Job 15:25
Because they raised their fists towards God,
Acting in defiance of the Almighty.
It snowed the night before last and last night was probably a record cold, but with no rain and no long freeze, it looks like the kids got out of two days of school for nothing. Better that then lots of accidents, but it does make it amazing that other places keep going in the winter. Of course, I like to ride my bike when it’s over 100, but to each his own.
‘Because’ was also ‘for’; ’raised’ was also ‘stretched out’, ‘lifted’, or ‘shakes’; and ‘fist’ was also ‘hand’ or ‘arm’.
‘Acting in’ was ‘bid’, ‘vaunts’, ‘strengthens’, ‘trying his might’, ‘assaulted’, and ‘played the hero’. ‘Defiance of’ was also ‘against’.
One of the concepts in my daily reading was that whoever is not against us is for us. (Luke 9) The reverse also seems to be true, whoever is not for us is against us. Back in my logic class, this might not follow, but I think this is the way the nominal brain works. I gave our Muslim neighbor a ride home the other day when I saw him walking home in the almost cold. My sinful nature wants to treat him as an enemy, but my repentant heart knows that God wants me to love him in such a way as to draw him near to Christ.
In the Old Testament, many of the Jews enemies are defined by their religion as serving a false god. In our world today, there are many other religions, but it does not make everyone who follows them an enemy. Even the terrorists who hate America and want to kill Christians believe in the God of Abraham. They simply reject Christ and all that is in the New Testament telling the world how the Old Testament was fulfilled.
The final idea is that even the Christian before they were a Christian acted in defiance of God and raised their fists at God wanting to follow their own pride and make their own way in the world. Between all the things I seem to be busy doing, I see this theme of God pushing us to stop judging others. Many of the ways we judge others is because we too have done or are doing those same things wrong. As a bicycle rider who runs stop sign while on the bicycle, I am irritated by people who do the same in their cars. My bike isn’t going to hurt anyone, but it doesn’t make my behavior right.
God saved us not to judge others, but to love them. We too had pride and continue to hold onto it in every way we think might be allowed. I have a blue and orange shirt that I decided yesterday I need to give away. I really like blue and orange things, but the shirt is simply too small. But I want to keep the other 50 or so blue and orange shirts I have. Some where in my head I am learning to balance ‘what I have’ with ‘what I need’ and ‘what I need to get rid of’. It’s a battle. I might lose another 50 pounds and fit in this shirt again one day. I might use some of these 50 different colors of paper my mom left. My guess is that we all need to learn to listen to God for even these little things rather than try to do so much on our own.
Written 1/22/25, Posted 3/20/25, Job 365