If I Eat My Morsel Alone -- By: W. E. Midgley

Journal: Central Bible Quarterly
Volume: CENQ 04:1 (Spring 1961)
Article: If I Eat My Morsel Alone
Author: W. E. Midgley


If I Eat My Morsel Alone

W. E. Midgley

Nashville Baptist Church

Winnebago, Minnesota

“If I eat my morsel alone” is a pertinent challenge for today taken from Job 31:16, 17. The book of Job is one of the most wonderful poems in the world. Tennyson called this book “the greatest poem of ancient and modern literature.” Luther said this book was “more magnificent and sublime than any other book of Scripture.” This book was written in patriarchal times. It lifts the veil off the spirit world. Man can see the extent and limit of the power of Satan in this book. The mystery of redemption and the fact of the resurrection are foreshadowed in this book.

Job’s Practice

Most of this book consists of an extended discourse between Job and his three friends. Job sits in sackcloth and ashes as he experiences excruciating pain and suffering from terrible boils. “If I eat my morsel alone” is found in Job’s final answer to these friends. Eliphaz has accused Job, “Thou hast taken a pledge from thy brother for nought, and stripped the naked of their clothing. Thou hast not given water to the weary to drink, and thou hast withholden bread from the hungry” (Job 22:6, 7). Now Job replies to that utterly false and groundless charge. The whole section in which this challenge is found is a step by step answer to this charge.

Job reminds these critics that he provided food and the fatherless ate the same morsel that he did. They did not eat after him, nor just gather the crumbs from his table. They ate with him. They sat at the same table and shared the same food. “If I have withheld the poor from their desire, or have caused the eyes of the widow to fail; Or have eaten my morsel myself alone, and the fatherless hath not eaten thereof” (Job 31:16–17).

After the death of Saul, David on one occasion desired to show kindness to the house of Saul for Jonathan’s sake. A search was made, and Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan, was brought to Jerusalem. Then “he did eat continually at the king’s table” (II Sam. 9:13). Likewise, Job declares that he has no uncharitableness. If I have eaten my morsel alone, “Then let mine arm fall from my shoulder blade, and mine arm be broken from the bone” (Job 31:22).

Our Abundance

We live in a land of plenty, of physical and material ble...

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