AS WE STUDY the interactions between Job and his friends, we notice that their emphasis on age as a source of wisdom stands out prominently. Job’s three friends—Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar—wield their advanced years like credentials, assuming age automatically confers deeper understanding. This pattern emerges first with Eliphaz the Temanite, who opens with subtle condescension:…
Author: Curtis L. Mattson
Dust to Destiny: Our Created Purpose
AS I PONDER man’s place in God’s creation through the lens of the Book of Job, several key passages stand out to me. In Job 7:17-18, Job asks, “What is mankind that you make so much of them, that you give them so much attention, that you examine them every morning and test them every…
Curses, Questions, and Doubts
When Do Curses and Questions Cross the Line? JOB’S VERY FIRST SPEECH (Job 3) introduces a large and recurring theme of the book. What is the place and nature of doubt and questioning in our relationship with God? Indeed, Job was neither the first nor the last Bible figure to experience—and express—doubt, disappointment, and even…
Job’s Understanding of Salvation
SOME PEOPLE SAY that true salvation is not to be found in the Old Testament. However, a closer look at the Book of Job shows that Job indeed seems to understand—at least in a primitive way—all the elements of salvation. He understands sacrifice and advocacy before a judge. Job says to God, “Why do you…
Should We Expect Any Good In This World?
THE BOOK OF JOB points out at least one trouble that we bring upon ourselves. That trouble occurs when we think, either because of some imagined worthiness in mankind, our cleverness and self-sufficiency, or even from our being saved by grace, that we should be immune from natural calamity or purposeful wickedness in the present…
Depressed in Uz
THOUGH I AM HARDLY a psychiatrist, and the Book of Job is far from a textbook on mental health, we can easily see how much Job’s experience displays the classic symptoms of clinical depression. And though the text is not intended as therapeutic, it can provide hope and clarity to individuals grappling with mental health…
Stock Exchange on the Range
ANOTHER THEME THAT ECHOES through the conversation between Job and his friends—sometimes loudly, sometimes quietly—involves his wealth. Unfortunately for his friends, their words reveal more of their attitude toward money than it does about Job’s. If you recall, the book states right from the start that Job was among the richest men of his time…
Theology Is for Cowards
THROUGHOUT THE BOOK of Job, we find Job’s three friends spouting theology of greater or lesser accuracy and applicability to Job in the face of his adversity. Their knowledge of God is praiseworthy, considering what little revelation of God’s character and plan would have been available by the date this book was presumably written. However,…
Justice Delayed and Blessings Denied
One of the most difficult things about the Christian life — one that perhaps requires the most faith — is God’s apparent delay in dispensing both judgment and blessing. If we’re honest, in some cases this delay is a good thing. That is, the Lord himself says he is “slow to anger” (Exodus 34:6; Numbers…
The Deepest of Disappointments
WHAT IF SOMEONE or something you love so deeply turns out to be something different? Turns out to disappoint you, deceive you. How do you feel after you have worked so hard, given up so much, and built your whole life around him, her, or it, then that person or thing changes—or worse, abandons you?…