Job 12:7-12 - Homilies By E. Johnson

The wisdom and tile power of God a truth universally known.

It is not the peculiar possession of those fancied wise friends. It is a truth impressed on all nature and on the experience of man.

I. APPEAL TO THE LIVING CREATURES . ( Job 12:7-10 .) The beasts, the birds of the air, the earth with all its living growths, the creatures of the sea,—all bear traces of his skill, all receive from him their life and sustenance, all are subject to his omnipresent power (comp. Psalms 104:26-30 ).

II. APPEAL TO THE EXPERIENCE OF AGE . As the palate tries and discriminates between the different dishes on the table, so does the ear try the various opinions to which it listens, and selects the best, the ripest, as its guide ( Job 12:11 ). Long life means large experience, and largo experience gives the criterion of truth and the guide of life. Yet experience is but the book of common experiences. It fails us when we have to deal with the peculiar and the exceptional, which is the present situation of Job (verse 12).

III. ELOQUENT DESCRIPTION OF THE POWER AND WISDOM OF GOD . (Verses 13-25.) Here Job rivals and surpasses his friends. With repeated blows, as of the hammer on the anvil, he impresses the truth that the might and intelligence of the Supreme are irresistible, and before him all human craft and power must be reduced to impotence. The power and the wisdom of God alternately occupy his thought, appear and reappear in a variety of images.—J.