The name Job is the Hebrew word "iyob" which means "hated."
It's an interesting name but is it the Lord that hated Job or satan? Clearly satan.
When we read the oldest book in the Bible, the book of Job, we seldom read passed chapter 3.
Don't get me wrong, many have ventured into the other chapters, but we focus so much on how the story starts.
satan appears before God with the other angels and twice accuses the Lord of placing a hedge around Job, his family, and his possessions.
Then the Lord does the almost unimaginable.
He allows satan to destroy almost everything. The situation was so dire that even Job's wife spoke like a foolish woman and tells Job to get it over with. Curse God and die.
The Lord said this about Job in "bragging" to satan.
Job 1:8 (NKJV) "Then the LORD said to Satan, “Have you considered My servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil?"
Not once. But twice because the objective of satan is to get Job to curse God.
If you destroy what he has and if you put on Job illness, he will curse you to Your face.
God knew that Job wouldn't curse God, but satan was so sure that Job would.
We don't understand this story as to why would the Lord allow trouble to come to a man that's blameless, upright, one who fears God, and shuns evil.
It's only after we've seen Job's three friends (really 4), sit around Job and tell Job that it's because of sin that these dreadful things happened to a man that has integrity. And Job appears to struggle with the fact that he was serving the Lord with all of his heart, soul, mind, and strength, yet, this catastrophe came upon him.
While it's understood that Job never sinned against God with his lips, yet, Job established such a self righteous attitude. It revealed what God was really after in Job.
What was it that the Lord was after?
Completely trusting God even when you can't see what He's doing and never trust in preempting evil to use it as protection because God can lift it at anytime.
But didn't Job maintained his integrity?
With Job's three friends. All they did was see Job as a sinner. He must have done something wrong to bring this calamity upon himself.
When you have three persons preaching to you that it's because of your sins that this has happened, you begin to believe it. So much so that you demand an audience with the Lord.
Job was so far gone that he even requested that God would crush him and kill him so Job could have peace (Job 6).
Then these words in Job 10 further indicates that he loathes his own life.
Job 10:1-2 (NKJV) “My soul loathes my life;
I will give free course to my complaint,
I will speak in the bitterness of my soul.
I will say to God, ‘Do not condemn me;
Show me why You contend with me."
He desired to know why these things happened to him. No doubt, when he observed his families having parties and living like the world because of the accumulation of wealth, he sacrificed to God to protect them.
It was a preemptive intercession.
Man is prone to prevent calamity by doing preemptive acts to head off calamity.
Men making the sign of a cross for "good luck," or wearing certain things to ward off evil spirits. Saying certain prayers. Giving certain amounts of money or material.
Then the Sabeans, the fire of God, the winds, and the Chaldeans took everything that Job had.
Job 1:21-22 (NKJV)
“Naked I came from my mother’s womb,
And naked shall I return there.
The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away;
Blessed be the name of the LORD.”
In all this Job did not sin nor charge God with wrong."
It's in these lessons that we realize that God can do anything He desires to do because He is God. It's our job that when certain things happen, they happen because He is God.
And when He's finished, He gets the glory out of it whether we understand it or not.
I've tried to learn that when certain things happen, that I should keep my mouth shut and just simply accept what's going on instead of questioning what God is doing. As you read the story, Bildad, Zophar, and Eliphaz continue to accuse Job.
You have to admit. It seems like they had the pulse of what's going on here.
But even Job had had enough of his friends.
Job 16:1-3 (NKJV)
"Then Job answered and said:
“I have heard many such things;
Miserable comforters are you all!
Shall words of wind have an end?
Or what provokes you that you answer?"
Instead of making things easy for a man that lost everything, they were Sunday Morning Quarterbacks. Job called them all "miserable comforters."
But in the end, the Lord tells them all that they were wrong.
Then these words...
Job 23:1-7 (NKJV) "Then Job answered and said:
“Even today my complaint is bitter;
My hand is listless because of my groaning.
Oh, that I knew where I might find Him,
That I might come to His seat!
I would present my case before Him,
And fill my mouth with arguments.
I would know the words which He would answer me,
And understand what He would say to me.
Would He contend with me in His great power?
No!
But He would take note of me.
There the upright could reason with Him,
And I would be delivered forever from my Judge."
It appeared that Job was forsaken by God. In calamity, it's as if the Lord let it happen and He walked away for you to suffer.
It's always in the heat of the situation that we begin to say things about the Lord, or to the Lord and it's not the thing that we've first said when it all began.
Remember that Job blessed the Lord at the beginning?
What happened?
The moment got the best of Job but there's one thing Job has to his credit.
He knew not to curse God and die.
But Job is getting closer to bringing serious charges against the Lord.
In chapter 24, Job recounts the many injustices man has committed, yet, they're not punished.
But in the end, Job brings it back to what will happen to the mighty that break God's commandments.
Job 24:22-25 (NKJV) “But God draws the mighty away with His power;
He rises up, but no man is sure of life.
He gives them security, and they rely on it;
Yet His eyes are on their ways.
They are exalted for a little while,
Then they are gone.
They are brought low;
They are taken out of the way like all others;
They dry out like the heads of grain.
“Now if it is not so, who will prove me a liar,
And make my speech worth nothing?”
Then we get to the foundation of what the Lord was after.
In Job 31:40, "The words of Job are ended."
Job 32:1-9 (NKJV)
"So these three men ceased answering Job,
because
he was righteous in his own eyes.
Then the wrath of Elihu, the son of Barachel the Buzite, of the family of Ram,
was aroused against Job; his wrath was aroused because he justified himself rather than God. Also against his three friends his wrath was aroused, because they had found no answer, and yet had condemned Job.
Now because they were years older than he, Elihu had waited to speak to Job. When Elihu saw that there was no answer in the mouth of these three men, his wrath was aroused.
So Elihu, the son of Barachel the Buzite, answered and said:
“I am young in years, and you are very old;
Therefore I was afraid,
And dared not declare my opinion to you.
I said, ‘Age should speak,
And multitude of years should teach wisdom.’
But there is a spirit in man,
And the breath of the Almighty gives him understanding.
Great men are not always wise,
Nor do the aged always understand justice."
You can have age and perhaps, be a great person, but lack wisdom and lack understanding "justice."
One of the things that we lack is the ability to hold our peace.
We don't have to say anything to defend ourselves when we know we're right.
And we don't have to justify ourselves to appear before our friends that we know what happened.
After Elihu spoke, being the youngest of them all, the Lord appears in a whirlwind.
It must have been a fearful sight.
After all that Job said, when the Lord appeared, Job's words were few.
What happened to all that "I'll give God a piece of my mind" talk?
In the real presence of God, when His unmatched power is on full display, He puts us in our place.
He is God and we lose the audacity and courage to confront God quickly.
The fear (being afraid) of God returns.
Job 40:1-5 (NKJV) "Moreover the LORD answered Job, and said:
“Shall the one who contends with the Almighty correct Him?
He who rebukes God, let him answer it.”
Then Job answered the LORD and said:
“Behold, I am vile;
What shall I answer You?
I lay my hand over my mouth.
Once I have spoken, but I will not answer;
Yes, twice, but I will proceed no further.”
This was after the Lord asked Job questions for which he had no answer.
Job's ego was reduced to nothing.
The intent was to show Job that God is God.
From chapters 36 to 40, the questions posed to Job were questions that only God Himself had the answer.
And that while everything was going on in the planet, God had Job.
Everything that happened to Job happened while God was still running the planet, the stars, the universe, the animals, and every human on the planet.
Nothing escapes the vision and knowledge of God.
Job was so obsessed with telling God about why did these things happened to me while I was serving you that his self righteousness emerged and God had to put Job in his place.
What was Job's response after God questioned him?
Job 42:1-6 (NKJV) "Then Job answered the LORD and said:
“I know that You can do everything,
And that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You.
You asked, Who is this who hides counsel without knowledge?’
Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand,
Things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.
Listen, please, and let me speak;
You said, I will question you, and you shall answer Me.’
“I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear,
But now my eye sees You.
Therefore I abhor myself,
And repent in dust and ashes.”
The word "repent" means that Job was sorry for accusing God of walking away, taking care of everyone and everything else, while Job suffered.
Not realizing that God was taking care of Job while taking care of everything else.
It's in calamity that our true colors about God comes through.
Job's three friends were miserable comforters, which I believe, helped pushed Job to appear self righteous. But God said that everything that they've said was wrong.
Instead of fixing up his property, they were running their spiritual mouths. Instead of comforting Job with encouraging words after losing his family, they accused him of sin.
Instead of giving Job physical relief of his boils, they were tormenting his soul.
Instead of saying bad things about the floods in China, linking it to Covid being released from China, be very careful. The last thing you and I want to do is respond to something that you and I know nothing about.
In the end, the Lord restored Job after he sacrificed and prayed for his friends.
Yes. Job prayed for his spiritual tormentors that were "miserable comforters."
Let this be a lesson for all of us.
Humility and humbleness of mind may prevent humiliation.
We must be very careful with our words because we really don't know what the Lord is doing.
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