Page 141 - Job

what I have allowed in your life?” Okay, Job, I have heard your challenge,
and now I am going to condescend this one time, that it might be written in
the Bible forever, so no one else will ever challenge Me on this again. I will
meet you where you are, and I challenge you. Come on out to the battlefield,
Job, with all your might and gird up your loins like a man.
I cannot imagine what the emotion must have been in Job’s heart. He
never expected that God would answer his outcry of frustration and
desperation. Oh, if only God would come! These guys won’t listen to me.
They don’t know what they’re talking about; they are all talking through
their hats. If only there was someone I could talk to. God knows why it is
going on. I could talk to Him! I don’t know the emotion he felt at that
moment. I can’t imagine it. But what took place in Job’s life at this point
both broke and healed him at the same time. God rebuked him and then
used it as a balm. He is about to give the full answer to the problem of
suffering. So this becomes the last act in the great drama of Job’s life.
Job’s problems were being compounded through the debates. The
problem started off with his suffering. You might think that the simplest
way to deal with that, would be to reveal the purpose for the suffering.
No, Job, it is not because of your sin. It is because Satan came to me and
la, la, la. That would have solved Job’s problem. He would say, oh, thank
you for telling me. I didn’t know. They said You were punishing my sin,
but really, You were trying my righteousness. If You had just explained
that, it would be all over. But God didn’t do that because Job’s problems
had been compounded. It was not only his suffering now. It was Job
himself that was the problem. And so now God begins. God speaks, and
Job listens. I believe that his heart was quivering like a leaf in the
whirlwind as he stood before God.

Let me suggest a simple outline of this message that God speaks. There
are a number of ways to look at it. It is a series of questions that God
slings at Job. Nothing, like the debates that have gone before. Man tried to
use logical arguments. God throws out judicial interrogations. He suggests
the Supremacy and Wisdom of all things He has created.
Here is one way to look at this section. God speaks two times and with
each of His messages answers a different question. In 38:1 through 40:5,
He answers the question: Shall a mortal man contend with God? When
you finish that section, you will see that the answer is no. A mortal man
should never do what Job did and contend with God. And then chapter
40:6 through 42:6: Shall a mortal man charge God with wrong doing in
the way He rules His world? Once again, the answer to that question is,
no, we should not challenge the way God does things. Chapter 40:3,

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