Matthew Henry Commentary Job 3:11-19

"Why died I not from the womb? Why did I not give up the ghost when my mother bare me? Why did the knees receive me? Or why the breast, that I should suck? For now should I have lain down and been quiet; I should have slept; then had I been at rest, With kings and counsellors of the earth, Who built up waste places for themselves; Or with princes that had gold, Who filled their houses with silver: Or as a hidden untimely birth I had not been, As infants that never saw light. There the wicked cease from troubling; And there the weary are at rest. There the prisoners are at ease together; They hear not the voice of the taskmaster. The small and the great are there: And the servant is free from his master." — Job 3:11-19 (ASV)

Job complained of those present at his birth for their tender attention to him. No creature comes into the world so helpless as man. God's power and providence upheld our frail lives, and His pity and patience spared our forfeited lives. Natural affection is put into parents' hearts by God.

To desire to die so that we may be with Christ, so that we may be free from sin, is the effect and evidence of grace; but to desire to die only so that we may be delivered from the troubles of this life suggests corruption. It is our wisdom and duty to make the best of what is, whether living or dying; and so to live to the Lord and die to the Lord, as in both to be His (Romans 14:8). Observe how Job describes the repose of the grave: There the wicked cease from troubling.

When persecutors die, they can no longer persecute. There the weary are at rest: in the grave they rest from all their labors. And a rest from sin, temptation, conflict, sorrows, and labors remains in the presence and enjoyment of God. There believers rest in Jesus; indeed, as far as we trust in the Lord Jesus and obey Him, we here find rest for our souls, though in the world we have tribulation.