Narrative Lectionary Key Verse for Today
“Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind... “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?””
NL Daily Devotion for Friday, August 24, 2018
by Dr. Kimberly Leetch, Clergy Stuff
The moral of this story is this -- God doesn't need another Armchair Quarterback. Job was such a person -- questioning God, God's ways, God's decisions, cursing God for things he knew nothing about.
But God wasn't having it. God challenged Job right back. "Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?" God reminds Job that God was the one who set everything in motion. God created. God destroyed. God loved. God lamented. And God has a hand in everything that happens, big and small. Who is Job to question God?
I question God a lot. To be fair, God was patient with Job. Quite patient. Really, really patient. No, like remarkably and unbelievably patient! God let Job go on for a good 38 chapters or so before speaking up. I don't think it's the questioning that upset God. It was the arrogance and ignorance with this Job challenged God's decisions.
While there is challenge in God's words, there is comfort, too. If God has a hand in providing for the ravens, how much more will God provide for people! So go ahead and question. But remember who God is and how God is with you.
Narrative Lectionary Daily Reading:
Job 38.1-15, 39-41
Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind: “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up your loins like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me.
“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements—surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone when the morning stars sang together and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy? “Or who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb?— when I made the clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band, and prescribed bounds for it, and set bars and doors, and said, ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stopped’?
“Have you commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its place, so that it might take hold of the skirts of the earth, and the wicked be shaken out of it? It is changed like clay under the seal, and it is dyed like a garment. Light is withheld from the wicked, and their uplifted arm is broken.
“Can you hunt the prey for the lion, or satisfy the appetite of the young lions, when they crouch in their dens, or lie in wait in their covert? Who provides for the raven its prey, when its young ones cry to God, and wander about for lack of food?”
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