Destroy And Disperse Them

Job 12:20-23 – 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.

Psalm 107:39-40 – Then their numbers decreased, and they were humbled by oppression, calamity and sorrow; he who pours contempt on nobles made them wander in a trackless waste.

Jeremiah 25:9 –  I will summon all the peoples of the north and my servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon,” declares the Lord, “and I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants and against all the surrounding nations. I will completely destroy them and make them an object of horror and scorn, and an everlasting ruin.

Application:

• ·         In their prosperity the people, led by their nobles, grow proud and turn their backs on the God who has blessed them, so He returns them to the desert.
• ·         God knows even plans conceived and held in secret.
• ·         “Servant” is used here not in the sense of “worshiper” but of “vassal” or “agent of judgment”, just as the pagan ruler Cyrus is called the Lord’s “shepherd” and His “anointed”.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Makes Fools Of Judges

Job 12:14-19 – 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.

1 Corinthians 1:20 – Where is the wise person? Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?

Psalm 107:40 – Then their numbers decreased, and they were humbled by oppression, calamity and sorrow; he who pours contempt on nobles made them wander in a trackless waste.

Isaiah 2:22 – Stop trusting in mere humans, who have but a breath in their nostrils. Why hold them in esteem?

Application:

• ·         All humanly devised philosophical and ideological systems end in meaninglessness because they have a wrong concept of God and His revelation.
• ·         In their prosperity the people, led by their nobles, grow proud and turn their backs on the God who has blessed them, so He returns them to the desert.
• ·         The Messiah alone is worthy of the esteem wrongly given to frail leaders.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Counsel And Understanding Are His

Job 12:11-13 – 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.

Job 34:10 – “So listen to me, you men of understanding. Far be it from God to do evil, from the Almighty to do wrong.

Proverbs 21:30 – There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan that can succeed against the Lord.

1 Corinthians 1:22-24 – Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

Numbers 23:19 – God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?

Daniel 1:17 – To these four young men God gave knowledge and understanding of all kinds of literature and learning. And Daniel could understand visions and dreams of all kinds.

Application:

• ·         Job sarcastically chides his counselors for being elders and yet lacking in true wisdom.
• ·         “No plan that can succeed against the Lord” because He is sovereign and controls people and nations.
• ·         The crucified Christ is the power and the wisdom of God that saves.
• ·         God is sovereign in the created world, and especially in history.
• ·         Only by God’s special revelation was Daniel able to interpret correctly.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Know

Job 11:20-12:10 – But the eyes of the wicked will fail, and escape will elude them; their hope will become a dying gasp.” 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.

Isaiah 1:3 – The ox knows its master, the donkey its owner’s manger, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand.”

Genesis 2:7 – Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

Application:

• ·         Refusal to know and understand God resulted in Judah’s exile from her land.
• ·         People are made “in the image of God” and have an absolutely unique relation both to God as His servants and to the other creatures as God’s stewards over them.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Rest

Job 11:18-19 –You will be secure, because there is hope; you will look about you and take your rest in safety. You will lie down, with no one to make you afraid, and many will court your favor.

Psalm 3:5 – I lie down and sleep; I wake again, because the Lord sustains me.

Isaiah 30:15 – This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says: “In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it.

Isaiah 45:14 – This is what the Lord says: “The products of Egypt and the merchandise of Cush, and those tall Sabeans—they will come over to you and will be yours; they will trudge behind you, coming over to you in chains. They will bow down before you and plead with you, saying, ‘Surely God is with you, and there is no other; there is no other god.’”

Application:

• ·         Even while David’s own watchfulness is surrendered to sleep, the watchful Lord preserves him.
• ·         “Repentance and rest” is the true way to salvation and security.
• ·         One day the nations will acknowledge Israel’s God.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Morning

Job 11:16-17 – You will surely forget your trouble, recalling it only as waters gone by. Life will be brighter than noonday, and darkness will become like morning.

Isaiah 65:16 – Whoever invokes a blessing in the land will do so by the one true God; whoever takes an oath in the land will swear by the one true God. For the past troubles will be forgotten and hidden from my eyes.

Job 22:28 – What you decide on will be done, and light will shine on your ways.

Psalm 119:105 – Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path.

John 8:12 – When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”

Application:

• ·         God is true to His promises.
• ·         “Light will shine on your ways” through obedience to the word of God.
• ·         Without the Word I can only grope about in the darkness.
• ·         As Jesus’ followers reflect the light that comes from Him, they too are “the light of the world”.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

To Him

Job 11:10-15 – “If he comes along and confines you in prison and convenes a court, who can oppose him? Surely he recognizes deceivers; and when he sees evil, does he not take note? But the witless can no more become wise than a wild donkey’s colt can be born human. “Yet if you devote your heart to him and stretch out your hands to him, if you put away the sin that is in your hand and allow no evil to dwell in your tent, then, free of fault, you will lift up your face; you will stand firm and without fear.

Job 5:27 – “We have examined this, and it is true. So hear it and apply it to yourself.”

Joshua 24:14 – “Now fear the Lord and serve him with all faithfulness. Throw away the gods your ancestors worshiped beyond the Euphrates River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord.

Ephesians 6:14-15 – Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.

Application:

• ·         Eliphaz’s purpose is to offer theological comfort and counsel to Job, but instead he wounds him with false accusation.
• ·         “Fear the Lord” means trust, serve and worship Him.
• ·         Character, not brute force, wins the battle, just as in the case of the Messiah.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Wisdom

Job 11:5-9 – Oh, how I wish that God would speak, that he would open his lips against you and disclose to you the secrets of wisdom, for true wisdom has two sides. Know this: God has even forgotten some of your sin. “Can you fathom the mysteries of God? Can you probe the limits of the Almighty? They are higher than the heavens above—what can you do? They are deeper than the depths below—what can you know? Their measure is longer than the earth and wider than the sea.

1 Corinthians 2:9-10 – However, as it is written: “What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived”—the things God has prepared for those who love him—these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit. The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God.

Genesis 15:5 – He took him outside and said, “Look up at the sky and count the stars—if indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.”

Job 36:26 – How great is God—beyond our understanding! The number of his years is past finding out.

Application:

• ·         “Spirit searches all things”, not in order to know them, for He knows all things.
• ·         More than 8,000 stars are clearly visible to the naked eye in the darkness of a Near Eastern night.
• ·         That God’s ways and thoughts are infinitely higher than ours is an important theme.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

I Am Pure

Job 11:4-6 – You say to God, ‘My beliefs are flawless and I am pure in your sight.’ Oh, how I wish that God would speak, that he would open his lips against you and disclose to you the secrets of wisdom, for true wisdom has two sides. Know this: God has even forgotten some of your sin.

Job 2:3 – Then the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil. And he still maintains his integrity, though you incited me against him to ruin him without any reason.”

Exodus 20:18-19 – When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance and said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die.”

Job 38:1-2 – Then the Lord spoke to Job out of the storm. He said: “Who is this that obscures my plans with words without knowledge?

Application:

• ·         God cannot be stirred up to do things against His will. Though it is not always clear how, everything that happens is part of His divine purpose.
• ·         The Israelites request a mediator to stand between them and God, a role fulfilled by Moses and subsequently by priests, prophets and kings—and ultimately by Jesus Christ.
• ·         Out of the awesome majesty of the thunderstorm, God reminds Job that the wisdom that directs the Creator’s ways is beyond the reach of human understanding—that humanity’s almost godlike wisdom should not presume to match God’s wisdom or take its measure.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Idle Talk

Job 11:2-3 – “Are all these words to go unanswered? Is this talker to be vindicated? Will your idle talk reduce others to silence? Will no one rebuke you when you mock?

Job 9:17 – He would crush me with a storm and multiply my wounds for no reason.

Ephesians 4:29 – Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.

Ephesians 5:4 – Nor should there be obscenity, foolish talk or coarse joking, which are out of place, but rather thanksgiving.

Psalm 1:1-2 – Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night.

Application:

• ·         Job does not know that God has allowed Satan to crush him for a high purpose.
• ·         Christians not only stop saying unwholesome things; they also begin to say things that will help build others up.
• ·         By being grateful for all that God has given us, we can displace evil thoughts and words.
• ·         “Mockers” are those who ridicule God and defiantly reject His law.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

I Wish I Had Died Before Any Eye Saw Me

Job 10:14-11:2 – If I sinned, you would be watching me and would not let my offense go unpunished. If I am guilty—woe to me! Even if I am innocent, I cannot lift my head, for I am full of shame and drowned in my affliction. If I hold my head high, you stalk me like a lion and again display your awesome power against me. You bring new witnesses against me and increase your anger toward me; your forces come against me wave upon wave. “Why then did you bring me out of the womb? I wish I had died before any eye saw me. If only I had never come into being, or had been carried straight from the womb to the grave! Are not my few days almost over? Turn away from me so I can have a moment’s joy before I go to the place of no return, to the land of gloom and utter darkness, to the land of deepest night, of utter darkness and disorder, where even the light is like darkness.” Then Zophar the Naamathite replied: “Are all these words to go unanswered? Is this talker to be vindicated?

Ecclesiastes 4:2 – And I declared that the dead, who had already died, are happier than the living, who are still alive.

Ecclesiastes 7:1 – A good name is better than fine perfume, and the day of death better than the day of birth.

Application:

• ·         Faith sees a bigger picture.
• ·         Happy times generally teach us less than hard times.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Dust Again

Job 10:9-14 – Remember that you molded me like clay. Will you now turn me to dust again? Did you not pour me out like milk and curdle me like cheese, clothe me with skin and flesh and knit me together with bones and sinews? You gave me life and showed me kindness, and in your providence watched over my spirit. “But this is what you concealed in your heart, and I know that this was in your mind: If I sinned, you would be watching me and would not let my offense go unpunished.

Genesis 2:7 – Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

Genesis 45:5 – And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you.

Psalm 115:3 – Our God is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him.

Application:

• ·         Humans and animals alike have the breath of life in them.
• ·         God had a purpose to work through the brothers’ jealous and cruel act.
• ·         If Israel is decimated or destroyed, it is God’s doing; it is not His failure or inability to act, nor is it the achievement of the idols the nations worship. When Israel is revived, that is also God’s doing, and no other god can oppose Him.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Sees

Job 10:3-8 – Does it please you to oppress me, to spurn the work of your hands, while you smile on the plans of the wicked? Do you have eyes of flesh? Do you see as a mortal sees? Are your days like those of a mortal or your years like those of a strong man, that you must search out my faults and probe after my sin—though you know that I am not guilty and that no one can rescue me from your hand? “Your hands shaped me and made me. Will you now turn and destroy me?

1 Samuel 16:7 – But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

Job 36:26 – How great is God—beyond our understanding! The number of his years is past finding out.

Genesis 2:7 – Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

Psalm 139:14 – I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.

Application:

• ·         The Lord is concerned with a person’s inner disposition and character.
• ·         That God’s ways and thoughts are infinitely higher than ours is an important theme.
• ·         The Hebrew for “formed” commonly referred to the work of a potter, who fashions vessels from clay.
• ·         Job imagines that God is angry with him, an innocent man, and that he takes delight in the wicked.
• ·         You know me as the One who formed me, but I cannot begin to comprehend this creature you have fashioned.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Hands

Job 10:3 – Does it please you to oppress me, to spurn the work of your hands, while you smile on the plans of the wicked?

Job 19:5-6 – If indeed you would exalt yourselves above me and use my humiliation against me, then know that God has wronged me and drawn his net around me.

Genesis 1:26 – Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

Psalm 95:6-9 – Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker; for he is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care. Today, if only you would hear his voice, “Do not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah, as you did that day at Massah in the wilderness, where your ancestors tested me; they tried me, though they had seen what I did.

Isaiah 60:21 – Then all your people will be righteous and they will possess the land forever. They are the shoot I have planted, the work of my hands, for the display of my splendor.

Job 2:13 – Then they sat on the ground with him for seven days and seven nights. No one said a word to him, because they saw how great his suffering was.

Job 42:6 – Therefore I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes.”

Application:

• ·         Job imagines that God is angry with him, an innocent man, and that he takes delight in the wicked.
• ·         Job, struggling with the enigma of his suffering, can only conclude that God is his enemy, though in fact He is his friend who delights in him.
• ·         Within the realm of His visible creation God places a creature capable of acting as His agent in relationship to other creatures (1) to represent God’s claim to kingship over His creation and (2) to bring its full potential to realization to the praise of the Creator’s glory.
• ·         Both as Creator of all things and as Israel’s Redeemer, God has made them what they are: the people of the Lord in the earth.
• ·         God made people as a potter forms clay.
• ·         “No one said a word to him” was a wiser response than their speeches would prove to be.
• ·         To his humility Job adds repentance for the presumptuous words he had spoken to God.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Charges

Job 9:33-10:2 – If only there were someone to mediate between us, someone to bring us together, someone to remove God’s rod from me, so that his terror would frighten me no more. Then I would speak up without fear of him, but as it now stands with me, I cannot. “I loathe my very life; therefore I will give free rein to my complaint and speak out in the bitterness of my soul. I say to God: Do not declare me guilty, but tell me what charges you have against me.

1 Kings 19:3-4 – Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. When he came to Beersheba in Judah, he left his servant there, while he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness. He came to a broom bush, sat down under it and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, Lord,” he said. “Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors.”

Hosea 4:1 – Hear the word of the Lord, you Israelites, because the Lord has a charge to bring against you who live in the land: “There is no faithfulness, no love, no acknowledgment of God in the land.

Hosea 5:1 – “Hear this, you priests! Pay attention, you Israelites! Listen, royal house! This judgment is against you: You have been a snare at Mizpah, a net spread out on Tabor.

Hosea 12:2 – The Lord has a charge to bring against Judah; he will punish Jacob according to his ways and repay him according to his deeds.

Application:

• ·         Because Job is so bitter, his mind has conjured up a false picture of God.
• ·         Elijah concluded that his work was fruitless and consequently not worth living.
• ·         As the Lord’s spokesman, Hosea brought charges against unfaithful, covenant-breaking Israel.
• ·         The priests, Israelites and the royalty were all responsible for maintaining justice, but it miscarried at their hands.
• ·         In their deceitfulness Israel and Judah were living up to the name of their forefather.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Someone To Mediate Between Us

Job 9:30-34 – Even if I washed myself with soap and my hands with cleansing powder, you would plunge me into a slime pit so that even my clothes would detest me. “He is not a mere mortal like me that I might answer him, that we might confront each other in court. If only there were someone to mediate between us, someone to bring us together, someone to remove God’s rod from me, so that his terror would frighten me no more.

Jeremiah 2:22 – Although you wash yourself with soap and use an abundance of cleansing powder, the stain of your guilt is still before me,” declares the Sovereign Lord.

Numbers 23:19 – God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?

Job 5:1 – “Call if you will, but who will answer you? To which of the holy ones will you turn?

Job 19:25-27 – I know that my redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand on the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see him with my own eyes—I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!

Application:

• ·         Sins can be removed and forgiven, but only when the sinner repents and confesses.
• ·         Balaam is a foil to God—constantly shifting, changing—a prime example of the distinction between God and human beings.
• ·         God is so immense that Job feels he needs someone who can help him, someone who can argue his case in court.
• ·         The idea of a mediator, someone to arbitrate between God and Job, is an important motif in the book of Job.
• ·         Job expresses confidence that ultimately God will vindicate His faithful servants in the face of all false accusations.
• ·         He is absolutely certain, however, that death is not the end of existence and that someday he will stand in the presence of his divine “redeemer” and see Him with his own eyes.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Cleansing Powder

Job 9:25-31 – “My days are swifter than a runner; they fly away without a glimpse of joy. They skim past like boats of papyrus, like eagles swooping down on their prey. If I say, ‘I will forget my complaint, I will change my expression, and smile,’ I still dread all my sufferings, for I know you will not hold me innocent. Since I am already found guilty, why should I struggle in vain? Even if I washed myself with soap and my hands with cleansing powder, you would plunge me into a slime pit so that even my clothes would detest me.

Malachi 3:2 – But who can endure the day of his coming? Who can stand when he appears? For he will be like a refiner’s fire or a launderer’s soap.

Isaiah 1:18 – “Come now, let us settle the matter,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.

Jeremiah 2:22 – “Come now, let us settle the matter,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.

Application:

• ·         Those who desire the Lord’s coming must know that clean hands and a pure heart are required.
• ·         “White as snow” is a powerful figurative description of the result of forgiveness.
• ·         Sins can be removed and forgiven, but only when the sinner repents and confesses.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV

Wicked

Job 9:22-24 – It is all the same; that is why I say, ‘He destroys both the blameless and the wicked.’ When a scourge brings sudden death, he mocks the despair of the innocent. When a land falls into the hands of the wicked, he blindfolds its judges. If it is not he, then who is it?

Ecclesiastes 9:2 – All share a common destiny—the righteous and the wicked, the good and the bad, the clean and the unclean, those who offer sacrifices and those who do not. As it is with the good, so with the sinful; as it is with those who take oaths, so with those who are afraid to take them.

Job 38:2 – “Who is this that obscures my plans with words without knowledge?

Job 10:3 – Does it please you to oppress me, to spurn the work of your hands, while you smile on the plans of the wicked?

Job 27:2-4 – “As surely as God lives, who has denied me justice, the Almighty, who has made my life bitter, as long as I have life within me, the breath of God in my nostrils, my lips will not say anything wicked, and my tongue will not utter lies.

Ecclesiastes 8:11 – When the sentence for a crime is not quickly carried out, people’s hearts are filled with schemes to do wrong.

Jeremiah 12:1 – You are always righteous, Lord, when I bring a case before you. Yet I would speak with you about your justice: Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all the faithless live at ease?

Application:

• ·         The God of the Bible is not morally indifferent.
• ·         God states that Job’s complaining and raging against Him are unjustified and proceed from limited understanding.
• ·         Job imagines that God is angry with him, an innocent man, and that he takes delight in the wicked.
• ·         Job’s faith in God continued despite his personal perception of denied justice.
• ·         Delayed punishment tends to induce more wrongdoing.
• ·         Because God is righteous, He is a dependable arbiter and judge.

All Scripture verses taken from NIV