Job 4:17 Shall mortal man be more just than God? shall a man be more pure than his maker? The sum of the assertion in this verse is, that no man can be more pure and just than God. Let a man be never so just or sincere, yet there ought no comparison be made betwixt his righteousness and God's. Learn — 1. God is most righteous, pure, and holy, within Himself and in His administration, so that He can do no wrong, nor ought He to be challenged by any. Sufficient arguments are not wanting whereby to clear this righteousness of God in all His dealings, and particularly in His afflicting godly men, and suffering the wicked to prosper; but when we consider His absolute dominion and sovereignty, and His holiness in Himself, it will put the matter beyond all debate, though we dip no further into the particulars. 2. This righteousness and holiness of God is so infinitely transcendent, that the holiness of the best of men cannot compare with it; but it becomes impurity, except he look on them in a Mediator. 3. Though God be thus just and holy, and that infinitely above the best of men, yet men are not wanting, in many cases, to reproach and reflect upon the righteousness of God, yea, and to cry up their own worth and holiness, to the prejudice of His righteousness. 4. An impatient complainer under affliction doth, in effect, wrong God and His righteousness, and sinfully extol his own holiness. 5. Whatever liberty men take to vent their passions, and to judge harshly of God and His dealing; and whatever their passion suggest for justifying thereof, yet men's own consciences and reason, in cold blood, will tell them that their sentence is unjust. 6. Men's frailty and mortality bear witness against them, that they are not perfectly pure, and that they may not compare with God. 7. Man, considered not only in his frailties, but even in his strength and best endowments, is infinitely inferior to God. 8. If men consider that God is their Creator and Maker, and that they have no degree of perfection which is not from God, they will find it a high presumption to compete with Him in the point of perfection. (George Hutcheson.) Parallel Verses KJV: Shall mortal man be more just than God? shall a man be more pure than his maker?WEB: 'Shall mortal man be more just than God? Shall a man be more pure than his Maker? |
    |