Tuesday: The Lord as Creator
Read Job 38:4–41. What questions does God ask Job, and what is the purpose of those questions?
If Job expected some detailed explanation about why all these calamities happened to him, he didn’t get it. Instead, what he got was a flow of rhetorical questions contrasting the Lord in His creative might to the transience and ignorance of poor Job.
Image © Lars Justinen from GoodSalt.com
“ ‘Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?’ ” the Lord begins (Job 38:4, NKJV). After echoing some of the earliest images in Genesis—for example, the origins of the earth, the sea, light, and darkness—God says to Job (basically) that, of course you know all these things “because you were born then, or because the number of your days is great” (see Job 38:21, NKJV).
The Lord then points to wonders and mysteries of Creation, again with a series of rhetorical questions that cover not just the foundations of the earth but also the mysteries of the weather and even of the stars themselves. “ ‘Can you bind the cluster of the Pleiades, or loose the belt of Orion?’ ” (Job 38:31, NKJV). He then points Job back to the earth, to everything from human insight (Job 38:36) to the lives of wild animals (Job 38:39–41)—a theme that is fleshed out in much more detail all through Job chapter 39, as well. Had the book been written today, the Lord might have asked, “Who binds the quarks in protons and neutrons?” “Where were you when I first measured out a Planck mass?” “Is it by your wisdom that gravity bends space and time?”
The answer to all these questions is the same: of course not. Job wasn’t there for any of those events, and he had little knowledge about any of the phenomena the Lord referred to. God’s point was to show Job that even with all his wisdom and knowledge and even though he spoke “right” (Job 42:7) about God in contrast to these other men, Job still knew so little. And his lack of knowledge was best revealed by how great Job’s ignorance of the created world was.
| If Job knew so little about the creation, how much could he understand about the Creator? What a powerful contrast between the Creator and the created, between God and humanity. Though God contrasted Himself to Job, any other human being (with the exception of Jesus) would have sufficed, as well. What are we in contrast to God? And yet, look at what this God has done to save us and to offer us the hope of eternal fellowship with Him. |
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Job has always been a mystery to me. Like Job's friends and Jews as a whole, I believed that God always blessed the righteous. The Lord showed me a long time ago that He does bless the righteous but that the righteous have a great tendency to refuse to grow spiritually and have to be roused out of their complacency.
This study of Job and your commentary have shown me that who am I to question what God does. I have no idea what His plans are outside of a general overview of what needs to be done. Trails are made for us to develop our faith and to grow spiritually. When we willingly accept that God is in charge and that no matter what circumstances/situations we face and stand firm in this knowledge and praise Him in all things trusting Him because we know that He has our ultimate well-being in mind we grow spiritually and grow closer to Him. But what most of us forget, including me, that well-being is not so much of the physical nature existing within time and space but a spiritual well-being on an eternal perspective. When we do this our trails are shorter and do not have to repeated over and over.
Thanks for the insight. God bless
From the Noah Webster's 1828 Dictionary;
Pleiades:- A cluster of seven stars in the constellation Taurus.
Orion:- A constellation in the Southern hemisphere containing seventy eight stars.
Job 38:6,31. The language in these questions has been simplified for human digestion but the science involved is far above any earthly science so that we cannot even begin to comprehend the laws and forces involved. Just a glimpse of how majestic our God is,full of Wisdom,Knowledge and great Glory. Yet He condescends to our level and maintains a vital relationship with us to the point of dwelling among us. O how humbling this is! Look at pitiful humanity with our deficient education grappling for world success with gratification of selfish ambition. Accounted learned by the world but no God in the thought. We divide ourselves in social classes strengthening pride while disobedient and estranged from God. True education should teach the fear of God and should be a preparation for the faithful discharge of life's duties. Let us reach out freely to all creating no barriers because of things we have freely received from God.
It is perhaps worth the effort to think about the significance of these questions in terms of today's knowledge and understanding. We now know that the Orion and the Pleiades are constellations and while the stars that make them up appear in the sky to be together, they are separated by huge distances that are difficult for us to comprehend. Even where stars belong to the same galaxy, the distances involved are still enormous.
I still gaze up at the skies and am amazed at what I see.
I took this photograph while I was in Western Australia recently. It is a really awe-inspiring experience to see the stars in a place where there is little interference from city lights. In this view we are looking at the thick part of our own Galaxy, The Milky Way. Now-a-days we can describe our position in the milky way quite well. The numbers are large and to a certain extent incomprehensible, but we can describe what is happening in terms of physics and mathematics reasonably well.
Perhaps even more inspiring is that the Milky Way is only one galaxy, I recently visited Siding Springs Observatory here is Australia and saw a plate taken on one of their large telescopes. The plate held images of hundreds of galaxies in a very small segment of the sky. Astronomers tell me that the the number of Galaxies are uncountable - they are always discovering more.
Interestingly even though we can see more of the Universe than ever before and can describe it better now that we have developed mathematical expressions and computer models, the big questions remain. There is a lot of space out there, and a lot of galaxies, each separated by huge distances. Even Scientists ask the questions, "Why and How?" Not all scientists dismiss the design as random and lucky. All of them are in awe of the design - even those who propose an entirely mechanical explanation.
For us as Christians, we can only marvel that the God who is responsible for all this is interested in individuals on one planet, in the corner of one galaxy.
And with all the vastness of God's creation, He still prefers to live in my heart! Woohoo!
"...The numbers are large and to a certain extent incomprehensible,...
Indeed Maurice! If Adam, on the day he was created, had started to travel from one end of the Milky Way to the other at the speed of light, he would only be 5% across today. And yet, it is estimated there are 2 trillion galaxies besides the Milky Way (recent estimates) separated not by miles but by billions of light years (the distance light can travel in 1 year). Hard to wrap our little minds around isn't it?
That is so awesome. Yes indeed we are drawn to Him through God's nature, creation, physics, mathematics, bioscience, Christian friends, and the Holy Spirit. Then like Adam and Eve we have a choice. Believe in Him and be born again of water and the Spirit. John 3:3.
Two angels from God in heaven told Adam and Eve that God would not compel them to obey—that he had not removed from them power to go contrary to his will; that they were moral agents, free to obey or disobey. There was but one prohibition that God had seen fit to lay upon them as yet. If they should transgress the will of God, they would surely die. 1Spirit of Prophecy Page 33.
The good news is Christ came to this earth some 2046 years ago to deliver us from evil. Prayer answered. Matthew 6:13. The Good news is we are saved not by our merits but by faith in Him. This faith also gives us access to His grace, saving grace. Romans 5:1-5. The awesomeness of the good news is He can save to the uttermost those who turn to Him. Hebrews 7:25. Good news my friends indeed. Chariots are coming.
Happy Sabbath
The Lord is the Creator.A Potter who can decide on His clay (Jeremiah 18:6),we are just subjects. Should we wait for Him to ask us the questions? We know not about the way He created the world.More so we were not there when He decided for our salvation,we should learn to trust Him
Absolutely beautiful Mr Ashton!! I can only imagine what it look like in real life (jaw dropping!) Thanks for sharing! The Lord is awsome; great things he has done!
My brothers and sisters, we serve an awesome God. I pray that we will let go of self and let God. Friends with all the knowledge and experience humanity still live in doubt and Uncertainty. The birds, the trees, the water, the sun and moon obey God; yet humanity falls in the troop of disobedience.
I am so glad that we can come to God in faith and humility, and plead with Him until our souls are brought into a close relationship with Jesus and we can lay our burdens at His feet, saying, "I know whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day". The Lord is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think.
Let us follow in the footsteps of Jesus, for He promised, he that followed Him will never walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.
Heavenly Father, please send your Angeles to watch over us today. God bless
After finishing reading today's lesson a bible verse that came to my mind was Psalm 8:4 "what is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You visit him?" (NKJV). Praise be our God that in Jesus Christ He visits us all.
Amazing how what Satan sought to use to over throw Job's faith, God used to grow his faith. It shows that the Great Controversy is between them not us verse Satan. What ever maybe your entrapment, give it to God, for he is the only one who can over throw your demise.
I humbly bow and say with the Psalmist in Psalm 8:3,4 - When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou has ordained, what is man that thou art mindful of him, and the son of man, that thou considerest him? Job was unable to answer one of God's questions despite the fact that he was perfect and upright, one that shun evil. Even though he spoke so rightly about God as opposed to the other men he still knew so little about his Creator and His creation. This tells me that no matter how much we think we know, and how much we have studied the deep things of God, like the vast Universe with all the galaxies and stars, we still know so little.
Indeed this is how great our God is. He reveals Himself more in mysteries. God's purpose is to conceal more of Himself than He makes known to man. Could men fully understand the ways and works of God, they would not then believe Him to be the infinite One. He is not to be comprehended by man in His wisdom, reasons and purposes. His ways are past finding out.
Our duty is to Trust and Obey Him.
To answer the question on Tuesday; God appears to men on this fallen world for the purpose of saving them through "reproof, correction, and instruction in righteousness" that we might be made "perfect" in order to bring each willing soul to the kingdom when it is again restored for eternity. In God's response to Job (and the others), we must see this purpose. Isn't this story for our benefit as well? We need perfect faith in God who in this appearance gives evidence for unshakable faith. This evidence surrounds us, and can be found everywhere by any who have faith the size of a mustard seed.
Nice that the beauty that would otherwise escape our vision, can be often captured in a photograph. More than ever is this purpose of God to save "to the uttermost" vital to understand as He is now preparing the Remnant of God to stand through a trial with a magnitude yet to be witnessed by a people. They must stand in perfect faith. Will these lessons help to bring such a faith to us? Isn't there more evidence today than ever before in the history of Adam's fallen race?