Study of Job 13:5

I worked on this in September of 2021. I apparently didn’t finish as I have two alternatives with neither one circled. It is Easter 2024 and I wanted to do a quick piece before church. My brain says, “This will be interesting.””

The second option was:

If only you could keep silent,

   It would make you seem wise.

I like this as it is derogatory from the speaker towards the audience and makes it seem wisdom or keeping silent are not possible for some. In my scattered daily reading, I read a piece from years ago on today (March 31), that says “Wisdom is God skillfully guiding you.” I really like that, and it follows this concept that some simply cannot be wise, in this case because they do not allow God to lead them.

The first option was:

If only you would keep silent,

   It would count as a mark of your wisdom.

I like this one because it makes the allusion of wisdom purely one’s choice. Looking like you are wise and being wise are indeed two separate things, but the idea is that you have the choice to not look like a fool trying to use words to make others think you are wise.

The two biggest goals in life should be to gain salvation by accepting Christ as our Lord and savior and then glorifying God by allowing Him to be our Lord. Being seen as wise when you are not, will not gain salvation, and someone who does not have salvation is not following God to give Him glory. Therefore, the fool in this verse is not a Christian if their only goal is to not look the fool.

I prefer my first option. The whole of our life is a series of choices we make based on who we are. If we are godless, we make choices to satisfy our worldly desires and look the fool to those whose only remaining goal is to glorify God, and quite simply, no one else cares. If we are Christians, we struggle with the sin nature’s desire to do as the fool opposing the call from the Holy Spirit to deny the sin nature and glorify God. We want to be active in pursuing things that will glorify God and be silent with words that would detract from that.

So choose to be wise by speaking positive when you should and avoid speaking negative when you should not. “Cat got your tongue.” is much better than “Wagging your tongue like a dog.”

PS – We had a big storm in town last night and power it out for many people with large electrical towers down. The pictures even made the Wall Street Journal this morning from little ole Cypress. Hiding in the middle of the house and praying the kids were able to get to shelter made for a stressful evening. Picking up the debris knowing we were all safe was easy work. Note everyone made it through and some of the damage was severe. There is a lot of pride in people refusing to believe in something bigger than themselves. Pray for those people around you.

Written 3/31/24, Posted 5/17/24, Job 289