Job’s story shows us that questioning God is not “wrong” – but God’s “answers” won’t always satisfy us. How do we ask questions without doubting God’s ultimate justice?
Scripture:
Job, chapters 39-40; 1 Corinthians, chapters 13-14
Job 40:6-14 (CEB):
The Lord answered Job from the whirlwind: “Prepare yourself like a man; I will interrogate you, and you will respond to me. Would you question my justice, deem me guilty so you can be innocent? Or do you have an arm like God; can you thunder with a voice like him? Adorn yourself with splendor and majesty; clothe yourself with honor and esteem. Unleash your raging anger; look on all the proud and humble them. Look on all the proud and debase them; trample the wicked in their place. Hide them together in the dust; bind their faces in a hidden place. Then I, even I, will praise you, for your strong hand has delivered you.”
Observations: Questioning God
Would you question my justice, deem me guilty so you can be innocent? What a powerful question God asks Job! From the beginning of Job’s trials, he has done just that – question God’s justice. He has maintained his innocence; therefore, he challenges God’s justice. Job’s friends, on the other hand, have defended God’s justice. They have insisted that Job must not be innocent, for God does not punish the innocent. And Job and his friends have debated this basic issue for 35 chapters!
Finally, God answers Job – in a sense, at least. God talks to Job, but He doesn’t really “answer” Job’s questions or his challenge. Instead, God challenges Job: “Who is this darkening counsel with words lacking knowledge?” (Job 38:2). God’s “response” to Job starts off on a bit of a sarcastic note. It’s almost as if God is saying, “Do you hear something? I hear something, but it just sounds like a bunch of gibberish. It doesn’t make sense!” And after a couple of chapters of that sort of thing, Job replies: “Look, I’m of little worth. What can I answer you? I’ll put my hand over my mouth” (Job 40:4).
But God is just getting started. In our passage for today, He gets down to the heart of the matter: Would you question my justice, deem me guilty so you can be innocent? Of course, Job would say “no” – but that’s exactly what he has done. In Job’s mind, God must be unfair. After all, Job knew that he hadn’t done anything wrong. In his mind, the only other answer is that God has acted unjustly.
Questioning God – But not God’s Ultimate Goodness
As we read on through the rest of the book of Job (the last two chapters are part of Friday’s readings), we find that God never really answers Job. Job wants to know why these things have happened to him. God never tells him. God’s entire defense is that Job is not wise enough to understand His ways. “Were you there when I created the universe? Are you able to make the rain fall? Have you established the ways of the animal kingdom? Do you have an arm like God; can you thunder with a voice like him?”
The fact that God never explains things to Job may not sit well with people. Why can’t God just tell him? Well, do you really think it would be helpful for Job to know why these things happened? Satan accused Job of following God only because God was good to him. “See, Job, what happened was that Satan came along and said you only serve me because I’ve blessed you. So I let him do all this stuff to you to prove that he was wrong. Sorry about that!”
Faith comes down to trusting God even when we don’t understand. We bristle at that; we think that we’re capable of understanding everything that God does. Ummm, NO. We’re not capable of understanding. “’My plans aren’t your plans, nor are your ways my ways,’ says the Lord. ‘Just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my plans than your plans’” (Isaiah 55:8-9).
Application: Questioning God – but not God’s Existence
Job and his friends started from the position of acknowledging God’s existence; their dispute was over God’s methods. People today still do that: some claim that God is directly responsible for everything, and that the fault lies with us, while others hold that we live in a world that is stained by sin, and thus bad things happen. That question impacts others as well; they struggle with the presence of evil so much that they question how a good God could exist with so much bad in the world.
It’s hard for us to hear, but we have to start from a position of humility. If there is an Almighty, infinite God who is Sovereign over the universe (which of course I believe), He must be so much greater than we are that we could never fully understand Him. As much as we think that we are capable of fully understanding God, we can’t. And as long as we refuse to believe, we won’t understand even what God has revealed to us. If we “create” a God that we can fully understand, then what we have created is less than us, not greater. And who would serve a “god” that was inferior to them?
But it’s also important to remember that God doesn’t condemn Job for asking the question! At the end of the story, God chastises Job’s friends: “you haven’t spoken about me correctly as did my servant Job” (Job 42:7). Asking the question is not the problem; the problem comes when we allow our lack of understanding to lead to a lack of belief. God is God, whether we acknowledge Him or not. But He has revealed Himself to us – most fully through His Son Jesus – so that we might believe. “No one has ever seen God. God the only Son, who is at the Father’s side, has made God known” (John 1:18).
Prayer:
Father, thank You for reminding us that it’s not wrong to ask questions of You. Help us, like Job, to hold on to our faith even as we ask the questions that trouble our souls. And give us faith to continue to trust even when we don’t understand. As Jesus said, we will face trouble in this world (John 16:33). Help us to be encouraged by the fact that He has overcome the world! Amen.
Post comments (0)