Reading

• Job 8:1-10:22

Devotional

When something happens to us, it is both natural and wise to question, “Why did this happen to me?” Often we can look at our own choices and identify that the reason we got where we are is because of a past decision—good or bad. That is called consequences. Our actions have consequences that we must live with. But there are other times when we see that something has happened to us, perhaps some trial, suffering or ridicule, and when we consider our past actions we conclude that we did nothing to bring that upon ourselves. Such is the case with Job.

In today’s reading one of Job’s three friends, Bildad, challenges Job that surely he must have sinned in some way to bring these sufferings upon himself. In Bildad’s thinking, for suffering to come upon a righteous person who hadn’t sinned seemed to be against the very character of GOD. In Job’s response to Bildad it is clear that Job has been thoroughly searching his own heart to see whether he is indeed somehow guilty and has justly brought this suffering upon his own head.

As Job considered the thought of taking his case up against GOD, he said:

³² “For [GOD] is not a man, as I am, That I may answer Him, And that we should go to court together. ³³ Nor is there any mediator between us, Who may lay his hand on us both. ³⁴ Let Him take His rod away from me, And do not let dread of Him terrify me. ³⁵ Then I would speak and not fear Him, But it is not so with me.
(Job 9:32-35 NKJV)

Job longed for someone who could defend him before GOD in a way better than he could himself. Because Job was a mere man and GOD is all-powerful and all-wise, there was no one Job could turn to in order to be in a better position to “argue” (as in debate) with GOD the fact that he had done nothing to deserve his suffering. Praise GOD that today you and I do have access to a Mediator—Jesus Christ.

Thousands of years after Job lived, the apostle Paul wrote:

⁵ For there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, ⁶ who gave Himself a ransom for all, to be testified in due time, ⁷ for which I was appointed a preacher and an apostle…
(1 Tim. 2:5-7 NKJV)

The writer of the Hebrew letter in the New Testament says:

¹¹ But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation. ¹² Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. ¹³ For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, ¹⁴ how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? ¹⁵ And for this reason He is the Mediator of the new covenant, by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.
(Heb. 9:11-15 NKJV)

What a tremendous blessing that we have today to know with full assurance that we have Jesus to plead our case against sin before GOD the Father so that we might not receive our due punishment, which He has now paid upon the cross! Rejoice in this!