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MARCH 2 — Exodus 13; Luke 16; Job 31; 2 Corinthians 1 􏰣

ONCE AGAIN WE MAY USEFULLY reflect on both designated readings.

Job 31 is the final chapter of Job’s last response to the three comforters. The closing three chapters of this address (chaps. 29—31) are dominated by two themes. First, Job now bemoans not so much his physical suffering as his loss of face and prestige in the community. He has been a man of dignity and honor; now he is treated with scorn, even by young men from contemptible families (e.g., 30:1). Second, although all along Job has protested that he is suffering innocently, now he discloses the habits of his life that explain why the opening chapter describes him as “blameless and upright,” a man who “feared God and shunned

evil” (1:1).

Indeed, one of the reasons why Job had been so honored in the community was that his righteousness and generosity were well known: he rescued the poor and the fatherless, assisted the dying, and helped widows (29:12). So also in the present chapter: almost in desperation because of the charges brought against him, Job lays out the evidence of his innocence. He made a covenant with his eyes “not to look lustfully at a girl” (31:1). He constantly remembered God’s all-seeing eye (31:4), and therefore spoke the truth and dealt honestly in business (31:5-8). He avoided adultery; he dealt equitably with any grievance from his menservants and maidservants, knowing that he himself must one day face God’s justice, and that in any case they are as human as he (31:13-15). Out of the fear of God, he was especially generous with the poor (31:16-23). Despite great wealth, he never trusted it (31:24-28), nor allowed himself to gloat over the misfortunes of others (31:29-30). So the chapter ends with Job maintaining his reputation for integrity, and finding no comfort.

Paul also suffers—not only the loss of possessions, family, and health, but the peculiar pressures of front-line ministry, and, worse, overt persecution (2 Corinthians 1:1-11). Of course, the circumstances are radically different. Paul knows, as Job did not, that he has been called to suffer (e.g., Acts 9:16). Moreover, Paul lives and serves this side of the cross: he self-consciously follows one who suffered unjustly for the sake of others. Perhaps most importantly, Paul knows that the encouragement he has received from “the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort” (1:3) he is able to pass on to others. He knows God “comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God” (1:4). Pity those who have never been comforted; they never give comfort either.

 

This reading is from For the Love of God, vol 2 by D.A. Carson. You can download the entire book as a free PDF here: For the Love of God, Vol 2. Alternatively, you can pick up a hard copy at the church or at your favorite book retailer.

In 1 Corinthians 16, Paul tells the Corinthians about his travel plans (16:5- 9). He does not want to see them immediately, on his way to Macedonia, and make only a passing visit. Rather, he intends to go to Macedonia first, and then “perhaps” he will stay with the Corinthians a while, or even spend the winter (when it was unsafe to travel on the Mediterranean). “I hope to spend some time with you,” Paul writes, “if the Lord permits” (16:7). Before embarking on any part of this trip, however, the apostle intends to stay for a while longer in Ephesus, “because a great door for effective work has opened to me, and there are many who oppose me” (16:9). In other words, he still has some unfinished ministry in that great city. Clearly there is uncertainty in Paul’s plans, but he is trying to lay out the next few months of his service in ways that will be of maximum benefit for the promotion of the Gospel and the good of God’s people.

The next two short paragraphs (16:10-12) suggest that the movements of Timothy and Apollos were not always entirely predictable either, though in both instances Paul provides the Corinthians with information covering certain eventualities.

Moreover, the first paragraph (16:1-4) finds Paul instructing the Corinthians to plan ahead in their giving. The “collection” that Paul mentions is a project to help poor Christians in Judea. He knows that if the Corinthian believers start collecting money only when he shows up, they will give little. Faithful, regular giv- ing, set aside “on the first day of every week” (when Christians met for corporate worship, encouragement, and instruction), would ensure that a considerable sum would be raised. Of course, in those days money could not be electronically transferred; someone would have to transport it personally. Paul wants the Corinthians to choose men they themselves approve, and he will provide them with letters of introduction to the leaders in Jerusalem. He may even go with them. Clearly, these sorts of arrangements would vitiate any hint of financial impropriety on the part of the apostle. In this case, too, there is evidence of careful, godly, wise planning, and encouragement to the Corinthians to engage in the same.

Today there is a form of ethereal “spirituality” that wants to wait for explicit guidance for every decision, that regards a phrase like “if the Lord wills” as a sanctimonious cop-out. That was not Paul’s perspective, and it should not be ours.

 

This reading is from For the Love of God, vol 2 by D.A. Carson. You can download the entire book as a free PDF here: For the Love of God, Vol 2. Alternatively, you can pick up a hard copy at the church or at your favorite book retailer.

FEBRUARY 26 — Exodus 9; Luke 12; Job 27; 1 Corinthians 13

THE LAST SPEECH FROM JOB’S “miserable comforters” is that of Bildad (Job 25), and it is pathetically short because even he now recognizes that he has nothing new to say, and neither do his friends. Job’s answer is long and complex (chaps. 26—31), as if he is determined to drive his friends into silence. Some of it is mere review. The opening chapter (yesterday’s reading, Job 26) finds Job mocking these “comforters” for their callousness, the sterility of their counsel in the face of suffering like Job’s. It also finds him agreeing with them regarding God’s unfathomable power. After a breathtaking review of God’s powerful deeds, Job concludes, “And these are but the outer fringe of his works; how faint the whisper we hear of him! Who then can understand the thunder of his power?” (26:14). While the “comforters” charge Job with reducing God to impotence, Job so insists on God’s transcendent power that he entertains the view that God is distant.

That brings us to Job 27. Here are all the tensions in Job’s position. Job puts himself under an oath (“As surely as God lives”) to make his point. He will never admit his opponents are right, for this would mean denying that he has lived his life with integrity: “Till I die, I will not deny my integrity. I will maintain my righteousness and never let go of it; my conscience will not reproach me as long as I live” (27:5-6). But ironically, the God by whom Job swears, whose greatness Job has praised in chapter 26, the God who provides the very breath in Job’s nostrils (27:3), is also, Job insists, the God “who has denied me justice, the Almighty, who has made me taste bitterness of soul” (27:2-3).

More irony: this does not mean that God is corrupt or unjust. Job recognizes that God calls unjust and wicked people to account (27:7-10)—often in this life (27:11-23), but finally in death.

This is not Job’s final position, of course; the drama is not yet over. But we may reflect on the place we have reached so far.

First, it is always best to be honest in our reflections on God, to avoid positions that distort facts (the folly of the three “comforters”), to remain transparent before God. He knows what we think anyway. Hope of advance is possible where there is honesty, but almost impossible where deceit reigns.

Second, this means that at various stages of a believer’s pilgrimage there may be times when opponents will see in him or her conspicuous ironies or profound mysteries. One should not glory in contradictions, of course, but in matters relating to God, mysteries are inevitable. In time, some of these edge toward resolution, but almost always accompanied by the unfolding glory of new depths.

FEBRUARY 25 — Exodus 8; Luke 11; Job 25—26; 1 Corinthians 12

1 CORINTHIANS 12 BEGINS A three-chapter unit on tongues, prophecy, and other “grace gifts” (charismata) and their relation to love, which is the supreme “way” (not a gift) for the Christian. We may at least follow the flow of thought.

First, 1 Corinthians 12:4-6 affirms that there are diversities of gifts but one source. The implicit Trinitarian reference is striking: different gifts, given by the same Spirit; different kinds of service, but the same Lord [Jesus]; different kinds of working, but the same God. This does not mean Paul is parceling these things up absolutely, as if, for instance, the gifts came from the Spirit but not from Jesus and not from God. Rather, this is a preacher’s device for insisting that however diverse the gifts and graces, there is but one source: the triune God.

Second, Paul enlarges upon this principle of unity tying together diversity (12:7-12). The various gifts mentioned—the message of wisdom, the message of knowledge, faith, gifts of healing, and so forth—are not only manifestations of the one Spirit, but their primary purpose is the common good (12:7). So both in source and in purpose, they serve unity in their diversity. Moreover, although Paul will shortly say that Christians are to pursue the greater gifts (12:31), here he insists that in the final analysis the Spirit distributes them as he sees fit—which means there should never be pride in having this or that gift, nor covetousness toward another who has a gift you desire.

Third, the theme of the chapter is driven home in an analogy (12:12-20). The body is one, but it is made up of many parts that must function together. The analogy is apt, for Christians were all baptized by Christ in one Spirit (the Spirit here is the medium in which Christians are baptized, not the agent doing the baptizing, who is Christ) into one body, the church. Transparently, all the body parts are needed: it would not do for the body to be nothing but one giant eyeball, for instance. So the diversity and distribution of gifts in the church is to be cherished.

Fourth, it follows further that no part of the body has the right to say to any other part of the body that it is neither wanted nor needed (12:21-27). Indeed, in some ways the least presentable parts of the body should be accorded the highest honor precisely because they otherwise lack it. There ought to be so much empathy among the diverse parts that if one part is honored, all are honored; if one part suffers, all suffer.

Even though the applications to the church are obvious, Paul takes care to spell them out (12:27-31).

FEBRUARY 24 — Exodus 7; Luke 10; Job 24; 1 Corinthians 11

IN THE SECOND PART OF HIS REPLY TO Eliphaz’s last speech, Job begins (Job 24) with a pair of rhetorical questions: “Why does the Almighty not set times for judgment? Why must those who know him look in vain for such days?” (24:1). The argument is not that God never rights the books, but that meanwhile a great deal of evil takes place without any prompt accounting, and righteous people suffer without any prompt vindication.

So Job begins another long list of representative evils, frequently unrequited in the short haul, yet commonly observed; and of public injustices (24:2-17). The wicked move boundary markers, steal cattle, abuse the poor and needy, put the poor into indentured slavery, rebel against the light, and feed their sexual lust. Meanwhile the poor barely get by, eking out a living from the wasteland. They glean in the vineyards of the wicked, they are often cold and wet, they carry the sheaves of others and go naked themselves. “The groans of the dying rise from the city, and the souls of the wounded cry out for help,” Job contends. “But God charges no one with wrongdoing” (24:12).

The next big section of this chapter (24:18-24) is something of a puzzle. At first glance Job seems to be advancing the kind of argument his miserable comforters prefer: God answers the wicked in kind. Some scholars have suggested the passage has been misplaced; others think Job is deploying massive irony and means exactly the reverse. Yet perhaps the explanation is simpler. Job is not denying that justice will be done someday. To do that he really would have to change his view of God in very substantial ways. But Job acknowledges that the wicked will finally face judgment. They die; they are not remembered. God is not blind; he “may let them rest in a feeling of security, but his eyes are on their ways” (24:23). So in a while they are gone (24:24). All this Job acknowledges: “If this is not so, who can prove me false and reduce my words to nothing?” (24:25). But in the context of the first part of the chapter, the question remains: “Why does the Almighty not set times for judgment?” In other words, why does he wait until the end? Granted that he is the God of justice and that justice will finally be done, why wait so long for it, the wicked becoming more wicked and the victims still suffering?

It is a searing question. Part of the answer emerges later in the book. But at the very least we should acknowledge that instant judgment on every sin would have most of us in pretty constant pain, yelping like Pavlovian dogs to avoid the hurt, but without inner transformation. Do you really want what Job seems to be asking for?