Job 8-14: Iyyob begs God to end the war against him

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As we go through this book, Iyyob (Job) and his friends become more hostile. His friends can’t convince Iyyob that he is a unrepentant sinner, and Iyyob can’t convince his friends of his integrity. Iyyob said God was fighting against him, but Iyyob would not assume to fight against God.

When you read the book of Job, I’d advise you to ignore the italicized words. Just read the statements as they are. The book was written in a different poetic form. In English, they try to make the story more flowing, but we forget that these men are carrying on an argument, which make us uncomfortable.

Each of the friends of Iyyob (Job) have a different paradigm that they are looking at Iyyob’s predicament. They sat there for seven days just observing Iyyob without saying anything. They waited for Iyyob to speak first, and then they began to prove Iyyob wrong in his approach. We can see how these men view the Creator. 

Iyyob’s friend Bildad the Shuhite used the phrase “If you…” quite often implying that Iyyob was the opposite.  Bildad the Shuhite told Iyyob that he didn’t really know who God is. 

Iyyob replies to Bildad the Shuhite in chapter 9 and his response is not a pleasant rebuttal. Do people argue quietly and silently? No, we often raise our voices. 

This was not a test on Iyyob’s wife or on his friends or Iyyob’s children. The one being tested is Iyyob. 

Iyyob warns  Bildad the Shuhite not to content with God, yet Iyyob is contending with God. What did God want Iyyob to see? What does God want Iyyob to repent of? We don’t know, but Iyyob’s friends assume they know what Iyyob did wrong and how to correct his life’s current course. 

Iyyob went on to say that God is too big to be perceived:

“Were He to snatch away, who could restrain Him? Who could say to Him, ‘What are You doing?'” (Job 9:12)

How can one challenge God? Iyyob had already asked God to show Iyyob is iniquity so he could repent and God was silent. 

Iyyob’s friend’s sound logical with their strong accusations. They even call him a hypocrite. What kind of friends are these, we wonder?

Iyyob responds to God with lots of bitterness but God never accused Iyyob of rebellion. 

In Iyyob 9:27, Iyyob started addressing God:

“If I should awash myself with snow and cleanse my hands with lye, yet You would plunge me into the pit, and my own clothes would abhor me.” (Job 9:30-31)

All of us will end up in the same dirt, the wicked and the righteous end up in the same place. Our “righteousness” doesn’t count for much or give us an advantage. 

Romans says that while we were at war with God, God delivered us out of that warfare. God won that war. We see here that in a sense: Iyyob is at war with God. 

Iyyob said God was fighting against him, but Iyyob would not assume to fight against God:

“According to Your knowledge I am indeed not guilty, yet there is no deliverance from Your hand.” (Job 10:7)

We find out later that Iyyob was correct in this assessment of himself. God did not consider him a guilty, wicked man. Iyyob admits that no one can deliver him from what God is allowing to happen, God is destroying Iyyob and no one can stop God’s hand.

Zophar the Naamathite was the next friend who responded. He was going to straighten Iyyob out. Have you ever tried to straighten out someone’s attitude? Was that successful? 

Iyyob responded to Zophar the Naamathite. These men were close friends but they don’t seem like very good friends, do they? Iyyob tells his friends that their “wisdom” is worthless and will die with them, but God’s wisdom is eternal and His power is overwhelming. 

“He reveals mysteries from the darkness and brings the deep darkness into light.” (Job 12:22)

When we kill a person, it is murder, but when God takes a life, it means their life is complete. He makes nations great and then destroys them. We think men are the ones who makes nations powerful and takes them down but God is the one in control. 

In Iyyob 13, he repeats a comment to his friends, “What you know I also know; I am not inferior to you.” He reproves his friends as “worthless physicians” and wants to “reason” with God about this current circumstance. 

Iyyob asked God two things: “Only two things do not do to me, then I will not hide from Your face: Remove Your hand from me, and let not the dread of You terrify me” (Job 13:20-21). God did remove His hand and allowed Satan to torment him and Iyyob had to hide himself from God. Iyyob doesn’t want to hide from God anymore. Adam and Eve hid themselves from God, Jonah tried to hide himself from God. None of these attempts to hide from God worked very well. 

Iyyob asks God, “How many are my iniquities and sins? Make known to me my rebellion and my sin. “Why do You hide Your face and consider me Your enemy?” (Job 13:23–24) 

As we go through this book, Iyyob and his friends become more hostile. His friends can’t convince Iyyob that he is a unrepentant sinner, and Iyyob can’t convince his friends of his integrity. 

“Oh that You would hide me in Sheol, that You would conceal me until Your wrath returns to You, that You would set a limit for me and remember me!” (Job 14:13)

Iyyob expresses a lot of hopelessness in Iyyob 14. He asks God to kill him so that God will not be angry with him anymore. 

Before Yeshua came, God spoke directly with people, including Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses and others but now He speaks to us through His Son, Yeshua. 

“If a man dies, will he live again? All the days of my struggle I will wait until my change comes. You will call, and I will answer You; You will long for the work of Your hands.” (Job 14:14-15)

Iyyob knew there was a resurrection. But he wanted to hurry up and die so he would not have to withstand God’s wrath anymore and hoped that at the resurrection, God’s anger would subside. He asks God not to focus on his sins. He asks God to seal up his transgressions in a bag and to cover up his iniquities. Iyyob feels he can’t escape the sins of his youth, that God is rebuking him now for those past sins. 

God didn’t just destroyed Iyyob’s present but his future. Iyyob would not have any children to give away in marriage, no hope of grandchildren, no money, no animals, no army. He only had three surviving servants of his entire household. It’s easier to accuse Iyyob of wrongdoing than to wrestle with what God is doing. It’s easier to accuse Iyyob’s children of iniquity than to deal with the uncomfortable truth that sometimes good righteous people die painful, horrible deaths. Why did God take away all of Iyyob’s children? The truth is that the righteous die and the wicked die. They have this in common. 

God was teaching Iyyob, Iyyob’s friends, and all of us who read this book a lesson. God doesn’t do this to every human being. 

Speaker: Richard Agee. Summary: Tammy.