Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

Then Job replied:
“Doubtless you are the only people who matter,
    and wisdom will die with you!
But I have a mind as well as you;
    I am not inferior to you.
    Who does not know all these things?
“I have become a laughingstock to my friends,
    though I called on God and he answered—
    a mere laughingstock, though righteous and blameless!
Those who are at ease have contempt for misfortune
    as the fate of those whose feet are slipping.
The tents of marauders are undisturbed,
    and those who provoke God are secure—
    those God has in his hand.
“But ask the animals, and they will teach you,
    or the birds in the sky, and they will tell you;
or speak to the earth, and it will teach you,
    or let the fish in the sea inform you.
Which of all these does not know
    that the hand of the Lord has done this?
In his hand is the life of every creature
    and the breath of all mankind.
Does not the ear test words
    as the tongue tastes food?
Is not wisdom found among the aged?
    Does not long life bring understanding?
“To God belong wisdom and power;
    counsel and understanding are his.
What he tears down cannot be rebuilt;
    those he imprisons cannot be released.
If he holds back the waters, there is drought;
    if he lets them loose, they devastate the land.
To him belong strength and insight;
    both deceived and deceiver are his.
He leads rulers away stripped
    and makes fools of judges.
He takes off the shackles put on by kings
    and ties a loincloth around their waist.
He leads priests away stripped
    and overthrows officials long established.
He silences the lips of trusted advisers
    and takes away the discernment of elders.
He pours contempt on nobles
    and disarms the mighty.
He reveals the deep things of darkness
    and brings utter darkness into the light.
He makes nations great, and destroys them;
    he enlarges nations, and disperses them.
He deprives the leaders of the earth of their reason;
    he makes them wander in a trackless waste.
They grope in darkness with no light;
    he makes them stagger like drunkards.

• Job 12:1-25

“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.
But I desire to speak to the Almighty
    and to argue my case with God.
You, however, smear me with lies;
    you are worthless physicians, all of you!
If only you would be altogether silent!
    For you, that would be wisdom.
Hear now my argument;
    listen to the pleas of my lips.
Will you speak wickedly on God’s behalf?
    Will you speak deceitfully for him?
Will you show him partiality?
    Will you argue the case for God?
Would it turn out well if he examined you?
    Could you deceive him as you might deceive a mortal?
He would surely call you to account
    if you secretly showed partiality.
Would not his splendor terrify you?
    Would not the dread of him fall on you?
Your maxims are proverbs of ashes;
    your defenses are defenses of clay.
“Keep silent and let me speak;
    then let come to me what may.
Why do I put myself in jeopardy
    and take my life in my hands?
Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him;
    I will surely defend my ways to his face.
Indeed, this will turn out for my deliverance,
    for no godless person would dare come before him!
Listen carefully to what I say;
    let my words ring in your ears.
Now that I have prepared my case,
    I know I will be vindicated.
Can anyone bring charges against me?
    If so, I will be silent and die.
“Only grant me these two things, God,
    and then I will not hide from you:
Withdraw your hand far from me,
    and stop frightening me with your terrors.
Then summon me and I will answer,
    or let me speak, and you reply to me.
How many wrongs and sins have I committed?
    Show me my offense and my sin.
Why do you hide your face
    and consider me your enemy?
Will you torment a windblown leaf?
    Will you chase after dry chaff?
For you write down bitter things against me
    and make me reap the sins of my youth.
You fasten my feet in shackles;
    you keep close watch on all my paths
    by putting marks on the soles of my feet.
“So man wastes away like something rotten,
    like a garment eaten by moths.

• Job 13:1-28

“Mortals, born of woman,
    are of few days and full of trouble.
They spring up like flowers and wither away;
    like fleeting shadows, they do not endure.
Do you fix your eye on them?
    Will you bring them before you for judgment?
Who can bring what is pure from the impure?
    No one!
A person’s days are determined;
    you have decreed the number of his months
    and have set limits he cannot exceed.
So look away from him and let him alone,
    till he has put in his time like a hired laborer.
“At least there is hope for a tree:
    If it is cut down, it will sprout again,
    and its new shoots will not fail.
Its roots may grow old in the ground
    and its stump die in the soil,
yet at the scent of water it will bud
    and put forth shoots like a plant.
But a man dies and is laid low;
    he breathes his last and is no more.
As the water of a lake dries up
    or a riverbed becomes parched and dry,
so he lies down and does not rise;
    till the heavens are no more, people will not awake
    or be roused from their sleep.
“If only you would hide me in the grave
    and conceal me till your anger has passed!
If only you would set me a time
    and then remember me!
If someone dies, will they live again?
    All the days of my hard service
    I will wait for my renewal to come.
You will call and I will answer you;
    you will long for the creature your hands have made.
Surely then you will count my steps
    but not keep track of my sin.
My offenses will be sealed up in a bag;
    you will cover over my sin.
“But as a mountain erodes and crumbles
    and as a rock is moved from its place,
as water wears away stones
    and torrents wash away the soil,
    so you destroy a person’s hope.
You overpower them once for all, and they are gone;
    you change their countenance and send them away.
If their children are honored, they do not know it;
    if their offspring are brought low, they do not see it.
They feel but the pain of their own bodies
    and mourn only for themselves.”

• Job 14:1-22

Job 13:15  ”In the final analysis, no one can lead another to God. All he can do is to lead the inquirer to the door of the kingdom and urge him onward. Between God and the returning soul there is a zone of obscurity through which he cannot see. It is the light that no man can approach unto and past which no one can go on his feet or by means of reason or theological knowledge. There faith must make its leap of pure trust into the arms of God crying with Job, ‘Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him,’ or with Newton, ‘O Lord, I trust in Thee completely, and if I go to hell I’ll go down standing on Thy Word.’”

• A.W. Tozer, The Size of the Soul

The Message

This is Job’s response to Zophar.  While Eliphaz and Bildad, danced around the issue, Zophar pounced.  While Job had been patient with the other two “friends,” he seems to be losing his patience with the direction his friends are going.

Job starts with sarcasm, claiming that his friends obviously are much better attuned to the wisdom of the world than he is, but he also has a brain, and he can think too.  The way his friends talk, Job is a laughingstock.

The workings of God should be obvious.  The animals know.  Why do people have such a problem?  Maybe not addressed here ,but what Job says about his friends, they are too pompous with their minds made up as to Job’s problem that they cannot see the forest for the trees.

Job spends the rest of the chapter with the ultimate answer.  The secrets of wisdom reside with God, not mankind.  God can silence the wisest sage or learned elder.  God can make all of us look like drunkards or simpletons.

Job has seen this, and he wants to present his case to God Himself.  Job sets his “friends” as the prosecution, giving charges against him, as they are doing.  Job argues that their charges against him are like ashes.  In other words, they would not stand up in court.

He wants God to do two things.  He wants God to remove his pain and then give Job a chance to present his case.

But then Job speaks of the ethereal life of mankind.  He piles one metaphor upon another.  Then near the end of Job 14, we see the result, after our feeble life is over.  Our children do not remember us and our thoughts are only on our personal pain.

Now, for the believer, when our life is over, God has assured us that there will be no mor pain.

And now let us sing.

The following song is I Will Fear No More.  This is sung by the Afters.  I guess you could say that Job has gotten to the point where he has lost everything except his life and he fears no more.

 

Closing Prayer

Dear Lord,
We need Your wisdom.  Lord, we suffer.  Others see our suffering, or they do not notice.  We all have both of those kinds of friends.  But to understand what goes on in our lives and what the purpose of our suffering is, none of us has the wisdom to fathom that.  In this case, we have the first two chapters of Job, but here, the “friends” do not have that advantage.  Job does not either.  We have the book of Job so that we can try with our feeble understanding of wisdom to relate this book to our suffering.  Are we being tested?  Are we receiving our thorn in the flesh to keep us humble?  Is God correcting us back to His perfect way for our lives?  While Job wants his audience with God, we can wait until we are in Your presence in Heaven, when all the suffering will be worth it.  In thy Name we pray.
Amen

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.