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So after all the blame of his three friends, assuring Job that no one is punished unless they had it coming to them, and Job is unable to figure out why such horrible things are happening to him, he challenges God to speak already and show him what terrible thing he did to bring this punishment down upon him.

So God speaks.  But His answer is not the account of sin that Job asked for… it is quite different.  First of all, God says, “Gird thyself up like a man.” (Job 38:3).  This pretty well shatters the effiminate image of a God who is all soft words and loving gestures.  God is love, no doubt, but God loves masculinity as well and at this point in time, Job needed to muster up every bit of manhood he could scrape together because he was about to get a ‘talking to’ of Jehovic proportion.  But enough of that aside (for now).

Next His answer takes a turn. [vastly condensed paraphrase of Job 38:4 - 39:30] “Tell me Job. How does this old world work? How is it that I make the sun come out each day? How is it that I formed the ocean and made its boundaries? Take me to the place where darkness lives. Show me the place where the snow and hail are stored!  Where are you when the wild animals are in labor?  Where are you when the lion cubs are hungry?  How would you have done it?  Where would you start?  ANSWER!”

I imagine Job was pretty humbled by this reminder of God’s majesty… but… How is this an answer to Job’s question of why he deserves to suffer? It is not.  Neither is this an example of God bullying Job with grandstanding in order to skirt the issue. God is simply showing Job what a stupid and meaningless question this is. That sounds harsh but it is true. Look at the wonders of the world that I HAVE MADE Job, and you expect to understand why you suffer?  Do you understand anything about how this world works, and yet you think you can puzzle out why good people have to suffer?  It is a laughable prospect when put in this perspective.

His answer continues in a way that is again unexpected… Job 40:8-14.

Would you annul my judgement [to allow good people to suffer]? Then YOU try it Job. You try to bring justice about in just the right ways, you bring disaster to the unrighteous and prosperity to the righteous without any muddling of the two… You make sure and give everyone just what they deserve and make everybody happy… go ahead Job, just try it. (anyone seen Bruce Almighty? This makes me think of the scene where he decides to make everyone happy by answering ‘YES’ to all prayers and the result is that millions of people won the lottery and they all ended up with a buck or two…)

And finally, God reveals the painful truth about chaos. Even He cannot harness it at every turn. Read Job 41:1-3. The Leviathan. Real or mythological I am not qualified to say of a certainty, but I have my theory.  We can safely say that in stories of Job’s time and throughout mythological tales, the Leviathan is used to denote chaos and disorder. I believe God’s speech is revealing some truths about the power of chaos through the figure of leviathan.

Chaos is the Devil’s territory, God loves order and walking orderly is part of obeying Him! (1 Corinthians 14:40)  But men have a choice whether they want to obey God or not.  So many have chosen the Devil’s path that Leviathan has amassed a great power.  Look at Job 41:9-11. No hope of overcoming the beast, God says! I think this includes God Himself, He is saying, “Who is mightier than I? But even I must reveal to you this:

Job 41:12-17.  “I will not conceal his limbs, His mighty power, or his graceful proportions.   Who can remove his outer coat? Who can approach him with a double bridle?   Who can open the doors of his face, With his terrible teeth all around?   His rows of scales are [his] pride, Shut up tightly as with a seal;   One is so near another That no air can come between them;   They are joined one to another, They stick together and cannot be parted.

“…I will not conceal what a mighty foe he is in fact:”

 Job 41:33,34.  On earth there is nothing like him, Which is made without fear.   34 He beholds every high [thing;] He [is] king over all the children of pride.”

The great beast of chaos and disorder has no fear. He beholds every high (good, decent) thing (including God) as nothing and is king over the proud… and poor Job, he played right into his beastly hands in jumbling up words against God without an ounce of understanding.  (as an aside, I do believe God can and will destroy this great beast, but not without destroying the earth as well [2 Peter 3:10] and until that time, under the power of ‘leviathan’ the world will wax worse and worse [2 Timothy 3:13])

So, why do we need God, when He does not have the power to stop chaos from entering into the lives of His very own children? Because He is the only hope among chaos. In the midst of chaos He is the order. A lighthouse in the storm… not taking the rocks away, but striving to guide us around them.

From the very beginning, God has tried to arrange the world away from chaos! See Genesis 1:1,2.  He sought to seperate out the light from the dark, the sea from the land, to give shape to the formless, sense to the senseless… He still does the same today. Why does suffering exist? Because chaos has always existed, sin opened the doors to allow the devil to lead us into chaos through our own choices, and now we all have to suffer through trials and tribulations whether we’re good people or not. There IS such a thing as bad luck. But there is a saying that, “we can make our own luck”. While I don’t necessarily agree with this, God has given us an escape from the disorder and the ‘bad luck’ if we choose to accept His way.

At a peak time of chaos and corruption. God sent His son. A light in the darkness. John 3:16-21. By coming into His light, we can find order, we can see clearly our own deeds and learn how to order them, to be righteous to live in the light.  So will you be part of the light, leading men to peace and order, or will you become part of the great beast, Leviathan, destroying God’s work and bringing havoc into the lives you touch.  The choice is yours.

Perhaps I’ll write more on this topic, as there is plenty more to say.  Anyone have any thoughts on the subject?  Let’s talk about it!

Trying to write a decent and orderly blog, amongst the chaos of the internet,

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