He builds his house like a moth’s,
like a booth that a watchman makes.
Job once again is defending his righteousness in this on-going argument with the three friends who came to comfort him; at least that was their original intent. Job, in the above verse, is talking about the insecurity of the wicked and their children. He has painted, thus far, that they have little that last in the world. In the above verse he writes about how unstable their homes are. He compares the homes of the wicked (homes they believe will keep them safe) to that of a moth’s home. Nothing is so easily destroyed than that crafted by the moth. He also compares it to the booth that the watchman makes. These were simply a lean-tos built by those who were sent to watch over the fields from those who might steal the crops. Never meant to be permanent, these quickly built booths were meant only to keep the sun off the backs of the watchmen. What Job is telling his listens is that wealth can’t protect you, no matter how secure your home is. He would know this truth better than anyone in this discussion:
Job 1:18-19 (ESV)
While he was yet speaking, there came another and said, “Your sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house, and behold, a great wind came across the wilderness and struck the four corners of the house, and it fell upon the young people, and they are dead, and I alone have escaped to tell you.”
To emphasize the same truth, Jesus said it this way:
Matthew 7:26-27 (ESV)
And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”
Job has lost everything. He is now left without home and health to defend his righteous integrity. He wants his friends to know that he, like the wicked, has no home able to withstand the trauma of life. Yet, in Christ, we have a sure and steadfast hope.
Hebrews 6:19 (ESV)
We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain,
When we trust our homes and lands for security we are standing on sand in the midst of the hurricane of life.
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