JOB 4, 5

 TEXT FOR REFLECTION

Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said:

2 “If one ventures a word with you, will you be impatient?

    Yet who can keep from speaking?

3 Behold, you have instructed many,

    and you have strengthened the weak hands.

4 Your words have upheld him who was stumbling,

    and you have made firm the feeble knees.

5 But now it has come to you, and you are impatient;

    it touches you, and you are dismayed. (Job 4:1-5)

REFLECT

Job's friend Eliphaz complained to Job about his attitude towards good advice. Job had been a spiritual teacher, instructing many, strengthening the weak, and upholding those who were stumbling. But now when he was himself in a crisis, he was impatient with those who gave him the same instruction that he had given to others. Job was good at giving instruction, but poor at receiving.

RELATE

Life is much harder than we make it out to be. It is even much harder when we try to obey God, or put to practice what we learn from the Bible. It is one thing to say "God is good". It is another  to believe that when we go through an excruciating experience, "God is good to me". It is one thing to talk about loving those who hate us or hurt us, and another to face that person many hours each day. The reality is that God's Word is good to talk about as a value, but close to impossible to embrace as a principle for living.

So we disengage. One of the ways in which we disengage is when we treat knowing the Word of God as an intellectual pursuit. I am not saying we should not store God's Word in our minds and hearts. But so often we treat knowledge of the Word as an accomplishment. I have often heard Christians say, "I know the book of Romans or Revelations. We studied it for a year in church." Or a complaint, "Why do we have another sermon series on the Gospel of Matthew? We have had it four years running and I know it like the back of my hand." But what does it mean to know God's Word? Can we really know God's Word?

Another way in which we disengage is when we freely counsel others with God's Word. It feels good when we find ourselves able to "apply" God's Word to others' problems. And like Eliphaz, we feel frustrated that others do not receive our godly counsel well. 

One of the cardinal rules I apply to myself is to never quote the Bible to another person who is in distress. The biblical answers that I 'know' may seem so harsh to that person at that time, and add further grief and pain to the person. I prefer to listen to the apostle James who tells us, "Let each of you be slow to speak, slow to anger, and quick to listen".

God's truths are eternal and apply to the deepest of our problems. But because our troubles are often so painful and seem impossible to resolve, we need time and space to consider God's answers. The Holy Spirit does gently put in our minds all that Christ has taught. And it has to be His way and His timing. Trying to thrust God's principles to another will almost always be counterproductive. Each of us needs space to "taste and see that the Lord is good". God and not Eliphaz eventually brought the truth of God to Job and convinced him that God is good.

REST

When peace like a river attendeth my way,

when sorrows like sea billows roll;

whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say,

"It is well, it is well with my soul."

O Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight,

the clouds be rolled back as a scroll;

the trump shall resound and the Lord shall descend;

even so, it is well with my soul. 

Chiu Ming Li