Job 8:1-11:20, 1 Corinthians 15:1-28, Psalms 38:1-22, Proverbs 21:28-29
Today is the 23rd day of August. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian and it is a joy to be here with you today. It’s a joy to be here with you every day as we come around the global campfire and do what we do, take another step forward in God’s word and let God’s word to orient us to his heart and advise and inform our choices today. I can’t imagine life without this as the rhythm and the center. So, I’m glad we can be here together and take that next step. And, of course, we’re in the book of Job now and we have spent a couple of days in the book of Job, and so we kind of know the lay of the land. And we heard one of Job’s friends, Eliphaz speak yesterday and Job responded to that and today we’re gonna hear from Bildad. So, we’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Job chapter 8,9, 10, and 11 today.
Commentary:
Okay. So, the apostle Paul was a Pharisee as we probably we all at least mostly know. And a Pharisee was very, very strict and very educated way to lead the people. And so, as we’re reading in first Corinthians today, even though Paul has kind of left that and has become this apostle of Jesus and is preaching the gospel of Jesus, he’s still being quite the Pharisee today because this is how he was trained. So, he’s very passionate. So, during the time that Jesus lived and then also during the time that Paul lived there were two different schools of thought in Judaism. On the one hand you have the Sadducees and they were the ones that were in power really, they were the elite among the Jews. They thought that they were actually the true ancestors among the priests. And, so, they were mostly centered in Jerusalem and very powerful, very, very conservative. And then, on the other hand, the Pharisees were more plentiful, and they were spread all over the countryside. So, they were way, way, way more in touch with the people. And, so, collectively when you have a Council made up of Sadducees and Pharisees that would be called the Sanhedrin and these were the people who, you know, maybe had a couple different points of view, but they would wrestle through it and interpret and enforce the Mosaic law and then teach people how to obey it. So, one of them big distinctions between Sadducees and Pharisees was that they had very, very different thoughts about the afterlife, especially about resurrection from the dead. Sadducees didn’t believe that the dead would rise again. For them, like a person would die and then they would return to God and then like, that’s that, the end of the story. So, Pharisees, on the other hand, they did have a hope in the resurrection from the dead. So, we, you know, from that perspective we could say that even Jesus took a pharisaical view on this particular point and it was the pharisaical view that actually prevailed in the end, historically. So, Paul, as a trained Pharisee, he was hoping in resurrection. He actually had that in common with Jesus even though he hated Jesus and he hated Jesus followers because of what it was…basically because it was like heresy to him as a very very trained Pharisee. So, he would’ve kept persecuting believers in Jesus if he had not had an experience with the resurrected Christ, right, with someone who had been resurrected. And that was his hope, that that was his defense when he found himself, you know, before the Sanhedrin back in the book of Acts. Jesus resurrection, that was the thing that proved all of it for Paul. This made all of his religious convictions true. So, in Paul’s view Jesus resurrection was like the only…like the centerpiece for it all. The reason Jesus mattered was because he was resurrected and that was proof that God was doing something new in the world. And that’s where we spent our time today in first Corinthians in the 15th chapter. So, let’s take that with us into this day - the implications of the resurrection. Like, we kind of take that for granted. Like, we just take it for granted. But as believers the resurrection from the dead is our hope but think about the two camps. The Sanhedrin, right? Think of the Pharisees and the Sadducees because you begin to wonder, like, where would you be on that…on that continuum? Because to believe in the resurrection, that means, that means that you will one day and I will one day after we have died awaken from the dead and rise, right? So, that’s not a metaphor, like that’s a pretty big deal. And, so, you think, “well, is that how it works? Is that how it’s gonna work? Is that how resurrection happens? Like, what if…”. But the thing is, without the resurrection as the centerpiece of our faith, the entire faith is useless. And that’s according to the apostle Paul not just according to our own reason, even though our own reason, like, is correct. Without the resurrection there isn’t any hope. I believe. Paul believed that Jesus indeed did rise from the dead and I believe that that was showing us what’s to come. And that gives us hope that is…that is eternal. But carry that into your day today by simply, you know, thinking about like, “would I have been a Sadducee, or would I have been a Pharisee?” You know, like, “What am I functionally believing today?” And that could be a little disruptive, but as we have learned, the Bible has no problem with being disruptive and we should stop fighting disruption. Those little things that come and make us go, “hmmmm, let me think about that some more.” That’s a good thing. That’s wrestling. Like that’s a good thing. And as we can see from the book of Job, the Bible has no problem with our wrestling, it’s part of the deal. God has no problem with that. And, so, let’s carry this today, and just kind of look at how it is that we live our lives as it relates to not only Christ’s resurrection, but our resurrection.
Prayer:
Holy Spirit, we invite You into that. We invite You to help us to wrestle with how we live versus how we need to believe and what we need to live into. And we invite You fully into that knowing that You’ve given us permission to wrestle with these kinds of things. And in whatever way we wrestle You are still present to us and leading us forward. So, come Holy Spirit we pray. In the mighty name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.
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