Today’s Reading: Job 32 – 34
I have been talking to people about God for over 30 years now. In the beginning I talked to them from one point of view and then after a few years I talked to the them from a whole different point of view. I switched sides I suppose you could say.
When I have stood on both sides of the discussions on God I thought I was right both times. I was and am one smart guy, or so I thought and think. When I first started talking about God I talked about the supposed fact that he did not exist. I challenged my church going friends to prove of God’s existence. I would pose, what I thought were really intelligent questions to them. Questions like “If God is all powerful can he make a mountain so large that he can’t move it?” O was I smart back then.
Of course, if you know we me know, you know that I have a deeper respect for God and the things of God. So now when I talk to people about God, I am not challenging them as I did in the past. Truth is, I am still challenging them on what they believe about God, but in a positive sense. I challenge them to believe in His existence, no longer challenging them to prove his existence.
However, when I talk to people today, they often come up with qualifications, expectations or limitations to who they want God to be. For example, they might say that God needs to rid the world of more evil before they will believe in his existence. Some will say, that they will believe in God when he makes himself more visible in their lives. There is this classic idea of a person who prays to God for the first time, asking for some miracle, who adds to their prayers, “If you do this for me, I will believe in you.”
Often the struggle to believe in God today comes to the argument that there is too much pain and suffering in the world to believe that God actually exists. The argument is that if there was a God then he would solve all these problems, eliminate pain and suffering and make all things good and perfect.
But in today’s reading in Job, Elihu comes up with a very telling statement about the nature of God. It took us all the way to the end of today’s reading – but there it is…
Job 34:33a NLT
33 “Must God tailor his justice to your demands?
Elihu is making the point that all of our reasoning does not change who God is and what he must to do. God does not need to respond to our demands for revelation, or understanding or justice. As the creator of all these things, the originator of all wisdom, he does not have to answer to the created.
I like Elihu’s next line, as it is especially true to those who challenge God but do not have a personal relationship with him. They have rejected his truth and continue in darkness..
Job 34:33b NLT
But you have rejected him!
The choice is yours, not mine.
It is kind of like saying, “you rejected God, and that is your decision, but don’t come demanding that He follow your demands.” I love that strong statement. Too often, we as the created want to defined how the creator should conform to our ideas. How naïve of us to think that we can tell a supreme being how he should act.
So the answer to today’s post’s title “Must God tailor his justice to our demands?” No. If you are putting a demands on God – maybe it is time to think about who is the creator and who is the created.
Plain and simple isn’t it?
Job 34:12 – 13 NLT
12 Truly, God will not do wrong.
The Almighty will not twist justice.
13 Did someone else put the world in his care?
Who set the whole world in place?
