Job CXLIII

 When an attempt at comforting becomes an accusation of wrongdoing, when those you count on to be a healing balm turn out to be the ones pouring salt into your open wounds, you can’t help but feel some kind of way about it. If Job’s friends had been strangers, it would be one thing. Because he considered them friends, however, his expectation was that they would be a source of comfort in his grief and a means by which his pain could be lessened, if only minimally.

The negative impact of having one’s expectations not only dashed to pieces but experiencing the opposite of what you hoped you would cannot be overstated. Imagine being told you’ve won the top prize in a raffle you entered, and it's for a new car. You’re over the moon excited, jump into your rusted Kia, and head to pick up your prize, only to discover that there's no new car. Not only that, but three men jump out of the bushes, demand the keys to your old car, and give you a good beating to add injury to insult.

Had you never been told of the prize you’d won, your expectations would never have blossomed, and your imagination would not have soared with thoughts of what make, model, color, or style of new car you’d be driving in a few short minutes. You would have never imagined what that new car smell was really like or wondered if it lived up to the hype. You would have been content with your Kia, replete with the pile of trash in the passenger seat and that funny smell that’s a cross between wet dog and spoiled shellfish.

Even the letdown of there being no new car would have been manageable. The most that would have happened is that you would have scolded yourself for being too gullible, and that would have been that. The black eye and having to walk home, however, those you could have done without, and the crash from the heights of expectation to having less than what you started out with will be the roiling resentment in your gut that you will have to contend with.

Job had expected his friends to be a source of comfort, and rightly so. Instead, they added to his pain and discomfort, proving themselves to be a detriment to his well-being rather than an added benefit. In light of this, it’s understandable that once it was Job’s turn to respond, he held nothing back and seemed utterly disinterested in trying to be conciliatory toward his friends.

Job 13:1-5, “Behold, my eye has seen all this, my ear has heard and understood it. What you know, I also know; I am not inferior to you. But I would speak to the Almighty, and I desire to reason with God. But you forgers of lies, you are all worthless physicians. Oh, that you should be silent, and it would be your wisdom!”

There had been no earth-shattering revelation in anything Job’s friends had said. What they knew, he also knew, and although, given God’s declaration that there was none like him on the face of the earth, Job could have rightly proffered that he was superior in his understanding of God, he settled for reminding them that he was not inferior to them.

Just because someone is loud, obnoxious, or belligerent doesn’t make them wise or right. We’ve fallen into a vicious cycle of trying to shout over everyone else until someone with a healthier set of lungs comes along and does likewise, never reaching a consensus or a deeper understanding but wasting our lives away yelling at strangers until we’re hoarse.

It’s often the case that, as the 90s pop song says, it doesn’t matter what you say as long as you speak with inflection and commit to your declared position. You hear some men speak so passionately about a topic that, in hindsight, you realize they know nothing about because everything they had to say was window dressing, filler, and fortune cookie one-liners that do nothing to open people’s eyes to the beauty, majesty, glory, and wonder of the God of the Bible.

Job was done trying to convince his friends of his innocence. It’s not that he hadn’t tried or done his best to explain to them that they were misjudging him, and if there had been anything untoward in his life, he would have confessed and repented of it already. He had, but all of his pleas had fallen on deaf ears. They’d made up their minds and would not be swayed no matter what he said, so the only recourse left to him was to speak to the Almighty and desire to reason with God.

When men will not hear you, when those close to you fail to understand you, there is always God. Run to Him, speak to Him, pour your heart out to Him, knowing that He hears, He sees, and He understands. Whether purposefully or in ignorance, you are bound to be misunderstood. Whether by friends, family, acquaintances, or colleagues, there’s bound to be someone who sees what isn’t there, who insists upon something that is a figment of their imagination, and will not be swayed, no matter how cogent your defense.

By this point, there was intentionality behind Job’s friends and their insistence that he had sinned. They refused to take their friend at his word and give him the benefit of the doubt because the prism through which they saw his suffering precluded the possibility of innocence.

Acknowledging his innocence would have turned their entire philosophical world on its ear, along with their belief structure and how they viewed the world on a very practical and binary level.

It says a lot about their heart that, given the choice to believe their friend to the detriment of their long-held beliefs, they chose their beliefs at the expense of sowing uncertainty and doubt in Job’s heart. You cannot be innocent because if you are, that means the world isn’t as we imagined it to be.

To that, Job calls them worthless physicians and forgers of lies. It takes effort to forge something. Typically, it involves a piece of metal that requires heating in a furnace, followed by shaping it into the desired form through the process of beating and hammering. Essentially, what Job was accusing his friends of was trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, even though they saw it wouldn’t fit. Given their words, declarations, and insistence that he had sinned, Job was not wrong.

With love in Chris,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

Job CXLII

 Job 12:13-25, “With Him are wisdom and strength, He has counsel and understanding. If He breaks a thing down, it cannot be rebuilt; if He imprisons a man, there can be no release. If He withholds the waters, they dry up; if He sends them out, they overwhelm the earth. With Him are strength and prudence. The deceived and the deceiver are His. He leads counselors away plundered, and makes fools of the judges. He loosens the bonds of kings, and binds their waist with a belt. He leads princes away plundered, and overthrows the mighty. He deprives the trusted ones of speech, and takes away the discernment of the elders. He pours contempt on princes, and disarms the mighty. He uncovers deep things out of darkness, and brings the shadow of death to light. He makes nations great, and destroys them; He enlarges nations, and guides them. He takes away the understanding of the chiefs of the people of the earth, and makes them wander in a pathless wilderness. They grope in the dark without light, and He makes them stagger like a drunken man.”

Try as one might, they would be hard-pressed to find a more profound, complete, and moving soliloquy on the sovereignty of God anywhere. David came close in the Psalms, but his musings had more to do with the greatness of God than the sovereignty thereof. To think that a man wracked with pain, addled by sleeplessness, and contending with worms and sores covering his body had the presence of mind to utter words of such profundity is humbling to the uttermost.

If we’re honest, we must acknowledge that on our best day, in good health, well-fed, and brimming with caffeine, we wouldn’t come close to encapsulating the omnipotence of the God we serve the way Job, a man sitting in the dust and scratching at himself with a potsherd was able to.

Although his three friends showed glimmers of wisdom in their orations, this handful of verses regarding God, His nature, and His immutable will over all that exists is so beyond anything they were able to express that it should have rightly shamed them into silence.

Not only was Job a blameless and upright man, but he was also a man of profound wisdom, light years ahead of his contemporaries, which, given the context of the time he lived in, makes it doubly impressive. Spend enough time in God’s presence, and it is inevitable that His wisdom will be poured into you.

When we desire to know God, He reveals Himself to us. He doesn’t play hide and seek with His children, nor does He keep Himself shrouded in mystery. His desire is for us to know Him just as He knows us. The caveat is that God has never forced Himself upon anyone, nor has He manhandled anyone into spending more time with Him. The desire for more of Him must be a present reality in our lives, springing forth from a sincere heart with no ulterior motives or vested interests beyond a genuine desire for Him. Only then will He reveal Himself to us in a deeper and more profound way.

It is a grace and a gift to be able to come before God, pour out our hearts, and know that He is listening. It is an honor and a blessing to have the opportunity to know more of Him every day. That some would try to blackmail God into giving them material things in exchange for spending time with Him is offputting on its best day. That’s not a relationship but merely feigned intimacy in the hope of receiving the thing you want more than you do God. It’s base usury, and God will not be mocked.  

Job had spent his entire life building a relationship with God, getting to know Him, going beyond the superficial and surface-level understanding of His nature and who He is, and it showed.

There was no uncertainty in Job’s words. He understood that God has absolute authority, absolute power, and absolute sovereignty over all things, whether the kingdoms of men, the rain that falls, kings, princes, counselors, wise men, fools, and everything in between. There is nothing in heaven or on earth that is outside of His purview, nothing that He cannot build up or tear down, illuminate, or confound.

If you are not in constant awe of the God you serve, chances are you do not possess a clear understanding of who He is. That’s as nicely as I can put it without coming across as snarky or condescending.

From Genesis to Revelation, every man or woman who grew in the knowledge of God possessed the requisite reverence for Him. There is nothing trivial about who the God we serve is. That men today can be so dismissive about His authority and omnipotence only shows that they do not truly know Him. They may have a vague knowledge of His existence, but they do their best to strip Him of His authority and sovereignty, attempting to place themselves on an equal footing with Him, some even having the temerity to consider their authority superior to His.

When anyone utters the words, “I know that’s what the Bible says, but I feel differently,” they are essentially subverting the authority of the Gospel and of God Himself, placing their own feelings and opinions above both of these. It’s no small thing, nor is it a negligible offense, because when we are no longer under the authority of God’s word, we are no longer under God’s authority, worshiping the creature rather than the Creator. This mindset is the petri dish for all manner of deception, foul doctrine, and unbiblical machinations.  

One cannot read Job’s reply to Zophar and fail to see the deep and abiding reverence he has for God. It is in every phrase, in every sentence, and though he had been brought low and sifted beyond what we can fathom, he had not lost his awe and reverence for the God he served.

My trial does not diminish God’s authority. My testing does not diminish God’s omnipotence. My sifting does not diminish God’s power. He remains God, sovereign over all, and the knowledge of this gives me strength even when I am at my weakest.

God’s nature is not situational. He is a constant. He remains the same yesterday, today, and forevermore. He is no less the Alpha and Omega, no less the Creator of all that is seen and unseen just because I’m going through a valley. He is no less present, no less able, no less loving, and whether here or in the life to come, His purpose in allowing me to go through testing will be made evident.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

Job CXLI

Whenever I’m going through a trial, a test, or a time of sifting, my purpose isn’t to ferret out why but to ensure that I love God, knowing that all things work together for good to those who love Him. My daily focus is to love Him more today than I did yesterday, to grow in my adoration and affection for Him, knowing that everything else will be put in its rightful place. This trust in His plan brings a sense of security, and eventually, the entire masterpiece of His plan will unfold before me, leaving me speechless and in awe and wonder of His amazing grace.

It’s not something that occurs naturally in our hearts and minds but rather something that must be actively pursued. The first instinct we have when we’re blindsided by something, whether a new, heretofore unfelt pain or an unforeseen setback, is to sit and stew, wondering why this has happened to us. If allowed, this ever-present question becomes an obsession, something we ponder and think about every waking hour while dismissing the underlying promise that if we love Him, it will work together for good.

When God said all things, He wasn’t being hyperbolic. It was not an exaggeration but rather a true and present reality that all who love Him experience. All things work together for good! This doesn’t necessarily mean they will work together for good in the physical, although we are predisposed to believe it was the physical He was referring to. Trials are inevitable in our spiritual journey, but they are not meant to break us. They are meant to shape us and make us stronger.

It’s the reason the entire doctrine of prosperity falls apart because the foundation of its presupposition is flawed from the start. When God says that all things work together for good to those who love Him, there is no addendum insisting that it would be in the physical or material sense. It could be that as well, but more often than not, when God strips away the material things when God allows testing to come upon us, it has more to do with our spiritual man and the maturing and perfecting thereof than it has to do with the supernatural healing of a bunion or the accidental deposit of a million dollars in your bank account.

When we love God, we naturally trust Him to define what is good rather than taking it upon ourselves to do so. What you may deem good may be detrimental to the utmost for your spiritual walk, leading you to a place exponentially more debilitating than what you are currently navigating.

When we take it upon ourselves to demand what we deem to be good of God, rather than trusting in His sovereignty, we are no longer walking in obedience or submission but attempting to usurp His authority and dictate terms to Him as though He were no more than a wish granter who must bend to our will. Obedience, therefore, is not just a requirement but a key to our spiritual growth, inspiring us to follow His path and not our own.

Not understanding something doesn’t necessarily mean we should reject it, dismiss it, or discard it simply because we do not understand it. When my daughters were babies, and they were old enough to require more than just their mother’s milk, whenever we’d attempt to feed them something new, usually some puree, whether fruit or boiled vegetable, their instinctual reaction was to turn their head and make the pucker face known by parents the world over, but we nevertheless persisted because we knew the nutritive value in the things we were feeding them.

Even if we’d taken the time to explain why the purees were necessary to their development and that they needed to eat them to grow strong and healthy, they could not understand or perceive the words we were speaking to them. The same can be applied to us when God allows something unpleasant to occur in our lives. That one experience can ripple throughout the rest of our days, making us better, stronger, more in tune with His will, and less reticent to obey Him even when the road ahead is not as straightforward as we would like it to be.

He can take the time to explain, but chances are we wouldn’t perceive and understand it even if He did. An infinite God explaining His grand design and plan for an individual, finite life, limited in its understanding, is likely to fall on deaf ears and not to be comprehended. Do this, and it will make you stronger. Do this, and it will give you endurance. Do this, and it will build up your most holy faith. Rather than doing it, rather than committing and putting one foot in front of the other, not looking back but only forward, we procrastinate by asking how these things will transform us in the way He promises they will. Even if He took the time to explain it, we wouldn’t fully grasp it. So, rather than pitching a tent in the land of indecision, our best course of action is to do as He commands and see His promises come to pass.

Are you calling me a dullard? Don’t take it personally. In light of God’s eternal wisdom, we’re all dullards. We get glimpses of the plan and mind of God, but as far as possessing full understanding thereof, there is none among us who has. Men have thought it, perhaps, or have declared it to the awe and aplomb of some, but in reality, we see in part and understand in part.

God will never steer you wrong. He will never set you on a path that will be detrimental to your spiritual well-being because that would mean actively working against His own purpose regarding your sanctification. The only time we find ourselves confused, and off balance, uncertain about the path we are treading is when we heed the whispers of men over the voice of God and convince ourselves that we’ve found an alternate route to the same destination. We haven’t; no man has. There is only one way, only one truth, and only one life. Every other path leads to destruction, no matter how well-paved or amply lit it may be.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

Job CXL

 Job 12:7-12, “But now ask the beasts, and they will teach you; and the birds of the air, and they will tell you; or speak to the earth, and it will teach you; and the fish of the sea will explain to you. Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this, in whose hand is the life of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind? Does not the ear test words and the mouth taste its food? Wisdom is with aged men, and with length of days, understanding.”

Wherever you turn, you’re bound to see the Master’s handiwork. You don’t have to search high and low for it, you don’t have to go on a quest to a far-off land to lay your eyes upon God’s creation, but whether the beasts, the birds of the air, the earth itself, or the fish of the sea, the hand of the Lord and artistry thereof are evident for all to see, save for those who refuse to see.

There isn’t much you can do for someone who squeezes their eyes shut and insists there is no sunrise even though they can feel the warmth of it on their face. Willful ignorance is hard to combat in any meaningful way, and you can tell someone about the greatness of God, the majesty of the works of His hands, and their reply will be something about a big bang and the accidental coming together of DNA strands, atoms, mankind, the animal world, and everything in between. That fish have gills and can breathe underwater, that birds have wings and can soar to the sky, that you have the ability to reason, that the sun is just far enough away not to scorch everything but close enough to give off its warmth, all accidental. A happy accident, to be sure, but an accident nonetheless.

So you’re telling me it’s easier to believe that something akin to taking ten thousand Swiss watches, breaking them down to their smallest parts, putting them in a barrel, rolling them down a hill, and once they get to the bottom expecting them to have put themselves together perfectly took place than it is to believe in intelligent design and that God created the universe and everything therein?

Some people don’t believe because they don’t want to believe. It’s not that there isn’t evidence of God; it’s that they’re terrified of the implications. If God exists, then I must give account. If God exists, then I must bow before Him. If God exists, I can no longer live as I will, do as I will, pursue what I will, but must submit to His authority.

Romans 1:20-21, “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.”

All one needs to do to see His invisible attributes, and clearly so, is open their eyes to all that is around them. From the budding flowers in the spring to the birdsongs in the morning to the caterpillar in its cocoon, God’s hand is seen and understood by the things that are made. So much so that man is without excuse when he stands before God, insisting that ignorance of His existence is what kept them from humbling themselves and embracing Him.

It shouldn’t go unnoticed that much of Job’s wisdom in addressing his friends is reiterated throughout the gospels and much of the New Testament as well. Perhaps not in the same words, but more distilled and concise, because wisdom is perpetual from one generation to the next, and what was deemed wisdom in Job’s day was deemed wisdom in Paul’s day, and by extension, our day as well.

When he penned his introduction to the Romans, Paul was expounding upon Job’s words, insisting that God’s fingerprints, His invisible attributes, are ever present and readily seen wherever one might look. He even goes one step further and points out those who would insist that it is not so, that God’s hand is not readily visible in all things, concluding that thinking themselves wise, they became as fools.

Only a fool can continue to deny overwhelming evidence contrary to his position. That’s no longer a man living in ignorance but one who willfully chooses ignorance in the face of the truth being laid bare before him.

Everything Zophar had thought deep wisdom on his part, so much so that it would compel Job to confess to something he hadn’t done, turned out to be a self-evident truth that could readily be seen by the simplest of minds if they so chose it.

The beasts, the birds, the fish, and the earth itself are aware that they were fashioned by the hand of the Lord. It is no mystery; it is not something veiled and kept in shadow only to be known by the wise among us. The earth sings of His glory from waking to sleeping, as does His wondrous creation, yet man, the crown jewel of His work, dismisses His involvement as no more than mere happenstance.

Zophar wasn’t telling Job anything he didn’t already know, and the one thing Job earned to know, which is why all these things had befallen him, was still kept out of reach. Even if God had answered Job’s question, it would only have led to more questions because the one thing we think will make the journey easier or the burden lighter rarely turns out to be so. One question would have turned into two; two would have turned into five because even if God had told Job the intricacies of it, Job’s mind was incapable of fully understanding it.

Whenever we find ourselves in a situation to which there is no easy answer or readily available explanation, we can spend our days asking why or submitting to the sovereignty of God and trusting that He will see us through, using the time to draw close to Him and grow our dependency upon Him. Depending on the choice we make, we will either come through it stronger, more committed, and with a deeper faith, or scarred, beaten, and bruised with nothing to show for the pain we went through but the experience itself.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

Job CXXXIX

 I’ve always been wary of people who insist they’re experts on everything under the sun. It doesn’t matter what the topic is, whether it is geopolitics, economics, space travel, or how to best get rid of a wasp nest, they’re quick to give their opinion and do it with such certainty as to make you believe they know what they’re talking about. If you take a moment and ask them if they’d ever implemented the advice they’re proffering, you’ll likely find out that they haven’t, but that shouldn’t stop you from trying it.

Two summers ago, we had a wasp nest that showed up on the side of the house, and it was impressive in its size. Given that I’m allergic to bee stings and I swell up like a hot air balloon, I thought it likely the same would happen from a wasp sting, so I was reticent to try and handle it on my own before I got some input as to what the best course of action might be.

I asked a couple of friends, and I got a plethora of advice, from going and just hitting it with a stick until it came off the side of the house to calling in a specialist and having them deal with it, to using WD40 on the nest, as it would make the wasps incapable of flight. Spoiler alert: The last one works, and the reason I chose that course of action was because the individual who suggested it had actually done it, and it had worked.

Yes, I could have called a company to come take care of it, and I did get a quote, but when they told me how much it would cost, I thought I’d risk it and save myself a couple hundred bucks. I’m not cheap, but I am frugal, and their quote seemed a bit excessive. The worst thing I could have done was to heed the advice of the first person who offered it, which was to go and beat it with a stick.

Had I done that, it likely would have been a painful lesson in what not to do, and I would have had no one to blame for myself for not thinking it through. Who’s the bigger fool? The one giving bad advice, or the one taking it? It’s the whole chicken and egg conversation again, and deciding which came first, but when it comes to taking bad advice, the one offering it doesn’t have to go through the pain of implementing it as the one who takes it does.

Not all opinions are worth taking at face value, and some of them are counterproductive, to say the least. It’s usually those who have never gone through what you’re going through who are quickest to offer their take on what you should be doing because, for them, it’s an intellectual exercise, void of the pain, hardship, struggle, and privation. It’s akin to the modern-day trust-fund babies who’ve never had to work a day in their life looking down on the guys with callouses and rickety backs, who are up before sunrise and put in twelve hours of hard labor a day and insisting that they’re not applying themselves or working hard enough.

Sorry, Stefan, but if you’ve never put in an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay, you have not earned the right to condescend to someone working two jobs in order to feed their kids.

The approach of Job’s friends was similar in attitude. They’d never endured anything near to what Job was enduring, yet they believed they were within their rights to sit in judgment and pass sentence, insisting that they knew more of the intricacies of Job’s situation than Job himself did. Unchecked hubris will make a fool of any man, be he wise or learned.

Words are easy to come by, as are opinions. Throw a stone in any direction, and you’re bound to hit someone who will tell you exactly what you need to do regardless of circumstance and insist that if you follow their counsel, all your problems will go away.

The same can be said of individuals within the household of faith whose words are like a fire hose without an off switch, yet when it comes to anything substantive or possessing any of the power they so eloquently describe; they fall short.

It’s not a new thing. It’s been going on since the early church, wherein you have those who talk a lot but do very little, if anything, and then those who, for the most part, say few words but do the heavy lifting within the body.

1 Corinthians 4:18-20, “Now some are puffed up, as though I were not coming to you. But I will come to you shortly, if the Lord wills, and I will know, not the word of those who are puffed up, but the power. For the kingdom of God is not in word but in power.”

Job’s friends were offering words. They weren’t even comforting or encouraging words, but words that were as daggers to his already wounded heart. We get that you’re in a hole, buddy. If only you had a shovel and a ladder, it would make things so much easier. But I don’t have a shovel or a ladder! True enough, but imagine if you did.

As far as being helpful, Zophar’s words had no actionable resolution, just as Eliphaz and Bildad fell short. There was no power in them, and nothing they had to say would provide a remedy for Job because his battle went beyond the physical into the spiritual and beyond what their minds could conceive of. He tried to placate the first two, but not so with Zophar. He’d reached the end of his tether and did not hold back in his reply.

There is a time to be congenial and conciliatory; then, there is a time to draw a line in the sand and be direct and forthright. For Job, the time to be direct had come, and once those floodgates opened, everything he’d been holding back and bottling up came rushing forward. 

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

Job CXXXVIII

Job 12:1-6, “Then Job answered and said: ‘No doubt you are the people, and wisdom will die with you! But I have understanding as well as you; I am not inferior to you. Indeed, who does not know such things as these? I am one mocked by his friends, who called on God, and He answered him, the just and blameless who is ridiculed. A lamp is despised in the thought of one who is at ease; it is made ready for those whose feet slip. The tents of robbers prosper, and those who provoke God are secure – in what God provides by His hand.” 

As was expected from the previous two interactions with his friends, it was Job’s turn to respond and mount a defense, or in the least show Zophar that not everything is so black and white, cut and dry, and without nuance or distinction. 

By his opening salvo, Job, too, was running out of patience if he hadn’t done so already, and there was no olive branch extended to Zophar, but rather the first words to come from his mouth were tinged with sarcasm so thick as to make due as an entire snack. Although he was responding to Zophar’s accusations, Job included all three of his friends in his acidic response, insisting that when they three went the way of all flesh, wisdom itself would die alongside them. Tongue in cheek as his response was, it likely stung all three of the men who were waiting for him to break and confess the sin they were certain he was guilty of.

I’ve heard what you had to say, but you forget that I, too, am privy to the things you’ve enumerated. I have understanding as well as you, and I am not inferior to you. This wasn’t an overreaction because Job had an inferiority complex, but given his friends’ words, it’s undeniable that they believed themselves intellectually superior and more knowledgeable about the things of God than him.

Perhaps they’d always harbored these feelings and kept them well hidden, but now the time had come, and each one was attempting to teach Job something they thought to be illuminating and earth shattering, while Job’s response to them was, who does not know such things as these?

What you deemed superior intellect is basic on its best day, and there’s nothing you’ve said that I don’t already know. If Job’s plan had been to hit them where it hurts, then he was over the target and connecting with each turn of phrase.

He’d been condescended to, talked down to, demeaned, and falsely accused while carrying the burden of watching his flesh being covered in worms and painful boils, and whether he tried to hold his tongue or not, we will never know, but what is clear is that he’d had enough. Yes, you can push a decent, soft-spoken, calm and collected person too far, and when you do, you’d better strap in because you’re about to get it in spades.

It is said it’s the quiet ones you have to look out for, and generally speaking, barring a handful of exceptions, it’s true. When someone who is mild-mannered, quiet, and not given to bouts of contention can no longer hold his tongue, you know you’ve gone too far.

Few things in life are more offputting than hearing someone you call a friend talk down to you, condescend, and belittle you for something you didn’t do. If a stranger were to say the same thing it would be a small matter, because they’re strangers, and they don’t know you as your friends should, but this was someone whom Job knew, and who in turn knew Job, and as he pointed out they were aware of his relationship with God, and that when he’d called out, God had answered.

There is no person, situation, or circumstance the enemy won’t use to try and get the upper hand. Nothing is beneath him, and there’s no shame in his plots and schemes, because as has become customary in our day and age, especially among those of political leanings, the ends justify the means, and if we achieved our end nothing we did in order to achieve it can be considered too slimy, or out of pocket.

It’s all about applying pressure and finding the precise point where pressure can be applied. Job had nothing left but his integrity, his steadfastness, and faithfulness to the God he served, and that was the target the enemy focused on with glee and abandon.

We’re all quite good at evaluating our strengths, and even overestimating and foolishly magnifying them at times, but not so when it comes to our weaknesses. Sometimes, we even like to talk ourselves into believing that a weakness is a strength, even though we know deep down that it’s not. When it comes to resisting vegetables, my self-control is impeccable. No crown of broccoli has tempted me to the point of surrender! The same can’t be said for warm peach cobbler with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, though. We like to pretend that we’re all strength, no weakness, and there’s nothing that can happen or anything anyone can say that will get to us or raise our hackles and make us react in the moment.

I am a rock; I am an island; I am what Stonewall Jackson wished he had been, and there’s nothing that will scar me. We can talk ourselves into believing it until the fateful moment when it’s proven a lie. We all have something that’s more likely to get a rise out of us than anything else, whether it’s a stutter, our hairline, crow’s feet, or a few extra pounds. For Job, that one thing was being accused of sin he knew himself not to have committed.

Throughout his ordeal, through all the pain and grief and loss, Job had clung to his integrity; he’d remained steadfast in His worship of God, and here were his friends insisting it was not so. You may think it, you may even believe it, but we know better, and you just need to admit that we do.

It seems as though it’s not just Job’s friends who’d decided to give him a piece of their mind, but Job also decided it was time to point out their inconsistencies and perceived wisdom that wasn’t so much wisdom as common knowledge.

It’s easy to pontificate and wax poetic when you’re not the one sitting in the dirt covered in worms having just buried your ten children. When it’s light out, what need have you for a lamp? Therefore, you despise it, but not so when the darkness comes, and you pray for a flicker, hoping it will light your way.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

Job CXXXVII

 People hear what they want to hear. God hears the cry of your heart. He does not filter your words through some bias or interpret them to mean something they were not intended to. He will not nitpick at you or belittle you for using the past tense when a present tense participle would have been the proper way of phrasing it, nor will He reject you for your lack of eloquence when crying out to Him.

If one of my children is crying out for help, I would not fail to answer because they did not address me in Old World English or because their tone was a bit too shrieky. They cry, and I run to their aid because they are in need of my help, protection, or comfort. The words they use, the volume thereof, or the cadence they appropriate is irrelevant in such situations. Yes, dear, I see you fell and scraped your knee, but you did not address me as sire; therefore, I did not respond to your cries. Knowest though better for next time? Verily, I hope you’ve learned your lesson. 

The only rule that applies when we’re crying out to God is that we do so with a sincere heart. Every other pet peeve men have thought up is just that, a man-made preference, and not a Biblical dictate or mandate. Leave others to their dead gods, to pray in a specific direction at specific times with specific wording and genuflection. Let them ring bells, light incense, or roll their eyes into the back of their skulls until only the whites show. You approach God in spirit and in truth, cry out to Him with a sincere heart, and know that He hears you.   

Men read into things, situations, circumstances, the specific wording we use, and the inflection with which we use them, but God sees the situation for what it is and knows our hearts better than we ourselves know them. A loving father would not turn away his children because they cry too much or too little, because their posture is not rigid enough, or because their tone isn’t appropriately sorrowful. God is a loving father. Therefore, He will not turn you away due to irrelevant things men deem worthy of rejection.

Stand before Him as you are, without pretense or the attempt to put on a façade, and pour your heart out to Him. Acknowledge your frailty, your weakness, your battles, your wounds, your scars, your setbacks, and your inconsistency. Be honest with Him. He already knows it all anyway.

When we attempt to stand before God clothed in our righteousness, we make fools of ourselves. When we stand before God clothed in Christ, understanding that His sacrifice and not our abilities have reconciled us with Him, humility will be an ever-present companion.

Luke 18:9-14, “Also He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other men – extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.’ And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”’

When we humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord, it is He who lifts us up. It’s not something we do on our own or something we talk ourselves into manifesting. There are situations where no amount of pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps will suffice, and the only remedy is to reach out, take His hand, and allow Him to do what He does, as He wills, when He wills. When you’re drowning and someone throws you a life preserver, you don’t complain that it’s the wrong color or that it doesn’t match your swimsuit. You grab it, cling to it, and show gratitude for having had your life saved from an untimely death.

Zophar heard what he wanted to hear in Job’s words. “You say my doctrine is pure, and I am clean in your eyes”, Zophar reminded Job, even though Job had never said those words. Zophar needed to make his point; he needed to defend his position, and if he had to twist the truth in order to fit his presuppositions, to him, it was a small price to pay if it meant being right.

Men see what they want to see. They hear what they want to hear, but God knows the truth of it since nothing is hidden from His eyes. There are even those who go out of their way looking for something they can object to, some twitch of the eye, or wave of a hand, or an out-of-place word that they can then magnify and point to as something legitimate rather than the ruminations of their contentious minds. If the same judgmental eye were to be turned on them, they would wilt and wither under its glare and demand that it stop, lest they crumble under its weight altogether.

No, I didn’t rub my eye because I’m Illuminati. I rubbed my eye because it was itching. I have allergies, and there’s pollen in the air. When we demand perfection of everyone around us but fail to apply the same standard to ourselves, all we are is pharisaical hypocrites who see ourselves in an undeserved light.

Some people have taken to calling themselves full-time heresy hunters, using it as an excuse for why they haven’t been looking in the mirror of the Word and dealing with the issues in their own lives. It’s far more rewarding to one’s ego to endlessly point out the shortcomings in others, whether real or perceived, than it is to deal with our own, but our primary duty is to ensure that we are working out our own salvation with fear and trembling before we dare to sit in judgment of everyone else, whether living or dead.

Matthew 7:2, “For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.” 

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.