Do you think it is only of Job that God thinks? Do you think that God is not thinking of every one of you now, and that in the presence of the evil angel? Do you suppose that this was something entirely exceptional? The account of it was, the allowance of it was, the special circumstances of it were peculiar; but the principle is the same for every believer. God in His sovereign love and grace takes a pleasure in His children, far more than we take in any of ours. And you know what that is for a parent. Well now, God takes more pleasure in you, not merely in Job, in you. I grant we do not deserve it; that is another thing altogether. Love does not count up what we deserve at all. Love goes out because God is love, and for His own glory in Christ the Lord. Now, He is able to do it righteously; able to do it effectively. But here, there was tremendous suffering before Christ came in, and before the full light of God came. God allowed all that; nevertheless, it was He that began it; and, if God begins, how will He end? Worthily of Himself.

God, in His wonderful ways, is not one that waits for the devil at all. He begins. God had a child of His; and when this subtle, active, malicious foe came, in his restless roaming backward and forward on the earth to do mischief, God said, “Look at my servant Job.” The enemy felt that as a challenge to him, as it were. God first of all laid down a certain restriction, and this He always does. He allows it only to a certain extent; and in this case it was to be to a very remarkable extent, that it might be a lesson forever after this Book was written; that it might cast a light on all the great struggle of good and evil, for every child of God from that day to this.