Job 38:1-6

G. The Cycle of Speeches between Job and God 38:1-42:6

Finally, God spoke to Job and gave revelation that Job had been demanding for so long (cf. Job 13:22; Job 31:35). There was now no need for the middleman that Job had requested who could mediate between them (cf. Job 9:33; Job 16:19). Yahweh spoke directly to Job, and Job had the opportunity to respond directly to God.

"God challenged both Satan and Job by confronting them with his wondrous works. And since Job himself is the divine work by which Satan was challenged, it is through the success of this challenge to Job that God perfects the triumph of his challenge to Satan." [Note: Kline, p. 486.]

What God did not say to Job is as surprising as what He did say. He did not mention Job’s suffering, He gave no explanation of the problem of evil, and He did not defend Himself against Job’s charge of injustice. God simply revealed Himself to Job and his companions to a greater degree than they had known, and that greater revelation silenced them. He proved Himself to be the truly wise Person.

"The reader is told why Job was suffering in the Prologue, but that is to show that Job was innocent. Job was never told this; had he been told, the book would immediately lose its message to all other sufferers. So the book is teaching us through the divine theophany that there is something more fundamental than an intellectual solution to the mystery of innocent suffering. Though the message reaches Job through his intellect, it is for his spirit." [Note: Smick, "Job," p. 1029.]

"To Elihu the suffering may bring enrichment; to the author of the book of Job it is the presence of God that is enriching, and that presence is given to men of integrity and piety in prosperity and in adversity alike." [Note: Rowley, pp. 20-21.]

". . . whereas the advice of Elihu is to learn his lessons that his prosperity may be restored, the effect of the Divine speeches is to make Job realize that he may have the Divine fellowship in his sufferings, and not merely when he has been delivered from them." [Note: Ibid., p. 229.]

God’s role in His speeches was not that of a defendant on trial, whom Job the prosecutor charged with injustice. Rather, He was the Prosecutor asking the questions of Job, the defendant. He asked him more than 70 unanswerable questions and proved him both ignorant and impotent. Wiersbe found 77 questions that God asked Job in chapters 38-41. [Note: Wiersbe, pp. 23 and 76.] Since Job could not understand or determine God’s ways with nature, he obviously could not comprehend or control God’s dealings with people. Who is the truly wise person? It is not Job, or his three older friends, or his younger friend, Elihu, but God. He alone is truly wise.

"In the end the point is that Job cannot have the knowledge to make the assessments he made. It is wiser to bow in submission and adoration of God than to try to judge him." [Note: The NET Bible note on 38:1.]