“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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The prosperity that follows upon Job’s submission is the embodiment of a great truth. Although a man must do right even if it were to send him to hell forever, yet we need not fear: all good things must grow out of and hang upon the one central good, the one law of life—the Will, the One Good. To submit absolutely to him is the only reason: circumstance as well as all being must then bud and blossom as the rose. And they will! What matter whether in this world or the next, if one day I know my life as a perfect bliss?
Friends, our cross may be heavy, and the via dolorosa rough; but we have claims on God, yea, the right to cry to him for help. He has spent, and is spending himself to give us our birthright, which is righteousness. Though we shall not be condemned for our sins, we cannot be saved but by leaving them; though we shall not be condemned for the sins that are passed, we shall be condemned if we love the darkness rather than the light, and refuse to come to him that we may have life. God is offering us the one thing we cannot live without—his own self: we must make room for him; we must cleanse our hearts that he may come in; we must do as the Master tells us, who knew all about the Father and the way to him—we must deny ourselves, and take up our cross daily, and follow him.
Commentary
by Earle Canty
God is timeless; He is not bound in any way by time. Though believers have eternal life {Romans 6:23}, it is challenging for mankind to escape having temporal thoughts about life. We see life and we want as much of life as we can have. We struggle to understand that our life on earth may be difficult and may have many hardships, even if we have great faith in God, and that we may need to wait until heaven before we enjoy the bliss that we believe others are experiencing on earth.
The great truth is that the Father loves us deeply and wants only the best for us; but there is a price. We must make Him the priority in our life; we must choose to live in accordance with His will for our life, not our will for our life. His will is that we forsake sin, that we live in the light and not in the darkness. We must deny ourselves, and take up our cross daily, and follow him. For some this is impossible, the attraction of the life offered by the evil one is too powerful for them to resist. Even for the most righteous of mankind, there are struggles because no person is free from sin {Romans 3:23}. Yes, for some, living life in accordance with His will appears easy. These are the ones who genuinely realize that their life will be best when lived in accordance with His will for them, and who make conscious choices, each and every day, to live that life. The rest of us struggle, sometimes mightily, because we don’t realize or accept that our life will be best when lived in accordance with His will for us. Our choices cause us to experience less than His best for us. Do we really want to settle for less than the best?
The link below is to a hymn entitled the “Sweet Will of God”. It is a lovely melody with lyrics that speak of His sweet will for His children.
https://www.hymnal.net/en/hymn/h/383