Can You Bind the Unicorn?
Notes
Transcript
Knowest thou the time when the wild goats of the rock bring forth? or canst thou mark when the hinds do calve? Canst thou number the months that they fulfil? or knowest thou the time when they bring forth? They bow themselves, they bring forth their young ones, they cast out their sorrows. Their young ones are in good liking, they grow up with corn; they go forth, and return not unto them. Who hath sent out the wild ass free? or who hath loosed the bands of the wild ass? Whose house I have made the wilderness, and the barren land his dwellings. He scorneth the multitude of the city, neither regardeth he the crying of the driver. The range of the mountains is his pasture, and he searcheth after every green thing. Will the unicorn be willing to serve thee, or abide by thy crib? Canst thou bind the unicorn with his band in the furrow? or will he harrow the valleys after thee? Wilt thou trust him, because his strength is great? or wilt thou leave thy labour to him? Wilt thou believe him, that he will bring home thy seed, and gather it into thy barn?
Today’s text highlights the special care that God shows to four types of wild animals. I want to emphasize that these animals really are wild, i.e., they defy all attempts at domestication. The animals in our text are wild goats and hinds in verse 1, wild asses in verse 5 and unicorns in verse 9. I’ll identify more specifically what each of these animals is as make our way through our passage.
My research for today’s message has taken me into the fascinating world of zoology. I knew some things already. For example, I knew that horses and donkeys are both equines, and I also knew that a male horse is a stallion and a female horse a mare. But I didn’t know that the gender terms for donkeys are different. A male donkey is a jack and a female donkey is a jenny. I also knew that mules are the offspring of a jack and a mare, but I learned that a stallion and a jenny could also produce offspring. Their offspring are called hinnies. Although both mules and hinnies are the result of breeding horse with donkeys, they don’t look alike, they don’t have the same temperament or share the same capabilities.
These details increased my appreciation of the wonder of God’s creation — the amazing ingenuity that put it all together and makes it work. As we make our way through our passage, we’ll find even more evidences of God’s amazing handiwork.
So, let’s go to our text.
Mountain Goats and Fallow Deer
Mountain Goats and Fallow Deer
In verses 1 through 4, the Lord asked Job about wild goats and hinds. The wild goats mentioned here are known today as Nubian ibices or mountain goats. You’ve probably seen them at the zoo or in photographs. They’re fairly large animals, have light tan bodies that blend well into their natural environment, and the male of the species has two very long horns that curl backwards. Today these beautiful creatures still inhabit the mountains and deserts of the middle east and northern Africa. In fact, the area west of the Dead Sea known as En Gedi literally means ‘spring of the goat,’ because it was there that wild goats often gather at a spring of fresh water. The hinds or fallow deer are a lot like the goats.
The Lord’s questions to Job about these particular animals have to do with birthing and raising the young. What did Job know about such things? He no doubt had plenty of experience with the birthing of domesticated animals. According to chapter 1, he once owned a lot of them — seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen and five hundred female donkeys. But he knew almost nothing about wild goats and fallow deer. He had never cared for the mothers during pregnancy. He didn’t know when they gave birth. Nor had he ever assisted in the birthing process. The wild goats and deer birthed their young unobserved and unsheltered. So, how could Job presume to understand God’s providence in other areas, let alone suggest improvements?
Actually, there’s no reason why Job would have helped the goats and Der give birth. They didn’t need his help. Verses 3 and 4 make it clear that it was all taken care of, and the little kids and fawns that were born went their own way soon afterward. The Lord said,
They bow themselves, they bring forth their young ones, they cast out their sorrows. Their young ones are in good liking, they grow up with corn; they go forth, and return not unto them.
Job may not have helped with these creatures, but God did. The Lord superintends all his creation, caring for his creatures even when no man is there to assist. Psalm 29:9 says,
The voice of the LORD maketh the hinds to calve, and discovereth the forests: and in his temple doth every one speak of his glory.
So, the questions in verses 1 through 4 remind us that God is a midwife to wild animals. But for us he’s even more. He’s our Father — even our Father which art in heaven. Unlike our earthly parents, he cannot fail us. The psalmist wrote,
When my father and my mother forsake me, then the LORD will take me up.
And therefore we must have no earthly thought of his heavenly majesty. We are also born of his Spirit, as Jesus told Nicodemus. The Spirit and the Word work together to make us children of God. Peter wrote that we have been born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever (1 Pet. 1:23). And we also have Jesus Christ — our faithful Savior, Messiah, prophet, priest and king — as our brother. Hebrews 2:11–12 says,
For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren, Saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee.
There are times when we may be ashamed to call Jesus our brother, but he is never ashamed to call us his because he bought us with his precious blood.
While it’s a wonderful thing for God to superintend the births of mountain goats and fallow deer, and surely something for which he deserves our heartiest praise, it’s even more amazing that he is our Father, brings about our new birth and welcomes into the family of his Son. And this should encourage us in our suffering.
Onagers
Onagers
Starting with verse 5, the Lord asked Job about wild asses. Keep in mind that these are not donkeys that a farmer might use to plow a field; they’re a species of donkey known as onagers. They have a light brown coat, short legs and can run extremely fast — often up to forty-five miles per hour. But the important point in our text is that they avoid all human contact and have never been domesticated. They are wild and love their freedom.
Earlier in the book of Job, Zophar used these wild donkeys to illustrate man’s wild and evil nature. He said,
For vain man would be wise, though man be born like a wild ass’s colt.
Like the wild ass’s colt, man is seemingly uncontrollable in his urge to rebel against God.
The questions God asked Job about onagers had nothing to do with birthing. They focused instead on the fact that onagers wander freely and roam around in the desert. In particular, they live in the area between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba. But who set them free? Did Job once have them under his control but later let them roam? No, the freedom of these animals was all God’s doing. In verse 6 God says,
Whose house I have made the wilderness, and the barren land his dwellings.
There's a little humor here. The Lord asked Job in verse 7 to imagine onagers, uninitiated beast, living a refined life in a city or obeying orders given to ordinary animals. Such things were so unthinkable that the very suggestion of it was almost a slap in the face for Job.
And just as the Lord gave onagers their freedom, he also frees us from sin and death and hell. Because Jesus shed his blood for our sins, we are free to serve him. Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 3:17,
Now the Lord is that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.
This is a freedom that no man can take away. But we must never use it to indulge in the very wickedness from which we have been saved. To indulge in sin is not liberty at all, but a return to slavery. In his letter to the Galatians Paul wrote,
Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.
After our Thanksgiving meal this past Thursday, I read Psalm 136 for our table devotion. To some this psalm might seem monotonous because it repeats the same phrase over and over, but it does this fora reason — to emphasize the fact that there’s never an time in which it would be inappropriate to praise God. Verse 16 really stood out to me. I think of it almost the theme of 2020: the Lord led his people through the wilderness: for his mercy endureth for ever. We tend to think that God shows mercy when he saves us from the wilderness so that we can be free to serve him in more delightful times, but this verse says that the fact that God put us in the wilderness in the first place is an act of his mercy. Why? Because that’s where we need to be. That’s where we learn how to use our liberty to his glory. That’s where we, like the onagers, forage for our food — the meat and drink of the gospel — as we learn to trust Jesus more and more.
Job’s trials were his wilderness. He needed God to lead him through it with all of his suffering just as much as we do.
Aurochs
Aurochs
Verse 9 introduces the last of the wild animals of today’s text: the unicorn. Just so there’s no confusion, especially for our younger members, the unicorn mentioned here is not the mythical creature that looks like a horse with a horn in the middle of its forehead. Rather, it’s an extinct ox known as an aurochs. Aurochs were much larger than domesticated oxen — some of the males surpassed six feet in breadth at the shoulders. Their size, plus their incredible strength, made them extremely dangerous. They were the most powerful of hoofed beasts. That’s why the book of Numbers says that God delivered his people from Egypt as if by the strength of a unicorn or wild ox (cf. Num. 23:22; 24:8). He also promises to give us the power of an ox when we rely on him in times of opposition. Psalm 92:10 says,
But my horn shalt thou exalt like the horn of an unicorn: I shall be anointed with fresh oil.
Again, the most important thing to know about these aurochs is that they, unlike domesticated oxen, refuse to be tamed. Domesticated oxen seem to thrive on service, but not these creatures. In that sense, men are more like aurochs. Isaiah 1:3 says,
The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib: but Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider.
In the ancient world, farmers prayed that their oxen may be strong to labour (Ps. 144:14) and understood that much increase is by the strength of the ox (Prov. 14:4). They would have loved to have aurochs in their service, but that wasn’t possible. Note what God asked Job about them: Can you get one to serve you? Will he be content to sleep in your barn at night or eat from your corn crib? Do you have the power to make one of these majestic creatures plow a field or bring in your crops? For that matter, could you even trust these animals enough to walk in front of them as you’re plowing your field? I doubt Job thought he could or would do any of these things.
Yet, the great power of these magnificent beasts seems to be all for nothing. No man benefits from their tremendous strength. So, for whom were they made? The obvious answer is that God made them for himself. He is their lord and master. He sustains them and delights in them.
And if the wild ox is powerful, then our God is even more so. As we teach our children, he can do all his holy will. And he does all his holy will. The Lord is omnipotent. And this means that he can turn evil to good and suffering to blessing. He used Joseph’s trials to save his family, and the death of his Son to save us from our sins. Like Job, we rarely know what he’s doing when we’re in the furnace of affliction. But we have to trust he will work all things together for his glory and our good.
One of the first passages that I remember learning as a young child is Proverbs 6:6–8. Solomon wrote,
Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise: Which having no guide, overseer, or ruler, Provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest.
These verses struck me at the time because they made me realize that there is literally no part of creation from which we cannot learn about God or his grace to men. Even tiny ants teach us how to serve him in a way that befits his place as our Lord and King and our place as his servants.
In today’s text, God used wild animals to teach Job that he is intimately involved in the lives of creatures that no man can touch. He superintends their births, gives them freedom to roam in the wilderness, and gifts them with incredible power. And if he’s that involved in their lives, will he not also care for you? Has he not already done so by sending his Son to purchase you, body and soul, to be his own special treasure forever? His Father would have to deny him not to give us the reward of his work, and that is something he cannot do. Therefore, whatever you suffer in this life, though it's real and painful, is only a tool that God uses to complete his work of grace in you. It doesn’t mean that he’s abandoned you. To the contrary, it means that he loves you enough to make you what he wants you to be, even he has to make you hurt for a while to get you there. And for such love we must give him our heartfelt and eternal praise. Amen.