Job 7:6

My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle.

The web of life

These words fitly describe the quickness with which the days of our life glide away. The weaver at his frame swiftly throws the shuttle from side to side, backwards and forwards, and every throw leaves a thread behind it, which is woven into the piece of cloth he is making. And Job compares human life to the shuttle’s motions.

I. The swiftness of our days. When anything is gone, and gone forever, we begin to think more of its value. “Man is like a thing of nought--his time passeth away like a shadow.”

II. Each day has added another thread to the web of life. What is our life but a collection of days? Each day adds something to the colour and complexion of the whole life--something for good or evil. Thus each day is, as it were, a representative of the whole life. Of how great importance then is every day!

III. We weave now what we wear in eternity. “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” Scriptures declare that our life will be brought into evidence to show whether we were believers in Christ or not. Then let us ask ourselves these questions--

1. On what are we resting our hope of salvation?

2. Is it our sincere desire to be conformed to the likeness of Jesus Christ?

3. Do we live in the spirit of prayer?

4. How has the day of our life been spent? What have we done for God’s glory? (E. Blencowe, M. A.)

The web of life

I. The swiftness of our days. We are apt not to prize them till they are gone. Each was full of mercies: did we appreciate them? Each was full of opportunities: did we use them wisely or abuse them?

II. Each day adds a thread to the web of life. Each day has its influence for good or evil, for sin or holiness, for God or Satan.

III. What we now weave we shall wear in eternity. What is the web your life is weaving? Application--

1. On what are you resting your hopes of salvation?

2. Is it your sincere desire to be conformed to the likeness of Jesus?

3. Do you live in the spirit of prayer?

4. Consider at the close of each day how it has been spent.

5. What, on the whole, is the texture and colouring of the web of your life as you look upon it in the light of another dying or opening year? (Homiletic Review.)

The web of life

A Christian man’s life is laid in the loom of time to a pattern which he does not see, but God does: and his heart is a shuttle. On one side of the loom is sorrow, and on the other joy; and the shuttle, struck alternately by each, flies back and forth, carrying the thread, which is white or black as the pattern needs. And in the end, when God shall lift up the finished garment and all its changing hues shall glance out, it will then appear that the deep and dark colours were as needful to beauty as the bright and high colours. (H. W. Beecher.)

Life’s brevity

How brief it is! Who stood sentinel by the gate of Shushan when the royal couriers, bearing hope to the Jews, dashed through, burying their spurs in their horses’ flanks--who stood on the platform by the iron rails that stretch from Holyhead to London, when signals flashed on along the line to stop the traffic and keep all clear, an engine and carriage dashed by with tidings of peace or war from America--saw an image of life. The eagle poising herself a moment on the wing, and then rushing at her prey; the ship that throwing the spray from her bows, scuds before the gale; the shuttle flashing through the loom; the shadow of a cloud sweeping the hillside, and then gone forever; the summer flowers that vanishing, have left our gardens bare, and where were spread out the colours of the rainbow, only dull, black earth, or the rotting wreck of beauty--these with many other fleeting things, are emblems by which God through nature teaches us how frail we are, at the longest how short our days. (T. Guthrie.)