Story: Trials and Blessings of Job

Category: Exile
Scriptures: Job 1 Job 2 Job 42

Commentary

Often people come to the Book of Job expecting to find answers to questions about suffering. However, Job is not what used to be called “everyman.” Job is most emphatically a believer, a worshiper, a man who fears God and turns from evil ( Job 1:1, Job 2:3). He suffers because he is a worshiper; this is the logic of chapters 1 and 2. So the Book of Job is about undeserved suffering, the trials of a man who belongs to God and trusts God.

This book is therefore fundamentally a book about the Creator God and particularly his power over the whole of Creation and his wisdom in governing the universe. The character and justice of God are perhaps more critical issues for the book even than the predicament of Job. The book is about the righteousness of God.

Of course, the Book of Job is also about Job as the believing and innocent sufferer. There is a deep sense in which Job in his sufferings foreshadows the Lord Jesus Christ in his sin-bearing passion. It is also well to remember that In a number of places, the New Testament speaks of Christian believers as sharing in the sufferings of Christ and of bearing trials in order that our faith may redound to the honor of God (e.g., Col 1:24; Rom 8:17; Luke 22:31 1 Pet 1:7). Just as Job bows down in worship before God, simply because he is Almighty God and not for the blessings he receives, we too learn to bow in humility. Along with all the blessings we enjoy in Jesus we are to expect in some measure to experience what Job suffers, and we should not be surprised by this.

The book profoundly foreshadows the gospel, as the undeserved sufferings of Job prefigure the sin-bearing sufferings of Jesus. We also learn from the errors of Job’s friends much about what religion looks like when it has morality but no gospel. We should be warned about the cruelty and emptiness of such religion.

Job says things he ought not to say and needs to repent of some of his words. As a consequence, he does not simply foreshadow Jesus; he also helps us to see how our sufferings can lead us into sin as we rail against God and begin to speak and think as though we knew better than God how to govern the world. We must repent as did Job and bow before the majesty and wisdom of the Creator.

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Job 1

1 There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job. That man was blameless and upright, and one who feared God, and turned away from evil.

2 There were born to him seven sons and three daughters.

3 His possessions also were seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, five hundred female donkeys, and a very great household; so that this man was the greatest of all the children of the east.

4 His sons went and held a feast in the house of each one on his birthday; and they sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to drink with them.

5 It was so, when the days of their feasting had run their course, that Job sent and sanctified them, and rose up early in the morning, and offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all. For Job said, “It may be that my sons have sinned, and renounced God in their hearts.” Job did so continually.

6 Now on the day when God’s sons came to present themselves before Yahweh, Satan also came among them.

7 Yahweh said to Satan, “Where have you come from?” Then Satan answered Yahweh, and said, “From going back and forth in the earth, and from walking up and down in it.”

8 Yahweh said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant, Job? For there is no one like him in the earth, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God, and turns away from evil.”

9 Then Satan answered Yahweh, and said, “Does Job fear God for nothing?

10 Haven’t you made a hedge around him, and around his house, and around all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land.

11 But stretch out your hand now, and touch all that he has, and he will renounce you to your face.”

12 Yahweh said to Satan, “Behold, all that he has is in your power. Only on himself don’t stretch out your hand.” So Satan went out from the presence of Yahweh.

13 It fell on a day when his sons and his daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house,

14 that there came a messenger to Job, and said, “The oxen were plowing, and the donkeys feeding beside them,

15 and the Sabeans attacked, and took them away. Yes, they have killed the servants with the edge of the sword, and I alone have escaped to tell you.”

16 While he was still speaking, there also came another, and said, “The fire of God has fallen from the sky, and has burned up the sheep and the servants, and consumed them, and I alone have escaped to tell you.”

17 While he was still speaking, there came also another, and said, “The Chaldeans made three bands, and swept down on the camels, and have taken them away, yes, and killed the servants with the edge of the sword; and I alone have escaped to tell you.”

18 While he was still speaking, there came also another, and said, “Your sons and your daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house,

19 and behold, there came a great wind from the wilderness, and struck the four corners of the house, and it fell on the young men, and they are dead. I alone have escaped to tell you.”

20 Then Job arose, and tore his robe, and shaved his head, and fell down on the ground, and worshiped.

21 He said, “Naked I came out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return there. Yahweh gave, and Yahweh has taken away. Blessed be Yahweh’s name.”

22 In all this, Job did not sin, nor charge God with wrongdoing.

Job 2

1 Again, on the day when the God’s sons came to present themselves before Yahweh, Satan came also among them to present himself before Yahweh.

2 Yahweh said to Satan, “Where have you come from?” Satan answered Yahweh, and said, “From going back and forth in the earth, and from walking up and down in it.”

3 Yahweh said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job? For there is no one like him in the earth, a blameless and an upright man, one who fears God, and turns away from evil. He still maintains his integrity, although you incited me against him, to ruin him without cause.”

4 Satan answered Yahweh, and said, “Skin for skin. Yes, all that a man has he will give for his life.

5 But stretch out your hand now, and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will renounce you to your face.”

6 Yahweh said to Satan, “Behold, he is in your hand. Only spare his life.”

7 So Satan went out from the presence of Yahweh, and struck Job with painful sores from the sole of his foot to his head.

8 He took for himself a potsherd to scrape himself with, and he sat among the ashes.

9 Then his wife said to him, “Do you still maintain your integrity? Renounce God, and die.”

10 But he said to her, “You speak as one of the foolish women would speak. What? Shall we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?” In all this Job didn’t sin with his lips.

11 Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this evil that had come on him, they each came from his own place: Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite; and they made an appointment together to come to sympathize with him and to comfort him.

12 When they lifted up their eyes from a distance, and didn’t recognize him, they raised their voices, and wept; and they each tore his robe, and sprinkled dust on their heads toward the sky.

13 So they sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his grief was very great.

Job 42

1 Then Job answered Yahweh,

2 “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be restrained.

3 You asked, ‘Who is this who hides counsel without knowledge?’ therefore I have uttered that which I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I didn’t know.

4 You said, ‘Listen, now, and I will speak; I will question you, and you will answer me.’

5 I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you.

6 Therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.”

7 It was so, that after Yahweh had spoken these words to Job, Yahweh said to Eliphaz the Temanite, “My wrath is kindled against you, and against your two friends; for you have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job has.

8 Now therefore, take to yourselves seven bulls and seven rams, and go to my servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering; and my servant Job shall pray for you, for I will accept him, that I not deal with you according to your folly. For you have not spoken of me the thing that is right, as my servant Job has.”

9 So Eliphaz the Temanite and Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite went, and did what Yahweh commanded them, and Yahweh accepted Job.

10 Yahweh turned the captivity of Job, when he prayed for his friends. Yahweh gave Job twice as much as he had before.

11 Then came there to him all his brothers, and all his sisters, and all those who had been of his acquaintance before, and ate bread with him in his house. They comforted him, and consoled him concerning all the evil that Yahweh had brought on him. Everyone also gave him a piece of money, and everyone a ring of gold.

12 So Yahweh blessed the latter end of Job more than his beginning. He had fourteen thousand sheep, six thousand camels, one thousand yoke of oxen, and a thousand female donkeys.

13 He had also seven sons and three daughters.

14 He called the name of the first, Jemimah; and the name of the second, Keziah; and the name of the third, Keren Happuch.

15 In all the land were no women found so beautiful as the daughters of Job. Their father gave them an inheritance among their brothers.

16 After this Job lived one hundred forty years, and saw his sons, and his sons’ sons, to four generations.

17 So Job died, being old and full of days.