You know, sometimes the stuff Job's friends say sounds pretty right on track. Here, Zophar has three main points for Job: the wicked enjoy riches or prosperity only for a short time, eventually the wicked will be reduced to dust and begging on the streets, and that the wicked will feel the full brunt of God's anger. At times, his statements seem to ring true: that evil, though sweet in the mouth, will turn to venom in the stomach. Evil can kill. The Bible would even back him up in some things: check out Psalm 37:35-36, for example. Job's friends take a sliver of truth to disguise the whole of the message that they are preaching. Zophar's is that God is angry with Job and that is why Job is not prospering. And if things continue in this vein, Job can expect worse. But we already know that God is not in fact angry with Job. Quite the opposite, up to this conversation. Rather, God allowed this to happen to prove a point, both to Satan and to Job, and well, actually, to us. His purposes for pain are not always to punish. Nor are riches and prosperity always a reward. Nor, if we are rewarded, will we always be rewarded with prosperity. We'll see this play out more at the end of Job. But for now, these friends who speak with so much assurance and so much self-righteousness, just might be stacking up God's own anger by presuming to speak for Him.
Tomorrow's Reading: Job 21:1-34
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