Day 005 (Job 6-9) - Year 7

Hey, Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble, and I'm your host for the Bible Recap.

We continued to read Job's story today.

He's just lost everything except his life, and today we had to listen to bad advice from the second of his three friends.

Yesterday, we heard from Eliphaz, today we heard from Bildad.

But first, we heard Job's response to Eliphaz.

He defends himself.

He's despairing, but he doesn't curse God.

He knows this pain isn't the result of sinful actions.

He knows his friends were wrong.

One of the questions counselors train you to ask yourself in relational difficulty is, where is my sin in this situation?

What can I own from this situation?

And that's an important question to ask, especially because we're often blind to our own sin and what we've contributed to the scenario.

But there are times when life is just hard or when you've just been sinned against and your troubles are not the result of something you contributed.

We would never tell someone who has been raped or physically abused to think about what they did to deserve that or cause that.

It's not always true that our circumstances and our problems are the result of our choices.

Sometimes they're the result of a fallen world.

Sometimes they're the result of other people's sinful choices.

Much like with Eliphaz, Bildad gives bad counsel.

He tells Job that he needs to repent.

But again, chapter 1 told us that Job was blameless and upright and that these problems actually occurred because of his uprightness, not as the result of sin.

Job's friends are attacking him in the midst of his grief, and it seems like they really think they're on the right track.

They really think they're helping him, and that if they can just convince him to repent, all his troubles will subside.

Stay tuned to see how that plays out.

Job replies to Bildad with a lot of truth about God.

And in 9.15, Job mentions that he would appeal to mercy to his accuser.

Personally, I'm inclined to think this accuser isn't necessarily a reference to God.

I think it's a reference to Satan, because like we talked about yesterday, the word Satan means accuser, adversary.

But interestingly, one of the other ways the Hebrew word that is used here can be translated is as the word judge.

So he could be saying, I must appeal for mercy to my judge.

And if that's what he's saying, then it seems it would be referring to God.

But regardless of whether Job is referring to his accuser Satan or to his judge God, this is a good place to point out something about the word mercy.

We often use the words mercy and grace interchangeably, but they actually mean very different things.

They're like a pair of opposites that work together.

Mercy is when you don't get what you deserve.

For fallen humanity, We all deserve hell.

We've all sinned against a holy God and we try to elevate ourselves to his rank.

We deserve nothing but punishment.

The fact that we're breathing right now is God's mercy toward us.

He has not given us the immediate death we deserve because of our rebellion, just like he showed mercy toward Adam and Eve when they sinned in the garden.

How generous of him.

So mercy is when you don't get what you deserve, and grace is when you get what you don't deserve.

It's basically everything over and above not being annihilated.

It's the way food tastes delicious.

It's the way music brings us joy.

And mostly, it's the way we get to enter into a relationship with God despite our wickedness.

Job has done nothing wrong in this situation, but he is still a sinful, fallen human like the rest of us.

He knows he deserves eternal punishment, but he also knows God might still show him mercy.

What was your God shot for today?

Was it something about his mercy?

I was tempted to hone in on that, but since I touched on it a few days ago, I thought I'd point out something new that I saw here.

My God shot was how powerful he is.

In Job 9, 1 through 10, Job waxes about God's power for several verses.

He commands the sun, he does great things, he's wise in heart and mighty in strength.

We also see how this enormous God who's so mighty steps down to be intimate with mankind.

Like Job says in 7:17, What is man that you make so much of him and that you set your heart on him?

The God of the universe is in charge of everything, but his heart isn't set on the mountains or on Orion or the Pleiades.

It's set on you and me.

I'm so grateful his heart is set on me because he's where the joy is.

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