00:00:01:21 – 00:00:14:48
Clint Loveall
Friends, thanks for closing out the week with us as we continue through the book of job and interesting section of the book of job we are in.

00:00:14:52 – 00:00:51:12
Clint Loveall
Chapter 34. I believe, Michael, as we continue through the words of this kind of next speaker, Elihu, and we mentioned that he he starts off saying that he is burning to speak, that he has something to say. He begins, you made the point yesterday. He sort of begins slowly, but he starts to get on a roll. And I think we see that increase today.

00:00:51:12 – 00:01:16:28
Clint Loveall
So if we jump in at chapter 34 here, and let’s look maybe like verse seven or so to start with, and if you were with us yesterday, I do think you’ll hear a difference in the rhetoric here. Who is like job, who drinks up scoffing like water, who goes in the company with evildoers and walks with the wicked?

00:01:16:33 – 00:01:57:12
Clint Loveall
For he has said it profits one nothing to take delight in God. This is a I mean, kind of he’s. Both barrels are open now. He’s given it to job. We move very quickly, you know jobs scoffing. He hangs out with evil and he said it profits one nothing to take delight in God, which I think is not an entirely fair summary of what job has said, though he has certainly raised those kind of questions.

00:01:57:16 – 00:02:21:16
Clint Loveall
Elihu continues, far be it from God that he would do wickedness and the Almighty that he should do wrong. For according to their deeds he repays them according to their ways. He makes it befall them of a truth God will not do wickedly. The Almighty will not pervert justice. And then he continues, verse 17, shall one who hates justice govern?

00:02:21:19 – 00:02:26:33
Clint Loveall
Will you condemn one who is righteous and mighty?

00:02:26:38 – 00:02:50:21
Clint Loveall
I, I don’t want to be cynical here, Michael, but it’s it sounds to me very much like we’re sliding back into territory. We’ve already covered a lie whose words begin very much to me, at least in my years, to echo the words of the other friends. And I’m not sure at this point he’s adding much that is new.

00:02:50:21 – 00:03:12:31
Michael Gewecke
So one of the things that we have to reckon with, I think, at this stage of the conversation, is that all of these characters, I would argue, have at some level, a shared understanding about the way that things that work, and we’ve said this now many times in the course of the study, one does wrong, and wrong is given back to us.

00:03:12:31 – 00:03:40:40
Michael Gewecke
One does right, and right is given back to us. I think a nuance and that came actually in yesterday’s study, an argument I think was being scaffolded out to make the case that actually sometimes, even though suffering may come into our lives, God can be using that for a constructive end. And I think that that’s a more nuanced way of saying, you know, maybe there’s a redemptive side of the effect that suffering can have.

00:03:40:50 – 00:04:16:16
Michael Gewecke
But here and I think specifically when we get into verse eight, who goes in company with evildoers and walks with the wicked? Clint, it’s hard to stay on the train with Elihu here. And and the reason why I say that is because we, the reader, had access to the conversation that preceded job situation, and we know for a fact, in God’s own voice, that wickedness was not the inciting reason for the suffering that’s happened to job.

00:04:16:19 – 00:04:40:02
Michael Gewecke
If you were going to make a positive or a more full throated argument for a lie, who here? Maybe he would argue that even if that is the case, that job has found his way into that with his response to the suffering, right? Maybe that job has not displayed humility. Maybe job has not pursued righteousness even in the midst of the pain that he has.

00:04:40:04 – 00:05:00:38
Michael Gewecke
I think you’re pushing the argument there, and I think you’re being very charitable. If that’s the place you want to go. Clint, at the end of the day, I think we have to recognize in verse 11, according to their deeds, he will repay them. This is ground we’ve been on before, and this is territory that we now know well.

00:05:00:52 – 00:05:10:45
Michael Gewecke
Is suffering a direct causal relationship to the actions that we’ve taken, or is it not? I think Elihu has changed course a little bit in the force of the argument here.

00:05:10:48 – 00:05:41:40
Clint Loveall
Yeah, I would agree. I think he’s leaned into what seems to be available as the only option for the men who have considered jobs plight if we push on through that chapter, Michael, maybe around verse 35, Elihu says here job speaks without knowledge and his words are without insight. And then if we move into chapter 35, beginning with verse six, Elihu makes a very interesting case here.

00:05:41:40 – 00:06:07:14
Clint Loveall
If you have sinned. What do you accomplish against him? If your transgressions are multiplied, what do you do to him? If you are righteous, what do you give him? What does he receive from your hand? Your wickedness affects others like you and your righteousness other human beings. Now, on one hand, Elihu is saying what I think is a helpful word here.

00:06:07:19 – 00:06:41:07
Clint Loveall
Your goodness of lack of the goodness doesn’t affect God. You don’t change the nature of God. God needs nothing from you. God doesn’t depend on us. We don’t have an impact on who God is. And again, as a general wisdom, there’s something humbling and helpful in that. Except and I’m sorry we keep coming back to this. We know that God does have something at stake in the righteousness of job.

00:06:41:12 – 00:07:06:16
Clint Loveall
God bet his wisdom and reputation against the Satan. That job would get it right. That job would prevail. So what if you are righteous? What do you give to him? You give to him victory over the adversary, the the advocate.

00:07:06:21 – 00:07:39:33
Clint Loveall
The one, the help me. Satan, the adversary, the accuser. Yeah. Thank you. Sorry about that. And so again, it just brings us to that question. What what is the author trying to do with Elihu? He he sprinkles in something, but then we read it and we think, well, that’s not right. Now. He begins to is he saying that this wise, this young person who thinks himself wise, doesn’t ultimately have any new information?

00:07:39:38 – 00:07:58:57
Clint Loveall
It it is just such a mystery as to what this part of the book is supposed to accomplish, especially as we continue. And I’m I have some thoughts as we get a little further, but in the chapters we’ve been through so far, I just don’t see that he has added much.

00:07:59:02 – 00:08:20:16
Michael Gewecke
So I think this is actually a really good example of where we need to be careful with the editorial comments that are in our Bibles, and for me, I have above chapter 36. The editors have put in here the heading Elihu exalts God’s goodness. I think that’s certainly in here, but I don’t think that this is the whole story.

00:08:20:19 – 00:08:45:40
Michael Gewecke
In fact, I think as it goes on, you can see where they get that. Surely Goddess Mighty does not despise any. He’s mighty and strength and understanding. Surely there’s an explanation happening here. But if you continue on, Clint, I think what’s really, really, really striking is verse 17. You are obsessed with the case of the wicked. Judgment and justice sees you.

00:08:45:43 – 00:09:32:04
Michael Gewecke
I that is a, I think, a very, very incisive argument to make the case that job, regardless of the inciting action that may have been responsible. And I think Elihu, we could easily, I think, make an argument that Elihu does believe that job is responsible for the causation of suffering. But even if not even if you were to say, you know that we don’t know that here, I think Elihu is making the case that jobs response to that suffering demonstrates that he has more interest in the plight of the wicked that are doing well despite their actions than he does actually in the justice of God.

00:09:32:04 – 00:10:01:31
Michael Gewecke
And, you know, he goes on to make these, these claims of things that he names as facts, right? This idea, God is mighty, doesn’t despise any mighty, and strength of understanding, doesn’t keep the wicked alive, gives the afflicted the right I Clinton. If you’re job and you’re hearing this, this would not strike you as new. And in fact, I think what you would respond to that and say, young man, that’s a stupid statement.

00:10:01:33 – 00:10:06:38
Michael Gewecke
There are there are wicked people all over doing really well. And we only need.

00:10:06:38 – 00:10:07:38
Clint Loveall
The trial was made.

00:10:07:45 – 00:10:23:09
Michael Gewecke
Exactly. So I just think we’re in a way here. I think the incisive argument that I was pivoting towards is maybe not so much the causation, as much as where job has gone in this journey of suffering.

00:10:23:12 – 00:10:51:09
Clint Loveall
Yeah. And I think if there’s if ally, who is helpful. I think it’s late in his remarks. I think about where you left off, Michael. So around verse 24, ally who begins to turn and I think the turn is interesting in light of the rest of the book. Verse 26, Surely God is great and we do not know him.

00:10:51:09 – 00:11:24:45
Clint Loveall
The number of his years is unsearchable. 29 can anyone understand the spreading of the clouds, the thundering of his pavilion? And then as we move into chapter 37, there is throughout much of this chapter a celebration of nature, of creation under the whole heaven. He lets loose the lightning to the corners of the earth. And if you look here, if you just picked a word or two out of each verse starting in verse six, sorry.

00:11:24:48 – 00:12:00:48
Clint Loveall
Starting in verse four, lightning thunders, snow, rain, animals, whirlwind, ice cloud. You begin to get this movement toward the natural world, the created order and this idea that the God who is well above us and and very much other from us is Lord over the physical world. And interestingly enough, this is, I think, the turn that the book is largely going to take.

00:12:00:50 – 00:12:29:16
Clint Loveall
When job hears directly from God. God is going to appeal to many of the same markers that Elihu mentions as job is questioned by God, and God essentially asks him, do you know about this? Or could you do this? Or have you seen these things? And it’s interesting, this bridge that the author builds here at the tail end of Elihu remarks.

00:12:29:16 – 00:12:35:21
Clint Loveall
And I do think that sort of paves the way for what God is going to say in the very next chapter.

00:12:35:26 – 00:13:00:19
Michael Gewecke
I think directly to that point, we have in verse 13 of chapter 37, whether for correction or for his land or for love, he causes it to happen. God is the one in control. God has agency. And ultimately, whether or not, as you draw out the scale of this argument right, as you say, Joe, can you measure the power of the clouds?

00:13:00:19 – 00:13:23:28
Michael Gewecke
Can you measure the power of the golden splendor right as you magnify the largeness of God? What it serves to do is to make jibs. Previous arguments about, let me give my case to the one who has done this to me. Let let me get in the room with the person who’s both my judge and my accuser. Right.

00:13:23:31 – 00:13:46:48
Michael Gewecke
All of these comments we’ve had along the way, this argument from Elia, who serves, I think, in the narrative to provide a pushback to job, to say even if you had that address, you are out of your lead, even if you got the opportunity to say the words that you would like to say, you don’t even have the first letter yet alone.

00:13:46:50 – 00:14:08:21
Michael Gewecke
The first paragraph of the thing that you would need to say to God because God out classes you in every way possible, every way imaginable. The the majesty of God in that way becomes a way of putting job in this place. And just to get explicit on that, therefore mortals fear him. Notice that word. Fear him that that matters, right?

00:14:08:24 – 00:14:20:31
Michael Gewecke
The orientation that God should not be boldness, it should not be accusation. It should be one of. For he does not regard anywhere wise in their own conceit. You can’t help but read that without it being pointed at job.

00:14:20:33 – 00:14:51:21
Clint Loveall
Yeah, and this is a wonderful transition, because if we read the tail end of Elihu words, and I and I do think, I do think if Elihu has something substantive to add to this debate or this dialog, it may be here in this later stuff, it may be in chapter 37. Look at verse 20. Should he be told that I want to speak, did anyone ever wish to be swallowed up?

00:14:51:33 – 00:15:17:31
Clint Loveall
No one can look on the light when it’s bright in the skies. When the wind has passed and cleared them out of the north comes golden splendor around. God is awesome, Majesty the Almighty. We cannot find him, for he is great. And power and justice abundant righteousness he will not violate. Therefore mortals fear him. He does not regard any who are wise in their own conceit.

00:15:17:43 – 00:15:57:00
Clint Loveall
And the caution for job here is job. You’ve said you want to sit down at a table and make your case to God. There is a forgetfulness in that that you are not equals. He is not appear. He does not owe you anything. And and how dare you raise those questions as if that would be a conversation among things that are the same, he is something completely other than we are.

00:15:57:04 – 00:16:29:40
Clint Loveall
And here you are presenting a case as if somehow you could explain it to him. Now again, we know that job is not necessarily in the wrong, but job has made an assumption that he could have a seat at that table. And Elihu seems to me, begins to introduce the idea that job you may be you may be asking for more than you understand, and you may if you get it when you get it.

00:16:29:40 – 00:16:33:40
Clint Loveall
In the next chapter, find out that you receive more than you bargained.

00:16:33:45 – 00:17:02:28
Michael Gewecke
I submit to you that this book is mysterious on purpose, and it may very well be that both of these are true at the same time, because in truth, I think we are seeing in the lighthouse comments. Contextualization, which is true and helpful. The creature is not called or was not made to bear the whole weight of the universe.

00:17:02:33 – 00:17:25:55
Michael Gewecke
Job isn’t. In other words, given the task and responsibility of lording over God, what should be? Because job exists in the economy of what God has made job in the world that God has made. And and there’s a way in which the right living in that is to not know all the answers, like you would see the Garden of Eden in sort of knowledge of good and evil.

00:17:25:55 – 00:17:57:14
Michael Gewecke
But the answer is living faithfully in the life that you have, right? So in that way, there’s a helpful correction here. I would argue, though, job also speaks some truth when he gives voice to the argument that what he thought before was that the actions that he made and the things he kept from doing would be enough from experiencing the consequences, the wrath, God’s pushback.

00:17:57:14 – 00:18:27:57
Michael Gewecke
And, you know, I think these this comment, verse 23 is really striking. Clint the Almighty, we cannot find him. He is great in power and justice and abundant righteous. He will not violate. And I just submit to you. Is that a defensible statement? In light of what we know, you would say God’s not the one that brought this directly to job, but God’s allow all of it.

00:18:28:00 – 00:18:42:55
Michael Gewecke
God’s willingness to let the adversary have access is indeed responsible for someone that is literally named is right I l I who is also oversimplifying and that is, I think, clear the way the book lays out.

00:18:42:57 – 00:19:15:52
Clint Loveall
Yes, but is there some sense in which the logic that all of those cases share is that righteousness is the determining factor and not God himself? In other words, that righteousness is some guarantee sure. Against suffering, that’s the case they’ve all essentially made. And to make that case puts the emphasis on righteousness as the determining factor of life and not the Almighty.

00:19:15:55 – 00:19:52:33
Clint Loveall
And I wonder if that’s the transition we’re beginning to make is. In arguments about what one does and doesn’t deserve. The idea of God’s ultimate authority to do as God wants begins to be curtailed or sacrificed. I don’t know what a job scholar would make of that, but as I anticipate where the conversations going with job, I wonder about that a little.

00:19:52:38 – 00:19:56:52
Clint Loveall
Well, we can have more of that conversation when we get to those other words.

00:19:56:52 – 00:20:25:45
Michael Gewecke
Well, and, you know, that’s maybe my last word here today is just to make note that we’ve said this. Whatever Elihu is adding to the argument or not, whatever you’re compelled by what he has to say, he is most certainly building a bridge to what is about to happen when when God shows up, when job gets what he wants in a very real way, and then he’s going to have to reconcile with the question, is this what I actually wanted?

00:20:25:48 – 00:20:52:31
Clint Loveall
And I think in that sense, whether we can say with any confidence that the author’s intention in introducing a lie, who was this or that, I, I certainly couldn’t say that with confidence. I don’t know if Elihu is supposed to be a wise figure or another foolish friend, but whatever he is, he does, I think, move the narrative to the place where we now stand on the precipice.

00:20:52:36 – 00:21:14:21
Clint Loveall
And he has even begun to introduce some of the ideas, some of the themes that God himself is now going to bring to the table. And I do think from a narrative perspective, he does fill a role, even though from a philosophical perspective, I think it’s difficult to say what his point is.

00:21:14:24 – 00:21:31:49
Michael Gewecke
You’re not going to miss our next study, won’t want to miss next week. There’s a lot coming and there’s a lot of content still to come. Job has a lot left to offer, so I hope you like this video. Helps others find it in their own study and then certainly subscribe so you don’t miss studies. Like what we will continue on as we go into chapter 38.

00:21:31:50 – 00:21:32:38
Clint Loveall
Thanks for everybody.