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.
Elihu continues, telling Job that his heart pounds when he thinks of God’s voice and wondrous power. He describes some of the ways in which God speaks and some of his wondrous acts. Then he asks Job a rhetorical question. He asks Job if he understands how God does these things. Elihu concludes by saying that since Job is so wise as to understand these things, he should teach others what to say to God.
When Elihu had finished speaking, God answered Job from a whirlwind. God starts by asking Job some questions. He asks him if he was there when the earth was created? The whole of chapter 38 is a beautiful rebuttal to those who think they know how the world came to be and that they can dismiss God as unimportant. I will quote here one example I found especially poignant:
Where does light come from,
and where does darkness go?
Can you take each to its home?
Do you know how to get there?
But of course you know all this!
For you were born before it was all created,
and you are so very experienced!
Chapter 39 continues with more examples of things which exceed human understanding and demonstrate the limits of human wisdom.
When God begins speaking to Job He asks the question which Ken Ham paraphrases so brilliantly when people tell him that this earth was created in some way that contradicts the Genesis account. God’s words here:
Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?
Ken Ham asks:
How do you know? Were you there?
There are many who challenge this as an easy question to answer, but that is because they do not listen to the whole follow up. That question is directed at those who dogmatically insist that there is no God because the whole universe came into being by random chance. It is a question about how do you know what you know and, more importantly, how do you know what you do not know? It is only when we recognize the limits to what we know that we can start to accept that God is beyond our ability to fully understand, that we have to take something on faith and it may as well be God.
Paul quotes the psalmist as saying, “I believed; therefore I have spoken.” Paul tells us that because he knows that the God who raised Jesus from the dead will also raise him and those who listen to his message, he cannot help but tell people about the Gospel. As God’s grace reaches ever more people will cause those who believe to give thanks for the greater glory to God. Paul never gave up because his spirit was being renewed every day, even though his body was wasting away. Paul was able to accomplish this because he did not look at the troubles he faced in this life, rather he looked at the things of God which cannot be seen.
Paul expresses his full confidence in God. Telling us that he would rather die and leave this earthly, corrupted body to be with Christ, but willing to stay within his earthly body for as long as God had use for him here. This whole passage gives us a model which we should strive to follow. Paul regards this life as something to be endured in service to God, but longed for the day when he would join Jesus in heaven, whether through death and resurrection or through transformation upon the Lord’s return. This made any trials or pains which he faced eminently endurable because the worse they were from a human perspective the more they demonstrated that God was honoring him by allowing him to share in Christ’s suffering.
In today’s psalm, the psalmist tells us that God has allowed his enemies to triumph over him and made him experience suffering. All of this has happened despite the fact that he has remained faithful to God. Despite being in this situation the psalmist trusts in God to rescue him from his troubles.
There will be times when our life goes through something like this. But let us remember the message of Job, that God will answer our cries in His time. And let us remember Paul’s expression of faith and keep our focus on the unseen glory of God. God will use our suffering to bring glory to His name and will reward us for our faithfulness according to His plan.
The lazy person will take any excuse to avoid working.