Job 23:1-17

Job does not bother to respond to the latest of his friend’s speeches; he simply sets forth the feelings of his heart.  Job seems to gain a little bit of perspective here as he considers his situation and what God might be doing.  He is wise not to try to answer the accusations that were made against him.  He is also very blunt about his feelings but he is confident that he has not sinned against the Lord.  I think that the Lord is pleased when we open our hearts before Him and are simply “real” with Him.  He knows our hearts and we must be careful not to be hypocritical before Him and pretend that everything is fine on the outside when we are truly conflicted in our hearts.

JOB DECLARES HIS COMPLAINT AGAINST GOD: Job’s principle complaint against God is that he simply cannot “find Him.”  He has looked north, south, east, west, up, down, left and right all to no avail as he simply cannot seem to find Him to be able to pour his heart out before him and defend himself.  Job feels like if he could just be in God’s presence and make Him hear his situation that God would stop striving with him.  Clearly Job’s perspective is far from correct.  God is in all the places where Job says he looked, but Job was simply unable to recognize Him.  It is a dangerous thing when we have expectations about how God should “be” because it prevents us from recognizing Him in our greatest times of need.


JOB DESCRIBES HIS CONFIDENCE IN GOD: The second half of this chapter Job makes a beautiful declaration about his confidence in his obedience as well as his confidence that God will accomplish His purpose.  Job recognizes that he is being tested and that on the other side of this testing he will be better than he was when he went into it.  He is still in great suffering and pain, but he is confident that God is in control.  The depth of Job’s pain causes him to fall before the Lord in true worship and fear as he recognizes His awesome power.  As we consider the works of God, we should come before Him in fear and trembling as we recognize His great power.

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