Job 18 - 19

Bildad Speaks Again, and Job Answers

After reading Bildad's second response, I don't know which is worse - the accusations or the monotony of his (and his friend's) speech.  Bildad scolds Job for speaking and defending himself, then Bildad defends his and his friend's intelligence, and warns Job against histrionics.  That alone would be enough to torment Job considering his terrible condition, but Bildad is not finished.

He preaches a lecture, in a chiding and condescending tone, about wicked people and the punishment they will receive.  Is Bildad trying to say that Job is in the class of people about which he speaks?  Is he trying to warn Job against wickedness. His metaphors are thinly veiled and he even uses hunting devices, a net, snare, and noose, to say that the sin of wicked ones lead them to a trap (18:8-10). Again, like the first speech of Bildad, there is not a tinge of compassion in anything he says.

Job responds tersely to Bildad in chapter 19.  Job wants to know how long they will continue to torment and accuse him.  The words they speak hurt and he asks them to examine their attitudes and words in humilty (v. 3). Verse 4 sums up the interaction, "Even if I have sinned, that is my concern and not yours."  He answers Bildad's lesson on hunting snares in verse 6 stating, "It is God who has wronged me, capturing me in his net."

Job wants mercy.  He wants compassion and empathy.  He wants God and his friends to enter into his suffering and offer words of understanding. He reiterates his hopelessness and wonders why this has happened.  He has reached a point where is he physically repulsive to all of those who know and knew him (vs. 13-20) (some of the more poignant and lucid descriptions of his physical suffering). Job begs his friends for mercy in verse 21 - a call they do not heed.

Verses 25 - 27 are prophetic and allude to the redemptive power of Christ.  In all his suffering and abandonment by God and man, Job know that his redeemer lives and will raise him up to new life some day. The King James version states this in more poetic terms than the NLT. "For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though the skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another: though my reins be consumed within me." Yes, Job is suffering. Yes, he is seemingly alone in his struggle, but he knows,  he knows the grace of God will manifest in his life.

May God bless you and bless the reading of His Word.