Bible Study: Job’s Friends

[Music] welcome to the online Bible study of the Old Testament book of Job today's reading jobs three friends when jobs three friends Elif as the temanite bildad the shuhite and so far the name of theit heard about all the troubles that had come upon him they set out from their homes and met together by agreement to go and sympathize with him and comfort him when they saw him from a distance they could hardly recognize him they began to weep aloud and they tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads then they sat on the ground with him for seven days and seven nights no one said a word to him because they saw how great his suffering was as we unpack the story of Job the great debate that had been happening in heaven and the heavenly realm in chapters 1 & 2 now gives way to the great debate on planet Earth we are introduced to jobs three friends we'll call them the Great Debaters because each of them will bring an argument of intelligence of incredible discussion and openness and maybe they'll dive deeper into some of the greater questions that we all have just below the surface in our own lives Elif as so far and Bildad all were leading intellectuals of their own time remember this story was most likely written eighteen hundred years before Jesus that gives us roughly thirty seven hundred years ago the news of job's calamity spread throughout the ancient world job's devastating economic loss must have been front line news his heart-wrenching loss of all of his children and the debilitating loss of his health would have captured everyone's attention no matter what time no matter what place no matter what world would have received this especially because job was a righteous man and everyone knew it even in our story God and Satan agreed job was the most righteous man in the world he still had his highest integrity there's no doubt that job's prominence among the world's elite in business and relationships and his own reputation was well known throughout the ancient world Ezekiel one of the prophets of the Old Testament mentions job along with Noah and Daniel as being the most righteous men of the Old Testament so why did these intellectuals travel and in one case why did they travel so far Elif as job's best friend his closest friend was from teman he was a temanite he traveled the farthest and most scholarly debates it said that he traveled 800 miles to see his friend teman was widely known in the ancient world as the capital of the intellectuals and all the people who were wise there even jeremiah mentions teman as one of the places where the best of the best the most scholarly people lived imagine for a moment what the financial investment must have been to get all of these men together to get Elif as all the way from teman who would have paid for that and why would they have done that for this man named job Zophar and Bildad were also intellectual heavyweights and they could hold their own in these great debates as we will see later on as we continue to read the impact of this great debate needed to be compiled for history every book that's ever written is written from a perspective so who was the writer of the transcript Elie Hugh he was a younger intellectual most likely a prodigy but he assembled a team to collect the story and to be sure that it was written down we might even say word for word the reals life's the real-life stories of great men and women make the best scripts for stories for our purposes I want us to agree the job was a real person and that the events that took place are factual there's plenty of argument out there that this story of job was actually written as a wisdom literature more like a story format but for you and I I want us to dive deeper and give job our respect give our friends the respect that these were real men who experienced real suffering in real time the poetic nature of the arguments are written in such a way that you and I could memorize them how else would you memorize something of this magnitude of this importance by putting it in a poetic form and putting it to music think of it as your favorite song why do you always remember every lyric to your favorite song because it tells the story and often our favorite songs are songs of love and suffering as we go deeper into the book of Job you'll notice that the basic human level the basic debate that we are introduced to goes into some deep discussions what did these great men come to see what did they expect to see when they arrived we'll learn more as we read further through the book of Job but on an elevated godly level the story of redemption is being played out and it's being challenged by Satan why would God want us to understand the value of suffering why would he want us to understand and be exposed to evil the question for me arises and maybe it has already for you would someone who is righteous and blameless who holds their integrity intact they do all the right things would they endure the testing the unimaginable losses to be sustained by God's love and not sin is our righteousness enough to make up for our sin we'll continue to read and we'll get to know these Friends of Job as you and I continue on the journey in the Old Testament book of Job [Music] you [Music]

Channel: Wheatland Salem Church

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Id: Z_O3F1AOVs4

Length: 7min 11sec (431 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 23 2020