yea, even fainteth for the courts of the Lord" (Psa. 84: 2). In the same way, says Job,

does the Lord "long for" the day to come, when in resurrection glory, Job and all like him

shall at length stand in beauty, to sorrow no more for ever.

When God fashioned Job's body He knew that His servant's life would constitute a

challenge to Satan, and that at length his body, so wonderfully made, would be afflicted

with such loathsome sores that Job--His servant Job--would be glad to take a potsherd

to scrape himself. Did God have no feelings of sorrow as He saw all this in prospect?

He did. He "grieved" as He made this earthen vessel. Nevertheless, we know something,

too, of the other end of the story. From his birth into the world of sorrow, Job leads us to

a new birth into a world of joy. If God "grieved" at the fashioning of Job's body when he

was born into this world, He is depicted as "turning pale" with extreme longing as He

awaits the day of Job's new birth into resurrection glory, when "the work of His hands"

shall at length attain its goal.

Here, then, is a God to Whom we may stretch out our hands, and feel a grasp almost

akin to our own. Here is the "God of all flesh", Who knows, Who is not untouched,

Who shares the suffering brought about by sin, even as He plans to share the joy brought

about by grace.

In our last article we were pondering the experiences of Job, and came to the

conclusion that God is by no means indifferent to the "sorrow" and "toil" that came into

the world when Adam sinned. We also found that the words "grieve" in Gen. 6: 6,

"made" in Job 10: 8, "vex" in Isa. 63: 10, "sorrow" in Gen. 3: 16, 17, and "toil" in

Gen. 5: 29 were all basically the same in the original.

As we think more about this problem of suffering and sorrow, our minds instinctively

turn to Gen. 3: to see whether there is any indication there of the same thought as we

have found in Job. An unaided reading of Gen. 3: may in itself fail to produce

sufficient evidence, but we must remember that we have "all Scripture" available, and we

therefore turn to what our own Apostle has written on the matter in Rom. 8:

As he looks upon the "sufferings of this present time" he says that they are not worthy

to be compared with "the glory that shall be revealed in us" (Rom. 8: 18). That in itself

is a comfort. Even if there were nothing further to be said on the problem of present

suffering, "glory" awaits us, and the prospect brings relief.

The Apostle, however, continues in verse 19: