Job 17 Hold Onto Hope
This second chapter of Job’s response to what Eliphaz had provoked is before us. The initial portion, Job seems to be encouraged and then drifts back into gloom and despair over his current status.
The spirit of Job was dried up and seemed to have little “fight” left in him; he was ready for “the grave”. His three friends’ mockery came against him and his “eye” did take note of their provocation. He asked, who would be friend him, shake his hand. No response. Job believed it was God who had hidden “understanding” from them and therefore would not exalt them. The usage of words of “flattery” would not cover up what their children saw and/or knew.
Again, we see that Job perceives that it was God who made him “a byword of the people”; being brought so low that men would spit in his face. Sorrow had taken away revelation Job had previously and he was less the man he use to be. There were those who were “astonished” at his condition, recalling all his past.
As an “innocent” man, he was stirred against the hypocrite. However he would “hold to his way” and because of the absence of sin, grow stronger day by day. If all his friends were to be gathered as the three comforters, there would not be found a “wise” one in their midst.
Here we see a turn back into the depression and despair Job had seemed to be exiting. His “days” were past, there wasn’t purpose for him any longer, even in his thought life; there was a receding time of revelation as darkness became more prevalent. He seems to have resigned himself death and would soon be mixed with corruption and the worms in the ground.
He asks the question, “where then is my hope?” If there was any, it couldn’t be seen. Would his expectation end up in Sheol? He would then have rest in the dust; death would be his friend and conqueror.
Saints, when we’re digging ourselves out of hopeless and despair, keep on digging and don’t succumb to the tyranny of the enemy to rob you of hope. Hold onto hope, expectation of what God’s future is for you. Jer. 29:11