The book of Job reveals everyone’s opinions about the reason for suffering and how God runs the world. Job has challenged that God has not treated him fairly. He does not think that God has not been right toward him because Job has been blameless and upright. Job’s friends have an opinion that Job must have sinned for all of this calamity to fall on him. Elihu has offered his speeches in which he disagrees with Job and with the three friends (cf. Job 32:1-5). Elihu defends God and challenges what Job has said about God. Elihu does not say that Job sinned and that is why he is suffering. Elihu says that Job’s words have been wrong about God. But there is one person we have not heard from in all of these discourses. We have not heard from God. We have not heard God speak since the first two chapters of the book when God and Satan were talking about the righteousness of Job. As Job and the three friends argued about how God runs the world, we did not know that Elihu was there, listening and then responding on God’s behalf. But even as all this was going on, they did not know that God was there, listening and about to respond on his own behalf. In Job 38 God himself will take the opportunity to speak. What I want us to think about for these final four chapters of the book is God’s message. What do you think God is going to say about suffering? What do you think God is going to say about how he runs the world? How do you think God is going to defend himself? How will God explain himself regarding what he has allowed Satan to do in this trial?
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