Though He Slay Me, Yet Will I Trust In Him

[Posted by permission. Chippenham Old Baptist Chapel.]

Prayer Meeting Address given at Old Baptist Chapel, Chippenham by Mr. G. D. Buss on Wednesday evening, 28th February, 2018 

“Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”—Job 13:15

These may seem extreme words from the mouth and the lips of God’s servant Job, yet they are very true words. As the Lord may give grace so to do, our text may be looked at in many ways to prove that, in one way and another, this is the experience of all God’s children in the way of faith.

To understand Job’s path, we have to understand that Job had a great privilege. I am not speaking about the days of prosperity that preceded his troubles, nor even perhaps the prosperity that succeeded them, but the fact that he was appointed by God to be on the front line of the battleground between Christ and Satan. Job’s heart and Job’s life was to be that battleground. The Lord had chosen His servant, Job, for that purpose. It was not accident, nor was it a miscarriage of justice. It was by divine appointment that Job should be called to be a soldier. We read in the epistles: “Be strong in the Lord, and in the power of His might.” Paul exhorts Timothy to “endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.” I say it was a privilege, for three reasons.

First of all (and this is perhaps being somewhat selfish on our part), we would never have had this book on the sacred page were it not for Job’s path. There are many, many things in this part of God’s Word that are so instructive and so helpful to God’s people in trouble and tribulation. So we should be thankful for that. Yes, this dear man was called to walk this way.

Secondly, we should be thankful for this reason: it shows us that whatever Satan’s purposes are, and he has many; they are always overruled by God. In the end, those things that Satan intends against the Church of Christ, fall out the very opposite, to the furtherance of God’s kingdom. God always has the last word.

Thirdly, the thing which is specifically on my spirit this evening is this. What was the secret that enabled Job to continue on this battleground for as long as he did, with, we might say, so many arrows and javelins being hurled at him from all quarters? How was it that this dear man could say this in the midst of his trouble: “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”? We read in Psalm 25: “The secret of the LORD is with them that fear Him.” That is what Job had. There was something secret in Job’s religion that Satan could not get at. He tried his hardest. He strained the leash, we might say. He stretched as far as he could with his powers of darkness, but he could not reach that secret thing. What was that secret thing? We read in the Colossians concerning it: “Your life is hid with Christ in God.” And therein you see the secret of it. Satan could not get at Job’s life. It was hidden in his God. That is why he could speak as he did in our text this evening: “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”

In many respects, Job was like God’s servant, Moses, but in very different circumstances. Nonetheless, it was the path of faith. When Moses forsook Egypt, we read this concerning Moses (the Holy Ghost inspired God’s servant Paul to use very graphic language; it is very good language, as well). We are told in Hebrews 11, “By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid three months of his parents, because they saw he was a proper child; and they were not afraid of the king’s commandment. By faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter; Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season; Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt: for he had respect unto the recompence of the reward.” And this is the point: “By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king: for he endured, as seeing Him who is invisible.” “He endured, as seeing Him who is invisible.” Not seen by the natural eye, but by the eye of faith: that is how Moses endured. And that is how Job endured. Job’s faith was greatly tried, perhaps more than any other of God’s dear saints on the face of the earth. Yet, blessed be God, Job endured. His eye was fixed upon his God. That is what Job is saying this evening. “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” Everything seemed against him.

“For though our cup seems filled with gall, 

There’s something secret sweetens all.”

J. Hart

What was it then that sweetened Job’s cup? First of all, he believed that the trial through which he was passing was in God’s hands. You say, ‘Well, Satan was very busy. His friends were not proving helpful. His own wife didn’t seem to understand the path he was in. Even his God hid his face from him!’ Yet, dear friends, behind all that, Almighty God sat on the throne, overruling it all. We sometimes sing (and I don’t think perhaps we realise what we sing sometimes):

“Not a single shaft can hit, 

Till the God of love sees fit.”

J. Ryland

And when the shafts do hit, a God of love has permitted it. This is what Job is saying this evening. “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”

I will take two or three examples from God’s Holy Word that will illustrate the point. Of course, it is a point of justification in this sense. Under the Holy law of God, the sinner is indeed ‘slain.’ The sentence of death has gone forth against him. “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” The sinner is ‘slain’ to any hope in himself and he is ‘slain’ to any confidence in the flesh. That is what Hannah meant when she said “The LORD killeth.” But, here is Job saying, ‘Yes. That is quite true. The law has this claim against me and the law has this sentence of death against me as a sinner, yet I have somewhere to flee. I have somewhere to look. Despite that condemnation and despite that curse, I have somewhere to look.’ “Yet will I trust in Him.” He looks out; away from self and away from the curse of the law to the comforts of the gospel, where a sinner may hide and be safe, and secure.

“Convinced as a sinner, to Jesus I come, 

Informed by the gospel for such there is room.”

S. Turner or Bennett

And all those who have known the killing power of the law and the slaying power of it, will understand what Job is saying here. He was killed to any confidence in his flesh, and any other arm of flesh, as well. Yet he says: “Yet will I trust in Him.”

Job takes the matter further. Elsewhere, he speaks of his own death and burial. He says: “For I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed within me.” Dear friends, he knew that one day his life would end, naturally speaking. His body would return to the dust from whence it came, but his soul was safe in his Redeemer’s hands. The hymnwriter puts it so beautifully:

“You’re safe in your Redeemer’s hands, 

Who bears your names upon His heart.”

B. Wallin

Job believed the day would come, and it will come, when his body, raised again like his Saviour’s, would be reunited with his redeemed soul to join the ransomed throng above, to sing praises for ever to Father, Son and Holy Ghost. “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”

Look at it another way. Follow me now with God’s servant Abraham for a moment. The Lord commanded Abraham to do something which seemed to kill all the hope he had ever had. “Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.” It was not the fact that the Lord was touching the only son left to Abraham after Ishmael had gone, nor was it the fact that the Lord was touching something very near and dear to Abraham. It was more than that. Abraham knew that it was “in Isaac” the seed was to be called. If Abraham was wrong concerning Isaac, then where was his hope of a Saviour? The Lord had promised that in due season He would come to be the Saviour of the lost through the seed of Abraham and the seed of David. And now, here was Abraham, being called to lay his only son on the altar; to plunge a knife into his bosom and offer him up for a burnt offering! When Abraham was half way up the mountain, you will remember how Isaac asked the question: “Behold the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” And, in the same spirit as Job, Abraham says: “My son, God will provide Himself a lamb for a burnt offering.” ‘Though He is slaying me in that sense, in this very path I am walking, I have that blessed confidence that in one way which as yet I cannot see, the Lord will provide and the Lord will appear.’ And so it was on Mount Moriah. On the top of the mountain after the wondrous event of the intervention of God to spare Isaac, a ram lay on the altar instead. “And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah-jireh: as it is said to this day, In the mount of the LORD it shall be seen.” “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”

Sometimes friends, God calls us to lay everything on the altar, as it were, for his dear name’s sake. One said,

“Were the whole realm of nature mine, 

That were an offering far too small;

Love so amazing, so divine, 

Demands my soul, my life, my all.”

I. Watts

Then, there is something else which was the secret of Job’s endurance: the continuing supply of the Holy Spirit maintaining his faith. I have mentioned before of the man who was throwing water on a fire in Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress. Strangely enough, the fire never went out. The secret was that there was a man behind supplying oil to the fire. As often as the water was thrown on the fire, so the oil kept it alive.

Friends, Satan throws – oh, what water he throws on our faith and our religion! Infidel thoughts, blasphemous thoughts, perhaps. ‘Ifs,’ ‘buts,’ ‘hows,’ ‘whys’ and ‘wherefores.’ But, despite all the storms that may come against us, Satan cannot destroy that work; that incorruptible seed where the work of grace has begun. It is indestructible. It is “hid with Christ in God.” “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”

The secret was a continuing, mysterious supply. And, many times Job, as we read in chapter 23, didn’t feel it and he couldn’t trace it. “Oh that I knew where I might find him!” At that moment he didn’t feel that he wasn’t in the Lord’s care (later on in that chapter he did), but at first it seemed he was at a loss. When he came to the end of his trouble and looked back over it all, he wrote these things down. And, as the Holy Ghost gave him the words to write for us, he would remember how, in all those dark days; even the darkest of days when everything seemed wrong and everything seemed against him, the Lord was mysteriously upholding, comforting and supporting him. The Lord often works a secret work. We like to have great things, great manifestations. But, very often dear friends, it is a secret upholding. Looking back, you can see you have been

“Brought safely by His hand thus far.”

“Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”

J. Newton

But, there is another reason; perhaps the sweetest reason of all. Whatever Job’s God did to Job, whatever He permitted to come into his life, Job loved His God. He loved His God! In 1 Peter 1 we have that lovely word. “Whom having not seen, ye love.” Job was often in the dark and often at the ends of the earth. Yet, deep, deep down there was this principle, which was part of the secret of the Lord with him: he loved His God. The very purpose of Satan was to separate him from His God. Satan says: ‘I can make him say, ‘Curse God.’ ‘He will curse you to your face,’ says Satan to God. But, Job did not do that. In one of his low moments he cursed the day he was born, but he never cursed his God. He loved his God. He said: “He knoweth the way that I take: when He hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold.” “For he performeth the thing that is appointed for me: and many such things are with him.” Job came right down to what we call ‘bedrock truth,’ and here was the secret of his endurance: the love he had, by grace, to His God. “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” That hymn we sometimes sing, and again it takes some singing: it is a very beautiful hymn, a very precious hymn but it exactly sums up what I am trying to set before you.

“And if our dearest comforts fall 

Before His sovereign will,

He never takes away our all – 

Himself he gives us still.”

J. Swain

Job believed that. That’s why, when that first terrible day came, he could say: ‘The LORD gave.” ‘My Lord,’ he could say. “The LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.” When that terrible affliction overtook him, he says: “Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?” You see, beneath it there was this love to His God. “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”

Then look at it another way. As the Puritans used to say, ‘When God gives a promise, He often buries it before He fulfils it.’ And those burying times; when everything seems buried and covered, they are greatly trying times. It was so with Joseph. When he was forgotten by the butler, the iron entered his soul. It seemed that there was now no hope of human help at all. And, if His God did not come to his aid, where would he be? Yet, Joseph could never give up that word God had given him. He could never give it up! It tried him, it tested him and it gave him much cause of exercise. But, he couldn’t give it up because God had given it him. I think, in his better moments: even in that dark prison cell during those two full years that followed the butler’s faulty memory, Joseph would have said with Job: “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”

Well, dear friends, how is it with you this evening? Have you, by God’s grace, this same secret that Job enjoyed: the fear of the Lord in your heart that burns with love?

“In all His holy, sovereign will, He is, I daily find,

Too wise to be mistaken, still Too good to be unkind.”

S. Medley

“Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”

I think of the dear Shunammite woman. It was a great, unexpected favour when that little lad was given to her. She hadn’t thought she would have a child, and yet, she was given one. But what a strange providence when suddenly he is taken from her by the hand of death! What has she to say about it? She was asked: “Is it well with thee? is it well with thy husband? is it well with the child?” And she could say: “It is well.” We might ask her how she could say that. ‘Because my God is in control. I cannot understand it, and I cannot explain it. But, this I believe: He has not made a mistake. He is too wise to err. He is too good to be unkind.’ “It is the LORD: let Him do what seemeth Him good.” “It is well.” And, she proved it, didn’t she? “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”

This is the mark of real religion. It is not the mark of just fair weather religion. Pliable, in Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, was a follower while it was easy going. As soon as he found himself in the Slough of Despond, he got out the same side he went in! Oh, my dear friends, may you not come out the same side of your trouble as you went in. It is through the deep waters:

“When through the deep waters I call thee to go, 

The rivers of woe shall not thee overflow;

For I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless, 

And sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.”

It is through them, friend.

K., 1787

“Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” Can you go back? Can you give it all up? There is something in you, child of God, that says, ‘No. I dare not give up what the Lord has given me, though it is tried, though it is tested and though everything seems against it. Who can tell?’

“I’ll not despair, for who can tell?”

B. Beddome

“Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” May God give you and I such faith as Job had. Remember, the end of Job’s life was better than its beginning. He came through. He came out of this deep trial. It is left on record for our encouragement. For those in similar difficulties and similar trials, if Job were here tonight he would say: ‘Look, God brought me through. God preserved that work of faith in my soul.’ It was so with Peter too, as the Lord told him. “But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not.”

God grant his blessing.

Amen.