Year 5, Day 134: Job 40

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Ambition

• Ambition: We all need a goal to which we can strive.  When our ambition comes from God, we find fulfillment in our obedience into that for which we have been equipped because our Out is in proper focus.  But when our ambition comes from ourselves, we find ourselves chasing after our own dreams and trying to find fulfillment in accomplishments of our own making.

I could easily do another blog post on God being the king.  After all, isn’t that what the vast majority of this chapter is all about?  Can Job clothe himself in righteousness?  Can Job judge over creation?  Is it not God who is King and not Job?

However, as I’ve done the last few days I want to talk about this on a deeper level.  What is it that got Job into this little moment with God?  Yes, Job is righteous in God’s eyes.  But even in his righteousness Job sinned.  Job focused on how he was being wronged and how God didn’t do anything about it.  Rather than focus on what God might do through it, Job focused on himself.  He wants to be right.  He wants to have all the answers.  He wants to be vindicated.

The question is, why?  Why is this so important to Job?  Why does Job have to be right?  Why does he have to be on top?  I think the answer is in the human desire for ambition.  Job wants to be right, not focus on what God is doing.  Job wants to be vindicated, not used by God.  Job wants the record to be set straight, not be humble before God.  Job wants to accuse God for not defending him rather than stop and listen to what God is actually doing.

Don’t get me wrong.  Job does eventually figure it out.  Here in this passage Job finally realizes he needs to shut up and clasp his hand over his mouth.  This is where we finally see his humbleness shine through for good.  Here we see Job finally put aside his quest for vindication and be silently humble before God.  We finally see that Job gets it.  It isn’t about him.  It isn’t about his ambition.  It is about God.

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Year 5, Day 133: Job 39

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Authority, Power 

• Authority: Our calling.  This comes from God as king.  Because He calls us as His representatives, He gives us authority to go and do His will.
• Power: This is the natural outcome when we truly get our authority from the king.  When our authority is from God, we are equipped with His power to accomplish His will.  We act on His behalf in a world that He desperately loves.

I could easily do another blog post on God being the king.  After all, how many of these verses have to do with the awesomeness of God?  How many of these verses talk about how great God is and how much God does that we don’t even think about?

However, I’d like to go a step further than just focusing on God’s kingship.  Once we understand that God is indeed King, we can understand just how much of our life is actually under His control.  He controls the movement of the animals.  He controls the behavior of the livestock.  He controls the movement of the stars and the rain that falls.  He controls everything.

This means that if we want to have control over anything, we need to get it from God.  If God has all the control, then we only get control from Him.  If we want power, it needs to come from Him because He is king.  If we want authority, it must necessarily originate from Him.

I believe that this is one of God’s primary points in this chapter.  Yes, He is putting Job in His place.  But He is also reminding us that once we are in our place, we are ready to receive from Him whatever authority and power He decides to give to us.

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Year 5, Day 132: Job 38

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: King

• King: This is the pinnacle of the Kingdom Triangle.  When we look towards God’s position in the universe, we acknowledge that He is an omnipotent king.  Authority comes from Him.  Power comes through His authority.  He is looking for representatives for His kingdom.

There is much reason to speak about God as king at the end of the book of Job.  God comes out swinging.  He asks Job, “Who darkens my counsel without knowledge?”  God lays it all out right here at the beginning.  Compared to God, what am I?  Compared to God, what are any of us?  Even if I know that which I know very deeply, what is it compared to all the things that God knows and I’m completely clueless to the fact that they are even there to be known?

And then God gives a plethora of examples as to why exactly He is king.  He set the universe in motion.  He knows what it is like to see it start.  He knows what it is like to command the wind and the storm.  He knows what it is like to command the snow and the rain.  He knows what it is like to command and set limits to the dawn.  God knows what it is like to know the Pleiades or even Orion intimately.  God know the nature intimately.  God even knows what it means to impart wisdom into others.

That’s what it means to be king of the universe.  He is completely king.  What are any of us to Him?

Yet let’s not forget that God is not so great as to not notice us.  He wants relationship with us.  God may know everything from the stars in the sky to the foundations of this world.  But He wants relationship with you and me.  He wants a relationship so badly that He sent His own Son.  He is indeed king of the universe.

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Year 5, Day 131: Job 37

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Competency, King

• Competency: Being able to accomplish what one is called to do.
• King: This is the pinnacle of the Kingdom Triangle.  When we look towards God’s position in the universe, we acknowledge that He is an omnipotent king.  Authority comes from Him.  Power comes through His authority.  He is looking for representatives for His kingdom.

Yesterday I spent a fair amount of time talking about God as King.  Today, we get another great opportunity to do so.  Elihu gives us many images to ponder God’s awesome nature.  He makes the snow fall.  He makes the rain fall.  He gathers all the clouds in the sky.  He scatters the lightning.  God set the world in motion and He continues to control it all.

God is clearly the king of the universe.  That is a huge part of Elihu’s great message for us this morning.  But I think we can take this chapter and go farther with it than that.  I think we can push past simple awe of God and take it to our relationship with this creator.

Elihu asks a deep and probing question: shall it be told to Him that I would speak?  This is fundamentally the same question that Paul asks in Romans 9:20 as to whether the clay can look at its potter and demand to know why it was made in such a manner.  What right do we have to stand before God and question Him?  We can be in awe in His awesome presence.  But what right do we have to question Him as to why anything happens?

This is where the idea of competency comes in to play.  Am I competent to do what God asks me to do.  So often we think of competency in terms of just being able to accomplish what I should accomplish.  But there is another side of competency.  Am I able to refrain from doing that which I have not been called to do?

Who am I to stand before an almighty being and question Him?  Who am I to stand before my maker and think that He owes me any answer?

Of course, I am in relationship with God.  He wants me to grow closer to Him.  But in order to be a competent follower I must learn the difference between seeking truth and demanding God explain Himself.  It is not wrong to seek answers because we seek His truth.  But it is always wrong to make demands that God explain Himself when things go differently than we estimate they should go.

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Year 5, Day 130: Job 36

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: King

• King: This is the pinnacle of the Kingdom Triangle.  When we look towards God’s position in the universe, we acknowledge that He is an omnipotent king.  Authority comes from Him.  Power comes through His authority.  He is looking for representatives for His kingdom.

It seems to make common sense that the king of the universe – the omnipotent being who set it into motion – should be the center of our life.  We should be about drawing closer to God and living according to His ways.  When we focus on Him, our lives are ordered, our advice is sound, and we are a blessing to the people around us.  Life is good when the King is truly at the center of our universe.  God the Father should be in our Up position.

However, it is often the case with human beings that we get our life out of order.  Rather than submitting to God’s order and God’s ways, we let our own desires rule our life.  We let our own wisdom guide our paths.  We turn our eyes from God and supplant the Father with a god we’ve created in our own image.

That’s what we see Elihu doing here.  So far, Elihu’s voice has been sound and full of God’s wisdom.  But in the opening portions of this chapter he begins to speak for God instead of allowing God to speak through him.  He also begins to assert that the righteous prosper and the unrighteous struggle in life.  He begins to assert a prosperity Gospel.  He asserts it not because it is true; he asserts it because he wants it to be true.

Job is not suffering because he is unrighteous, and it is wrong to assert this.  The same mistake that haunted Job’s friends now comes to roost in Elihu.  Elihu gets much right, but in this chapter we begin to see him fall from good theology.

That’s the danger of supplanting God and putting our own conception of God in His place.  When we do this, we often begin to teach theology that is not in line with what God actually asserts.  We begin to assert what we want to believe rather than what God tells us to believe.  We begin to believe what our wisdom says is true rather than actually listening to what God’s Word tells us is true.

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Year 5, Day 129: Job 35

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Ambition, Appetite

• Appetite: We all have needs that need to be filled.  When we allow ourselves to be filled with the people and things that God brings into our life, we will be satisfied because our In will be in proper focus.  But when we try to fill ourselves with our own desires we end up frustrated by an insatiable hunger.
• Ambition: We all need a goal to which we can strive.  When our ambition comes from God, we find fulfillment in our obedience into that for which we have been equipped because our Out is in proper focus.  But when our ambition comes from ourselves, we find ourselves chasing after our own dreams and trying to find fulfillment in accomplishments of our own making.

Elihu focuses on two major points in his critique of Job.  Elihu asks how it is that Job can ask, “What benefit is there to being righteous?”  In other words, Job has questioned what good his righteousness has been to him.  The second point that Elihu raises is what is to us whether we bring anything to God.  In other words, why are we concerned with what we can add to God?

While I think Job is an amazing man and he lived an incredible life in incredibly horrible circumstances, I also think that Job is guilty on each of these points.  The one place of error that Job has been consistent is in questioning why God hasn’t defended him.  He is guilty of short-sightedness.  In fact, he is guilty of self-centered sight.  Job has occasionally been focused on what is in it for him.  This is rooted in appetite.  Job wants to know what benefit has come to him for his faith.  Of course, we know what benefit comes from relationship with God.  We also know that Job knows this, too.  Job knows his redeemer lives.  He just is forgetful and occasionally has a temporal mindset rather than an eternal mindset.  That’s often what appetite brings about.

As to Elihu’s point regarding what we bring to God, I think that this is an error of ambition.  Think about this for a second.  If God is omnipotent and omniscient, what can I possibly bring to God?  What can I bring to God that He already isn’t?  We want to be important.  We want to be recognized.  That’s ambition speaking.  But the truth is that what should be important is our humbleness before God that allows us to be used in His hand.  That’s what is truly important.

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Year 5, Day 128: Job 34

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Character

• Character: Having the interior life that is necessary to support the work that God sets before a person.  It is hearing from God and obeying.  It is doing the right thing when nobody is looking.

Often when I talk about character I talk about our character.  But occasionally it is important to remember to track the idea of character back to God and remember that He is the model of character.  We should be about getting our life to look like Him.  As we draw closer to Him, our character will naturally improve.

Fundamental to God’s character is His righteousness.  He is just.  Everything that He does is just.  If God does something, it is by definition right.  That’s what it means to be a perfect God.  Our God is not a God like many ancient cultures whose love needs to be bought and whose wrath needs to be appeased.  He is just.  He is righteous.  He never looks to harm us.  So long as we do right, we have nothing to fear from Him.  This is the argument that Elihu makes in this chapter, and he’s spot on correct.

This might seem like a no-brainer.  But it really is an important concept.  How often do I get angry at God for something that happens?  If I get angry at God for something that happens to me, am I not intrinsically questioning God’s character?  Think about this, and you’ll see what I mean.  If I get angry at God, then I am assuming that He had something to do with it.  So if I am assuming that He had something to do with what happened and I am angry, then I am calling His action into question.  If I call God’s action into question, then am I not fundamentally questioning God’s justness and therefore questioning God’s character?

Unfortunately, this is what Job has occasionally done in this book and this is the error that God will highlight in a few chapters when He speaks to Job.  Job does call God’s character into question by arguing that God should have protected Him better.  That’s just not right.  If Job thinks God had anything to do with what is happening and Job also believes God is just, he should not be able to be angry at God because there must be something at work that God is doing that is just.

This is a really difficult position to take in one’s life.  It is difficult to not get angry at God for not using His omnipotent power for our benefit.  It’s tough for us to see God as being willing to let evil come into our life for some greater purpose because we don’t want to care about the greater purpose.  We want to care about ourselves more than anything else.  Because of this, we end up not seeing God for what He is actually doing and question His character.

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Year 5, Day 127: Job 33

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: In:

• In: This is the word we use to express our relationships with our spiritual family.  These are often the people who hold us spiritually accountable.  They are the ones to whom we typically go for discussion and discernment.  These are the ones with whom we learn to share leadership.  They are the ones with whom we become family on mission.

Certainly Elihu isn’t perfect, and we’ll start to see some of his imperfections shortly.  But for right now, I think Elihu should get high marks for his approach.  Elihu appears to be really adept at building In.

Look at how he approaches Job.  First of all, Elihu doesn’t come to criticize Job.  He doesn’t come with his mind already made up.  He’s already listened to all the conversation that has happened thus far.  When he speaks to Job, he says, “I am toward God as you are.”  Elihu is looking to create common ground between him and Job.  He doesn’t want to walk in opposition; he wants to walk beside Job.

Furthermore, Elihu says to Job that he too was pinched of prom a piece of clay.  In other words, Elihu is saying that he understands that he is just a man.  He understands that he isn’t perfect and doesn’t have perfect insight.  Yes, he is confident that he has wisdom, but he is opening the conversation with Job by reminding Job that Elihu knows he’s human and finite.

Then he tells Job that he doesn’t need to fear him.  Job will not feel a tremendous weight from Elihu’s speech.  Job can be at ease, even if Elihu tries to speak truth into his life.

You see, what Elihu is trying to do is create some In with Job.  Elihu doesn’t want to dominate over Job, he wants to walk with Job.  Elihu doesn’t want to place himself as better than Job but as Job’s equal.  Elihu doesn’t just want to spout words of advice, he wants to listen first and then speak.

Elihu is showing grant competency at being In.  Elihu wants to walk through life with Job rather than stand in judgment over Job’s life.  This is all any of us can ask from our In.

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Year 5, Day 126: Job 32

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Competency

• Competency: Being able to accomplish what one is called to do.

I think it is interesting to hear Elihu speak.  I realize that he is human.  He is going to make his own fair share of mistakes with respect to theological teaching.  He’s not perfect.  But I think he really shows us a competent image in this opening chapter.

First of all, look at what Elihu does.  Elihu sits and listens.  He lets everyone else speak their words before opening up his mouth.  I realize that Elihu is young and he is likely respecting the older men.  But even so this is an incredibly competent approach!  When dealing with any issue, information is always helpful.  Elihu sits and listens and absorbs before speaking his mind.

Second, look at what Elihu says.  Elihu accuses Job’s friends of not developing true wisdom.  Elihu accuses them of not ending in wisdom.  He accuses them of having theology that is more self-justifying than anything else.  I think that this is a competent analysis.  I think this analysis of Elihu comes because Elihu spends so much time listening first.

In the end, I always look forward to Elihu’s speech.  As I said, he’ll make his mistakes, too.  But I think he sets a great example of how to posture oneself when preparing to address a situation.  Look.  Listen.  Observe.  When the time is right give a competent analysis rooted in legitimate observation.

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Year 5, Day 125: Job 31

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Character

• Character: Having the interior life that is necessary to support the work that God sets before a person.  It is hearing from God and obeying.  It is doing the right thing when nobody is looking.

I think that the last sentence above is my favorite definition of the word character.  Character is what you do when nobody is looking.  Character is what you do when you can get away with anything.  Character is who you are when the only person there to hold you accountable is yourself.

Job is a man of character.  Look at the laundry list of reasons he gives as to how his righteousness shines in his life.  Mind you, this is not a works-based righteousness argument.  Our righteousness should shine before mankind not so that we are saved but as a demonstration of our salvation.  This is what Job is saying here in this passage.

Job has cared for the widow and the orphan.  Job has treated those under him with respect and compassion.  Job has cared for the earth and has been careful of the demands that he has placed upon it.  Job has kept himself sexually pure and honest.  I can keep going, but this is a great report!

Of course Job isn’t innocent of wrongdoing.  Who among us is without sin?  But Job is a man of character.  On the last day that we hear Job’s words, it is refreshing to hear him finally come back to what matters most of all.  He is righteous before his God.

After all, isn’t that why this whole book started in the first place?  Job is righteous before God.  Satan could do his worst, but Job remained faithful and righteous.  Amen.

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Year 5, Day 124: Job 30

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Abide

• Abide: This is a moment, day, or even a season when we focus on God.  It is a time when we are rejuvenated by God.  It is the time for us to gather up what we will need for the coming growth after a season of pruning.  However, abiding is not the end.  We abide so that we can grow, bear fruit, prune, and abide again.

Job 30 gives us the perspective of a man who has been beaten down by life.  His life was going along very well with riches, family, and community.  But His wealth was taken away.  His family was lost.  His health declined.  Job went from leading a life of comfort to leading a very difficult life in an incredibly short time period.

It makes sense to hear Job speak as he does in this chapter.  I’m not saying that Job’s words are right, mind you.  But it makes sense.  Job has had everything stripped away from him and even his wife and closest friends come and tell him how wrong he must be.  I can’t blame him for saying that he feels like he’s a brother to jackals.  Job’s alone and living in a dark moment in life.

It is these moments in life when we can use a time for abide most.  When our life is crumbling round us, it is very easy to feel as though we are distant from God, too.  When our life is hard, it is easy to feel as though God has abandoned us.  At times like this we need to pay attention to our abiding.  We need to place special emphasis upon our connection to God.  While it is easy for us to feel distant to God, we must work hard to make sure that we do not feel that way.  God is always here and always present.  Only through our abiding with Him and trusting in His grace and glory will we come through the dark moments of life with strength and relationship intact.

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Year 5, Day 123: Job 29

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Ambition, Approval

• Ambition: We all need a goal to which we can strive.  When our ambition comes from God, we find fulfillment in our obedience into that for which we have been equipped because our Out is in proper focus.  But when our ambition comes from ourselves, we find ourselves chasing after our own dreams and trying to find fulfillment in accomplishments of our own making.
• Approval: We all need to feel as though we are accepted.  When we seek the approval of God, our Up is in the right place.  But when we seek the approval of other people besides God, we open the door to pursuing false gods and risk putting someone or something other than God in our Up position.

In this chapter, Job stumbles.  I can’t say that I blame him.  Here is a man whose life has been ripped from him.  He’s had to be a stalwart against the crushing opposition of his friends as they tried to convince him that he is to blame.  Is there any doubt that eventually he would stumble?

Job’s words in this chapter tell us that the perspective of his friends is getting to him.  He is beginning to equate his own desire for ambition with the approval of God.  When Job says, “when God watched over me,” he’s showing us that he’s feeling as though God only watches over him when his life is going well and he is successful.  This is a shame.

Don’t get me wrong.  We’re all human.  I can’t help feeling for Job here.  But we should remember that God watches over us at all times.  He walks with us – especially in the bad times.  This simply is who God is.  We may feel as though God is far from us, but that is an error of our perspective rather than a statement of reality.  Just because we want to equate God’s approval with our own ambition doesn’t mean that God isn’t there walking with us in our darkest moments of life.

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Year 5, Day 122: Job 28

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Guidance, Power

• Power: This is the natural outcome when we truly get our authority from the king.  When our authority is from God, we are equipped with His power to accomplish His will.  We act on His behalf in a world that He desperately loves.
• Guidance: God grants us His guidance.  Sometimes this guidance is God leading us away from temptation.  Sometimes this guidance is helping us to follow in a direction for which He has chosen.  Our default position should be to wait for God’s guidance and then follow when it comes.

Job gives us a really interesting perspective into humanity.  What can humanity not do?  We can shape the world around us.  We can pull precious minerals out of the earth and form them into new things.  We can change the flow of water, dam up rivers, create lakes and reservoirs.  We can dig into the earth and move mountains.  We as human beings are incredibly powerful.

However, what is the end of such power?  We are on the verge of our population becoming greater than our ability to produce food for it.  We are on the verge of having potable water shortages.  There are reports that say that within 50 years we may have burned through the earth’s resources of fossil fuels and even the uranium deposits that we use to generate electricity.  We have incredible human power, but do we have the wisdom to utilize it properly?

You see, human beings are incredibly powerful beings.  We are insightful and creative.  But when we utilize this power without wisdom, we ultimately endanger ourselves with respect to our long-term survival.  We need to use the power that God has naturally given to use over His creation in conjunction with the guidance that comes from His character.  Only when we use the power of God in conjunction with the wisdom of God are we truly living as He would have us live and in a matter that is for our own good.

Yes, we are powerful.  But as Job asks in this chapter, are we wise?

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Year 5, Day 121: Job 27

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Provision

• Provision: God gives us what we truly need.  God knows our needs better than we can know them.  We learn to trust God to provide for us.

Job’s questions today really inspired me to think about hope.  Where does my hope come from?  Where do I lean when I am weak or unable to see very far down the road?  Where does my strength come from when I need it and cannot muster it within myself?  When the world attacks me, where does my defense come?

For me, it is God.  So long as there is God, there is hope.  So long as there is God, I know I can survive.  So long as there is God, I have strength.

That’s what provision is all about.  I don’t think for a minute that God will give me everything I want.  But I do believe that God will provide for my needs.  I do believe that God will provide a kingdom for me to live in both in this world and the next.  When this world crashes, I believe that God is the one who can help me see what I cannot.

Provision is the domain of God.  I will have it no other way.

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Year 5, Day 120: Job 26

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: In

• In: This is the word we use to express our relationships with our spiritual family.  These are often the people who hold us spiritually accountable.  They are the ones to whom we typically go for discussion and discernment.  These are the ones with whom we learn to share leadership.  They are the ones with whom we become family on mission.

I’ve talked about In a lot since beginning Job, probably more so in Job than in any other book.  But I think this is a really important dynamic to at least the first half of the book of Job.  When the chips are down, we need people around us.  When we are struggling, we need our In.  When we are spending all sorts of time pondering our life, we need people who can be there beside us.

Look at Job’s continued complaints regarding his friends all throughout Job and in the opening verses of this chapter.  Job complains that his people aren’t listening to him.  He complains that they are just here to prove their point to him rather than walk with him.  They are there to convict him without even listening to whether or not conviction is even necessary in the first place!

I think this is a huge point to consider as we look out into the world.  Yes, we are all sinners.  Yes, every one of us need to repent and change of our ways.  But the truth is that we don’t need that rubbed in our face all the time.  What we need is people who can listen to us, walk beside us, encourage us, and correct us when needed.

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Year 5, Day 119: Job 25

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: King

• King: This is the pinnacle of the Kingdom Triangle.  When we look towards God’s position in the universe, we acknowledge that He is an omnipotent king.  Authority comes from Him.  Power comes through His authority.  He is looking for representatives for His kingdom.

What a great chapter of Job!  And no, before you ask, it isn’t because it is so short.  Neither is it because this is the last of the replies of Job’s friends that we have in this book.  What we have here in these verses is a simplistic perspective on humanity.

We are not righteous.  We will never compare to God.  We pale in comparison to the great Almighty.  We’re not God, and we never will be.

You see, God is king of the universe.  He set it into motion.  He made it out of nothing.  He hung the stars in the sky.  He shaped the image of man in His own image.  He is the king.

However, there’s an incredible message here.  While He may be king, He wants relationship with us.  While He may be king, He wants to know us intimately.  He’s not some great and far off king.  He’s a king that doesn’t care about our inability to compare to Him.  He lends us His righteousness.  He gives us a promise of a better life in the eternal.

Ultimately, Bildad is right on the surface but wrong where it counts.  We’ll never match up to God.  That much is true.  But that doesn’t matter to God.  God lends us His righteousness and desires relationship with us anyways.  God is an amazing king.

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Year 5, Day 118: Job 24

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Kingdom

• Kingdom: We live in God’s creation, but it is fallen.  We do not yet live in the fullness of God’s Kingdom.  But we do know that the Kingdom of God is drawing near.  We do get to see glimpses of the kingdom each and every time that God works in us and through us as He tries to demonstrate Himself to the world.

I have often thought as Job thinks in this chapter.  The wicked prosper.  The powerful oppress the powerless.  The masters are lords over those who could benefit from them.  People steal from the defenseless.  Our world is messed up, and it doesn’t really seem to be getting any better.  In fact, I’ve heard many people say that our culture is in decline, not improving.

This is absolutely a pessimistic view of the world.  I think it has merit and is based in truth.  But it is admittedly pessimistic.  To say that our culture is slipping into moral and ethical decline is a sad commentary on our culture.

It leads to the question that Job asks.  How can God stand by and watch?  How can God watch while the wicked prosper?  How can God sit back and deny justice to the righteous?  How can God be king of this kingdom if the people who aspire to know Him are seldom prosperous and lifted up by the world?  If God is king, why do His people not rise to the top of His kingdom?

I think there are two answers to this.  The first answer is deeply theological.  The answer is that God’s kingdom is eternal.  We cannot say who really is rising to the top of God’s kingdom until we get to the eternal.  Who are we to say that after a few decades of living in this world that we have any ability to testify as to who God is allowing to be elevated?

The second answer is rooted more in the truth about humanity.  In God’s kingdom, who among us is really righteous?  Who among us truly deserves God’s love more than we deserve God’s wrath?  When I lift up our hand against some injustice done to me, am I really innocent and blameless?  Am I without sin?

The truth is that in God’s kingdom we are all there by God’s grace.  No human being deserves to be there.  No human being deserves to stand in the presence of God.  We will all be there by God’s grace.  What a great day it will be!  But none of us will deserve it.

Job’s right on one account.  The unrighteous prosper.  The unrighteous go unpunished.  People oppress one another.  But I’m just as guilty as the next person.  My life is full of sin, too.  God has prospered me when I don’t deserve it. 

That’s what it means to be a part of God’s kingdom.  We see it.  We even see injustice within it.  But we are all in it by God’s grace.

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Year 5, Day 117: Job 23

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Abide

• Abide: This is a moment, day, or even a season when we focus on God.  It is a time when we are rejuvenated by God.  It is the time for us to gather up what we will need for the coming growth after a season of pruning.  However, abiding is not the end.  We abide so that we can grow, bear fruit, prune, and abide again.

I truly think that this whole chapter revolves around Job’s inability to abide with God in the midst of his pain and suffering.  Job complains that he feels that he cannot be in the presence of God.  He cannot talk to God face to face.  He cannot explain his condition to God.

I’ll admit that sometimes abiding is quite difficult.  It can be difficult in the midst of our pain to abide.  It can be difficult in the midst of our worry to abide.  It can be especially difficult to abide in the midst of our doubt.  And if we cannot abide, it is difficult to feel connected to God and feel as though we are able to do anything pleasing to Him.  When we can’t abide, it is easy to feel as though life is pointless and shallow.  I think that’s where Job is today.  He is wrestling with life because he feels as though he cannot be in the presence of God.

However, once more I find that I love Job because he is such a great example of how to wrestle with God.  Even though he is groaning and complaining that he cannot be in the presence of God in order to plead his case, Job is certain that if he could that God would hear him.  Job is certain that God would listen.  He is certain that God would provide an answer that would make it all make sense.

This is why I love Job.  Job is honest with himself.  He can’t abide.  He is struggling with life and struggling to make sense of it all.  He doesn’t understand what on earth God is doing and why it is happening to him.  But through it all, he does not lose faith.  Whether he can abide or not, Job maintains the belief that if he could abide then it would be exactly what he needs right now.  Job is faithful to the fact that he knows that he just needs time with God.  Job is faithful to the truth that to make sense of life we need to have our moments in the presence of a living God.

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Year 5, Day 116: Job 22

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Father

• Father: This is the pinnacle of the Covenant Triangle.  God is the Father.  He is the creator.  He is love.  Our relationship with the Father is rooted in His love for us.  We get our identity through Him.  When the Father is in our life, obedience becomes clear.

Eliphaz is annoying at the beginning of this chapter.  He asks if a man can be profitable to God.  He also asks if it is pleasing to the Almighty if I am right.  In both of these questions Eliphaz is wrong!

You see, Eliphaz is trying to make the point that we are nothing to God.  How does my being right change God?  How can I bring anything of profit to God?  And in a very shallow sense of the questions there is a point.  God is God regardless of what I bring to the table.

However, what Eliphaz has neglected is the fact that God is not just our King but also our Father.  Does a father have joy when his children imitate the goodness within him?  Does a father take pleasure in their children choosing rightly?  Of course he does!

The same is true with God.  Our Father takes great pleasure when we choose His ways over the selfishness that lies within each of us.  Our Father loves the moments when we are rooted in His love.  Our Father can take us, mold, us, and make us into very profitable tools in His hands.  We do have value in the eyes of the Father.  We do have joy in the eyes of the Father.

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Year 5, Day 115: Job 21

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Appetite

• Appetite: We all have needs that need to be filled.  When we allow ourselves to be filled with the people and things that God brings into our life, we will be satisfied because our In will be in proper focus.  But when we try to fill ourselves with our own desires we end up frustrated by an insatiable hunger.

In Job 21, Job speaks to the fact that the wicked do prosper in this life.  I personally believe that Job is right.  When I look around to the leaders of the world, to the truly wealthy of the world, to the ones in the world who have much power, or to the ones in the world who have much fame I see many people who are living selfish godless lives. 

Now, don’t get me wrong.  Who am I to judge?  Am I innocent in ungodliness?  Absolutely not.  I have my own sin to worry about, not theirs.  God can judge them.  I'm just looking around for truth.

The truth doesn’t just because I have my own sinfulness to worry about.  The wicked do often prosper in this life.  When the wicked prosper, it usually results in the wicked turning further and further from God.  As the wicked prosper, the people around them learn how to prosper under the desire to first think about oneself.  As people prosper, the generations that come after them learn from their self-centeredness.

I believe this is inherently rooted in appetite.  We want.  We want more than we need.  We want to keep up with the neighbors.  In fact, we want to have more than the neighbors to prove our worth and status and station in life.  Because we want, we take what we want.  Because of our appetite for things, we often find ourselves doing whatever we can in order to acquire the things.  Our appetite drives for prosperity – however it is that we define prosperity – drives us to selfishness instead of godliness.

In the end, I believe that Job is right.  The wicked don’t usually get what they deserve.  The wicked prosper all around us.  You cannot look very far without seeing the selfish fingerprints of humanity there.  Most often, when you find those selfish fingerprints of humanity you often find them going unchecked, too.

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Year 5, Day 114: Job 20

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Approval

• Approval: We all need to feel as though we are accepted.  When we seek the approval of God, our Up is in the right place.  But when we seek the approval of other people besides God, we open the door to pursuing false gods and risk putting someone or something other than God in our Up position.

I think the human need for approval is inherently behind Zophar’s words in the opening part of this chapter.  Zophar is offended by Job’s words and Job’s defiant stance that he hasn’t done anything wrong.  Zophar is offended because Job refuses to accept a commonly held opinion by human beings: people who live nice lives must be loved by God because of their righteousness.  To put it another way: people who lives seemingly cursed lives must be despised by God because of their sin.

I think approval is at the root of this belief.  We all want to live good lives.  We also want to live a life believing that we are good people.  How can we justify our dual need to have God’s approval but still be able to live up a life to our own financial and communal prosperity?  We do it by equating prosperity with God’s love.

You see, if I am living a prosperous life and I want it to continue, then I need to convince myself that God must bless me because I’ve chosen wisely.  Therefore, I convince myself that I have God’s approval.

On the other hand, if I want to judge people who are living more poorly than I am – because I want to justify my need to stay at my current level – I can do so by declaring that God must not love them as much because they aren’t as blessed.  Therefore, it is possible for human beings to equate fewer resources with a lack of God’s blessing.  It’s completely wrong, but we do it all the time as human beings.

Zophar doesn’t want to be wrong.  Zophar doesn’t want to change.  Zophar doesn’t want to conceive of the possibility that he might not have as much approval as Job does.  So Zophar equates living a life of difficulty with living outside of God’s approval.  Sin Job seems to be cursed, Zophar can stand high and mighty in his opinion that he’s right and Job is wrong.

It makes me wonder what Zophar would have thought of Paul or Jesus.  Can we really equate living a life of prosperity with having God’s approval?

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Year 5, Day 113: Job 19

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Vision

• Vision: Vision is most needed when we are our most human. Vision is most needed when we have a typical D₂ moment. Vision is partnered by Time and Grace.

I don’t know that there is any greater verse in the Bible that displays vision quite like Job 19:25.  Remember that Job has been afflicted.  His friends accuse him.  He feels alone as if nobody can understand his condition.  I’ve spoken before about how it is completely understandable to think of Job as being in a pit of despair.

What is it that gets us out of the pit of despair?  Time.  Vision.  Grace.  Job has time to consider what is happening.  God has bestowed grace upon Job to process what is happening and forgive him for any mistaken conclusions that he might find.  So what is the vision?  The vision is that Job believes that one day his redeemer will be on this earth.  On day he will find himself in the presence of God and see God.  One day – when this whole world and all of its pain has passed away – Job will see God.  That’s a vision that nobody can take away from Job.

That’s the vision that allows Job to continue on.  That’s the vision that can conquer any kind of dark day that can come our way.  Our redeemer lives.  One day we shall see God.  What pit of despair is greater than the knowledge of that?

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Year 5, Day 112: Job 18

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Authority

• Authority: Our calling.  This comes from God as king.  Because He calls us as His representatives, He gives us authority to go and do His will.

When we are doing God’s will, we act under God’s authority.  When we speak with God’s blessing, we actually speak with His words.  When God is our king, we get access to His authority and the power that comes through it.

However, when we don’t have God as our king, we speak with our own power and our own authority.

Look at how Bildad ends this chapter.  “Thus is the place of him who knows not God.”  In other words, Bildad is judging Job and saying that job is miserable because he doesn’t really know God.  Bildad is saying that people whose lives are destroyed must be far from God.

Who is Bildad to make this claim?  Certainly Bildad is not speaking with the authority of God!  After all, while Job is not perfect we can absolutely say that this problem began because Job was righteous, not unrighteous.  Job’s problem is not his distance from God.  This actually came about because of Job’s closeness to God.

Bildad just doesn’t speak with the authority of God.  These aren’t God’s words.  This isn’t a display of God’s power.  This is a display of Bildad stepping out on his own authority and actually making a mess of things.

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Year 5, Day 111: Job 17

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: In

• In: This is the word we use to express our relationships with our spiritual family.  These are often the people who hold us spiritually accountable.  They are the ones to whom we typically go for discussion and discernment.  These are the ones with whom we learn to share leadership.  They are the ones with whom we become family on mission.

Do you know what I love about true In?  True In is willing to walk beside you whatever the cost.  True In is willing to stand beside you when life stinks.  True In is there to help you put your life back together.  True In is there regardless of celebration or suffering.  True In is there regardless of joy or sorrow.  True in is there in sickness and health.

In that light, look at what job says in verse 8.  “The upright are all appalled at this.”  Here’s what Job is saying.  Job is confessing that the upright won’t come near him.  The upright don’t want to have anything to do with Job.  Either they are too good for Job or they are afraid that his recent string of bad luck will rub off on them.  Either way, the righteous just don’t want to have anything to do with Job.

I mourn with Job in this chapter.  How sad it is that the people whose lives are together can’t come and be with Job!  What does it say about humanity that Job feels like he is being avoided?  What does it say about humanity that people are appalled at Job rather than coming to his aid?

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Year 5, Day 110: Job 16

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: In

• In: This is the word we use to express our relationships with our spiritual family.  These are often the people who hold us spiritually accountable.  They are the ones to whom we typically go for discussion and discernment.  These are the ones with whom we learn to share leadership.  They are the ones with whom we become family on mission.

As I read through Job 16, I can feel Job’s pain.  Christian community does need to be about admonition.  When we do something wrong, the Christian community should take on the role of disapproving and helping us find repentance.

But we hear Job legitimately complaining about something serious as this chapter begins.  Where is the compassion?  Where is the relationship?  Where is the willingness of Job’s friends to walk beside him and listen to him?

Job’s friends have done nothing but come before him and tell him what he needs to do.  They cannot even tell him what he’s done wrong; all they can do is assure him that he’s done something wrong in the first place.  That’s not friendship.  That’s not In.  This is religious piety at its worst.  This is a story about religious people who are all too familiar with looking down their nose upon those who are in worse circumstances than they are.

Yes, In should be able to bring about correction.  However, within In there needs to be relationship.  There needs to be a willingness to listen.  There needs to be a willingness to partner up with one another and walk through life together.  It is in that context that admonition is received.  It is in that context that true repentance and forgiveness can happen.

Job feels the lack of true community as this chapter opens.  He is surrounded by people with all the answers and no desire for relationship.  Job’s so-called friends want to fix him and add another tally of success upon their life.  That’s not In.  But unfortunately, often that’s what we like to substitute for true community.

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Year 5, Day 109: Job 15

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Kingdom

• Kingdom: We live in God’s creation, but it is fallen.  We do not yet live in the fullness of God’s Kingdom.  But we do know that the Kingdom of God is drawing near.  We do get to see glimpses of the kingdom each and every time that God works in us and through us as He tries to demonstrate Himself to the world.

I always wrestle with the words of Job’s friends.  I find them often to be quite misleading.  Look at what Eliphaz says here about the life of the righteous and the wicked.

Eliphaz tells us that the righteous live lives of goodness.  He makes it sound like the righteous don’t ever have struggles.  He makes it sound like the righteous just coast through life with life working out for them.  I hate to say it, but if having an easy life is a true gauge of being righteous, I’m doing something pretty horribly wrong.  But I believe the truth is far from that.  God’s kingdom isn’t about the ease of this life.  God’s kingdom isn’t about this life working out successfully and smoothly.

On the other hand, Eliphaz also tells us that the unrighteous live in a horrible life.  He indicates that the unrighteous know that their life is horrible.  He says that they are prevailed upon.  He says that they live in darkness.  He says that the wicked writhe in pain all of their days.  The truth is that I don’t believe this, either.  In my experience, the wicked actually tend to get along in this life better than the righteous.  Those who think only of themselves tend to go through life getting what they want more often than others.

Again, I don’t think that we can summarize righteousness by looking at who is leading a more stress-free life of ease.  I don’t think that the absence of pain in this life is an indicator of how far we are in the kingdom of God.  After all, when Jesus brought the kingdom of heaven to this earth, He was crucified for it.  Many of His disciples lost their lives because of it.  If we want to be in the kingdom, we should do anything except take Eliphaz’s advice here in this passage!  Evaluate the kingdom based on faithfulness and relationship to God, not ease of life and freedom from pain and misery!

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Year 5, Day 108: Job 14

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Competency, Up

• Competency: Being able to accomplish what one is called to do.
• Up: Up is the word we use for what we worship.  If we are following God’s will, God will occupy the Up position.  Our life, our identity, our mission, our family on mission is all derived from Up.  This is why God needs to be in our Up position.

The end of this chapter is a very deep sentiment as expressed by Job.  A man mourns only for his own pain.  In other words, we are inherently selfish.  We are inherently focused on our own needs and our own concerns first.  On one hand, this completely makes sense.  I spend every waking moment in my own life.  You spend every waking moment in your own life, too.  Simply from that perspective, it should make sense that I am focused on my own life.

However, do you recall what Jesus calls the two greatest commandments?  Jesus tells us to love the Lord our God with all of our heart, soul, and mind.  Jesus tells us that the second greatest commandment is to love our neighbor as ourselves.  Do you hear what is mysteriously missing from that?  Jesus doesn’t tell us to focus on ourselves.  He tells us to focus on God and our neighbor.  I think this is because Jesus knows that we won’t have any difficulty at all focusing on ourselves.

But I can’t help but wonder how this applies to being a disciple of Jesus.  Is God my Up?  When things are going well, is God my up?  When my life is crashing around me, is God my Up?  Am I really competent at worshipping the Father in all situations, not just when it is convenient for me?

What about my neighbor?  Am I as competent at worrying about my neighbor as I am at worrying about my own life?  I’m so naturally focused on my own life and my own needs.  How tuned in am I to the needs of the people that God is putting into my life?

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