Commentary - Job 25:1-6

Bird's-eye view

We now come to the third and final speech from Bildad the Shuhite. It is remarkably short, as though he has run out of arguments and is now falling back on a handful of theological maxims. He is no longer attempting to engage with the particulars of Job's situation. Rather, he ascends to the heavens to declare the absolute majesty and sovereignty of God, and from that great height, he looks down to pronounce upon the utter worthlessness of man. The central question he poses, "How then can mortal man be right with God?" is perhaps the most important question a human being can ask. Bildad gives the implied answer of "he cannot," using this truth as a cudgel against Job. He speaks a great deal of truth in these six verses, but it is a truth untempered by grace, a law without a gospel. And the law, when it is wielded by a graceless man, always kills.

Outline

Context In Job

This is the third cycle of speeches, and Job's friends are beginning to show their exhaustion. Eliphaz gave a blistering, accusatory speech in chapter 22, and Job responded with a lament and a declaration of faith in chapters 23 and 24. Now it is Bildad's turn, but his contribution is a mere six verses. He does not address Job's arguments. He simply reiterates a point he has made before: God is great, and man is small and sinful. He is correct in his theology, as far as it goes, but entirely wrong in his application. He is using the doctrine of God's holiness and man's depravity to shut down the conversation and condemn a suffering saint. This speech effectively ends the dialogue, as Zophar does not speak again. Job will have the last word before God Himself intervenes.

Key Issues

Commentary

1 Then Bildad the Shuhite answered and said,

Bildad takes his final turn. The word is "answered," but he is not really answering Job. He is delivering a final, polished, and impersonal theological statement. This is the last we will hear from him.

2 “Rule and dread belong to Him Who makes peace in His heights.

Bildad begins with the absolute sovereignty of God. Dominion, or rule, is His. So is dread, or terror. God is not a tame God; He is fearsome in His majesty. The phrase "makes peace in His heights" refers to His effortless governance over the heavenly realms, the angelic hosts. There is no celestial civil war, no challenge to His authority that gives Him a moment's trouble. He rules His domain with perfect, settled peace. This is a truth designed to make a man on an ash heap feel very small indeed.

3 Is there any number to His troops? And upon whom does His light not rise?

He continues with two rhetorical questions. First, are God's armies countable? Of course not. His power is limitless, His resources infinite. Second, who is outside the reach of His light? This can be understood as the light of His omnipresence and His common grace. The sun shines on the just and the unjust. God's gaze is upon all His creation; no one can hide from Him. Bildad is establishing the complete and totalizing nature of God's reign. He is everywhere, and He is all-powerful.

4 How then can mortal man be right with God? Or how can he be pure who is born of woman?

Here is the pivot, and the central question of the book, and of the entire Bible. Given this God of absolute dread, power, and holiness, how can a man stand before Him and be declared righteous? How can someone born of a woman, which is to say, born in sin, be considered clean? Bildad asks the right question. This is the question of justification. But he asks it in order to silence Job, to tell him, "See? You cannot be righteous, so cease your protesting." The Bible's answer, which is utterly foreign to Bildad, is that a man can be right with God, but not on the basis of anything in himself. He can be right with God because God Himself provides the righteousness in the person of His Son.

5 Behold even the moon has no brightness, And the stars are not pure in His sight;

Bildad now argues from the greater to the lesser. He points to the heavens. Look at the moon, he says. In God's presence, its reflected glory is nothing. Look at the stars. In the sight of Him who is perfect light, they are tarnished and impure. If the most magnificent and seemingly pure objects in the created order fall short of God's glory, what hope is there for man?

6 How much less mortal man, that maggot, And the son of man, that worm!”

This is his devastating conclusion. If the stars are not pure, then what about man, a maggot? What about the son of man, a worm? The language is intended to communicate utter filth, weakness, and insignificance. And in one sense, separated from God's grace, this is a true assessment of fallen man's condition before a holy God. We are corrupt and crawling in the dust. But Bildad says this to crush Job. The gospel takes this same assessment and turns it on its head. For it was the true "Son of Man," Jesus Christ, who said of Himself in the agony of the cross, "But I am a worm, and no man" (Psalm 22:6). God's answer to the problem of man the worm was to become a worm for us, to die our death, so that He might make maggots into sons of God.

Application

Bildad's speech is a potent example of a right doctrine applied with a wrong heart. We must learn from both what he gets right and what he gets disastrously wrong.

First, we must agree with Bildad's high view of God and his low view of natural man. Any approach to God that does not begin with a profound sense of His holiness and our own sinfulness is a false start. Humility is not optional; it is the entryway to the kingdom. We are not "basically good people." Left to ourselves, we are worms before the living God.

Second, we must never, ever use this truth as a weapon against the suffering. Bildad's theology is correct, but his pastoral ministry is an abomination. He takes the weighty truth of God's majesty and drops it on his friend's head. The law without the gospel always accuses and crushes. It can show us our sin, but it cannot show us the Savior.

Finally, we must answer Bildad's great question not with his implied cynical despair, but with the triumphant declaration of the gospel. How can a man be right with God? He is justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus (Rom. 3:24). God declares us righteous not because we have ceased to be worms, but because He clothes us in the perfect righteousness of His Son. The answer to our impurity is not our effort, but Christ's blood. The answer to our maggot-like state is resurrection glory. Bildad saw the problem with perfect clarity, but he was blind to the only solution.