1.7.25 – Job 9

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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 9, we’ll hear Job’s response to Bildad’s arguments about how God would not judge a blameless man. So let’s listen in to Faith Comes to Our Hearings recording of Job chapter 9.

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Job 9 Then Job answered and said, “‘Truly I know that it is so. But how can a man be in the right before God? If one wished to contend with him, one could not answer him once in a thousand times. He is wise in heart and mighty in strength. Who has hardened himself against him and succeeded?’ He who removes mountains, and they know it not when he overturns them in his anger, who shakes the earth out of its place and its pillars tremble, who commands the sun, and it does not rise, who seals up the stars, who alone stretched out the heavens and trampled the waves of the sea, who made the bear and Orion, the Pleiades and the chambers of the south, who does great things beyond searching out, and marvelous things beyond number. Behold, he passes by me, and I see him not. He moves on, but I do not perceive him. Behold, he snatches away. Who can turn him back? Who will say to him, What are you doing? God will not turn back his anger. Beneath him bowed the helpers of Rahab. How then can I answer him, choosing my words with him? Though I am in the right, I cannot answer him. I must appeal for mercy to my accuser. If I summoned him and he answered me, I would not believe that he was listening to my voice. For he crushes me with a tempest and multiplies my wounds without cause. He will not let me get my breath, but fills me with bitterness. If it is a contest of strength, behold, he is mighty. If it is a matter of justice, who can summon him? Though I am in the right, my own mouth would condemn me. Though I am blameless, he would prove me perverse. I am blameless. I regard not myself. loathe my life. It is all one, therefore I say he destroys both the blameless and the wicked. When disaster brings sudden death, he mocks at the calamity of the innocent. The earth is given into the hand of the wicked. He covers the faces of its judges. If it is not he, who then is it? My days are swifter than a runner. They flee away. They see no good. They go by like skiffs of reed, like an eagle swooping on the prey. If I say, I will forget my complaint. I will put off my sad face and be of good cheer. I become afraid of all my suffering, for I know you will not hold me innocent. I shall be condemned. Why then do I labor in vain? If I wash myself with snow and cleanse my hands with lye, yet you will plunge me into a pit, and my own clothes will abhor me. For he is not a man as I am, that I might answer him that we should come to trial together. There is no arbiter between us who might lay his hand on us both. Let him take his rod away from me, and let not dread of him terrify me. Then I would speak without fear of him, for I am not so in myself.

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Back in 1984, when I read Job 8 through 10, I wrote, In 2015, I read Job 8 and 9 together, and I wrote, And I wrote, And I wrote, Then I continued, Job answers, Who can contend with God? Who can argue their case before God? No one. All we can do is ask for mercy. Job gives an eloquent description of God Almighty in verses 4 through 12. Yet I hear people say, when they get to heaven, they have a few questions for God. Good luck with that. Job offers that he has done nothing wrong in chapter 9, verse 15 and 20 through 21. That also is true. But Job understands before God, our righteousness is filthy rags. Let’s take a look at the key principles of Job chapter 9. At the beginning of chapter 9, once again, we have to go back to the previous chapter. Because Job says, truly I know that that is so. Well, let’s find out what he knows is so. The end of chapter 8 is what he’s referring to. Behold, God will not reject a blameless man, nor take the hand of evildoers. He will yet fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouting. Those who hate you will be clothed with shame, and the tent of the wicked will be no more. And that’s what Job is saying. Truly, I know that that is so. But then he goes on to his next point. But how can a man be in the right before God? If one wished to contend with him, one could not answer him once in a thousand times. Job gets it. We cannot be right before God. Though Job is saying that he believes he’s blameless, he understands that that’s not good enough before a holy God. And then he gives us a marvelous description of God’s characteristics. Verses 4 through 12. He is wise in heart and mighty in strength. He commands the sun and seals up the stars and stretched out the heavens. God does great things beyond searching out and marvelous things beyond number. And he concludes by saying, and who will say to him, what are you doing? That’s what I was referring to in one of my journals. Many people say when they get to heaven, they have a few questions for God. I said, good luck with that. Job understands that. I hope we do too. We are not going to question what God has done in our lives. Going back to verse 3. If one wished to contend with him, one could not answer him once in a thousand times. And concluding with verse 12. Who will say to him, what are you doing? Again, Job understands. He declares it in verse 15. Though I am in the right, I cannot answer him. I must appeal for mercy to my accuser. Friends, that’s our only hope too. Though you may think you’re a good person, it’s not going to be good enough. You must appeal to God for his mercy, his forgiveness, his grace. In verse 22, Job gives us some more understanding about God. He says it is all one. Therefore, I say he destroys both the blameless and the wicked. That statement goes back to Bildad’s argument in chapter 8, verse 3. Does God pervert justice, or does the Almighty pervert the right? No, because God is just. And verse 24 is a very important principle to understand, especially in our day. The earth is given into the hand of the wicked. We see it all around us. We often hear it asked, why does God let bad things happen to good people? Because the earth is given into the hand of the wicked. Verse 25 gives us more wisdom about life. Job says, my days are swifter than a runner. They flee away. They see no good. We often say, life is just flying by. Job sensed the same thing. And Job concludes his response to Bildad in verse 32 by saying, for he is not a man as I am, that I might answer him. that we should come to trial together. There is no arbiter between us who might lay his hand on us both. Let him take his rod away from me, and let not dread of him terrify me. Then I would speak without fear of him, for I am not so in myself. True for Job, and true for us, we do not go to God equally, for God is not a man. We don’t come to trial with God on equal ground, and there is no arbiter between us. He will decide each one of our cases. So what’s our practical application from Job chapter 9? Good is not good enough. God is God, and we are mere human beings. We do not have equal standing before Almighty God. But aren’t you glad the Bible doesn’t end with Job chapter 9? Praise God for the New Testament. where Jesus comes and provides a blood sacrifice that is acceptable to God. And because of his blood sacrifice and his standing before his Father, we will get a fair trial if we are covered under the blood of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. But if you’re depending on going to God in your own righteousness, Job understands it’s not going to work. I hope after Job chapter 9, you understand it’s not going to work either. Let’s pray. Father, thank you for the great lessons of Job chapter 9. We have no righteous standing before you. We will not contend with you. We will not question you. We will bow humbly before you and plead for mercy and grace. And thanks to Jesus, we can receive those beautiful gifts. Hallelujah. We thank you. In Jesus’ name. 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 begin 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.