Job CCLI

 Job 23:8-12, “Look, I go forward, but He is not there, and backward, but I cannot perceive Him; When He works on he 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 commandments of His lips; I have treasured the words of His mouth more than my necessary food.”

Job’s biggest concern wasn’t the pain he was in, the possessions he’d lost, the children he’d had to bury, or that his friends were accusing him of things he hadn’t done, but that though he went forward, God was not there, and if he went backward, he could not perceive Him. It’s the absence of the presence of God that vexed him more than anything else he was currently experiencing, and that’s saying a lot.

If you’ve ever wondered why God saw Job as a blameless and upright man, this handful of verses should suffice in answering the question. The first thing that stands out and serves as the bedrock of Job’s unshakeable faith is that although he could not see, hear, or perceive God, he was certain that God saw, heard, and watched over him. He knows the way I take. He sees me where I am, as I am, hears the cry of my heart, and when He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold.

Just because God is silent, it doesn’t mean He isn’t there. Just because God does not act on our behalf when we would like Him to in the manner we deem fitting, it does not mean He will not, or is incapable of doing so.

Job had been crushed, everything he’d had was taken from him, his health was failing, his flesh stunk to the point that his own wife couldn’t stand him, he’d cried out day and night, repeatedly pleading for everything from an answer, a resolution, and even death itself, yet through it all he never doubted that God knew the way he took, and one way or another, when God had tested him, he would come forth as gold.

If you possess this level of submission to the will, purpose, and sovereignty of God, wherein no matter what, you are fully assured that God sees, hears, and will bring about a resolution in the manner He sees fit, then feel free to call yourself blameless and upright. If not, perhaps a little less chest-beating and a little more humility would be in order.

We murmur and bristle at the slightest hiccup nowadays, thinking it’s the end of the world if the corner store runs out of bagels before we get a chance to buy one, and fail to consider that we run across people every day who deal better with far worse things than we do with the trivial.

Job wasn’t boasting about his righteousness, his attributes, his charity, or his uprightness; God did it on his behalf. It’s an important distinction and one we would do well to take to heart. The only thing Job was certain of, and as such was willing to verbalize declaratively, was that his foot had held fast to God’s steps; he had kept His way and not turned aside; and he had not departed from the commandments of His lips.

Whether that classified him as blameless or upright did not concern Job. He wasn’t interested in the title, just the obedience and faithfulness. Had he been the sort of man to feign righteousness for the sake of others or pretend to be upright when he wasn’t, the inverse would have occurred. He would have boasted of his blamelessness, insisted upon his uprightness, while God would have remained silent regarding his boasts, or rebuked him for having made such claims.

This is also a reliable telltale sign, generally speaking, when someone insists that you address them by their title or office, whether self-appointed or undergirded by some piece of paper declaring them to be what they insist you address them as. Unless you live out in the woods, far away from civilization, you’ve likely run across such individuals, and more often than not, the entire exchange is off-putting and disappointing.

“I have a to-go order for Jeff”, the girl at the counter shouts over the din of conversation and steaming milk.

“Actually, it’s Dr. Jeff,” the man answers smugly. And? Will that make your coffee taste any better, or your bran muffin feel less like you’re chewing sodden dirt and crunchy pebbles?

Granted, I used an inoffensive example, but you know, and I know, and you know that I know, and I know that you know, that it happens with such regularity within Christendom as to have become cliché. Whether the title is prophet, apostle, elder, bishop, or pastor, unless that’s the name on your birth certificate, shake my hand and tell me your name’s Bob. I’ll respect you more for it.

If indeed you are an apostle or a prophet, the calling will be evident soon enough. If you aren’t, no matter how many times you insist I address you as such, you’re still a faker, a farceur, a pretender who will one day have to answer before God for having claimed a title you had no right to.

Claiming a title will do nothing to impress God. All it does is stroke the ego of the self-obsessed, self-serving, and self-aggrandizing, who, as yet, have no identity in Christ, but in themselves. If they did, they would understand that the title of servant is more than enough, it suffices, and encapsulates everything one could ever hope to be in Him.

I’ve known genuine men of God who could be labeled as prophets, biblically speaking, yet none of the real ones claimed the title for themselves, and what’s more, they scolded anyone who addressed them as such. They understood that it’s not about them as an individual, but about whom they served, and if any of the honor or glory risked being syphoned from Jesus and appropriated to them, it was something they could not abide.

If you ever wonder whether someone is or isn’t what they claim to be, ask yourself one question: Are they determined to further the kingdom of God, or their own? Do they give God the glory or take it for themselves? That should tell you everything you need to know.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.