Scroll to the bottom for thoughts/discussion questions!
One-sentence summary: Job is ready for death, his friends hunker down on the belief that he is evil, and Job asks for some pity from them and warns them against judging him.
Job's spirit is broken, and he is ready to die. He calls his friends mockers. He says God has hidden their hearts from understanding. He has become despised in the sight of all men. We don't often recognize how the loss of reputation is a sort of death, and Job feels that thoroughly. It is interesting how he says, like David, that his eye has "grown dim because of sorrow." It may seem like an unusual analogy, but when we can't see any good, our vision for life gets clouded, too. He wonders if he will make his home in the grave (his description gets pretty grotesque) and if his hope will die there with him.
His second friend speaks again, and of course, it's all Job's fault. He describes the calamity that comes upon the one who "doesn't know God." His friends are 100% committed to painting Job as an evildoer. One wonders why any of them do not say, "We actually don't know why this is happening." There is a lot of pride and self-righteousness, not to mention hard-heartedness and lack of compassion.
Job answers yet again and says, "How long will you torment my soul and rake me in pieces with your words?" He says that if he has sinned, then that is on him, so why persecute him even further and side with God in attacking him? He says there is no justice; God has it out for him, has "fenced [him] in and put darkness in [his] path." He asks for some pity from his friends. Then, he makes a bold statement of faith: "Yet I know that my Redeemer lives and that at last He will stand on the earth" (a prophetic statement referring to Christ.) He believes he will see God while he lives and warns his friend against judging him lest they, too, fall under God's sword of judgment. His words show that it is actually his friends who lack the fear of God, the very thing they are accusing him of.
The same friend speaks again describing the reward of the wicked. "Total darkness is reserved for his treasures... fire will consume him.... the heavens will reveal his iniquity and the earth will rise up against him." He says the wicked man will lose everything.
Thoughts/Questions:
Pride has a hard time saying, "I don't know."
At the time of Job's most intense suffering, he actually prophesied about Christ's coming. Wow. If only we knew how our stories were being written in heaven, we wouldn't give up so easily!
When we judge others, aren't we mocking God and not fearing Him rightly? Not to mention doing the very things we are accusing others of doing?
We are waiting for God to have the final say in all this! And He always does!