THREE IMPORTANT QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER
“Oh, that I knew where I might find Him, That I might come to His seat!” Job 23:3
I. CAN GOD BE FOUND?
Many children of God, both before and after Job, have felt a sense of having lost God. Though God is always near His children, our spiritual eyes may be blinded from seeing Him. Some of these blinding forces are:
A. Circumstances blinded Job from seeing God. In his distressing circumstances, Job declared, "Even today my complaint is bitter; His hand is heavy in spite of my groaning.” Job 23:2
As we give thought to the calamities that had occurred in Job’s life, it is easy to understand his groaning. The first two chapters of Job tell us that the Sabeans raided his estate, stole his livestock and killed his servants that tended them. Then he was told that fire from heaven burned up his sheep and the servants that tended them. Next the Chaldeans came, stole his camels and killed his servants who tended them. Next he was informed that “a great wind” destroyed his son’s home and his seven sons and three daughters were killed.
Such overwhelming loss would devastate any one of us. But Job’s testing was not yet over. Satan was permitted to touch his body and painful boils covered his entire body. His wife suggested that he “curse God and die!” Finally, three of his friends came to “comfort” him but all they did was to tell him that his sins and iniquities brought all this on him. One might think that with friends like these, who needs enemies!
Sometime the dark clouds of affliction and overwhelming loss can blind our spiritual eyes to the fact that God may test us, but we must never forget that God will never forsake us!
B. Unforgiven sin: “But your iniquities have separated you from your God; and your sins have hidden His face from you, So that He will not hear.” Isaiah 59:2
Fortunately for every one of us is that God stands ready to forgive our sins. We are continually comforted by I John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
C. Our doubts: “Now when John, while imprisoned, heard of the works of Christ, he sent word by his disciples and said to Him, "Are You the Expected One, or shall we look for someone else?" Matthew 11:2-3
If John the Baptist, who had witnessed the coming of the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove upon Jesus after he had baptized Him and heard the Father speak from heaven saying “This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased”, could have doubted that Jesus was the Messiah, we are not immune to doubting as well.
Although we may be blinded by these and other things from seeing God with our spiritual eyes, Isaiah 55:6 tells us, “Seek the LORD while He may be found, Call upon Him while He is near.” Yes, we can find God for He is not far from any one of us!
Job’s groping for God in the spiritual blindness he was experiencing did not conquer his faith. We continue reading in the twenty-third chapter as Job reasons his way from doubt to conquering faith. "Look, I go forward, but He is not there, And backward, but I cannot perceive Him; When He works on the left hand, I cannot behold Him; When He turns to the right hand, I cannot see Him. But He knows the way that I take; When He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold. My foot has held fast to His steps; I have kept His way and not turned aside. I have not departed from the commandment of His lips; I have treasured the words of His mouth More than my necessary food.” Job 23:8-12
When our spiritual eyes become blinded by the times and tides of this life, let us follow Job’s example and reason our way out of the darkness. Many of us have experienced the soul distress of the man who had brought his son to Jesus to be healed. Jesus told the father, “If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.” “Immediately the father of the child cried out and said with tears, “Lord, I believe, help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:23-24). Isaiah’s advice to the people of God is good for us today. “Come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord.” Isaiah 1:18.
II. “HOW THEN CAN MAN BE RIGHTEOUS BEFORE GOD?” (Job 25:4)
Bildad the Shuhite directed this question to Job, suggesting that man is entirely too worthless to be of concern to God, saying, “how much less man, who is but a maggot-- a son of man, who is only a worm!" Job 25:6.
Bildad’s theology left much to be desired. Did he not know that God made man in “His own image and after His own likeness”? In all likelihood, Job lived in the time of the patriarchs and the book of Job was likely written at some point during this period. Surely Bildad had knowledge of God’s love for His children. We might ask: “how can a believer be so wrong?”
We find the answer to Bildad’s question in John 3:16 and II Corinthians 5:21, “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”
III. “IF A MAN DIES, SHALL HE LIVE AGAIN?” (Job 14:14)
Job asks this question and then answers it for us. "If a man dies, will he live again? All the days of my struggle I will wait until my change comes. You will call, and I will answer You; You will long for the work of Your hands.” Job 14:14-15.
Later, in chapter nineteen, Job reaffirms his belief in a glorious bodily resurrection of the children of God. “I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end He will stand upon the earth. And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh I will see God; I myself will see Him with my own eyes--I, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!” Job 19:25-27.
“Jesus said to her, ‘I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live.” John 11:25.
CONCLUSION:
It would be good for all of us to carefully consider these three questions from the book of Job. In all likelihood we will, from time to time, experience some degree of spiritual blindness when our faith needs the strengthening that only the Word of God can give. In any time of despair, distress or doubt, let us open the Bible, read and reason our way from doubt to reassuring confidence.
