Job 7:1-21

7:1-21 | Hard service has a general meeting here (14:14; Isa. 40:2) but typically refers to military duty or a hired laborer. Job’s service to God now seemed like a repetitive, joyless activity. Nothing comforted him; nothing assured him.

7:3-4 | Months of futility indicates the length of Job’s suffering. In addition to physical distress, he also struggled with insomnia (Ps. 39:4).

7:6-10 | The metaphors here convey life’s transience, parallelling language that is found in the Psalms (Ps. 39:4-6; 62:9; 89:47-48; 144:3-4). While such realities drove the psalmist to God, Job spoke as one without hope.

7:11-21 | Job now turned his lament toward God, with questions that centered on his prolonged misery. If Job’s life was a breath that would inevitably expire one day (James 4:14), why did God bother guarding him like some monster of the sea? Why not train His eye elsewhere and let Job pass away?

7:13-16 | The agony Job experienced was constant, He could barely sleep, yet when he did, he was haunted by nightmares he believed came from God. Hence, Job pled with God to let me alone so death could bring relief.

7:16 | The word for breath is the same word often translated “meaningless” or “futile” in Ecclesiastes. Scripture often uses it to depict the transience of life (Eccl. 1:2-4).

7:17-19 | The language in these verses resembles that of Psalm 8:4, except that Job associates God’s excessive attention with testing. Despite Job’s feelings of worthlessness, he felt that even in the minutiae of life, God would not allow him one moment of peace (till I swallow my saliva).