Read the Word:
Job 11:7-9
Meditate on the Word:
Job’s three friends Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite have all come to comfort him in his distress. The problem is not when they show up and sit in silence with him for seven days and nights. This was the part of their visit they got right. What they got wrong was when they opened their mouths to help. They, like many in Old Testament times saw sickness and calamity as a direct punishment of sin. Therefore, they concluded, Job must have sinned greatly in order to warrant the calamity he faced.
While their main point was wrong, it is amazing how much these three got right in their lengthy speeched. They just started with an erroneous conclusion and used what they knew about God to support it. Indeed Zophar was correct that we cannot fully understand God. We are unable to fully comprehend him. Yet, he seems certain that he does fully comprehend God’s ways.
We can sometimes be guilty of the same thing. We know and we admit that we cannot know all God’s ways. Yet we see something of His works and think that we suddenly know everything there is to know. God’s works and His ways are not bound my our ability to understand them. But we can take comfort in knowing that He is all wise and that He does understand what He is doing.
Pray the Word:
Confess any ways that you have tried to limit God to your own understanding of Him.
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