I am using One Year Bible Online for my daily Bible study. For today, One Year Bible Online links here. I have found that by writing this daily blog of what I see when I read these scriptures, I get more out of them. I hope that by posting these ruminations others may get some benefit as well. If you have any thoughts or comments regarding these verses or what I have written about them, please post them.
Zophar responds to Job once more and makes the claim that the success of the wicked and the godless is only temporary. Job replies that such is not always the case. He says that sometimes the wicked grow old and powerful. All too often, no one will dare to criticize them openly, or pay them back for the evil they have done. It is then Eliphaz’s turn to respond to Job again. Eliphaz then lists the sins which he thinks Job must be guilty of since he is suffering as he is. It is worth noting that Eliphaz does not have any evidence other than Job’s suffering for Job’s sin, but he is convinced of it nonetheless.
Zophar here goes to far. He is convinced that Job is guilty of all sorts of terrible sins, not because he has seen Job commit any such sin, or heard someone accuse him of them, but because Job has suffered great misfortune. We should not make the same mistake of assuming that someone has done wrong in the absence of evidence. The George Zimmerman-Trayvon Martin case is a classic example of this. Many people concluded that since he ended up shooting an unarmed seventeen year old, George Zimmerman must have done something wrong. As a Christian, I would never want to be in the position where I might even be tempted to take someone else’s life, let alone actually do so, but our society says there are circumstances where such action is justified. There is no evidence that George Zimmerman was not in such a circumstance, and some evidence that he was. There are gaps in the evidence in which things could have happened that make what George Zimmerman did wrong, but we do not have evidence that those things happened. My point is that we should not conclude that George Zimmerman did wrong according to our society’s standards just because we do not like the results of what happened that night.
I am using this as an example. We have a tendency to do similar things in our every day lives. We look at the outcome of an event we know nothing about and conclude that one party did wrong without knowing the facts. In most cases we may be correct that one of the parties did wrong, but we do not have any way to know which one that was. We should not place the blame for what went wrong on either one without evidence that they were in the wrong (and that the other party was not equally in the wrong).
Paul begins his second letter to the Corinthians by speaking of the troubles he had in the province of Asia. He tells them that things were so bad that he expected to die. But as a result, he stopped relying on his own ability and came to rely fully on God. God was faithful and rescued them from their troubles. Paul tells us that when we face troubles, God will comfort us. Indeed part of the reason we face trouble is so that we can offer the comfort God gave us to others who face trouble. If continue to rely on God, God will continue to rescue us from the troubles we face. He points out that God can and will rescue us from death, because God raises from the dead and if we rely fully on Him, He will raise us from the dead/
This psalm fits well with the passage from 2 Corinthians. The psalmist tells us that troubles surround him and he cannot see his way out. From that position he calls on the Lord to rescue him. He is confident that God will do so and is prepared. even in the midst of his troubles, to declare, “The Lord is great!”
The writer tells us that if we are wealthy we should not think ourselves better than the poor, and that if we are poor we should not think ourselves less than the wealthy, because we are all of us God’s creation, made for His purpose.
The prudent prepare for danger and go forward. They do not fear to act because bad things might happen. They merely prepare the best they can and go on. The foolish never look ahead and suffer the consequences.
The path to genuine wealth and honor is humility and fear of the Lord.