God Speaks

Time and time again, I wish we could hear the stories of the Bible as if for the first time. They would startle and surprise us. All through the book of Job, the friends who present themselves as Job’s comforters and counselors are also trying to convince us that they represent the path of divine wisdom and Job needs to abandon the quest to bring his case before God. As much as we might dislike the unfeeling response of these friends, until we come to the conclusion, there lurks a nagging fear they will be vindicated in the end. That’s not at all what happens. Instead God tells them to ask Job to pray for them, for I will accept his prayer not to deal with you according to your folly (Job 42:8).
I thought about this conclusion to the story and wondered what message there was for us here. As I kicked that idea around in my head, I kept coming back to what God says about Job. God tells the friends of Job they have not spoken truthfully about God as Job has. I went a bit further with that idea. The thought that came to me was this—only someone with a mature faith would be commended in this way by God. I don’t mean that Job is perfect. I mean only that this honest, searching, rigorous faith of his is the one that is moving in the direction of spiritual maturity. I decided then the best thing we could do as we finish our look at Job is to examine some of the contours of his spirituality.
We are going to examine three things that Job says to God. Here is the first: “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted” (Job 42:2).
One of the things we looked at during one of our Wednesday studies was that by his actions Job witnessed to his belief that God was trustworthy. Perhaps an earth-bound example will be helpful. Let’s say I needed someone to check on the dog while we were away for a weekend. There is a neighbour we always call on. I can give the job to the youngest daughter of the family, knowing that she will enjoy having a few extra dollars in her pocket. I also know her father and mother will ask her about our dog, will make sure she gets over at a descent time on a Saturday morning. I ask them to take care of something because I trust them.
Job brought his questions and doubts and pain and frustration to God because he had found God to be trustworthy. Job’s questions do not show a lack of faith; they show the presence of a profound faith. I can open my soul and offer God the raw emotions that are there because God can handle it.
When he was spoken to by God, Job interpreted what he was told to mean that somehow in the course of this life the purposes of God will be fulfilled. Job did not doubt the righteousness of God, nor his ultimate power. In the end the life of those who are faithful to God will reflect the righteous purposes of God. This was Job’s first conclusion.
Here is the second part of Job’s creed. “Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know” (Job 42:3). In our text Job quotes God who asked, “Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?” In Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase, The Message, he puts the question this way. “Who is this muddying the water, ignorantly confusing the issue, second-guessing my purposes?” Job is quoting God. This is the question God asks of Job when he begins his answer to him (Job 38:2).
What follows is a long series of questions in which God asks Job where he was when the work of creation began, what role he has taken in the ongoing work of sustaining creation, if he knows where snow and rain come from or how female animals give birth to and care for their young.
At the end of the questions, God has not provided Job with any sort of definitive answer to the questions raised by Job. If the story were being made into a movie, we might write the script to include a flashback here. God could reveal to Job a vision of the heavenly council which we saw in the prologue to the book and Job would have an insight into what had happened. But if we give that idea a little bit of thought, we know it cannot be.
Job is faced with the enormity of God. Job is faced with the complexity of God. Job is faced with the “otherness” of God. Let me return to a theme which I often mention. One of the things that strikes me about the current crop of aggressive atheist authors is that it seems to me the god they want to deny is not any sort of being that is worthy of my worship and devotion.
I know I’m not as intellectually gifted as say, Christopher Dawkins, the author of The God Delusion. After all, he taught at Oxford; the only way I’m getting into Oxford is if I pay for a tour. But as bright as Dawkins is, a god he could figure out is not worthy of worship and devotion. Job says I have spoken of things I did not understand. His faith grows to the point of realizing it could not be otherwise. To paraphrase what I believe was said by C. S. Lewis, Job had too big an imagination to be an atheist.
There is a third side to Job’s spiritual maturity. “I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you” (Job 42:5). One of the wonderful things we have discovered in looking at Job is there are places where this ancient story points forward two millennia to the gift of Jesus Christ. Job had heard about God; now he sees him. Can this be true? If it is true, how is it true?
One of the themes or concepts that runs through the Hebrew scriptures is this: no one can see God and live. You may remember the experience of Moses when he goes to the mountain the second time to receive the stone tablets on which the commandments are written by God. Moses tells God that he wants a glimpse of God’s glory. God tells Moses that he will make his goodness pass before him, but that is all. “You cannot see my face; for no one shall see me and live” (Exodus 33:20).
You may also remember the story of the prophet Elijah told in 1 Kings 19. Elijah is on the run. Queen Jezebel has threatened his life. Elijah goes to Mount Horeb and there God reveals himself to him. In the story we are told that God is not in the wind or the earthquake or the fire, but instead in what is translated as a sound of sheer silence (NRSV), a still small voice (KJV), or a gentle and quiet whisper (The Message). Notice what Elijah does in response. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. In other words, he hid his face. He dared not look at God.
One more example is taken from the call of the prophet Isaiah. The prophet sees a vision of God in the temple. The reaction of Isaiah is one of horror. “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5).
We have then at the conclusion of Job this amazing revelation that the only thing that can satisfy the soul of the spiritual seeker is to know God face to face. Something that you have heard from others, even well-worn bits of wisdom that supposedly tell you how the world works do not bring a sense of peace and understanding to the soul. There are still questions that cannot be answered, but Job through this personal encounter with God has discovered his place in the universe and he is at peace.
Friends, what about us? I cannot pretend to know everything that is going on in every heart that is part of the Blythwood family. I do know that some of you have been active, involved Christians for as long as you can remember. Others of you would tell me that you are more on the edge of faith, feeling that your soul is reaching out for God, but not sure yet if you should take that next step.
I want to call all of us then to a faith that is maturing, according to the creed of Job. God says it is Job that has spoken rightly of him and that is the direction that I believe all of us need to aim our spiritual formation. (And remember, the question is not if you are being spiritually formed, the question is whether your spiritual formation is good or bad.)
If you want to grow as a Christian, you need to stake your life on the trustworthiness of God.
If you want to grow as a Christian, you need to commit your emotion and intellect to discovering all there is to know about God and at the same time be content that there is no human mind that will ever discover the boundaries of the will and purposes of God.
If you want to grow as a Christian, you will rejoice and grow in grace and gratitude that God has not left you to hear about him in any sort of second-hand fashion, but has given himself to creation in Jesus, the one who is Emmanuel, God with us. As John tells us in the prologue to his gospel, the eternal Word became a human being and pitched his tent with us.
Dr. Francis Collins, one of the world’s leading geneticists and head for many years of the Human Genome Project was appointed this past July as director of the National Institutes of Health by President Obama. Dr. Collins has had a long time interest in the relationship between science and religion and has written a compelling case for belief in his book, The Language of God.
In the chapter where he tells the story of his journey from atheism to belief, he quotes these words of Sheldon Vanauken—
Between the probable and proved there yawns
A gap. Afraid to jump, we stand absurd,
Then see behind us sink the ground and, worse,
Our very standpoint crumbling. Desperate dawns
Our only hope: to leap into the Word
That opens up the shuttered universe.
Friends, I commend to you that leap into the Word, that leap into Jesus, for your soul will never be content to simply hear about God. You will only see the grace of God in the face of Jesus, you and the Almighty, face to face.

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