“O that thou wouldst hide me in the grave, that thou wouldst keep me secret, until thy wrath be past, that thou wouldst appoint me a set time, and remember me! If a man die, shall he live again? All the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come. Thou shalt call, and I will answer thee: thou wilt have a desire to the work of thine hands.
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In light of the truth, that God’s nature is that of Jesus Christ, of absolute love and devotion—let us look at the words “Oh that thou wouldst hide me in the grave!” Job appeals to his creator, whom his sufferings compel him to regard as displeased with him, though he knows not why. He prays to forget him for a time, that the desire of the maker to look again upon the creature he had made may awake within him, and make the heart of the parent remember and long after the face of the child; then will he rise in joy, to plead with confidence the cause of his righteousness. For God is closer to the man than is anything God has made: what can be closer than the making and the made? The whole existence of a creature is a unit, an entirety of claim upon his creator: just therefore, let him do with me as he will—even to seating me in the ashes, and seeing me scrape myself with a potsherd! Not the less but ever the more will I bring forward my claim. Is it not the sweetest music ear of maker can her? Except the word of perfect son, “Lo, I come to do thy will, O God!” We, imperfect sons, shall learn to say the same words, too: that we may grow capable and say them, and so enter into our birthright, become partakers of the divine nature in its divinest element, that Son came to us—died for the slaying of our selfishness, the destruction of our mean hollow pride. We are his father’s debtors for our needs, our rights, our claims, and he will have us pay the uttermost farthing. So true is the father, he will even compel us, through misery if needful, to put in our claims, for he knows we have eternal need of these things: without the essential rights of his being, who can live?
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