We all stand to be overwhelmed at
times by the shock and awe of storms that come into our lives, but it is in the
reflections of those storms where the spiritual danger lies. Giving an ear to the
devil or the self-righteous is not going to help in the struggle. We have
something Job did not; we have the Scriptures. To
prevent thinking wrongly about God, we need to be Word-driven before the shadows
appear. Ignorance of the Word is the greatest enemy we have to deal with in the
valleys because ignorance does not and cannot foster trust in God when stuff
hits the fan.
Rather than focusing on trusting
in God, the enemy uses the why and how could thinking to distract and
detour us away from that. Invariably, the devil moves into the shadows like a
serpent with great subtlety and sneakiness to suggest all kinds of negative
scenarios to leverage against our ignorance of the Word and to create doubt and mistrust
in God.
Trust is only strengthened by a
personal relationship with Yahweh and knowledge of the Scriptures. If you are
born again but carnal, and your knowledge of the Bible is weak, you will be
overtaken by the shadows. It is imperative for all believers to trust in God (Psa
23:4; Prov 3:5-6) no matter the severity of the situation.
We simply cannot
wait until we are in the valley to nurture a relationship with Yahweh and to
learn of Him and His ways. We cannot think of the right thoughts of God and follow His
path if we are suffering from spiritual anemia and blindsided by a storm. Job
never made claim to be spiritually perfect, but having a spiritual resume like
his (Job 1:1, 8) goes a long way in maintaining spiritual integrity when things
get rough, and they will.
Verses like Job 13:15 doesn’t become
a reality overnight or because of guilt. It comes only through a deep abiding relationship
with Yahweh, a pure heart, and a prepared spirit disciplined by years of loving
obedience. It is remarkable the level of understanding Job possessed of God,
living in a time when there was no special revelation given. We have access to
all the revelation of God today in knowing and doing God’s will for our lives,
even in the shadows of life.
Oral traditions concerning God
Almighty must have been handed down by Noah and his three sons and passed along
to their descendants to choose to live accordingly or not. Conservative
scholarship maintains that the book of Job is the oldest book of the Bible;
however, our English Bible is organized thematically rather than
chronologically which is why Job is not positioned in the OT as the first book
in our English Bible.
As we watched the clouds drift
above the Atlantic Ocean that day, you could almost feel as if their shadows were
being dragged across the waters. God ordains the direction of the clouds, and
He determines where and when they intersect with us. Shadows of roughness
do not choose the time or place when they enter our lives; this is governed by the winds of God’s sovereignty. He oversees that the shadow creatures strictly comply with
His will. It must be so; don’t you think? Otherwise, God would not be sovereign
of the universe.
Rom 8:28 is often quoted during
smooth sailing, but rarely or never quoted when the waters get tumultuous, “And
we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those
who are the called according to His
purpose,” regardless of the circumstances. Naturally, the devil is not going to
promote that idea. No, he attempts to tear down the idea of the goodness of God
in the eyes of the very man he is trying to destroy instead. Our adversary
would have us think in times of trials, “You call this good? How could any
good possibly come out of this?” Listening to these types of questions are
designed to steer our heart and mind from trusting in God. The body language of
the enemy is always finger-pointing.
There are many people who get
hung up about God allowing bad things to happen to good people because they
think God owes them for being good (contrast Isa 64:6; Rom 3:10, 12)! When He
doesn’t ante up, He is accused of being unjust or unfair. We never read in
Scripture where God is indebted to man for anything for any reason. Actually, it’s
the other way around; we owe God our all.
Being in the shadows of a storm
has a way of helping us in calibrating our will to His will for His glory. It
is too bad that it has to get to that point at times in our lives when we allow
sin into our lives. To be clear, I am not contradicting what I said earlier by suggesting
here that Job was in sin and the cause for all of his troubles. Sometimes bad things
do happen to good people, and there is no sin or trace of rebellion to be
found, no syncing up of our will to His will as in the case of Job.
Only God knows the reason for
all the terrible things that happened to Job and his family on that fateful day.
We have the luxury to get a glimpse behind the scenes before the storm hit
Job and his family. Ironically, we don’t perceive of a possible glimpse behind
the scenes going through some of the valleys in our life; do we? Rather, we
treat our negative situations as misfortune or random acts of chaos. Since love
(agape) is an eternal attribute of God, it was the God of love that allowed
Satan to enter the hedge of protection of God’s servant, Job.
For God to be the Almighty God,
nothing enters our lives unless God permits and orchestrates. God’s permission given
to Satan to attack us in no way changes the fact that God is love; nor does the
allowance of sin in the world mean that God is not eternally holy. The devil
and our faulty reasoning make an issue of a fake issue. If Satan could
circumvent God’s permission then Yahweh would not be sovereign.
This is really where trust comes
into play, particularly if you have a spiritual resume like Job (Job 1:1, 8),
and the next thing you know; you are blinded-sided by a full-blown disaster on
your hands without any warning. If anyone had a “right” to complain about bad
things happening to good people, it would have been Job himself (Job 1:1), but
he didn’t complain! And after it was all said and done, God never informed Job
as to the why of it all. Read of Job’s response to each wave of attacks by
the enemy,
“In
all this Job did not sin nor charge God with wrong” (Job 1:22).
“In all
this Job did not sin with his lips” (Job 2:10c).
When
Job’s so-called friends, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar discovered what happened
to Job, they were visually stunned. They came to the conclusion, as many do when
bad things happen to good people, there was sin in Job’s life; in their mind how
else could one account for this!? Ever notice when tragedy strikes a believer,
most think it is sin-related?
People
think this way because (1) they hold to a view of God that is not supported by
the Scriptures (or oral traditions as in the case of Job) and (2) They are
naïve concerning spiritual warfare being waged against the saints (Job 1:8; 2:3,
“Have you considered My servant Job…?”).
It
is important to note that the eternal God of love and holiness instigated the
attack on Job’s family, servants, possessions, and health. The devil and
his minions knew there was no opening in the hedge or force field. Otherwise,
they would be out for blood like mosquitoes. Being righteous or slap-dab in the
middle of God’s will at any given time doesn’t immune any believer from attack
by the enemy if God so decrees an invasion into our life; the hedge is hinged,
and in pours the enemy.
Have
you ever come out of a dark and brutal storm and said something like this?
“And
he [Job] said: ‘Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return
there. The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD (Job 1:21, emphasis mine).’” This
is not what Satan wanted to hear (contrast Job 1:11; 2:5)!
Job
blessed Yahweh while the devil was convinced that he would curse God because he
knew most men do, but Job was not like most men (Job 1:1, 8). You see; the
devil is not all-knowing like the LORD; he is a very powerful creature indeed
because Yahweh made him so, but he is not
the Creator God. If we had lost all of our kids like Job, we probably wouldn’t
be quoting Job who made such faith statements under great duress. No, we would
be crying out, “Why? How could…?” And the devil slithers our way and questions
the whereabouts of God in all of this, and how could a God of love do this or
that to us?!”
Do
you know why God is silent on why bad things happen to good people as He was
with Job? Because the issue is not about the why or the how could, but
it is about trusting in Him in every storm shadow that comes our way. If God is everywhere present, and He is, then God is with us in the shadows, too (Psa 23:4; Heb 13:5)!
Trusting
in Him and knowing the Scriptures are
the best way in dealing with all of the dark, darker, and darkest shadows that cross our paths. In other words, trust is living
without questioning the why or how. It just stays the course regardless
of the shadow cast (Prov 3:5-6). <><
%20MG%20t-bkgrd%2060x44%20png.png){kind=small}
%20sunflower%2045x63%20png.png){kind=small}
 |
| End of Series |
