1.18.25 – Job 22

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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 in Job chapter 22, Eliphaz declares that Job’s wickedness must be great. Let’s listen in. The faith comes by hearing his recording of Job 22. Job 22

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Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said, “‘Can a man be profitable to God? Surely he who is wise is profitable to himself. Is it any pleasure to the Almighty if you are in the right? Or is it gain to him if you make your ways blameless?’ Is it for your fear of him that he reproves you and enters into judgment with you? Is not your evil abundant? There is no end to your iniquities, for you have exacted pledges of your brothers for nothing and stripped the naked of their clothing. You have given no water to the weary to drink, and you have withheld bread from the hungry.” The man with power possessed the land and the favored man lived in it. You have sent widows away empty and the arms of the fatherless were crushed. Therefore, snares are all around you and sudden terror overwhelms you or darkness so that you cannot see and a flood of water covers you. Is not God high in the heavens? See the highest stars, how lofty they are? But you say, what does God know? Can he judge through the deep darkness? Thick clouds veil him so that he does not see and he walks on the vault of heaven. Will you keep to the old way that wicked men have trod? They were snatched away before their time. Their foundation was washed away. They said to God, Depart from us, and what can the Almighty do to us? Yet he filled their houses with good things, but the counsel of the wicked is far from me. The righteous see it and are glad. The innocent one mocks at them, saying, Surely our adversaries are cut off, and what they left the fire has consumed. Agree with God and be at peace. Thereby good will come to you. Receive instruction from his mouth and lay up his words in your heart. If you return to the Almighty, you will be built up. If you remove injustice far from your tents, if you lay gold in the dust and gold of Ophir among the stones of the torrent bed, then the Almighty will be your gold and your precious silver. For then you will delight yourself in the Almighty and lift up your face to God. You will make your prayer to Him and He will hear you. And you will pay your vows. You will decide on a matter and it will be established for you. And light will shine on your ways. For when they are humbled, you say, it is because of pride. But He saves the lowly. He delivers even the one who is not innocent, who will be delivered through the cleanness of your hands.

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In my journal entry in 2015 concerning Job 22 and 23, I wrote Eliphaz unleashes on Job is not your evil abundant, quoting verses 5 through 9. No, Job is not evil, nor has he done evil. Then I continue to write, Confess, and God will restore you, referring to verse 23. Halfway through the book of Job, the conversation gets a little bit more intense. Let’s look at Eliphaz’s argument. He declares Job’s wickedness must be great. Let’s begin at verse 2. Can a man be profitable to God? Let’s think about that concept for a moment ourselves. Can any of us be profitable to God? Does God need you or me? No, but he chooses to have a relationship with each one of us. That’s amazing. And he chooses to spread his word and his salvation through mere men across the globe. That also is amazing. So no, we are not profitable to God, but he, in his infinite wisdom, love, and mercy, chooses to use us to build his kingdom on earth. Hallelujah. Eliphaz continues his argument against Job. That is harsh. Could you imagine saying that to anyone? Or having that said to you? Is not your evil abundant? There is no end to your iniquities? Wow! In verses 6-11, Eliphaz accuses Job of not helping the poor. We know from the earlier chapters that Job was rich. We don’t know whether he was generous or not, but based on God’s description of Job, most likely he was. So these are probably false accusations once again. Eliphaz is prodding Job to confess his guilt before God. That’s a good thing. Let’s pick it up in verse 21. He says, Jump down to verse 26. For then you will delight yourself in the Almighty and lift up your face to God. You will make your prayer to him and he will hear you and you will pay your vows. You will decide on a matter and it will be established for you and light will shine on your ways. And let’s conclude with what Eliphaz concluded with in verse 30. He delivers even the one who is not innocent, who will be delivered through the cleanness of your hands. Eliphaz is right. Come to God, confess to God, and God is merciful, and he will restore you. The problem is he’s wrong about Job, but he’s right about us. We are a sinful people. Our evil is abundant. There is no end to our iniquities or our sin, and it is good advice to agree with God and be at peace, to receive instruction from His mouth, to return to the Almighty, and He will build us back up, to make our prayers to Him, and He will hear us. And praise God, he will deliver even the one who is not innocent. Yes, yes, Eliphaz is correct, but he’s not right about Job. So what are the lessons from Job 22? We in our flesh are not profitable to God. He doesn’t need us. Secondly, our evil is abundant. There is no end to our sinfulness, our iniquities. But there’s a way of escape, and Eliphaz outlines it. If you’ve never done this, do it today. Agree with God. Be at peace with Him. Confess your abundance of sin, your iniquities. Return to God, and He will build you up. He will instruct you with His mouth, and He will lay up His words in your heart. Throughout the scripture, God gives his people a chance to come back to him. Here in Job 22, another chance exists for us today. If you’ve never given your heart to Jesus, do it today. That would be the most important practical application from Job 22. Let’s pray. Father, we thank you that throughout the scriptures you call us back to you. You remind us in this chapter that we are sinful. There is no end to our iniquities. But you also remind us of your love, your grace, and your mercy. If we confess our sins, you are faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Some may be doing that even as we pray right now. we thank you for your promise in this chapter that you will deliver even the ones who are not innocent and that is each and every one of us and we thank you for your promise that when we do we can receive instructions from your mouth and you will lay up your words in our hearts And finally, that as we return to you, you will build us up. Thank you for these wonderful promises in Job 22. We reach out for your love, your mercy, your grace, and your forgiveness. We agree with you, and now we can be at peace. Hallelujah. Thank you. In Jesus’ name, amen. By the way, friends, if any of you just gave your hearts to God, if any of you repented of your sins and wanted the forgiveness of God, and you want to let us know, you can do that by visiting the Ezra Project website. There’s a place for you to contact us so we can pray for you and rejoice in your decision to agree with God. Let us know. We love to hear from you at EzraProject.net. God bless you. Amen. Thanks for listening to AdBible today. You might wonder why we call this the Ezra Project, AdBible, connecting God’s people to God’s Word. It came out of Nehemiah chapter 8, when Ezra, the priest and scribe, brought the Word of God back to the people. And so he got up and read the Bible to people in Nehemiah chapter 8 that had been without the Word of God for 130 years. And as he did, the people began to weep and worship. So we also in the Ezra Project realized that people are not reading the Bible as much as they like or as much as they could or should. So thus the Ezra Project, connecting God’s people to God’s Word. We hope to create 21st century Ezra’s, just like Ezra was as he described himself in Ezra 7.10. For Ezra had set his heart to study the law of the Lord and to do it and to teach his statutes and rules in Israel. So what we want to create today is 21st century Ezra’s. People who will simply read God’s word, do it, and share it with others. 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