THE NAKEDNESS OF JOB

JOB 1:21

Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither.

WE have an instance in this chapter of one of the greatest men in the world, in the most prosperous worldly estate and condition, brought to be externally one of the meanest of men; brought from seven thousand sheep, and three thousand camels, and five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred sheÐasses, and a very great household, all at once to nothing at all, as poor as the meanest beggar: a most remarkable instance of the vanity of worldly honor, riches, and prosperity. How soon is it gone and lost; how many hundred, yea thousands of accidents, may deprive the most prosperous of all in a little time, and make him most miserable and forlorn!

Here is a man that sat like a king and dwelt as a prince, but, as yesterday and today, is become a miserable and forlorn beggar. Before the messenger had finished his bad news, another came with more of the like upon the back of it. First, he has the news of his servants' being killed and his oxen and asses being taken, as you may see in the fourteenth and fifteenth verses; but before he had done telling this sad news to Job, there comes in another and brings him tidings that fire from heaven had burnt up all his sheep, and servants that kept them; and before he had done speaking there comes in another, and tells him that the Chaldeans had carried away all his camels and killed his servants; and before he had done, there came another with the yet more dreadful news that his children were all suddenly killed, as they were feasting together in their eldest brother's house.

And to what circumstances is this man, that just now was one of the richest men in the world, brought to? Now most that read or hear this remarkable history will doubtless acknowledge that, if such a catastrophe was to happen to every man's estate, it would be enough quite to wean him from the world. Almost every man will doubtless say that, if they knew they should lose all their great estate and be deprived entirely of all their outward prosperity, as Job was, they would entertain no thought of striving and laying themselves out for a great estate in the world, seeing they must certainly in this manner be deprived of it, and they know not how soon. If it were so, men would not be so eager and earnest after riches, but would strive only for that that they could not be deprived of; all will grant [that] it would not be worth the while to do more.

But we may speak of it not only as a thing supposed, but as a thing that shall certainly be, for thus every man, however rich, shall certainly be deprived of all his goods, whether sheep, or oxen, or camels, or asses, or servants, or children; they shall be deprived of them as much as Job was, and he knows not how soon. Perhaps, when you read the history of Job, you read it as a strange thing that happened but once in the world; but, for the time to come, read it as a thing that happens daily, and frequently, for every man at death is as much deprived of all his worldly goods as Job was. The great men in the world, as kings, princes, and lords, when they die are as much deprived of all their outward prosperity as Job was: 'tis lost at once, and gone forever, never to be possessed more. Job's losses came indeed sudden, and in a little time one messenger came after another in a very strange manner, but the dying man is deprived of all his external prosperity and worldly good at once, at one breath, even his last breath. This history of Job is only a shadow of death; it is no more than happens to every man in the world.

This poverty that Job was reduced to puts him in mind of death, of which this was a shadow, whereby he and all men must be stripped of all these things and return, possessing nothing, into the earth from whence they come. It also remembrances him of the state he was born in: how he was born, naked and helpless, having nothing and depending entirely on others.

Job, at the news of his losses, shaved his head and rent his mantle, as is said in the verse before the text, so that now he was become literally and properly naked, as this also helped to put him in mind of the estate he was born in, and of the estate he must die in.

These three useful doctrines may be deduced from the words:

DOCTRINE.

I. That we bring nothing of our own into the world with us. By "coming naked from our mother's womb," can't be meant only that we come unclothed, but we come poor, miserable, helpless creatures, without either power or possession, spiritual or temporal; so that hereby we are taught' that all we receive, we receive from God, because we bring nothing with us. This appears to be Job's meaning, by this improvement Job makes of [it] in the ensuing part of the verse: "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord."

II. [The second] doctrine is that the earth is the common mother of mankind. Job says, he came naked out of his mother's womb, and he shall return naked into his mother's womb again. What mother's womb shall Job return into again, but the bowels of his mother earth, out of which every man is made? Our bodies are made of the substance of the earth, as appears, because, when the body is rotten, it returns into the substance of the earth. Cod says to Adam, "Dust thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return." God was Adam's father and the earth was his mother; and by this same mother, out of whose bowels we come, are we nourished at her breast, for man lives by what he digs out of the earth by tillage. Now this doctrine, and the consideration of our mean original out of the earth, ought to teach us humility and so submission to God's will in all dispensations. The wise man would have us see that e are but beasts: what, shall man, whose body is made out of the ground, be proud of that body, whether of its beauty or its riches or honor, or shall man, that is made out of earth, proudly insult one another, for who makes us to differ from others? We are all born of the same mother earth, and thither we shall all return [Eccles. 3:18Ð20)

To this use it is that Job improves it; to teach him submission under God's hand, that he who was made out of earth as well as the meanest beggar, ought not to murmur when his estate is made as mean and low as theirs.

III. The last doctrine, upon which e shall at this time insist, is this:

When man dies, he is forever stripped of all earthly enjoyments

This must be what Job means when he says, "and naked shall I return thither again"; that he should return to the earth, stripped clean of all manner of worldly goods and possessions.

This his doctrine is full of useful improvements, and is plain and certain, and needs little proof or explication. All the world knows the truth of this doctrine perfectly well, but though they know, yet it don't seem at all real to them; for certainly, if it seemed a real thing to them that, in a little time, they must certainly have no more to do with the world, they would act wholly otherwise than they do. We very much need to be put in mind of these things; wherefore, my business [at] this time is only to jog our memories, for we cannot think too often of our latter end. There are these two things implied in the doctrine: First, that man, when he dies, can carry none of these earthly things out of the world with him; second, [that he] shall never enjoy any more of the like nature.

First. Man, when he dies, can carry none of these earthly things out of the world with him. If he possesses all the riches of the Indies, and governed the largest empire in the world, and the lives and fortune of all men upon earth in his hands, yet when death comes, he will strip him as naked as he was born, and will carry him out of the world with no more in his possession than the meanest beggar.

Death serves all alike; as he deals with the poor, so he deals with the rich: is not awed at the appearance of a proud palace, a numerous attendance, or a majestic countenance; pulls a king out of his throne, and summons him before the judgment seat of God, with as few compliments and as little ceremony as he takes the poor man out of his cottage. Death is as rude with emperors as with beggars, and handles one with as much gentleness as the other.

They are all alike in death's territories; one is no richer, no more honorable, than another in the grave, Job 3:14Ð19,

With kings and counselors of the earth, which built desolate places for themselves; or with princes that had gold and silver,` who filled their houses w ith silver; or as an hidden untimely birth, I had not been, as infants which never saw light. There the wicked cease from troubling, and there the weary be at rest; there the prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressor. The small and the great are there, and the servant is free from his master.

Death, when he comes into kings' courts to perform his office, to' fetch away kings and princes that used, as it were, to roll themselves in millions of money and drown themselves in pleasures: to carry them into the other world, he rends him away by force from all his money, and from all his pleasure. He will not allow him to carry away so much as one farthing out of all his shining treasures; forever shuts him out from any more earthly pleasures. His time for those things is ended. A poor creature; one drop of blood would be better than all; the least spark of true grace would be preferable to his kingdom.

Second. Man, after death, shall never more enjoy anything of the nature of these earthly things. He not only leaves all these goods and possessions in this world, but he shall never find any more such like possessions: never leaves house and land in one world, to inherit the like in another; never, when he leaves his bags of silver and gold here, to receive the like treasure elsewhere. No, but when once his soul is departed this life, he leaves all such like things to all eternity; he shall never fix his eyes on things anything like these any more at all. He is gone; he has taken a final farewell of all things of an earthly hue and appearance: he shall never any more be pleased with eating and drinking, never more have the pleasure of conversation of terrestrial friends, If ever they enjoy any pleasures after death, and be not fixed in eternal misery, they will be quite of another nature, exceeding different from them: the pleasures of another world are spiritual pleasures; the possessions are spiritual possessions, and the food is spiritual food, without any gross mixtures of flesh or earth.

As for the body, that will be in a condition incapable of all enjoyment, as much as any common lump of clay; [it] shall be shut up in the silent grave and quickly moulder away to dust: and then of what advantage will pleasures, profits, and honors be to that? What is the dead body of a king the better for his having ruled a large and opulent kingdom, for his having been honored and respected in the world, for its once having been decked with jewels of gold and precious stones?

And as for the soul, the souls of the godly shall be brought to those enjoyments that are purely spiritual. Jesus Christ will be to them riches, honors, pleasures, and friends, and all things; and they shall forever feed on him, as the food of eternal life.

And as for the souls of the wicked, their d; dwelling place will be the lowest hell, where there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth, and blackness of darkness forever. Instead of their former sensual pleasures, or anything like them, they shall feel incessant terrors: instead of' their merry conversation, they shall have furies surrounding them, tearing and tormenting them; instead of' eating and drinking, chambering and wantonness, rioting and drunkenness, they shall drink the dregs of the cup of God's fiery vengeance, and shall roar out forever, being enwrapped in eternal flames.

IMPROVEMENT.

1. Use of Infor.

[First.] From this doctrine, we may be instructed and informed that earthly riches and pleasure are not true riches and pleasure. Now all the worlds of good and bad are seeking after riches and pleasure; no man is to blame for seeking to be rich, or thirsting for pleasure, so that it be for true riches and true pleasure; but here is the case: some men are fools and pursue after shadows of riches, and shadows of pleasures, that the devil represents to them instead of the substance, and there are but a few that distinguish themselves from the common herd of human beasts, or rather beastly men, by seeking for true riches and true pleasures.

Now earthly riches and pleasures cannot be the true [riches and pleasures], because they presently leave us, disappointed and ashamed, and we can never obtain them more. These riches, which so suddenly leave us, cannot be called true riches any more than the shadow of a man that vanishes away as we attempt to lay hold of him, can be called a man; neither can those vanishing pleasures be called true pleasures, any more than the pleasure of a dream that leaves a man ' as sorrowful as ever when he awakens. The best locks and keys will not keep a man's silver and gold for him when he dies; he cannot hold it, it all slips between his fingers.

Now, that is the true riches that will stick by one, that there is no danger of losing, that one can hold by a sure tenor, in spite of death'., and all the world; and that is the true pleasure, whose delights never ' cease, and not that short, seventyÐyears' cream that returns no more,' to all eternity.

Second. Hence we learn that we are not made for an earthly happiness. God certainly never made man for that sort of happiness which he cannot hold; he was never made for that happiness which,'"' almost as soon as enjoyed, flies from us and leaves us disappointed. If this was the highest happiness we are made for Ð that happiness; that would be unavoidably accompanied with those disappointments and frustrations that do more than counterbalance it Ð if we were! made for this happiness it would he our greatest wisdom to set our hearts upon it, for it is our wisdom to set our hearts upon that that we are made for; but as the case now stands, the more we set our hearts on those things, the more trouble and vexation, and the less satisfaction, do we find in them.

This, the vase heathen plainly saw, and for that reason taught it as a great part of the wisdom of man, to abstract his thoughts and affections from all earthly things. Though they had no other knowledge of a future happiness than what naked reason taught them, even they discovered so much unsatisfactoriness and vexation of these enjoyments, that many of them, of their own choice, sequestered themselves from these things, and denied themselves even the common comforts of life.

[II. Use of Exh.] First Exh. Not to use these things as if we were to carry them out of the world with us. Worldly things are most commonly so used; the children of men are so full of madness and folly, as to love these things as much, and set as much by them, and rejoice at the attainment of them, and mourn for the loss of them, as much as it' they were to endure here to all eternity, or as if the acquisition or loss of them affected their eternal state.

Now what madness and folly is it so to do! Such persons only make to themselves torment and vexation when there is no need of it; they fill themselves with the tormenting fears of death, whereby they must leave these things that they so dearly love, and hen the time comes that they must be rent away from them, how cloth it even tear their very heartstrings to be violently separated from that [to which] they cleaved, and even grew so fast to; whereas, those that don't set their affections upon them are easily separated from them.

What folly is it for a man, when he finds something that pleases him, that he can enjoy but a few minutes, to please himself with it as if he were to possess it always; and then, when it is taken from him, he is left disappointed and ashamed! They that would not be a torment to themselves here, and lay up torment for a deathbed, must follow the Apostle's direction, I Cor. 7:29Ð31,

But this I say, brethren, the time is short. It remaineth that both they that have wives, be as though they had none; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, [as though they rejoiced not;] and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use this world, as not abusing it: for the fashion of this world passeth away.

Such is the folly of the world. They pursue violently after the world, slave and tire themselves for a little of it, are exceeding anxious and careful about [it]. Their minds are gnawn with care and anxiety; they undergo abundance of difficulties for it, and will often violate their consciences, disobey their God, and go very near hellfire Ð so near as to scorch them Ð come so near to the pit that their feet are every moment ready to slip. Whey they lose the world, they mourn as if they had met with a loss that it is impossible should be repaired, either in this world or the next, and when they have got a little of the world, they please themselves with the thoughts of it as much as if they were sure they could never lose it, neither by death nor otherwise; and then, as soon as they have got a little of the world into their hands, death comes and lays hold of them, and hales them away from it all, naked and stripped of everything, into such a state as they seldom or never thought of. Before, they were careless and at ease, as if death were not wont to come into their parts of the world, but now they are in the greatest confusion imaginable; now they see, and tremble; now they are not a fart hing the better for all their prosperity; now they mourn because they must leave their beloved estate, and must not carry any of it with them. How they wish they had not been so worldly, and had taken a little more pains for that which will stand by them! Thus the fools of this world act.

But as for the wise man, he will not be a selfÐtormentor He neglects and despises the world; cares little for it, for he knows it can last him but a little while, and if he could keep it forever, 'twould do him little good. Wherefore, he seeks out for something better, that he don't fear losing, and then when death comes, he smiles in his face and says, "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"

Second Exh. Let all set themselves, with the greatest seriousness and diligence, to make sure of goods that death is not able to deprive them of. Every man knows he shall die; he cannot be ignorant of that. But yet they set themselves to the violent pursuit of earthly things as vigorously, and about heavenly things Ð if at all Ð as negligently and remissly, as if they were to remain here forevermore: just as if they had made a league with death and a covenant with the grave; just as if they secretly hoped that, although everybody else died, yet, they might be an exception from the general rule. Their strange folly is excellently represented in [Ps.] 49: 11 , "Their inward thought is, that their houses shall continue forever, and their dwelling places to all generations."

How many men are so foolish as inwardly to entertain this foolish thought? Not that any are so void of all sense and reason as to think they shall never die, when they really, seriously think of it, but there is the thing: they seldom think of it; it hardly ever starts into their thought, "It is but a little while and I must die, and never live here more." T hey very seldom think where, and how, and what their bodies will be a few years hence. They are now in life and health, stirring and moving about the world amongst the rest of the crowd of mankind; but they little think how, in a little time, they must lie buried in the ground, in the dark, still, and silent grave, rotting and putrefying, loathsome and filthy, by degrees turning to dust, and none taking notice of them, their flesh by degrees rotting off from their bones, leaving nothing but the ghastly skeleton.

They know all this, but when do they seriously think of it? They continue to act just as if they intended to live upon this earth always, and it is but seldom they seriously think otherwise; surely, if they did, they would be something concerned about something else than how to live prosperously here. The question, "What shall I do to be saved?" would be more frequently asked than it is.

They hey know that in all former generations, that used to make as great a stir in the world as they, are gone: they have no more to do here; they make no more noise in the world; they are no more seen walking about and taking pleasure in earthly things; Zech. 1 :5, "Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live forever?"

Be persuaded for your own safety, to look a little forward and be concerned about your welfare an age hence, and not only what you shall eat, and what you shall drink, and wherewithal you shall be clothed for that little time you are to remain here. Frequently ask yourself the question, what you intend to do if death comes and summons you out of the world, and from all your earthly good things. If you arc not prepared to die, you cannot resist the summons: none are able to grapple with the king of terrors. When death comes, he will hale you from all your dear enjoyments, whether you will or no, never to set your eye on those things more. And as there will be no encountering death, so neither will there be any entreating it; he'll…..not be wrought upon by cries and tears; he is altogether inexorable. He'll not wait for you one minute, that you may have a little opportunity to be better fitted and prepared to go with shim].

Consider whether you not are in such a state that you need not fear to meet death. If he should come immediately, should you meet him with terror and horror under dreadful apprehensions of going into another world, and leaving all these things forevermore? Or should you be able to look him cheerfully in the face, knowing that although you must be stripped of these enjoyments, yet death cannot take from you your heavenly happiness; knowing that although he takes you away from your earthly possessions, he cannot deprive you of your heavenly inheritance: though he takes you from your earthly friends, yet he is not able to separate you from your heavenly Father, nor from Jesus Christ, the spouse anti bridegroom of your soul?

How would it be with you, if death should now lay hold of you? Would [he] find you asleep, or diligent at your work with your loins girt and your lamps burning? Do you live as circumspectly and watchfully, and keep the commands of God as strictly, as if you knew death would seize you tomorrow?

Let all examine themselves, and know whether they use this world just as if they would carry their earthly enjoyments into the other world with them, or whether they set their hearts chiefly on things which are not seen; and let all be exhorted to apply themselves immediately to the preparations for eternity. Set about [it] with the greatest seriousness and diligence, with the utmost vigor and most fixed resolution, for such things as concern eternal happiness or eternal misery are not to be trifled with, nor to be trusted to a mere peradventure; for what shall it profit you, if you gain the whole world, and lose your own soul?