Page 113 - Reading Job to Know God

why. God has rejected him, and man has rejected him, and he has finally
come to the place where he says I know I am going to die, but I am innocent.
And one day my blood will cry out and God will vindicate me. It is a
pathetic scene. Chapter 16, verse 20. Job lifts his tear filled eyes to God.
“My friends are my scoffers; My eye weeps to God.”
He looks up to the God that he thinks is unjustly bringing him to death, but
he has a hope that even after he is dead and after worms destroy his body, he
will be vindicated. One day everyone will know that he was right. He does
not have any hope for this life. Look at chapter 17:10-16,
“But come again all of you now, for I do not find a wise man among
you. My days are past, my plans are torn apart, even the wishes of my
heart. They make night into day, saying, the light is near, in the
presence of darkness. If I look for Sheol as my home, I make my bed in
the darkness; If I call to the pit, ‘You are my father’; To the worm, ‘my
mother and my sister’; Where now is my hope? And who regards my
hope? Will it go down with me to Sheol? Shall we together go down

into the dustAnd Job says, I knew you would understand this, gentlemen. I
know your theology. The wicked suffer. I am suffering. Therefore, I am
wicked. I reject your theology. I cannot explain it. I cannot convince you
of it. I know I have done nothing. I know I am not wicked. I know I am
right. My prayer is pure. I know what has come upon me has come from
God. I have cried out for Him to say why. I have called upon Him to come
and face me like a man, and He refuses to listen. And so I have one choice.
Since God is too strong for me, I must die. And die I will. But I am going
to go into the grave saying I am right. And one day I have the assurance that
God, who is Holy, will vindicate me somehow.
That is how Job feels. He feels like that is going to end his discussion. The
argument is ended. He sinks back into his bed, and he says it is all over. Job
feels like a man who has lost his wife. They are arguing, why did she leave?
He says, “I don’t care why she left! She is gone; that is what bothers me.
You are not going to help me by telling me why”. And so he feels like that’s
the end of it. He has already closed the argument. But, these good physicians
will not let it lie. Bildad now has to add his two cents. Job keeps trying to
quit, and they keep dragggggging him back in. In Chapter 18 Job speaks in
ruthless severity. Job has given up. His spirit is broken. He doesn’t want to
argue anymore. He doesn’t want to fight God. He doesn’t want to fight man.
He hopes to die and somehow be vindicated. But Bildad will not let it end.
His pride is hurt. Chapter 18, verse 3,
“Why are we regarded as beasts, as stupid in your eyes?”

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