Job 42: 8-9 - So now take
seven bulls and seven rams and go to my servant Job
and sacrifice a burnt offering for yourselves. My servant Job
will pray for you, and I will accept his prayer and not deal
with you according to your folly. You have not spoken of me what
is right, as my servant Job has." So Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite
and Zophar the Naamathite did what the LORD told them; and the
LORD accepted Job's prayer.
God completed his talk with Job…chastising him only for
trying to understand things he was never meant to understand. Then he turned
his anger to the friends who had counseled Job so harshly…and accused him of
sins he had not committed. He told them to offer sacrifices and repent of their
sin…and have Job pray over them…so he could forgive them for speaking wrongly
of God’s ways.
Job had no problem following the words of God. I can just
imagine his prayer for the friends….full of words of forgiveness and restoration
of the relationship they once had together.
It must have been a really good one…for God accepted it…and forgave all
of them.
Job had to swallow his pride to forgive these men…so he
could do the job God gave him to do. He
couldn’t harbor any more anger or bitterness over what had happened...God would
have seen it in his heart when he prayed.
Job had to turn all his anger and bitterness over to God…and allow him
to wash away the hate that had built up for these friends. Job had to let God replace the hurt feelings
with God’s grace and love….that covers all sins.
Amazing to me that Job forgave so quickly without the model
of Jesus on the cross. In Luke 23:34
Jesus spoke these painful words of love … “Jesus said, "Father, forgive
them, for they do not know what they are doing." And they divided up his
clothes by casting lots.” He allowed men to spit….beat…mock and nail him to a
cross….with not a thought of hate or revenge.
He turned his thoughts totally on the father...so that even the ones who
murdered him could receive the father’s forgiveness for their sin.
Perhaps some of Job’s strength came from the words of Isaiah 55:6-7 “Seek the LORD while he may be found; call upon him while he is near;
let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him
return to the LORD, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he
will abundantly pardon” Maybe he even used it in the prayer of forgiveness for
his friends.
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