Job 26:14

Lo, these are parts of His ways.

The veil partly lifted

The least understood Being in the universe is God. Blasphemous would be any attempt, by painting or sculpture, to represent Him. Egyptian hieroglyphs tried to suggest Him, by putting the figure of an eye upon a sword, implying that God sees and rules, but how imperfect the suggestion. When we speak of Hint, it is almost always in language figurative. He is “Light,” or “Day spring from on high,” or He is a “High Tower,” or the “Fountain of Living Waters.” After everything that language can do when put to the utmost strain, and all we can see of God in the natural world and realise of God in the providential world, we are forced to cry out with Job in my text, “Lo, these are parts of His ways; but how little a portion is heard of Him? but the thunder of His power who can understand?” We try to satisfy ourselves with saying, “It is natural law that controls things, gravitation is at work, centripetal and centrifugal forces respond to each other.” But what is natural law? it is only God’s ways of doing things. At every point in the universe it is God’s direct and continuous power that controls and harmonises and sustains. What power it must be that keeps the internal fires of our world imprisoned--only here and there spurting from a Cotopaxi, or a Stromboli, or from a Vesuvius putting Pompeii and Herculaneum into sepulchre; but for the most part the internal fires chained in their cages of rock, and century after century unable to break the chain or burst open the door. What power to keep the component parts of the air in right proportion, so that all round the world the nations may breath in health, the frosts and the heats hindered from working universal demolition. What is that power to us? asks someone. It is everything to us. With Him on our side, the reconciled God, the sympathetic God, the omnipotent God, we may defy all human and Satanic antagonisms. We get some little idea of the Divine power when we see how it buries the proudest cities and nations. Ancient Memphis it has ground up, until many of its ruins are no larger than your thumbnail, and you can hardly find a souvenir large enough to remind you of your visit. The city of Tyre is under the sea which washes the shore, on which are only a few crumbling pillars left. By such rehearsal we try to arouse our appreciation of what Omnipotence is, and our reverence is excited, and our adoration is intensified, but, after all, we find ourselves at the foot of a mountain we cannot climb, hovering over a depth we cannot fathom. So all those who have put together systems of theology have discoursed also about the wisdom of God. Think of a Wisdom which can know the end from the beginning, that knows the thirtieth century as well as the first century. We can guess what will happen; but it is only a guess. Think of a Mind that can hold all of the past and all the present and all the future. We can contrive and invent on a small scale; but think of a Wisdom that could contrive a universe! Think of a Wisdom that was able to form, without any suggestion or any model to work by, the eye, the ear, the hand, the foot, the vocal organs. What we know is overwhelmed by what we do not know. What the botanist knows about the flower is not more wonderful than the things he does not know about the flower. What the geologist knows about the rocks is not more amazing than the things which he does not know about them. The worlds that have been counted are only a small regiment of the armies of light, the hosts of heaven, which have never passed in review before mortal vision. What a God we have! All that theologians know of God’s wisdom is insignificant compared with the wisdom beyond human comprehension. The human race never has had, and never will have enough brain or heart to measure the wisdom of God. “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are tits judgments, and His ways past finding out!” So, also, all systems of theology try to tell us what is omnipresence, that is God’s capacity to be everywhere at the same time. So every system of theology has attempted to describe and define the Divine attribute of love. Easy enough is it to define fatherly love, motherly love, conjugal love, fraternal love, sisterly love and love of country, but the love of God defies all vocabulary. I think the love of God was demonstrated in mightier worlds, before our little world was fitted up for human residence. Will a man, owning 50,000 acres of land, put all the cultivation on a half acre? Will God make a million worlds, and put His chief affection on one small planet? Are the other worlds, and larger worlds, standing vacant, uninhabited, while this little world is crowded with inhabitants? No, it takes a universe of worlds to express the love of God! Go ahead, O Church of God! Go ahead, O world! and tell as well as you can what the love of God is, but know beforehand that Paul was right when he said, “It passeth knowledge.” Only glimpses of God have we in this world, but what an hour it will be when we first see Him, and we will have no more fright than I feel when I now see you. It will not be with mortal eye that we will behold Him, but with the vision of a cleansed, forgiven, and perfected spirit. (T. De Witt Talmage.)

Parts of His ways

The man who said that was not left comfortless. Sometimes in our very desolateness we say things so deep and true as to prove that we are not desolate at all, if we were only wise enough to seize the comfort of the very power which sustains us. He who has a great thought has a great treasure. A noble conception is an incorruptible inheritance. Job’s idea is that we hear but a whisper. Lo, this is a feeble whispering: the universe is a subdued voice; even when it thunders it increases the whisper inappreciably as to bulk and force: all that is now possible to me, Job would say, is but the hearing of a whisper; but the whisper means that I shall hear more by and by; behind the whispering there is a great thundering, a thunder of power; I could not bear it now; the whisper is a Gospel, the whisper is an adaptation to my aural capacity; it is enough, it is music, it is the tone of love, it is what I need in my littleness and weariness, in my initial manhood. How many controversies this would settle if it could only be accepted in its entirety! We know in part, therefore we prophesy in part; we see only very little portions of things, therefore we do not pronounce an opinion upon the whole; we hear a whisper, but it does not follow that we can understand the thunder. There is a Christian agnosticism. Why are men afraid to be Christian agnostics? Why should we hesitate to say with patriarchs and apostles, I cannot tell, I do not know; I am blind, and cannot see in that particular direction; I am waiting? What we hear now is a whisper, but a whisper that is a promise. We must let many mysteries alone. No candle can throw a light upon a landscape. We must know just what we are and where we are, and say we are of yesterday, and know nothing when we come into the presence of many a solemn mystery. Yet how much we do know! enough to live upon; enough to go into the world with as fighting men, that we may dispute with error, and as evangelistic men, that we may reveal the Gospel. They have taken from us many words which they must bring back again, when rationalism is restored amongst the stolen vessels of the Church, agnosticism also will be brought in as one of the golden goblets that belongs to the treasure of the sanctuary. We, too, are agnostics: we do not know, we cannot tell; we cannot turn the silence into speech, but we know enough to enable us to wait. Amid all this difficulty of ignorance we hear a voice saying, What thou knowest not now, thou shalt know hereafter: I have many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now: if it were not so, I would have told you,--as if to say, I know how much to tell, and when to tell it. Little children, trust your Lord. (Joseph Parker, D. D.)

Limited knowledge of the Creator

The works of God should lead us to God Himself. Our study of the creature should be to gain a clearer light and knowledge of the Creator. There are many expressions and impressions of God upon the things which He hath made, and we never see them as we ought, till in them we see their Maker. A critical eye looks upon a picture, not so much to see the colours or the paint, as to discern the skill of the painter or limner; yea, some (as the apostle speaks in reference to spirituals) have senses so exercised about these artificials that they will read the artist’s name in the form and exquisiteness of his art. An Apelles or Michael Angelo needs not to put his name to his work, his work proclaims his name to those who are judicious beholders of such kind of works. How much more (as the Psalmist speaks), “that the name of God is near, do His wondrous works (both of nature and providence) declare” to all discreet beholders! That which the eye and heart of every godly man is chiefly upon, is to find out and behold the name, that is, the wisdom, power, and goodness of God in all His works, both of creation and providence. It were better for us never to enjoy the creature, than not to enjoy God in it; and it, were better for us not to see the creature, than not to have a sight of God in it. And yet when we have seen the most of God which the creature can show us we have reason to say, how little a portion is seen of Him! And when we have heard the most of God that can be reported to us from the creation, we have reason to say, as Job here doth, “How little a portion is heard of Him?” (Joseph Caryl.)

Our ignorance of God

The true knowledge of God is founded in a deep sense of our ignorance of Him. They know Him best who are most humble that they know Him no better. In this chapter Job celebrates the power and wisdom of God as manifest in the works of creation.

I. How little a portion do we know of His being. That there must be some intelligent, independent, first cause of all created nature is most certain. This first Being must subsist necessarily, or by a necessity of nature. But have we any idea what that means? If He be necessarily existent, He must be eternal. But a Being subsisting of Himself from all eternity, surpasses the utmost stretch of our imagination. If God necessarily exist, He must be omnipresent, or present in all places. But what idea can we form of the Divine immensity?

II. The manner of God’s existence as much exceeds all our comprehension as the necessary properties of it. How can we suppose that it should not? If Scripture does not explain to our understanding the peculiar mode or manner of His existence, or a distinction of subsistence in the Divine essence, why should the mystery of it be a stumbling block to our faith, when in the world of nature we are surrounded with mysteries which we readily believe, though no less incomprehensible?

III. How little we know of the Divine perfections. Both His natural and moral perfections leave our thoughts labouring in the research infinitely behind. What those perfections are, as subsisting in a limited degree in creatures we know, but what they are as existing without limits, or to the utmost extent in God, we know not.

1. When our minds are once satisfied and established in the doctrine of the Divine perfections, let no difficulties or objections that may arise from our contemplation of the works of nature, or the ways of providence, be suffered to weaken our faith therein.

2. When we are speaking of the Divine attributes we commonly say they are infinite, that is, they have nothing to limit, obstruct, or circumscribe them, or that they extend to the utmost degree of perfection.

3. The attributes of God are sometimes divided into His communicable and incommunicable attributes. By the former are meant His moral perfections; such as His wisdom, holiness, goodness, etc., which in various degrees He communicates to His creatures. By the latter are understood those attributes which are appropriate to Deity; such as absolute independence, self-sufficiency, eternity, immensity, and omnipotence, which are in their own nature incommunicable to any finite subject.

IV. How little do we know of the works of God. How few of them fall under our observation! Look at the minute animal work; at what is revealed by the microscope. Look at the great world; or at the finished mechanism of our body. How astonishing the union of two such opposite substances as flesh and spirit.

V. His ways of providence are as unsearchable as His works of Power. Whilst His thoughts and views are not as ours, but infinitely more extended, it is no wonder that there should appear to us inextricable mysteries in the course of His providential conduct.

VI. How low and defective is our knowledge of the Word of God. In a revelation that comes from God, it might reasonably be expected that we should meet with some hidden truths or sublime doctrines which surpass our understandings.

(1) How humble we should be in view of our ignorance.

(2) Speak of God with the profoundest reverence.

(3) Be thankful for what we know of God, and try to increase it. (J. Mason, A. M.)

On the incomprehensibleness of God

Under the dispensation of the new covenant, a clearer knowledge of the Divine nature and properties was vouchsafed. Yet still the things of heaven are raised far above the level of mortal faculties. If God under the law made darkness His pavilion, He dwells under the Gospel in inaccessible light.

I. The incomprehensibleness of God as it relates to His general nature. Who can comprehend His distinct personality, combined with His diffused omnipresence? What clear and distinct notion does man entertain of eternity? Nor can we form a more accurate notion of unbounded space. God is omnipotent. But God cannot destroy His own nature. God cannot obliterate space. God cannot act wickedly. What is this omnipotence which is fettered with so many “canners”? God is a Spirit. But what does man know of Spirit? God is omniscient. But how can we reconcile this with the contingent and optional conduct of men as moral and free agents?

II. To how small an extent we can comprehend God’s moral attributes. Wisdom, Justice, Holiness, Mercy. If God be holy, why did He permit the existence of vice? If He be merciful, wherefore did He permit the existence of suffering? If He be just, whence the promiscuous distribution of good and evil observable, with little respect to merit or demerit, in this world? How many such questions might be asked! Inferences--

1. How exceedingly petulant appear the cavils of infidelity!

2. In those matters of faith wherein we possess no analogy to assist our power of comprehension, it will be well to rest satisfied with the authority of Scripture.

3. In our present inability to comprehend the Divine nature, we seem to possess the valuable earnest of a future state of being. Oh, the exquisite and endless pleasures which the full comprehension of Divinity will impart to the unfilmed understanding of man! (Johnson Grant.)

The mystery of Providence

The patriarch, extolling the majesty and might of Jehovah, adduces various exhibitions of His power in the natural world. The meaning of Job is, “These manifestations of the Deity, grand and imposing as they are, present but a very inadequate display of His character and works. They are, as it were, but a breathing of His power.” It is the feeling of every devout philosopher engaged in the researches of natural science, “These are parts of His ways.” When he meets with difficulties, therefore, which baffle his sagacity, he modestly refers them to his own ignorance, satisfied that there must be principles or facts, as yet undiscovered, that will explain them. It is the sciolist who draws sweeping conclusions from scant premises. It will do much to save science from repeating its mistakes, to keep in mind that in its profoundest researches into the arcana of nature it sees but “parts of His ways who made and governs all.” What is here affirmed of creation is no less true of His providence. Providence comes home to us all. It has to do with everyone’s affairs at every moment of life. Who does not feel that this whole dispensation under which we live is a mystery? We come into being heirs of a depraved nature. The world is a scene replete with temptation, and filled with suffering. Sin, sorrow, and death range over every part of it. The mystery which enfolds this whole condition of things deepens when we consider the character of the Supreme Being. It seems, at first view, to be incompatible with His moral perfections. We are all pressed with these moral difficulties. It is a tangled web which we cannot unravel. Sometimes, in meditating on it, our faith almost gives way. If there be any method of removing or mitigating these trials, we ought to know it. Take the text as equivalent to the declaration of the apostle, “We know in part.” To take this world by itself, dissevered from its relations to the great scheme of providence, and from its own past and future, is to consign ourselves to atheism and despair. To contemplate it as a part, and an infinitesimal part of a “stupendous whole,” will relieve even its darkest features, and assist us in believing that although “clouds and darkness are round about Him, righteousness and judgment are the habitation of His throne.” “These are parts of His ways.” There is a prime truth presented in these last words. We are not to escape from the perplexities of our position by denying that the Divine government extends to this moral chaos around us. Whatever is, is by His direction or permission. All these inequalities of our condition proceed according to a purpose. It is chaos only to our limited and imperfect vision. It is something to be assured of this. If these events are but “parts of His ways,” both reason and religion forbid us to judge of them as though they were the whole of His ways. As parts of God’s ways, we can so far understand as to perceive that it is what it is because we are what we are. We may not attempt to penetrate the Divine counsels and inquire why this order of things was established in preference to any other. But since it is established, we cannot fail to see that it expresses in a most emphatic manner God’s hatred of sin. And it is adapted to supply the very training which we need. We are under the discipline of temptation. (Henry A. Boardman, D. D.)

The Jubilee of Science in 1881

I endeavour to point out the direct religious bearings of some of the main discoveries achieved within fifty years. Half a century ago it was generally held that every living thing, whether animal or plant, from the lichen on the wall to the cedar of the forest, from the crawling worm to the king of beasts, and man the crown of all, was called into existence by an instantaneous fiat, just as we see them now. All Nature was looked upon as a gigantic stationary stereotype, the handiwork indeed of God, who stood outside of it, and had done so since creation’s dawn. In presence of that Nature, as the performance of a Divine artificer, men wondered and worshipped indeed; but to a large extent their worship was ignorant, and the wonder vacant. Our admiration lacked intelligence, our awe was a blank dismay. But Darwin and Wallace arose like prophets in our midst, and at the bidding of their voice chaos gave place to order, darkness made way for light. People who call themselves, and think themselves, and are, according to their light, religious, tell us, forsooth, that this theory of development is not demonstrated, is not proven, is a mere hypothesis. Of course it is a mere hypothesis. Everything is a mere hypothesis that attempts to give a philosophical explanation of Nature. Every effort to piece together, in a consistent whole, the isolated facts of experience, is a mere hypothesis. But the theory of separate creation is likewise a mere hypothesis. The question is, which hypothesis is the more reasonable? To accept this theory of evolution demands an act of faith. Every intellectual judgment is an act of faith. And just in proportion as it is earnest and sincere, and bends before the majesty of reason, and is a genuine endeavour to read a meaning into life and destiny, it is a religious act. There used to be a time when it was held religious to believe in miracles, in a stoppage or reversal of the quiet course of Nature. The more prodigies and marvels, the more inexplicable things a man could accept, or a book recount, the more religious that man or book was supposed to be. But the more God is recognised in order, in unbroken sequence and succession, in continuous cause and effect, in religious reason and persistent purpose, the more will piety recoil from everything that is miraculous; the more averse will be our reason and our faith--which is but reason’s confiding or imaginative side--to harbour the thought of the preternatural, the supernatural, the supernatural. It was supposed that the human race appeared all of a sudden on the scene some six thousand years ago, a few centuries more or less after the disappearance of the extinct mammalia. But modern science carries back the existence of man one hundred thousand years, and even that is but a portion of the time during which some high authorities consider we have traces of the race. What are the religious lessons of this high antiquity of man? Do not Judaism and Christianity assume quite other proportions in our eyes, in relation to the entire humanity, than when it was believed that they, together with the light vouchsafed the patriarchs, constituted a revelation coeval with the lifetime of mankind? In all these cases, and in many more, it would be easy to show that the ascertained facts of science are valuable, and fraught with religious and theological worth; not only because they give the lie direct to many an ancient preconception, and many a narrowing prejudice, but because they open a wide and legitimate door to authorised flights of imagination and reasonable faith. The Bible will not lose its charm, nor its lessons their sanctity, because better understood, and more justly valued, than of old. (E. M. Geldart, M. A.)

The thunder of His power.

A discourse upon the power of God

The text is a lofty declaration of the Divine power, with a particular note of attention--“Lo!” Doctrine. Infinite and incomprehensible power pertains to the nature of God, and is expressed in part in His works. Though there be a mighty expression of Divine power in His works, yet an incomprehensible power pertains to His nature. His power glitters in all His works, as well as His wisdom.

I. The nature of this power.

1. Power sometimes signifies authority. But power taken for strength, and power taken for authority, are distinct things. The power of God here is to be understood of His strength to act.

2. Power is divided ordinarily into absolute and ordinate. Absolute is that power whereby God is able to do that which He will not do, but is possible to be done. Ordinate is that power whereby God doth that which He hath decreed to do. These are not distinct powers, but one and the same power.

3. The power of God is that ability and strength whereby He can bring to pass whatever He please, whatever His infinite wisdom can direct, and whatever the infinite purity of His will can resolve. Power, in the primary notion of it, doth not signify an act, but an ability to bring a thing into act.

4. This power is of a distinct conception from the wisdom and will of God. They are not really distinct, but according to our conceptions. We cannot discourse of Divine things, without absolutely some proportion of them with human, ascribing unto God the perfections, sifted from the imperfections, of our nature. In us there are three orders--of understanding, will, power; and accordingly three acts--counsel, resolution, execution; which, though they are distinct in us, are not distinct in God.

5. As power is essentially in God, so it is not distinct from His essence. Omnipotence is nothing but the Divine essence efficacious ad extra. It is His essence as operative.

6. The power of God gives activity to all the other perfections of His nature; and is of a larger extent and efficacy, in regard of its objects, than some perfections of His nature.

7. This power is infinite. A finite power is a limited power, and a limited power cannot effect everything that is possible. The objects of Divine power are innumerable--not essentially infinite. God can do infinitely more than He hath done, or will do.

(1) Creatures have a power to act about more objects than they do.

(2) God is the most free agent. Every free agent can do more than He will do.

(3) This power is infinite in regard of action. In regard to the independency of action. It consists in an ability to give higher degrees of perfection to everything which He hath made. As His power is infinite, extensive, in regard of the multitude of objects He can bring into being, so it is infinite, intensive, in regard of the manner of operation and the endowments He can bestow upon them.

(4) This power is infinite in regard of duration.

8. The impossibility of God’s doing some things is no infringing of His almightiness, but rather a strengthening of it. Some things are impossible in their own nature. Such as imply a contradiction. Some things are impossible to the nature and being of God. Some are impossible to the glorious perfections of God. He cannot do anything unworthy of Himself.

II. Reasons to prove that God must needs be powerful.

1. The power that is in creatures demonstrates a greater and an inconceivable power in God. Nothing in the world is without a power of activity according to its nature. All the power which is distinct in the creatures must be united in God.

2. If there were not an incomprehensible power in God, He would not be perfect.

3. The simplicity of God manifests it.

4. The miracles that have been in the world evidence the power of God.

III. How His power appears--in creation, in government, in redemption.

1. In creation.

(1) His power is the first thing evident in the story of the creation.

(2) By this creative power God is often distinguished from all the idols and false gods in the world. How doth the power of God appear in creation? The world was made of nothing. The creation of things from nothing speaks an infinite power. The power appears in raising such variety of creatures from this barren womb of nothing.

(3) God did all this with the greatest ease and facility. Without instruments. By a word; a simple act of His will. Note also the appearance of this power in the instantaneous production of things.

2. In government. God decreed from eternity the particular ends of creatures, and their operations respecting those ends. As there was need of His power to execute His decree of creation, there is also need of His power to execute His decree about the manner of government. All government is an act of the understanding, will, and power. This power is evident in natural government, which consists in the preservation of all things, propagation of them by corruptions and generations, and in a cooperation with them in their motives to attain their ends. In moral government, which is of the hearts and actions of men. And in gracious government, as respecting the Church.

3. In redemption. This is the most admirable work that ever God brought forth in the world. This will appear--

(1) In the person redeeming.

(2) In the publication and propagation of the doctrine of redemption.

(3) In the application of redemption--in the planting grace; in the pardon of sin; in the preserving grace.

IV. Uses.

1. Of information and instruction. If incomprehensible and infinite power belongs to the nature of God, then Jesus Christ hath a Divine nature, because the acts of power proper to God are ascribed to Him. Hence may also be inferred the deity of the Holy Ghost. Works of omnipotency are ascribed to the Spirit of God.

2. The power of God is contemned and abused. Contemned in every sin; in distrust of God; in too great fear of man; and by trusting in ourselves. Abused when we make use of it to justify contradictions; by presuming on it, without using the means He hath appointed. This doctrine is full of comfort, and it teacheth us the fear of God. (S. Charnock.)

The power of God

I. The nature of God’s power. Power sometimes signifies authority; here it signifies strength.

1. The power of God is that ability or strength whereby He can bring to pass whatsoever He pleaseth, whatsoever His infinite wisdom can direct, and the unspotted purity of His will resolve.

2. The power of God gives activity to all the other perfections of His nature. As holiness is the beauty, so power is the life of His attributes in their exercise.

3. This power is originally and essentially in His nature. The power of God is not derived from anything without Him.

4. Hence it follows that the power of God is infinite. Nothing can be too difficult for the Divine power to effect.

II. Wherein the power of God is manifested.

1. In creation.

2. In the government of the world.

(1) In preservation, or natural government.

(2) In moral government. The restraint of the malicious nature of Satan. The restraint of the wickedness of man.

(3) In His gracious government. In the deliverance of His Church.

In effecting His purpose by small means. In the work of our redemption. Note the Person redeeming; the progress of His life; His resurrection. Note the publication of it. The power of God was manifested in the instruments; and in the success of their ministry. Conclude--

1. Here is comfort in all afflictions. Our evils can never be so great to distress us as His power is to deliver.

2. This doctrine teaches us the fear of God. “Who would not fear Thee?” (Skeletons of Sermons.).