Job [Jobe]

Every time I read through the Old Testament book of Job, it is an interesting experience. Sometimes I find the long arguments of Job's friends boring. Sometimes I see great foreshadowing of Jesus and the cross. Sometimes I realize that the notes I wrote in my margins are so wrong! Also, I don't know of any other book in the Bible where I read a discourse and ask myself, "Wait, which parts of these arguments are true? Is that really how God works? I think he's wrong about that!" I believe we can and should ask ourselves those questions when we read Job's so-called friends' rebukes because God eventually rebukes them for how they act and speak. Consider this statement by the young acquaintance, Elihu...

4 “I would like to reply to you
and to your friends with you.
5 Look up at the heavens and see;
gaze at the clouds so high above you.
6 If you sin, how does that affect him?
If your sins are many, what does that do to him?
7 If you are righteous, what do you give to him,
or what does he receive from your hand?
8 Your wickedness only affects humans like yourself,
and your righteousness only other people.

I think it is important that when we read this we can say, "No, Elihu, you are wrong. Our sin does not simply affect other men. God is not merely a God far-off in the heavens. God is an emotional and personal being. He created emotion. He cares about the little things. When we choose sin over God, he takes it personally. God tells the heavens to be shocked and appalled at the putrid audacity of men, the fact that we actually choose stuff over God. God takes that personally and grieves over individual sin. That is what compelled him to send his son to the cross. If our sins did not affect him to the core, he would never give up his only son whom he loves more than anyone or anything else."

Does anyone else have any interesting observations in trying to understand this book? I think it shares a valuable message from God that can help us to know how to respond to God when we go through suffering, because Job surely suffered more than anyone else I know, bar Jesus. He was practically a human scab with no possessions, no friends, and almost no hope!