Thursday, March 13, 2014

Do you have great Theology and bad application? Job 22

Job 22:24-26 (NASBStr)
And place your gold in the dust,
And the gold of Ophir among the stones of the brooks,
 Then the Almighty will be your gold
And choice silver to you.
 “For then you will delight in the Almighty
And lift up your face to God.

When does sound logic and, even sound Theology, become off the mark and actually wrong?   In the above portion of Job we have one of Job's friends, Eliphaz, telling Job that the reason for his suffering is the misplaced focus he has on himself, his possessions, and, in these three verses, his gold.   As in each of these first three friends of Job, we see the age old question of, "why do bad things happen to good people?" being reasoned out and applied to a suffering soul.   In this case we see the Eliphaz is correct in regard to a point he is trying to make:  Those who trust in their riches are sinful and will cause their relationship with God to deteriorate.  However, as with all of Job's friends, the application of this observation in regard to Job is unmerited.   We know why Job is suffering.   God put him up as a test-case dummy for Satan to crash in the storms of life.   There is no secret, to us, in this story.   There is only a secret to Job and his friends.   This story is written, however, so that we don't make the same mistake of judging others when we see them suffer.   It is so tough to avoid this lesson.   Eliphaz, in this chapter accuses Job of withholding water from a thirsty widow, from using his power to impress God and many other accusations.   Yet, God told us in the beginning (in His conversation with Satan) that Job was a righteous and upright man.   Whereas Eliphaz is true that those who trust in their riches should repent and return to God ... and, God, will delight in them when they do ... this is not the issue with Job.   Again, the Theology is right but the application is wrong.  Be leery of those with great Theology but wrong application.   Each of the New Testament Epistles were written to correct both bad Theology and bad application.   Your great Theology is no good if you apply it wrong to life.    Yes, God should be our gold.  Yes, God delights in those who come to Him and cast off their gold.   Yet, Job was not focused on his gold and still suffered.   As men, we so desperately want to find a reason for suffering that we often just simply blame the recipient of it ... until the recipient is us.  We ought to pray that we have great Theology and great application.  

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