Job 41-42

The context of Job 41 is clear as it follows the questioning the Lord has been addressing Job since chapter 38.  God is saying in effect, “Job, if man is unable to appropriate understand and discover the secrets of baser things on the earth, then how much more can you raise yourself up to heaven and demand of God answers far to great for you?”

People will find it astonishing that God may delay to answer certain questions particularly questions regarding suffering.  Even after reading the full extent of God’s response, the reader may even still feel anxious about knowing God’s purpose in allowing Job’s bitter suffering.  But let me suggest two answers found in the text you may have not considered.

1. Judge Present Circumstances According to their Final Chapter

In Job 42, the final chapter, God blesses Job (v12) and accepts him (v8).  This gives all of the previous suffering some perspective that Job didn’t have before.  Previously, the clouds and fog of suffering were so thick that Job couldn’t see how life would ever have any joy or purpose again.  But the biblical answer is in God’s commitment to blessing the people whom He accepts.  God accepts Job and blesses Him with double blessing, not only restoring what he previously loss but even more.

Job’s blessing, though it was in material things acts as prophetic landmark for all those whom God accepts.  This of course is the final blessing God’s people receive from trusting in Jesus Christ when God bring them into the Kingdom.  The people who God accepts are brought into eternal life with no more worry, suffering, or despair.  It is the final comfort of rest God blesses His people with.  Job in a sense rested with his final double blessing from God, but ultimately we look to rest in our ultimate blessing in Jesus Christ.   The ending of Job serves as a glimpse of our final ending for those who look to the Lord Jesus’ return.

2. Repentance is Always Appropriate

God purpose in Job’s suffering was never fully explained to Job’s satisfaction.  Job maintained his innocence and therefore maintained that he had nothing to repent for.  But God helps him, and Job does finally repent, not for some named sin, but simply because the very presence of God has humbled him.  Job learns he is not God, yet he has required information, a reason for his suffering, that God has chosen to hide away at the present moment.  When God appeared in chapter 38, the story could have ended their for Job as he beheld God’s encompassing presence, suddenly the question no longer mattered, and the only thing left to do is repent.

Graciously, God never rebuked Job for his prodding questions for a satisfactory reason for suffering, but He did allow Job some room to be satisfied with His favored positioned with the Almighty. In the end, Job repents, not superficially over some broken rule, but by realizing his relationship to the Almighty is enough, even if it involves suffering.  His repentance prepared him for God’s final blessing which causes him to forget previous sorrows and be at rest again. If he had not repented, then such a blessing would not have been accepted with joy and humility, but rather a prideful expectancy to receive something better from the Almighty.

Doesn’t then the final blessing Job symbolize for us the final rest God bestows upon those who repent and believe in Christ?  Isn’t Christ the final innocent sufferer who prays for His stupid friends?  Doesn’t the repentance of Job reveal the sort of repentance that Jesus requires from us?  Doesn’t that repentance prepare us for the kingdom and reconciliation with God who ultimately satisfies us with His presence and acceptance of us in Christ?

Therefore, no matter whether in suffering or in blessing, give God a heart of repentance and be contented with His presence and acceptance of you in Christ.  Such repentance will give you more confidence in trials of suffering because you’ll now this suffering is not God’s final chapter for you.  And a life of repentance will remind you that the blessings of God do not come because you require them, but because He sacrificially gave them.