Monday, January 23, 2012
Job 37:22 and Matt 15:8 "Terrible Beauty" (January 23)
We all search for Life-giving words that heal and help.
We don't want people to suffer.
We want to explain what God is doing.
No words weigh in to pour out Terrible Beauty.
Job 37:22 "A Terrible Beauty streams from God."
Out of the north comes Golden Splendor;
God is clothed with Awesome Majesty.
Job's young inexperienced Friend with ravishing rhetoric
hurls words right on target in so many ways.
But does Elihu draw out of Job the man God intends?
No. Diction drives gaping distance.
Maybe Job's friends should have just sat in Silence
rather than delivering a Discourse over 30 plus chapters.
Maybe the Silence of A Heart that Deeply Cares
is really the best medicine we offer.
I don't want your words, I want your heart for me.
Matt 15:8 "This people honor Me with their lips
but their hearts are far from Me."
"Silence is often more eloquent than speech
And tears more effective than Theology."
Eugene Peterson
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Sage advice, Bev, from the wisdom of God's Word on silence.
ReplyDelete"But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person"
Words muck things up. They seem all we have, ill-equipped as we are with them-for the heart above all is deceitful (Jer 17:9)
But Luke 6:45 reminds us "A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of."
So bottom line is when we're not sure, silence is golden. In the meantime, fill our hearts with good. But don't get hung up on the word good--it's what brings good that God seems to be focused on, not what feels good to us. Fill our lives with Him who brings good even if it starts badly. "It all ends good. If it's not good, it's not the end..." How's your day going? We may have another opportunity. :)
(And I just used 176 words recommending silence!)
"11 If they listen and serve him, they complete their days in prosperity, and their years in pleasantness.
ReplyDelete12 But if they do not listen, they perish by the sword and die without knowledge."
Oh, my, pearls...is this prosperity preaching I hear from Elihu?
I don't believe in the teaching of prosperity preaching. Some of the greatest men and women of God were battered and bruised, desolate and without food, even.
John the Baptist comes to my mind first.
Jesus Christ with no place to lay his head.
The disciples beaten and and killed for their testimony.
I'm not sure where this teaching comes from, but I hear it today out of the mouths of ministers.
I do NOT glory in suffering.
But I am NOT pious enough to believe that God only blesses perfect people.
Oh my, I know what's coming next in the book of Job...and I'm ready to finally hear God silence all of those "friends" who dare to explain the persecution of Job by Evil satan. I hate to even say his name.
Why has no one mentioned him, this evil one, at all in these mighty explanations of Job's "punishment" from God?
DIRTY HANDS DEFILE?
ReplyDelete"For they do not wash their hands when they eat."
OR
DIRTY HEARTS DEFILE...
"But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person."
Lord, may we be convicted today of the selfish way we see others' sin and the blindness we have towards our own. I repent. You are the One who opens blind eyes and unstops ears that never hear. Remove the scales from our own eyes and open our ears to listen to Your Truth. Our petty traditions and our self-imposed commandments have caused much shame to fall upon Your Name, Lord. I repent of the times I've been guilty. Make ME whole, Lord. I want to be made well. In Jesus Name only. Amen.
Annette, your words hit home with me as I have been struggling with wanting to have my say over a situation, but knowing I need to be silent. It would make me feel better to speak, but the words would not be from a heart that is seeking Him. They would be from that which wars against a heart that is seeking Him. I needed to hear that it would make me feel better rather than glorify Him. I want to glorify Him through this, oh help me Lord!
ReplyDeleteDeborah, you know I'm far from the prosperity teaching. If you pick apart Elihu's words, some of it is good advice... but it isn't from a good place within him either. Just wanted to clarify I wasn't on board with the prosperity teaching.
ReplyDeleteI am so sorry if you thought I was seeing that in your words, Bev.
ReplyDeleteNot at all.
I guess I focused on that one point from Elihu's message because he was so different from the other friends.
He wasn't calling Job out for his unconfessed sin causing his calamity. To me, he was implying that Job needed to get over the whining.
But what do I know. These friends definitely talked too much and I know I can be guilty of that, too.
Did they help Job with all of their counsel?
We each have to learn from these chapters what NOT to do when our friends or family are suffering through a calamity.