Wednesday, February 5, 2025

Job CXI

 There is a realm beyond the physical that is just as real. A realm with principalities and powers, where the war between light and darkness rages, where good and evil are well defined and delineated, and the human soul is both the prize and the object of contention. From time to time, some of us are given a glimpse beyond the veil of the physical into the spiritual realm, and we quickly realize that the picture in our minds of chubby cherubs playing harps on puffy clouds couldn’t be further from reality.

One need only read the account of Daniel and that it took twenty-one days for the messenger to make his way to him, having had to battle the prince of the kingdom of Persia and be aided by Michael, one of the chief princes, to understand how preposterous some of the fables being spun by so-called modern-day prophets are.

You’re telling me a messenger had to fight his way to Daniel for twenty-one days, yet you’re getting teleported to heaven via a porta-potty every other day? You’re telling me that every time someone is graced with seeing an angel or a messenger of the Lord, they are undone and see the frailty of their current existence, yet you claim to have sat on God’s lap, braided His beard, and even played a spirited game of pinochle, being so flippant about it as to infer it was just another Tuesday?

We sit enraptured listening to individuals who should likely be institutionalized regale us with stories of pet dinosaurs and body part rooms in heaven, not realizing we are surrounded by spiritual hosts and war is being waged on our behalf. We’ve infantilized the spiritual realm to such an extent that we are wholly ignorant of its reality. No, you cannot obtain victory without battle. No, the enemy will not flee from you if you do not resist him.

We have become as children playing at being adults. We have become as couch potatoes playing at being soldiers. Walking circumspectly with our God and being sober-minded in all things is too boring for our taste. We would rather have aliens and blue beams than Christ and the cross. We would rather play some deranged version of Where’s Waldo trying to spot the antichrist than prepare our hearts and minds for the eventuality of suffering for His name’s sake.

The world will do what God said it would do, and it will become what He warned it would become. How we meet that iteration of humanity wherein we will be hated by all because we belong to Him, betrayed by those closest to us, and finding no solace, safety, or security but in His embrace is something we are individually and wholly in control of. If you’re driving down the road and see a sign warning you that the bridge is out a mile ahead, if you gun it rather than turn around, it’s nobody’s fault but your own. It’s not as though the sign wasn’t big enough or that there weren’t multiple signs by the time you nosedived into the depths. You ignored the warnings and the signs because you either thought you knew better or that all the flashing lights were simply hyperbolic fearmongering.

Our duty is to count the cost and ensure we are willing to pay the full freight. Jesus didn’t mollycoddle his disciples or hold back when it came to telling them what their futures held should they choose to follow after Him. He didn’t promise them mansions of private jets, the approval or adoration of the masses, or any comfort while they walked this earth.

He made it clear that they would be persecuted, hated, put to death, mocked, belittled, spoken evil of, dismissed, rejected, and villainized. If you sign on, you’re not signing up for an all-expenses paid life at Club Med. You’re signing on for a lifetime of battle, service, trials, tribulations, and hardships galore, but the prize at the end of your race, the reward at the end of your journey, is well worth any hardship you may incur on your way to it.

Jesus wasn’t trying to sell a timeshare. He didn’t bury the lead or have a dozen pages of fine print that he insisted his disciples ignore because it was just for legal purposes and not really that important. He made it very clear what we as His servants should expect while in the world, and not telling the truth to those we would have embrace it, does nothing for them except give them false expectations of what they think their Christian walk will be.

Job knew that both blessing and adversity come from the hand of God. He knew that although he could despise his current existence and even wish that he would perish, he could charge God with no wrong because He is sovereign over all.

Job 8:11-18, “Can the papyrus grow without a marsh? Can the reeds flourish without water? While it is yet green and not cut down, it withers before any other plant. So are the paths of all who forget God; and the hope of the hypocrite shall perish, whose confidence shall be cut off, and whose trust is a spider’s web. He leans on his house, but it does not stand. He holds it fast, but it does not endure. He grows green in the sun, and his branches spread out in his garden. His roots wrap around the rock heap, and look for a place in the stones. If he is destroyed from this place, then it will deny him, saying, ‘I have not seen you.’”

In his attempt to undergird his conclusion and prove that he was right in his assessment, Bildad began to pontificate. He didn’t come right out and say that Job had forgotten God or that he was a hypocrite, but he alluded to it nonetheless because, in his understanding, he could not fathom that Job had not done something to displease God and bring upon himself the tragedy that had befallen him.

It’s okay to admit that you don’t know the reason or purpose around some event in your life or someone else’s life as long as you acknowledge and fully trust that God does. We were never meant to know everything. Even the best of us see in part and understand in part, but what we were meant to do is grow our faith and our trust in the God we serve to the point that come what may we rest in Him and are at peace.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

Tuesday, February 4, 2025

Job CX

 Even when God is silent, He is present. Even when life is hard, God is there. Even when we are crushed and carrying on another day seems an impossible task, His mercies endure. The purpose of your trial may not be evident to you, but it is known to God, and you can take solace in the undeniable, unshakeable, unequivocal truth that good will come of it. It may be that you won’t get to see the good that your trial produced, yet know that it is assured.

I don’t have what some might label prized possessions. I don’t collect watches or tie clips, and the Salvation Army down the road would likely refuse to take half the stuff I own on principle because even the homeless have standards, but the one exception is a cardboard box filled to the brim with notebooks of stories I’ve collected over the years, first and secondhand accounts of people who were persecuted, tortured, and even martyred for the cause of Christ.

The box keeps getting moved from one closet to the other depending on how much room my daughters and their ever-expanding wardrobe of sparkly dresses require, and yesterday, I was informed that my box was in their way and I needed to move it. They said it nicely enough, but it seemed an urgent enough matter to them wherein I dutifully went and picked up my box and moved it.

It had been some time since I’d perused any of the notebooks, and since I had a few minutes, I picked a random one out of the box and began to leaf through it. I read through a couple of the stories contained in the notebook, but there is one in particular that came to mind as I was contemplating the notion that just as Moses was not given to enter the promised land, we may not be given the opportunity to see the good that our trials and hardships produce.

Vasile was not yet a teenager when the police showed up at their home, snatched his father, Toma, and spirited him away in the middle of the night. Toma was a preacher, the type of preacher who was not bashful about sharing his faith in Christ with any who would hear, and news of his dissidence had reached the county officials, who in turn delivered his name to the Securitate.

That night was the last time Vasile would see his father. “The last sermon I heard my father preach,” Vasile said, “was on Romans 8, and how all things work together for good. For the longest time, I couldn’t reconcile that scripture passage with what my mother and I had been going through after losing my dad, and even though my mother was a praying woman who insisted we memorize Scripture every night, I grew bitter in my heart. Not knowing what had happened to my father also weighed heavily on me; the only information we’d ever received came by way of an officer showing up three weeks after he’d been taken to inform us that he was deceased and handing over a certificate of death. They didn’t even bother to bring the body. We never got to have a proper funeral for him. Just a man in a uniform delivering the worst news I’d ever heard in cold, clipped tones.

Almost six years later, close to my eighteenth birthday, a man showed up to our apartment and asked if he could speak to me. By then, my bitterness had been on a slow simmer for years, and I planned to go to university and pursue a career in engineering. I still believed in God, but as far as a relationship with Him, I must admit, it was lacking.

The man introduced himself as Remus, and although he was wearing civilian clothing, I knew he was some type of government official, whether police or Securitate. You could always tell. It’s in their posture, mannerisms, and how they carry themselves. Not so much the haircuts but their bearing.

The man asked if he could come in, and knowing that if I refused, he’d likely come in anyway, I nodded and moved aside. My mother was in the kitchen plucking the feathers off a chicken, and after motioning for the man to sit, I asked how I could be of help.

He squirmed for a while, rubbing his hands together and unable to meet my gaze until, staring at the floor with all the intensity he could muster, he said, “I was there for the last few days of your father’s life. I didn’t have a hand in it, but I was witness to it, being a young officer at the time. Your dad changed my life. I’ve never met someone with more conviction and assurance that there was something beyond this life. He never despaired; no matter what they did to him, he never once despaired. I found Jesus because of what I saw in your father. I’ve been meaning to look you up for a couple of years now, and I felt this was the right time. I just wanted you to know some good came of his suffering.”

I had no words. I don’t think I could have found any even if I’d tried, but one thing did happen, which I remember clearly all these years later: all the pent-up bitterness, the anger, the resentment, the doubts I’d been harboring that I’d never shared with anyone disappeared in an instant. It was like flipping a switch and turning on a light, and what was once murky and in shadow became bright and illuminated.

That one conversation changed the course of my life, and I reminded Remus of this every time we met over another twelve years. Just as my father had changed his life, his visit had changed mine. I got to preach Remus’s funeral and shared this testimony as his friends and family gathered to say their final farewells.

I never went to university, I didn’t become an engineer, but I became a pastor, and now, thirty years later, with six children of my own, I can echo my father’s last sermon, not as an afterthought or something I feel compelled to say, but as a cornerstone of my faith: all things do work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”

Toma did not live long enough to see the fulfillment of this promise, but he died believing it to be true. We are predisposed to wanting to see, to feel, to touch, to taste, and to experience in the physical what can only be seen in the spiritual. Sometimes, we don’t get to see it or feel it; we don’t get to see the fulfillment of the promise with our eyes of flesh, but we know with an unshakeable faith that comes about by witnessing God’s repeated faithfulness that it will be so.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

Monday, February 3, 2025

Job CIX

 Every conclusion Bildad came to was through the prism of the physical. Everything was filtered through human understanding, making no allowance for the possibility that something other, something more, or something different was going on. He lived in a world of black and white with no gray areas to be had, and everything had to have a logical explanation that he could decipher, given enough brain power.

Your sons must have sinned; ergo, God cast them away for their transgression. God has not awakened for you and prospered your rightful dwelling place; ergo, you are not pure and upright.

To Bildad, everything had a simple explanation, and the simplest, most appropriate explanation he came up with is that Job had some hidden sin he was unwilling to confess. This perspective is important in the context of suffering and faith, as it raises the question of whether suffering is always a result of personal sin. Job’s travails show us that it’s not, and we would be remiss if we did not consider the complexity of suffering in the context of faith.

What did you do? Nothing. Well, you must have done something. But I didn’t. Now you’re just lying and putting on an air of spiritual superiority, aren’t you? Job had months to go through every chapter of his life to pinpoint where he had erred, where he had displeased God, or sinned in some form or fashion. He was not above repenting had he discovered something heretofore overlooked, but there was nothing, and not knowing why this had befallen him was an added layer of constant grief.

Suffering due to something you know yourself to be guilty of and suffering while knowing you are innocent of what you’re being accused of doing have different mental impacts. As the kids like to say, it hits differently. I did the crime, now I’m doing the time, and that’s the way it is. You make your peace with the reality that, on some level, your punishment is deserved, and although you might have liked it otherwise, you understand why you find yourself in your current predicament. But if you’re in a cage waiting for someone to bring you a cup of water, knowing that you’ve done nothing to deserve your current lot, the injustice of it weighs as heavily on one’s countenance as the situation itself.

It is said that if you take five individuals, accuse them of the same crime, and put them all in a jail cell, the one who goes to sleep is the guilty party because he knows he’s been caught and might as well get some rest. The innocent, those not guilty of the crime they’ve been accused of, tend to pace back and forth, decry their guilt, insist upon their innocence, and plead with their jailors to hear them out. This concept of ‘the innocent’ is crucial in understanding the mental impacts of suffering, as it highlights the psychological turmoil of being falsely accused and the desperate plea for justice in the face of suffering.

Job 8:8-10, “For inquire, please, of the former age, and consider the things discovered by the fathers; For we were born yesterday, and know nothing, because our days on earth are a shadow. Will they not teach you and tell you, and utter words from their heart?”

If Bildad, who likely predated the Patriarchs, could say that Job should consider the things discovered by the fathers, how much more do we have to look back on and glean understanding from? There is no viable excuse for any believer in our day and age to be ignorant of God, His will, His purpose, and His nature. We could excuse it, perhaps, in those of Job’s generation, given the limited availability of historical data and the lack of proliferation of printed materials, but even Bildad pointed out that what they had thus far learned from the fathers was enough to shape and form some sort of understanding, partial though it was.

I would be remiss if, in discussing Joseph and his journey from the mountaintop to the valley, back to the mountaintop, then the valley, then the mountaintop again, I did not mention his father Jacob, whom God Himself declared He loved. No small thing to be loved by God, yet for eighteen years, Jacob lived with the belief that Joseph, his beloved son, was dead. He carried the burden of Joseph being torn apart by wild beasts for longer than Joseph had been alive when he thought he’d lost him, and never once did God whisper in Jacob’s ear, “Do not despair; he lives.”

Imagine the weight that would have been lifted from Jacob’s shoulders upon hearing that one sentence. Imagine the relief, the joy, the utter jubilation at knowing that his son was not lost, that he had not gone to the grave but that he lived. Yet Jacob was kept in the dark. God did not reveal the one thing that would have taken Jacob’s pain away but comforted him, molded him, and grew him in his pain. This is a testament to the potential for growth in suffering, a beacon of hope in the darkest of times.

It was only after Jacob shook off the lie that Joseph was dead that God spoke to him that very night, telling him to go to Egypt and see his son. Oftentimes, the prejudices we hold and the lies we believe are so deeply rooted in our hearts that they block out the voice of God, and were He to speak clearly, we would brush it off because it would contradict what we believe to be established facts.

During a conversation with a former cessationist, he said something that stuck with me for the longest time. Because of his conviction that the gifts had ceased with the early church Apostles, when God began speaking to him, for the longest time, he thought he was either losing his mind or hearing the enemy's voice. The more he prayed, however, the more he heard the voice of God until the experience forced him to go back to the Word and discover for himself that things were not as he believed or as he had been taught.    

1 Corinthians 4:5, “Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord comes, who will both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and reveal the counsels of the heart. Then each one’s praise will come from God.”

Just because you think a situation is hopeless, it doesn’t mean God does. Just because you can’t see a way out of a predicament, it doesn’t mean God hasn’t already made a way. We must allow for the reality that God sees what we cannot and walk by faith rather than sight. Your sight will hinder you. It will disincline you to press onward, sap your energy and enthusiasm to continue on your journey, and bring to mind all the things that are wrong, that can go wrong, or that might go wrong, keeping you static and unmoving.

Faith sees beyond the present, beyond the now, beyond the current situation one might find themselves in, and propels us ever forward toward the prize, toward the goal, toward the reward He will bring upon His return to give to everyone according to his work. Eyes of faith allow you to see what will be based on the promises God has made in His word, giving us full assurance that our light affliction, our temporary suffering, our season of heartache or hurt is working for us a far more exceeding weight of glory.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

Saturday, February 1, 2025

Job CVIII

It’s also important to remember that while we see the past and the present with no certainty about the future as far as our individual selves are concerned, God’s perspective is one of eternity. He knows the end from the beginning. He is not constrained by time and space, and He knows that what we may deem as a negative today will produce good fruit and testimony in our lives six months or a year down the road. The pruning and the shaping may hurt for a season, but the end result is worth the temporary pain we may have to endure in order to attain what could only be produced by the aforementioned pruning and shaping.

I do not know what tomorrow may bring for myself or my family, but I know that God is already there, making a way, and so I do not fear or concern myself with it. We spend far too much time trying to affect things we can’t control and ignore the things that we can. I can dwell on the future, obsess over it, and run in circles until I’m ragged and discombobulated, but tomorrow will still come with its own troubles.

I’ve learned to focus on the things I can control, and leave those I can’t to God. I have control over how much time I spend with God. I have control over how much time I spend in the Word. I have control over where I choose to focus my time and energy on any given day. What I can’t control is whether my car decides to break down in the middle of the road or if I get a flat tire because someone decided it was perfectly reasonable to throw a fistful of nails out their window.

Obsessing over things we have no control over is another of the enemy’s tactics to keep us from deepening our relationship with God and building up our most holy faith. If I constantly focus on something that may happen tomorrow, I won’t take the time to grow in God today. But you don’t understand! The world is a scary place, and getting scarier by the day. I do, though. I understand better than most people and even have the added weight of ensuring my kids get fed and have a roof over their heads, but I know my limitations. I know what I can control, I know what I can’t, and I choose to focus on seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, knowing that all these things will be added on.

We cannot know the end of a thing or its final iteration because we are not omniscient. God does because He is. Every situation seems positive or negative based on its effect on us in the present, but the present comes and goes in the blink of an eye, and what may have seemed a glorious thing today can readily become bitter and offputting tomorrow. Likewise, what seemed difficult and insurmountable today can readily become the moment of your greatest victory tomorrow.

We need look no further than the life story of Joseph to see how quickly what was meant for evil can be turned into good and that your current lot is not indicative of your future or the course your life will take. To go from being the favored son to being sold into slavery by one’s own brothers, to being made overseer of Potiphar’s house only to be thrown in prison after being falsely accused by Potiphar’s wife, to becoming the most powerful man in Egypt second only to the Pharaoh himself, one can readily say that Joseph’s life had its ups and down.

Through it all, Joseph held to his integrity, his faith, and his convictions, whether he was being sold as a slave or being clothed in fine linen and having a gold chain placed around his neck.

Whatever your circumstance, cling to God. One’s faithfulness cannot be contingent on their current lot, nor can it be conditional depending on whether God does as we will. God will do as He wills, and if you are faithful in the present, if you are faithful today, tomorrow and its outcome may surprise and stun you.

Whether as a slave or in a prison cell, Joseph did not have the promise of restoration or even justice. The only things he had were a handful of dreams he’d dreamt that seemed so out of reach at certain points in his life as to be laughable. His obedience and faithfulness to God were not proffered with conditions or strings attached. Joseph served God because He is God and worthy of our servitude. Anything beyond that, Joseph left in the hands of the God he served. Were there moments in his life when he could have grumbled or thought God unjust? Most assuredly. Whether being thrown in prison for resisting the advances of Potiphar’s wife or being forgotten by the butler whose dream he had interpreted, Joseph had plenty of reasons to despair, yet he did not. He languished in prison for two full years after the chief butler got reinstated and summarily forgot about Joseph until the Pharaoh had a dream, and he was brought to the butler’s mind afresh, knowing all this time that he was an innocent man and had not done what Potiphar’s wife had accused him of.

Whatever you may be going through, do not despair. Even if you have been unjustly accused and suffer the wrath of the godless, knowing yourself to be innocent, do not grow bitter. God has a plan, He always does; and when the last chapter is written, you will look back on your story and see the faithfulness of God on every page.

He is faithful. If I’ve learned anything over the last thirty-eight years of ministry, it’s that our God is faithful. As long as our eyes are on Him rather than our current situation, circumstance, or trial, we will press ever onward and, with each passing day, see the pieces falling into place and His plans come into focus, providing clarity.

When you’re in the valley, your view will always be limited. When you’re on the mountain top, however, you see the panorama for what it is and realize the beauty of it all. Even in the darkest valleys, His light remains an ever-present beacon that guides us and gives us comfort. Even when all seems lost, and the only thing that could provide a remedy is an outright miracle, thankfully, you serve a miracle-working God.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

Friday, January 31, 2025

Job CVII

 Job 8:1-7, “Then Bildad the Shuhite answered and said: ‘How long will you speak these things, and the words of your mouth be like a strong wind? Does God subvert judgment? Or does the Almighty pervert justice? If your sons have sinned against Him, He has cast them away for their transgression. If you would earnestly seek God and make your supplication to the Almighty, if you were pure and upright, surely now He would awake for you, and prosper your rightful dwelling place. Though your beginning was small, yet your latter end would increase abundantly.’”

If you thought Eliphaz’s remarks to Job were cutting, Bildad’s words were downright cruel. Being the traditionalist that he was, his take on the matter was that everything that had happened to Job thus far was deserved. He even went so far as to insinuate that Job’s sons had met their demise because they had sinned against God; therefore, He had cast them away for their transgression. Keep in mind that these were Job’s closest friends, men he’d likely known for decades, but as is evident, although they were keen on passing judgment, they lacked compassion of any sort.

Perhaps it was sitting in the dirt for seven days in silence that got to them, but while they sat in perfect health, Job had painful oozing boils to contend with on top of mourning the loss of his ten children and trying to process the loss of everything he owned. Job’s friends, Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar, had come to comfort him in his time of distress, but their words and actions often added to his suffering rather than alleviating it.

We cannot dismiss the possibility that the words Job’s friends spoke were influenced by some nefarious force, perhaps Satan himself, in an attempt to demoralize him even further. We got the sense that there was a duality of thought as Eliphaz spoke, where he caught himself speaking words intended to wound rather than comfort. Then Bildad comes along, and he holds nothing back, with the opening lines of his discourse being so caustic and acidic as to make one wonder if he considered Job his friend.

It seems as though Bildad was already tiring of Job’s words, even though, given the situation he was in, he had every right to voice his pain and the injustice of it all, whether real or perceived. Had he done something he’d known to have been a sin, then, at least, he would understand the reason this was happening to him, but having had months to go through the entirety of his life, he had yet to find one thing he deemed an offense to God.

That’s a high bar. To go back over all the years of your life and be unable to find a misstep, a mistake, or a situation wherein you fell short of the standard. There’s a reason God deemed Job unique among his contemporaries. It wasn’t something He did offhandedly or rashly. Job was a blameless and upright man who feared God and shunned evil. That couldn’t be said of anyone else living in his generation.

There is a time and place for simple, straightforward explanations. When your kids keep nagging you about why they should be eating broccoli when Sour Patch Kids taste so much better, it’s perfectly fine to tell them that broccoli is good for you and Sour Patch Kids will make your poo glow in the dark. I didn’t think that one through because now they really want to see if they can get their poo to glow in the dark, but the analogy holds nonetheless.

When it comes to life, spiritual battles, trials, hardships, and testing, a simple explanation just isn’t viable. Bildad thought there was, and he even reasoned out that there could be no other explanation save that Job had sinned. Does God subvert judgment? Or does the Almighty pervert justice? Obviously not; therefore, you must have done something, just as your sons must have; otherwise, you wouldn’t be in this pickle.

Psalm 11:3-7, “If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do? The Lord is in His holy temple, the Lord’s throne is in heaven; His eyes behold, His eyelids test the sons of men. The Lord tests the righteous, but the wicked and the one who loves violence His soul hates. Upon the wicked He will rain coals; Fire and brimstone and a burning wind shall be the portion of their cup. For the Lord is righteous, He loves righteousness; His countenance beholds the upright.”

And with one Psalm, David blew Bildad’s entire theory, along with the cottage industry of the prosperity gospel, out of the water. The Lord tests the righteous. It is a truth we cannot overlook or circumvent because it’s inconvenient. If we cannot differentiate between testing and judgment, then rather than voice our opinion on a given situation, silence is our best course of action.

God does as He wills, and there is a purpose in all that He does. This truth must be the foundation stone of our faith, and if it is, nothing we encounter in this life; no hardship, trial, or testing we go through will shake us or cause us to crumble into the dust.

Once again, we come full circle as to why doctrine matters. If my expectations of a sovereign God only go so far as having a wish granter here on earth and eternity in paradise for the low, low price of raising a hand in a church setting, then whenever hardship or testing comes, my natural instinct will be to bristle, grow angry, bitter and disillusioned. I was promised this life of glorious prosperity, perfect health, no adversity or trial, and what I’m getting is being steamrolled by life, and even what seemed like easy wins manage to fall apart somehow.

But why can’t God just take my word for it when I promise I’ll be faithful? Why can’t He just bless and prosper me until I die peacefully in my sleep, well over one hundred years old, in my mansion on the hill? It sounds like God has trust issues if He can’t take my word at face value. God also knows that the hearts of men are deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. He knows that fair weather fealty is easy to pull off, but when called upon to stand and fight, to go to war or defend the kingdom, the pledge of fealty gets a bit wobbly, and the excuses as to why it’s not the best time to be called upon to sacrifice pour forth like a breached dam.

God tests the righteous and chastens those He loves. If you are being left to your own devices, knowing yourself to be wandering from the light with no correction in sight, rather than a reason for rejoicing or concluding that God doesn’t mind the duplicity after all, it ought to be a reason for deep concern, if not outright fear.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr. 

Wednesday, January 29, 2025

Job CVI

 Deception can only ever be allowed to take root in a heart when that heart is not fully saturated with the Word of God. Just as pesticide kills weeds, the Word of God kills deception. Even if we have to admit that some dream, or some vision was not from God, eating a slice of humble pie is by far preferable to being judged by God for speaking something He never spoke and attributing it to Him. Sober-mindedness is not an option; it’s a mandate, a command, and something we must strive to be, especially when it comes to spiritual matters. There is certainty, and then there is guesswork. There is revelation, and then there is personal opinion. These concepts cannot be conflated, nor are they interchangeable.

Job was being tormented by dreams and visions, and he assumed they came from God. Assumption is a dangerous playground to spend time in because, whether consciously or subconsciously, our preconceived notions, prejudices, partialities, and preconceptions will come to the fore, attempting to sway us and insisting that this one time, we can ignore what Scripture says because what we think or feel better suits us than what the Bible says. Assume nothing. Verify everything, and use the Word of God as your plumb line, litmus test, and absolute authority in every matter.

Although we have the benefit of the written word, Job didn’t, and after months of torment, night terrors, and demoralizing visions, he assumed they came from God, not understanding the purpose or allowing for the possibility that there was a nefarious third party at work. We can look our noses down on Job and insist that we would have proceeded differently, but all of us have been guilty of blaming God for something we did to ourselves with our own two hands and trying to circumvent accountability by insisting it was the devil rather than our lack of self-control. The devil didn’t make you eat the chocolate cake! You drove yourself to the store, put the cake in your cart, paid for it, drove back home, and proceeded to devour it in one sitting. Even though the box said there were fifteen servings, we all know that’s arbitrary.

Don’t blame God for what the devil does, and don’t credit the devil for what God does. When we fall into this snare, we tend to project an image of needless cruelty on a good and loving God or conclude that the enemy of our soul isn’t so bad after all, just misunderstood.

Job 7:17-21, “What is man, that You should exalt him, that You should set Your heart on him, that You should visit him every morning and test him every moment? How long? Will You not look away from me, and let me alone till I swallow my saliva? Have I sinned? What have I done to You, O watcher of men? Why have You set me as Your target, so that I am a burden to myself? Why then do You not pardon my transgression, and take away my iniquity? For now I will lie down in the dust, and You will seek me diligently, but I will no longer be.”

When we falsely attribute a season of testing to punishment of some kind, self-recrimination is a given. What did I do? When did I do it? It must have been something grievous since I am suffering, but I can’t think of anything. Still, there must have been something; otherwise, why am I going through what I’m going through?

It took months for Job to come to this place, but he arrived here nevertheless. Given enough time, without proper understanding, we all arrive at the same spot. Again, because it’s so important and relevant, Job did not have the benefit of Scripture to bring him an understanding of the possibility that this could be something other than God’s punishment. He felt as though God was targeting him, and he wanted some understanding.

Why? Why is this happening to me, and if the reason was a transgression, why do You not pardon it and take away my iniquity? How long must I suffer? Should not the punishment be commensurate with the crime, and if I’ve committed a crime or some offense, could I not be made aware of what it was? At least then, I’d understand.

Imagine if every time you sat down to take a test, you got all the answers in advance. It wouldn’t be a test, would it? This is why faith is so crucial. It gives you the strength to press on, persevere, and endure, even when the why isn’t clear. As long as I know the God I serve, as long as I know that His mercies are new every morning, and as long as I know He is a good Father, the why becomes irrelevant. This faith is not just a belief but a source of strength and comfort in the midst of trials.

If you have searched your heart and know that your singular desire has been to walk circumspectly and grow ever more into the image of the risen Christ, then whatever valley you may be traversing, know that it will have a good end. Your faith will ostensibly mature, your spiritual man will ostensibly grow, and you will come to understand the Father in a far deeper fashion than you did before your testing came. This growth is not just a possibility but a promise that you can hold onto in the midst of your trials.

But that’s just an anecdotal conclusion based on personal experience. One may be anecdotal, but if everyone who goes through a trial experiences the same growth once they’ve persevered through it, it’s no longer anecdotal; it’s the expected outcome of something based on the aggregate data available. If everyone who grabs hot coal gets burned, the evidence that hot coal burns isn’t anecdotal any longer but a settled fact.

We do our best to circumvent the reality that God’s ways are to be trusted, not understood, because no one likes being left in the dark and having to guess at why they’re going through their valley of suffering.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.  

Tuesday, January 28, 2025

Job CV

 Job saw in part, and he understood in part. He had no knowledge of Jesus or what He would ostensibly do in order to redeem mankind and reconcile humanity to God. If in his limited understanding he was able to attain blamelessness and uprightness, we who are privy to the Christ and all He has done for us, we who have limitless resources regarding salvation at our fingertips, we who have the written Word, have no excuse for not pressing in, growing in Him, knowing Him, and being faithful to the end.

If only we could learn patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, love, and self-control from books or workshops. We know what the fruits of the Spirit are, but they are not acquired simply by being aware of them or by some intense concentration exercises. They are birthed in us by the process of daily crucifying the old man and putting to death the deeds of the flesh. It is an exhaustive, often painful process, and not something that happens overnight or without exertion on our part.

It is a war within one’s own mind and heart, wherein we wrench ourselves from the comforts of the status quo and take a step of faith into that new life where Christ is King and Lord over all that we are, all that we do, all that we desire, and all that we pursue. There’s the easy way, then there’s the right way, and the right way isn’t easy, at least as far as the flesh is concerned. Not only are we starving the flesh of the things it previously reveled in, but we are actively mortifying it. The flesh will resist, just as anything that understands the existential nature of the battle raging within will, and if we show the flesh mercy or give it an inch, it will take a mile and drag us back to the dungeon and shackles from which we were set free.

Job 7:11-16, “Therefore I will not restrain my mouth; I will speak with the anguish of my spirit; I will complain in the bitterness of my soul. Am I a sea, or a sea serpent, that You have set a guard over me? When I say, ‘My bed will comfort me, my couch will ease my complaint,’ Then You scare me with dreams and terrify me with visions so that my soul chooses strangling and death rather than my body. I loathe my life; I would not live forever. Let me alone, for my days are but a breath.’”

By this point, Job was no longer addressing Eliphaz; he was addressing God. After months of suffering, his entire outlook had darkened, having come to the point of seeing no reason for living, no hope for redress, and no silver lining in the endless night of his torment. Part of him wanted to restrain his tongue. However, it had come to the point that he needed to speak with the anguish of his spirit, to release the pressure, to verbalize what he had been internalizing for months, and to try to process his current state.

There are those who speak their pain the moment they feel it and those who bottle it up to the point that they feel like they are going to explode. I must confess, I fall in the camp of the latter, not because of any misplaced sense of masculinity or because men shouldn’t cry, but because it’s my nature. You take life as it comes, rejoice when there is no pain, and grit your teeth and press on when there is. There’s something to be said for stoicism in the face of adversity, but everyone has their breaking point, the proverbial straw that breaks the camel’s back even though a camel is sturdy enough to carry supersized Western tourists through the desert without missing a beat.

The danger in bottling up your emotions and pushing down your hurt is that there is a good likelihood of overacting to something insignificant in a wholly unjustified manner because of all the pent-up emotions you’ve been trying to keep caged. When that moment comes, it will likely be toward someone who had nothing to do with the roiling sentiments you’ve been trying to suppress. They’ll just be a convenient outlet and likely undeserving of the flood of emotions they’re about to get drowned in because the dam broke.

Job had been bottling it up for months on end, and with each passing day, his outlook on the future as it related to him as an individual grew ever more stark. Time had taken its toll, and we see Job going from saying shall we indeed accept good things from God and shall we not accept adversity, to saying, I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.

Months had passed, and Job was still in the dark as to why all of this was happening to him. His health wasn’t getting any better, and to top it all off, he was having terrifying dreams and visions he assumed were from God but which were not. Satan had been given free reign over Job, allowed to do his worst except for taking his life, and the dreams and visions that assailed him were another layer in the enemy’s plan to compel Job to relinquish his integrity and surrender his faith.

Just because God allows something, it does not necessarily mean He is the originator of it. By the same token, just because one has a dream or a vision, it does not mean it was God inspired. This is why we must be ever cautious with what we deem revelation, whether in dream form or vision, and take the time to confirm that it was from God and not the product of our own machinations or, worse still, the enemy’s attempt at deception.

The easiest way to know if something did not originate from God is if what was received contravenes or contradicts Scripture. You don’t even have to ask for confirmation or pray for a sign as to whether the dream or vision was from God; you know that it wasn’t because God will neither refute dispute nor undermine His Word.

Far too many, it seems, are so excited about the prospect of being labeled a seer or a prophet that they don’t take the time to apply this all-important litmus test. When they are inevitably called on the carpet for speaking something contrary to the Word, chances are they’ll double down, reject the correction, and imply that their revelation is above Scripture. In such cases, your best course of action isn’t to back away slowly but to run at full speed, as fast and as far as your legs will take you.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea, Jr.