1. His glory, that we may give Him the worship due to His name and majesty.

2. That we may express our gratitude.

3. That we may obtain assurance of His favour.

4. That we may learn His will.

5. That we may secure His help.But the charge is aggravated. Were God a being regardless of the worship, the miseries, and discomforts of His creatures, although such neglect could not then be justified, yet it would seem to be palliated to a certain extent. But when God is a strength to the poor, when it is in the ordinary course of His government to heal the broken in heart, the neglect is greatly aggravated. The night is a general symbol for what is melancholy and sorrowful; as the day, illuminated by the splendour of the sun, is the image of joy and exhilaration. Whatever the darkness we contemplate, we shall find that for that "night season" God has provided consolations, has given songs to cheer the heart of the believer. Life itself is a time of darkness. It is a scene of sin, trial, and temptation. There are seasons of gloomy night to individuals, as well as to the world. The seasons of temptation, affliction, and death, are times of darkness, on which Christ arises as the light. Then let reason have her just sway, and you will inquire after God your Maker. You will become penitent, humble believers in Christ. You will become new creatures.

(T. Kennion, M.A.)

(C. Wadsworth, D.D.)

(J.H. Jowett, M.A.)

1. When we investigate the important question, Is there a Deity? what notions are we to form of His nature, perfections, and providence?

2. When we apply to Him in the exercise of religious duty, particularly prayer (Job 8:5; Isaiah 55:6).

3. When we are solicitous to discover His will concerning our duty and privilege, as moral and reasonable beings (Romans 12:2; 1 Thessalonians 4:3).

4. When we earnestly pant after His approbation, and give ourselves no rest till we obtain it, through repentance for sin, and faith in the atonement of the Son of God (Romans 3:25, 26).

5. When we thirst after that better country, where God is enjoyed, and where our inquiries after Him shall meet with ample success. There we shall have the justest and the brightest ideas of Him, the most glorious resemblance of His holy and benevolent nature (1 John 3:2).

II. WHY IS IT THAT SO NEW ARE MAKING THIS INQUIRY?

1. Because mankind are so much engaged about visible things: these strike the senses more than things of a spiritual and invisible nature; and seem to be the only things which command their attention.

2. Dissipation. They have no taste but for play and amusement, one scene of diversion after another; the hours which should be spent in intercourse with heaven, are prostituted to folly, vanity, and idleness.

3. They make a God of this world, by placing their affections supremely upon it (James 2:4); its gold and silver, honour, fame, power, dominion, popular applause.

4. They are sensual, making a God of pleasure, sensuality, lascivious gratifications. How can a soul, thus fettered to earth, elevate itself to inquire after God its Maker? no more than a bird can ascend without wings.

5. Some live so criminally, that God is the object of their dread: they wish there was no God; are glad to hear religion opposed; would be happy to hear its truths confuted, if they could; they would obliterate the doctrine of providence, and the soul's immortality.

III. CONSIDER THE AMIABLE ACCOUNT HERE GIVEN OF GOD. "He giveth songs in the night"; or matter of songs, etc.

1. By exhibiting those bright orbs which fill the expanse of heaven (Psalm 8:3, 4).

2. Night may be taken figuratively. Day is put for prosperity, success, joy, and comfort. Night for adversity, calamity, grief, and vexation. God cheereth the mourner's heart, and solaceth His people in the night of adversity, grants support, unexpected relief (Psalm 66:19).

3. He giveth songs in the night of death, of praise and thanksgiving, of victory (1 Corinthians 15:55; 1 Corinthians 4:7).Improvement —

1. Let us rejoice in Him, who lifteth up the hands that hang down, and giveth songs of praise in adversity.

2. Let us adore the wisdom of Providence, in whose dispensations day and night, good and evil, are so seasonably blended, enjoy the good thankfully, suffer the evil with resignation.

3. Let us fortify ourselves under every calamity by looking forward.

(T. Hannam.)

1. It becomes us to acknowledge with all gratitude the liberality and kindness of our Creator, in forming and designing us for the acquisition of such excellent and valuable knowledge, and in bringing us to the possession of it.

2. Let us observe and pursue the Divine intention, by a diligent improvement of our advantages.

3. The knowledge of God, and of the visible intentions of His wisdom and goodness in the frame of our world, in the faculties of our minds, and in the order of society, is the best preparation for understanding and embracing the Gospel of our Saviour. We must believe in God, before we can have faith in Christ; we must previously hear and learn of the Father Almighty, before we come to Christ duly qualified for His instructions. If we wisely improve present advantages, there is a glorious everlasting constitution, which God hath established in Christ Jesus our Lord, in order to our rising again from the dead to the enjoyment of immortality.

(E. Bown.)

II. WHAT IS THE REAL CHRISTIAN'S SPIRIT AND TEMPER AND CONDITION IN THESE DARK SEASONS OF SUFFERING? Singing bespeaks an easy, contented, and happy state of mind. We seldom if ever hear a person singing who is very unhappy. But this excellent gift and faculty may be and often is abused. There are different sorts of song, and different characters who sing them. We should not understand the word "songs" in our text, only in its literal meaning. It also represents that sweet and composed and resigned spirit which the Christian sufferer experiences inwardly when all outward things are dark about him. "Songs in the night" describe that peaceful and composed frame of mind and soul which the Christian sufferer enjoys in his darkest night of suffering or sorrow.

III. WHO IS TO GIVE US THIS CHRISTIAN SPIRIT, TEMPER, AND CONDITION? Even the Lord, our Maker, and Preserver, and Saviour, and Comforter. A heavenly mind and spirit can only proceed from heaven. "If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature"; and as such he receives a new nature, and a new spirit, and he sings a new song. He sees everything with different eyes; he receives everything with a different spirit; he bears everything with a different temper; he no longer looks upon himself, or his condition in this world, as he once did. It is no longer his rest; it is a school in which he is to learn lessons of heavenly wisdom; a warfare, in which he is to fight the good fight of faith.

(Robert Grant, B.C.L.)

1. Young has these lines —

"Earth, turning from the sun, brings night to man;

Man, turning from his God, brings endless night."

And we have no more fit image than night for the occasion of our heaviest woes. What a pall sin will bring over our souls! We are all of us learning by experience. Are not our moods ofttimes of a sombre character? We cannot always control the moods of our soul. It is not easy to sing the song of faith when the voice refuses to sing the song of glad and happy love. Yet let the true soul wait on God, and the songs will come. Cry first, and you will sing presently.

2. So, too, faith may lose its assurance. It may want some of the links that give perfection and continuity to a personal trust. The shades of unbelief, or a faith that has lost its clearer lights, will sometimes take the place of a well-evidenced trust. If the time should ever come that you lose your early trust, do not let your cry lose aught of its devoutness; do not lose your hold upon God; still cling to Him. He is still with you in all those earnest questionings; and He will give you songs even in that dark night if you cry to Him.

3. "At midnight Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises to God." It was a strange place for the voice of thanksgiving, for the melody of praise. That night seemed a fit image of their circumstances, dark enough in all truth. Not much, to human seeming, that could inspire songfulness; everything to beget fear and alarm. Not more so, perhaps you are thinking, than the circumstances of some you know — your own, perhaps. Little outwardly to cheer your life, very much to depress it. And yet you, too, may have songs of trust and loving confidence; songs of hope, and triumph in that hope. We must not spend the time of our trial in fruitless complaining. Let us besiege heaven with our suppliant tones.

4. But I think it would be easier to die for Christ than to live through the commonplace life of thousands of modern Christians, who have to drink of the water of affliction, and eat the bread of adversity, and yet be Christ-like. Yes, to live thus, and still keep one's hold of God, and lift in consequence a hymn of glad thankfulness or patient hope, is it not yet more difficult? I often think so.

5. What is the aggregate life of the Church, with all its blessed fruits of love, joy, and peace, but a "song in the night"? If then, God has given any of us "songs in the night"; songs of happy love, songs of quiet hope, songs of deep trust, songs of true thankfulness, no night will last forever.

(G.J. Proctor.)

1. Our sufficiency in God is in no way affected by our outward circumstances. Have you never rejoiced in the purposes of your God? Another well of comfort is found in the love of God. The thought of God's having pardoned us is a fountain of joy. Have you not often rejoiced in the anticipation of heaven? What is your night? Perhaps it is one of changed prospects; or of changed health; or it is a night of bereavement; or, may be, of spiritual depression.

2. Some of the songs God gives to His saints. The song of faith; hope; tranquillity; sympathy with Jesus; heavenly anticipation.

(Archibald G. Brown.)

I. WHO IS THE AUTHOR OF THESE "SONGS IN THE NIGHT"? God our Maker. Any fool can sing in the day. It is easy enough for an AEolian harp to whisper music when the wind blows; the difficulty is for music to come when no wind blows. What does the text mean, when it asserts that God giveth songs in the night? Two answers.

1. Usually in the night of a Christian's experience God is his only song. We can sacrifice to ourselves in daylight — we only sacrifice to God by night.

2. He is the only one who inspires songs in the night. It is marvellous how one sweet word of God will make whole songs for Christians.

II. WHAT IS GENERALLY THE MATTER CONTAINED IN A SONG IN THE NIGHT? What do we sing about? About the yesterday that is over; or else about the night itself; or else about the morrow that is to come.

III. WHAT ARE THE EXCELLENCIES OF SONGS IN THE NIGHT ABOVE ALL OTHER SONGS? A song in the night of trouble is sure to be a hearty one. The songs we sing in the night will be lasting. They will be those which show a real faith in God. Such songs prove that we have true courage and true love to Christ.

IV. SHOW THE USE OF SUCH SONGS. It is useful to sing in the night of our troubles, because thus we may cheer ourselves: because God loves to hear His people sing. Because it will cheer your companions. Because it is one of the best arguments in favour of your religion.

(C.H. Spurgeon.)

1. What an aggravation it is of the guilt of men's forgetting their Creator, that He is a God who giveth "songs in the night." It is one beautiful instance of the adaptation of revelation to our circumstances, that the main thing which it labours to set forth is the love of our Maker. Natural theology, whatever its success in delineating the attributes of God, could never have proved that sin had not excluded us from all share in His favour. The revelation, which alone can profit us, must be a revelation of mercy, a revelation which brings God before us as not made irreconcilable by our many offences. This is the character of the revelation with which we have been favoured. But if God has thus revealed Himself in the manner most adapted to the circumstances of the suffering, does not the character of the revelation vastly aggravate the sinfulness of those by whom God is not sought?

2. With how great truth and fitness this touching description may be applied to our Maker. Take the cases of death in a family, or the times of sorrow a minister meets with. And how accurate the description is, if referred generally to God's spiritual dealings with our race. Who would not be a believer in Christ? when such are the privileges of righteousness, the privileges through life, the privileges in death, the wonder is, that all are not eager to close with the offers of the Gospel, and make these privileges their own.

(Henry Melvill, B.D.)

     4957   night
     5167   mouth
     5420   music
     8710   atheism

Job 35:9-10

     6169   godlessness

Songs in the Night
"But none saith, Where is God my Maker, who giveth songs in the night?"--Job 35:10. ELIHU was a wise man, exceeding wise, though not as wise as the all-wise Jehovah, who sees light in the clouds, and finds order in confusion; hence Elihu, being much puzzled at beholding Job thus afflicted, cast about him to find the cause of it, and he very wisely hit upon one of the most likely reasons, although it did not happen to be the right one in Job's case. He said within himself--"Surely, if men be tried …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 44: 1898

Spurgeon -- Songs in the Night
Charles Haddon Spurgeon was born at Kelvedon, Essex, England, in 1834. He was one of the most powerful and popular preachers of his time, and his extraordinary force of character and wonderful enthusiasm attracted vast audiences. His voice was unusually powerful, clear and melodious, and he used it with consummate skill. In the preparation of his sermons he meditated much but wrote not a word, so that he was in the truest sense a purely extemporaneous speaker. Sincerity, intensity, imagination and …
Grenville Kleiser—The world's great sermons, Volume 8

'Why Should I?'
Thou saidst, What advantage will it be? What profit shall I have, if I be cleansed from my sin? I will answer thee, and thy companions with thee.' (Job xxxv. 3, 4.) In reading these words I have no wish to enter into the controversy between Job and his friends as to the relationship of physical suffering to sin, but to emphasize a certain mental attitude which they indicate, and which often expresses itself in relation to other things. The human mind is so constituted that men will not commit …
T. H. Howard—Standards of Life and Service

The Introduction to the Work with Some General Account of Its Design
. 1, 2.That true religion is very rare, appears from comparing the nature of it with the lives and characters of men around us.--3. The want of it, matter of just lamentation.--4. To remedy this evil is the design of the ensuing Treatise.--5, 6. To which, therefore, the Author earnestly bespeaks the attention of the reader, as his own heart is deeply interested in it.--7 to 12. A general plan of the Work; of which the first fifteen chapters relate chiefly to the Rise of Religion, and the remaining …
Philip Doddridge—The Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul

The New Song
Heinrich Suso Job xxxv. 10 O Lord, in my songs I have praised Thee For all that was sweet and was fair; And now a new song would I sing Thee, A song that is wondrous and rare. A song of the heart that is broken, A song of the sighs and the tears, The sickness, the want, and the sadness Of the days of our pilgrimage years. A song of the widows and orphans, Of the weary and hungry and sad-- Loud praise of the will Thou has broken, The will of the young and the glad. A song of the outcasts and martyrs, …
Frances Bevan—Hymns of Ter Steegen, Suso, and Others

Whether the Motive of Anger is Always Something done against the one who is Angry?
Objection 1: It would seem that the motive of anger is not always something done against the one who is angry. Because man, by sinning, can do nothing against God; since it is written (Job 35:6): "If thy iniquities be multiplied, what shalt thou do against Him?" And yet God is spoken of as being angry with man on account of sin, according to Ps. 105:40: "The Lord was exceedingly angry with His people." Therefore it is not always on account of something done against him, that a man is angry. Objection …
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

Whether a Man May Merit Anything from God?
Objection 1: It would seem that a man can merit nothing from God. For no one, it would seem, merits by giving another his due. But by all the good we do, we cannot make sufficient return to God, since yet more is His due, as also the Philosopher says (Ethic. viii, 14). Hence it is written (Lk. 17:10): "When you have done all these things that are commanded you, say: We are unprofitable servants; we have done that which we ought to do." Therefore a man can merit nothing from God. Objection 2: Further, …
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

Whether Beneficence is an Act of Charity?
Objection 1: It would seem that beneficence is not an act of charity. For charity is chiefly directed to God. Now we cannot benefit God, according to Job 35:7: "What shalt thou give Him? or what shall He receive of thy hand?" Therefore beneficence is not an act of charity. Objection 2: Further, beneficence consists chiefly in making gifts. But this belongs to liberality. Therefore beneficence is an act of liberality and not of charity. Objection 3: Further, what a man gives, he gives either as being …
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

Whether a Human Action is Meritorious or Demeritorious Before God, According as it is Good or Evil?
Objection 1: It would seem that man's actions, good or evil, are not meritorious or demeritorious in the sight of God. Because, as stated above [1202](A[3]), merit and demerit imply relation to retribution for good or harm done to another. But a man's action, good or evil, does no good or harm to God; for it is written (Job 35:6,7): "If thou sin, what shalt thou hurt Him? . . . And if thou do justly, what shalt thou give Him?" Therefore a human action, good or evil, is not meritorious or demeritorious …
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

Whether Sin is Aggravated by Reason of Its Causing More Harm?
Objection 1: It would seem that a sin is not aggravated by reason of its causing more harm. Because the harm done is an issue consequent to the sinful act. But the issue of an act does not add to its goodness or malice, as stated above ([1736]Q[20], A[5]). Therefore a sin is not aggravated on account of its causing more harm. Objection 2: Further, harm is inflicted by sins against our neighbor. Because no one wishes to harm himself: and no one can harm God, according to Job 35:6, 8: "If thy iniquities …
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

An Essay on the Mosaic Account of the Creation and Fall of Man
THERE are not a few difficulties in the account, which Moses has given of the creation of the world, and of the formation, and temptation, and fall of our first parents. Some by the six days of the creation have understood as many years. Whilst others have thought the creation of the world instantaneous: and that the number of days mentioned by Moses is only intended to assist our conception, who are best able to think of things in order of succession. No one part of this account is fuller of difficulties, …
Nathaniel Lardner—An Essay on the Mosaic Account of the Creation and Fall of Man

The Advanced Christian Reminded of the Mercies of God, and Exhorted to the Exercise of Habitual Love to Him, and Joy in Him.
1. A holy joy in God, our privilege as well as our duty.--2. The Christian invited to the exercise of it.--3. By the consideration of temporal mercies.--4. And of spiritual favors.--5. By the views of eternal happiness.--6. And of the mercies of God to others, the living and the dead.--7. The chapter closes with an exhortation to this heavenly exercise. And with an example of the genuine workings of this grateful joy in God. 1. I WOULD now suppose my reader to find, on an examination of his spiritual …
Philip Doddridge—The Rise and Progress of Religion in the Soul

Whether a Man Can Merit Anything from God
Whether a Man can Merit Anything from God We proceed to the first article thus: 1. It seems that a man cannot merit anything from God. No one merits a reward by repaying what he owes to another. But we cannot even fully repay what we owe to God, by all the good that we do. For we always owe him more than this, as the philosopher says in 8 Ethics 14. Hence it is said in Luke 17:10: "when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that …
Aquinas—Nature and Grace

Whether it is Necessary for the Salvation of All, that they Should Believe Explicitly in the Mystery of Christ?
Objection 1: It would seem that it is not necessary for the salvation of all that they should believe explicitly in the mystery of Christ. For man is not bound to believe explicitly what the angels are ignorant about: since the unfolding of faith is the result of Divine revelation, which reaches man by means of the angels, as stated above [2287](A[6]; [2288]FP, Q[111], A[1]). Now even the angels were in ignorance of the mystery of the Incarnation: hence, according to the commentary of Dionysius (Coel. …
Saint Thomas Aquinas—Summa Theologica

"They have Corrupted Themselves; their Spot is not the Spot of his Children; they are a Perverse and Crooked Generation. "
Deut. xxxii. 5.--"They have corrupted themselves; their spot is not the spot of his children; they are a perverse and crooked generation." We doubt this people would take well with such a description of themselves as Moses gives. It might seem strange to us, that God should have chosen such a people out of all the nations of the earth, and they to be so rebellious and perverse, if our own experience did not teach us how free his choice is, and how long-suffering he is, and constant in his choice. …
Hugh Binning—The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning

Job
The book of Job is one of the great masterpieces of the world's literature, if not indeed the greatest. The author was a man of superb literary genius, and of rich, daring, and original mind. The problem with which he deals is one of inexhaustible interest, and his treatment of it is everywhere characterized by a psychological insight, an intellectual courage, and a fertility and brilliance of resource which are nothing less than astonishing. Opinion has been divided as to how the book should be …
John Edgar McFadyen—Introduction to the Old Testament