
spirit" (4) If the whirlwind, as is
usual, was accompanied by lightning,
still more was it the symbol of the hid
ing of Gods power-mysterious, all
pervasive, always working, but occa-
sionally flashing out with terrific and
dazzling force. In no way could the
answer of God be given in more ap-
propriate and effective form.
1t is noted by all that Jehovah does
not give a direct answer and solution to
the problem which Job and his friends
have been wrestling with. But () he
does give the best possible practical
solution of the problem, by so setting
forth Gods goodness and wisdom and
power that Job sees that he can trust