Chapter 30

Job continues:

Job laments that the young men, who's father's were not worth Job's time of old, now laugh at him, and scorn him.  These verses describe the contrast:

1 "But now they laugh at me, men who are younger than I, whose fathers I would have disdained to set with the dogs of my flock. [Job 30:1 ESV]

Job goes on to describe the fathers of those who are laughing at him now.  They are pretty low:

3 Through want and hard hunger they gnaw the dry ground by night in waste and desolation; [Job 30:3 ESV]

6 In the gullies of the torrents they must dwell, in holes of the earth and of the rocks. 7 Among the bushes they bray; under the nettles they huddle together. [Job 30:6-7 ESV]

9 "And now I have become their song; I am a byword to them. [Job 30:3, 9 ESV]

Besides the change in his public reputation, from a place of honor to being spit at by lesser men, Job is still also suffering physically.  His current state is pitiable in all its aspects:

17 The night racks my bones, and the pain that gnaws me takes no rest. [Job 30:17 ESV]

19 God has cast me into the mire, and I have become like dust and ashes. 20 I cry to you for help and you do not answer me; I stand, and you only look at me. 21 You have turned cruel to me; with the might of your hand you persecute me. [Job 30:19-21 ESV]

Job says it is right to pray for relief, as anyone in his situation would do.  And this is the answer he got:

26 But when I hoped for good, evil came, and when I waited for light, darkness came. [Job 30:26 ESV]

30 My skin turns black and falls from me, and my bones burn with heat. [Job 30:30 ESV]

The physical distress that Job is in boggles the mind.  This is Satan's worst, to convince Job to give up his faith.  It is relentless pain, day and night, constant fever, disease that gives no quarter.  Enough to kill, but Satan is prevented from that.  So the disease that would kill anyone else just continues to ravage Job.  The life that God commanded Satan to leave alone turns out to be the thing Job values least.  He wants to die so that his grief and suffering will end.  But God prevents that.  We know where it is going - we know that life will turn out to be worth living for Job, but he can't see that light at the end of the tunnel and certainly his friends can't see it and encourage him to persevere through this. 

This would be an awful place to come to.  Losing hope that God will help.  Feeling that God's back is turned and that nothing but judgement can be expected until death.  But still, Job leaves the length of his days in God's own hands.