Passage of the Day: Job 40: 1-5 … From The Message Version …
1-2God then confronted Job directly: "Now what do you have to say for yourself? Are you going to haul Me, the Mighty One, into court and press charges?"
3-5 Job answered: "I'm speechless, in awe—words fail me. I should never have opened my mouth!I've talked too much, way too much. I'm ready to shut up and listen."
My Journal for Today: I’ve gone to Peterson’s colloquial version of Scripture in Job 40, which, in the first five verses, shows where Job had come to realize how he had become too self assured and too determined in his defense before his four worldly friends. God had, in Chapters 38-39 deftly and powerfully put Job in his place; and now Job was forced to acknowledge his insignificance to the Almighty God.
The question immediately as to personal application becomes, “Am I seeing myself in proper proportion to my God?” Well, in these first five verses of Chapter 40 we read a model of humility, vulnerability, and reality.
Job first humbly acknowledges his awe, being in the presence of God; and that’s a position we need to continually hold in that we choose to come into the presence of the Throne of Grace, bearing our burdens before our Lord. Well, Job came to realize that before his calamities arose, he had gotten too self assured; and now he needed to bring himself down before the Creator of the world and acknowledge his dependence upon his God.
Secondly, we read how Job admits that he had likely over-spoken his case before God, questioning the “WHY” of his circumstances in all the confusion of his loss and pain. Actually God doesn’t mind any of His children bringing their feelings to Him as we read in Lam. 3: 22-23 or 1st Peter 5: 7; but we, as Job did here, need to do so with vulnerability, recognizing that God is still – and always - totally in control.
And finally, Job recognized and acknowledged what I’ve just said … the reality that we need to be in a listening posture when we come to God because we’re never in an adversarial role with our God. God is not on “the other side” of our circumstances. As I’ve said often – and need to remember - life often causes us to challenge our belief in the truth of Romans 8: 28 and to seek HOW we can grow from life’s circumstances rather than to know WHY things are not going the way we’d like to see them.
After Job acknowledged God so humbly in today’s highlighted passage, I can just imagine a wry smile coming over the face of our Lord as He knew that Job was now in a posture of readiness to receive God’s grace. And don’t you know, my dear one, that we so desperately need God’s grace. So, when – hopefully not IF – you go to God today, come to our Lord with a posture of humility, laying all pride aside; and when we do that, we’ll find what is promised in God’s word (see Prov. 3: 34, James 4: 6) that God will pour His grace into humility; but He will resist pride whenever He sees it raise its ugly head.
My Prayer for Today: Lord, I pray that I don’t need to ask for You to help me find true humility this day. But if so, please do so; because I so need Your grace! Amen
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