This chapter will conclude Job’s final argumentation. This chapter shows you where it all goes wrong, you start to see where even he can’t break out of the divine retribution principle. Beyond that, you see some incorrect perceptions and reactions to suffering. If you don’t get what’s going on in this chapter, then Elihu just looks like a dork. If you understand what’s going on here, then Elihu is cool. It is popular for scholars to rag on Elihu, but that is inappropriate and often because of what is a popular opinion.
If we depend on science for the way we understand the world, we’re wrong because that doesn’t have as much certainty as scripture. You have to establish what you trust, who you get your information from. When you listen to science, you listen to it with a grain of salt because it is coming from man, but when you listen to God you listen with submission, because it's coming from an all-knowing God. This is what Job is about. Who do you trust: the bible or science? You have to draw back to authority.
A lot of things that humans engage in can be fictional, they are not real. In the movie “A Beautiful Mind,” there is a brilliant mathematician who sees hallucinations and eventually they drive him to do things. In the end, he has to say, “You’re not real!”. That is what you have to understand. A lot of the philosophy in the social sciences, hard sciences, or whatever is actually not real and they are telling you information that is not real. It might be partly true but it’s not the whole story.
People don’t really question whether things are real or binding. Those issues of epistemology are central. When people start to question this, they get disturbed if they really start to think about it. You have to press yourself and others to do so. Then you will start to realize this is why you need God’s word. This is the only anchor point you have.
The way you work with an atheist is by working with the question of existence. How do you know you exist? How do you know that you’re not a frog that is having pulses put through you that make you think that you are a human? This answer is they don’t know. Why? Because they can’t think outside of themselves. So wouldn’t it be convenient if someone told you that you were human and that you do exist? At that moment it requires something external and at that moment you show the need for divine revelation and that everyone depends on a form of divine revelation. From there you have to work through what divine revelation is, how you figure it out, how a divine individual reveals himself to you. You go step-by-step and they can reject it in the end but then you say that this was all a part of divine revelation, and they can’t break free of the system, they actually are self-proving that they are wrong.
The point is Job is an important book and the issue of epistemology is very important when you go to people and to your church. Work with them, people don’t realize what they are buying into. Help them understand, which is why Job is so important as an opening book to the bible.
At this point in the discussion Job has beat up his friends and shows them why they are wrong and after pointing them back to God Job dovetails down in trying to defend himself. He has proposed that his friends cannot figure out how such a great man like him could become the loser he is now. The problem with this is in Job 29:18. Job is illustrating how great he was. He was thinking along the terms of divine retribution principle. Similarly, in Job 30:26 Job was anticipating that he deserved good, but evil came. He was thinking in the divine retribution principle but not in the sense that bad people get bad things, but good people should get good things, so God is wrong and misjudged him. Job is still stuck in the box. There is a self-righteousness to Job that results from divine retribution because he talks about having to be with the poor and how he shouldn’t have had to be with them. He is making a judgment call based upon divine retribution and elevating himself over them. That is the attitude of self-righteousness. Divine retribution principle really drives the attitude of the self-righteous. There is only one way you can go from here, either his friends say if God is right then Job is wrong or Job will say if I am right then God is wrong. When you hear these words, you should be shocked at what Job says. At this point Job breaks cover and you see that he has crossed the line.
There are a few things to think about as we go through chapter 31. We start to see how the thesis “God is right” plays out. It is not only because Job’s friends are wrong, but also because of Job he is wrong and that means God is right. Because Job is wrong it points to God’s rightness. His friends are wrong, they cannot figure out God, they have the wrong kind of system and equation, and because God transcends it His ways are blameless and right. On the flip side of the divine retribution principle, we begin to see the author point out how Job is wrong. On one hand, there are some things that are good about Job in the sense of pursuing the Lord, but on the other hand, that can (and did here) turn into self-righteousness. Some things Job does are not bad things to imitate in and of themselves, but the way Job made it was that he had to be good, and God had to be wrong. A lot of what Job says is not evil; how he uses it is. Because we don’t always get rid of the divine retribution principle suffering can force someone into a situation where they have to make certain assumptions about God and their situation. It can go into a self-righteous attitude, that it is not fair, and God shouldn’t have done that to them. What happens if suffering isn’t about what you deserve or don’t deserve, but God does it for a totally different reason? Then all of the sudden you are no longer in the mode of justice; you have to think about different purposes of God entirely. You could also conclude that God has to be a certain way because He did that to you based on your preconceived notion which is faulty. We need to warn people against this, people can become just like Job, it is not hard.
If you rely on human wisdom to figure it out, you will end up with divine retribution principle because that is what makes sense to us, that resonates with our innate sense of justice. You have to step back and realize you don’t know; God does, so you listen to what he says. That’s where the gospel comes in and then the gospel says you are not anything. You don’t bring anything to the table except your sin. You have no right to be self-righteous, only God is right, and He makes right so therefore you cannot boast in anything you do because it gives you no credit. Divine retribution is a philosophical heart issue and tied with that is our reliance on human wisdom. That is what you have to root out first and then you can start to deal with everything else.
Job 31:1
Job argues that he has done what is right. Two things to note: making a commitment to purity is not a bad idea, but how does this work? Job is saying he has made a covenant with his eyes and therefore it is impossible for him to ever do it. The fallacy is that he is the source. He is asserting that he does it then it is all him. At that moment you start to see that Job has a high view of himself. At this moment he becomes self-righteous. New Year's resolutions prove that Jobs' view doesn’t work.
Job 31:2-3
Job sounds like his friends here, so some people think it is Zophar’s missing speech. It is not Zophar’s speech, this is Job talking because he can’t get out of the divine retribution principle.
Job 31:4
Job says that God sees his way and he numbers his steps. Remember that for later. Job knows God is going to evaluate him and in light of that Job begins to discuss his righteousness with a series of if-then statements. Skim chapter 31 and you will see “If” over and over again. Job is saying if he does “x” then God is right to judge him. Two things are implied from this. One, he has not done it, but if you read these statements, you see that the “if” is ridiculous.
Job 31:5-6
The word accurate here is the same as just or right. This implies that God has weighed him with unjust scales. Job is charging God with injustice. The irony in this is that God is the one who said “Look at my servant Job, who is blameless.” in Job 2:3. God knows Job is full of integrity to begin with, God wasn’t even weighing him with unjust scales to begin with, He was always righteous, but Job doesn’t think so.
Job 31:7-8
This implies that Job has never let his eyes rule his heart and he has never deviated from God’s command.
Job 31:9
This is now dealing with personal integrity issues. You can’t see what’s going on in a heart and if you’re lurking in the doorway you are hidden. Job is saying if he has done anything that is remotely deceitful if he has pretended to be something that he is not. This implies that he has never done that. That he has never done anything that masks what is on the inside, ever.
Job 31:10-12
The idea here is that this is a sexual sin. The idea is that Job could be condemned for that because it is wrong but that right now, he is being condemned for nothing, so God is wrong. Job is arguing of course this sin would deserve divine retribution, this type of sin should be judged.
Job 31:13-15
This moves from personal integrity type of questions to societal type of questions and gets more ridiculous. Job argued that if he had done this then when he and God came face to face, he would acknowledge that he had nothing to say because he was wrong. In verse 15 Job is saying we are all equal, he understands equality relative to humanity.
Job 31:16-18
So, is Job telling us that every time he saw an orphan, he gave them everything they wanted, and every time he saw a poor person, he gave them whatever they demanded? Think about that in this society. Do you always give the poor everything they ever desire? Even if you say you help the poor what do they sometimes demand of you? Take them to your home and feed them forever. Do you do those things? No. Basically, Job is saying he ran a world organization that ended poverty. Job says from the womb he led the orphan, the guy, and the widow, the girl. Job is saying he grew up with them, claiming he views them all as a part of his family.
Job 31:19-20
This means not only if someone asks for Job’s help, but even if he only saw them. This is seeking people who might need clothing. This means that they are so satisfied that they have blessed him. Job is saying that he has gone to such an extent that people's bodies are thanking him.
Job 31:21
If I have raised my hand against the orphan is talking about abuse. Because I saw my help at the gate means that Job refuses to beat up the orphan even though he knew at the gate, because of his social privileged, people would help him in the act of mistreating the orphans. This portrays that Job actually thought he could do that, which shows you something about Job’s heart. Job is already thinking of situations in which he could violate things. This shows you that Job is an inventor of evil, Job is not a good guy. Even though he makes himself look like a good guy, but that is self-righteous.
Job 31:24-28
These verses all deal with Job’s spiritual state. That he would trust in silver and gold rather than God, that he would boast in his abundance of strength, and look upon the light and the moon and trust in them. His point his he never did anything but trust in God, but the reality is in boasting in that he is actually trusting in himself. Job is contradicting himself. Job says that it would be fair to be condemned based upon this.
Job 31:29-32
This is not an evil in society, it is dealing with something before the Lord. He is saying he has never done that. Instead, he says instead of bad-mouthing his enemies everyone who comes into his door is welcomed, can lodge for the night, and they are satisfied. This is for everyone, poor or rich, enemy or friend. Has Job really done all of these things?
Job 31:33-34
Job continues on back into some societal justices. This is talking about a coverup because of fear of people. Again, he says he never would have done any of that. Implying that this is not true for God.
Job 31:35
Job is saying God needs to deal with this. He is making a demand of God that He would answer Job. His signature means that he is making an official allegation. First, God has not answered anyone so far. Second, Job has asked God to answer him before in Job 23:5. Read that again. In this situation, God's answering was a miracle to Him because he knew that God had never answered anyone. Job said he would understand what God would say to him. At that point Job was receptive to God's answer, he was appreciative of God’s answer in Job 23. Here in chapter 31, you have Job asking for an answer not because he wants to listen to it, but because he demands it. The first time it was “I don’t know what happened I need you to answer me so I can understand.” now it’s “I do understand, you’re wrong and you need to come at me, you need to change what I say.”. Remember these kinds of answer statements, God’s answer is going to be a big deal. It not only shows a change in disposition in Job’s heart, but it goes beyond that.
Job 31:36
This gets crazy, the “it” is God’s inditement of Job. Let’s thing rationally, if God came to with a list of everything you did wrong would you wear it like a crown? No, it would be heavy even if it was in the smallest font. You wouldn’t wear it, who wants to wear a scarlet letter a-z of everything you have done wrong? Job is thinking that there would be nothing there. Now you see total self-righteousness. This is a problem.
Job 31:37
God sees all of Job’s steps, so Job is saying that God saw all of his steps, but He really didn’t. Job would tell Him what he did because he knows better, Job knows what was really going on. At this point Job’s own point about true wisdom being the fear of the Lord, he has completely lost it. To some extent, his friends have pushed him to the extreme. Job has presumed that if he does this then God should do that. As if the only reason that God could cause calamity is judgment. Job doesn’t have this information but that is fundamentally wrong, think about James 1, it says count it all joy because it refines you. It is not because you sinned it is because it produces patience, endurance, and perfection thereby. James is breaking you out of the divine retribution model.
Job 31:38-40
Job becomes environmental. What he has essentially argued is that “I’m right God, you're wrong” and that is how he ends his words. Job has taken care of his friends but now Elihu needs to take care of Job. Notice 32:2 Elihu burned with anger against both Job and his friends.