40 Minutes In The Old Testament - Job 8:8-9:24 (Episode 394)

Episode Date: November 29, 2023

Bildad continues to call Job to repent. Job answers him and asks how a man be right before God? How can a man argue with God without an arbiter? Job firmly believes bad things happen to good people. And if God isn't responsible, who is? Have a listen.  Show Notes: Support 1517 on Giving Tuesday! 1517 Podcasts The 1517 Podcast Network on Apple Podcasts 1517 on Youtube What's New from 1517: Freedom Lessons Album Free 2023 Advent Resources Your God is too Glorious, 2nd Edition 2024 NWA Tickets (May 3-4) Join the 1517 Academy More from the hosts: Daniel Emery Price Chad Bird

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40 Minutes in the Old Testament is a 1517 Podcast Network podcast. You can go to 1517.org slash podcast. Check out all the other podcasts that are living over there. And while you're over there, check out the events page. You can still register for the Here We Still Say in Regional event in Northwest Arkansas. You might want to do it now. Tickets will not last long. It is mostly sold out.

I think we're about, I don't know, 80% of the way there. So if you want to grab a ticket now would be the time to do so. Love to see you there. There's a link in the show notes as well. Chad, we are in Job chapter 8. We've got, you know, we got into a little bit of Biladad, his response to Job. Essentially, he says to Job at the beginning of this anyway, where we were at, we kind of ended with him saying,

Hey, Job, sounds like you're saying that God kind of perverts justice. That's what kind of seems like what you're saying. It kind of sounds like you're suggesting that the Almighty perverts the right, the just, the good, the true, all the things. And surely you wouldn't be saying that. I mean, surely whatever is happening to you is justified. It must be, unless you're becoming a blasphemer, Job. That is kind of how it ended.

He also suggested that maybe God should just, you know, or maybe that Job should just seek God. Maybe that would be a good idea, as if Job hadn't thought of this before. Like, just seek God, and maybe plead with him for mercy. And if you're, you know, the right kind of guy, if you're pious, he'll answer you. And that's kind of where we ended, and we'll see how he continues. Yeah, he even goes so far as to promise that, you know, you were great before all of this stuff went down with your family,

your possessions, your health, your everything. But, you know, if you'll do what's right, then your latter days are going to be very great. you thought you were great before well just wait you know what you know what's weird about that much better what's weird about that is that that turns i mean not to not to spoil the ending but that does turn out to be the case but just because that turns out to be the case doesn't mean that that is in any way comforting to someone like if you if you like lose like Dude, if you lose 10 kids and then you're like, don't worry,

you're going to have more kids, that's not helpful. That's not comforting. No, kids. More kids being born don't replace the kids you've lost. No, that's not. It doesn't work there. It's not like, oh, well, you know, I lost my car. My car caught fire, exploded, but I'll get another car.

It'll be fine. I'll get the exact same cars before. That's not the way it works with relationships. And it doesn't—even in a—I don't know what's the right way to say this—a harder, colder time, which this is. I mean, in a time where people are much more familiar with loss and unexpected death and this sort of stuff, right? I mean, certainly modern times, when we experience that kind of stuff, it's very different—not very different, But somewhat different than previous times where people's life expectancies were shorter. You know, modern medicine, war was brutal.

I mean, shoot, man, how many people died for lack of antibiotics being invented, right? Like, there's a lot of dudes that died in old school military conflict for lack of penicillin. You know, penicillin had been invented. there'd be a lot less death because it wasn't just like, oh, I got stabbed and died. It was I got cut, I got infected because I took a sword to the leg and I died that way. So they're much more familiar with death. Death is not the thing that it is now. But even still, if you're talking about something unexpected and tragic and all-encompassing like this,

I don't think saying, well, all that stuff's going to be restored to you, if you'll just say the right words, is in any way helpful, even though he does have things restored to him. I don't think Job in any way suggests at the end, when Job does get blessed, that that somehow negates his suffering. Yeah. I mean, plus the premise of what he's saying is false, too, because his premise is that Job has sinned, and therefore if you will turn and seek god make amends with god then god will make his latter days to be to be very great so uh yeah no comfort now and also a false premise on the part of uh on the part of joe's friend so then build that goes on verse seven i mean verse eight to uh to say listen i'm not just uh i'm not the one who

came up with this what you need to do is you need to uh inquire into bygone ages and figure out what the fathers have have said before us so inquire of bygone ages consider what the fathers have searched out for who are we i mean we are but of yesterday and know nothing that's probably one of the the uh the truest things until that's said that's probably it we are but of yesterday and know nothing you're right about that for our days on earth are a shadow will they not teach you and tell you in other words out of their understanding well i mean this is another one of these examples where it's true i mean in the sense of yeah we should we should always beware of anyone who talking here especially in the theological realm anyone who says something theologically no one

has ever said before is immediately suspect yeah because yeah novelty and theology is a very dangerous game to play um so uh anyway but i mean it is yeah so what he says is truthful i mean we should always be inquiring into bygone ages what can we learn from the wisdom of the past we all stand on the shoulders of giants i think that's a c.s lewis image uh for sure but that doesn't mean that the fathers of bygone ages are actually agreeing to build that right or that what they said applies in the situation of of job you can have wisdom from the past which is true but it doesn't it's not necessarily applicable to every situation in which we find ourselves and i mean that runs that's a theme that runs through all of these responses of job's friends

what they say many times is not untrue it's just unapplicable to job's situation i mean we encounter situations like this all the time many of the things they say are very uh proverbial it's kind of stuff you'd find in psalms kind of stuff you'd find with the proverbs but their application of it to the very specific sufferings of job are not only wrong but cruel because they assume what is not true about job situation so anyway he goes on verse 11 to uh kind of paint an image here of of nature kind of parabolic i suppose we could say and then apply that to job he says can papyrus grow where there is no marsh can reeds flourish where there is no water well of course they have to have marsh they have to water that's where papyrus that's where

reeds reeds grow while yet in flower and not cut down they wither before any other plant such are the paths of all who forget god the hope of the godless shall perish so the basic parable is hey you you know you can have these papyrus reeds uh and that's that's this is kind of an aside here but uh that's the way that they made ancient papyrus so manuscripts used to be made out of we didn't they didn't have paper uh they had uh later they had parchment which is leather but uh a lot of the early manuscripts from it out of papyrus so you take a papyrus plant you you cut it and you actually make these uh pages as it were out of the the parts of the papyrus plant so they have to have water to grow and his point is that yeah well they have water

whether whether in a marsh well they flower they i mean they grow we we experience this of course You know, you plant a flower, if it has water, you plant a crop, if it has water, it's going to grow. You take the water away, it's going to die. He says, well, that's what happens. For all who forget God, the godless shall perish. They're going to wither, just like the papyrus plant when it has no water. Of course, the implication here is that this is what's happening in the case of Job. He's cut himself off from the source of life.

He's cut himself off from God. And because of that, he's withering. He's perishing. Yeah, I mean, the not-so-subtle implication here is, like, such are the paths of all who forget God. So the implication here is that you are on such a path, Job. And he does this, like, I mean, have you not inquired of God? Have you not sought God? Have you not come before Him and confessed?

And it's like, I think you're on the wrong path here, Job. I think you're on the path of what? I think you're on the path of those who have forgotten God. And this is why you don't have any hope. The hope of the godless shall perish. You're sitting here, and you're looking and acting rather hopeless, and that's because you've forgotten God, which, of course, is preposterous. I mean, Job has been addressing—he addressed God for the second half of his very long speech.

I mean, he addressed his friends for a chapter. He addressed God for a chapter. So he hasn't forgotten about God. In fact, Job is in this weird situation where he's like, uh god i wish god would forget me yeah i was gonna say he wishes god would forget him but uh it's not happening i mean there's nothing there's nothing worse than saying like uh god is so against me that he won't let me die yeah yeah so uh forgetting god is not joe's problem joe's problem is i wish god would forget

him just you know leave him alone for a little bit just let him let him go ahead and perish and and be done with it so uh yeah bill dad's going to go on to verse 14 to uh he's got all of these images that are kind of woven together here uh he he's been talking about the papyrus plant now he's going to switch to a spider's web his says that the the godless his confidence that is the confidence of the godless is going to be uh severed his trust a spider's web that's i mean you got to give these guys uh points for their rhetorical flourishes i mean that is that is good you're if your trust is a spider's web well then they you know not much of a not much of a trust there you know yeah it might be strong as far as web quality goes but it's not going to hold

if something weighty is is placed upon that and if your trust is a spider's web it's ready to snap yeah is this is this a word here web is it is it uh like is it more i can screenshot your web because a web is where a spider lives. But in the Hebrew here, his trust is a spider's dwelling or a spider's house. And in 15, he says, yeah, spider's house, which is a funny thing to say, right? So his trust is a spider's house, which, of course, is a web. He leans against his house, but it does not stand. So it's like a spider lives in a web, and that's a spider's home.

That's the home you have. You have a little spider's house. But when you lean against that, it's no good. uh what webs are not real sturdy yeah this i mean yeah i mean the esv has that in the footnote this is a case where i wish they had just translated it quite literally his trust is a spider's house that way you know when you see the index line he leans against his house you're like oh okay yeah because you don't obviously the same words being used here he's talking about the web right here like he's talking like yeah these are connected otherwise you might think he's

he's transitioning into some other analogy yeah i so i like robert and alter translate this a little bit differently uh he translates it uh his faith is a mere cobweb a spider's house his trust he leans on his house and it will not stand so he captures the uh the essence of what's being communicated you ever tried to you ever tried to lean on a spider's web you ever been out in the yard working real hard and maybe you grab that glass of lemonade and you see a spider's web and you're like, let me just lean on this real quick. I've run through several

spider's webs. It's the worst. It's the worst, yeah. You feel like you have multiple spiders on you for some time after that, don't you? Yeah. Nothing will make you slap your face quicker than running through a spider's web. Turns out, they won't

hold you. No. Nothing will make you want to strip down naked faster than running through a big old spider. You're like, check your whole body. Terrible, terrible feeling. So, yeah, so he leans against his house. It doesn't stand. He lays hold of it.

It does not endure, of course, because that's what spiders' houses do. And now he's going to, so he's done with his spider imagery. Now he's going to shift to something else. He's going to talk about plants and roots and things like that. He has a lush plant before the sun,

and his shoots spread over his garden his roots entwined the stone heap he looks upon a house of stones if he is destroyed from his place then it will deny him saying i have never seen you behold this is the joy of his way and out of the soil others will spring there's a there's a ton of issues here with with the hebrew and a little bit you know uncertainties what some of these things mean but i think the overall the overall image is pretty clear it's it's i picture like you've got this you've got this tree or this plant whatever has a lot of roots and they're just kind of growing everywhere you know they're they're entwining on the stones and and whatnot all over the house of house of stones and uh if something happens you know and and people come

along and say well you know who did this belong to or whose place was this the the place itself is going to say uh i don't know i've never seen you you know there's no remembrance of him in other words he's going to go the way of all flesh and then out of the soil others will spring he's gonna be replaced by by somebody else the the overall effect is the kind of the you know the the ephemeral nature of human existence so you're here you're gone especially if you're godless you're gonna be forgotten you're gonna pass away and lo you are no more and it seems like uh as Job's houses are rubble at this point, that

this makes sense that he would be saying, yeah, man, you're going to be like, people are going to walk by this rubble and be like, hey, who lived here? And everyone's going to be like, I don't know. Yeah. I mean, and this is another one of these cases where it's not untrue.

I mean, one of the Psalms say, you know, look at this guy. He's spreading himself like a, what's the Psalm say? Like a luxuriant vine, and then lo, he was no more. I searched for him, he couldn't be found. Such is the way of those who deny God.

So again, it's not wrong. It just doesn't apply. It just doesn't apply. You can't be running around, and every time you see somebody suffering, and say, oh, well, that's what happens to the godless. I don't know, man. When that tower fell on those people,

what did they do exactly? sinners yeah were they worse sinners than anybody else so to wrap up his argument here at the end of into chapter eight he says uh so that's the way of that's the way of the godless but behold god will not reject a blameless man nor take the hand of evildoers so if you're blameless god's not going to reject you but he's also not going to have anything to do with evildoers he will yet fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouting those who hate you will be clothed with shame and the tent of the wicked will be no more all of which i mean sounds okay you know

just there's there's still hope job uh i know you're lamenting now you're really upset uh you've got huss oozing sores all over your body but a day is coming when your mouth will laugh your lips will shout everybody who hates you they're going to be clothed with shame the tent of the wicked will perish so better days are coming and the only way you're going to get there is really about listening to my theological advice and following the way that i've laid out for you you know what's interesting about this is that he says listen god's god's not going to reject a blameless guy so we got to figure this out which reminds you of the opening of job which was there was a man in the land of us.

His name was Job. And that man was blameless and upright. He's telling this to the only blameless guy according to the text in the story. So there's one blameless guy. His name is Job. And his friends come around like, man, if you could just be blameless.

This is the blameless. But he is, according to God. Yeah, can you imagine the look on Job's face when that line came out of his mouth? God will not reject a blameless man. And Job's like, it looks pretty much like he has. Yeah, you sure about that? I mean, are you sure about that?

Maybe it would have been better if God had rejected me because he didn't reject me now. I mean, look what's happening to me. Yeah. So, well, that wraps up chapter eight. That's Bildad's first go at explaining, going to explain this to Job, his sufferings. And now Job is going to reply. And, you know, I mentioned this before, but keep in mind these replies, this is not like a formal debate session. You know, person A stands up, they give their, you know, their argument. Person B stands up, they give their argument. And then, you know, person A responds to B and B responds to A. This is not a very structured response-response kind of argument.

There is some responses built into it. These are more like, I'm going to try and give a speech which explains better what's going on than the other guy. So it's kind of a speech competition more than it is a response back and forth. But Job is going to give his speech now after Bildad sits down and is done. Yeah, and what's interesting about Job's response is that Job's going to start, and I don't know, I think that his first words are addressing these final words about, like, God won't reject a blameless man, and Job's going to say, like, yeah, I know that.

Here's the issue, though, if I was going to condense the first little portion of Job's response. I know that God won't reject a blameless man, but check it out. who really knows what God is like, and what He likes, and what He doesn't like, and what He thinks, and why He does what He does. And Job seems to be responding from a place of, like, yeah, but to be blameless before God, you'd have to, like, really know God. And I'm starting to wonder if I understand God at all. Yeah, I mean, if you—these first 12 verses, especially—almost are reaching forward to god's speech i mean there's there's some things in here which is like

i think job is already uh anticipating what god himself is going to say in in those closing chapters when he begins to to speak yeah it starts out truly i know that this is so so i mean yeah i mean i think there is a response yeah you're right yeah i mean what you're saying is not completely untrue but how can a man be in the right before god but that's a that's a good question to ask of the scriptures yes how can a man i mean you're talking about like cutting right to the heart of things all right let me ask a question how can a man be in the right before god that's kind of the uh that is that is the christian question right how can we be right before god yeah well job's response i mean we know our response well there's one way you can

right before god um no question about it you uh you are clothed in the righteousness of christ and uh your sins are forgiven and he has made you right with his father so that there's no condemnation for those who are in christ jesus that that's the answer to joe chapter nine verse two yeah because because what's it what's sort of baked into this into this response is okay you're right uh god won't reject the blameless but what exactly is a man gonna do to be blameless what is a man how can a man be right with god is is there something that a man an unrighteous man could do to then become righteous and this is like this is the question Because the answer to that is nothing, because that's not how righteousness works, right?

So if you are not blameless, there is no becoming blameless because of something that you now do. This is the thing you must do to become blameless. There's nothing you can do. Righteousness is not gained by practicing righteousness. No. That's where it's utterly the contrary to every human experience, because we get better by doing things, right? you get better at basketball by doing what playing basketball you get better whatever you're doing by doing that thing well you don't get better at righteousness by practicing righteousness it

doesn't work that way it's going to be a gift instead of a um an achievement yeah well it's one of those it's one of those things that once you're not that thing there is no becoming that thing either like there's you can't undo your unrighteousness there's no there's no way for you to do this right and so so since you were born in iniquity and sin like righteousness is not exactly in the cards for you like there's no you're you're not ever going to be that you you've you either you have to have always been that this is why you need uh the righteousness of one who has always been righteous because if you're not that you'll never be that that's that's how it works so job here asked the question how can this be how can man be the

right before god and he goes on to say you know if if you wanted to like go to to court with him if you want to contend contend with him uh you couldn't answer him a thousand times so that contend with him in hebrew is uh it's a technical term for like going to trial right so if you if you are contending with someone you're you're you're in trial with them and uh jumps as if this happens you know if i'm gonna be in the right before god and and go to court with him i couldn't answer him no one can answer him uh once in a thousand times there's no way you could really respond to god and then he goes into this uh very wisdom kind of description where he's going to talk about nature and all kinds of elements of creation he says he is wise in heart and mighty

in strength who has hardened himself against him and succeeded he who removes mountains and they know it not when he overturns him in his anger he shakes the earth out of its place and its pillars tremble who commands the sun and it doesn't rise who seals up the stars who alone stretch out the heavens and trample the waves of the sea who made the bear and orion the pleiades and the chambers of the south who does great things beyond searching out and marvelous things beyond number behold he passes by me and i see him not he moves on but i do not perceive him behold he snatches away who can turn him back and who will say to him that is who will say to god what are you doing

I mean it's true there's nothing in here this is not real this is a different this is a different kind of approach that Job has taken from the past I mean this is all I think the kind of the tone behind it is frustration

because that's the way he began so I mean how can it you can't be right with God you take him to trial if he asks you a question you know a thousand questions you're not gonna be able to answer even one of them and the reason it is because he's all this stuff that i described he's he's wise and hard he's mighty in strength and he not only you know like makes mountains he can remove mountains he's the one who makes the stars do their their starring and the sun do it sunning i mean he's the power behind all of this

so what chance do you have with him in fact if he like moves by you you don't see him uh you can't perceive him and uh who is going to say to god what are you doing you can't he's he is unsearchable he's unfathomable he's god and we're not so this is a this is not this is not the kind of response that we have seen so far in job it i think it is uttered from a position of frustration but he at least is as it were praising god for who he is even in the midst of his frustration well it seems like that he's he's responding to this this idea that just do the thing that you know that god wants you to do and and uh i think his answer is, are you sure you know what it is that this God wants people to do? Like, listen, like,

it's easy for me to try to, like, think of what someone might want me to do, or what words someone might want to hear, right? So if you're in a conflict with your spouse, you might be able to think, like, what could I say that could make this better? And you could try to put yourself in her position and all this stuff, because, I don't know, you're both just creatures. You're just people. Joe's being like, dude, there's not a way for you to try to come up with the right things. How would you possibly know what a God like this really wanted to hear from you? I mean, you could give him an answer a thousand times and never get this thing right. Look at the kind of god this is i mean he's you can't see him he's making the sun do its shining he's doing all this

stuff uh i'm starting to wonder if i understand this god at all in fact i don't know if anyone can even just say to him in the midst of what he's doing i don't know if you can ask him what are you doing because his this is like a another way of saying his ways are not like our ways. He's not like us, and so I don't know that you can know exactly what the magic words that he wants to hear to make all this go away are. He's way bigger than that. You're acting as though God is much more like you than he is. Yeah. Yeah, they've kind of flattened God out, you know? They've made him just a very predictable, very easy to understand, a very non-mysterious God. And, you know, it's like, oh, well, the God is just, he's a rule giver.

And if you just keep his rules, everything's cool, you know. And Job's like, oh, do you really know God? Do you think you can just sit down and have a regular conversation with God and he's very understandable and you know exactly what he wants you to do? No, he's well beyond that. Or that you would be able to know this is what God always, like God thinks this is right and this is wrong all the time. It's easy to understand it, right? Like it's easy to be blameless. Obviously, you just think about what God would like, and then you do those things.

You think about what he would dislike, and you don't do those things. So simple. All you got to do, here's ABC to ABC, and you're good with God. So he goes on, verse 13. god will not turn back his anger beneath him bow the the helpers of rahab how then can i answer him choosing my words with him though i am in the right i cannot answer him i must appeal for mercy to my accuser so first of all the helpers of rahab uh this is not like the rehab we're probably familiar with from uh beginning of joshua the prostitute there in jericho this is that which

is actually spelled differently in hebrew than this rahab that's more rahab this is uh i think we've talked about rahab before um this is the mythological sea creature that often pops up pops up in the bible so uh this he's using this mythological language to talk about god's power over the uh the elements of creation here which are uh called by the name of rahab so god won't turn back his anger. Beneath him bow the helpers of Rahab. So how can I answer him? I mean, what kind of words am I going to use to speak to him? How can I choose my words with him? Even if I'm, I love verse 15, though I am in the right, even if I'm right about this, I can't answer him. I must appeal for mercy to my accuser. So Job's saying, listen, even if I am in the right, even

if i am where i need to be i still can't answer him he's be he's beyond my ability to respond to all i can do is appeal for mercy yeah and this this appeal for uh mercy for his accusers i mean it's not just he's appealing to like both his accuser and judge right the person that's going to make the decision it's not just as though uh he's got an accuser and somebody else is going to give the verdict this is the he believes that god is both accusing him and going to be the one that delivers the judgment and uh and what's interesting about that is he said like it'd be like if you were uh accused of something you didn't do by a judge and then you're like okay if maybe i can like carefully construct my words and because i know i'm i'm not guilty of this thing i didn't

do this thing and this judge thinks i did this thing and then you realize like that's not going to work so now like all that's left for me to do is to appeal for mercy from this person for something i don't think i'm guilty of yeah and how do you do that i mean if you're in the if you're in the right how do you appeal for mercy when according to your own self-understanding you don't really need mercy you just need a right and proper judgment yeah it's like if you were on the horns of a dilemma yeah it's like if you got like pulled over for speeding and you i mean this is trite, but like if you got pulled over for speeding and he's like, you're doing a hundred miles an hour. And you're like, dude,

I was doing 30 miles an hour. What? No. Like it's like he clocked a different car that was the same exact car as your car. And then, and then I know I clocked you and you're like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. That was that car. That wasn't me. And you're starting to realize, okay, I didn't do this thing, but I am going to have to pay this ticket. and maybe i'm going to switch tactics here maybe i'm just going to say uh i just would really like the court to be lenient i'm just gonna go ahead and ask for

mercy even though i i know i didn't do this thing i think there's no i can't win this debate yeah you can't appeal for mercy without uh at least implicitly acknowledging guilt right yeah so that's what he's done i must appeal for mercy to my accuser so if i summoned him and he answered me i wouldn't believe that he was listening to my voice joe is like he's he's at the point where you could he doesn't know what to do listen if even if okay let's see i let's say i summon him all right and he actually answered then i don't i'm not at the point where i would even believe he was listening to me i'm i'm so far gone that uh even if he does say something it's really hard me to believe that he was listening when he gave the response uh because of who he is and i mean

what has he done well verse 17 he says he's uh he's crushed me with a tempest and uh multiplies my wounds without cause he won't even let me catch my breath and he fills me with with bitterness so this is the job that we've been familiar with i mean he's he's not talking about being crushed and he's he's wounded and god it's god's like chasing him he's the image i get here one of my one of them let joe black stop and catch his breath but he's chasing him is pursuing him and he's full of this he's full of bitterness and he says verse 19 if it's a contest of strength i mean if we're like if it's a wrestling match between me and god well i don't stand any chance because he's mighty if it's a matter of justice well then who can really summon him i mean he's

the judge of judges she's the king of kings he's the one who sits on the ultimate judgment throne so who who's going to be able to to summon him though i'm in the right my own mouth would condemn me and though i am blameless he would prove me perverse no hope in other words anyway any way that the joke turns uh if he summons him and god answers he's not gonna believe that he responds but he can't even really summon him because he's the ultimate judge and you know even if he's in the right then he's going to say something that is going to condemn him and even if he's even though he's blameless god is going to find something in him that proves he is he's perverse so he does this dance back and forth where he's it's like he's he's moving

around looking at every option he has and every option that he has is basically a door slammed in his face no matter what he what he does yeah i mean this is uh he feels very powerless in this in this it's like uh he's essentially saying here like this uh i could like i guess uh yeah i could demand to go to court but i feel like this court is rigged because uh that guy's got all the power yeah yeah just imagine you're you're what like people like me or you who don't have a legal background where it's like we're we're summoned to make an argument before the supreme court yeah and and just to kind of make the uh make the situation even more ludicrous everybody on the supreme court let's say are people that don't like us so that that is the

odds that joe feels he's standing before all of this this almighty judge and uh he looks and he's like you know it doesn't matter what i do it doesn't matter what i say it doesn't matter what argument i put forward nothing is going to work work for me and then he goes on to verse 21 he says i am blameless i regard not myself i loathe my life it's all one therefore i say he destroys both the blameless and the wicked when disaster brings sudden death he mocks at the calamity of the innocent the earth is given into the hand of the wicked he covers the face of its judges and if it's not he that is if god is not the one doing this then who is it so he's some bitterness i think is creeping in here well he says he's full of bitterness so

we see something leaking out yeah yeah against god i mean he's when he says he destroys both the blameless and the wicked and he mocks at the calamity of the innocent this is uh this is job giving us the real hard and honest lament here when he's looking out at everything that's going on in his own life uh he says he sees nothing he hears nothing but god mocking yeah i i kind of imagine joe's saying all this stuff and then it's like he's working up to like to this this part right here and he's saying all this stuff in that last line of verse 24 well 23 and well actually 22, that second part of 22 through 24, he's working up to

this therefore, and when he says, therefore I say this, and you can sort of, he says he destroys both the blameless and the wicked, is the opposite of what his friend just said, and so

he's, and you can sort of see imagine the look on their faces like you didn't just say that like, no dude, let me tell you what conclusion i've come to i come to the conclusion that you're wrong he destroyed it doesn't matter if you're blameless or you're wicked when disaster brings sudden death he mocks at the calamity of the internet like this is a string of things that i'm sure these guys are starting

to like step back instead in case like lightning strikes or something yeah and and from joe's perspective i mean when he looks at when he simply observes what's going on in his life how could this not be the conclusion that he comes to, right? I mean, if he is judging what is true based upon what his eyes see, there really is no other conclusion that he can draw other than that, therefore, God destroys both the blameless and the wicked because all he's experiencing is destruction, even though he himself is blameless.

Yeah, well, his friend's argument is bad things don't happen to good people. people and job's argument is yeah they do like that's that's what it is like you're wrong yeah bad things do happen to good people yeah yeah bad things happen to blameless people yes the best of people right look at look at my life and then i mean he the very last line is basically listen if god's not the one behind all this well then who would it be i mean all of this stuff is is happening and the one who you know removes mountains and places mountains in their in their in their place and one who made the sun and the stars and all the constellations well if he's not the one who's orchestrating all these events that are happening on earth well then tell me who

who would it be so it's a very it's a very strong monotheistic argument if there's one god then there's only one he behind all of these all of these things and he's obviously destroyed the righteousness with the wicked the blameless with the wicked job says he mocks at the calamity of the innocent uh all of these things are happening and god is the one who's behind them all this is kind of kind of job's perspective for this at this moment i mean we're not done with his argument uh he's actually got quite a ways to go but we're about halfway through verse i mean chapter nine and we're at the end of our uh 40 minutes so i guess i have to pick up his argument next time That's right. Well, I would like to say that Job is not wrong that bad things happen to good people.

This is obviously most exemplified in Christ, where the worst thing happens to the only truly blameless man. And of course, I think it's R.C. Sproul that used to say, bad things happen to good people, that only happened once, and he volunteered for it. And he volunteered, yes. all right great great yes sir all right man well i will see you next week all right see you then