1.16.25 – Job 20

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Welcome to Add Bible, an audio daily devotion from the Ezra Project. Alan J. Huth shares a Bible passage with comments from over 35 years of his personal Bible reading journals and applies the Word of God to our daily lives.

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Today we are in Job chapter 20. Zophar speaks. He talks about how the wicked will suffer. Let’s listen in. The faith comes by hearing his recording of Job 20. Job 20.

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Then Zophar the Naamathite answered and said, Therefore my thoughts answer me, because of my haste within me. I hear censure that insults me, and out of my understanding a spirit answers me. Do you not know this from of old, since man was placed on earth, that the exulting of the wicked is short, and the joy of the godless but for a moment? Though his height mount up to the heavens and his head reach to the clouds, he will perish forever like his own dung. Those who have seen him will say, Where is he? He will fly away like a dream and not be found. He will be chased away like a vision of the night. The eye that saw him will see him no more, nor will his place any more behold him. His children will seek the favor of the poor, and his hands will give back his wealth. His bones are full of his youthful vigor, but it will lie down with him in the dust. Though evil is sweet in his mouth, though he hides it under his tongue, though he is loath to let it go and holds it in his mouth, yet his food is turned in his stomach. It is the venom of cobras within him. He swallows down riches and vomits them up again. God casts them out of his belly. He would suck the poison of cobras. The tongue of a viper will kill him. He will not look upon the rivers, the streams flowing with honey and curds. He will give back the fruit of his toil and will not swallow it down. From the profit of his trading he will get no enjoyment, for he has crushed and abandoned the poor. He has seized a house that he did not build. Because he knew no contentment in his belly, he will not let anything in which he delights escape him. There was nothing left after he had eaten. Therefore his prosperity will not endure. In the fullness of his sufficiency he will be in distress. The hand of everyone in misery will come against him. To fill his belly to the full, God will send his burning anger against him and rain it upon him into his body. He will flee from an iron weapon. A bronze arrow will strike him through. It is drawn forth and comes out of his body. The glittering point comes out of his gallbladder. Terrors come upon him. Utter darkness is laid up for his treasures. A fire not fanned will devour him. What is left in his tent will be consumed. The heavens will reveal his iniquity and the earth will rise up against him. The possessions of his house will be carried away, dragged off in the day of God’s wrath. This is the wicked man’s portion from God, the heritage decreed for him by God.

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Job chapter 19 ended with these great words from Job himself. for i know that my redeemer lives and at the last he will stand upon the earth and after my skin has been thus destroyed yet in my flesh i shall see god he then concludes that chapter with these words if you say and he is speaking to his friends how will we pursue him and the root of the matter is found in him Be afraid of the sword, for wrath brings the punishment of the sword, that you may know there is a judgment. As he finishes those words, his friend Zophar probably interrupts, leading us into chapter 20. The basis of his answer to Job is in the first few verses. Let’s look at verse 2 and following. Zophar says, Therefore my thoughts answer me, because of my haste within me. I hear censure that insults me, and out of my understanding a spirit answers me. do you not know this from of old since man was placed on earth that the exalting of the wicked is short and the joy of the godless but for a moment the rest of the chapter talks about he and his and he is talking about the wicked And in my journal in 2015, concerning Job chapters 20 and 21, concerning 20, I wrote, Zophar is correct. The wicked will be judged before God, but he is wrong in inferring that Job is wicked. So, yes, chapter 20 reminds us that the wicked will face judgment. so far says it many ways verse seven he will perish forever like his own dung verse eight he will fly away like a dream and not be found first nine the eye that saw him will see him no more nor will his place any more behold him verse fifteen he swallows down riches and vomits them up again Verse 18, he will give back the fruit of his toil. Verse 22, in the fullness of his sufficiency, he will be in distress. The hand of everyone in misery will come against him. Verse 23, God will send his burning anger against him. So yes, God will eventually judge the wicked. But we see wickedness around us, don’t we? And it seems like oftentimes it prospers, and sometimes even at our expense. We see plenty of people who are ungodly, but they seem to prosper and enjoy life. And we have conversations about how they get away with it. And yet we try to live a righteous life and we seem to suffer. It doesn’t seem very fair, does it? And friends, yes, all that is true. But it’s temporary. God will eventually judge the wicked. The difficulty here in chapter 20 is that Zophar is basically accusing Job of being in that category. He was aware of Job’s life and he knew the prosperity he used to enjoy. And these guys are trying to find answers as to why that has all disappeared. So in their humanity, they decide that it must be Job’s fault. Job even understands that as we go back to chapter 19 verse 28 when he says the root of the matter is found in him. That’s what he thinks that they think. Let’s look at how Zophar concludes this chapter, starting with verse 27, speaking directly to Job. The heavens will reveal his iniquity and the earth will rise up against him. The possessions of his house will be carried away, dragged off in the day of God’s wrath. This is the wicked man’s portion from God, the heritage decreed for him by God. That’s what’s happened to Job, and that’s Zophar’s conclusion, is that it’s Job’s fault. And Job is going to respond in chapter 21. So what do we do with this chapter? I believe our first application is to understand wicked exists alongside righteousness every day of our lives. And though we see wicked prosper, it will not prosper forever. God is just and he will judge the wicked. So we ought to be able to be more peaceful as we see these conditions around us. Secondly, we ought never to be drawn into the wickedness of this world. We don’t need it to have prosperity in life. God is our provider. He will prosper us. Remain faithful. Remain righteous. And lastly, be careful to judge those around you who may be suffering. I think I’ve learned this lesson over the years of my life. I, like Job’s friends, probably thought if people were suffering, it was because of the things they did. The root of the matter was found in them. That’s what I thought. But I believe that’s not the case anymore. I have no idea why they’re suffering or what they’ve done or not done. I don’t know what tests God is taking them through in their lives. So, I have become much less judgmental. I hope that’s an application we can all apply in our lives after reading Job 20. Let’s pray. Father, we thank you for this chapter that reminds us that you will judge the wicked. It’s up to you, not us. And we pray, Lord, for strength not to be drawn into the wickedness of this world. We pray that we would depend on you as Jehovah Jireh, our provider. And we pray that we would have mercy on those suffering around us and not judgment. Thank you for these applications to our lives out of Job chapter 20. Continue to strengthen us as we spend time in your word. In the name of Jesus we ask it. Amen. Thanks for listening to AdBible today. You might wonder how I became a daily Bible reader. When I was 15 years old, a buddy and me stole his father’s car. We could steal his father’s car because his father was in Vietnam, serving in the war. So he was never home. So we took the car that day, neither one of us with a driver’s license, and we took off out east of Colorado Springs on a dirt road. We were flying down this dirt road at 60 miles an hour, and he lost control of the car. We began to spin, and we were going down the road, fishtailing, and he spun the wheel of the car, 60 miles an hour. The car tumbled, crushed the top, tucked the wheels under, totaled the car. I was on a dirt road. I don’t know if I was thrown out of the car or crawled out of the car, but I looked at that car, and I thought, am I even alive? Am I broken? Am I bleeding everywhere? And I began to pat myself down, and I felt like I was okay. So I stood up, and I was uninjured, amazingly. The sheriff came to draw up the accident. He said, it’s a miracle you guys are alive. I got home that night, went down into my bedroom. My mother came to me and said, you ought to thank God you’re alive. I was laying on my bed, and I was thinking about the day’s activities, and I just thought, wow, I could have been dead today. I wasn’t the driver. I was the passenger. I wasn’t in control, but God was. At that moment, I figured out at 15 years old, God could take my life any time. He could have that day. So as I laid there, I thought, okay, you could take my life any day. So you saved my life today for a reason. For whatever reason that is, I’m going to live for you and that reason. As I said that, I heard a voice say to me, there’s a Bible on your bookshelf. Get it down and read it. I must have heard something, because I got up, I went over to the bookshelf, and I pulled down a Bible. I opened it to the first page, just like I would any other book, and I began to read God’s Word. I read Genesis chapter 1. The next day I read Genesis chapter 2. The next day I read Genesis chapter 3. And a chapter a day, I began to read God’s Word at 15 years old. If you do that, by the way, it’ll take you about three and a half years to finish reading the Bible a chapter a day. And that’s a good plan. So that’s how I became a daily Bible reader. And when I finished going through the Bible the first time, at 18 years or so, I just started over because I thought that’s what Christians did was read their Bibles every day. So that’s how I became a daily Bible reader. 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