“Still I stand the tempest’s shock, For my anchor grips the rock.” —W.C. Martin
Like a compass needle seeking north in the midst of a storm, Job refused to give up on God. In this section (Job 30:24-31), he once again, like Paul in the teeth of Euroclydon’s gale, shouts into the wind, “I believe God” (Acts 27:25). He still expects the Lord to explain what’s happened. The commentators find Job 30:24 hard to translate. Is he saying there’s nothing left for God to ruin? Or that no one should do further damage to one in an ash heap? Or that people shy away from helping a man in his condition? Here are two other translations. “Surely no one lays a hand on a broken man when he cries for help in his distress” (NIV). “Yet no one stretches out his hand to a ruined man when he cries for help in his distress” (BSB). They won’t further hurt him, or no one will help him? Whatever the case, he says his life is just “a heap of ruins.” Yet somehow, like a battered ship with the sails in tatters, the mast broken, and the rudder gone, Job can still assess his situation. His expectations are in ruins. “Have I not wept for him who was in trouble? Has not my soul grieved for the poor? But when I looked for good, evil came to me; and when I waited for light, then came darkness” (vv 25- 26). I had compassion on others, but there’s none for me. The good I did was returned as evil; when I should have had light to understand my plight—nothing but darkness. His emotions are shattered. “My heart is in turmoil and cannot rest;…I go about mourning…and cry out for help” (vv 27-28). His engagement with others is long gone. “I am a brother of jackals, and a companion of ostriches” (v 29). In such anguish (v 30), his expressions are all of misery and despair (v 31). And yet, though he doesn’t know it, Safe Harbor is just ahead!