Job CCCXIX

 Job 36:22-33, “Behold, God is exalted by His power; who teaches like Him? Who has assigned Him His way, or who has said, ‘You have done wrong’? Remember to magnify His work, of which men have sung. Man looks on it from afar. Behold, God is great, and we do not know Him; nor can the number of His years be discovered. For He draws up drops of water, which distill as rain from the mist, which the clouds drop down and pour abundantly on man. Indeed, can anyone understand the spreading clouds, the thunder from His canopy? Look, He scatters His light upon it, and covers the depths of the sea. For by these He judges the peoples; He gives food in abundance. He covers His hands with lightning, and commands it to strike. His thunder declares it, the cattle also, concerning the rising storm.”

Nestled within his multitude of words, Elihu said something that, in modern parlance, seems more like a Freudian slip than anything else. It rings different than all the other things he’s said thus far, and reveals something Elihu would have been reticent to admit had his mouth not gotten ahead of his brain: God is great, and we do not know Him! But you’ve been waxing poetic regarding God for the better part of four chapters. You’ve been talking endlessly about all the wisdom and knowledge that reside in you, flow from your lips, and have nested in your heart, to the point that everything you say is worthy of being chiseled into stone tablets to be preserved for future generations. You’ve been boasting about your knowledge endlessly, yet the one thing man should strive to know above all else, you admitted, you do not know.

It’s never been easier to learn more about the most obscure or niche topics than it is now. Everyone presumes they’re a genius because they have a smartphone and can get answers at the click of a button, without putting forth the effort of diligent searching. What once would have taken endless months in dusty libraries can be accessed within a breath, and for some reason, men equate that to their own wisdom being enriched and heightened.

Given the abundance of evidence on hand, I would submit we haven’t gotten smarter, wiser, or more knowledgeable, but the opposite. We’ve been dumbed down, duped into using technology as a crutch and a safety net, so dependent on it that if the Apple Watch doesn’t beep to remind us to drink water, we’d die of thirst.

I’m old enough to remember the good old days where you’d have to fork out ten bucks for an atlas if you were planning on driving cross country, mapping your journey, figuring out if you were going east or west, when now all you have to do is punch in an address four states away, and the device will not only tell you the best route to take, but an estimated time of arrival. Easier? More convenient? Most assuredly, but now you have people Google-mapping the grocery store they’ve been to a hundred times for fear of getting lost within four blocks.

We’ve taken to asking Siri about spiritual matters that only the Word of God can reveal, and what’s even more concerning is that we would take the word of a gadget over Scripture when it comes to salvific matters. Jesus said He was the way, the truth, and the life, but if you ask Siri how many paths there are to heaven, I’m sure it will list a plethora of them, because a soulless machine can never grasp the profundity of eternity, nor perceive what salvation means.

Some edgy, hyper-modern contemporary churches have even taken to embracing the notion of Artificial Intelligence delivering sermons, believing it to be viable, rather than the nefarious, destructive threat it credibly poses to something as existential as eternity. Yes, AI may use fancier words, better sentence structure, and more engaging story arcs, but what it can never possess is the unction and power of the Holy Spirit that the sons and daughters of God ought to. A machine, no matter how technologically advanced, can never feel the unction of the Holy Spirit or speak the words the hungry soul needs to hear. Likely, what you’ll get is a carefully curated word salad, akin to Elihu’s self-indulgent, bloviating speech, that neither challenges nor exhorts, and does its utmost to cause as little offense as possible.

Elihu inadvertently admitted that he did not know God, and, as any hubristic soul would, he had to include everyone else in his statement. If I don’t know God, then no one else can, so we, as a monolith, do not know Him! I can’t see it; I really can’t. Here I am speaking on God’s behalf, and I don’t know Him, and if someone like me can’t know Him, then no one else can. The probability that someone, anyone, would have a true and abiding relationship with God while I rattle off attributes about Him just doesn’t compute.

Look, I know stuff about God. He is great. He draws up drops of water which distill as rain from the mist. He scatters His light upon the canopy of the clouds and covers the depths of the sea, but as far as knowing Him personally, I don’t, so you can’t either, for we do not know Him! It’s hard to imagine anyone could be more presumptuous than Elihu, but to this day there are people who insist that, because they have not experienced something, it is therefore impossible for anyone else to have experienced it. Prophecy? Revelation? Divine healing? The indwelling of the Holy Spirit? Surely you jest. I’ve experienced none of these things, and I know a lot about God, so if I were not graced with these gifts, anyone who claims to have been graced with them must be lying through their teeth. Circuitous logic at its best, or at its worst, depending on how you view it, but if all else fails, ask Siri or Alexa; I’m sure they’ll have the right of it.     

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.

Job CCCXVIII

 Job 36:13-21, “But the hypocrites in heart store up wrath; they do not cry for help when He binds them. They die in youth, and their life ends among the perverted persons. He delivers the poor in their affliction, and opens their ears in oppression. Indeed He would have brought you out of dire distress, into a broad place where there is no restraint; and what is set on your table would be full of richness. But you are filled with the judgment due the wicked; judgment and justice take hold of you. Because there is wrath, beware lest He take you away with one blow; for a large ransom would not help you avoid it. Will your riches, or all the mighty forces, keep you from distress? Do not desire the night, when people are cut off in their place. Take heed, do not turn to iniquity, for you have chosen this rather than affliction.”

If Job had never cried out for help, Elihu may have had a point. It’s not that Job hadn’t cried out; it’s not that Job hadn’t pleaded with God for an answer, or asked to be shown his wickedness if there was any to be found. It’s that God had remained silent, and this, above all else, eclipsed what he’d been through and was a torment for his soul. It was the absence of God’s presence and voice that Job found most unbearable even though he’d been reduced to scratching at his festering boils with a potsherd.

It’s not that there was any evidence of Job’s guilt that compelled Elihu to conclude that he was filled with judgment due the wicked; Elihu needed Job to be guilty of wickedness to support his conclusion. It was an attempt to justify his judgment despite there being no evidence of wrongdoing because, above all else, Elihu needed to be right.

During the height of the Communist scourge, one of Joseph Stalin’s most infamous henchmen was an individual named Lavrentiy Beria. He served as the head of the secret police for some twelve years, and his famous quote was as chilling as it was succinct: “Show me the man, and I’ll show you the crime.” To him, guilt or innocence were irrelevant, as was the notion of fairness or justice. To him, the rule of law wasn’t something to be equally applied, but rather something to be used as a cudgel, a tool to get his way, and whether a man had done something worthy of punishment or death was irrelevant. As long as that man stood in the way of Stalin’s stated goal, he would find something to pin on him, even make it up out of whole cloth if need be, because his guiding principle was winning at any cost rather than discovering the truth of a thing. You presume the man guilty, then fill in the blanks at your leisure.

Elihu did not start out with a presumption of innocence when it came to Job. He’d already made up his mind. As far as he was concerned, the case had been adjudicated in the court of public opinion, and Job’s guilt was certain. Now all he had to do was backfill the narrative with incriminating tidbits, lean on causation to do the heavy lifting, and insist that he knew the mind of God when it came to Job. And so the entire thing could be wrapped up in a shiny bow, and he would be the man who’d proven what Job’s three friends could not.

This was Elihu’s version of “it is written” that would take place far into the future, as Satan unsuccessfully attempted to tempt Jesus into turning stones into bread, then later to throw Himself from the pinnacle of the temple, by misusing and abusing what was, in fact, written, but not in the spirit in which it was intended.

Jesus already knew who He was. Satan likewise knew who Jesus was, and any attempt at proving it was tantamount to tempting God. If you know who you are in Christ, you have no need to prove it to anyone, especially to someone who demands you do so in bad faith. Oh, you’re saved and redeemed? Prove it! Even if you decide to go through every detail of how Jesus transformed you, how you were born again, how you no longer pursue the things you once did but Him alone, it won’t suffice, it won’t be enough, because those asking for proof aren’t doing it out of a sincere desire to know, but in the hope that you come to doubt your place in God’s Kingdom.

Elihu was not well meaning, he wasn’t well intentioned, he wasn’t trying to get Job to repent of something he’d done, but rather to sow seeds of doubt regarding his relationship with God by repeatedly pointing to those who came before, who had rightly been judged for their wickedness, and insisting that Job was just like them, and he too had committed evil in the sight of God.

The sad reality is that Satan knows Scripture better than most believers, and if he thinks he can use it to sow doubt, he will not hesitate to attempt to pervert the truth of it toward his own ends. There is one surefire way to combat such schemes, and that is to know Scripture for yourself, consume it daily, and allow it to take root in your heart, so that when one of the devil’s minions comes calling insisting that it is written, you can likewise point to it and say, it is also written, and what you have stated as the basis of your argument is invalidated by Scripture itself, not parsed out, mutilated, twisted, and reimagined, but in context as it should be.

All things being equal, any one of us today would have a far easier time rebuffing the claims of Elihu because we have the written Word to fall back on, we have the Bible to which we can go and glean wisdom and understanding, while Job had none of those graces. What Job did have was unwavering faith in the God he served. He knew himself to be innocent of the things being said about him, and that was enough for him to weather the barrage of accusations and insinuations leveled against him.

If the day ever comes, let Scripture defend you if you know yourself to be a son or daughter of the Almighty, walking humbly in the way he has set before you. It’s the only effective defense, and the only surefire way to quench the fiery darts of the wicked one.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

Job CCCXVII

 Job 36:5-12, “Behold, God is mighty, but despises no one; He is mighty in strength of understanding. He does not preserve the life of the wicked, but gives justice to the oppressed. He does not withdraw His eyes from the righteous; but they are on the throne with kings, for He has seated them forever, and they are exalted. And if they are bound in fetters, held in the cords of affliction, then He tells them their work and their transgressions – that they have acted defiantly. He also opens their ear to instruction, and commands that they turn from iniquity. If they obey and serve Him, they shall spend their days in prosperity, and their years in pleasures. But if they do not obey, they shall perish by the sword, and they shall die without knowledge.”

There is who God is, then there’s what men would like Him to be. There are undeniable attributes that God possesses, clearly defined in His word; then there are attributes that those who refuse to submit to His sovereignty project on Him as a way to excuse their rebellion and disobedience.

It is obvious Elihu wasn’t speaking about God from a position of having known Him personally and intimately, but rather from a position of assigning attributes to God that he would have liked Him to possess. He wasn’t saying anything new. One of Job’s three friends had already brought up the notion of karmic justice, wherein if you do good, only good will be visited upon you, and if you do wicked, evil.

I get the feeling Elihu would have made a spectacular modern-day prosperity preacher since he reduces everything to a give-and-take, tit-for-tat approach of God, not allowing for the possibility of refinement, correction, chastening, or testing.

If you have no worries, then you’re living right. If you’re obeying and serving God, then you’ll spend your days in prosperity and your years in pleasure. If you have trials and tribulations, you’re obviously doing evil, because everyone knows that status, wealth, and opulence are the surefire ways to know if God looks favorably on someone.

For a man who boasted that wisdom flowed from his lips and insisted that he was perfect in knowledge, Elihu said some ignorant things, showcasing his lack of understanding both of God and Job’s situation.

Because they refuse to consider context or weigh what a fragment of a verse says to the overall message of the gospel, some disreputable individuals could take Elihu’s words and make an entire doctrine out of it, not because it was true and in harmony with Scripture, but because his words confirmed their bias and spoke to the desire of their heart.

Look, it’s right there in black and white: you are on the throne with kings, exalted, seated forever, destined to spend your days in prosperity and your years in pleasure. Never mind that these words came from the lips of a man who had no true knowledge or understanding of God, and who proceeded to speak on God’s behalf words God never told him to speak.

Never mind that Jesus Himself said we would be hated for His name’s sake, and that in this world we would have tribulation. Elihu said we’re going to prosper and spend our years in pleasure!

Who said it matters. The context in which they said what they said matters as well. Some things are said with a negative connotation, but because we’re so focused on getting scripture to say what we want it to say rather than submit to what it says, we’ll flip it on its ear and pretend as though God Himself spoke the words that men took upon themselves to speak.

One of the most surreal moments that occurred not long ago was when none other than good ole’ Jesse had his wife on his program, and in an attempt to justify his excess, he went to the 49^th Psalm. The context of the latter part of the psalm has nothing to do with God prospering His own, but rather instruction not to be dismayed when the wicked prosper. Jesse, being Jesse, just took the first few words of the sixteenth verse and ran with it like his hair was on fire until his own wife called him out and pointed to the context, insisting that the verse didn’t say what he thought it said.

Psalm 49:16-20, “Do not be overawed when others grow rich, when the splendor of their houses increases; for they will take nothing with them when they die, their splendor will not descend with them. Though while they live they count themselves blessed – and people praise you when you prosper – they will join those who have gone before them, who will never again see the light of life. People who have wealth but lack understanding are like the beasts that perish.”

When read in context, the meaning of the text is very different than not being overawed when others grow rich, and when the splendor of their houses increases, as though warning against jealousy and envy, which is what Jesse was attempting to convey. What the Psalm conveys is that all the wealth in the world is meaningless if one lacks understanding, because eventually the grave will beckon, as it has to all those who have gone before them, and if they didn’t know God, it would be for naught.

Elihu’s words might be appealing to the flesh, so much so that men would dismiss everything else the Bible says and cling to them as to a piece of driftwood on a roiling sea, but all they’re doing is clinging to the words of a self-important man who neither knew God nor His presence in his life. I’ve heard enough preachers insist on some variation thereof often enough over the years, but when considering what Jesus said to those who would follow Him, what they should expect while they walk the earth, and how the world would treat them, I have no expectation of being exalted or being seated on the throne with kings.

Sure, suffering persecution is far less appealing than sitting on a throne with kings, as is being hated for His name’s sake when the alternative is to be exalted, but between Elihu and Jesus, I believe Jesus, even if my flesh would rather I believed Elihu.

Who said the thing you’re clinging to with greater fervor than you would the Word of God? Touchy subject, I know, but one that must be confronted head-on, because many are coming in His name, speaking demonstrable falsehoods, and the household of faith is lapping it up and asking for seconds without once considering that Jesus said the opposite.         

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

Job CCCXVI

 Job 36:1-4, “Elihu also proceeded and said: ‘Bear with me a little, and I will show you that there are yet words to speak on God’s behalf. I will fetch my knowledge from afar; I will ascribe righteousness to my Maker. For truly my words are not false; One who is perfect in knowledge is with you.”’

If you know what to look for, there is no shortage of red flags when it comes to Elihu’s speech. Once again, the way he frames it does not suggest that God sent him with a message or that God had spoken to him, but that he had taken it upon himself to speak on God’s behalf.

I’m not done, not by a long shot, and you’re going to hear everything I have to say on God’s behalf. On whose authority? By what authority? What permits you to speak on behalf of the Almighty? Could He not speak on His own behalf if He so chose? Surely, He could!

Men going without being sent and speaking on behalf of God, even though God never spoke to them, have become an epidemic in the contemporary church. It was such a common thing that the more astute among us concluded they needed to up the ante if they had any hope of standing out, because when everyone from Uncle Bob to Aunt Lucy takes it upon themselves to speak on behalf of God, it’s just not that special anymore.

And so we have the new breed of interdimensional travelers who teleport to heaven and back on the weekly, hanging out with God and watching old reruns of Little House on the Prairie, being used as a confidant and sounding board as to how God should rule the universe He spoke into being, because, you know, He second-guesses Himself so often, he needs some input from some spiky haired train wreck who discovered that a portapoti is the Star Trek equivalent of a transporter.   

Perhaps people are so hungry for some type of supernatural experience that they’re willing to swallow anything. Perhaps it’s the utter lack of Biblical literacy, but whatever the reason behind the rise of individuals who make greater, grander, and more bombastic claims regarding their own supposed experiences, it will not end well, not for them, and not for those who follow them.

In his second letter to the Corinthians, Paul spoke of knowing a man who fourteen years hence had been caught up to the third heaven. There is a high probability that Paul was speaking of himself, but because he did not want to be seen as special or unique, he claimed it was some other individual. If it’s all about Jesus as some claim, then they’ll make it all about Jesus. If it’s all about themselves while claiming it’s about Jesus, they will be the ones standing in the spotlight, passing themselves off as superior in spirituality as well as experience, because they are the hero of their story, the star of their show, and there’s only room on the stage for one individual.

That Elihu would have the temerity to speak on God’s behalf was the first red flag, shortly followed by the second, which was elevating himself to the point that he deemed himself perfect in knowledge. One who is perfect in knowledge is with you! By whose qualification? By whose standard? By whose plumbline? My own, of course, silly. Who else can ascertain whether I am perfect in knowledge if not I? If anything, you should be grateful that one such as myself is taking the time to speak to you, rather than asking pesky questions like whether or not I have any evidence to back up my claims.

Trust me; I’m not lying; my words are not false. I am perfect in knowledge, and if you don’t see it, that’s on you. Anyone making audacious claims about interacting with the Almighty Himself and braiding His beard follows up their fanciful tale with trust me, I’m not lying; that’s a tell, and you should be aware of it.

What they are doing when they throw out the trust me line is attempting to short-circuit your rational thinking ability and guilt-trip you into thinking you’re too judgmental and unwilling to give the benefit of the doubt. It’s the same mind game confidence men like to play, where they pretend to be hurt and aggrieved when you call them out on their inconsistency.

You’re telling me that if I give you a hundred dollars today, you’ll give me five hundred in a week? But how can that be? What? Don’t you trust me? I’m not lying; my words are not false. And that’s when they have you on the back foot, no longer wondering why, if this individual could turn a hundred dollars into five hundred in a week, they need your hundred dollars, why they’re still driving a rusty Pinto, or why they smell like a cross between boiled head cheese and an outhouse.

Here they are, just trying to help me out, and I’m questioning their integrity. Shame on me.

Then the greed comes into play, and the question is no longer whether this person is lying or how this could possibly be real, but whether he can turn a thousand into five thousand rather than a measly hundred into five. Those playing the long con will even insist that you start out small, just to see that it works, and return in a week with five crisp hundreds, knowing that the next time it won’t be just a hundred bucks, but a thousand, or even ten.

If you don’t believe these are some of the same shenanigans being done in some churches, you’ve been sheltered, and I envy you for it. From the gold dust that never turns out to be real gold to people mysteriously finding fifty dollars in their Bibles after they threw five bucks in the offering plate, these are tricks intended to elicit a specific response.

Elihu was not motivated by justice, charity, love, or compassion. Elihu was motivated by Elihu and how others perceived him. His baseline was that he be seen as one who is perfect in knowledge and would accept nothing less. If that meant dragging Job through the mud and making him out to be a wicked man, so be it. You can’t have an omelet without breaking some eggs, after all, and it wasn’t like Job was long for this world regardless. Funny thing how, even to this day, people justify the most reprobate, vile, and evil things if they have a mind to.         

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

Job CCCXV

 Be wary of anyone who insists they have the market cornered on wisdom, and if perchance you desire some, the only means to attain it is through them exclusively. If the person, whoever they might be, places themselves as the middle man between you and the Word of God, and tries to convince you that only via their interpretation of the text and not your own diligent study and immersion in Scripture can you attain the wisdom you desire, at best, they have an ulterior motive and do not have your best interest at heart, spiritually speaking.

At worst, they are attempting to appropriate the authority of Christ and present themselves as an alternative messianic figure who must be obeyed, if not outright worshipped, ceaselessly minimizing Jesus while magnifying themselves to the point of seeing themselves on equal footing, if not superior to the Son of God Himself.

Delusion feeds on itself. Hubris is self-perpetuating. If an individual has started on the path of deception, they’re not going to get better, more balanced, or wiser, but descend further into folly, becoming unhinged to the point of saying and doing things contrary to the Word of God, the words of Christ, and dragging those who would follow them further into the deep.

2 Peter 2:1-3, “But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom the way of truth will be blasphemed. By covetousness they will exploit you with deceptive words; for a long time their judgment has not been idle, and their destruction does not slumber.”

Given that Jesus Himself warned of false teachers and false prophets rising up and deceiving many, the closer we get to the end of all things, the closer we get to His return, the more relevant His warning becomes because it will be in these last days that the enemy will go all out, doing his utmost to deceive, if possible even the elect. These warnings are there for a reason. They are not to be dismissed, ignored, or brushed off, nor are we to underestimate the power such individuals will display, even to the point of performing great signs and wonders. They are to be taken to heart, understood for what they are, so that when we see these things occurring, we will not be shaken, nor made to stumble, as many will.

We know that many will be deceived because that is the word Jesus used. It won’t be a handful, a few, or some negligible number, but many. What is deception? In simple terms, anything that attempts to replace the lordship, sovereignty, uniqueness, and indispensable need for Christ. The Word tells us there is one way, one truth, and one life, all encompassed in the person of Jesus, who was born of a virgin, lived a sinless life, died on a cross hanging between two thieves, rose again on the third day, and ascended to heaven forty days hence.

There is salvation in none other than in Jesus, nor is there any other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. Anyone attempting to add to or take away from this principle, absolute, unequivocal truth, is sowing deception.

People love playing at being the gatekeepers to wisdom. They love insinuating there are alternatives to Jesus, or that something more than humbling ourselves, repenting of our sins, being born again, denying ourselves, taking up our crosses, and following after Him is required. It makes them feel special, spiritually superior, a cut above the rest, which feeds their insatiable pride. Sure, Jesus is all great and good, but you need a little something extra, a little extra spice, the secret to the secret sauce that only I have the recipe to, and if you want the full experience, you have to do this other thing I’m about to share with you in confidence.

Make sure that what you believe is in harmony with the Word of God. If it isn’t, then no matter how much you might want to believe it, no matter how good it makes you feel, no matter how much you might want it to be true, it isn’t, and that’s just a plain fact. The way I feel about the reality of something does not change the reality of the thing. I may feel like I’m in my twenties, but the reality is that I’m well past fifty, and no matter how hard I might try to talk myself into believing I’m twenty, the creaking bones, achy joints, and wrinkly skin say otherwise.

God does not negotiate terms and conditions. Any man who insists they are exempt from the guardrails the Bible sets forth is either lying to themselves or lying to you. There are no backdoors into heaven; there are no secret passages that only a select few are given to know, and if you follow after someone who claims as much, they aren’t leading you to the promised land but to a place of sorrow, grief, resentment, bitterness, and disillusionment.

It doesn’t matter how often this scenario plays out; it seems as though we never learn our lesson. Every time a wolf is proven a wolf, another steps up to fill the vacuum, insisting that though they act as a wolf, growl as a wolf, consume and devour as a wolf, they are not a wolf. And so, the way of truth is blasphemed anew, and a fresh crop of souls gets shipwrecked, because they allowed themselves to believe something that the Word did not confirm or agree with.

What does this have to do with Job, you might ask? Job knew God, and God knew Job. He did not allow external pressures to dictate his relationship with the Almighty, nor did he allow himself to be swayed by his friends and family into abandoning his integrity. If your relationship with God is anchored in truth, it will abide. If the foundation of your spiritual house is built upon the Word of God, it will weather the storm. Men might call you stunted, backward, antiquated, a relic of a bygone era when people were satisfied with serving God, worshipping Him, knowing Him, and being in fellowship with Him because they didn’t know any different.

I mean, people were happy with the radio before television came along, content with AM FM before satellite, shifting into gear and using the steering wheel before autonomous driving, but now that these things exist, they’re more exciting and cutting-edge. All of that may be true, but where we err is in equating the eternal God and Creator of all that is with technological advancement, concluding that if one has changed, the other must as well. God changes not, from age to age, and generation to generation. There is no improving on God because there is no improving on perfection. Likewise, there is nothing that can be added to a genuine, sincere, and consistent relationship with Him that can make it more satisfying.

Those who seek something other than knowing Him and being known by Him never knew Him to begin with, for had they known Him, they would have realized He is sufficient.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

Job CCCXIV

 Job 35:9-16, “Because of the multitude of oppressions they cry out; they cry out for help because of the arm of the mighty. But no one says, ‘Where is God my Maker, who gives songs in the night, who teaches us more than the beasts of the earth, and makes us wiser than the birds of heaven?’ There they cry out, but He does not answer, because of the pride of evil men. Surely God will not listen to empty talk, nor will the Almighty regard it. Although you say you do not see Him, yet justice is before Him, and you must wait for Him. And now, because He has not punished in His anger, nor taken much notice of folly, therefore Job opens his mouth in vain; he multiplies words without knowledge.”

The only thing more off-putting than condescending, sanctimonious self-importance is when you couple them with an inflated ego that thinks it not only knows everything, but the reason for everything. Sprinkle in the name of God liberally, not because you are deferring to Him in the matter at hand, but using His name as validation of the rightness of your position, and it becomes difficult, if not outright impossible, to see the individual as likable.

My dad was one of the most gracious people I’ve ever known. He would extend the benefit of the doubt and try to see the good in someone even when scraping the bottom of the barrel and finding little, if any, redeeming qualities. Even the man who once commented that an individual trying to pass himself off as a Bible scholar who obviously knew nothing of what Scripture says, at least had straight teeth, had his limits.

That moment came shortly after my dad became pastor of the Messiah church, the church built next to the orphanage so the children would have a place to attend regular services, since there was no such church in that part of the city. Believers still gather, fellowship, and worship to this day, and it has grown over the years, but back then, it was only a couple of hundred people, plus the children and the orphanage staff.

One day, my dad got a call from another pastor in a different region of the country asking if we would host an evangelist from England and let him speak in our church. The pastor, whom my dad knew well enough, vouched for the preacher, and my dad agreed, slotting him to speak at a Sunday morning service.

My dad was informed that the evangelist would be in touch to hammer out the details, and a few days later, true to his word, he called. Anyone who knew my dad can attest that he was a jovial and gregarious man. He was always smiling, always had something nice to say, was always polite to a fault, and never went out of his way to drone on about his bona fides. Not so with this individual. After giving his name and asking if this was the pastor of the church he was to minister at the following month, he proceeded to regale my dad with all the places he’d preached, and once that was done, he went on to itemize his list of demands.

He needed three hotel rooms for himself and his entourage, nothing primitive, preferably something with at least three stars, a car to shuttle them from the hotel to the church and back since they would be arriving by train, and if the church was planning on any sort of post-service meal, there were a handful of dietary restrictions we should make the cooks aware of. By dietary restrictions, he did not mean allergies, but rather trivial things like a fresh fruit plate instead of a fruit salad, individual rolls instead of sliced bread, and so on.

My dad had planned to put him up in a hotel, although finding one with multiple stars in the area is a big ask, so that didn’t bother him overly much. He likewise understood that people have their preferences. Even though one could question why you would insist on being an unnecessary burden on a church body you were supposedly coming to serve by demanding things that were not, culturally speaking, normal fare as far as food goes, that didn’t push him over the edge either; what did it was the man’s insistence on being addressed by his title, rather than his name, if any of the congregants wanted to engage him in conversation.

“If any of the people want to approach me after my talk, please have them address me as Evangelist Rick,” were his exact words. Not brother Rick, but specifically evangelist Rick, as though that carried a greater weight than being called a brother.

That was when my dad’s inscrutable niceness cracked. Although he was never quite as barbed or acidic as yours truly can be, and often is, my dad was no lightweight. In the calmest voice he could muster, in his heavily accented English, my dad said, “Let me stop you there. I get the feeling we lowly folk are not deserving of being graced with your presence, sir. Perhaps you need a bigger venue to prove that you can walk on water. Have a good day.”

As I was reading Elihu’s words to Job, the same smug, condescending, entitled spirit stood out, reminding me of this event. If all one ever does is look down on everyone else, demanding respect without earning it, demanding to be heard even though what they have to say is banal and lacking in insight, it’s not because they are spiritually superior; they just think themselves to be.

It wasn’t Job and Elihu that God looked upon and deemed blameless and upright. There was only one whom God singled out: Job. Yet Elihu, in his hubris, saw himself as more righteous by far than Job, insisting that he knew the mind of God, His purpose, and His reason behind why Job was in the state he was in.

If you have to tear someone down to build yourself up, that tells me everything I need to know both about your character and your level of spiritual maturity.     

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

Job CCCXIII

 Job 35:1-8, “Moreover Elihu answered and said: ‘Do you think this is right? Do you say, ‘my righteousness is more than God’s’? For you say, ‘What advantage will it be to You? What profit shall I have, more than if I had sinned?’ I will answer you, and your companions with you. Look to the heavens and see; and behold the clouds – they are higher than you. If you sin, what do you accomplish against Him? Or, if your transgressions are multiplied, what do you do to Him? If you are righteous, what do you give to Him? Or what does He receive from your hand? Your wickedness affects a man such as you, and your righteousness a son of man.”

The older I get, the fewer the words necessary for me to get my point across in any given situation. Not so with the young. They have the energy and stamina to prattle on, and do it with an almost infectious enthusiasm. I have two daughters, and they are both natural-born storytellers. A point they could have made in less than thirty seconds turns into a fifteen-minute dissertation about how the dog got off its leash, and they had to chase it through the neighborhood, and by the time the story is well and truly over, they’ve also sprinkled in ample excuses for why her harness wasn’t fastened properly.   

Elihu was young, admittedly so, and he had no qualms about speaking his mind, being repetitive for effect, and saying the same thing in a slightly different way, in the hope that he could wear Job down to the point of finally admitting that he had sinned. I have no problem with lengthy conversations as long as they are necessary. Some things need to be discussed for longer than two sentences; others not so much.

Even assuming that Elihu was sincere in his discourse, and he wasn’t looking to elevate himself, stroke his ego, or prove his self-evaluated wisdom, the continued attempt to put words in Job’s mouth, words that he never spoke, simply to come out on top or prove that he was right about his judgment of Job, is wrong, and casts a shadow on the intent with which he addressed him.

Job never said that his righteousness was more than God’s, never even hinted at it, nor did he ever query whether pursuing holiness was a pointless endeavor since there seemed to be no profit in it. Job wasn’t looking to work an angle or gain some profit from being a blameless and upright man; he was compelled to pursue these things by his proximity to God and his desire for God’s presence in His life.

The presence of God molds, the presence of God transforms, the presence of God purifies and sanctifies an individual. If the desire of the individual in question is more of God’s presence in his life, he will naturally gravitate toward the good, the noble, the ideal, and the virtuous. He will shun evil, reject the temptations of the world, and the fear of the Lord that is present in his heart will direct him toward a life of obedience to God’s will.

Your pursuit of God is not based on a speculative transaction wherein you hope to get more than you put in, but a sincere and overarching desire to have an abiding relationship with Him, to know true fellowship with the Almighty, and feel His presence throughout.

That’s the one thing Elihu and Job’s three friends didn’t understand: the one constant in his life, the presence of God, was missing from him. God was silent; His presence seemed a far and distant thing, and that’s the one thing Job couldn’t live without.

If you’ve ever asked someone why they are a believer and their answer was because they didn’t want to go to hell, the foundation upon which their spiritual house is built is not love but fear. It is not out of a pure desire to have fellowship with God, to know Him, worship Him, praise Him, serve Him, and love Him, but to avoid eternal judgment.

When man is motivated by fear, all that he does in the attempt to allay it is done grudgingly, with the smallest task seeming like a burden threatening to crush him beneath its weight. The worship is performative, the declarations of fealty insincere, and if one were to come along and make them a better offer, or assure them that they can avoid eternal judgment without serving God, they would jump at the chance in a heartbeat.

When love for God is the motivation and the driving force, we set about doing the work of the Kingdom joyfully, without grumbling or thinking it beneath us, because whatever it is God would have us do, whether preaching from a pulpit or vacuuming the sanctuary, is deemed an honor and a privilege. Love carries you farther than fear ever will, and those with sincere, abiding, and unflinching love for God can endure when those motivated by something other than love have long given up the fight.

One needs only read the letter to the angel of the church of Ephesus to understand the importance of love as the driving force and motivating factor in their worship and devotion. Unlike the church of Laodicea, the church of Ephesus was hitting the mark in every area save one. They labored, they were patient, they could not bear those who are evil, they tested those who say they were apostles and were not, they persevered, had patience, and labored for His name’s sake without becoming weary, yet there was charge against them that Christ Himself insisted must be remedied lest He come and remove their lampstand from its place: they had left their first love!

They were doing all the right things, commendable and worthy of mention, yet the love that once burned bright was now but a flicker, and the warning they received was dire indeed if they did not take steps to repent and remember from where they had fallen. It wasn’t a slap on the wrist; it wasn’t a timeout; it was a warning that, lest they returned to their first love, their lampstand would be removed from its place. A lampstand holds the lamp that provides the light. Without it, they would be in darkness, lest they repent and return to that glorious, all-consuming first love that left room for nothing else in their hearts.

Boast as he might about his own wisdom, Elihu did not understand the type of love that motivated Job, a love that wasn’t a means to an end, but the end itself. All Job desired was God’s presence, without guile, artifice, or ulterior motive. Because he could not fathom such a love, Elihu believed Job to be a proud, arrogant, and self-righteous man who had rightly been brought low, which couldn’t have been further from the truth.       

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.