Job 1:1-3:26, 1 Corinthians 14:1-17, Psalm 37:12-29, Proverbs 21:25-26
Today is the 21st day of August, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It is great to be here with you today, as we walk into a brand-new week together, throw open that threshold, step into it together and look out at the vista, it’s all waiting to be written, the story of this week, is all waiting to be told. And it’s exciting, to see what this week is going to shape up to be and it’s wise of us to allow the Scriptures to inform what this week is going…going to be like as we gather around the Global Campfire, each and every day for the next step forward. Our next step forward, leads us into some brand-new territory.
Introduction to the Book of Job:
We’ve finished the book of Esther yesterday, which brings us to the book of Job, which is truly one of the most beautiful pieces of literature in the Bible and a genuinely, honest wrestling with the problem of evil and why we suffer. It’s asking the questions that we either ask or that we’re too afraid to ask, which is basically, why is this happening to me? Why? And then wrestling with it and trying to find that answer. And this book that we’re moving into, it’s…it’s disputed, at least in terms of when it falls into the historical context. There’s not a lot of details in the book of Job that give clues to other events or other times, which leads to a lot of speculation, not just random speculation, the like scholarly attempts to truly sort this out, but it’s different people have different opinions. Some believe that it has archaic Hebrew words that are, that have fallen out of use and that maybe no one even really truly knows what they mean. There are Hebrew words in the book of Job that aren’t really used anywhere else in the Bible. So that leads some to believe maybe, Job was around the same time that Abraham was, or Jacob was, or maybe even before that. While other scholars believe this is written by a scribe coming out of exile so, making it much more recent. And so, the person that wrote this down, didn’t fully know Hebrew and so that would account for different kinds of usage of words. Others believe this is very ancient and collected probably through oral tradition by Moses. And the truth is we can take our pick of what our conviction is and what we think. The truth is that we just don’t fully know. What we do know is what is in the book of Job and what it is dealing with, which is unwarranted, undeserved, suffering. And in just a few minutes, as we begin the book of Job, we’re going to see why like, Job has the worst day of any human being, I can even fathom or imagine. And we will see that and then what we need to do is begin to watch Job, watch what Job does and we can imagine that if Job loses a lot, which he does, like everything in a day, that he would be grief stricken, maybe angry, maybe a lot of things, not the least being in shock, but we need to watch him and how he conducts himself because he is suffering tremendously and he truly believes it’s for no reason. There’s no reason that he should receive the kind of judgment that he is receiving, and he believes that the judgment is coming from God. So, that leaves him with a bunch of questions, he believes he is a righteous and upright man before the Lord. And so, it doesn’t make sense why the Lord would strike him down. What Job wants, is a conversation with God so that, he might understand, so that he might bring his case, as we’ll hear him say, bring his case before the Lord and explain like, I don’t understand why you’re doing this to me. I have been faithful and loyal to you. And as Job is contemplating these things and suffering through these things, his friends show up and they sit with him and it’s beautiful because they don’t say anything for like a week, just like sitting with Job in his grief, but eventually they do start talking, which is really the rest of the book of Job. Job wants God, his friends are trying to help him sort out why these things have happened to him, they’re giving him the kind of advice that we give each, other all the time. Like when we hear the different things that Job’s friends say, we can just dismiss them because we know that Job wants God and that God’s gonna show up, but if we’re just listening to them, they are trying to help Job understand, through their own idea of God is, and Job essentially has to tell them, there isn’t anything that you know, that I don’t know. So, I know all of the things that you’re saying. I’ve said all these things before, but things have changed for me, and I need an actual audience with the Almighty. I actually need to hear what God has to say and not what other people have to say because I already know that human wisdom. And before it’s over, Job will get what he wants, it just won’t be anything like he thinks. What we end up learning is, there is a lot more going on than we are ever aware of, that God is all powerful and good and so let’s begin. We’ll read from the New Living translation this week, Job chapters 1, 2 and 3 today.
Prayer:
Father, we thank You for Your word and we thank You for this brand-new week that we are entering into, and we ask Your blessing over it. We ask Your wisdom, to hover around us and that we would be aware of it, that every step may be a correct step, that every conversation would be a good life-giving one, that the things that we have to do, the obligations and responsibilities would be carried out as acts of worship to You. And we thank You for this brand-new book that we are entering into, completely changing the complexion of so many of the things that we have talked about so far. But in so many ways, tying them all together, as we move through the book of Job come, Holy Spirit, lead us into all truth. And may we consider the posture of Job after finding out that life, as he knew it was…was over, had vanished in one day. He grieved, he cried, he tore his robes, he fell to the ground and worshiped. May this picture stick with us as we move through the coming days. May we consider this posture deeply we ask. In the name of Jesus. Amen.
Song played today “Blessed Be The Name” Brent Bourgeois