Job 17
1
My breath is corrupt, my days are extinct, the graves are ready for me.
2
Are there not mockers with me? and doth not mine eye continue in their provocation?
3
Lay down now, put me in a surety with thee; who is he that will strike hands with me?
4
For thou hast hid their heart from understanding: therefore shalt thou not exalt them.
5
He that speaketh flattery to his friends, even the eyes of his children shall fail.
6
He hath made me also a byword of the people; and aforetime I was as a tabret.
7
Mine eye also is dim by reason of sorrow, and all my members are as a shadow.
8
Upright men shall be astonied at this, and the innocent shall stir up himself against the hypocrite.
9
The righteous also shall hold on his way, and he that hath clean hands shall be stronger and stronger.
10
But as for you all, do ye return, and come now: for I cannot find one wise man among you.
11
My days are past, my purposes are broken off, even the thoughts of my heart.
12
They change the night into day: the light is short because of darkness.
13
If I wait, the grave is mine house: I have made my bed in the darkness.
14
I have said to corruption, Thou art my father: to the worm, Thou are my mother, and my sister.
15
And where is now my hope? as for my hope, who shall see it?
16
They shall go down to the bars of the pit, when our rest together is in the dust.
True Christian Religion # 844
844. The Jews are especially notable for failing to know that they are in the spiritual world, believing themselves still to be in the natural world. The reason is that they are utterly external people, having no inward thoughts about religion. They therefore speak in the same way about the Messiah as they did previously. Some say that he will come with David and glittering with jewels will go before them, leading them into the land of Canaan, drying up rivers for them to cross by raising his rod. They say that the Christians, whom among themselves they actually call gentiles, will then catch hold of the skirts of their clothes, humbly begging to be allowed to accompany them; and they will accept the rich if they are well enough off, and these too will be their servants. They support this belief by what is said in Zechariah (8:23) and in Isaiah (66:20). On the coming of David to be their king and shepherd they quote Jeremiah (30:9) and Ezekiel (34:23-25; 37:23-26). They are utterly unwilling to be told that David there means our Lord Jesus Christ, and that the Jews there mean those who are going to belong to His church.
