Job is a prologue to the bible because if you don’t understand the crisis in Job, then you won’t know how to read your bible. You need the right perception of divine revelation, and Job gives that to you. Is divine revelation something that you question, or something that gives you answers? And if it is something that gives you answers, what do you do? You listen.
This is going to depend on how you view the wisdom of man.
The issue with questions is not the asking of questions, but it is when those questions make demands, demands which diminish authority. When somebody questions the bible from a Christian worldview, they’ve already assumed that the Bible is an authority. It is okay to question the Bible—not to test its validity but observe its validity. The issue of questioning is sometimes an issue of skepticism or doubting something. But questioning becomes bad when its goal is to disparage that viewpoint. Don’t be afraid of people asking questions, be afraid of people using them as a front for disbelief of the Bible.
It’s all in the motive, and in whose wisdom you trust: God’s, or man’s.
Job 23
Begins Job’s answer to Eliphaz.
Job 23:1-2
This complaint is both a thought process as well as physical. Job is saying his entire being as he thinks and as he physically feels (hand is an image of strength/power) is completely worn out and bitter. Job is desperate, but we have to ask ourselves what for?
Job 23:3
This is a wish statement, what Job is desperate for. What Job means by “find God” is he wants a physical location; he already has a relationship with Him. He needs direct access to God. This is an important contextual reality because at this point as Job is talking with his friends, he knows further debate is futile.
At that moment you begin to answer the set of introductory questions I’ve asked. What is the relationship of divine revelation? You have to address divine revelation as not something you can question, but as something that gives answers. Job is arguing that he needs to go directly to the source because that alone can provide answers.
Job 23:4
Divine revelation is two things in Job’s mind. First, divine revelation is information about Job’s situation. Second, divine revelation is revelation of the divine. Job wants to find out information pertaining to his situation, but hand and hand in that are that there is also information pertaining to who God is within that.
Continuing from verse three’s wish statement. He wishes that he could present his case to God. The fact that Job wishes this presumes two things: 1. That God is right or just, 2. That God is personal and cares. Job hopes he finds God and he would find this kind of God.
Job 23:5
Job wants an answer from God. The nature of divine revelation presents answers. Your job isn’t to destroy or to doubt any of the answers, your job is to listen to the answers. That becomes what Job depicts divine revelation as.
Job is hoping God will do what he has never done because God never answers in the book of Job. Satan answers God. Job’s friends answer each other, you can even see this in 23:1. God has never answered though.
Job 23:6
Job is saying that what he hopes for is that compassion would balance out God's might and that He would demonstrate that He’s good.
Job 23:7
Job’s wish is that God is upright so He would be willing to interact with the upright. How is Job described earlier on in the book? As upright, so the implication is that Job is one of these individuals. Job desires a personal God who cares and is right and just.
Job 23:8-9
Job doesn’t know if his wish will come true. God is one of a kind, unique, so Job doesn’t know if this will work.
Job 23:10
Job says that he may not know how to find God, but God knows how to find him. There is an implication that trials purify and refine us. Think about 1 Peter with similar imagery. What Job is saying is that God knows his ways so when he is tried, he will be vindicated because he hasn’t done anything wrong.
Is Job right or wrong here? He’s wrong, he didn’t do anything totally wrong, but he is still a sinner. The reason Job can come and talk to God is because he will eventually have a mediator. The reason that Job is accepted before God is because that mediator was instrumental in allowing Job to have forgiveness of his sins. When Job is tried, he will come out as gold, but not because he is golden, but because that trial has refined him through the mediator.
Job 23:11-12
Job says that with his life and doctrine that he has remained committed to the Lord. Job wishes for a right and just and that would counterbalance God’s power to do whatever He wants. Job doesn’t know how God’s power works with His rightness, with His justness, with His power. No one has told Job how it works.
Job 23:13
Therein lies the problem, God is one of a kind. Gob withholds certain pieces of information from Job, so the value of that information goes up.
Job 23:14
In Job’s mind, God’s power overrules everything.
Job 23:15-17
God’s power is a wild card for Job. If God always wins then God is back in the Bildad situation. Job is not sure how it is all balanced, he hopes it is balanced, but he doesn’t know. The divine retribution system says that God is just, and He uses all His power to enforce that justice. Job wants God to not only be the judge but also the justifier and that He will use his power to that end. He doesn’t know it is a fact, but you do.
Divine revelation, the rest of it, reveals that what Job hoped for and really wished for is true. So, when you deal with people who are suffering you need to help them understand that God’s power doesn’t just mean he does whatever he wants arbitrarily. His power is used to facilitate both His compassion and His justice, and none are ever compromised. This is what Job was unsure of. We know that God’s sovereignty enforces His compassion. You don’t put these things together, they work together. In Job’s mind, only one can win, but he hopes they all win.