Study 2 – The book of Job by Neville Clark – Easter Camp, Waikerie 2017 – “The Companions of Job”

Study 2 – The book of Job by Neville Clark – Easter Camp, Waikerie 2017 – “The Companions of Job”

Reading Job Ch 4.

In our last study we established the background upon which we can now appreciate the story of Job. It began, as you will recall, when the sons of God came to present themselves before Yahweh. Amongst the brethren who came together that day there was a certain adversary of Job’s, a brother, but not a true brother, a cynical, bitter, envious protagonist, and as a result of the discussion that took place between him and that angel, Job is plunged into a level of suffering that few of us can understand, much less relate to. Well things, of course, go from bad to worse across the series of chapters 1 and 2 as we saw by the end of Ch 3 all that Job wants to do is die, and it seems from reading that chapter that it is very likely that he didn’t have long to wait until in fact death would be his end, but before that happens, three very dear friends made their way across the country to come and see him.

This begins the second major section now, of the book of Job, the debate between Job and his three friends. Eliphaz who is the first of Job’s friends to speak, in the first of the two chapters you have just read, here in Ch 4, he begins the debate, in Ch 4. Bildad who is last to speak concludes the debate in Ch 25. So for our purpose this section is 22 chapters long, the debate between Job and his friends, back and forth, round and round, as the four of them try to come to terms with the reason for Job’s sufferings.

Well, we actually met those friends, back in Ch 2 and v 11. It tells us there that when Job’s three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came every one from his own place, Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, Zophar the Naamathite, where they had made an appointment together to come to mourn with him and to comfort him. The Septuagint has a rather interesting translation of V 11 it calls Eliphaz the King of the Temanites, Bildad, the Sovereign of the Shoshaines, Zophah the king of the Namaines. Gen 36 and V 31 that chapter we considered about the sons of Esau, V 31 of Gen 36 tells us that there were kings in Edom long before there was a king in Israel. Well the land of Uz, of course, is in the region of Edom, and so it appears likely, certainly in the case of perhaps, Eliphaz and Zophar, that these were som of the Dukes of Edom, of Gen Ch 36. Be that as it may, these were men of some status, probably successful men, eloquent men enough as it appears, men of means, perhaps, not so dissimilar to Job himself. But they were brethren, by that I mean, they were serious Christadelphians, there is no question the Truth was the most important things in the lives of all three of them, they spent a lot of time thinking about the character of God and man’s relationship to him and even though they don’t get the right answers, in so far as Job’s situation is concerned, there can be no question about their sincerity.

There is another thing to appreciate here, this section of the book, and you’ve got to be aware of this, this section of the book, the debate between Job and his friends, is not an inspired debate, it is an inspired record of a debate. What I mean by that, the spirit records what those brethren say, not everything they say is doctrinally correct. What that means is, that if you are going to quote Job, in a public lecture so somewhere else, particularly if you are going to quote the friends, just be careful you’ve checked what you are quoting, because there is false doctrine in what they the friends say, though the Spirit has accurately recorded what they did say. Well as I say, no doubt, they were true brethren, and there is no doubt they were true friends, they travelled some distance to see Job, probably 100 miles each, or something like that. Now when I say they were friends I will show you what I mean, come to Ch 19, they were friends to Job when many other people weren’t. In Job Ch 19:13 this is what Job says of his friends. V 13, “God hath put my brethren far from me and mine acquaintance are verily estranged from me, my kinsfolk have failed, my familiar friends have forgotten me, they that dwelt in my house and my maids count me for a stranger, I am an alien in their sight. I called my servant, he gave me no answer, I intreated him with my mouth, my breath was strange to my wife, though I entreated for the children’s sake of my own body. Yea young children despised me, I arose and they spoke against me, all my inward friends abhorred me and they whom I love are turned against me.

You can take a coloured pencil between Vv 13 and 19, brethren, acquaintances, kinsfolk, friends, maids, servants, wife, young children, inward friends, everybody has deserted Job. At the end of the story, you know, in Ch 42:11 it tells us, “then came to Job all his brethren and sisters and all that had been of his acquaintance before,” This is his family, even his extended family has deserted him. But these three brethren in Ch 2, came in the midst of Job’s distress, and no-one else did, they came to help him, to mourn with him to comfort him in his troubles, no-one else did. He’s become an outcast, you see, estranged from society. It doesn’t worry them, they are not concerned at the stigma that now might have attached itself to Job, they were friends.

Here’s the question for you. Put yourself in the situation, would you have gone to visit a brother in Job’s situation? Of course you would, because you have got the Book of Job and you would look at, perhaps if this had happened to a brother or sister in our lives, you’d go and see them. Now let me give you the details. Job has lost his children, if they were married the in-laws have lost their children too. He’s lost his business empire, if the servants were brethren there are many families now without a husband and without a father and without an income. Imagine if this happened in one of our ecclesias. A family is dead, like Job’s family is dead, everyone associated with him in business is dead, their spouses are dead. Only Job and his wife are left, so you go to the funeral of Job’s children. How much more time would you now spend with Job. Are you going to go and see him now, because this has happened in your ecclesia. You might be supportive for the first month, but perhaps you are suffering too, perhaps you have lost a family member too and if you saw this in ecclesia life, would there be any part of you that might say, ‘He’s been punished by God?’ I mean how many things can happen to someone before you start asking the question.

Well, if you were to say that, then you would be believing the false doctrine that the friends believed, I’ll show you shortly. Well, think about this in an ecclesial context. If you were to believe that God punishes people immediately for things they do in their life, which is what the friends believed, then the only conclusion you could draw about Job’s circumstances, would be that the most prominent brother in the ecclesial world has just fallen, greatly fallen, he’s been punished by God, at which point, you’d be wanting to send an ecclesial representative to him. Many other brothers and sisters in the ecclesial world have become casualties because of this situation, there is a lot more at stake here than just the life of Job, you need answers for the ecclesial community, because everybody knew who Job was. That does change things, doesn’t it, about Job’s situation, and perhaps whether you might want to go and see him. If there were vacancies in Job’s businesses empire, now would you apply for a Job there? Now of course we would go and see him, but would we. Think a little while on the immediate circumstances of the story. But these three friends back in Chapter 2, they come and see Job. Hmm, changes everything doesn’t it? They come and see Job, and in V 13 it tells us that they sat down with him upon the ground for seven days and seven nights, none spake a word to him for they saw that his grief was very great. No need for conversation, it is far too early for any answers. They sit there with Job with tears in their eyes for a week, clothing rent, it says in V 12, dust on their heads and they wait, because of course until Job’s going to speak none of them will say a word.

But there is a problem, and it is this problem that I have mentioned, this doctrinal problem that we call “exact retribution.” “Exact Retribution” simply goes like this, that God rewards you immediately for the things you do in this life whether they are good or whether they are bad, so if you are blessed in this life, you must be spiritually going very well. If things are going downhill for you then you must spiritually going very bad because God is cursing. That’s as simple as it is, that’s what the friends believed, that righteous people were blessed and unrighteous people are cursed in an immediate sense by God in this life. So they had this doctrine of “Exact Retribution,” that’s what it is called, and simply they just said, “All suffering is a punishment for sin,” that’s what they believed. Job believed it too, by the way. Job was a great sufferer, no question there, therefore the conclusion is that Job is a great sinner, and they saw Job’s suffering, in fact, as a punishment for sin, now nobody knew what the sin was that Job had done.

The fact was he hadn’t done anything, well not a sin he was being punished for. The punishment, so called, or the affliction better called was as result of the conversation between Yahweh and Satan, nothing to do with Job’s form of life at all, but nobody knew that. So they drew what were in fact incorrect conclusions about what was happening to Job because of their doctrinal bias. Well, can you see, that if the friends believe this doctrine, and they think therefore that Job has got some secret sins that nobody knows about, and they can see what’s more that he is about to die, I mean he is so sick he must very shortly plunge into the grave, if they quickly don’t get Job to repent of this sin, to confess the sin, and repent of this sin that he presumably has done, then he will die and he won’t be in he kingdom of God, so these friends are going to take a pretty aggressive approach with Job, because they think that this an issue of salvation, you see? Now the doctrine of exact retribution might sound like a pretty unlikely doctrine, but in fact it is extremely common. In John 9:2 for example, the disciples came to Jesus and they said, “Master, this is the story of the blind man in John 9. “Who did sin, this man or his parents that he was born blind?” You see, so they think that the consequence in someone’s life are an immediate reaction to some sin that has been done to somebody. Jesus says, “No man has sinned, not this man nor his parents, but that the truth can be taught, that’s why he was born blind.” Or again, Luke 13:4, the Tower than fell upon those people and killed that 18. Jesus says, “Were they any greater sinners than all the rest in Galilee?” No they were not they were unlucky people who happened to be in the way of the tower.

So you see it is a very easy thing in life to see everything that happens to us as a blessing or a punishment from God, it is not just that simple. It is not just that simple. What had Job done to deserve the affliction that he was suffering? He was suffering for the sake of other people, which means, of course, that it may just be that the brother or the sister who is suffering amongst us the most, rather than being the least righteous person among us may be the most righteous person, and that if that degree of suffering were to come upon us, it may be that it would have destroyed us and therefore they are the one that bears it for the sake of others, for the example to others. You see the very opposite implication might be true from what the friends have drawn. Well Ch 3 tells us that after seven days, Job did speak. Ch 3:1. “After this Job opened his mouth and he cursed his day.” When it says “He cursed his day,” it means he cursed his very existence, he laments his birth in V 3, his infancy in V 12, his manhood in V 25, he just wants to die. Ch 3:20, “Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, and life unto the bitter in soul.” ‘What’s the point of living, he says, if it is only to suffer like this?’ You see, Job says this, because his conscience is clear, as far as sin is concerned, but he’s in affliction, and he can’t understand it, and it doesn’t seem fair. If you believe that suffering only comes as a punishment for sin, then the righteous shouldn’t suffer. God has already called Job a righteous man in Ch 1:1, so you can see the implication of Ch 3:20, Job believes the doctrine of exact retribution himself, he doesn’t think it is fair what’s happened.

In Ch 4, Eliphaz is the first one now to answer Job. Eliphaz name means “God is gold,” he’s the eldest of the three friends, probably 30 or 40 years older than Job because he was in fact the friend of Job’s father. It tells us that in Ch 15:10 and in that capacity he approaches Job with a certain degree of seniority. He was Eliphaz the Temanite, and historically the city of Teman was a university city, it was known for its wisdom. Many hundreds of years later when God brought judgment on Edom for persecuting Israel, he said in Jer 49:7, “Is wisdom no more in Teman. Is counsel perished from the prudent, is their wisdom vanished?” because destruction is coming to Teman, and Eliphaz is very, very conscious of his own wisdom. Look at V 8 Ch 4, “Even as I have seen,” V 12, “A thing was secretly brought to me.” Ch 5:3, “I have seen,” Ch 5:8 “I would seek unto God,” Ch 5:27, “Job we have searched it, so it is, hear it and know thou it is for thy good.” ‘I’ve seen a lot of life, Job, you ought to listen to what I say,” he’s pretty confident, Eliphaz, the most courteous, no doubt, of the three, the most polite and the most sympathetic, and that was Eliphaz, you see, a man of experience, a man of observation, a man wisdom, but he’s going to try and get a confession out of Job. He’s going to try to get Job to repent, the problem is, that Job’s not going to do that. Job’s going to deny any wrong-doing, and he’s going to reject the need for repentance.

So you can see straight away, that it is going to go like this they are not going to agree, and patience is going to wear thin, things are going to flare, but despite that by the time we get to the end of the debate and Eliphaz makes his third and final speech in Ch 22, when he frankly thinks that Job is an obstinate and blasphemous sinner, he moderates his language, he calms himself down, he pleads to Job to return to God and be healed. And here he is, remember he has been thinking about this problem for seven days and seven nights. V 1, Ch 4, “Then Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said, Job if we assay to commune with thee wilt thou be grieved?” Who can withhold himself from speaking. Job will you be offended if we speak. You see the friends are sympathetic to Job’s situation, they didn’t want to intrude without permission, you can see their dilemma, they think he is in imminent danger of losing the kingdom of God. ‘Look Job,’ he says, ‘We’ve got to talk,’ V 3, “behold thou hast instructed many and thou hast strengthened the weak hands, thy words have upholder him that was falling, and thou hast strengthened the feeble knees, but now it hast come upon thee, and thou faintest, it touches thee and thou art troubled.” ‘Job when other people suffered, you counselled them and you gave them advice, now you’re suffering Job, and you’ve gone to pieces. How come you can give advice but you can’t take it, how come you can’t even take your own advice Job. V 6, a most important verse, “Is not,” delete the italics, “Is not thy fear thy confidence, thy hope and the uprightness of thy ways?” Here is the New International Version, ‘Should not your piety be your confidence, and your blameless ways your hope? With your conduct, Job, what have you to worry about? Unless, of course, there’s something we don’t know?’

So you can see what he is angling at here. They think that suffering is a punishment for sin, they are wrong in that conception, but because they believe that, the only way they can see to save Job’s life, is to confess the sin and repent of the sin, if that doesn’t happen he will die in his sin. Now we’ve already asked the question, ‘Why doesn’t Satan appear at the end of the book of Job?’ We explained that, of course, with the example of Cain. Well, look at this, think about what you have just read here, V 3. ‘Job, you’ve been exemplary, V 4, Job, you were the example that everybody looked to, V 5, Job, you’re suffering, God’s touching you, you are not going too well, V 6, Job, you’ve been caught. What was the real motive behind your uprightness, Job, maybe, well, maybe because it paid you to live like that Job? And you see the very accusation Satan made against Job at the beginning is now picked up by the three friends. So really it doesn’t matter about the story of Cain in relation to the parallel with Satan, the friends are going to do all the debate that Satan would have done personally if he had been there, you see? They’ve latched onto exactly the same points. They knew Job was superior to them, just like Satan did, but now, everything could change, you see? So there is no need for Satan any more, every question Satan might have been going to ask the friends are going to ask. Every allegation Satan could have made, they will make. And in Ch 42, as we have said, God does take up an issue with these three friends. Well, V 7, “Remember I pray thee, Job, whoever perished being innocent, or where were the righteous cut off?”

Well there’s the first doctrinal error of Eliphaz. “Whoever perished being innocent?” Well, we could start with Abel and we could follow him with a long list of prophets. It is not true that the righteous never suffer, and the wicked only suffer, it is clearly not true. V 8, Here’s the wisdom of Eliphaz. “Even as I have seen, Job, they that plough iniquity and sow wickedness, reap the same.” ‘I don’t know Job, I’ve been around a long time and I’ve seen a lot of things happen to Brethren in my life, you are not the first one. I tell you this is how God deals with sin, the wicked are punished and are punished quickly. I don’t just rely on what I see in ecclesial life, Job, V 12. A thing, Job, a thing was secretly brought to me and my ear received a little bit of it. In thoughts from the visions of the night, when deep sleep falls upon men, fear came upon me, and trembling, which made all my bones shake, Job. Then a spirit passed before my face, the hair of my flesh stood up, it stood still and I couldn’t quite make it out, an image was before mine eyes. There was silence, then I heard a voice, Shall mortal man be more just than God?’ I mean what are we thinking, brothers and sisters? I mean, he’s a Pentecostal isn’t he? He’s having visions of spirits giving him revelations, here’s the second doctrinal problem with Eliphaz. Be careful when you quote Eliphaz. He’s lying in his bed at night, Whoosh, something runs across the room and his hair stands on end like this, and then a voice comes to him. We’ve got a fellowship problem with Eliphaz emerging. V 18, ‘Behold,’ the Revelation tells me, ‘God puts no trust in his servants and his angels he charges with folly.’ God doesn’t even trust the angels, doctrinal problem number 3, we are all over the map with this brother. ‘Men are like little moths,’ he says in V 19, ‘and God crushes them every day,’ V 20. This is not true, what he says. ‘And you want to know something about the wicked, Job? Ch 5:3, “I’ve seen the foolish taking root, but suddenly I cursed his habitation,’ he says. Read this carefully, “the foolish taketh root, his habitation is cursed. His children are far from safety and they are crushed in the gate, neither is there any to deliver them, whose harvest the hungry eateth up, and taketh it even out of the thorns and the robber swallowed up their substance.” This is what happens to the wicked, this is my observation in ecclesial life, Job, The wicked, well their household is cursed, that’s how it begins, and they lose their children, they lose their income and robbers come and swallow up their substance. Can you see yourself in that, Job? This is round one, this is the first speech, of three brethren who came as friends to Job. So what’s the answer? V 17, “Behold, happy is the man,” says Eliphaz, “whom God correcteth, therefore despise not the chastening of the almighty.” V 19, “He shall deliver thee in six troubles, yea in seven, shall no evil touch thee. In famine he shall redeem thee from death, in wars from the power of the sword. Thou shalt be hid from the scourge of the tongue, neither shalt thou be afraid of destruction when it comes.” ‘Repent Job, and all your blessings will return. That’s how God is. I ought to know’ he says in V 27, that’s my observation in life. Trust me, I know what I am talking about.’

So what has he said, he makes three simple points,
Number 1, No-one is righteous before God.
Number 2, Only the wicked suffer, with some very pointed examples.
Number 3, Repent and all your blessings will return.

That’s what Eliphaz says, that’s his speech. Well, you can imagine, Job’s pretty upset by this. Ch 6:5 “Dost the wild ass bray when he has grass, or loweth the ox when he has fodder?” Do you think I am complaining about nothing. You say, ‘happy is the man that God correcteth’ in Ch 5:17, ‘Eliphaz, even the wild animals complain when they suffer, is there no pity? Is there none at all?’ he says. Ch 6:24 “Teach me Eliphaz and I will hold my tongue, cause me to understand wherein I have erred. You tell me the sin that I am being punished for and I will listen to you. Thanks for coming. Well, of course, this now brings the next speech by Bildad in Ch 8. Bildad is a very different man to Eliphaz. Whereas Eliphaz based his wisdom on revelation or on experience, Bildad bases his wisdom upon tradition, upon what people have done before him. Ch 8:8, “For inquire ,” says Bildad, “I pray thee of the former age, and prepare thyself for the search of their fathers.” Job, we are young men, we are but of yesterday, we know nothing. Our days upon earth are a shadow but shall not they teach thee?” That is the fathers of V 8, “and shall they not tell thee and utter words out of their heart?” ‘Ah, Job, you’ve got do what our forefathers do, it’s always been done this way, Job. Brethren far wiser than you and me have wrestled with the deeper questions of life, Job. You don’t agree? Well who do you think you are, you are a boy?’ And here comes Bildad, you see. If Eliphaz focuses on the moral purity of God, Bildad focuses on his justice. Bildad means “Son of Contention,” and there is no softer side here. He’s got nothing of the dignity of the courtesy of Eliphaz, he’s a cold, unsympathetic, unemotional character. Never gets excited, never gets upset. For him Job’s just a number, he is a problem to be thought out and solved, that’s Bildad’s approach to life, and look at his solution, Ch 8:3. “Doth God pervert judgment,’ he says, “does the almighty pervert justice? If thy children have sinned against him and he has cast them away for their transgression.” ‘If your children are dead, Job, it must be because they’ve sinned. God never destroys the righteous, there’s only one answer here, Job. Try and rise above the emotion of losing your family Job, try and rejoice in the justice of God.” Instead of coming alongside Job and trying to identify, all Bildad’s advice is detached, its aloof. He never ever, really makes the truth personal, he talks forever in cliches, he’s a hard, tough customer. Let me show you, V 11 of Ch 8. “Can the rush grow up without mire, can the flag grow without water.” Now this is one of his analogies, now I mean, you have to learn a lesson from this, what’s the lesson? The lesson is, when the water dries up the ‘waterees,’ the plants that depend on water, are the first ones to die. V 13, “So are the paths of all those who forget God, and the hypocrites hope shall perish. “ What do you do with that? Well what he is simply saying is ‘When God judges man, the hypocrites are the first to go. Kiss your children goodbye. Or V 14, “The hope of the wicked is like a spider’s web, Job. It looks secure, but it is not, no matter how hard it tries” or V 16, ‘The green shoot leaps out of the earth, its roots go all through the garden, but when that green shoot dies, all those roots rot, there is no trace of that green shoot and the soil is occupied by other plants, as if that little plant never even existed.’

So people that God judges, he wipes their memory into oblivion. Cliches, you see, proverbs, I mean these are all word pictures, no depth in it. What’s he answer from Bildad? V 20, Ch 8, “Behold, God will not cast away a perfect man neither will he help te evil-doers. Repent and be blessed, Job, the same message as Eliphaz. What is he saying? Three simple points. 1) God is just, if your children are dead it is because they have sinned, God is just. 2) The wicked are always the first to be destroyed. 3) Repent and be blessed. Well what does Job say to that? Ch 9, Job’s answer, Ch 9 and V 21. Well, what does Job say to that? Ch 9, Job’s answer, Ch 9:21, “Though I were perfect,” he says, “yet would I not know my soul, I would despise my life.” That needs a little bit of help, translating. It really ought to be ‘I am perfect,” that is to say ‘blameless.’ ‘I have no regard for myself, I despise my own life, and therefore since that’s my situation, Bildad, I feel at liberty to say this,’ V 22, “This is one thing therefore I have said it, God destroys the perfect and the wicked.” ‘You say in Ch 8:20 that God doesn’t take away the perfect man. I say, Ch 9:22, he does so, and it is happening to me right now.’ Well, Job’s risen the stakes to the next level by that statement, because in comes Zophar in Ch 11, this is the return volley, and let me tell you, of the three friends, Zophar is the least engaging.

The name ‘Zophar’ means ‘impudent.’ Whereas Zophar approaches Job on the basis of human experience, Bildad approaches him on the basis of human tradition, Zophar comes in on the basis of human merit. He’s a restless man, a impulsive man, his argument lurches from one direction to the other, and he really doesn’t have anything of value to add, but Oh, he is s a very upset young man. In simple terms, you can think of it like this, Eliphaz: if you sin, Job, this is what will happen, Bildad: you must have sinned Job, because this is what has happened. Zophar: you have sinned Job, even more than you can imagine. All this has happened, and you ain’t seen nothing yet! That’s what Zophar is like. And here he is, Ch 11:1, straight to the point, “Then answered Zophar the Naamathite and said, Should not the multitude of words be answered, and should a man full of talk be justified?” Straight into it, ‘what are we listening to this for,’ you see, he says, “Should thy lies make men hold their peace, and when thou mockest shall no man make thee ashamed?” ‘ Job, you liar, how much more of this do we have to take?’ V 4, “For thou hast said, “My doctrine is pure, and I am clean in thine eyes.” ‘You think you are so pure, Job. You want an audience with God so he can justify you. Well, I hope you get one, because you know what God is going to tell you?’ V 5, “Oh that God would speak and open his lips against thee and that he would show thee that the secrets of wisdom that they are double to that which is. Know therefore that God exacteth of thee less than thine iniquity deserveth. It is pretty clear to me Job, from all I have heard, you haven’t suffered enough. You haven’ suffered enough. God is punishing you less than you deserve.’

How is that for comfort? And what you see, you know, what you see in Zophar is an extremely unpleasant trait of character. In his next speech, he only speaks twice, in the three rounds of the friends, he only speaks twice, and his next and final speech is in Ch 20. He devotes the entire speech in describing the intimate sufferings of the wicked. The curse, the torment, the agony. I mean here is an example, I will just read from the New International Version, Ch 20:12. “Though evil is sweet in his mouth and he hides it under his tongue, though he cannot bear to let it go and keeps it in his mouth, yet his food turns sour in his stomach, it becomes the venom of serpents within him, he will spit out the riches he has swallowed and God make his stomach vomit them up.” Or V 24 of Ch 20, “Though he flees from the iron weapon, the bronze tipped arrow pierces him, he pulls it out of his back, the gleaming point out of his liver, terrors overcome him.” I mean, where does this come from? You see he’s trying to scare Job into repentance. But he’s got a morbid fascination with suffering, and his view, once again is driven by his misunderstanding of God. Eliphaz reveres God for his moral purity. Bildad reveres God for his justice. Zophar reveres him for his omniscience, the fact that he knows everything, that he sees everything. Look at V 11, “For he knoweth vain men, he seeth wickedness also. Will he not then consider it?” ‘He sees every sin, Job, in fact, even if you don’t know what you have done wrong, God does. There is nothing you can do in a corner and you are being punished for it now.’ What’s the solution? V 13, “If thou prepare thine heart, and stretch out thine hands towards him,” V 18, “thou shalt be secure, because there is hope, yea, thou shalt dig about thee and thou shalt take thy rest in safety.” Repent and be blessed, you see? And after what seems to be an extremely vicious opening in Ch 11, Zophar tries to be helpful. V 19, “And thou shalt lie down, none shall make thee afraid, yea many shall make their suite unto thee.” The RSV, “Many shall intreat thy favour.” V 20, “But the eyes of the wicked shall fail and they shall not escape, and their hope shall be as giving up the spirit.”

He can’t help himself, can he? He can’t help himself. He’s got to get back into it doesn’t he. What does he say? Three simple points.

1) God is all-knowing. He knows what you are like Job, he doesn’t miss anything.
2) It is obvious you haven’t suffered enough yet.
3) So repent and be blessed, because if you don’t, you are going to die.
And back and forth you see for three cycles, Eliphaz, Job; Bildad, Job; Zophar, Job. Apart from the first cycle where Zophar doesn’t speak, for three cycles this debate goes round and round, and for 22 chapters between Ch 4 and Ch 26, this debate rages, the friends accusing, Job denying, emotions rising, allegations getting more and more pointed.

This is what happens. In the first round of speeches between Ch 4 and 14, the three speakers approach Job as friends with a view to helping him. They speak in general terms using broad principles talking about the character of God and about their exact retribution theory, about the fate of the wicked, they assume that Job is guilty of some secret sin. They exhort him to reform and to repent and that’s what you see. Well, Job doesn’t play ball, he doesn’t agree. Round 2. The second cycle of speeches from Ch 15-21, the friends make no progress at all. They restate their earlier positions, but in more specific and sometimes brutal terms. They simply repeat their previous arguments.

But now when they explain what happens to the wicked they make direct references to Job’s life. They don’t mention repentance at all. And then the third round, Ch 22-26, the friends now are desperate, they are not making any headway with Job. If Job doesn’t live long enough to repent, then they cannot save him, and therefore this is their problem. They see suffering only as a punishment for sin, so Eliphaz now attacks Job personally, and he finishes with an appeal for repentance. Bildad repeats an earlier argument that God is so great that all men are sinners and therefore they deserve to suffer. He doesn’t even make an attempt to answer the suggestion that the wicked don’t suffer, and that the righteous often do suffer. Zophar doesn’t speak the third time. And by the end of those three rounds, Job defeats the friends, because at the end of Ch 24, I’ll show you how he does it, “And if it be not so, who will make me a liar and make my speech nothing worse,” he says. “The wicked do prosper, the righteous do suffer, exact retribution is not true.” ‘Prove me wrong, make me a liar,’ he says in V 25, and you see Job has defeated their false doctrine, and therefore wiped out their argument.

So the friends of course are out of answers, they cannot help Job because he has disproven their doctrinal basis. Now you might say to me, ‘Well, frankly, how difficult was that? You could have done that in one chapter, I could have done that in one chapter, why did this take 22 chapters? Well, the simple answer is that Job’s got more to wrestle with here than the three friends. He’s got to get his position clear with God, that’s the real story of the debate which we will cover tomorrow morning, but for now, I hope you can see that Job quickly defeats the friends when he puts his mind to it, simply by disproving their doctrine of exact retribution.

All right then what do you think of the three friends. I am going to give you one observation on each of these friends. What would you say of Eliphaz? Look at Ecc 7, here’s Eliphaz, he’s an older brother, he’s seen a lot of life in the truth and he believes that his experience mean that he could answer Job’s precise situation but he wasn’t prepared for debate and he gets upset when his position is challenged, particularly by a younger brother. He’s a bit precious, actually, Eliphaz. Now Job is quite polite towards Eliphaz, but he’s got a preconceived idea of how things are in the world, but he wasn’ agile enough to accommodate the facts of this problem. Ecc 7:15. “All things I have seen in the days of my vanity,” says the preacher, “there is a just man that periseth in his righteousness. There is a wicked man that prolongeth his life in his wickedness,” you see, even Solomon disagrees with ‘exact retributio,’ “Be not righteous over much, neither make thyself overwise, why shoulders thou destroy thyself.” That is, don’t be morbidly scrupulous, which leads to self-righteousness in V 16. Eliphaz, you see, had a real problem in that he might not have all the answers. He was proud of his wisdom, he came from a University City, his life was running along very happily, which he interpreted as proof of his righteousness, but there’s a lesson in that, age and experience can be a great blessing, but pride can destroy everything. Just because we are old it doesn’t instantly give us the right to be listened to, what we need is spiritual maturity, not chronological maturity.

If you want to play the age card, you’d better have the answers, otherwise you are an Eliphaz. Well, this raises another question. If you are older, then people will expect you to have answers, won’t they? How do you get them, there are no shortcuts to having good biblical answers, start when you are young, it takes a long time to be able to say, “Thus it is written,” “thus saith the Lord,” it takes a long time. But unless you can say “thus it is written,” “thus smith the Lord,” everything else, frankly, is humanism. What about Bildad? Well, here’s a man who just couldn’t sympathise, a man who is completely tactless. He’s eloquent, there’s no question he was eloquent, he could put words together, he could create enormous word pictures, he understood Job’s argument precisely but he makes no effort, whatsoever, to relate to Job’s condition. He’s friend enough to want to help, and from that point of view he is prepared to make Job confront reality, as he saw it doctrinally, in he face of sin, it is better to rebuke someone than to maintain silence, but, Woah, there’s a way to do that, surely. Prov 27, here’s Bildad, Prof 27 and V 5, here’s Bildad’s motive. “Open rebuke is better than secret love.” “Faithful are the wounds of a friend but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.” “Open rebuke is better than secret love,” that is a silence that masquerades as love. You know, it is a wicked thing to see a sin and say nothing and call that love, that’s silence masquerading as love, that’s not love. So open rebuke is better than secret love, the wounds of a friend are better than the kisses of an enemy, there’s no doubt, but there’s got to be a way to say things, doesn’t there. Ch 1, Proverbs Ch 12:18 “There is that speaketh like the piercings of a sword but the tongue of the wise is health. It is one thing to inflict the wounds of a friend, it is another thing to inflict the piercings of a sword. The fact is that Bildad just could not relate to Job. ‘If your children are dead,’ he says, ‘it must be because they have sinned,’ God knows best Job. His whole argument is supported with platitudes, the water plant, the spider’s web, the little green shoot, but there’s a lesson here too, here’s a man who’s never really been tested, he’s never ever had to rely upon God, he’s never had a trial that he couldn’t deal with himself. So he’s never ever asked the sort questions Job is asking and therefore never ever likely to get the sort of answers that Job needs. He’s a traditionalist, he only does things because he has been taught by people who went before them, so he’s not really a student of the Bible, he ‘s a student of Bible students. He’s actually a very shallow brother, someone who would copy a traditional view because it was traditional, but tomorrow he’s going to copy the majority view, because everyone else is doing it, or he’s going to copy the loudest voice because it sounds convincing because that was the first argument he heard, but he could never justify any position that he took. He’s an extremely shallow Bible student, and therefore no use, in this discussion.

And what about Zophar? Prov 17. What would you make of him. Well, he’s a problem, he’s a real problem. He’s aggressive, he’s emotional, he’s inexperienced and he’s got a morbid fascination with suffering, almost as if he comes to see Job just so that he can look at the damage, because he’s never seen anybody in intensive care before. He’s the sort of person who is interested in trawling though all the unpleasant details, so if there is and ecclesial issue, thus and so might occur, there’s, perhaps a couple of select people dealing with it, he wants to know the details, no, no, no, the precise details. Almost as if he has some sort of satisfaction when a sinner is caught. V 5 of Prof 17, “Whoso mocketh the poor reproacheth his maker, and he that is glad at calamities shall not be unpunished.” He doesn’t understand that God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked, that when a brother falls it is not a case of rejoicing. It appears as though Zophar has a very imperfect love of the truth, a secret desire, perhaps to participate in wickedness, and therefore a sort of envious satisfaction when a sinner, doing something that he wants to do but daren’t is caught, and publicly humiliated. A bit like the prodigal son’s older brother, knew the intimate details about what his younger brother was doing, but stayed in the house, like a lost coin. In his first speech in Ch 11, he said that Job hadn’t suffered enough. In his 2nd speech in Ch 20, he goes into enormous and graphic detail about the suffering of the wicked. The only thing that he knows about the character of God is that God sees every sin you do. You’ll never hear about grace, you’ll never hear about love, you’ll never hear about mercy from Zophar, and there’s a lesson there too. God is righteous, it’s true. He can’t look upon sin, it’s true, but if that is all there is to God we are in enormous trouble, aren’t we? And you know, unless that changes, Zophar, I would suggest, hasn’t got long in the Truth, because fear of the consequences won’t hold you for long. At some point, lust will exceed fear. It happened in the garden of Eden, it will happen to Zophar. Fear of the consequences alone is not a good enough reason to get baptised. Zophar’s in trouble. Well, the friends, you know, really as I say they didn’t make any progress with Job in 20 odd chapters, and yet in a funny way, they did help Job. In Ch 26, when Job finally answers Bildad, he didn’t believe the same thing as he believed in Ch 3. The friends believed he same things for three cycles, but Job progresses, drastically progresses, in his understanding of his relationship with God and in his arguments. What I am saying is, in Ch 26 Job is a different man to what he was in Ch 3. That wasn’t true of the friends, but it is true with Job. There has been a major6 development in his understanding. But that is the subject of another study.

Transcription by Fay Berry 2017