Inter-Varsity Press

Contents
Preface
Outline and structure of the book of Job
1. What is the book of Job about?
2. Do we live in a well-run world? ( Job 1:1 – 2:50)
3. Weep with those who weep ( Job 2:11 – 3:26)
4. What not to say to the suffering believer ( Job 4 – 27)
5. Two marks of a real believer ( Job 4 – 27)
6. Is God for me or against me? ( Job 19)
7. Why will God not answer my question? ( Job 28)
8. Why justification matters desperately ( Job 29 – 31)
9. A surprising new voice ( Job 32 – 37)
10. The God who is God ( Job 38:1 – 42:6)
11. The end comes at the end ( Job 42:7 - 17)
Postscript: So what is the book of Job about?

Extracts from the Preface

This book is not a treatment of a topic, whether the topic of suffering or of anything else. It is a study of the Bible book of Job. I want you to venture into the book of Job, to read, meditate, explore and pray this profound Bible book into your bloodstream. If you have never done so, my prayer is that this short study will help you find a way in. If you have ventured in but got bogged down and confused, I hope this introduction will signpost the main roads.

Job is a neglected treasure of the Christian life. It has spawned an enormous outpouring of scholarly work, and yet few Christians know quite where to start in appropriating its message for themselves. …

1. What is the book of Job about?

This book began as a sermon series on the book of Job. Twelve days before the first sermon, on 14th January 2003, Detective Constable Stephen Oake was stabbed and killed in Manchester. Why? He was an upright man, a faithful husband and a loving father. What is more, he was a Christian, a committed member of his church, where he sometimes used to preach. The newspapers reported the moving statement by his father, Robin Oake, a former chairman of the Christian Police Association: how he said through his tears that he was praying for the man who had killed his son. They told of the quiet dignity of his widow, Lesley. They showed the happy family snapshots with his teenage son Christopher and daughters Rebecca and Corinne.

So why was he killed? Does this not make us angry? ….

Job is a fireball book. It is a staggeringly honest book. It is a book that knows what people actually say and think – and not just what they say publicly in church. It knows what people say behind closed doors and in whispers; and it knows what we say in our tears. It is not merely an academic book. If we listen to it with any care, it will touch, trouble and unsettle us at a deep level.

Before we launch into the book, let me make two introductory points.

Job is a very long book

Job is 42 chapters long. We may consider that rather an obvious observation, but the point is this: in his wisdom God has given us a very long book. He has done so for a reason. It is easy just to preach the beginning and the end, and to skip rather quickly over the endless arguments in between as if it would not much matter if they were not there. But God has put them there.

… if this short study is treated as an alternative to reading the text of Job, it will be like reading a guide book to a foreign country as a substitute for actually visiting it, rather than as a preparation and accompaniment. This study is to help us read the book of Job itself. For we must read it, and read it at length and at leisure. …

Most of Job is poetry

About 95% of the book of Job is poetry. Chapters 1 and 2, the start of
chapter 32, and part of chapter 42 are prose. All the rest is poetry. But so what? Well, so quite a lot. For poetry does not speak to us in the same way as prose. For poems, says J. I. Packer, ‘are always a personal “take” on something, communicating not just from head to head but from heart to heart’. A poem can often touch, move and unsettle us in ways that prose cannot. Job is a blend of the affective (touching our feelings) and the cognitive (addressing our minds). …

2. Do we live in a well-run world?

(Job 1: 1 – 2: 10)
The scene is set (1:1– 5)
There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job, and that man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil. (1:1)

Job was ‘healthy, wealthy and wise’. This is what we would expect in a well-run world: that one who is wise will as a consequence be healthy and wealthy. After all, to be wise – in the Bible sense – means to fear and honour the living God (as human beings ought in their religion) and to turn away from wrongdoing (as human beings ought in their morality). And any self-respecting god who claims to be both fair and in control is surely bound to reward such a person with wealth and health. To do otherwise would be either unfair or evidence of weakness. Likewise we may expect to meet others who are ‘sick, poor and wicked’, their wickedness leading inevitably to illness and destitution. …

And now the horrifying surprise. Four sharp, quick, alternating scenes, the first three signalled by Now there was a day . . . We may picture them dramatized on a stage. Stage left, the Lord’s council chamber; stage right, Job’s land. As we walk through this staccato drama, let us watch for the four salient features or markers our story-teller wants to fix in our minds at the outset of our journey. It is vital for us to be absolutely clear about these; otherwise we shall be hopelessly confused when we get into the body of the book. And the storyteller also poses a big question.

• Marker 1: Job really is blameless
• Marker 2: Satan has real influence
• Marker 3: The Lord is absolutely supreme
• Marker 4: The Lord gives terrible permissions
• Question: Will Job prove to be a real believer?