Lenten Study Job Ch 23
Today is short because it is a short chapter. However, today is also short because my father-in-law’s memorial service is this afternoon. Thankfully, there are no coincidences. God has granted me a shorter chapter to manage today because there is much to do. Praise be to God.
"There was a man in the land of Uz" by andrevanb is marked with CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.Caption
1 Then Job replied,
2 “Even today my complaint is rebellion; His hand is heavy despite my groaning.
3 “Oh that I knew where I might find Him, That I might come to His seat!
4 “I would present my case before Him And fill my mouth with arguments.
Job 23:1-4 (NASB)
Job knows God doesn’t punish without just cause. Not all bad things happening to someone are God’s punishment, but when He does punish, He is in the right. Job knows this. He further knows that arguing with him is a rebellious act because God is right, but he would do it anyway. I suspect because he hopes God would rebut him with the reasons why Job is being punished, something everyone gathered there wants to know.
5 “I would learn the words which He would answer, And perceive what He would say to me.
6 “Would He contend with me by the greatness of His power? No, surely He would pay attention to me.
Job 23:5-6 (NASB)
Yes, Job wants to be able to present an argument to God that God will answer with why He is doing what He is doing. Further, in Job’s day, people of power sometimes avoided conversations with other people they felt were beneath them in both caste and power. Job hopes that God would not avoid the conversation simply because Job is so far beneath God as to have absolutely no standing to talk to God.
7 “There the upright would reason with Him; And I would be delivered forever from my Judge.
Job 23:7 (NASB)
Job is still convinced he is righteous and being punished unjustly. Never mind everything he knows to be true that if God is punishing him, it is justly. Job thinks that if he could get an audience with God to argue his position, other righteous people would take his side and convince God that Job is being unjustly persecuted.
8 “Behold, I go forward but He is not there, And backward, but I cannot perceive Him;
9 When He acts on the left, I cannot behold Him; He turns on the right, I cannot see Him.
Job 23:8-9 (NASB)
Job is looking to understand God’s position in why God is punishing him, and he cannot find it. This makes the trials and tribulations Job is going through feel more like persecution, which is more accurate because Satan is doing it all to try and make a point to God. Satan is going to fail, but he doesn’t know that. Job doesn’t know or realize that Satan’s hand is the one moving against him rather than God’s.
10 “But He knows the way I take; When He has tried me, I shall come forth as gold.
11 “My foot has held fast to His path; I have kept His way and not turned aside.
12 “I have not departed from the command of His lips; I have treasured the words of His mouth more than my necessary food.
Job 23:10-12 (NASB)
Job is still God’s man intending to remain on God’s path, in God’s ways. He has no intention of departing from what he has done all his life. This is why Satan is going to fail. Job will remain unwavering in his faith in God. He won’t understand why these things are happening.
13 “But He is unique and who can turn Him? And what His soul desires, that He does.
14 “For He performs what is appointed for me, And many such decrees are with Him.
Job 23:13-14 (NASB)
Job acknowledges God is sovereign. That simple statement means that God is God, at the top of the universal food chain when it comes to who is in charge. No one has more power, is more capable, is more able to create than God. Further, Job also acknowledges that what is happening is on God’s path for his life, what is supposed to be for Job. He doesn’t understand it or why it is, but he does acknowledge it is right that God is doing this because it is “…appointed for me….”
15 “Therefore, I would be dismayed at His presence; When I consider, I am terrified of Him.
16 “It is God who has made my heart faint, And the Almighty who has dismayed me,
Job 23:15-16 (NASB)
This is Job, in the same breath that he says what is happening to him is right because it is what God wants, who says he doesn’t understand why it is what God wants for him. He knows God is doing it and understands that what God wants is good; he just doesn’t understand why all this tragedy in his life is considered good and what God wants for him.
17 But I am not silenced by the darkness, Nor deep gloom which covers me.
Job 23:17 (NASB)
He is also not going to be quiet about what is happening to him. Today, we can see Job’s testimony of sticking with God even when we cannot understand why something is happening to us when we think we’ve done what God wants as just that; solid testimony of faith in God. God can be trusted. Right now, we’ve seen a short one or two chapter explanation of all the bad stuff that happened to Job, and we’ve spent the other twenty chapters with Job, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar discussing both sides of these situations. The beauty of our perspective is that we totally understand the situation because we are four thousand years on the other side of it. We know a whole bunch of stuff none of these men knew at the time of the events. That provides context for us to understand better the meanings of what Job went through and the discussions that followed.