To cause it to rain on the earth, where no man is; on the wilderness, wherein there is no man;
The verse belongs to God's own words to Job in Job 38-40, recorded by the shepherd of Midian before the world's poets had sung, ranking among the earliest as well as the most sublime poetic utterances known to man, unequaled and unapproached in majesty by human genius. It is God's own Word to be read against human fallacies. It shows God cleaving a channel for the floodwater and a way for the lightning of the thunder in order to cause rain to fall on land where no man is.
God directs rain to uninhabited wilderness as well as to places where people live, satisfying the waste and desolate ground and causing the tender grass to spring forth. He actively directs nature even where no human observer or beneficiary is present. Rain is one of the operations of nature performed directly by God, with nothing said of independent laws of nature. God is superintendent as well as Creator, engaged in upholding what He has created, calling everything in order and keeping all things in motion, and the laws He instituted are only His servants through which He effects results.
The verse is part of a poetic display of God's authority over the earth and its weather, beyond human power or knowledge. It shows man took no part in the creation of the world or anything that has the breath of life, because man was made last. It confirms man was created after the image of God and Christ, by whom the worlds were made and who is the brightness of God's glory and the express image of His person. The verse is one of the questions God asks that men of greatest intellect and the most profound scholar cannot answer, and it was not asked to be answered but to call attention to the deep mysteries of God and to teach that human wisdom is limited, showing that in the surroundings of daily life there are many things beyond the comprehension of finite beings. It reveals infinite power that skeptics cannot comprehend yet must acknowledge, as much from what God does not reveal of Himself as from what is open to limited comprehension, for both in nature and in divine revelation God gives such mysteries to command faith, leaving an infinity beyond for ever searching, inquiring, and learning.
The verse belongs to God's own words to Job in Job 38-40, recorded by the shepherd of Midian before the world's poets had sung, ranking among the earliest as well as the most sublime poetic utterances known to man, unequaled and unapproached in majesty by human genius. It is God's own Word to be read against human fallacies. It shows God cleaving a channel for the floodwater and a way for the lightning of the thunder in order to cause rain to fall on land where no man is.
God directs rain to uninhabited wilderness as well as to places where people live, satisfying the waste and desolate ground and causing the tender grass to spring forth. He actively directs nature even where no human observer or beneficiary is present. Rain is one of the operations of nature performed directly by God, with nothing said of independent laws of nature. God is superintendent as well as Creator, engaged in upholding what He has created, calling everything in order and keeping all things in motion, and the laws He instituted are only His servants through which He effects results.
The verse is part of a poetic display of God's authority over the earth and its weather, beyond human power or knowledge. It shows man took no part in the creation of the world or anything that has the breath of life, because man was made last. It confirms man was created after the image of God and Christ, by whom the worlds were made and who is the brightness of God's glory and the express image of His person. The verse is one of the questions God asks that men of greatest intellect and the most profound scholar cannot answer, and it was not asked to be answered but to call attention to the deep mysteries of God and to teach that human wisdom is limited, showing that in the surroundings of daily life there are many things beyond the comprehension of finite beings. It reveals infinite power that skeptics cannot comprehend yet must acknowledge, as much from what God does not reveal of Himself as from what is open to limited comprehension, for both in nature and in divine revelation God gives such mysteries to command faith, leaving an infinity beyond for ever searching, inquiring, and learning.