Grasp the Gospel — Bible Comprehension Quizzes

Job 17 Devotional

Asking God to Stand Surety

“Give me, I pray, the pledge You demand. Who else will be my guarantor?”Job 17:3 (BSB)

Job's spirit is broken, and the grave is waiting (17:1). Mockers surround him, people spit in his face, and he has become a byword (17:2, 17:6). By the end of the chapter, he asks where his hope could possibly be, and whether it will go down into the dust with him (17:15-16).

In the middle of this darkness comes a strange request. Job asks God to provide the pledge himself, to be the one who guarantees Job's case, because no one else will (17:3). In other words, he appeals to God to stand with him even while God seems to stand against him. Job could not see how such a guarantee would ever be given. Hebrews calls Jesus the one who guarantees a better covenant (Hebrews 7:22). In Christ, God has given the kind of pledge Job longed for, and he has given it himself. When hope seems to be going down into the dust, it rests on what God has secured, not on what we can see.

To think about: When your own hope runs low, how does it help to know that God himself has given the pledge in Christ?

About Job 17: Job's Hope Fades Toward the Grave

Job continues his reply, saying his spirit is crushed and death is near. He asks God to stand as his guarantor, mourns that he has become a public object of scorn, and wonders whether any hope can remain if the grave is to be his only home.

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