The Devotional - 38

The Devotional

Comment:

If you have ever had the opportunity to stoke the back of a duck, it will always feel dry. And when it comes to words of instruction many of us receiving these words are like the down of a ducks back; the duck is dry and under the first layers of soft down ignorant of what it is like to be wet. For the duck, this is normal since the LORD God created the duck to resist water. On the other hand God created mankind in His Image. Genesis 1:22 “God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them” (NIV). How about that, do you believe it? Are you and I aware of wisdom and instruction revealed by the LORD God through His Word, the Holy Bible? Or, or we abnormal like the many whose intellect is starving, parched and starving; who by choice are ignorant of their God ordained image?

Challenge: Job 1 through 19

For the moment I would like to revisit some of the words of Eliphaz in chapter 15. I poked at these words yesterday but forgot the point I intended to make so here it is, the verse and the point.15:27 – Though his face is covered with fat and his waist bulges with flesh. The point! Take a brief look around today at the many fat faces and bulging bellies! Eliphaz sees this as a blight, not just directed at Job, but in the surrounding communities of the day in which they all lived. Today is no different, is it?

Back now to chapter 17 and Job’s words beginning in verses 10 -11 – (my version) “but come on, bring it on, try again, maybe this time I will find a wise man among you? Bah Humbug! My future and plans are shattered, even the desires of my heart have melted away. Yet you continue to talk of a better day”. These comments of Job, along with chapter 19 put spark in the words of Bildad and Zophar which are some of the cruelest or hottest words pointed at Job in the book, chapters 18 and 20.

Again, I like the words of Job, here in chapter 19, right out the gate he says “If it is true that I have gone astray, my error remains my concern alone”. While the statement without the following context is really an error in judgment, Job qualifies his words with the following; “if indeed you would exalt yourselves above me and use my humiliation against me”. Job feels abandoned by God and by his friends. 

As he finishes his plea in chapter 19 he says, you are my friends you came to me in friendship (Job 2:11-13), he says “have pity (mercy) on me as I seen when you first arrived. How often should I repeat to you my desire for your comfort? Job says, “Men look, I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the end He will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see Him. I myself will see Him with my own eyes – I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me. (Yes, we the children of God do yearn for His return and we know our Redeemer lives).

Job 19: 28-29 – Yet you say day and night, how shall we continue to hound him, since the root of the trouble is in him? Job says you are missing the point, I do not need your accusations, I need your comfort and you yourselves should fear the judgment. Your wrathful words toward me will bring punishment on you and then you will know that there is a “judgment!” The question then to us is. “Do we look joyfully at this pending return and judgment of God, or do we look fearfully? The answer is personal, but each of us will give account, Romans 14:9-13.

The Devotional - 37

The Devotional

Comment:

Coming home from school one day I heard odd noise of a moving car behind me, I turned around to take a look. In those days most cars were black so it has no bearing on the matter at hand. It was one of those long Buicks, these always reminded me of a large roach on wheels. Anyway it was swerving to and fro and finally the driver lost complete control and the car wedged itself between two telephone poles that were close together and it came to a stop. I ran up to the car and inside were two women, they were laughing hysterically and they sounded drunk. Some others at the accident, an older man and his wife thought the women were drunk. They had no words of comfort, in fact they were quite mean to the women. Also there were two children in the backseat who were crying. The children seemed okay and they were not injured. Finally the police arrived and as it turned out the cars braking system failed, the women were not drunk and when their emotions calmed. The driver looked at the man who had accused her of being drunk said, “Thank you for your kind words of counsel and comfort”! “I think he melted into a peep frog at that point”.

Challenge: Job 1 through 17

There is little doubt in my mind that we have ever met a man or woman like Job and if we have we have no doubt judged him or her wrongly. One of the several things that struck me in reading through to the beginning of chapter 18 is something the Eliphaz says 15:27. “Though his face is covered with fat and his waist bulges with flesh” Man looks on the outward appearance of another to judge the inner workings that only God sees.

I like Job’s response to Eliphaz, but it is true throughout the book so far that Job, just as you or I would seek to identify God as the cause of all of his suffering. Yet and we must see this characteristic in Job that he remains steadfast in his integrity and faith, both before God and his friends. As he says in 16:17 “yet my hands have been free of violence and my prayer is pure.

Job reveals the suffering going on in his heart and discomfort going on in his physical body beginning in 17:1 – His spirit for living has in his mind been broken, the grave has opened its door for his entry, yet the people around him mock and Job’s eyes and ears must see and hear them. I like what Job says in verse 10, “but come on, try again men” in other words “bring it on!” maybe the next round of comfort will work for you”! Yet I perceive that there is not a wise man among you.

When we are called to counsel, we must consider the whole counsel of God. Otherwise we will be shamed by the very problem in this book which as I see it is there is much misapplied knowledge of God and little faith to move mountains.

The Devotional - 36

The Devotional

Comment:

Sometimes I am overwhelmed with events to write about that will parallel or be an analogy to the subjects I see in the written and Living Word of God. To choose one of these events is not so easy. Yesterday, I sought to use an old antique and the ability to refurbish it back to the original. I suppose I would like to use some of that old paint and labor of restoration again today. However, we should always remember that human analogy is limited by the impurity of time, while the Living Word of God is Pure, Peaceable and Patient through time and eternity. Note James 3:17; But the wisdom that is from above is FIRST pure, THEN peaceable and gentle, willing to yield full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy.

Challenge: Job 1 through 14

Zophar, Eliphaz and Bildad are identified as friends, looking back at Job 2:11-13 we see that these men made an appointment with each other to go and visit with Job to mourn and comfort him. When these men saw him from a distance, they could not recognize him, Job’s condition of suffering was more than they expected. Have we not at times wept over someone’s moments of suffering and even failed to speak words of comfort or restoration? The answer is yes, yes we have been there, even walked away knowing we failed to comfort properly.

At these times in life, while we seek to be a comfort we can and often are just the opposite. We know that the devil walks about like a “roaring lion” seeking someone to devour. We also feel that we have been ordained by God to comfort the broken hearted and no doubt we have been selected to do just that. With this motivation we move forward and fail to notice the roaring lion who is promoting his  religion has his sights on us. When we fail to notice our human good reacts and we seek unknowingly to use our thoughts and lips to burn deeper wounds into ears of the mourner.

It is not difficult to understand Job’s response in 13:1-5 – My eyes have seen all this, my ears have heard and understood it. What you know, I also know; I am not inferior to you. (Mourning does not mean that one lacks wisdom and understanding). When we suffer we do not seek to be smeared with lies; why go to a doctor whose practice is worthless? Job concludes that all of his friends at this point should keep silent since their judgment is out of line with Job’s request to God to know WHY? Job is about to speak to them and he says “for when I speak it will be wisdom for you”.

Job has not given in to false religion and human good, and it is not pompous or arrogant to be mourning and say “Though God should slay me, yet will I TRUST Him”. The Spiritual Wisdom and understanding attained by one who suffers is far more valuable than the misapplied words of religion and human good.