Devotional Thoughts: Job, you have instructed many ...

Checking out Job chapter four this evening.

Previously, unknown to Job, Satan and God discussed Job's faithfulness. Satan believed if Job's health, family and possession are taken away, Job would turn against God. God doesn't think that will happen. Job is left in sack clothes and ashes. Three of his friends show up and they don't say anything for 7 days. Job finally speaks in chapter 3 lamenting his situation.

In chapter four, Eliphaz responded to Job ...

Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said:

If one ventures a word with you, will you be impatient?
Yet who can keep from speaking?
Behold, you have instructed many,
and you have strengthened the weak hands.
Your words have upheld him who was stumbling,
and you have made firm the feeble knees.
But now it has come to you, and you are impatient;
it touches you, and you are dismayed.
Is not your fear of God your confidence,
and the integrity of your ways your hope?

This sounds a lot like, physician heal thyself!

I suppose there are times when you tell someone, snap out of it! I don't know if Job's situation is one of them. In the scale of loss one can experience, he has pinned the needle. These kinds of changes are difficult on anyone. Check here to see how much life change you are facing.

Remember: who that was innocent ever perished?
Or where were the upright cut off?
As I have seen, those who plow iniquity
and sow trouble reap the same.
By the breath of God they perish,
and by the blast of his anger they are consumed.
The roar of the lion, the voice of the fierce lion,
the teeth of the young lions are broken.
The strong lion perishes for lack of prey,
and the cubs of the lioness are scattered.

Today, we look at the animal kingdom and think, oh, the warm fuzzy nice animals. But the reality is that lions either eat somebody or they starve to death!

And so we look at our lives and figure, the innocent will be vindicated and the bad guys punished. This is true often enough that we expect it. But it is not true often enough that we feel outrage!

Nonetheless, Eliphaz felt the need to emphasize that the innocent don't perish.

He continues with the corollary thought ...

Now a word was brought to me stealthily;
my ear received the whisper of it.
Amid thoughts from visions of the night,
when deep sleep falls on men,
dread came upon me, and trembling,
which made all my bones shake.
A spirit glided past my face;
the hair of my flesh stood up.
It stood still,
but I could not discern its appearance.
A form was before my eyes;
there was silence, then I heard a voice:

"Can mortal man be in the right before God?
Can a man be pure before his Maker?
Even in his servants he puts no trust,
and his angels he charges with error;
how much more those who dwell in houses of clay,
whose foundation is in the dust,
who are crushed like the moth.
Between morning and evening they are beaten to pieces;
they perish forever without anyone regarding it.
Is not their tent-cord plucked up within them,
do they not die, and that without wisdom?"

So what is the answer to Eliphaz?

Can mortal man be in the right before God? Can a man be pure before his Maker?

Eliphaz is arguing:
(1) If the innocent don't perish
(2) If no one can be right and pure before God
Then ...
(3) Job you aren't innocent which makes sense because no one is right and pure before God anyway!

Eliphaz is right up to a point. But Job did offer sacrifices for the sins of his children. I would assume he would offer sacrifices for his own sins too. Thus, to the extent possible, he sought to be right with God and pure before God.

But the fact remains: Job has lost everything. When bad things happen, we assume it is sin. It might be - when one drinks and drives terrible things can happen. But then again, sometimes bad things happen to people through no fault of their own.

Its an existential question we all face. We like a tidy explanation and it bugs us when there isn't one.

Lord, help me to seek you. Help me to be discerning about the things that happen in my life. Some of the things, I really do need to take responsibility for. But some of them ... it might really be that it isn't my fault. So for the things I can do something about, please give me the strength, the will and the wisdom to correct. And for the rest, help me to give it over to you. Amen.