Seven Lessons from Job

God cares more about our faith than our pleasure.
—Philip Yancey on Job in The Bible Jesus Read

Our Sunday school class finished our discussion of Job last week. I can’t remember when we started the study, but it has taken some months, and about two-thirds of the way through the book I told my husband that I was sick of Job’s friends. However, my enthusiasm returned at the end of the book, and now I want to reflect on what I learned—or what I already knew that was reinforced.

I. God is sovereign.
No surprise that a “grace girl” would start here, is it? Job presents a concise picture of God’s sovereignty by showing us God’s involvement in and intimate acquaintance with the life of one of His children, and it demonstrates God’s power in the creation and maintenance of His world. One can rightly conclude from Job that nothing happens that isn’t either initiated or permitted by God. Which is reinforced by and leads to my next point…

II. There are things going on in the spiritual realm that we cannot begin to contemplate.
I really don’t like to think too much about the implications for my life of Job 1:8 when God asks Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job?” …Have you considered my servant, Katy? However, as frightening as it may be to consider that God may initiate incredible hardship in our lives to accomplish His purposes, we should find comfort in the knowledge that He allows these things to happen because He has confidence in us. He knows we will endure because of the work He has done and will do in us.

III. It is never about us.
Bad theology reigns supreme in this world and even throughout the church. The philosophy that what we do or don’t do results in either good or bad things happening to us is the primary mode of thinking, and it is NOT Biblical. This thinking is why Job’s friends couldn’t get away from the conviction that Job had committed some sin to kindle the wrath of God against him. God’s wrath is ultimately kindled against Job’s friends because “you have not spoken of Me what is right as My servant Job has.” (Job 42:7) Of course, we will reap what we sow (Galatians 6:7) and we can expect to be disciplined by God for sin (Hebrews 12:4-11), but the ultimate reality of our lives is not based on our actions but on God’s purposes.

IV. Creation is primary evidence for the existence, power, and provision of God.
When God speaks to Job (beginning in chapter 38), He focuses on His creation. This makes me think of Romans 1: 19-20:
…that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.

V. The presence of God satisfies all of our questions.
Up until chapter 38 when God speaks to Job, he repeatedly asks for an audience with God. Understandably, in light of his humanity and his bad theology, Job wants an answer as to why such bad things could happen to someone who is “blameless” (Job 1:8). After God responds in chapters 38 and 39, Job has this to say in chapter 40 (v. 4-5):
Behold, I am insignificant; what can I reply to You?
I lay my hand on my mouth.
Once I have spoken, and I will not answer;
Even twice, and I will add nothing more.

VI. We can only begin to have the proper perspective of ourselves when we see ourselves as God’s servant.
God refers to Job as his servant (1:8) at the outset of the narrative, and he reaffirms Job’s status at the end (42:7-8). The Hebrew word “ebed” used here denotes bondage. The New Testament makes our position even clearer in I Corinthians 6:19-20:
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own? For you have been bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body.

VII. The restoration of Job’s fortune is not the point of the story. His knowing God is.
In a world filled with proponents of a prosperity gospel, there is a tendency to want to focus on the end of the book of Job and the restoration of Job’s fortune. However, (and this is speculation on my part, but I believe it is enlightened speculation) I believe if you were to ask Job, he would say that the highlight of his experience was coming face to face with God and knowing Him in a way he had not known him before. As another servant, Paul (who lost much from the world’s standpoint), wrote in Philippians 3:8:
More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ.