Job 5-8

May 31

Job 5-8

I think they meant well. They showed up and sat with Job when it seemed like everything was against Job. Three friends came and sat on the ground with Job for seven days. Their hearts really hurt for him. Finally after three days Job spoke. He lamented his life. Why was he born? Why would God allow him to suffer so much? Job longed for death and the relief death would bring.

Eliphaz seemed to think that God was correcting Job. He reminded Job of his own teaching and that trouble was a normal part of life. He told Job that when God corrects us, it hurts for a season, but then God will also bring healing. Though Job was suffering he continued to worship God. He refused to deny God’s word. But he wanted his friends to support him no matter what happened. He did not want their advice; he wanted their love and support regardless of where he was or what was going on in his life. The writer of Proverbs wrote; "A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity." (Proverbs 17:17, NIV)

We all need true friends. We tend to live in an independent, I can do it myself world, but we cannot do it ourselves. We need friends especially when we are in the midst of the tough times. We don’t necessarily need their advice, but we need their support. We need them to love us even if we are wrong. That does not mean they do not point us in the right direction, but timing is the key.

Just as we all need friends, we also need to be friends. Sometimes we need to just be there for others. We do not have to speak. We do not have to give advice. We just need to be there and sit with them and let them air their feelings without our judgment of advice.

Job 1-4

May 30

Job 1-4

Sometimes we wonder why bad things happen to good people. Job gives us a glimpse of the heavenly court. The accuser, the Satan, came before the Lord. God asked Satan; “where have you come from.” Satan said he had been roaming the earth. God said;  “Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil.”" (Job 1:8, NIV)  Would God say that about you? Job must have been a great guy. Even God said he was blameless and upright and feared God and shunned evil. But Satan told God no wonder he obeys God, God blessed him. Satan tells God that Job just wants God’s blessings and if he was not blessed he would not serve God.

God told Satan he could take everything Job had to test him and see if he only served God for what he could get from God. Sure enough Satan wiped out everything Job had, his wealth, his livestock, worse of all, his children. But Satan did not touch Job’s body. Job replied; “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.” In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing." (Job 1:21-22, NIV) 

Satan came back before God and God once again drew attention to Job. Satan said that Job would curse God if God allowed Satan to touch his body. God agreed to allow Satan to try Job again and this time he could affect his body but could not take his life. He even turned Job’s wife against him. She told him;  “Are you still holding on to your integrity? Curse God and die!”" (Job 2:9, NIV)

Just because we do what we are supposed to do, Just because we are followers of Jesus, just because God has blessed us in the past does not mean we will not face trials in life. God does not promise that we will not have challenges. We do not understand why, but God allows Satan to test us, I don’t believe it is to see if we will make it through the trial, but to prove our strength in the midst of trials to ourselves and the Satan.

When the tough times come, when everything seems to be falling apart around us, when we feel like we are in it all alone, everyone seems to have abandoned us, even those we are closest to, we can remember that God is with us and is looking out for us. God is setting limits on what can be done to us. Some of the challenges may seem unbearable, but God will bring us through. He may not take us around the trials, but He will bring us through. Remember Satan may be able to take everything else away from us, but he cannot take away God’s love and salvation.

Esther 5-10

May 29

Esther 5-10

People often speak of their pride as an asset. They are proud of their accomplishments, the accomplishments of an organization they participate with, or they are proud of their children or parents or others people they know well. Pride kept in check is not a problem. The problem is that pride easily overflows its banks and brings a flood of problems with it.

Haman had a problem with pride. We often see this kind of pride when someone is elevated in position. He enjoyed having people kneel down before him and pay him honor, but one man, Mordecai refused. We assume by the passage the Mordecai does not kneel before Haman because of his dedication to God, but this infuriates Haman. So Haman plots for a way to get rid of Mordecai and all the people like him. He got the king to sign a law that would allow for all the Jews to be wiped out on a given day. Haman had everything going for him, it seemed, but still whenever he saw Mordecai at the king’s gate, it stirred up hatred within him.

Haman called his friends together to brag about all that was going well in his life, but he also said that with all that was going well, he found no satisfaction because of Mordecai. The convinced Haman to build a gallows to hang Mordecai, to get rid of Haman’s problem. The more Haman plotted against Mordecai, the more God seemed to be working behind the scene to lift him up. Situations arose that made Haman believe he was being lifted up for honor, when the end results showed he was being lifted up in preparation for a great fall.

When Haman told his friends and family that the king had made him honor Mordecai, the man who refused to honor him, his friends and family saw that Haman was fighting a losing battle against God and His chosen people. “Since Mordecai, before whom your downfall has started, is of Jewish origin, you cannot stand against him—you will surely come to ruin!”" (Esther 6:13, NIV) In rapid succession, events turned against Haman and he was hung on the gallows he built for Mordecai.

Pride is dangerous. Our pride can lift us up in our own eyes only to prepare us to fall with a crash. Throughout the bible we are told that God does not like the proud. When we begin to think we are better than others, we are putting down God’s children and elevating ourselves. God loves us, but He also loves every other person you meet. He calls us to care for “the least of these.” If we remain humble we do not have far to fall. 

Esther 1-4

May 28

Esther 1-4

The Book of Esther never mentions God. He is not out front leading or bringing discipline as He is in most of the bible. Instead God is working behind the scenes. God’s hand led Esther to the position of queen under King Xerxes. When the king’s assistant decided he wanted to wipe out the Jewish people, Esther knew she had to speak up to protect the Jews or disaster would come upon them. Mordecai, the man who raised her, reminded her that perhaps she was queen for just such a time as this. Esther felt inadequate for the task at hand but asked Mordecai to gather the Jews in Susa to fast for her and she and her maids also fasted. Though the word prayer does not appear here, we can assume they were fasting and praying.

Mordecai did not tell Esther that if she did not step up the Jews would be annihilated instead he told her that if she did not step up and help her people, deliverance would come from another place, but Esther and her family would perish. Esther was being asked to put her life on the line in order to save others. Mordecai told her that if she tried to save herself, she would perish and the rest of the Jews would be saved in another manner.

God has a plan for us. He orchestrates situations to have us in the right place at the right time to make an eternal difference. But God gives us free will. We are not like puppets on a string with no choice in the matter. We have a choice and our choices make eternal differences. Sometimes, by trying to save ourselves, we put others at risk. Sometimes the right thing to do is not the easiest thing. Sometimes we look around and wonder; where is God in this? But we can be sure that God is working behind the scenes. He may even have us where we are to make a difference.

There are times in our lives when God expects us to speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves. God wants us to go where they cannot go and say the words that need to be spoken on their behalf. There are times in our lives when we can save others by  sharing our faith in Jesus. We may face persecution or ridicule, but if we don’t share our faith, God will find someone, but we face the consequences for our actions. Jesus said; "“Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven." (Matthew 10:32-33, NIV)

Stand strong, speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, share your faith, persevere and like Esther we can say; “if I perish, I perish.”

Nehemiah 12-13

May 27

Nehemiah 12-13

After the wall was built, Nehemiah returned to Babylon to serve the king. While he was gone some of the people slipped right back into their old way of living. Eliashib, the priest allowed Tobiah, the man who tried to keep the wall from being built, to move right into one of the storage rooms in the temple. They went back to working, buying and selling on the Sabbath and intermarrying with the people around them who worshiped false gods.

It is often not the big things that trip us up in our walk with the Lord, but the little things. We allow little things to move back into our lives. Things that may have controlled our lives before we began to follow Jesus find their way back in our lives again. We think “one time will not matter,” or “I am no longer controlled by this action, so it is ok to participate,” or “it is not that bad compared to what I used to do.” We use these and many other excuses to go back to our sin. Sin that Jesus died to cleanse us of, we allow to move right into the temple, our bodies.

Proverbs 26:11 reads; "As a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his folly." (Proverbs 26:11, NIV) This sounds kind of gross, but it reminds us that the temptation to return to our sin is always present. The Christian life involves continued walking with Jesus and perseverance in the face of temptation. The Israelites started to get back into their old habits even after God had brought them back from exile.

When Nehemiah returned to Jerusalem and saw what was happening he forcefully removed Tobiah from the temple storage room, threatened physical harm to anyone who desecrated the Sabbath, and beat and pulled out the hair of the men who married foreign women. All these actions led Israel away from God previously. Nehemiah was going to do all that was in his power to make sure it did not happen again.

We need to purposely and powerfully resist the things that pull us away from God. There are good things that are not good for us because we know from experience they draw us away from our relationship with God. There are other things that we know do not please God. "Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings." (1 Peter 5:8-9, NIV)

God gives us the power to overcome through the Holy Spirit. We just have to use the strength God has given us. Self control and perseverance will keep us walking on the path God has called us to walk.