June 16, 2024 Bible Study — God Can Do No Wrong

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Job 34-37.

Reading what Elihu says in today’s passage reminds me once again of those who preach “prosperity gospel”, those who preach that if you do God’s will you will be wealthy and powerful.  Elihu rightly tells us that God will not, cannot, do wrong or pervert justice.  He points out that if God withdrew His spirit from the world all life would cease.  God can do no wrong and cannot commit injustice because He defines what the words “good” and “justice” mean.  Elihu also tells us, correctly, that our sin causes no harm to God, and if we were righteous it would bring no benefit to God.  Whatever sinful or righteous acts we perform only have an impact on our fellow humans, not on God.  However, Elihu also tells us that the wicked always experience obvious suffering and those who do good always experience good fortune and obtain wealth.  I believe that there is more good than bad in what Elihu has to say.  I see chapter 37 verses 23 and 24 as his summation of what he had to say:

The Almighty is beyond our reach and exalted in power;
in his justice and great righteousness, he does not oppress.
Therefore, people revere him,
for does he not have regard for all the wise in heart?

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

June 15, 2024 Bible Study — God Is Not Silent, But We May Not Be Listening

Today, I am reading and commenting on Job 29-33.

When Job finishes his final monologue the passage tells us that his three friends stopped answering him “because he was righteous in his own eyes.”  This reminds me of a theme which was brought up repeatedly by the writer of the Book of Judges, “everyone did what was right in their own eyes.”  Further, it tells us that Elihu, a fourth friend of Job who was not mentioned earlier, was angry because Job had justified himself rather than justifying God.  So, Elihu begins to speak.  He starts by first declaring that he waited for his elders to speak before he voiced his own thoughts because with age should come wisdom.  He then says that young people may possess wisdom as well.  Now that those with more experience have exhausted their arguments against Job and failed to refute him, he will present his own thoughts about Job’s rants.  Elihu starts by declaring that he knows that he is no better in God’s eyes than Job, so Job should not consider anything he says to be a condemnation of Job.

Which brings Elihu to his first point.  He challenges Job’s assertion that he has done no wrong but is nevertheless condemned by God.  In particular, Elihu challenges Job’s assertion that God does not respond to those who call out to Him.  Elihu declares that God does speak, it’s just that we humans do not listen when He does.  God sends a messenger to us, in one form or another, when we sin, who will show us how to be upright and do God’s will.  The messenger might be a dream or a nightmare.  It might be suffering which we experience.  Or, it might be wise advice from a person we meet. We need to be alert and repent of our sins in response to the messages which God sends us.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

June 14, 2024 Bible Study — Wisdom Can Not Be Found Unless One Turns to God

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Job 22-28.

Eliphaz begins his reply to Job by saying something true: God does not need us, and nothing we do can benefit Him, even if we were righteous God would gain nothing from it.  Unfortunately, he immediately follows that by accusing Job of great wickedness.  Eliphaz lists a series of sins of which he is sure Job must be guilty.  Eliphaz goes on to espouse what closely resembles “prosperity Gospel” when he tells Job that he is suffering because of his sin and would be prosperous once more if he would just return to living a righteous life.  Job responds by saying that God should establish days when people can come before Him to request His judgement in the manner that many kings hold court.  If God would do that, Job would come before Him and establish his innocence.  Instead of such a system, Job proclaims, we have a world where no one is secure, where the poor suffer and even the powerful can suddenly become subject to misfortune.  Bildad replies to Job’s claim of innocence by making the point that no one is pure in God’s eyes.  A very true point, but not one which offers much comfort to someone suffering as Job was at this point.  Job replies to Bildad by pointing out that his point offers no comfort to one who is suffering.  Job then says one of the things for which God later calls him out: he declares that God has denied him justice.  Job then finishes today’s passage by telling us something of value: all wisdom comes from God.  No matter where we look, or how hard we search, we will never find wisdom until we turn to God.  There is no other source for wisdom than God.  If we wish to be wise, we must turn our face towards God and listen to what He tells us.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

June 13, 2024 Bible Study — Job Expresses His, and Our, Great Hope

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Job 16-21.

The Book of Job is an interesting foreshadowing of many themes which are addressed in the New Testament.  In his suffering Job had begun to hope for death, but he tells us that if all we have to hope for is death, we have no hope.  Which sounds very similar to what Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15 where he says, “If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.”  Job also goes on to say that his intercessor plead with God for him.  Which fits with what Paul says in Romans 8:34, “Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.” And what John writes in 1 John 2:1, “My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have an advocate with the Father—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One.”  Finally, Job also expresses the hope for resurrection when he says, “I know that my Redeemer lives…in my flesh I will see God.”  I know that one day I will die, unless Christ returns before then, but I also know that in my flesh I will see God.  That is the great hope all those who put their trust in Jesus have, no matter what they may suffer in this life.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

June 12, 2024 Bible Study — Do Not Use Deception to Argue on Behalf of God

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Job 11-15.

I often struggle with the Book of Job because the things Job’s friends say have a lot of truth to them, but God condemns them roundly at the end of the book.  However, today I noticed that when Zophar responds to Job, her responds to a straw man, he takes something Job said and paraphrases it to make it more extreme than what Job actually said.  Zophar claims that Job said that his beliefs were flawless, but that is not what Job said.  Job did say that he was blameless, and that is not true because the Bible makes clear that all have sinned.  However, in the context one might take Job’s statement as meaning that he was no more worthy of blame than his friends, who were not suffering as he was.  Zophar went on to insult Job by essentially calling him witless.  Zophar was there to offer Job comfort in his suffering, so he should not have misstated Job’s argument, and he most certainly should not have insulted him.  Job replies by pointing out that Zophar was speaking for God dishonestly, something we should never do.  Further, Job put his claims of innocent in context by asking his friends how they would fair if God were to examine them in detail, would they show any more innocent than Job?  When our friend, or anyone else for that matter, is suffering we should not condemn them,  Also, when we debate others, something which we should save for a time when they are not suffering, we should be careful to argue against positions they actually hold, not what we think they meant by what they said.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

June 11, 2024 Bible Study — The Need for a Mediator Between God and Man

Today, I am reading and commenting on Job 6-10.

In today’s passage, Job expresses how great God is compared to us.  God’s power and wisdom are so vast that no human can resist Him and remain unscathed.  When He acts, no one can stop Him.  Even if we were innocent, being in His presence would cause us to declare our guilt because He is so much more than us.  We cannot even begin to imagine that we might answer any charges God might bring against us, even if such charges were not true.  All of this Job declares, and it is true.  Which leads Job to wish for a mediator, Someone who could listen to us as another mortal would yet who could stand before God as an equal.  Thank God that He has provided such a mediator in the form of Jesus Christ, Who is both God and man.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

June 10, 2024 Bible Study — Accepting Both the Good and Bad Which God Sends Into Our Lives

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Job 1-5.

When Job received word that all of his herds and flocks had been destroyed immediately followed by the news that his children had all been killed, his response was to mourn and worship God.  He acknowledged that all that he had had had come from God (Okay, that is an awkward sentence structure with three hads in a row).  Then, when he was suffering with painful sores over his entire body, he still refused to turn from God, or hold Him to blame.  When his wife told him to curse God and will himself to death, he told her that such talk was that of those who foolishly lacked morals.  He took the position that we should accept both the good and the bad which God sends our way and continue to faithfully serve Him.  Finally, after his friends commiserated with him in silence for seven days, Job expressed his misery by wishing that he had never been born.  Even here he does not hold God at fault, he just expresses his despair over what has happened to him and the physical pain he was suffering by saying he would rather that he had never lived than experience what he was experiencing.  His friend Eliphaz responds to Job’s deep despair  by telling him that if he would just confess his sin and throw himself on God’s mercy things would get better.  When we face hardship, let us follow Job’s example.  And when our friends face hardship, let us understand that everyone has a limit to what they can take and pray to God that He give them relief rather than tell them that they should not talk like that.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

June 9, 2024 Bible Study — Others Will Be Drawn to Our Faith When We Remain Strong in the Face of Persecution

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Esther 8-10.

Having exposed Haman’s plot for what it was and thus causing the king to have him executed, Esther begged the king to overrule the edict which Haman had issued in the king’s name.  The king gave Esther and Mordecai permission to issue an edict to counter that of Haman, after reminding them that no edict issued in the king’s name could be revoked.  The edict which Mordecai wrote seems to be nothing more than a mirror of the one which Haman had issued.  It gave the Jews the right to arm themselves and assemble to defend themselves and their families against those striving to carry out Haman’s edict, and to seize the property of those from whom they defended themselves.  The way in which the results of this edict are described suggests that there existed a group of people who had organized to take advantage of Haman’s edict and that Mordecai’s edict empowered the Jews to destroy the members of that group.  Perhaps the most interesting thing about this passage is the fact that it tells us that people of other nationalities became Jews because of this edict.  The lesson we learn here is that God will provide for us when we refuse to cower from those who seek to harm us because of our faith, and others who had not previously shared our faith will be drawn to stand with us.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

June 8, 2024 Bible Study — Accepting the Risk of Doing God’s Will

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Esther 4-7.

When Mordecai asked Esther to appeal to the king on behalf of the Jewish people, she expressed the danger to herself for doing so.  Mordecai points out that she is at risk anyway.  Esther then asks Mordecai to have all of the Jews of the city fast for three days, at the end of which she will approach the king.  Mordecai’s message to Esther contains an important lesson for us.  If we are in a position to act to protect God’s people from harm, if we refuse to take that action out of fear for ourselves, our position of privilege will not protect us.  In fact, God has probably given us that position of privilege in order to act on behalf of His people.  However, there is more to this passage, there is also Esther’s response to that message from Mordecai, “If I perish, I perish.”  Once she heard Mordecai’s message, she knew he was right.  She was in a position of privilege and luxury, God had put her in that position in order to do something.  That did not mean that God would protect her from the risk of taking action, but it did mean that she needed to accept that risk.  In the same way, each one of us must be willing to accept the risk which comes from doing God’s will.  Each of us is where we are in life in order to do something for God.  That something involves taking risks.  We need to be willing to take those risks.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

June 7, 2024 Bible Study — Lessons About Maintaining a Relationship

Today, I am reading and commenting on  Esther 1-3.

There are multiple lessons we can take away from this passage.  I am going to start with the lessons on relationships we can learn from the account of the interactions between King Xerxes and Queen Vashti.  I am going to make some assumptions about the motivations of those involved which are not spelled out in the passage, but which I think likely.  King Xerxes and Queen Vashti threw joint parties: King Xerxes threw a party for all of the men of significance in his kingdom and Queen Vashti threw one for all of the women.  When both parties were in full swing and King Xerxes was rather drunk, he decided to show off how beautiful his wife was.  So, King Xerxes sent for Vashti to come to him.  I think it is safe to assume that Queen Vashti was probably having a rather good time herself at her party and she didn’t want to leave her party to go be made a spectacle of in front of a bunch of men.  King Xerxes summons to Vashti was likely intended as a compliment to her beauty, but it did not come across that way to Vashti.  Instead, she interpreted it as being objectified, being seen by Xerxes as another one of his possessions (and that might indeed have played a role in his thinking).  So, she refused to come to Xerxes summons.  At this point, from a relationship perspective, both Xerxes and Vashti have made mistakes.  Xerxes mistake was that he summoned Vashti, rather than telling her that he wanted his “friends” to see how lucky he was to have such a beautiful wife and asking her to join him (and perhaps bringing some of her guests with her).  Vashti’s mistake was in angrily rejecting Xerxes summons, rather than coming to him and telling him in person why he had angered her, and thus giving him a chance to correct her misunderstanding of his motivation, or correct his behavior if she was correct.  Xerxes then compounded his mistake by angrily asking his, also drunk, “friends” what he should do about her rejection.  Instead of doing that, and, worse, acting on their advice, Xerxes should have gone to Vashti and talked to her about why he was angry and why she had refused his request.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.