Page 19 - Reading Job to Know God

I am going to ask you to turn to Job chapter 29:1-17

“And Job again took up his discourse and said, ‘Oh that I were as in
months gone by, As in the days when God watched over me; When His
lamp shone over my head, And by His light I walked through darkness;
As I was in the prime of my days, When the friendship of God was over
my tent; When the Almighty was yet with me, and my children were
around me; When my steps were bathed in butter, and the rock poured
out for me streams of oil! When I went out to the gate of the city, When
I took my seat in the square, The young men saw me and hid
themselves, and the old men arose and stood. The princes stopped
talking and put their hands on their mouths; The voice of the nobles
was hushed, And their tongue stuck to their palate. For when the ear
heard, it called me blessed, and when the eye saw, it gave witness of
me, Because I delivered the poor who cried for help, And the orphan
who had no helper. The blessing of the one ready to perish came upon
me, And I made the widow’s heart sing for joy. I put on righteousness,
and it clothed me; My justice was like a robe and a turban. I was eyes
to the blind and feet to the lame. I was a father to the needy, and I
investigated the case which I did not know. I broke the jaws of the
wicked and snatched the prey from his teeth.”

And it goes on and on. I, I, I, I, I yay yay!!! . You can glance at Job 31 and
see more of the same – even worse. You see here the deep root of self-
assuredness. There is not one word of brokenness. Not one word of
helplessness. No evidence at all of a contrite spirit. Nothing about conscious
weakness. Nothing about failure.

You go through this book and see Job who was in the summer of prosperity,
now in the cold dark winter of adversity! Under the awful pressure of divine,
satanic and human oppression, Job began to utter many things from the
depths of his heart. He started saying things he would never have said in the
beginning of the book. Take chapter 30, verse 1. Boy, you could see his
heart here.

“But now those younger than I mock me, whose fathers I disdained to
put with the dogs of my flock.”
He is bitter now. He says, “Now look at the people who are mocking me.
Why, I wouldn’t even employ their fathers to watch over my dogs, and they
are mocking me”. Now don’t get me wrong. This is not the theme of Job.
The theme of Job is not how to get rid of self-righteousness, how to get rid
of subtle pride. For years I had a real shallow view of the book of Job. I
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