The Unanswered Indictment Text: Job 24:1-12
Introduction: The Ache for Justice
We come now to a raw and unsettling portion of Job's complaint. If you have ever looked at the world, at the headlines, at the raw data of human experience, and felt a profound disconnect between what you know to be true about God's justice and what you see with your own eyes, then you will find a companion in Job. This is not the complaint of an atheist; it is the agonized cry of a believer. The atheist sees injustice and says, "See? There's no one in charge." The believer sees injustice and says, "Why does the one in charge not make His days of judgment known?" This is a far more profound and troubling question.
Job's friends have been peddling a neat and tidy worldview, a tidy little system of cosmic bookkeeping where every righteous act gets a credit and every wicked act gets a debit, all settled up by the end of the business day. They are the original proponents of the prosperity gospel, but in reverse. They see Job's calamity and work backward to find the sin. "You must have done something terrible," they insist, "because God is just, and this is what happens to terrible people."
But Job, from his ash heap, looks out at the world and says, "That is simply not true." His experience has shattered their simplistic formula. He knows he is righteous, and yet he suffers. And more than that, he knows that wicked men are not suffering. They are, in fact, getting away with it. This chapter is Job's legal brief, his indictment against the wicked, and his searching question to the God who seems to stand by and watch. He is not denying God's existence or His ultimate sovereignty. He is wrestling with the timing of His justice. He is asking a question that echoes down through the centuries: Why does evil so often prosper?
This is not a comfortable passage. It is a detailed, graphic account of social rot, of the oppression of the weak by the strong. And Job's central charge is not just that these things happen, but that God "does not pay attention to such offense." This is the heart of the scandal, the central ache. We must not rush to defend God from Job's charge too quickly. We must first sit with Job, look at the evidence he presents, and feel the weight of his question. Only then can we begin to understand the Bible's much larger, more glorious, and more terrifying answer.
The Text
"Why are times not stored up by the Almighty, And why do those who know Him not behold His days? Some move the boundaries; They seize and devour flocks. They drive away the donkeys of the orphans; They take the widow's ox for a pledge. They push the needy aside from the road; The afflicted of the land are made to hide themselves altogether. Behold, as wild donkeys in the wilderness They go forth seeking food earnestly in their work, The desert becomes for him a place of bread for his young ones. They harvest their fodder in the field And glean the vineyard of the wicked. They spend the night naked, without clothing, And have no covering against the cold. They are wet with the mountain rains And hug the rock for want of a shelter. Others snatch the orphan from the breast, And against the afflicted they take a pledge. Those poor ones walk about naked without clothing, And hungry ones carry the sheaves. Within the walls they produce oil; They tread wine presses but thirst. From the city men groan, And the souls of the wounded cry out; Yet God does not pay attention to such offense."
(Job 24:1-12 LSB)
The Central Question (v. 1)
Job begins with the central theological problem that is tormenting him.
"Why are times not stored up by the Almighty, And why do those who know Him not behold His days?" (Job 24:1)
This is the thesis statement for the entire chapter. Job is not questioning God's omniscience. He affirms it. The "Almighty" knows all things; times are not hidden from Him. The problem is not God's knowledge but His apparent inaction. Why doesn't God set public, observable court dates? Why doesn't He schedule regular days of judgment that everyone can see? If a righteous man like Job, who knows God, cannot see these days of reckoning, what hope is there?
Job's friends have argued that judgment is swift and predictable. Job looks around and sees that the wicked are living long, prosperous lives. They are not beholding God's "days." This is a direct contradiction of the neat moral calculus of Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar. Job is saying that the observable reality does not line up with their theology. And when your theology clashes with reality, you have two options: you can either deny reality, which is what the friends are doing, or you can wrestle with your theology, which is what Job is doing. Job is engaged in the difficult, honest work of faith, refusing to accept easy answers that contradict the plain facts on the ground.
A Catalog of Injustice (v. 2-4)
Job now begins to list his evidence. He presents a series of vignettes illustrating the brazen confidence of the wicked.
"Some move the boundaries; They seize and devour flocks. They drive away the donkeys of the orphans; They take the widow's ox for a pledge. They push the needy aside from the road; The afflicted of the land are made to hide themselves altogether." (Job 24:2-4 LSB)
This is a list of high-handed, covenant-breaking sins. Moving boundary stones was a grave offense in the ancient world, equivalent to forging a property deed. It was a theft of a family's inheritance and future, a sin explicitly condemned in the Law (Deut. 19:14). Seizing flocks is straightforward robbery. But notice how the wickedness escalates. It is not just theft; it is theft from the most vulnerable.
They target the orphans and widows, the very people God has placed under His special protection (Ex. 22:22). The donkey of the orphan is likely the family's only means of transport or labor. The widow's ox is her only means of plowing her field. Taking it as a pledge for a debt was a death sentence, which is why the Law of Moses forbade taking a man's millstone as a pledge, for it was his life (Deut. 24:6). These wicked men are not just greedy; they are predatory. They are economic cannibals.
Their arrogance is such that they don't even allow the poor to use the public roads. They shove them aside, forcing them into hiding. The social fabric is being torn apart. The wicked are so dominant that the righteous poor cannot even be seen in public. They are erased, made invisible. And Job's point is that this is not happening in secret. This is open, public, arrogant sin, and yet the thunderbolts of judgment are not falling.
The Life of the Dispossessed (v. 5-8)
Job then shifts his focus from the actions of the wicked to the consequences for their victims. He paints a grim picture of the life of the oppressed.
"Behold, as wild donkeys in the wilderness They go forth seeking food earnestly in their work, The desert becomes for him a place of bread for his young ones. They harvest their fodder in the field And glean the vineyard of the wicked. They spend the night naked, without clothing, And have no covering against the cold. They are wet with the mountain rains And hug the rock for want of a shelter." (Job 24:5-8 LSB)
The comparison to "wild donkeys" is brutal. These are not domesticated animals, cared for by a master. They are feral, scavenging creatures, pushed out to the margins of existence. The men who should be working their own fields have been driven into the wilderness, where they must forage for survival. The only "bread" they can find for their children is in the barren desert.
The injustice is compounded. They are forced to work as day laborers in the very fields that were likely stolen from them. They "harvest their fodder" and "glean the vineyard of the wicked." They are building up the wealth of their oppressors while they themselves starve. This is a picture of systematic exploitation. The gleaning laws in Israel were designed to provide for the poor (Lev. 19:9-10), but here, even that provision is part of the machinery of oppression.
Their poverty is absolute. They are naked, exposed to the cold of the night and the mountain rains. Their only shelter is a crevice in the rocks. This is not just poverty; it is a complete loss of dignity, of home, of security. They have been stripped of everything that makes for a humane existence. They are living like animals, precisely because the wicked are behaving like animals.
The Cycle of Cruelty (v. 9-12)
The indictment continues, returning to the heartless actions of the oppressors and culminating in the central problem.
"Others snatch the orphan from the breast, And against the afflicted they take a pledge. Those poor ones walk about naked without clothing, And hungry ones carry the sheaves. Within the walls they produce oil; They tread wine presses but thirst. From the city men groan, And the souls of the wounded cry out; Yet God does not pay attention to such offense." (Job 24:9-12 LSB)
The cruelty here is almost unimaginable. Snatching an orphan from the breast suggests taking a child into debt slavery because the widowed mother cannot pay. Taking a pledge "against the afflicted" is a general statement of their predatory lending practices. The result is a permanent underclass of the working poor.
Job then gives us two of the most poignant images of injustice in all of Scripture. The hungry are carrying sheaves of grain. They are surrounded by food, laboring to bring in the harvest, but they are not allowed to eat. And within the city walls, men are treading grapes in the winepress and pressing olives for oil, yet they are thirsty. They are producing abundance for others but are denied the most basic sustenance for themselves. This is the very definition of exploitation. The fruit of their labor is stolen from them at the source.
The result is a city full of groaning. The "souls of the wounded cry out." This is not silent suffering. This is a loud, public appeal for justice. And this brings us to the final, devastating line of this section: "Yet God does not pay attention to such offense." The Hebrew is stark. God does not lay "folly" or "wrong" to their charge. He does not seem to notice. The cries of the wounded reach the streets, but they do not seem to reach heaven.
This is the scandal. Job is not saying God is unjust. He is saying that from his vantage point, God appears to be indifferent. And this is a terrible thing for a man of faith to conclude. It is a crisis of worldview. Job has been taught that God is the defender of the orphan and the widow, the one who executes justice for the oppressed. But the evidence of his eyes tells a different story. And he is honest enough to say so.
Where is the Verdict?
So what are we to do with this? Job is asking our questions. He is voicing the protest that rises in our own hearts when we see wickedness flourish. The first thing we must do is recognize that the Bible does not shy away from these hard questions. God is big enough to handle our complaints. He is not threatened by our confusion.
Job is, of course, seeing things from a limited perspective. He sees the "now," but he cannot see the "not yet." He is like a man watching the first act of a five-act play and complaining that the villain has not yet been brought to justice. The Bible's consistent answer is that judgment is not a matter of "if," but "when." The times and seasons are indeed stored up by the Almighty. God has appointed a day when He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained (Acts 17:31).
The apparent delay of God's justice is not indifference; it is patience. As Peter tells us, "The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance" (2 Peter 3:9). The time that the wicked are using to heap up their sins is time that God is graciously extending for them to turn from their wickedness.
But there is a deeper answer still. The ultimate answer to Job's cry is found at the cross. Where was God when the innocent suffered? He was on a Roman cross, in the person of His Son. The ultimate act of injustice in human history, the murder of the only truly righteous man, was happening, and God did not "pay attention" in the way Job expected. The heavens were not torn open. The legions of angels were not dispatched. The Father turned His face away.
Why? Because in that moment, the ultimate injustice was becoming the instrument of ultimate justice. On that cross, God was loading all the sins cataloged by Job, all the moved boundary stones, all the stolen oxen, all the groans of the wounded, onto His own Son. He was paying attention. He was paying the debt Himself. The cross is where God's justice and mercy meet. He is just, and so sin must be punished. He is merciful, and so He provides the substitute to bear that punishment.
Therefore, we who are in Christ look at the injustices of the world not with the despair of Job, but with a settled hope. We know that every account will be settled. Every tear will be wiped away. Every stolen field will be restored. Every hungry laborer will feast at the marriage supper of the Lamb. The souls of the wounded do not cry out into an empty sky. Their cries are heard by the one who was Himself wounded for our transgressions, and He will return to make all things new. And on that day, no one will ask why God is not paying attention.