Insightful Musings on the Scriptures

by

Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67

Good morning, dear ones.

No jog again. Phooey! There were some emergencies yesterday evening that whisked Becki away…all having an effect on this morning’s lateness.

I am trying to carry on with this table project. After solving one engineering problem, it’s like another arises. I guess that keeps it interesting.

I ran a little long again this morning. I would like to have given more attention to analyzing Zophar. I have reason to label him as a “properity cultist.”

May your day be blessed.

Love, Dad/Ray.

Who would have expected that this gathering of men surrounding the terrible disaster and suffering of Job would be turned into a heated philosophical and theological debate? On second thought, I guess this should present no big surprise. This same debate is raging throughout our world today. In fact, I’m now seeing it at the heart and core of nearly all human conflict—a competitive debate over who’s right and who’s wrong about God and things important. It can become so heated that men will move beyond the arena of verbal debate and kill. We behold the debate progressing to extreme extremes in our day with the development of weapons of mass destruction—intimidating punctuations of support for a rigid version of right and wrong.

This human conflict surrounding Job offers no encouragement for me. I see no evidence of any good coming from it—no evidence that any party ever changes their view as a result of input from another perspective. So when Job presents a view that is not compatible with that of his “friends,” or visa versa, it only heats things up hotter. No one ever says anything like, “Thank you. I appreciate that. I never thought of it that way before.” Instead, these friends turn very unfriendly.

Pondering all this in the context of our own nation of today, I’m recognizing with greater clarity how valid this observation really is—that the main issues being debated are really theological at their base. The two basic views in conflict can be reduced to two basic views about God. The one side on the far right insists that Creator God has every right to set the rules and we are accountable to Him. Therefore, we should honor His design and standards. The extreme of the other side insists that God should not be allowed to have anything to do with what they want to do. The notion that we are in any way accountable to Him is offensive to them. They will even try to establish laws that prohibit any such offense—like a “separation of church and state”—like making it illegal to display the Ten Commandments in public view—like removing “In God We Trust” and prayer in schools—like killing babies when resulting from their promotion of recreational sex—like totally opposing Biblical revelation in an effort to sanction same sex marriage (a perversion of not only function, but the very definition of the word), etc. Do you see it?—it’s all very theological.

Do you recognize the arrogance of Zophar? On one hand his “wish that God would speak” is not a bad one. But he presumes to know how God would direct His words. He is so engrossed in his own righteousness and dogma that he really believes that if God did speak so as to settle the issues, He would blast Job and applaud Zophar. To be sure, God does speak at the end of this particular debate but does quite the opposite—blasting Zophar and applauding Job.

Also, to be sure, there is no end in view of this debate on planet earth—not till God Himself strips away the separation of God and man and enters the debate with absolute TRUTH—leaving no room for even a trace of opinion—when He speaks to settle all debates once and for all. You don’t have to be exceptionally brilliant to know what to do in the mean time.