An excerpt from the forthcoming book, God is Greater than Man: A Mystical Interpretation of Job Chapter 21: 1 ¶ Then Job replied: 2 Listen carefully to my words; let this be the consolation you give me. 3 Bear with me while I speak, and after I have spoken, mock on. 4 Is my complaint directed to man? Why should I not be impatient? 5 Look at me and be astonished; clap your hand over your mouth. 6 When I think about this, I am terrified; trembling seizes my body. 7 ¶ Why do the wicked live on, growing old and increasing in power? 8 They see their children established around them, their offspring before their eyes. 9 Their homes are safe and free from fear; the rod of God is not upon them. 10 Their bulls never fail to breed; their cows calve and do not miscarry. 11 They send forth their children as a flock; their little ones dance about. 12 They sing to the music of tambourine and harp; they make merry to the sound of the flute. 13 They spend their years in prosperity and go down to the grave in peace. 14 Yet they say to God, ‘Leave us alone! We have no desire to know your ways. 15 Who is the Almighty, that we should serve him? What would we gain by praying to him?’ 16 But their prosperity is not in their own hands, so I stand aloof from the counsel of the wicked. 17 ¶ Yet how often is the lamp of the wicked snuffed out? How often does calamity come upon them, the fate God allots in his anger? 18 How often are they like straw before the wind, like chaff swept away by a gale? 19 It is said,‘God stores up a man’s punishment for his sons.’ Let him repay the man himself, so that he will know it! 20 Let his own eyes see his destruction; let him drink of the wrath of the Almighty. 21 For what does he care about the family he leaves behind when his allotted months come to an end? 22 Can anyone teach knowledge to God, since he judges even the highest? 23 One man dies in full vigour, completely secure and at ease, 24 his body well nourished, his bones rich with marrow. 25 Another man dies in bitterness of soul, never having enjoyed anything good. 26 Side by side they lie in the dust, and worms cover them both. 27 ¶ I know full well what you are thinking, the schemes by which you would wrong me. 28 You say, ‘Where now is the great man’s house, the tents where wicked men lived?’ 29 Have you never questioned those who travel? Have you paid no regard to their accounts— 30 that the evil man is spared from the day of calamity, that he is delivered from the day of wrath? 31 Who denounces his conduct to his face? Who repays him for what he has done? 32 He is carried to the grave, and watch is kept over his tomb. 33 The soil in the valley is sweet to him; all men follow after him, and a countless throng goes before him. 34 So how can you console me with your nonsense? Nothing is left of your answers but falsehood! (NIV) Job’s observation is that the wicked live a prosperous life apart from God. They don’t need him or want him. Their lives are just fine without the rigors of serving God. What’s more, God doesn’t seem to mind. He leaves them alone. Job took such issue with Zophar’s conclusions in chapter 20 because Job had spent his entire life striving to serve and please God. Yet he had lost everything and was afflicted. “Where’s the justice? Job cries. “One man dies in full vigour, completely secure and at ease, his body well nourished, his bones rich with marrow. Another man dies in bitterness of soul, never having enjoyed anything good. Side by side they lie in the dust, and worms cover them both. The ways of God are revealed in this chapter. Job’s observations are correct. Many who are wicked do live prosperous lives. They never experience the rod of God. But here is God’s wisdom: “For those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, and He scourges every son whom He receives (Heb. 12:6).” Have you ever wondered why so many Christians never seem to experience what this study is about? Why do their lives never reflect the hardships and suffering that produce sons? The answer is found in the question posed in verse 15. Who is the Almighty, that we should serve him? What would we gain by praying to him? It’s more subtle, however, than a Christian blatantly saying, “Why should I serve God?” But to the degree that Christians are satisfied with their lives and have no hunger to grow past the initial stages of salvation, they are invisible to God. Jesus said in Rev. 3: 15 ‘I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I wish that you were cold or hot. 16 ‘So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth. 17 ‘Because you say, I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing, and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, 18 I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself, and that the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed; and eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see. 19 ‘Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent. Jesus is speaking to Christians here, not unbelievers. He advises them to buy from Him gold refined in the fire. We know that gold represents His nature. The shame of our nakedness is our fallen nature. Too much of Christianity is living in the shame of its nakedness. To “buy” refined gold means we must initiate the dealings of the Lord that produce it. The Lord does not automatically deal with every Christian. There is something of our own initiative that must be involved. Spiritual maturity does not just happen because time passes. We have to want it. We must actively seek to “buy” the refined gold. The word buy is also used in these passages because buying implies cost. Attaining refined gold costs us something. What do we give in exchange for the Lord’s nature to be established in us? It costs us our lives. We give everything in exchange for the refined gold of the Lord. This is God’s deal with His people: We give Him everything and He gives us everything that is His (John 16:12-15). Whether it’s the wicked or God’s own people, they are left alone by God if they are not actively seeking Him. This principle is established in James 4:8: “Draw near to God and he will draw near to you.” The initiative is ours. There is a day of judgment when all must appear before the judgment seat of Christ and give an account for their lives (2nd Cor. 5:10). In that sense no one escapes the consequences of their deeds. But this study is not about the hereafter; we are concerned about receiving from the Lord now. We don’t want to be ignored by God. In Jer. 29:13 it says, “You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart.” We can be as those Christians in Rev. 3, thinking we are rich and have need of nothing. We will continue in what appears to be a blessed and prosperous life right up to the grave, or we can buy from the Lord eye salve to anoint our eyes that we may see our need. God initiated the hardship and sufferings in Job’s life because He found in Job a desire to serve Him and be pleasing in His sight. The Lord is faithful. He will always respond to our cries to have more of Him. We want to look at one last example of Job’s complaint and God’s wisdom in the parable of the wheat and tares found in Mat. 13: 24 ¶ Jesus presented another parable to them, saying, The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. 25 But while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went away. 26 But when the wheat sprouted and bore grain, then the tares became evident also. 27 The slaves of the landowner came and said to him, ‘Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares?’ 28 And he said to them, ‘An enemy has done this!’ The slaves *said to him, ‘Do you want us, then, to go and gather them up?’ 29 But he *said, ‘No; for while you are gathering up the tares, you may uproot the wheat with them. 30 ‘Allow both to grow together until the harvest; and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, First gather up the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them up; but gather the wheat into my barn.‘ When the tares are discovered in the landowner’s field, the slaves ask the landowner if he wants them gathered up. The landowner says no because the wheat might be uprooted with the tares. “Allow them both to grow together until the harvest,” he says. This corresponds to the passages in John 15 that we read earlier. Jesus is the vine and we are the branches. The branches that bear fruit the Father prunes that they bear more fruit. Listen to what Jesus said about the branches that don’t bear fruit: “If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned.” This is the same fate as the tares in Mat. 13. The tares and wheat grow together. Both the tares and the wheat are God’s people. The burning of the tares and the dried branches does not mean they are sent to hell, it means the output of their lives is burned up because it wasn’t the product of the Lord’s life (nature) within them. They suffer bitter loss. 1st Cor. 3: 11 ¶ For no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if any man builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, 13 each man’s work will become evident; for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man’s work. 14 If any man’s work which he has built on it remains, he will receive a reward. 15 If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire. While the tares are bundled and burned in our parable, the landowner’s wheat is gathered into his barn. Although everything grows together for a season, eventually there is a separation. The harvest is not a one time deal. There is a perpetual harvest taking place within us. God continually “gathers the wheat into His barn” as the tares of our life are burned up. Back to Mat. 13: 36 Then He left the crowds and went into the house. And His disciples came to Him and said, Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field. 37 And He said, The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man, 38 and the field is the world; and as for the good seed, these are the sons of the kingdom; and the tares are the sons of the evil one; 39 and the enemy who sowed them is the devil, and the harvest is the end of the age; and the reapers are angels. 40 So just as the tares are gathered up and burned with fire, so shall it be at the end of the age. 41 The Son of Man will send forth His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all stumbling blocks, and those who commit lawlessness, 42 and will throw them into the furnace of fire; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 43 Then THE RIGHTEOUS WILL SHINE FORTH AS THE SUN in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear. Jesus’ explanation of this parable to His disciples is that the tares are sons of the evil one (vs. 37-39). It’s the devil who sowed the tares into the field. This is not a contradiction to the tares also being God’s people, as previously stated. Jesus is speaking mystical truths here and they must be understood on a spiritual level. The deeper truths of the kingdom always apply to what is taking place IN us, not outside of us. There is only one group of people in this parable. The “sons of the evil one” represent the fallen, Adamic nature. The devil has indeed sown that nature into us, and he is the father of it. But the wheat, which is the sons of the kingdom, represent those who have had that nature dealt with, producing the fruit of Christ’s life within them. The last verse of Jesus’ explanation of the parable is, “Then THE RIGHTEOUS WILL SHINE FORTH AS THE SUN in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear.” It’s only the Lord’s nature in us that is righteous. It’s Christ’s nature that shines forth as the sun.
Posted on: Mon, 05 Jan 2015 21:21:17 +0000
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