DAY 183 HEARING CLEARLY Job 22 & 23 and Acts 11

DAY 183

HEARING CLEARLY

Job 22 & 23 and Acts 11

There are times in our lives and subjects in our minds that often prevent us from hearing and understanding. Today we have two stories: one where people continue not to hear each other, and one where they hear and understand a new story.

Not hearing: in many ways I feel like Job’s so called friends cannot hear him. Their idea of God and how God operates has such a strong hold on their minds that they screen out anything that does not line up with their notion of things.

Job’s friends are saying, “Look, God doesn’t just punish people willy-nilly, you have not only done something very wrong, you are an unrighteous person.” In fact Eliphaz says, “Is not your evil abundant? There is no end to your iniquities.” He even accuses Job of holding an attitude of “What does God know?”

Job throughout has been portraying a different image of God. It is not that Job is saying he is sinless. No, what Job is saying is that he wants to plead his case to God, he says, “God would pay attention to me.” He is so confident in God’s character that he believes he can come before him. It is not without trepidation that Job would come before God as Job writes, “But He is God, He will do what He wants and I am terrified at his presence.” Job is terrified of the greatness and goodness of God, but he also is confident in the nature of God.

His friends, because of their strong views, cannot accept his views, but Job’s views are not some new idea. The Scriptures testify to the nature of God, and so does Jesus. My sense is that it is Jesus’ nature that paved the way for the apostles to accept the God was welcoming the Gentiles into the kingdom. Imagine the situation. The Apostles have been working to convince their Jewish brothers and sisters that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah and in the middle of this mission, the Holy Spirit is poured out upon the Gentiles. Their reaction, “And they glorified God saying, “Then to the Gentiles also God has granted repentance that leads to life.”…and a great number appeared to the Lord.” What a great reaction! The Apostles could hear and receive this news.

Rooted in this reaction, this hearing, is a clear sense of God’s nature. As you have been reading the Old Testament and New Testament together my prayer is that you are getting a full and balanced sense of the is all-powerful, justice-seeking, holy, merciful and loving God – those are a lot of adjectives to hold together, but God is infinitely able.