Latest / Journey Elgin / Journey Through Scripture- Job 22-31
Transcript
- Phillip Thomas: It's good to see you today. Welcome to our journey through scripture. My name is Philip Thomas, Pastor of Journey here in Elgin, and we are continuing our walk through the book of Job at this point. We're going to be in Job 22 through 31. Job 22 through 31. And ⁓ and remember again, the basic premise of this this really you have to understand what the book of Job is. It is more of a parable. It is telling us about. godly wisdom and it's doing it in the form of this conversation. But this conversation is actually in in kind of poet poetic language, okay? So it's it's telling us more ⁓ about wisdom, ⁓ about godly wisdom versus traditional wisdom. The traditional wisdom has been the righteous are rewarded, the wicked are punished, and that it it should always be that way. Right? And so Job is clearly being punished ⁓ it from from ⁓ the ⁓ From his circumstances. And so they are assuming that he is wicked. His friends have been kind of reminding him of that. Job is struggling with that because that's the wisdom that he has. So he's like, What's going on? ⁓ he he's kind of gotten frustrated with God. He's asked God just to end it. ⁓ all of these different things that he's ⁓ done. But he's he's never turned his back on God. He's he's just kind of resigned to the fact that, well, I guess God's just gonna do what he's gonna do. But he doesn't understand. His friends don't understand his friends are being very unhelpful. And now they kind of elevate their unhelpfulness. So Eliphaz basically from just tr trying to educate, he went from trying to educate Job and reminding him, ⁓ now you remember the wicked are punished, ⁓ the righteous are rewarded. ⁓ you know, hint hint, you must be wicked, ⁓ to just coming out and basically saying, Job, you're you're wicked, you're you're doing something. And so chapter twenty two ⁓ is is seen in that l that light. ⁓ he says, Can a man be profitable to God, though he who is wise may be profitable to himself? Is it any pleasure to the almighty that you are righteous, or is it a gain to him that you make your ways blameless? It is because of your fear of him that ye corrects you and enters into judgment with you. Is not your wickedness great and your iniquity without end? For you have taken pledges from your brother for no reason, stripped naked of their clothing? You have not given the weary water to drink, you have withheld bread from the hungry, but the mighty man possessed the land, and the honorable man dwelt in it, you have sent widows away empty, and the strength of the fatherless was crushed, therefore snares are all around you, and sudden fear troubles you, or darkness so that you cannot see, and the abundance of water covers you. Right? So he's he's saying clearly you've done something. So he just starts throwing out accusations. ⁓ right and and We don't know whether these are true or not. They're probably not. They're just those are things that happen. Sometimes you you d you don't pay attention like you should or whatever. And and but he is just kind of laying it on Job, reminding him of how wicked he is, ⁓ because he just assumes that Job has to be wicked, ⁓ because he's he's ⁓ being punished. Verse twenty one says, Now acquaint yourself with him and be at peace. Thereby good will come to you. Receive, please, instruction from his mouth, lay up his words in your heart. If you return to the Almighty, you will be built up, if you remove iniquity far from your tents. So in the friend's defense, he he wants what's best for Job, but he believes that what's best for Job, the way that he gets that is for Job to be faithful to God, because then clearly everything's going to be fine. And Job knows that he hasn't done anything to be unfaithful, and so he doesn't have anything to change. Right. He can't ⁓ he can't change his behavior ⁓ in order to get rewarded because his behavior wasn't bad to begin with. ⁓ and so so Job responds in j ⁓ chapter twenty three. Basically he's just kind of ⁓ it's not even necessarily a direct response. He's kind of questioning he he doesn't feel like God is there, and then he's frustrated with just the evil in the world. ⁓ so he kind of goes on a monologue about that. ⁓ verse two says ⁓ even today my complaint is bitter, my hand is listless because of my groaning. ⁓ that I knew where I might find him, that I might come to his seat, I would present my case before him, fill my and fill my mouth with arguments. I would know the words which he would answer me. ⁓ and and I would be delivered forever from my judge. Verse seven. And it says, verse eight, Look, I go forward, but he is not there, and backward I cannot perceive him. ⁓ when he works on the left hand I cannot behold him, he turns to the right hand, I cannot see him. ⁓ but he knows the way that I take. Right. So he he's saying, I c I just can't find God. I don't know where he is. Again, he's not rejecting God. He's not turning his back on duck God. He's not cursing God. But he just he feels like God is not there. Then he just kind of starts complaining about the violence on the earth. ⁓ you know he he talks about verse twenty ⁓ chapter twenty four. ⁓ verse eleven, they press out oil with their walls and tread wine presses, yes su yet suffer thirst, the dying groan in the city, the souls of the wounded cry out, yet God does not charge them with wrong. ⁓ right, so he's saying, you know, look at all these these other people and and they're they're continuing to to go on and not having to go through what I'm going through. ⁓ He's he's just struggling because again he has this false understanding of godly wisdom. ⁓ ⁓ Job twenty five. So this is Bildad. He's he began, so now he's gonna get his chance to really lay it to Job. And what's funny is you actually see Job interrupt. Yeah, he just like, nope, ⁓ enough of this. ⁓ Bildad in verse in chapter twenty five says, Dominion and fear belong to him. He makes peace in his high places. Is there any number to his armies upon whom does his light not rise? How then can man be righteous before God, or how can he be pure who is born of a woman? If even the moon does not shine and the stars are not pure in his sight, how much less a man who is a maggot and a son of man who is a worm? So I I think he basically just called Job a maggot and a worm. And and so Job ⁓ quickly just kind of responds and and he he he acknowledges man's frailty and God's greatness. Chapter twenty six, ⁓ he says, How have you helped him who is without power? How have you saved the arm that has no strength? How have you counseled one who has no wisdom and have declared sound advice to many? To whom have you uttered words? And whose spirit has have you come from? And then he's talking that so that's more than likely responding to Bildad. Then he's talking about God in verse ten, He drew a circular horizon on the face of the waters, at the boundary of light and darkness the pillars of heaven tremble and are astonished at his rebuke. He stirs up the sea with his power, by his understanding he breaks up the storm. By his spirit he adorned the heavens, and his hand pierced the fleeing serpent. Indeed, these are the mere edges of his ways and how small a whisper we hear of him. But the thunder of his power, who can understand? Right? So he's he's still acknowledging the greatness of God, ⁓ but also acknowledging how how people fall way short of that. ⁓ but it still doesn't make sense of why ⁓ Job is going through what he's going through. ⁓ chapter twenty seven, Job basically is maintaining his integrity. ⁓ he he is saying, You know, I I I know that I have not done wrong. ⁓ he says, As God lives who has taken away my justice, and the Almighty who has made my soul bitter, as long as my breath is in me and the breath of God in my nost nostrils My lips will not speak wickedness, nor my tongue utter deceit. Far be it from me that I should say you are right. Till I die I will not put away my integrity from me, my righteousness I hold fast, and will not let it go. My heart shall not reproach me as long as I live. So so he is he is holding on to his integrity ⁓ to to what he believes is right. Then ⁓ chapters twenty eight is kind of just him talking about wisdom. ⁓ and he he it it's similar to something that we would see in Proverbs or even Ecclesiastes. But he's talking about ⁓ wisdom. ⁓ verse twelve he says, But where can wisdom be found? And where is the place of understanding? Man does not know its value, nor is it found in the land of the living. The deep says it's not in me, and the sea says it's not with me. It cannot be purchased for gold, nor can silver be weighed for its price. Right, so he's he's valuing wisdom. He's seeking to understand, but he's he's realizing my old way of understanding is is just not right. and ⁓ then it continues for the price of wisdom ⁓ verse nineteen is above rubies. The topaz of Ethiopia cannot equal it nor it be valued in pure gold. So is he's elevating wisdom. Then verse ⁓ starting in verse twenty. From where then does wisdom come and where is the place of understanding? It is hidden from the eyes of all living and concealed from the birds of the air. Death and dis ⁓ destruction say, We have heard a report about it with our ears. God understands its way, he knows its place, for he looks to the ends of the earth and sees under the whole heavens to establish a weight ⁓ for the wind and a portion the waters by measure, when he made a law for the rain and a path for the thunderbolt, right? So th so God is the one who understands wisdom. ⁓ verse twenty seven. Then he saw wisdom and declared it. He prepared it indeed, he searched it out, and to man he said, Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, and to depart from evil is understanding. So so Job is is really starting to simplify this, and he's basically saying, Okay, wisdom is not about whether the righteous are rewarded and the wicked are are punished. Wisdom is fearing the Lord. Which leads to obeying the Lord, which is moving away from evil. Right? And and the the result of that ultimately doesn't really matter, right? That's what we do. We fear the Lord and we follow Him and we seek to do good and not evil, no matter the consequences. Because if we have the traditional wisdom mindset that the w the wicked are punished. And the righteous are rewarded. When you start to not be rewarded, and guess what? There's gonna be times in your life that you are not going to feel like you're going to be w rewarded. You're just going to start assuming, well, I'm not doing what I should. And so you may just start changing the way that you're living your life in order to get a different outcome. That may or may not be a good thing. And then whenever if if you hold on to this wisdom, it may get to the point where Things start going bad and you just say, you know what, I'm done with you, God. If you're not going to reward me for what I've been doing, then why am I doing this? Well, that is not godly wisdom. Godly wisdom is knowing who God is, that we are created by him to fear the Lord and then to walk in his ways. That is what wisdom comes down to. It has nothing to do with the consequences. As you continue on, ⁓ chapters ⁓ twenty nine, thirty, and thirty one. Basically this is just kind of Job's summary, his defense of himself, ⁓ that he's laying out. ⁓ verse twenty or chapter twenty nine. ⁓ that I were in months past, as in the days when God watched over me, when his lamp showed upon my head, when his light ⁓ I walked through darkness, just as I was in the days of my prime, when the friendly counsel of God was over my tent, when the Almighty was yet with me. When my children were around me, when my steps were bathed with cream and the rock poured out the rivers of oil for me. So he's remembering how it was and how he wished it was that way again. ⁓ and now he talks about how how people respected him and now they don't. And and so he's he's mourning this loss. ⁓ and and then ⁓ chapter thirty, ⁓ he talks about, but now they mock me, all right, men younger than I, you know, those who used to respect me, now they don't. ⁓ verse nine, and now I am their taunting song. Yes, I am their byword. They abhor me. They keep far from me. They do not hesitate to spit in my face. So he's he's just talking about look at what is happening to me. ⁓ then chapter thirty one, ⁓ verse five. If I have walked with falsehood, or if my foot has hastened to deceit, let me be weighed on honest scales, that God may know my integrity, if my step has turned from the way Or my heart walked after my eyes, or if my spot adheres to my hands, then let me sow and another eat. Yes, let my harvest be rooted out. ⁓ so he he's saying, if there's something that I have done, reveal it to me. Hold me account for that. ⁓ but I have to know what I have done. he he continues to to say about and he goes into different different areas in his life. If I've been greedy, if I've been lustful, whatever it may be. ⁓ and then he ends by saying in verse thirty eight, If my land cries out against me and my furrows weep together, if I have eaten its fruit without money or caused its owners to lose their lives, then let thistles grow instead of wheat and weeds instead of barley. And and then he kind of rests his case. All right. So that ⁓ come sorry in for today. I encourage you to read thirty two through thirty seven, thirty two through thirty seven ⁓ we'll we'll be reading that on read thirty two through thirty seven and then next we'll start seeing God's response to Job and his friends. All right. We'll see you