June 18, 2025 • 41 mins
The oldest book in the Bible tells a story of extreme suffering that reveals profound truth about our relationship with God and how we handle life's darkest moments.
• Job's story takes place around 2000 BC in modern-day southern Jordan
• Most people remember Job only as "the suffering guy" but his story contains much deeper meaning
• The book begins with a heavenly court scene where Satan challenges God about Job's faithfulness
• Job's initial relationship with God appears ritualistic rather than deeply personal
• When tragedy strikes, Job questions God but never completely abandons his faith
• Job's friends wrongly insist his suffering must be punishment for hidden sin
• Divine justice doesn't equate to human happiness or always follow a simple cause-effect relationship
• Job eventually moves from theological knowledge to personal experience with God
• God rebukes Job's friends and accepts only Job's prayers on their behalf
• Suffering can transform a ritual-based faith into an authentic relationship with God
• Our temporary pain can produce lasting spiritual growth when we remain engaged with God
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The story of Job presents one of humanity's most enduring questions: Why do bad things happen to good people? In this deep dive, we explore the oldest book in the Bible and discover it's far more than just a tale of suffering.
Job was likely a Gentile living around 2000 BC in what's now southern Jordan. Though traditionally portrayed as the epitome of righteousness, our conversation reveals the nuanced reality - Job was theologically correct but relationally distant from God. His practice of religion was dutiful rather than intimate, making sacrifices "just in case" his children had sinned. This separation sets the stage for the transformation to come.
When Satan challenges God about Job's faithfulness, suggesting he only serves God because of his prosperity, God permits a devastating series of losses. What's fascinating is how God shows protection even in allowing suffering - concentrating Job's tragedies into a single day rather than prolonged torture, mercifully limiting the psychological damage of extended uncertainty.
As Job processes his losses, we witness his struggle between theological knowledge and lived experience. His friends offer the conventional wisdom of their day - that suffering must be punishment for sin - but Job knows this simplistic equation doesn't explain his situation. Through poetic laments that scholars consider among the most beautiful ever written, Job maintains his innocence while questioning divine justice.
The climactic moment comes when Job finally has his audience with God. Rather than explaining suffering, God reveals his incomprehensible power and wisdom. Job's response captures the heart of the story: "I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you." His ritualistic faith has transformed into authentic relationship.
What's the takeaway for us? Suffering breeds growth when we remain engaged with God through it. Prayer isn't primarily for God's benefit but for ours - it redirects our focus from inner dialogue (which spirals downward) to divine connection. Job's temporary suffering - a mere fraction of his 140-year lifespan - produced lasting transformation that prosperity alone never
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to the Boundless Bible.
My name is David Shapiro, hey,I'm Javi Marquez and I'm Jason
Holloway.
Welcome back everyone.
Hey guys, how's it going?
Doing well today.
What's going on, dudes, I amreally excited about today we're
going to jump into the story ofJob.
A lot of people look at Job andthey kind of remember him as a
(00:24):
suffering guy and that's prettymuch it.
But we're going to dive alittle bit further in today.
We're going to explain it alittle bit differently, but let
me just kind of give a littlebackground on who Job is and
where this comes from.
So Job is known.
The book of Job is known as theoldest book actually written in
the Bible.
So this is is the oldest one.
It's part of the wisdomliterature.
(00:45):
It's part of, uh, the booksthat people read to gain wisdom
from, yeah, uh, god's word andand from the bible.
Ultimately, um, this is somebodywho probably takes place around
2000 bc.
This is around the time ofabraham.
Yep, um, and there's some cluesto that.
So some of the clues to that umwould be that uh, job actually
(01:06):
references the, uh, the flood,and this is in job 22, 16.
Uh, they were snatched awaybefore their time.
Their foundation was washedaway by flood, um, so this is
something that happens probablyafter the flood story, but there
are no levitical laws, so it'sprobably before Moses.
So a lot of scholars have itaround 2000 BC.
(01:28):
This is in a land that is notpart of Israel and it is kind of
what they dictate right now ismodern southern Jordan in the
land of Uz, and this is wherethis took place, which means
probably Job wasn't even anIsraelite.
He's probably a Gentile.
So that kind of lays the storyof who Job is.
(01:49):
We know from the beginning thathe is a wealthy man.
He has a lot of cattle, he hasa lot of camels, he has a
healthy family, he has a bighome, he's got servants.
And then Satan comes into God'scourt and kind of tempts him
and says look, the only reasonthis guy really likes you and
obeys you the way he does isbecause you've given him
(02:11):
everything and he's got thisgreat life and as soon as you
take this away he's going tocurse you.
And then God allows him.
And then we go into the storyof Job and all the things that
have happened to him throughoutthe story and what he does.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
So it's so interesting.
Yeah, that court, that wholecourt scene is so interesting,
Like God speaking to, what isSatan?
Satan is it.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
The Satan, the accuser, the Satan the adversary
right.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
It's so interesting to see that and I think there's
a lot even there we could sit onand just kind of like break
down and figure out.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
Yeah, I mean, I think the story is so fascinating and
I think we have to start bytalking about the historical
versus the metaphorical rightLike this is in the wisdom books
, so it's not necessarily meantto be taken as historically true
.
Plus, I think anybody who wasto say there was a catalog of
God talking to Satan wouldalready have a challenge in
saying that this is a historicalstory.
So, for me, I don't even try togo down the road and figure it
(03:10):
out, I just I think this is astory that has so much meaning
and it's so.
It's like the world's firstmovie.
It's so full of like emotionand so full of like character,
depth and story and each personis very consistent with their
own character and and thatcharacter development and their
inter you know, intertwining in,their intercommunication is is
(03:33):
where all this meaning is builtand I just I love this story,
yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
I definitely agree that.
I I believe that there's a tonof meaning in it.
I actually happen to think andI'm not saying 100%,
archaeologically they have notfound, sure, uh, a man named joe
, okay uh, but there isarchaeological um kind of facts
on the areas that he's talkingabout yeah yeah sure.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
So there, yeah sure again.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
This is one of those things where there is history
within it.
Does that mean this was ahistorical character?
I don't know exactly, um, butthis is a real place with real
people with real problems.
Yep, and this is mentioned twoother times.
Job is mentioned two othertimes in the Bible and I always
think when somebody mentions himlater on again, is that proof
that he existed.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Right, or is this?
Speaker 1 (04:16):
proof that they know the story of Job.
Yeah, for sure, but there arepeople that feel as though this
was a real person, he did existand these are the things that he
went through.
But I definitely understand.
Listen, there are some.
There's some real challenges,uh, when you get into some of
the story on whether or not thiswould have occurred the way.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
And don't get me wrong, I'm not.
I'm not saying I don't thinkit's plausible that he was right
.
I'm just saying it's not.
It's not a question I wrestlewith.
It's not something I have towrestle with, because I know
that, whether he was or wasn't,the meaning of this story is so
intense and it's so deep andit's so.
It's the, it's the story thatkeeps on giving, and every time
you read it you get somethingmore out of it.
So it's 100.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
Why don't we talk more about it?
Yeah, so for me, I will tellyou that uh, job is not the most
righteous person that they playhim out to be.
Now, I know he's righteous.
I know that he does things as apriest would at the time,
without Levitical laws.
So he does make sacrifices forhis kids, he does make
sacrifices for his friends.
(05:14):
He is living a life that is asrighteous as he can be.
But I think that we're lookingat is this is somebody who,
theologically, is doingeverything right For sure.
I don't think the relationshippart is what he has with God.
In the beginning it definitelybuilds through the story, but I
think, if you look at the reallybeginning parts of the story,
(05:38):
he's somebody who makesreferences to God in a way where
he's very far away.
Even the Lord took and gaveaway I mean, the Lord gave and
took away Even a statement likethat.
It's not a personalrelationship, it's just no, the
God can do what he wants.
He can give you, he can take itaway.
Then he says something alongthe lines in Job 3.11.
Why did I not persist at birth,he's saying, why am I even here
(06:02):
?
He does not have thisrelationship with with god job 9
, 11, 12, um this is when hepasses me, I cannot see him.
Yeah, um, and a lot of peoplelook at it and they go well,
these are laments of somebodywho is tortured, or, if you look
at it, he is not speaking togod.
He's speaking about god almostthe entire book of Job, right up
(06:24):
until the end when he kind ofloses it.
And this is part where I go.
Was he righteous theologically?
Yes, and I look at people todayand I go hey, theologically,
man, they know a lot of theBible.
Yeah, does that mean they havea relationship with God?
Not necessarily.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
You know?
So this is the first point thatreally caught me, and so let's
spend a little time on thisright.
Like, is he righteous?
Yeah, yeah.
To an extent right, like therelationship he doesn't have.
We get that, but is herighteous?
Yes, and ultimately, that'swhat he is able to hold on to
throughout the story.
No matter how much he complains, no matter how much he whines,
(07:00):
no matter how much he laments,no matter how much he cries, no
matter how much he's angry.
He knows God to be just andrighteous and because of that,
he is able to hold on to thetrust in God, based on his
knowledge that he's been doingwhat he should have been doing.
(07:21):
And I found this interestingbecause, look, there are
multiple sides to a relationshipwith God, but one of them is
that you know, if God is tellingyou to do these things, you
need to, whether you understandthem or not, whether you agree
with them or not, whether you,whether you even know what the
outcome is going to be.
(07:42):
It's submission, it's aboutsubmission, and, and he did
submit.
And now he's at the point isgoing to be it's submission,
it's about submission, and, andhe did submit.
And now he's at the point wherehe's quite he might be
questioning that submission.
He might be curious if that wasthe right way to go.
I don't.
He never actually says he's.
You know he, he wishes he didthings differently.
He just says like I did allthese things, I, and now you're,
now you're betraying me, youknow, and so, but he, he never
(08:05):
curses God, he just he's, hedoesn't understand it.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
See, for me I would disagree, david.
I think for me he is righteous.
The word says he is righteous.
There's a reason why we evenreading this they say blameless.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
The word blameless is used.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Blameless, right or right.
The reason why we're readingthis is because de santan, you
know, said hey, he is, he isrighteous, he is good, he is
blameless because he you've beengiven, you've given him all
this life, right, you've givenhim the wealth, you've given him
everything.
So if we take that away, let'ssee if he continues to be
(08:40):
blameless right, right.
And then to me he is blameless.
To me he is, and then to me heis blameless.
To me he is righteous.
He does have a relationshipwith God because he does make
these sacrifices.
And when it does, this stuffstarts happening to him, which
is where we see that after whatthe verses that you were talking
about?
This is after something happensto you, something happens to
you like this, the first thingyou're going to do is you
(09:00):
probably freak out.
You probably start cursing God.
Right, but he didn't curse God.
He's asking these questionswhat did you leave me?
What's going on?
Right, he seek God first duringthis trouble.
That's how I feel.
I don't.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
I don't believe he did see what happens, even the
first sacrifices he makes.
He's saying I'm makingsacrifices for my kids in the
event that maybe they didsomething against God.
Yeah, he's not talking to thekids, he's not figuring out what
they're doing, he's not havingthat conversation with him.
He's going I'm just doing thisas a tradition, I'm just going
to do burnt offerings justbecause you might have, you
might not have, but I'm going todo it.
(09:32):
That's not relational.
No, it blah, he didn't.
What he starts saying is well,if God can give it, he can take
it away, and this and that.
And he's talking still aboutGod very, very distant, even
(09:52):
after all these things happen.
Only after his friends, hiswife and everybody tells him
that he should curse God, doeshe finally get to the point
where he's screaming out now toGod and then has this amazing
interaction with God.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Yeah, um, this conflict with God he's not wrong
for saying he, he's absolutelyright, he's wrong yeah.
God can't give it and take itaway.
I'm not saying he's wrong, I'msaying.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
what he's saying is all the right things that have
nothing to do with relationship.
So here's the thing I I.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
You're both right, and this is the point of the
story.
This is the point, right Likeright.
This is the point of the storythat Job has everything.
God has given him those things.
He has been righteous, he hasbeen faithful.
Let's remember thatfaithfulness doesn't necessarily
mean agreement, as you've saidbefore.
It means obedience, right.
(10:43):
And so he's been obedient, he'sdone those things and now he's
having a crisis, right, a crisisof in his life.
God is not opaque, god istransparent.
So he doesn't get to talk togod.
In the beginning, god didn'tcome down and go hey, job, some
stuff's gonna happen.
Need you to work through this?
Yeah, you know he doesn't getthat because, guess what?
None of us do.
None of us get that.
We all are living our high life, we're dealing with everything
(11:06):
well, everything's going well,and then, all of a sudden,
something.
The bottom falls out.
God doesn't come to us beforeand say I just want to let you
know some bad stuff's coming.
You better get ready.
So the story is is one that isthe most related, one of the
most relatable in the Bible.
I mean it's, for me it's one ofthe most relatable.
I mean it's yeah.
I mean I mean, look, he's goingthrough everything good,
everything's being well.
He's, he's faithful, he's doingwell, everything's going good.
(11:28):
And then the bottom drops out.
Hopefully my bottom neverdropped out the way jobes does
but you get the point, that'sextremism to get the idea and
then what does he?
Speaker 3 (11:37):
do?
I mean?
What happens to him is extremeright.
It's like really exactly yeahso what?
Speaker 2 (11:41):
what would we all do in that situation?
We're not going to goimmediately.
Go pray and go, god.
I know this is for yourwellbeing.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
Like no, we're going to go why am I alive?
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Why did you, why have you let me live so good, to
fall so?
Speaker 3 (11:57):
hard, right, why he's questioning?
David questioned the same thing, david King, david King David
questioned the same thing right,when things were going wrong,
when things were going bad.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
He's like where are you, where are you?
God?
Like what was going on.
He's having a conversation withGod Again.
I'm not.
Speaker 3 (12:09):
Right, right, well it starts.
I mean, relationship startswith conversation For me to go.
So, for instance, something wasto happen to me in my life.
You know the first person Iwant to hear from her.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
I want her to counsel me.
I want her to comfort me andthat's the conversation that
I'm-.
And if your wife is taken fromyou, God forbid if your wife is
taken from you and all yourriches are taken from you, and
your house is taken from you andeverything that, and you're
still going.
Well, you know this God.
He's doing this and he's doingthat and he can do it and it's
again.
It's this separation of not myGod.
Why are you doing this, the wayDavid calls out?
Speaker 3 (12:46):
I'll be honest for me when things go wrong or
whatever it is.
That's something that doescomfort me in some ways, Meaning
I try to take myself out of thesituation and go.
I have no control over this andI have to trust God.
To me, that's faith.
Right, I'm trusting God,whatever happened there, even
though it feels horrible that hehas it under control, or I will
(13:10):
spiral out of control and go.
Oh my god, you know this iskilling me.
God, where are you?
And I probably will curse godbut again this is I would.
That's that helps me to takemyself out and go.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
God, you got this this is the story, though, like
the story is not a story of howyou should act.
It's about how we really do actand how we should be acting.
Yeah, because the story startswith him cursing he again.
He's not cursing God, but he'scursing himself.
He's cursing his life and hisexistence at all.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
Right.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Which is something that we all understand, whether
it's the right thing to do ornot.
And you're right, david, that'sgoing on in his life and he
feels sorry for himself and hegoes straight to the bottom of
that hole, which is somethingwe've all done.
And then he goes to his friendsand then he lets his friends
counsel him and his friendsagain, his friends aren't God.
(13:59):
This is the story.
It's first go to yourself, thengo to your friends.
Your friends don't know, and Ilove this, like inner turmoil
and external turmoil.
That happens to the entire book.
It's me first, and then you'retalking to me and then I'm
telling you you're wrong.
Yeah, and they are wrong a lotof times.
Honestly.
I mean, that's the thing that'sinteresting about those you
(14:24):
know guys that come is they'realso wrong, because we know from
the beginning that that's notwhy this happened.
His friends continue if youhaven't read the book his
friends continue to in some wayinsinuate that he has done sin,
that he is blamed, he is atblame.
Yeah, what I hear, yeah, goahead.
And at the end of the story isthe more he fights and fights,
and fights.
Then this new guy, Elihu, comesin, the younger guy in the
crowd and he tries to lay somethoughts on top of it which,
(14:46):
again, are not entirely right,but they have a little bit more
sense and they do sharpen thatvision of what they're trying to
say.
At the end is the first time.
Actually, right in the middlesorry, right in the middle Job
tries to bargain with God.
Again, who hasn't tried tobargain with God in the middle?
It's like, if I can't hear you,if I can't see you, if you're
not answering me, take me tocourt.
(15:09):
Let me prove my case Again.
That's not the way God works.
But he keeps doing that.
It's not until the very endwhen he submits.
It's not until the very endwhen he submits and he calls out
to God and he asks God forGod's will to be done, that it
gets fixed.
So again, I'm not saying he'sright or wrong, I just want to
go through this process of like.
That's why I love this book.
To me, the book if I could zoomout
Speaker 3 (15:31):
and just kind of like per his eye view.
And I'm thinking about thisbecause you're saying this.
It's a question we all haveright.
When bad things happen, whenthings go wrong, whose fault is
that?
Is it mine for doing it?
Is it mine for thinking aboutit?
Is it mine for doing it?
Is it mine for thinking aboutit?
Is it mine for not taking careof it?
Was it god?
And you know, is it?
But then, wait, is god wrong?
(15:51):
Is he this, this, this?
You know, little boy on ananthill, you know, kind of yeah,
you know is he this evil god?
and we did an episode on thatabout.
Is god evil, right, or is hejust right?
Is he a just god?
And this is what just happensin the world and I think we see
that play out through severalbooks.
I think Ecclesiastes talksabout a little bit about this
and things being worthless rightor meaningless right, and we
(16:16):
see that throughout Job.
Right, Just kind of figure out,is God this just God?
That's what his friends aresaying.
Right, he's just God.
So it must have been you.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Job that did something wrong.
It's what does justice mean?
Speaker 3 (16:25):
at some point, right, that becomes the central
question, which is funny too,because right there also, it
seems like this courtroom rightWith Satan, so it's like it's
God is judged on, you know, onthis hill, and just kind of like
judging everybody, whatever'sin this court, sorry.
And as we play out throughoutthe end, god speaks to Job and
he talks about that and goeswere you there in the beginning?
(16:46):
Were you here?
Whatever it is, these thingshappen because they happen, but
I still am just.
I still am this God, and I seethat I'm paraphrasing.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
But I also.
You know there's so manydifferent layers and I think
this is why probably Jason, yousaid that when you look at the
friends and you, you know again.
We quickly curse the friendsand go.
They're so wrong for blaminghim.
You're going to do all thesethings, but what you also don't
read in the story is Jobactually does this to other
people that come to him whenthey're suffering.
He says this and they go youdon't understand what.
(17:15):
I'm going through, becauseyou've never gone through this
type of stuff and you start tosee that people usually have
like-minded people around them,and so when you hear their
opinions, this is alsoreflecting the opinion of Job,
and he needs to now go throughall this to have a different
opinion, and that's why I saidthe relationship part is what he
starts to build with God going.
You know what?
(17:35):
I haven't been throughsomething like this.
I am going through this rightnow.
I do hear what my advice usedto be, how worthless it is
because it's not helping.
I mean, man, there's so manylayers to unpack here.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
Look how important it is, then, under that statement,
that the whole book begins withGod and Satan having a
discussion.
Why is that important?
Because, from the verybeginning, they lay it out very
clearly that none of what isabout to happen is happening
because of blame.
Right, none of it.
None of what's going to happenis because of blame.
None of what's going to happenis because of blame.
None of what's going to happenis because of fault.
(18:07):
None of what is going to happenis because of divine
retribution.
What's going to happen isbecause it's going to happen
Because chaos exists in theuniverse.
Why is it going to happen?
Because justness doesn't meanrightness Sorry, let me say it
differently Justice doesn't meanhappiness.
Because action doesn't alwaysreflect reaction.
(18:30):
Reaction or reaction doesn'talways reflect action, because
that's just the way our worldworks.
We talked about that in ourother episode.
The reality is that the world isthe world and it's going to
move the way it moves and it'sgoing to happen the way it
happens, whether that's Godmaking it happen or the devil
making it happen, or just thefact that God created an earth
that moves, shifts, shakeschanges.
And we live in that world thatmoves, shifts, shakes changes.
We're going to have to dealwith the consequences of the
(18:52):
earth being the earth, and so Ilove the fact.
Again, I'm going to go back tothe very, very beginning.
That sets the story up.
With this context, everythingyou are about to read is just
the way the world works, and howyou react is going to be how
you, how you process it right,how you navigate it, how you
process it.
(19:12):
So everything else from there isthen, which is why I love that
Job starts up by doing what weall do.
God, you hate me, right?
Why did you do this to me?
And immediately, you know hedidn't.
So look, look what the humandid.
The human went and made itabout themselves.
The human immediately made itabout themselves.
What did I do?
I tried so hard I did, I wasn'table to make it happen.
You don't like me.
(19:33):
I don't understand you.
And yet, not only is it true,but it's also something again,
we all know when have you not,when have you wanted you don't
send an email to God and hesends you an answer back.
That's just not the way thatworks, and this is a story of
(19:55):
that.
This is a story of how tonavigate your life with faith.
With faith despite the factthat you feel like the whole
universe is falling apart.
Speaker 3 (20:04):
And I hear you on that and I think, and I think I
get that from the story, butsometimes it's tough.
I'm speaking for maybe forgenerally.
I'm speaking for other peoplehere, including myself.
It's when you see the scripturesays God is speaking to say and
he goes, go ahead.
You do that.
And it's just like is that theway he's orchestrating things?
(20:26):
He's just testing us out, kindof thing.
And it's just tough to hearthat, it's tough to read, that,
I think, and I I just want tothrow out there I mean not not
to go into a big discussion-it's very tough.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
I have something to tell you.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Yeah, I mean yeah let's go through that, because
that's an important part.
Anybody who's written, who'sread this story kind of goes.
Why would God allow that?
Why would he entertain this?
Right, and what you don'trealize is that even in this
moment, when, yes, the world ischaos and he's just allowing
chaos to happen, god is stillbeing protective.
(20:58):
So when you point at God and go, god, why would you do this?
You go wait a minute, let'slook what God also did.
He said first you will not dothis to him, don't harm him, you
can't do this.
But then, on top of that,something that that a finer
point is.
And and this is I'm just goingto compare it with if there is a
, a company that has to do amass firing, okay, and they fire
(21:19):
somebody, two people every weekfor the next two years, what
happens?
Everybody works anxious.
When's it going to be my turnand my I next week, am I next
week?
And it builds, and it buildsand it becomes the most
miserable place in the world.
But if they do all of thefirings on one day and then it's
done and you're still there,what happens?
The anxiety comes down and yougo whew, I survived that, right,
(21:40):
and you can actually breatheagain.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
If you notice, god has all of these horrible things
happening the same day he did,he did all at once, so it is and
we look at it and go this is sobrutal for Job.
Speaker 1 (21:52):
No, no, what he's doing is protecting him going.
I'm going to have all thishappen on one day.
Here, you lost everything.
Deal with it.
How are you going to deal withit?
Are you going to deal with itfaithfully?
Versus let me pluck somethingfrom you every single day or
every single week and drive youmentally insane from it.
Yeah, even that showsprotection that God's using on
him that we don't even thinkabout.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
I never thought about that, yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
Never thought about that.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
Yeah, it's a.
It's a little bit of humanityright or not.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Humanity, uh, it's humane.
It's a more humane way to doliterality on it, because I
think it's too complicated tounderstand.
But I think what the God andthe devil talk, or God and Satan
speaking to one another, is forme in my taking a step back and
(22:39):
trying to just process themeaning of it, is… trying to
like mythologically form what itmeans to say life happened,
life happened.
You know bad stuff is going tohappen and you're not always
going to understand it, and andagain.
I think that's what this storyis about.
It's not.
It's not about understanding.
Another thing I want to bring up, though, is you know we give
(23:00):
Job all this.
You know hard time for all ofhis whining and complaining and
upsetness, but there are somereally beautiful lines in this
where you can tell he loves God.
I mean, one of them is Job 14,13.
If only you would hide me inSheol and conceal me until your
anger passes.
If only you would appoint at atime for me and then remember me
(23:20):
when a person dies, will hecome back to life?
If so, I would wait all thedays of my struggle until my
relief comes.
You would call and I willanswer you.
You will long for the hard workof your hands, for then you
would count my steps but wouldnot take note of my sin.
My rebellion would be sealed upin a bag and you would cover
over my iniquity.
(23:41):
I just love that he's alreadyseeing into the future of being
in heaven and what it would belike, and that he just wants to
walk beside God and be with Godand be connected to God.
He's, he's begging and this isright in the middle of the third
of the way through the book.
He's already begging for thatrelationship that you've been
talking about, and I think it'sjust such a beautiful line to
talk about that again.
He's, he's.
He's so human, he's so human,he's struggling, he's fighting,
he's fussing.
(24:02):
But in between all those lines,there's always these little
like nuggets that you're likeman.
In between all those lines,there's always these little like
nuggets that you're like man.
That's a guy who loved God,like that's a guy who loved him.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
There is, uh, you know this is actually written in
a format of Jewish poetry Uh,and, and I know we didn't
mention that, but there arequite a few scholars,
non-biblical scholars that feellike this work, this, this poem,
is the absolute best everwritten ever in the history of
time, and these are people whodon't believe in the bible, who
(24:31):
just look at the, the incrediblelanguage like we just read,
yeah, and it's just filled withvisuals and emotion and
everything you want out of.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
it's so rich and it is literally every line of job,
of the, of the discussion, partof the jobs.
I mean it's a beautiful book.
I mean, if you appreciate, youknow, you know, uh, you know
noir type topics, it's perfect,cause he's so dark, like there's
some like really deep hyperboleand like really intense
metaphor, like it's a.
(24:59):
It's a really beautiful booktoo, but, um, I guess I I'll
tell you.
There's two other things that Iwant to talk about, but one of
them is that I really think thatit's important to note.
This is about justice, you know.
I mean, it's like what doesdivine justice mean?
Divine justice isn't what weconceive of, it's what God
(25:20):
conceives of, and it's saidthroughout the book.
You know, does my righteousnessmean anything to you?
Does me being good or bad doanything for God?
Does it matter at all?
And it's not until the very endof the book that he says you
know what?
I just don't know?
And God says again.
God says to him were you there?
Were you there in the beginning?
(25:41):
It's the understanding.
It's that separation of Godversus human.
We are so finite and so smalland he is so big.
We can sit here and whine allwe want, but we're just not
going to understand it.
We just have to trust.
That is what faith is.
Keep moving forward, believingthat God knows better than we do
which he does.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
Yeah, yeah, I agree.
I think there's, as we see, youknow, through time is that God
loves us, right, and he wants arelationship with us.
But what we do is not reallyfor him, it's for us, for us to
shape us in that way.
And they, you know, in Job 35,six through eight, elihu says if
(26:22):
you sin, how does that affectthem?
If your sins are many, whatdoes that do to him?
If you're righteous, what doesthat have to do with him?
Or what does this does hereceive from your hand?
Your wickedness only affectshumans like yourself and your
righteousness only other people,and I think that's holds true.
Uh, when we look at it, when Ilook at, god is just really
(26:43):
trying to shape us.
Prayer is one of those things.
Right, prayer is not as much asfor me I mean for God as it is
for me.
It shows a humility, it shows areverence to God.
When we do those things and Godis going to continue to be God
he's not affected in any kind ofway.
He's hurt.
Sure, he loves us.
He wants us to not sin and notdo certain things, but really
(27:09):
what he wants from us is to begood and do good to others.
There's this relationship, partof humans on humans, like
really paying attention to yourhuman being, attention to your
neighbor, to your family, toother humans, and be good to
them, to learn how to lift themup and be good to them.
You know what I'm saying.
So that's what I always getthroughout the Bible and I love
that about God because I findthat true in my life.
I'm more happy in my life whenI have good humans around me and
(27:33):
that that I love and thatreally lifts me up and I want to
lift them up.
Speaker 2 (27:36):
I love what you said about prayer is not for God,
it's for us.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Right.
I think that's such animportant majority of this book,
because he doesn't do one verysimple thing he doesn't reach
out to God.
He doesn't reach out to God andhe follows his own instinct.
He follows his own flesh.
(27:59):
He feels sorry for his ownexistence, instead of doing what
we all need to do in thatmoment, which is to submit, to
acknowledge that there is apower in this universe that is
far greater than us.
That it's not for ourunderstanding, it is for our
benefit, and I think that's whatprayer does for us.
(28:22):
Prayer reminds us that there'sinner dialogue and there's
prayer.
Right, they both happen insideyour head, but one of them is me
talking to me.
The other one's me talking toGod, and when I talk to me, that
ain't good.
There's a lot of bad, in fact.
That's that's whenconversations spiral, because me
talking to me is like awhirlwind of it's, like a
(28:42):
Tasmanian devil that's justdriving itself straight to the
pit of hell.
When I talk to God, I shootstraight up in the sky.
And this is it right.
Speaker 3 (28:53):
It's the well of wisdom, right it's the well of
wisdom.
Your well of wisdom is shallow,right, no offense to you, but
for us humans it's shallow, butGod's well.
I'm offended, but yes.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
No, I love you.
You know, one of the thingsthat humans in general do, love
is struggle.
It's one of the reasons whythis book is so great to read.
We love struggle, and anybodywho says no, no, I want
everything to be smooth, I'mgoing.
You know, let's you're the onewho's also rubbernecking where
there's an accident, right,right, we enjoy struggle, and
what's happening through thisbook is there's this incredible,
beautiful, poetic strugglethat's happening.
(29:26):
it's a struggle that that startswith Satan and God and it ends
with Job and his faith.
But when you look at the verylast verse verses, if you look
at the very last chapter, sochapter 42, this is when Job
finally gets it and this is whatI said, where the relationship
part finally clicks in and hesays he says Job answers the
(29:47):
Lord and said I know that youcan do all things and that no
purpose of yours can be thwarted.
And he goes on and on, and hegoes hear and I will speak, I
will question you and I willmake it known to me.
I had heard you, but by hearingof the ear, but now my eyes see
you.
Therefore, I despise myself andI repent in dust and ashes.
Love it.
He is basically just coming outand saying I get it, I.
(30:09):
I.
I thought I was with you and Irealized that I was not.
I was trying to understandeverything you do.
I can't.
I can't understand the divinejustice.
I can't.
I know that what your plans areare your plans, and all I can
do is just pray to you, have arelationship with you and
apologize, repent for my mistake, which is I did turn on you.
Listen, there was a point wherehe did turn on God by
(30:32):
questioning him.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
Yeah, Guys, I have a weird thought.
So we started this whole thingout by saying why would God
allow this to happen?
Yeah, right, yeah, look at whathappens at the end.
Yeah, it's better for Job.
Job learns.
Job has spent his whole lifebeing what he thought was close
to God, but he wasn't close toGod, god loves me because he
blessed me.
Speaker 3 (30:51):
Look what I have.
He thought he loved him forthose reasons.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
The devil comes along and goes.
He's not going to love youafter this.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
And why did God say, yes, that's the question we
asked earlier why did God sayyes?
Speaker 2 (31:06):
Because he knew at the end Job was going to be
better off.
Yeah, oh, okay, whoa dude, thatlike freaked me out.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
That's crazy.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
Because that's what this whole, again the story is
so rich and robust.
So when the question of why,guys, I literally have chills
Like why would God let someterrible things happen like that
, it's because he knew it wasgoing to work out for his
betterment.
And so now Job not only has asuperficial relationship with
him, with with god through thetradition, he now has a real
(31:32):
relationship with him throughpersonal.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
Yeah, and man, that's intense, yeah and then is
restored back to exactly.
Speaker 2 (31:40):
So now that he has back.
I mean to be fair.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
He didn't get his family back no, he well, he got
a, he got another family backthat he's he's happy with um
which?
Is crazy but yes, he does he,he has this, he at the end gets
a personal relationship, getshis things quote unquote back,
um, he is restored.
He is restored but only afterhaving to go through it, which
is the other thing.
Speaker 2 (32:03):
I was having that relationship, man this one's
gonna hit me hard for a while,because that's I mean, I've
never considered that that's.
Everybody's always asked thequestion why would God allow
that to happen?
Right, because it ends up inhis favor.
That's why, and what?
And so what does that part ofthe story tell you alone?
That part of the story tellsyou suffering breeds growth.
You know, tragedy breedssharpening.
Speaker 3 (32:30):
If reads sharpening, if you allow it to, if you turn
to God.
Yeah, I think about I've heardof like the way they make metal,
or the way you kind of likeSilver yeah, silver right it has
to go through the furnace.
It has to go through this likeshaping process.
Speaker 2 (32:36):
Well Job even says in fact Job, I think it's.
Job 23,.
Says something like I will gothrough your trials and I will
come out as gold.
You know, so even that part ofthe story, it's a reminder for
anybody out there who's goingthrough something.
You may be angry at God, youmay be questioning God, you may
not understand why this ishappening to you, but if you
(32:57):
turn your trust to God, if youturn your connection to God and
you're personally related to God, he's going to use it for good.
Speaker 3 (33:04):
Is that?
Speaker 2 (33:05):
Roman 28?
Speaker 3 (33:05):
And I can say this Satan puts those lies in our, in
us.
Right, he wants us to go.
Hey, you're not going to loveGod after this happens to you.
Hey, how can you love God afterthat happened to your son?
You shouldn't love him and theyyou know.
And just to really try to psychus out, and we have to even
further, when these thingshappen, not trying to understand
(33:27):
it, we can't leave in our, wecannot lean in our own
understanding, and Proverbs says, but lean on God's
understanding and through thatwe'll find peace, we'll find
hope, and he helped us throughit.
We know the things that happen.
Tragic happens to us all thetime and we want to just you
know, we want to fight againstthe things that happen.
You know the people that do itto us and we must understand
(33:48):
that.
Maybe it's a shaping process.
Maybe we'll come out betterthan that and get another family
and get more stock.
Speaker 2 (33:56):
Get more livestock.
Get more livestock.
Speaker 3 (33:58):
Yeah, I could use some.
No, nowadays stocks yeah, Icould use some.
You're getting talk of realstock.
I want real stock.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
I want live stocks, yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:05):
The other little thing I'm just going to end on
this with, with kind of what,where my brain goes in this book
is um, you know, we always lookat pastors and priests uh, to
to intercede for us.
Even even when we know, hey, Ihave this relation with God, we
still go over to a pastor and go, hey, can you pray for in that,
and it definitely hasimportance.
(34:25):
But I always look at this, I godon't forget that you can also
pray for others in your circle.
And at the very end, god is madat his friends and says I'm
only accepting you by the prayerof Job.
So Job prays for them, praysfor them, yeah, and God accepts
it for his prayer, not theirs.
They could have gone.
He was like, no, I'm going toaccept it because job is praying
(34:47):
for you.
And I look at that, I go.
You know, it's a reminder thatwe should all pray for each
other as well.
There's a time where don't wait, don't, don't just pray for
yourself, pray for others aswell.
Yeah, go to your friends, learnwhat's going on, have a
relationship with them as well.
But you were talking about javi, the person on a personal
relationship, and, and you don'trealize the importance of that
until you go.
God only accepted theforgiveness because somebody
(35:09):
else prayed for it.
I'm going, man, I want tosurround myself with everybody.
Speaker 3 (35:14):
I'm going to pray for everybody.
There's something that happensthere too.
When you pray for other people,there's something that shapes
you.
I think I heard recently on adifferent podcast and the guy
said there's something aboutgiving a gift rather than
receiving it right.
Like when you give a nice giftthat you know someone is really
going to love or they do love it, that does something to you for
(35:36):
doing it.
And when you pray for someoneand you hope in the best for
them, or you hope that Godintercedes for them in their
life the way God has, maybe inyou there's something that
shapes you as a human, as yourlife or maybe a relationship
with that person is somethingthat you get out of it.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
Um and I'm not saying you do it to get something out
of it, but there's somethingthat's rewarding yeah, not to be
, uh, mr negative, but the otherthing to pay attention to here
is that he surrounded himself bypeople who were wrong.
And you know, true, it's animportant note that you got to
be careful who you surroundyourself with, because if you're
surrounding yourself with thewrong people, they're going to
(36:11):
condemn you when things go bad.
Speaker 1 (36:13):
Or, and I love to flip it, what if you're that
negative person?
What if you're the negativeperson?
Somebody surrounded themselveswith you.
A hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
And at this case and I'll leave my discussion of Job
at an end here, but you know, Ithink the thing is the friends
were wrong and the thing that Ireally respected about Job on
this last reading is that Jobwas confident in his own faith.
Like he had problems, he hadissues, but he never gave up.
Nope, he never.
(36:40):
You know what's worse thantalking badly to God, not
talking to God at all?
Yeah, that's the challenge,right, and he never did that.
He might have been cursing him.
Speaker 3 (36:48):
He might have been angry with him.
Well, he, he might have beencursing him.
He might have been angry withhim, he didn't curse him.
Speaker 2 (36:51):
You know he might have been angry with him, right
right, he might have been, uh,you know, deeply upset with what
he was saying to him, but henever stopped talking to him.
He never said you know what,screw these rules.
Yeah, I'm gonna go do what Iwant now.
If you're gonna, if you'regonna, mess with me, no matter
what, I'm just gonna go do me.
But and this is what humanstoday do, this is what everybody
does today Like, if you're notgoing to give me what I want,
(37:12):
I'm out of here.
And he didn't ever do that andI really respected that.
This read around.
Speaker 3 (37:17):
If we don't build our foundation of God and really
build that and relationship withhim, we could easily be, you
know, led astray Totally,totally, and that's what Satan
does.
He wants to put these lies andthen go back to what I said
before and I don't want torepeat it, but there is that
that happens and I think youbrought a good point.
It's true, he has a foundationwithin God, he knows God is good
(37:41):
, he knows God has blessed himand his friends are going no,
you did something wrong, youshould.
What are you doing?
And he's like no, no, no, Iknow my god, yeah, I know my god
, and he's just there'ssomething more he's gotta
understand my god, right, yeah,yeah.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
Yeah, I don't understand it right now, but I
know him right, yeah, yeah andit's, it's something beautiful,
like you said, jason, yeah, Ithought that was cool and and to
not forget that, you know, weread a story and obviously the
story is filled with drama, yeah, and it's filled with negative
circumstances and things likethat.
And it's easy to look at it andgo, yeah, that's what's
(38:15):
happened to me or that's whatI've gone through, or whatever
it is.
And you start to feel that Joblived 140 years is what it says
in Job.
He lived 140 years.
And you start to go, well, howlong did this last?
Because all of these tragedies,things, and honestly you go you
lived 140 years.
You had this wonderful life upuntil that point.
(38:37):
You lost it and then god didrestore it.
It might not have been the same.
There might have been some youknow some lasting effects from
from the first thing you lost,yeah, but you know, out of 140
years if you go.
I don't know how long thislasted, did it last a month, a
year, I don't know but out of140 years.
Sometimes we look at at God andwe curse him for the negative
that we're going through andwe're going, man, you know, I
know I've been around thosepeople.
I've been that person where I'mjust negative and negative, and
(38:58):
negative and negative, and thenone day I get annoyed with
myself.
I'm going what am I so negativeabout?
I have a lot to be thankful for.
That's good.
And I think out of 140 yearsyou go, man, there's a lot to be
thankful for and it could be.
Speaker 3 (39:09):
Whatever pain and affliction that you're going
through.
It could be temporary andthat's what it was right.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
I mean it always is, that's another small little key
message right, but I mean, it'salways temporary and God makes
sure God's timing and our timingnot the same To us.
That week that we're goingthrough it, that month we're
going through, that six monthswe're going through it is
forever.
For God it's a split second,right?
So, guys, this has been one ofthe most rousing discussions
(39:35):
we've had in a while.
Maybe we recap a little bit.
Look, job is a fascinatingstory.
It is.
That is potentially historical,but definitely so full of
meaning.
I would, I think we would allhighly suggest that everybody
sit down with this book, readthrough it, figure out where you
sit in it.
Where do you sit today?
(39:56):
Where have you sat in your past?
You know identify, you know.
Do you?
Do you identify with Job?
Do you feel like he did theright thing or did he go about
it all wrong?
You know there's so much inthis story.
There's there.
We'd love to talk to you aboutit.
Uh, if anybody has anything thatyou'd like to, you know, add to
this conversation, we have theuh boundless bible discussion
group.
Uh, you can email us.
(40:16):
Um, in our podcast actually,there's a text text message link
too.
You can text this uh withquestions.
So we'd love to hear thosequestions and keep these
conversations going, because jobis the book that keeps on
giving.
Yeah, um.
So what we do know is that Jobis very clear that if you follow
God, if you are faithful to God, god is not going to let you
(40:37):
down.
God is going to be by your side.
God is going to, and eventhough you don't understand
what's going on in your liferight now, god does, and when
you submit to his knowledge ofit, that temporary thing you're
going through is going to passand he's going to find a way to
use it for good.
Speaker 3 (40:54):
Yeah, I love it.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
So I hope this has at least shown somebody out there
that this is the case.
But again, if you need anybodyto talk to, you want anybody to
talk to, we're all available, solet us know.
Yeah, so, guys, we're wrappingright.
Thank you appreciate it, guys.
We'll see you on the socials,we'll see you in emails and we
look forward to talking to younext week.
Thanks a lot, see ya.
Welcome to the Boundless Bible.
My name is David Shapiro, hey,I'm Javi Marquez and I'm Jason
Holloway.
Welcome back everyone.
Hey guys, how's it going?
Doing well today.
What's going on, dudes, I amreally excited about today we're
going to jump into the story ofJob.
A lot of people look at Job andthey kind of remember him as a
(00:24):
suffering guy and that's prettymuch it.
But we're going to dive alittle bit further in today.
We're going to explain it alittle bit differently, but let
me just kind of give a littlebackground on who Job is and
where this comes from.
So Job is known.
The book of Job is known as theoldest book actually written in
the Bible.
So this is is the oldest one.
It's part of the wisdomliterature.
(00:45):
It's part of, uh, the booksthat people read to gain wisdom
from, yeah, uh, god's word andand from the bible.
Ultimately, um, this is somebodywho probably takes place around
2000 bc.
This is around the time ofabraham.
Yep, um, and there's some cluesto that.
So some of the clues to that umwould be that uh, job actually
(01:06):
references the, uh, the flood,and this is in job 22, 16.
Uh, they were snatched awaybefore their time.
Their foundation was washedaway by flood, um, so this is
something that happens probablyafter the flood story, but there
are no levitical laws, so it'sprobably before Moses.
So a lot of scholars have itaround 2000 BC.
(01:28):
This is in a land that is notpart of Israel and it is kind of
what they dictate right now ismodern southern Jordan in the
land of Uz, and this is wherethis took place, which means
probably Job wasn't even anIsraelite.
He's probably a Gentile.
So that kind of lays the storyof who Job is.
(01:49):
We know from the beginning thathe is a wealthy man.
He has a lot of cattle, he hasa lot of camels, he has a
healthy family, he has a bighome, he's got servants.
And then Satan comes into God'scourt and kind of tempts him
and says look, the only reasonthis guy really likes you and
obeys you the way he does isbecause you've given him
(02:11):
everything and he's got thisgreat life and as soon as you
take this away he's going tocurse you.
And then God allows him.
And then we go into the storyof Job and all the things that
have happened to him throughoutthe story and what he does.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
So it's so interesting.
Yeah, that court, that wholecourt scene is so interesting,
Like God speaking to, what isSatan?
Satan is it.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
The Satan, the accuser, the Satan the adversary
right.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
It's so interesting to see that and I think there's
a lot even there we could sit onand just kind of like break
down and figure out.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
Yeah, I mean, I think the story is so fascinating and
I think we have to start bytalking about the historical
versus the metaphorical rightLike this is in the wisdom books
, so it's not necessarily meantto be taken as historically true
.
Plus, I think anybody who wasto say there was a catalog of
God talking to Satan wouldalready have a challenge in
saying that this is a historicalstory.
So, for me, I don't even try togo down the road and figure it
(03:10):
out, I just I think this is astory that has so much meaning
and it's so.
It's like the world's firstmovie.
It's so full of like emotionand so full of like character,
depth and story and each personis very consistent with their
own character and and thatcharacter development and their
inter you know, intertwining in,their intercommunication is is
(03:33):
where all this meaning is builtand I just I love this story,
yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
I definitely agree that.
I I believe that there's a tonof meaning in it.
I actually happen to think andI'm not saying 100%,
archaeologically they have notfound, sure, uh, a man named joe
, okay uh, but there isarchaeological um kind of facts
on the areas that he's talkingabout yeah yeah sure.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
So there, yeah sure again.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
This is one of those things where there is history
within it.
Does that mean this was ahistorical character?
I don't know exactly, um, butthis is a real place with real
people with real problems.
Yep, and this is mentioned twoother times.
Job is mentioned two othertimes in the Bible and I always
think when somebody mentions himlater on again, is that proof
that he existed.
Speaker 3 (04:15):
Right, or is this?
Speaker 1 (04:16):
proof that they know the story of Job.
Yeah, for sure, but there arepeople that feel as though this
was a real person, he did existand these are the things that he
went through.
But I definitely understand.
Listen, there are some.
There's some real challenges,uh, when you get into some of
the story on whether or not thiswould have occurred the way.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
And don't get me wrong, I'm not.
I'm not saying I don't thinkit's plausible that he was right
.
I'm just saying it's not.
It's not a question I wrestlewith.
It's not something I have towrestle with, because I know
that, whether he was or wasn't,the meaning of this story is so
intense and it's so deep andit's so.
It's the, it's the story thatkeeps on giving, and every time
you read it you get somethingmore out of it.
So it's 100.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
Why don't we talk more about it?
Yeah, so for me, I will tellyou that uh, job is not the most
righteous person that they playhim out to be.
Now, I know he's righteous.
I know that he does things as apriest would at the time,
without Levitical laws.
So he does make sacrifices forhis kids, he does make
sacrifices for his friends.
(05:14):
He is living a life that is asrighteous as he can be.
But I think that we're lookingat is this is somebody who,
theologically, is doingeverything right For sure.
I don't think the relationshippart is what he has with God.
In the beginning it definitelybuilds through the story, but I
think, if you look at the reallybeginning parts of the story,
(05:38):
he's somebody who makesreferences to God in a way where
he's very far away.
Even the Lord took and gaveaway I mean, the Lord gave and
took away Even a statement likethat.
It's not a personalrelationship, it's just no, the
God can do what he wants.
He can give you, he can take itaway.
Then he says something alongthe lines in Job 3.11.
Why did I not persist at birth,he's saying, why am I even here
(06:02):
?
He does not have thisrelationship with with god job 9
, 11, 12, um this is when hepasses me, I cannot see him.
Yeah, um, and a lot of peoplelook at it and they go well,
these are laments of somebodywho is tortured, or, if you look
at it, he is not speaking togod.
He's speaking about god almostthe entire book of Job, right up
(06:24):
until the end when he kind ofloses it.
And this is part where I go.
Was he righteous theologically?
Yes, and I look at people todayand I go hey, theologically,
man, they know a lot of theBible.
Yeah, does that mean they havea relationship with God?
Not necessarily.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
You know?
So this is the first point thatreally caught me, and so let's
spend a little time on thisright.
Like, is he righteous?
Yeah, yeah.
To an extent right, like therelationship he doesn't have.
We get that, but is herighteous?
Yes, and ultimately, that'swhat he is able to hold on to
throughout the story.
No matter how much he complains, no matter how much he whines,
(07:00):
no matter how much he laments,no matter how much he cries, no
matter how much he's angry.
He knows God to be just andrighteous and because of that,
he is able to hold on to thetrust in God, based on his
knowledge that he's been doingwhat he should have been doing.
(07:21):
And I found this interestingbecause, look, there are
multiple sides to a relationshipwith God, but one of them is
that you know, if God is tellingyou to do these things, you
need to, whether you understandthem or not, whether you agree
with them or not, whether you,whether you even know what the
outcome is going to be.
(07:42):
It's submission, it's aboutsubmission, and, and he did
submit.
And now he's at the point isgoing to be it's submission,
it's about submission, and, andhe did submit.
And now he's at the point wherehe's quite he might be
questioning that submission.
He might be curious if that wasthe right way to go.
I don't.
He never actually says he's.
You know he, he wishes he didthings differently.
He just says like I did allthese things, I, and now you're,
now you're betraying me, youknow, and so, but he, he never
(08:05):
curses God, he just he's, hedoesn't understand it.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
See, for me I would disagree, david.
I think for me he is righteous.
The word says he is righteous.
There's a reason why we evenreading this they say blameless.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
The word blameless is used.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Blameless, right or right.
The reason why we're readingthis is because de santan, you
know, said hey, he is, he isrighteous, he is good, he is
blameless because he you've beengiven, you've given him all
this life, right, you've givenhim the wealth, you've given him
everything.
So if we take that away, let'ssee if he continues to be
(08:40):
blameless right, right.
And then to me he is blameless.
To me he is, and then to me heis blameless.
To me he is righteous.
He does have a relationshipwith God because he does make
these sacrifices.
And when it does, this stuffstarts happening to him, which
is where we see that after whatthe verses that you were talking
about?
This is after something happensto you, something happens to
you like this, the first thingyou're going to do is you
(09:00):
probably freak out.
You probably start cursing God.
Right, but he didn't curse God.
He's asking these questionswhat did you leave me?
What's going on?
Right, he seek God first duringthis trouble.
That's how I feel.
I don't.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
I don't believe he did see what happens, even the
first sacrifices he makes.
He's saying I'm makingsacrifices for my kids in the
event that maybe they didsomething against God.
Yeah, he's not talking to thekids, he's not figuring out what
they're doing, he's not havingthat conversation with him.
He's going I'm just doing thisas a tradition, I'm just going
to do burnt offerings justbecause you might have, you
might not have, but I'm going todo it.
(09:32):
That's not relational.
No, it blah, he didn't.
What he starts saying is well,if God can give it, he can take
it away, and this and that.
And he's talking still aboutGod very, very distant, even
(09:52):
after all these things happen.
Only after his friends, hiswife and everybody tells him
that he should curse God, doeshe finally get to the point
where he's screaming out now toGod and then has this amazing
interaction with God.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Yeah, um, this conflict with God he's not wrong
for saying he, he's absolutelyright, he's wrong yeah.
God can't give it and take itaway.
I'm not saying he's wrong, I'msaying.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
what he's saying is all the right things that have
nothing to do with relationship.
So here's the thing I I.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
You're both right, and this is the point of the
story.
This is the point, right Likeright.
This is the point of the storythat Job has everything.
God has given him those things.
He has been righteous, he hasbeen faithful.
Let's remember thatfaithfulness doesn't necessarily
mean agreement, as you've saidbefore.
It means obedience, right.
(10:43):
And so he's been obedient, he'sdone those things and now he's
having a crisis, right, a crisisof in his life.
God is not opaque, god istransparent.
So he doesn't get to talk togod.
In the beginning, god didn'tcome down and go hey, job, some
stuff's gonna happen.
Need you to work through this?
Yeah, you know he doesn't getthat because, guess what?
None of us do.
None of us get that.
We all are living our high life, we're dealing with everything
(11:06):
well, everything's going well,and then, all of a sudden,
something.
The bottom falls out.
God doesn't come to us beforeand say I just want to let you
know some bad stuff's coming.
You better get ready.
So the story is is one that isthe most related, one of the
most relatable in the Bible.
I mean it's, for me it's one ofthe most relatable.
I mean it's yeah.
I mean I mean, look, he's goingthrough everything good,
everything's being well.
He's, he's faithful, he's doingwell, everything's going good.
(11:28):
And then the bottom drops out.
Hopefully my bottom neverdropped out the way jobes does
but you get the point, that'sextremism to get the idea and
then what does he?
Speaker 3 (11:37):
do?
I mean?
What happens to him is extremeright.
It's like really exactly yeahso what?
Speaker 2 (11:41):
what would we all do in that situation?
We're not going to goimmediately.
Go pray and go, god.
I know this is for yourwellbeing.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
Like no, we're going to go why am I alive?
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Why did you, why have you let me live so good, to
fall so?
Speaker 3 (11:57):
hard, right, why he's questioning?
David questioned the same thing, david King, david King David
questioned the same thing right,when things were going wrong,
when things were going bad.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
He's like where are you, where are you?
God?
Like what was going on.
He's having a conversation withGod Again.
I'm not.
Speaker 3 (12:09):
Right, right, well it starts.
I mean, relationship startswith conversation For me to go.
So, for instance, something wasto happen to me in my life.
You know the first person Iwant to hear from her.
Speaker 1 (12:29):
I want her to counsel me.
I want her to comfort me andthat's the conversation that
I'm-.
And if your wife is taken fromyou, God forbid if your wife is
taken from you and all yourriches are taken from you, and
your house is taken from you andeverything that, and you're
still going.
Well, you know this God.
He's doing this and he's doingthat and he can do it and it's
again.
It's this separation of not myGod.
Why are you doing this, the wayDavid calls out?
Speaker 3 (12:46):
I'll be honest for me when things go wrong or
whatever it is.
That's something that doescomfort me in some ways, Meaning
I try to take myself out of thesituation and go.
I have no control over this andI have to trust God.
To me, that's faith.
Right, I'm trusting God,whatever happened there, even
though it feels horrible that hehas it under control, or I will
(13:10):
spiral out of control and go.
Oh my god, you know this iskilling me.
God, where are you?
And I probably will curse godbut again this is I would.
That's that helps me to takemyself out and go.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
God, you got this this is the story, though, like
the story is not a story of howyou should act.
It's about how we really do actand how we should be acting.
Yeah, because the story startswith him cursing he again.
He's not cursing God, but he'scursing himself.
He's cursing his life and hisexistence at all.
Speaker 3 (13:36):
Right.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Which is something that we all understand, whether
it's the right thing to do ornot.
And you're right, david, that'sgoing on in his life and he
feels sorry for himself and hegoes straight to the bottom of
that hole, which is somethingwe've all done.
And then he goes to his friendsand then he lets his friends
counsel him and his friendsagain, his friends aren't God.
(13:59):
This is the story.
It's first go to yourself, thengo to your friends.
Your friends don't know, and Ilove this, like inner turmoil
and external turmoil.
That happens to the entire book.
It's me first, and then you'retalking to me and then I'm
telling you you're wrong.
Yeah, and they are wrong a lotof times.
Honestly.
I mean, that's the thing that'sinteresting about those you
(14:24):
know guys that come is they'realso wrong, because we know from
the beginning that that's notwhy this happened.
His friends continue if youhaven't read the book his
friends continue to in some wayinsinuate that he has done sin,
that he is blamed, he is atblame.
Yeah, what I hear, yeah, goahead.
And at the end of the story isthe more he fights and fights,
and fights.
Then this new guy, Elihu, comesin, the younger guy in the
crowd and he tries to lay somethoughts on top of it which,
(14:46):
again, are not entirely right,but they have a little bit more
sense and they do sharpen thatvision of what they're trying to
say.
At the end is the first time.
Actually, right in the middlesorry, right in the middle Job
tries to bargain with God.
Again, who hasn't tried tobargain with God in the middle?
It's like, if I can't hear you,if I can't see you, if you're
not answering me, take me tocourt.
(15:09):
Let me prove my case Again.
That's not the way God works.
But he keeps doing that.
It's not until the very endwhen he submits.
It's not until the very endwhen he submits and he calls out
to God and he asks God forGod's will to be done, that it
gets fixed.
So again, I'm not saying he'sright or wrong, I just want to
go through this process of like.
That's why I love this book.
To me, the book if I could zoomout
Speaker 3 (15:31):
and just kind of like per his eye view.
And I'm thinking about thisbecause you're saying this.
It's a question we all haveright.
When bad things happen, whenthings go wrong, whose fault is
that?
Is it mine for doing it?
Is it mine for thinking aboutit?
Is it mine for doing it?
Is it mine for thinking aboutit?
Is it mine for not taking careof it?
Was it god?
And you know, is it?
But then, wait, is god wrong?
(15:51):
Is he this, this, this?
You know, little boy on ananthill, you know, kind of yeah,
you know is he this evil god?
and we did an episode on thatabout.
Is god evil, right, or is hejust right?
Is he a just god?
And this is what just happensin the world and I think we see
that play out through severalbooks.
I think Ecclesiastes talksabout a little bit about this
and things being worthless rightor meaningless right, and we
(16:16):
see that throughout Job.
Right, Just kind of figure out,is God this just God?
That's what his friends aresaying.
Right, he's just God.
So it must have been you.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Job that did something wrong.
It's what does justice mean?
Speaker 3 (16:25):
at some point, right, that becomes the central
question, which is funny too,because right there also, it
seems like this courtroom rightWith Satan, so it's like it's
God is judged on, you know, onthis hill, and just kind of like
judging everybody, whatever'sin this court, sorry.
And as we play out throughoutthe end, god speaks to Job and
he talks about that and goeswere you there in the beginning?
(16:46):
Were you here?
Whatever it is, these thingshappen because they happen, but
I still am just.
I still am this God, and I seethat I'm paraphrasing.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
But I also.
You know there's so manydifferent layers and I think
this is why probably Jason, yousaid that when you look at the
friends and you, you know again.
We quickly curse the friendsand go.
They're so wrong for blaminghim.
You're going to do all thesethings, but what you also don't
read in the story is Jobactually does this to other
people that come to him whenthey're suffering.
He says this and they go youdon't understand what.
(17:15):
I'm going through, becauseyou've never gone through this
type of stuff and you start tosee that people usually have
like-minded people around them,and so when you hear their
opinions, this is alsoreflecting the opinion of Job,
and he needs to now go throughall this to have a different
opinion, and that's why I saidthe relationship part is what he
starts to build with God going.
You know what?
(17:35):
I haven't been throughsomething like this.
I am going through this rightnow.
I do hear what my advice usedto be, how worthless it is
because it's not helping.
I mean, man, there's so manylayers to unpack here.
Speaker 2 (17:47):
Look how important it is, then, under that statement,
that the whole book begins withGod and Satan having a
discussion.
Why is that important?
Because, from the verybeginning, they lay it out very
clearly that none of what isabout to happen is happening
because of blame.
Right, none of it.
None of what's going to happenis because of blame.
None of what's going to happenis because of blame.
None of what's going to happenis because of fault.
(18:07):
None of what is going to happenis because of divine
retribution.
What's going to happen isbecause it's going to happen
Because chaos exists in theuniverse.
Why is it going to happen?
Because justness doesn't meanrightness Sorry, let me say it
differently Justice doesn't meanhappiness.
Because action doesn't alwaysreflect reaction.
(18:30):
Reaction or reaction doesn'talways reflect action, because
that's just the way our worldworks.
We talked about that in ourother episode.
The reality is that the world isthe world and it's going to
move the way it moves and it'sgoing to happen the way it
happens, whether that's Godmaking it happen or the devil
making it happen, or just thefact that God created an earth
that moves, shifts, shakeschanges.
And we live in that world thatmoves, shifts, shakes changes.
We're going to have to dealwith the consequences of the
(18:52):
earth being the earth, and so Ilove the fact.
Again, I'm going to go back tothe very, very beginning.
That sets the story up.
With this context, everythingyou are about to read is just
the way the world works, and howyou react is going to be how
you, how you process it right,how you navigate it, how you
process it.
(19:12):
So everything else from there isthen, which is why I love that
Job starts up by doing what weall do.
God, you hate me, right?
Why did you do this to me?
And immediately, you know hedidn't.
So look, look what the humandid.
The human went and made itabout themselves.
The human immediately made itabout themselves.
What did I do?
I tried so hard I did, I wasn'table to make it happen.
You don't like me.
(19:33):
I don't understand you.
And yet, not only is it true,but it's also something again,
we all know when have you not,when have you wanted you don't
send an email to God and hesends you an answer back.
That's just not the way thatworks, and this is a story of
(19:55):
that.
This is a story of how tonavigate your life with faith.
With faith despite the factthat you feel like the whole
universe is falling apart.
Speaker 3 (20:04):
And I hear you on that and I think, and I think I
get that from the story, butsometimes it's tough.
I'm speaking for maybe forgenerally.
I'm speaking for other peoplehere, including myself.
It's when you see the scripturesays God is speaking to say and
he goes, go ahead.
You do that.
And it's just like is that theway he's orchestrating things?
(20:26):
He's just testing us out, kindof thing.
And it's just tough to hearthat, it's tough to read, that,
I think, and I I just want tothrow out there I mean not not
to go into a big discussion-it's very tough.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
I have something to tell you.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Yeah, I mean yeah let's go through that, because
that's an important part.
Anybody who's written, who'sread this story kind of goes.
Why would God allow that?
Why would he entertain this?
Right, and what you don'trealize is that even in this
moment, when, yes, the world ischaos and he's just allowing
chaos to happen, god is stillbeing protective.
(20:58):
So when you point at God and go, god, why would you do this?
You go wait a minute, let'slook what God also did.
He said first you will not dothis to him, don't harm him, you
can't do this.
But then, on top of that,something that that a finer
point is.
And and this is I'm just goingto compare it with if there is a
, a company that has to do amass firing, okay, and they fire
(21:19):
somebody, two people every weekfor the next two years, what
happens?
Everybody works anxious.
When's it going to be my turnand my I next week, am I next
week?
And it builds, and it buildsand it becomes the most
miserable place in the world.
But if they do all of thefirings on one day and then it's
done and you're still there,what happens?
The anxiety comes down and yougo whew, I survived that, right,
(21:40):
and you can actually breatheagain.
Speaker 3 (21:43):
If you notice, god has all of these horrible things
happening the same day he did,he did all at once, so it is and
we look at it and go this is sobrutal for Job.
Speaker 1 (21:52):
No, no, what he's doing is protecting him going.
I'm going to have all thishappen on one day.
Here, you lost everything.
Deal with it.
How are you going to deal withit?
Are you going to deal with itfaithfully?
Versus let me pluck somethingfrom you every single day or
every single week and drive youmentally insane from it.
Yeah, even that showsprotection that God's using on
him that we don't even thinkabout.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
I never thought about that, yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
Never thought about that.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
Yeah, it's a.
It's a little bit of humanityright or not.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
Humanity, uh, it's humane.
It's a more humane way to doliterality on it, because I
think it's too complicated tounderstand.
But I think what the God andthe devil talk, or God and Satan
speaking to one another, is forme in my taking a step back and
(22:39):
trying to just process themeaning of it, is… trying to
like mythologically form what itmeans to say life happened,
life happened.
You know bad stuff is going tohappen and you're not always
going to understand it, and andagain.
I think that's what this storyis about.
It's not.
It's not about understanding.
Another thing I want to bring up, though, is you know we give
(23:00):
Job all this.
You know hard time for all ofhis whining and complaining and
upsetness, but there are somereally beautiful lines in this
where you can tell he loves God.
I mean, one of them is Job 14,13.
If only you would hide me inSheol and conceal me until your
anger passes.
If only you would appoint at atime for me and then remember me
(23:20):
when a person dies, will hecome back to life?
If so, I would wait all thedays of my struggle until my
relief comes.
You would call and I willanswer you.
You will long for the hard workof your hands, for then you
would count my steps but wouldnot take note of my sin.
My rebellion would be sealed upin a bag and you would cover
over my iniquity.
(23:41):
I just love that he's alreadyseeing into the future of being
in heaven and what it would belike, and that he just wants to
walk beside God and be with Godand be connected to God.
He's, he's begging and this isright in the middle of the third
of the way through the book.
He's already begging for thatrelationship that you've been
talking about, and I think it'sjust such a beautiful line to
talk about that again.
He's, he's.
He's so human, he's so human,he's struggling, he's fighting,
he's fussing.
(24:02):
But in between all those lines,there's always these little
like nuggets that you're likeman.
In between all those lines,there's always these little like
nuggets that you're like man.
That's a guy who loved God,like that's a guy who loved him.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
There is, uh, you know this is actually written in
a format of Jewish poetry Uh,and, and I know we didn't
mention that, but there arequite a few scholars,
non-biblical scholars that feellike this work, this, this poem,
is the absolute best everwritten ever in the history of
time, and these are people whodon't believe in the bible, who
(24:31):
just look at the, the incrediblelanguage like we just read,
yeah, and it's just filled withvisuals and emotion and
everything you want out of.
Speaker 2 (24:39):
it's so rich and it is literally every line of job,
of the, of the discussion, partof the jobs.
I mean it's a beautiful book.
I mean, if you appreciate, youknow, you know, uh, you know
noir type topics, it's perfect,cause he's so dark, like there's
some like really deep hyperboleand like really intense
metaphor, like it's a.
(24:59):
It's a really beautiful booktoo, but, um, I guess I I'll
tell you.
There's two other things that Iwant to talk about, but one of
them is that I really think thatit's important to note.
This is about justice, you know.
I mean, it's like what doesdivine justice mean?
Divine justice isn't what weconceive of, it's what God
(25:20):
conceives of, and it's saidthroughout the book.
You know, does my righteousnessmean anything to you?
Does me being good or bad doanything for God?
Does it matter at all?
And it's not until the very endof the book that he says you
know what?
I just don't know?
And God says again.
God says to him were you there?
Were you there in the beginning?
(25:41):
It's the understanding.
It's that separation of Godversus human.
We are so finite and so smalland he is so big.
We can sit here and whine allwe want, but we're just not
going to understand it.
We just have to trust.
That is what faith is.
Keep moving forward, believingthat God knows better than we do
which he does.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
Yeah, yeah, I agree.
I think there's, as we see, youknow, through time is that God
loves us, right, and he wants arelationship with us.
But what we do is not reallyfor him, it's for us, for us to
shape us in that way.
And they, you know, in Job 35,six through eight, elihu says if
(26:22):
you sin, how does that affectthem?
If your sins are many, whatdoes that do to him?
If you're righteous, what doesthat have to do with him?
Or what does this does hereceive from your hand?
Your wickedness only affectshumans like yourself and your
righteousness only other people,and I think that's holds true.
Uh, when we look at it, when Ilook at, god is just really
(26:43):
trying to shape us.
Prayer is one of those things.
Right, prayer is not as much asfor me I mean for God as it is
for me.
It shows a humility, it shows areverence to God.
When we do those things and Godis going to continue to be God
he's not affected in any kind ofway.
He's hurt.
Sure, he loves us.
He wants us to not sin and notdo certain things, but really
(27:09):
what he wants from us is to begood and do good to others.
There's this relationship, partof humans on humans, like
really paying attention to yourhuman being, attention to your
neighbor, to your family, toother humans, and be good to
them, to learn how to lift themup and be good to them.
You know what I'm saying.
So that's what I always getthroughout the Bible and I love
that about God because I findthat true in my life.
I'm more happy in my life whenI have good humans around me and
(27:33):
that that I love and thatreally lifts me up and I want to
lift them up.
Speaker 2 (27:36):
I love what you said about prayer is not for God,
it's for us.
Speaker 3 (27:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Right.
I think that's such animportant majority of this book,
because he doesn't do one verysimple thing he doesn't reach
out to God.
He doesn't reach out to God andhe follows his own instinct.
He follows his own flesh.
(27:59):
He feels sorry for his ownexistence, instead of doing what
we all need to do in thatmoment, which is to submit, to
acknowledge that there is apower in this universe that is
far greater than us.
That it's not for ourunderstanding, it is for our
benefit, and I think that's whatprayer does for us.
(28:22):
Prayer reminds us that there'sinner dialogue and there's
prayer.
Right, they both happen insideyour head, but one of them is me
talking to me.
The other one's me talking toGod, and when I talk to me, that
ain't good.
There's a lot of bad, in fact.
That's that's whenconversations spiral, because me
talking to me is like awhirlwind of it's, like a
(28:42):
Tasmanian devil that's justdriving itself straight to the
pit of hell.
When I talk to God, I shootstraight up in the sky.
And this is it right.
Speaker 3 (28:53):
It's the well of wisdom, right it's the well of
wisdom.
Your well of wisdom is shallow,right, no offense to you, but
for us humans it's shallow, butGod's well.
I'm offended, but yes.
Speaker 1 (29:04):
No, I love you.
You know, one of the thingsthat humans in general do, love
is struggle.
It's one of the reasons whythis book is so great to read.
We love struggle, and anybodywho says no, no, I want
everything to be smooth, I'mgoing.
You know, let's you're the onewho's also rubbernecking where
there's an accident, right,right, we enjoy struggle, and
what's happening through thisbook is there's this incredible,
beautiful, poetic strugglethat's happening.
(29:26):
it's a struggle that that startswith Satan and God and it ends
with Job and his faith.
But when you look at the verylast verse verses, if you look
at the very last chapter, sochapter 42, this is when Job
finally gets it and this is whatI said, where the relationship
part finally clicks in and hesays he says Job answers the
(29:47):
Lord and said I know that youcan do all things and that no
purpose of yours can be thwarted.
And he goes on and on, and hegoes hear and I will speak, I
will question you and I willmake it known to me.
I had heard you, but by hearingof the ear, but now my eyes see
you.
Therefore, I despise myself andI repent in dust and ashes.
Love it.
He is basically just coming outand saying I get it, I.
(30:09):
I.
I thought I was with you and Irealized that I was not.
I was trying to understandeverything you do.
I can't.
I can't understand the divinejustice.
I can't.
I know that what your plans areare your plans, and all I can
do is just pray to you, have arelationship with you and
apologize, repent for my mistake, which is I did turn on you.
Listen, there was a point wherehe did turn on God by
(30:32):
questioning him.
Speaker 2 (30:33):
Yeah, Guys, I have a weird thought.
So we started this whole thingout by saying why would God
allow this to happen?
Yeah, right, yeah, look at whathappens at the end.
Yeah, it's better for Job.
Job learns.
Job has spent his whole lifebeing what he thought was close
to God, but he wasn't close toGod, god loves me because he
blessed me.
Speaker 3 (30:51):
Look what I have.
He thought he loved him forthose reasons.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
The devil comes along and goes.
He's not going to love youafter this.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
And why did God say, yes, that's the question we
asked earlier why did God sayyes?
Speaker 2 (31:06):
Because he knew at the end Job was going to be
better off.
Yeah, oh, okay, whoa dude, thatlike freaked me out.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
That's crazy.
Speaker 2 (31:10):
Because that's what this whole, again the story is
so rich and robust.
So when the question of why,guys, I literally have chills
Like why would God let someterrible things happen like that
, it's because he knew it wasgoing to work out for his
betterment.
And so now Job not only has asuperficial relationship with
him, with with god through thetradition, he now has a real
(31:32):
relationship with him throughpersonal.
Speaker 1 (31:34):
Yeah, and man, that's intense, yeah and then is
restored back to exactly.
Speaker 2 (31:40):
So now that he has back.
I mean to be fair.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
He didn't get his family back no, he well, he got
a, he got another family backthat he's he's happy with um
which?
Is crazy but yes, he does he,he has this, he at the end gets
a personal relationship, getshis things quote unquote back,
um, he is restored.
He is restored but only afterhaving to go through it, which
is the other thing.
Speaker 2 (32:03):
I was having that relationship, man this one's
gonna hit me hard for a while,because that's I mean, I've
never considered that that's.
Everybody's always asked thequestion why would God allow
that to happen?
Right, because it ends up inhis favor.
That's why, and what?
And so what does that part ofthe story tell you alone?
That part of the story tellsyou suffering breeds growth.
You know, tragedy breedssharpening.
Speaker 3 (32:30):
If reads sharpening, if you allow it to, if you turn
to God.
Yeah, I think about I've heardof like the way they make metal,
or the way you kind of likeSilver yeah, silver right it has
to go through the furnace.
It has to go through this likeshaping process.
Speaker 2 (32:36):
Well Job even says in fact Job, I think it's.
Job 23,.
Says something like I will gothrough your trials and I will
come out as gold.
You know, so even that part ofthe story, it's a reminder for
anybody out there who's goingthrough something.
You may be angry at God, youmay be questioning God, you may
not understand why this ishappening to you, but if you
(32:57):
turn your trust to God, if youturn your connection to God and
you're personally related to God, he's going to use it for good.
Speaker 3 (33:04):
Is that?
Speaker 2 (33:05):
Roman 28?
Speaker 3 (33:05):
And I can say this Satan puts those lies in our, in
us.
Right, he wants us to go.
Hey, you're not going to loveGod after this happens to you.
Hey, how can you love God afterthat happened to your son?
You shouldn't love him and theyyou know.
And just to really try to psychus out, and we have to even
further, when these thingshappen, not trying to understand
(33:27):
it, we can't leave in our, wecannot lean in our own
understanding, and Proverbs says, but lean on God's
understanding and through thatwe'll find peace, we'll find
hope, and he helped us throughit.
We know the things that happen.
Tragic happens to us all thetime and we want to just you
know, we want to fight againstthe things that happen.
You know the people that do itto us and we must understand
(33:48):
that.
Maybe it's a shaping process.
Maybe we'll come out betterthan that and get another family
and get more stock.
Speaker 2 (33:56):
Get more livestock.
Get more livestock.
Speaker 3 (33:58):
Yeah, I could use some.
No, nowadays stocks yeah, Icould use some.
You're getting talk of realstock.
I want real stock.
Speaker 2 (34:03):
I want live stocks, yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:05):
The other little thing I'm just going to end on
this with, with kind of what,where my brain goes in this book
is um, you know, we always lookat pastors and priests uh, to
to intercede for us.
Even even when we know, hey, Ihave this relation with God, we
still go over to a pastor and go, hey, can you pray for in that,
and it definitely hasimportance.
(34:25):
But I always look at this, I godon't forget that you can also
pray for others in your circle.
And at the very end, god is madat his friends and says I'm
only accepting you by the prayerof Job.
So Job prays for them, praysfor them, yeah, and God accepts
it for his prayer, not theirs.
They could have gone.
He was like, no, I'm going toaccept it because job is praying
(34:47):
for you.
And I look at that, I go.
You know, it's a reminder thatwe should all pray for each
other as well.
There's a time where don't wait, don't, don't just pray for
yourself, pray for others aswell.
Yeah, go to your friends, learnwhat's going on, have a
relationship with them as well.
But you were talking about javi, the person on a personal
relationship, and, and you don'trealize the importance of that
until you go.
God only accepted theforgiveness because somebody
(35:09):
else prayed for it.
I'm going, man, I want tosurround myself with everybody.
Speaker 3 (35:14):
I'm going to pray for everybody.
There's something that happensthere too.
When you pray for other people,there's something that shapes
you.
I think I heard recently on adifferent podcast and the guy
said there's something aboutgiving a gift rather than
receiving it right.
Like when you give a nice giftthat you know someone is really
going to love or they do love it, that does something to you for
(35:36):
doing it.
And when you pray for someoneand you hope in the best for
them, or you hope that Godintercedes for them in their
life the way God has, maybe inyou there's something that
shapes you as a human, as yourlife or maybe a relationship
with that person is somethingthat you get out of it.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
Um and I'm not saying you do it to get something out
of it, but there's somethingthat's rewarding yeah, not to be
, uh, mr negative, but the otherthing to pay attention to here
is that he surrounded himself bypeople who were wrong.
And you know, true, it's animportant note that you got to
be careful who you surroundyourself with, because if you're
surrounding yourself with thewrong people, they're going to
(36:11):
condemn you when things go bad.
Speaker 1 (36:13):
Or, and I love to flip it, what if you're that
negative person?
What if you're the negativeperson?
Somebody surrounded themselveswith you.
A hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
And at this case and I'll leave my discussion of Job
at an end here, but you know, Ithink the thing is the friends
were wrong and the thing that Ireally respected about Job on
this last reading is that Jobwas confident in his own faith.
Like he had problems, he hadissues, but he never gave up.
Nope, he never.
(36:40):
You know what's worse thantalking badly to God, not
talking to God at all?
Yeah, that's the challenge,right, and he never did that.
He might have been cursing him.
Speaker 3 (36:48):
He might have been angry with him.
Well, he, he might have beencursing him.
He might have been angry withhim, he didn't curse him.
Speaker 2 (36:51):
You know he might have been angry with him, right
right, he might have been, uh,you know, deeply upset with what
he was saying to him, but henever stopped talking to him.
He never said you know what,screw these rules.
Yeah, I'm gonna go do what Iwant now.
If you're gonna, if you'regonna, mess with me, no matter
what, I'm just gonna go do me.
But and this is what humanstoday do, this is what everybody
does today Like, if you're notgoing to give me what I want,
(37:12):
I'm out of here.
And he didn't ever do that andI really respected that.
This read around.
Speaker 3 (37:17):
If we don't build our foundation of God and really
build that and relationship withhim, we could easily be, you
know, led astray Totally,totally, and that's what Satan
does.
He wants to put these lies andthen go back to what I said
before and I don't want torepeat it, but there is that
that happens and I think youbrought a good point.
It's true, he has a foundationwithin God, he knows God is good
(37:41):
, he knows God has blessed himand his friends are going no,
you did something wrong, youshould.
What are you doing?
And he's like no, no, no, Iknow my god, yeah, I know my god
, and he's just there'ssomething more he's gotta
understand my god, right, yeah,yeah.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
Yeah, I don't understand it right now, but I
know him right, yeah, yeah andit's, it's something beautiful,
like you said, jason, yeah, Ithought that was cool and and to
not forget that, you know, weread a story and obviously the
story is filled with drama, yeah, and it's filled with negative
circumstances and things likethat.
And it's easy to look at it andgo, yeah, that's what's
(38:15):
happened to me or that's whatI've gone through, or whatever
it is.
And you start to feel that Joblived 140 years is what it says
in Job.
He lived 140 years.
And you start to go, well, howlong did this last?
Because all of these tragedies,things, and honestly you go you
lived 140 years.
You had this wonderful life upuntil that point.
(38:37):
You lost it and then god didrestore it.
It might not have been the same.
There might have been some youknow some lasting effects from
from the first thing you lost,yeah, but you know, out of 140
years if you go.
I don't know how long thislasted, did it last a month, a
year, I don't know but out of140 years.
Sometimes we look at at God andwe curse him for the negative
that we're going through andwe're going, man, you know, I
know I've been around thosepeople.
I've been that person where I'mjust negative and negative, and
(38:58):
negative and negative, and thenone day I get annoyed with
myself.
I'm going what am I so negativeabout?
I have a lot to be thankful for.
That's good.
And I think out of 140 yearsyou go, man, there's a lot to be
thankful for and it could be.
Speaker 3 (39:09):
Whatever pain and affliction that you're going
through.
It could be temporary andthat's what it was right.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
I mean it always is, that's another small little key
message right, but I mean, it'salways temporary and God makes
sure God's timing and our timingnot the same To us.
That week that we're goingthrough it, that month we're
going through, that six monthswe're going through it is
forever.
For God it's a split second,right?
So, guys, this has been one ofthe most rousing discussions
(39:35):
we've had in a while.
Maybe we recap a little bit.
Look, job is a fascinatingstory.
It is.
That is potentially historical,but definitely so full of
meaning.
I would, I think we would allhighly suggest that everybody
sit down with this book, readthrough it, figure out where you
sit in it.
Where do you sit today?
(39:56):
Where have you sat in your past?
You know identify, you know.
Do you?
Do you identify with Job?
Do you feel like he did theright thing or did he go about
it all wrong?
You know there's so much inthis story.
There's there.
We'd love to talk to you aboutit.
Uh, if anybody has anything thatyou'd like to, you know, add to
this conversation, we have theuh boundless bible discussion
group.
Uh, you can email us.
(40:16):
Um, in our podcast actually,there's a text text message link
too.
You can text this uh withquestions.
So we'd love to hear thosequestions and keep these
conversations going, because jobis the book that keeps on
giving.
Yeah, um.
So what we do know is that Jobis very clear that if you follow
God, if you are faithful to God, god is not going to let you
(40:37):
down.
God is going to be by your side.
God is going to, and eventhough you don't understand
what's going on in your liferight now, god does, and when
you submit to his knowledge ofit, that temporary thing you're
going through is going to passand he's going to find a way to
use it for good.
Speaker 3 (40:54):
Yeah, I love it.
Speaker 2 (40:55):
So I hope this has at least shown somebody out there
that this is the case.
But again, if you need anybodyto talk to, you want anybody to
talk to, we're all available, solet us know.
Yeah, so, guys, we're wrappingright.
Thank you appreciate it, guys.
We'll see you on the socials,we'll see you in emails and we
look forward to talking to younext week.
Thanks a lot, see ya.
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