Job: Part 3 - (God honors Job)

“Go to my servant Job and offer a burnt offering for yourselves; and my servant Job will pray for you, and I will accept his prayer on your behalf.” Job 42:8

It turns out Eliphaz and his friends had been wrong about everything and God noticed. As we recall, they claimed Job was a wicked sinner and God was punishing him. God called them on their duplicity. He said “I am angry with you and with your two friends, for you have not been right in what you have said about me.” He could have dealt severely with them for their lies but extended his mercy instead...leavened with a healthy dose of “humble pie”.

God told Eliphaz “Job has been right all along so...take seven young bulls and seven rams and go to Job and offer a burnt offering. my servant Job will pray for you, and I will accept his prayer on your behalf. I won’t destroy you as I should because of your sin.” So Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar did as the Lord commanded and the Lord accepted Job’s prayer on their behalf. When Job prayed for his friends, the Lord restored his wealth and happiness! In fact, the Lord gave him twice as much as before! All of his brothers, sisters, and former friends feasted with him in his home, consoling him for all his sorrow and comforting him because of all the trials the Lord had allowed in his life.  

So the Lord blessed Job at the end of his life more than at the beginning. Job lived 140 years after that, living to see his grandchildren and great-grandchildren too.

The life of Job provides some important lessons for us. First, God is always in charge. Second, God is always speaking if we will only listen.  Third, God is always faithful to serve our best interests. Fourth, God’s sovereignty does not ensure a life free from trouble. 

I’m reminded of a particularly humbling meme from my seminary days; “Theology is God’s Word polluted by human  interpretation”. What should strike us most powerfully about Job is that it is possible to  misunderstand God...be incorrect in our assessment of what God may be doing, and still be righteous. This makes perfect sense in light of the fact that God is, in so many ways, incomprehensible to the human mind and heart. Fortunately, our righteousness before God is NOT predicated on  our perfect comprehension of God but upon our faith in the sacrifice of His Son Jesus, the Christ.

We are reminded the Holy Spirit speaks but He doesn’t tell us “everything”. He tells us what we need to know and explains what we need to understand.  The real question before us is...when trouble inexplicably invades our lives can we humbly trust God even when we don’t understand what He is doing? Or, will we shake our fist and say “I can never believe in a God who is so demonstrably unfair!” 

Job got some of the details wrong and God challenged him on that but, Job got the most important thing right; in the middle of calamity he proclaimed “I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth.” (Job 19:25). God rewarded him for being faithful in spite of everything that was taken from him.

We are free to take either path but, I heard a rumor...there is a God and I am not Him.

Live boldly out there today...

Job: Part 3 - (Rumors of God)

“I admit I once lived by rumors of you; now I have it all firsthand—from my own eyes and ears. I’m sorry—forgive me. I’ll never do that again,” (Job 42:5)

Mali was preparing to serve dinner when one of our grandsons sat at the table and began eating before anybody else had been called to the table. His grandma asked “is this the way we begin our meal?” To which he replied, “but...I was hungry!”

We  all want to defend ourselves...

The Pulpit Commentary remind us Job wanted to take issue with God, to argue out his case and God now offers to listen but, challenges him to “stand up like a man" and get ready for some hard questions. God says “I will demand of you, and answer me”; then Job will be entitled to put questions to God. Job, however, after hearing God’s questions, says, "I have said too much already" (40:5). The confident boldness which he felt when God seemed far off disappears in his presence, and is replaced by diffidence and distrust. 

And...God begins, “Do you presume to tell me what I’m doing wrong? Can you shout in thunder the way I can? Go ahead, show your stuff. Let’s see what you’re made of. Unleash your outrage. Stop the wicked in their tracks—I’ll gladly step aside and hand things over to you—you can surely save yourself with no help from me!” (The Message)

So God gives Job a lesson in reality...

1. Have you ever ordered Morning, ‘Get up!’
2. Do you know the first thing about death?
3. Do you know where Light comes from and where Darkness lives?
4. Who do you think is the father of rain and dew, the mother of ice and frost?
5. Do you know the first thing about how the  constellations affect things on Earth?
6. Can you control the lightning bolts and have them serve you?
7. Can you teach the lioness to stalk her prey and satisfy the appetite of her cubs?
8. Will the wild buffalo voluntarily agree to serve you,
9. Did your wisdom teach  the hawk how to fly,
10. volunteer to spend the night in your barn?

Oops...God called Job’s bluff and Job replies “I’m speechless. I should never have opened my mouth! I’ve talked way too much. I’m ready to shut up and listen.” (40:4)

I must have misunderstood...

God continues...Look at the giant hippopotamus, grazing on grass, docile as a cow. I created him as well as you—but you’d never want him for a pet, you’d never be able to housebreak him! Or can you land a great whale, with a fly rod and stuff him in your creel? If you so much as lay a hand on him you won’t live to tell the story. If you can’t hold your own against him, how do you expect to stand up to me?  “I’m in charge of all this—I run this universe!”

Job must have heard a rumor it’s OK to argue with God but...he got the message; He says “I’m convinced: You can do anything and no one can upset your plans. I admit I babbled on about things way over my head. I once lived by rumors of you; now I have it all firsthand—I’m sorry—forgive me. I’ll never do that again.” 

The greatest problem, for faith, in 21st century America is we have actually figured out the answers to some of God’s questions so we’ve begun believing we’re as smart as God. In the process we’ve transmogrified God into our own image so we presume he acts like us. This is insidious, not intentional. It derives from our own fallen desire to be our own God. Once we buy the lie it’s only a short step to believing God is just like us. Why wouldn’t he be?

Job’s real struggles were the result of this idea that he would never treat anybody the way he’d been treated so...God had to be to wrong. They ideas were spawned by the false notion that God, in order to be righteous, had to conduct himself as we do. That’s just an ugly rumor. God’s response is simple...”who told you that?”

Do we worship God or do we worship “rumors of God?” When calamity strikes we can remember God is the potter and we are the clay or we can demand a hearing from God but...have we ever heard a lump of clay say “I don’t want to be a coffee mug?” If we choose to quarrel with God...are we sure we want to hear the answer? He has a compelling way of saying “you’re not the boss of me!”

Live boldly out there today...

Job: Part 2 - (Second, Elihu contradicts Job):

“Indeed God speaks...yet no one notices it.” Job 33:14

I told my grandsons they could use my study...as long as they put it back the way they found it when they were finished. Easy enough, or...not! They came over one day and asked to use my study and I said “no”. To which they replied, “Why, grandpa?”

I answered, “Well, I set some rules about this space and last time you were here you didn’t follow them”. To which they replied, “You never said that, grandpa!” So, they were attempting to make the point that their restriction was my fault. I don’t believe they were lying to me. I believe they just didn’t hear me when I spoke. They were too wrapped up in their own world to listen.

Elihu suggests Job had the same problem...one common to all humankind. He said, listen to my words, Job; “pay attention to what I have to say. I speak with all sincerity for the Spirit of God has made me”. So you don’t need to be afraid of me because I won’t accuse you like these other guys. “You said, ‘I am pure; I am without sin; I am innocent; I have no guilt. God is picking a quarrel with me, and he considers me his enemy’ but you are wrong, and I will show you why. 

God speaks, but nobody listens.

Elihu continues; In a dream, for instance...when men and women are deep in sleep, God opens their ears and gives them inclinations. Or, God might get their attention through suffering, or even through an angel...in the flesh...to mercifully reveal God’s intentions. One thing is certain,  says Elihu, “God does not listen to the arrogant person’s empty plea; How much less, then, will he listen when you say that you do not see him, that your case is before him and you must wait for him.”

The Bible, our sacred scripture, is both a blessing and a bane; The Bible is a great blessing because it is “God’s word” spoken to us. When we read it we are able to discern precisely what God desires of/for us. It is a bane because the certainty we have in scripture inhibits our curiosity that God may speak in other ways. We like to say the Bible is our “sole rule for faith and practice”. 

And, it is...

But, what about Believers in Job’s day...before God’s word was delivered to them? How did they know what God intended? As Elihu suggested...God spoke, by His Spirit, directly to their spirits. Or, He spoke through circumstances or prophets (angels). The important truth is; God has always spoken and always will.

As Christians, we need to recall one of our greatest blessings is God sent His Holy Spirit to live in/with us.  Romans 8:9 confirms we, “are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in [us]. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.” It is impossible to be a Christian without God living in us. This makes us a “new creation” (2 Corinthians 5:17). I am no longer “Lee Thompson” but I am “Lee Thompson with God living in me”.

Just try to wrap your head around that...

Foremost, this Holy Spirit living in us is intended to be a “deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until our redemption” (Eph 1:14). He is the only thing that guarantees our eternal life in Heaven. So much for the value of our good works!  Also, in context with Elihu’s point, the Holy Spirit “guides us into all the truth because He will speak only what he hears God (the Father) say.” (John 16:13).

So you and I, as Christians, don’t have to let our “conscience be our guide” like the rest of the world. Good thing because our conscience is a dubious guide. Otherwise good people do some foolish things because they followed their human intuition. When Christians feel our conscience prompt us it is the Holy Spirit speaking, just as Jesus promised. And those words come directly from God through our thoughts and dreams or through the words of God’s agents (angels or prophets) and the Holy Spirit will confirm which sources are authentically Divine.

You may have heard the old story of the man who died in a flood. He sat on his roof, as the water was rising, imploring God to save him. Three different neighbors came by in boats asking if he wanted to get in. “No thank you”, he said, “God will rescue me”. When the rising flood overwhelmed him and he was ushered to the gates of Heaven he was disappointed and complained to God, “why didn’t you save me? I was praying so fervently!”

God answered...”I sent you three boats, why didn’t you get in?”

When we face trouble and confusion we need to trust God to speak. Many times He will point us directly to a passage in the Bible. Many time is will be through the words of a wise and godly friend. More often than we can imagine it will be from the mouth of an angel we don’t even recognize. But always it will be the direct prompting of the Holy Spirit speaking with our spirit. 

It’s a good habit to compare God’s voice with what we already know He declares in scripture because our hearts can be prone to misunderstanding.

Live boldly out there today...