He needed Pity not Judgement

 Job 19:21-29

 

“Have pity on me, my friends, have pity, for the hand of God has struck me.   Why do you pursue me as God does?  Will you never get enough of my flesh?  “Oh, that my words were recorded, that they were written on a scroll, that they were inscribed with an iron tool on lead or engraved in rock forever!  I know that my redeemer lives and that in the end, he will stand on the earth.  And after my skin has been destroyed, yet in my flesh, I will see God; I myself will see him with my own eyes I, and not another  How my heart yearns within me! “If you say, ‘How we will hound him since the root of the trouble lies in him, you should fear the sword yourselves; for wrath will bring punishment by the sword, and then you will know that there is judgment.”

 

Can you recall anyone asking you to have pity on them?  I’m sure that many a lawyer has stood before a Judge and ask for mercy for his client, but I cannot imagine a man who is upright like Job having to do so.  

 

Job was not Hebrew, for he apparently lived long before there was a Jewish people.  So like Abram who became Abraham, Job believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness.  Now Job wonders if his three friends are pursuing him as God is doing?

 

Job longs for there to be a record of all that is going on in his life, and I have no doubt that God said that is precisely what I’m planning on doing.  See the story of Job was much bigger than Job understood, for thousands and millions of people have read and learned this message, not about Job so much but about the endless battle of good and evil.  Do you recall these words from Jesus, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”  John 10:10  Do not be deceived that was the devil's plan for Job and it is the same plan he is asking God to allow him to do to you.  Now the bad news, but for all that are in Christ and He in them, the old thief has to come to Christ before He can get to you.  Do you recall these words in John 17: 20-21, “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, ²¹ that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”  The devil, to get at a follower of Christ, must go through the Father and the Son, before he has access to you, now that is security!

 

From the Back Porch,

 

Bob Rice