An exposition with practical observations continued upon the thirty-fifth, thirty-sixth, and thirty-seventh chapters of…

Vers. 9. By reason of the multitude of oppressions they make the oppressed to cry.

This offended Job; the poor cried, and they had no helper, no deliverer. We may conceive, that Elihu gathered up this complaint from the words of Job, (Chap. 24.12.) Men groan from out of the City, and the soul of the wounded crieth out, yet God layeth not folly to them: As if he had said, The Lord lightly passeth ⟨p. 55⟩by, and takes little notice of the greatest afflictions, the oppressions of the poor, though righteous men.

This offended Job; the poor cryed, and they had no helper, no deliverer. We may conceive, that Elihu gathered up this complaint from the words of Job, (Chap. 24.12.) Men groan from out of the City, and the soul of the wounded cryeth out, yet God layeth not folly to them: As if he had said, The Lord lightly passeth ⟨p. 55⟩by, and takes little notice of the greatest afflictions, the oppressions of the poor, though righteous men.

Elihu grants these general truths; First, that many are oppressed; Secondly, that many cry out in their oppressions; Thirdly, that many remain undelivered from, and unrelieved in their oppressions. God sometimes seemeth not to regard the groans and cries of the afflicted, nor doth he always presently take vengeance of oppressors according to their folly. Elihu grants all this, he grants that many poor men are so mightily oppressed by the mighty, that they are forced to cry mightily; yet he strongly acquits God from any such imputation, as those words of Job seem to admit or insinuate. And in the prosecution of his answer (as will appear in opening the 10th and 11th verses) he showeth, that the reason why the oppressed are not delivered, or answered when they cry, is in themselves, and not in God, (and he would have Job consider, whether he were not of that number) they cry (saith Elihu) but they do not cry with such a frame of heart, with such a disposition of spirit, as they ought; they cry as men pressed rather with the weight of their own sufferings, than touched with any sense of their sins, or reverence of the sovereignty of God, giving them up to the power of oppressors; or as having any faith in him for their deliverance, or quiet submission to him, who is ready to help all those who religiously fly to him for refuge, and is able to bring them out of their dakest and most deplorable condition. These may be said either not to pray at all, or they pray not with such holy aims and designs, with such integrity and uprightness of heart, as becometh the people of God: They pray under the power of impatience, or moved with envy at the power of their adversaries, or with a desire of utmost revenge, which nothing stops them from, but their own want of power, or because they cannot; and therefore God takes no notice of their prayers, (v. 12, 13.) There they cry, but none giveth answer; Surely God will not hear vanity, neither will the Almighty regard it. That's the sum and scope of the Context. I shall now open the words in order.