Job 8:1-6 - Then Bildad the Shuhite replied to Job: "How long will you go on like this? Your
words are a blustering wind. Does God
twist justice? Does the Almighty twist what is right? Your children obviously sinned against him,
so their punishment was well deserved.
But if you pray to God and seek the favor of the Almighty, if you are pure and live with complete
integrity, he will rise up and restore your happy home.
The second friend began to speak his thoughts to Job. Bildad
was convinced that Job and his children must have sinned to bring such harsh
judgment on themselves. He told Job to
stop his useless rants to God of his innocence…and begin to confess his sin and
ask God to forgive and restore. Bildad told Job to release his love of the
worldly things that had caused his sin. His words of advice were based on his
opinion that Job was guilty….and Job’s plight was the result of God’s anger and
judgment against him.
It must have hurt Job to the core of his heart to have his
friend doubt his innocence….to hear him chastise him so harshly. For none of Bildad’s words were untrue of a
guilty man…and Job knew this deep in his soul.
God will judge the sinner…and a world built on Earthly things will
crumble. Bildad was correct in saying that God can and will restore….when we
come to him in repentance. But none of Bildad’s words helped Job to understand
why God had allowed this to happen to him…an innocent …righteous man…who feared
God more than anyone else in that day.
Job was forced to depend on his own heart…process his pain
based on his relationship with God …what he had placed in his heart alone. Sometimes it is like that. No one else has gone through exactly what we
have…and no one else has the same relationship with the father as anyone else. God
asks us all to walk a different path to complete his will. God asks us all to study for ourselves his
great Bible…so he can reveal the perfect words for each situation he asks us to
endure.
Job knew he had followed the words of Deuteronomy
11:18-23… “You shall therefore lay up these words of mine in
your heart and in your soul, and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand,
and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall teach them to your
children, talking of them when you are sitting in your house, and when you are
walking by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall write
them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates, that your days and the
days of your children may be multiplied in the land that the Lord swore to your
fathers to give them, as long as the heavens are above the earth. For if you
will be careful to do all this commandment that I command you to do, loving the
Lord your God, walking in all his ways, and holding fast to him.” We would all do well to do the same.
Father…thank you for reminding me that my relationship with
you is not a group project. Help me find the strength to walk out in faith…when
you ask me to do something that everyone else around me is convinced is wrong. Help me to search deep down in my own heart
for answers to the hard questions…and not depend completely on the advice of
others…but instead…. deepen my relationship with you….and study even more to
find your will and direction for my life. Amen.
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