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| Book: The Challenges of Job (Job, chapters 32-42) SERIES 3 of 3 in Job : PART 2 of 5 : CHAPTERS 34 & 35
Study No.6 Passage: Job 34:1-12 Title: Elihu God does no wrong |
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A. Find Out1. What does Elihu call his listeners to do? v.1-4 2. What had Job been saying? v.5,6 3. What does he say of Job and why? v.7-9 4. What principle does he declare about God? v.10 5. How does God often work? v. 11 6. So, what again does he declare about God? v.12
B. Think:1. What had been Job's first complaint covered by Elihu? See 33:9,10 2. What had been his second complaint covered? See 33:13 3. What now is the third complaint covered? v.5,9 C. Comment:As we've just seen, Elihu is holding Job to account for the various things he has said. First Job's complaint was that he was sinless but nevertheless appeared as God's enemy. Second, that God didn't seem to be listening to him and certainly not answering him. Now he claims that God denies him justice (v.5). So, listeners, listen to all this and think about it (v.2-4) because there is yet a further expression of Job's complaint: it seems pointless to try to please God (v.9). In this Job is putting himself into the category of those who pour out scorn about God (v.7) and who enjoy the company of bad men who revile God (implied, v.8). So how does Elihu seek to deal with these complaints? Elihu simply states a general principle: God does no wrong! (v.10,12). If He seems to be doing bad to a person it is the fruit of their actions that He is bringing back on them (v.11). Now the principle of v.10 & 12 is exactly right and verse 11 is so often true but not here. This, we have seen many times, is not what this is all about. We really do need to hold on to the statements of verses 10 & 12. I have said many times in my preaching career' that if we do not understand what is going on, I believe when we get to heaven the Lord will show us and we will see that we never have any cause to criticise God for what He has or has not done in our lives! Hold that!
D. Application:1. Declare your absolute trust in God's goodness. 2. Thank Him that He does all things well.
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| Book: The Challenges of Job (Job, chapters 32-42) SERIES 3 of 3 in Job : PART 2 of 5 : CHAPTERS 34 & 35
Study No.7 Passage: Job 34:13-23 Title: Elihu God fairly judges |
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A. Find Out1. What question does Elihu next ask? v.13 2. What does he say about God? v.14,15 3. What does he ask about justice? v.17 4. How does God deal with the rich? v.18-20 5. What does he say about how God sees? v.21,22 6. With what conclusion? v.23
B. Think:1. What does Elihu declare
about God's justice here?
2. Why doesn't God need
to ask men about their lives at judgement?
C. Comment:Elihu has just made that strong statement that God does no wrong (v.10,12). Now he points out God's greatness. Did anyone appoint God as lord over the world? (v.13). Of course not, He is the Creator of it. He is so great and so powerful that He could bring it to an end in an instant if He wanted to (v.14,15). God is clearly a ruler over all things but can you rule and keep and maintain order (implied) unless you are just and so God is just! (v.17). Without justice anarchy and chaos ensue and the creation is not chaotic. Justice here means everything working fairly and rightly and Elihu maintains that is how God works. Look, he continues, He deals with all peoples and deals with them all the same, so that the rich and powerful are answerable to Him just as the poor man is (v.18,19), and He brings speedy judgment to all as it is needed (v.20). Moreover God sees everything (v.21) and so no one's actions are hidden from Him, there is no darkness or dark places that He does not see into (v.22). The truth is that when people come and stand before Him in judgment, He doesn't have to ask them what they have done because He has already been watching their lives and knows exactly what they have done (v.23). The implication here is that everything points to God being a just God His power and His observation all point to it. He is just!
D. Application:1. God has no reason
to be unjust. You can trust in His fairness.
2. Thank Him for the
security that we have in this knowledge.
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| Book: The Challenges of Job (Job, chapters 32-42) SERIES 3 of 3 in Job : PART 2 of 5 : CHAPTERS 34 & 35
Study No.8 Passage: Job 34:24-30 Title: Elihu God's hidden judgment |
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A. Find Out1. What does God do and why? v.24,25 2. In doing that what is He doing and why? v.26,27 3. How had they brought that on themselves? v.28 4. How does He sometimes operate? v.29a,b 5. Yet what is He still doing? v.29c,30
B. Think:1. What point is Elihu
making in verses 24 to 28?
2. Yet what point does
he make in verse 29?
3. How are we not to
misunderstand that?
C. Comment:Elihu has been saying that God does no wrong. He then went on to say that God is impartial in His judgements. He doesn't have to ask about an individual's sins because He sees everything. Thus He acts against the powerful and ungodly without having to ask (v.24) because He has been watching what they have been doing (v.25). All we see are His acts of judgement against them (v.25,26) but it is obvious that is because they were both ungodly (v.27) and had been oppressing the poor (v.28). Ungodliness and unrighteousness go hand in hand! But the fact is that often He appears to remain silent and hidden from us (v.29a) but we must always remember that even if He is doing that, He is still Lord over all things and He will continue to bring judgement or discipline to the earth (v.29b,30). Merely because we do not see His activity, that does not mean he is not acting. He does still see and will still hold the ungodly to account. In all of this Elihu is laying down a theology of God's righteousness. He has been laying down key principles: 1. God never does wrong. 2. God's judgements are always right because He sees absolutely everything and knows everything that happens. 3. He does act against ungodliness and unrighteousness. 4. Sometimes we may not be able to see His presence or His activity, but He is still there, He still sees and He is still acting against wrong.
D. Application:1. Again, are we convinced
of God's goodness?
2. Do we realise He is always working into His world?
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| Book: The Challenges of Job (Job, chapters 32-42) SERIES 3 of 3 in Job : PART 2 of 5 : CHAPTERS 34 & 35
Study No.9 Passage: Job 34:31-37 Title: Elihu Absence of Repentance |
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A. Find Out 1. What does Elihu envisage a man (Job?) doing? v.31,32 2. But then what does he envisage him doing? v.33 3. What had been said to him? v.34,35 4. What do they want to happen and why? v.36 5. What had they said Job had done? v.37
B. Think:1. Of what failure does Elihu first speak in v.31-33? 2. What had others said Job had done? C. Comment:Elihu now moves from the general to the specific and the specific is about Job! However he approaches Job indirectly. He envisages a hypothetical man coming to repentance (v.31) who goes to God acknowledging his wrong and saying he will not do it again (v.32). But then he envisages him, despite his words, NOT repenting! (v.33). He asks the hypothetical question, should that man be rewarded for using words but having no acts to back them? The obvious implication is that this is what Job has done just used words. So then he becomes more direct. He calls on others to hear and declare what they think (v.34). Job, he says, has spoken without knowledge (v.35). The Lord Himself uses the same words (38:2). It is true; Job spoke without knowing what had gone on in the courts of heaven and so he had not known the true reason for what had happened and therefore he had jumped to wrong conclusions (e.g. that God was his enemy). Really, he goes on, Job deserves to be tested to the very end of this for answering as he has done (v.36) until he comes to see the truth (implied). To the folly of speaking out without knowledge he has uttered words that are tantamount to rebellion against God and he just kept on doing it, adding more and more words (v.37). This is a telling and truthful indictment. The good news is that although the Lord will correct him He will not hold it against him when Job sees what he has done (and that will happen!).
D. Application:1. Beware speaking about what you only half understand! 2. Beware slipping into criticising God.
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| Book: The Challenges of Job (Job, chapters 32-42) SERIES 3 of 3 in Job : PART 2 of 5 : CHAPTERS 34 & 35
Study No.10 Passage: Job 35:1-8 Title: Elihu Conflicting Arguments |
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A. Find Out1. What had Job maintained? v.2 2. Yet what had he said at the same time? v.3 3. What did Elihu want Job to do? v.5 4. What questions did he then ask? v.6,7 5. What conclusion did he reach? v.8
B. Think:1. What had been the conflict in what Job had previously said? 2. What point was Elihu making in verses 5-8? C. Comment:Elihu has previously declared that Job had spoken unwisely. Now he gives an example of that and asks him to consider whether what he had said was just and true? (v.2a). On one hand Job had maintained he was righteous and that God would clear him of wrongdoing (v.2b) but in a bad following moment in his anguish, he had wondered, in the face of his suffering, what was the point of trying to please God by not doing wrong (v.3). OK, says Elihu, I have an answer for you and your friends (v.4): look upwards! (v.5). Looking at the magnitude and unchanging nature of Creation can often put things in perspective for us. Our petty quibbles, and even our small lives, fade into insignificance in the face of Creation. We actually need the Lord to bring significance to our lives. Then he asks a very simple question: how does our wrong doing affect God? (v.6). How does our right doing affect him? (v.7) i.e. is God's character affected by our actions and, of course, the answer is no. God may feel differently about us in His love for us, when we behave in different ways, but His character is completely unchanged. No, says Elihu, your wrongs or your right doing affect only yourself (v.8). Therefore to say what do I gain from not sinning (v.3) is silly if you are saying it to have a go at God. It's like you are shooting yourself in the foot for you are the one you hurt most when you sin, so that is just silly talk! There is a great truth here and many of us fail to see this, that our wrong living hurts us more than others!
D. Application:1. God's character remains unchanged by our behaviour. 2. God's feelings may be moved by our behaviour. Think on that.
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| Book: The Challenges of Job (Job, chapters 32-42) SERIES 3 of 3 in Job : PART 2 of 5 : CHAPTERS 34 & 35
Study No.11 Passage: Job 35:9-16 Title: Elihu Who God ignores |
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A. Find Out: 1. How and why do men pray? v.9 2. But what don't they say? v.10,11 3. What doesn't God do? v.12,13 4. What two things had Job been saying? v.14,15 5. Do what does Elihu conclude? v.16
B. Think:1. What point does Elihu make in verses 9 to 11? 2. What is he saying in verses 12 & 13? 3. How had Job spoken foolishly? C. Comment:Elihu had just dealt with one wrong thing that Job had said; now he deals with another which he doesn't actually speak out until the end of the chapter. He berates Job for objecting to not being able to see God and discuss with him his situation (v.14) and for also saying that God doesn't bother with or take notice of wickedness (v.15). Working towards this, Elihu points out that people do cry out to God when they are oppressed (v.9) but in their desperation they do not berate God (v.10,11) demanding where He is. Usually people in distress are humble (implied). Indeed, he continues, when the arrogant do call out and berate Him, He doesn't bother to answer (v.12,13). In reality there is no point the Lord replying to them for they only hear what they want to hear. When we come into a right attitude and right relationship with the Lord, then we start hearing again and then we start seeing' but until then it is a futile thing to be demanding of the Lord who is the Almighty and all-wise One. It is just because God stays silent, because of these things, that it is foolish of Job to make such demands of the Lord and his words are judged empty and foolish (v.16 implied). It is a thing we have to learn, that the Lord in His wisdom, knows that when we are in a bad frame of mind there is no point His answering our ranting demands.
D. Application:1. God often remains silent until we come to our senses. 2. The moment we do, He is there speaking.
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| Book: The Challenges of Job (Job, chapters 32-42) SERIES 3 of 3 in Job : PART 2 of 5 : CHAPTERS 34 & 35
Title: RECAP 2: "Elihu Continues" Chapters 34,35 |
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| SUMMARY:
In this second group of 5 studies we have seen Elihu: • answering another of Job's complaints, declaring that God does no wrong, • declaring God sees all and impartially deals with all and none are hidden from Him, • saying God sees and judges but He Himself is sometimes hidden, • considering a hypothetical man who says words but doesn't repent. It is Job! • challenging Job's wrong words, • declaring our sins don't change God,. • declaring the Lord ignores the rantings of the arrogant, • declaring how God uses suffering to save men.
COMMENT :In these middle two chapters of Elihu's speaking, we find him challenging Job on specific things he has said his claim to righteousness, and his putting God in the wrong. Elihu refutes these things and speaks of how God responds or rather doesn't respond to our foolish rantings. Mostly though, he declares God's utter goodness and inability to do wrong or be unjust. Powerful assertions!
LESSONS?1. We need to be sure that God never does wrong. 2. Similarly that God is never unjust. 3. Similarly that God is utterly good. 4. God's character is never changed by our behaviour.
PRAY :Thank and praise the Lord for all you know of Him, for His goodness and love, for His fairness and compassion, and for His encouragement and care.
PART 3: "More from Elihu"In the final two chapters of Elihu speaking, he further declares Gods justice and warns against wrong reactions in the face of God's mighty power.
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