For those who may wish to ‘study’ this chapter, the following simple resources are provided for you. Each passage has a four-Part approach to help you take in and think further about what you have read.

Passage: Job 16:1-14

1 Then Job replied:

2 ‘I have heard many things like these;
    you are miserable comforters, all of you!
3 Will your long-winded speeches never end?
    What ails you that you keep on arguing?
4 I also could speak like you,
    if you were in my place;
I could make fine speeches against you
    and shake my head at you.
5 But my mouth would encourage you;
    comfort from my lips would bring you relief.

6 ‘Yet if I speak, my pain is not relieved;
    and if I refrain, it does not go away.
7 Surely, God, you have worn me out;
    you have devastated my entire household.
8 You have shrivelled me up – and it has become a witness;
    my gauntness rises up and testifies against me.
9 God assails me and tears me in his anger
    and gnashes his teeth at me;
    my opponent fastens on me his piercing eyes.
10 People open their mouths to jeer at me;
    they strike my cheek in scorn
    and unite together against me.
11 God has turned me over to the ungodly
    and thrown me into the clutches of the wicked.
12 All was well with me, but he shattered me;
    he seized me by the neck and crushed me.
He has made me his target;
13     his archers surround me.
Without pity, he pierces my kidneys
    and spills my gall on the ground.
14 Again and again he bursts upon me;
    he rushes at me like a warrior.

A. Find Out

1. How does Job describe his ‘friends’? v.2,3
2. How would he speak if he were in their shoes? v.4,5
3. Yet what is his state, however he speaks? v.6
4. What does he say the Lord has done? v.7-9
5. How do people respond to him – and why? v.10,11
6. How does he describe what has happened to him? v.12-14

B. Think:

1. Why does Job feel as he does about his friends?
2. How is Job right in what he says about what God has done?
3. How is he wrong in what he says about it?

C. Comment:

Job has found what his so-called friends have said, totally dispiriting. He calls them miserable comforters (v.2) using long winded speeches (v.3). If their positions were reversed he could speak like that (v.4) but wouldn’t! He would encourage them (v.5) and that’s what he needs (implied). Whether he speaks or stays silent he is stuck with his pain (v.6) so speaking does no good for him (implied).

Then he turns to address the Lord. It is God who has devastated his household (v.7) and has bound him (with suffering) so his awful appearance speaks against him (v.8). It is God’s anger that has done this (v.9) so that when people see him they mock him and unite against him in their condemnation (v.10). It is God who has turned him over to such people (v.11). It had been all right until He acted (v.12) but then it was like arrows of pain struck him (v.13), not just once but many times (v.14). This is all God’s fault!

Now in this outpouring there is both truth and falseness. Yes, it is true that this has all happened because of God. We saw in the opening two chapters that this was all instigated by God and so ultimately He IS responsible for all this, using Satan as His agent. But God HASN’T done this out of anger (v.9), He’s not gnashing His teeth at Job. It’s happening because He trusts Job and is pleased with him!

D. Application:

1. God sometimes allows suffering for specific purposes.
2. Sometimes suffering comes through man’s free will in a Fallen World.

Passage: Job 16:15-22

15 ‘I have sewed sackcloth over my skin
    and buried my brow in the dust.
16 My face is red with weeping,
    dark shadows ring my eyes;
17 yet my hands have been free of violence
    and my prayer is pure.

18 ‘Earth, do not cover my blood;
    may my cry never be laid to rest!
19 Even now my witness is in heaven;
    my advocate is on high.
20 My intercessor is my friend
    as my eyes pour out tears to God;
21 on behalf of a man he pleads with God
    as one pleads for a friend.

22 ‘Only a few years will pass
    before I take the path of no return.

A. Find Out

1. How does Job describe his physical & moral state? v.15-17
2. What does he ask? v.18
3. Yet of whom does he testify?  How does he describe them? v.19
4. How also does he describe them? v.20
5. What does this one do? v.21
6. And what does he conclude? v.22

B. Think:

1. What is Job’s activity described in these verses?
2. What remarkable revelation and statement of faith is given.

C. Comment:

It is intriguing that so often when a person appears at their lowest they receive the greatest revelation. In the first half of this chapter Job has bemoaned his terrible state and he continues that in these verses. Yet following that comes amazing revelation!

He speaks first of his terrible physical state, in sackcloth covering his awful sores that have caused him to bow down and cry out to God (v.15). This has not been a casual prayer but an intensive pouring out of his soul (v.16), yet he has sought to remain free of sin (v.17). He cries out that the earth will not take him, but that he may live to continue to plead his case (implied, v.18).

Then comes this amazing revelation. He speaks of someone in heaven (v.19) who he describes as a witness (who has seen what has happened to him), his advocate (who speaks out for him), his intercessor  (v.20, who cries to God for him – also v.21a), his friend. He faces death at some unknown time in the not-distant future (v.22) – but he has a friend in heaven.

This is a true statement of faith. Centuries later the apostle John would write, “If anyone does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defence, Jesus Christ the Righteous One.” (1 Jn 2:1). Somehow in the depths of his anguish as he cries out to God, Job senses this wonderful truth – God is for us and has provided an advocate for us!

D. Application:

1. Jesus speaks for us because he has taken our sin and punishment.
2. He simply reminds the Father of what they have done for us!