The character that wins respect.
Job paints a glowing picture of his honoured condition in past days. Then he was more than prosperous. He was treated with great deference. Let us gather up the traits of the character that wins respect, and in order to do so let us distinguish them from false grounds of deference.
I. FALSE GROUNDS OF DEFERENCE.
1. Power. Multitudes cringe before mere power, either in fear of giving offence or with a hope of gaining some advantage. The Oriental makes his humble salaam to the infidel whom in his heart he despises. This deference is no credit to either party.
2. Wealth. The worship of mammon may be less visibly cruel than the worship of Mars, and yet in some respects it is more degrading, for it calls out no heroic qualities. The deference shown to the rich simply because they are rich is one of the most unworthy characteristics of human weakness. It is not peculiar to our own age; this miserable sycophantic spirit was ridiculed by Roman satirists and reprobated by New Testament writers (e.g. James 2:2). Its sordid meanness humiliates all who are enslaved by it.
3. Self-assertion. The world is often too easy in taking men at their own valuation of themselves. Because a great claim is made it is often tacitly assented to, simply because people are too indolent or too cowardly to question it. But self-importance is not greatness.
4. Success. There is more in this when it is not merely a business matter, when it indicates sterling qualities of ability and energy. Still, good fortune may have much to do with it, and conscientious scruples may have been trampled down in the fierce determination to win it at any cost. Then the failure that would not stoop to the lower and more easy means of success is infinitely more worthy of honour.
II. THE TRUE CHARACTER THAT WINS RESPECT. it is portrayed in Job's description of his own happy past. Why was this hushed deference of old men as well as young, of princes and nobles? The answer is to be found in the conduct of Job.
1. Active benevolence. "Job delivered the poor that cried," etc. Here was more than princely generosity. It costs a man absolutely nothing to leave a big legacy to the poor, and it does not hurt him much to give freely during his lifetime out of his superfluous cash. On the contrary, the money may be profitably laid out, even from a purely worldly and selfish point of view, in the honour of standing well in subscription-lists. But the greater honour is due to those who exert themselves for the good of their brother-men. Lord Shaftesbury was a man of small means. His fame is not founded on money gifts; it rests on the more solid foundation of self-denying labours.
2. Integrity. Job put on righteousness, and it clothed him. Without this, benevolence is of little value. We must be just before we are generous. A Christian man of business should see to it that his name is without reproach in the commercial world. Truth and honesty are primary conditions of respect.
3. Wisdom. "Unto me men gave ear, and waited, and kept silence at my counsel" (verse 21). Had Job been a foolish, though a well-meaning man, deference to his counsel would have been asign of weakness on the part of others. But he proved himself to be a man of strong mental power and of true wisdom. We owe respect to the "men of light and leading" when their leading is determined by their light.—W.F.A.