Whirlwind
Job 38:1 – 7, 34 – 41
As we come to our lesson this week, Job continues to be defiant in exclaiming that he has been faithful, righteous and blameless. That he is being punished unjustly and he will make his claim against God, if he could only find him. Job says that a God that he believed was good and just not only has treated him unfairly, and that God will admit that and will accept his grievance and find him innocent of sinfulness when Job talks to him face to face but there is one problem; Job cannot find God. Job cries out, Where is God to be found so that I might talk to him?
What’s that Job? What do you want? You want to come face to face with God and argue your opinion of how God is mistreating you, and how you would change some things about how the world is run? What’s the old saying, “Be careful about what you ask for because you just might get it”?
So then we come to the first line in our scripture lesson in Job today is “Then the Lord answered Job out of a mighty whirlwind”. Not only has God not been absent during Job’s plight, but He has also been watching and listening and now He wants to talk to Job personally. Whether Job is ready for it or not, he is going to get a response from God to all of his accusations and challenges toward God.
For most of us the prospect of an audience with God would be terrifying, yet this seems to be what Job longed for and now it happens. Job did not find God but the Almighty knows right where Job is and has been and come to him with awesome power. Job does not come face to face with God as he wanted, but rather God comes to him in a most Old Testament sort of way, as a thundering voice out of a storm, out of a whirlwind.
We also meet this stormy God also at Mount Sinai in Exodus and in Psalm 18. Elijah was transported into Heaven in such a whirlwind. Many centuries later Ezekiel in Babylon will see “a stormy wind out of the north, and a great cloud” and met with God. Also Zechariah prophesies that “the Lord GOD will march forth in the whirlwinds of the south”. This seems to be a favorite means of communicating to the world when God wants their attention, He comes to us in a Whirlwind!
This particular storm which is described in the two preceding chapters to our lesson today, like the other Old Testament storms, speaks to the awesome and sovereign power of God. It also represents the turbulence and terror that Job’s own life has become. This great God speaks when and to whom he chooses. He is neither hurried nor humbled to do what Job demanded that He do. God coming in such a powerful and awesome manner humbles Job, and would humble us.
In the midst of the storms of Job’s life, God speaks to him but his tone and demeanor are not as Job had portrayed previously when Job said, that God would acquit me of all charges. In fact, what Job gets is not an acquittal or an admission of poor judgment by God. What he gets is a reorientation away from a fixation on himself and toward an understanding of the awesome power and authority of the Creator. God demands:
Why do you confuse the issue? Why do you talk without knowing what you’re talking about? Pull yourself together, Job! Up on your feet! Stand tall! Gird yourself because I have some questions for you, and I want some straight answers.
God is has not come to pass judgment on Job for supposed secret, but Job has spoken words, many words, and some of his words have lacked any wisdom or knowledge. He has spoken words critical about the God’s rule over the world and its effect on man, one man in particular, at least, Job. It is about Job’s words that God challenges him.
So the Almighty has decided to respond to Job and ask him exactly what he does know about the creation of the world. He asks Job: Where were you when I created the Earth. Tell me, since you know so much!
Who decided on its size? Certainly you’ll know that! Who came up with the blueprints and measurements? Job has no answer to that question.
How was its foundation poured, and who set the cornerstone, while the morning stars sang in chorus and all the angels shouted praise?
And who took charge of the ocean when it gushed forth like a baby from the womb? I wrapped it in soft clouds, and tucked it in safely at night. Then I made a playpen for it, a strong playpen so it couldn’t run loose, That, God thunders, was me and you weren’t there, I had not even created you yet. ‘Stay here, this is your place.
Who, Job, did these things? Do you remember the stories of my creative power, providential care and divine orchestration? Do you remember that? And suddenly, even though the pain did not go away, Job began to understand and with respect and humility Job was silent.
In his questioning God had taken Job on a Whirlwind tour of the universe that He created, beginning with the foundation of the earth, and the birth of the Sea. Throughout His response to Job, God spends a lot of time describing all kinds of fierce and untamed creatures — lions, mountain goats, deer, wild donkeys and oxen, ostriches, eagles — and two primordial chaos monsters, Behemoth and Leviathan.
But here is the curious part about God’s Whirlwind message this morning. Did you notice in that long list of creatures, terrestrial and celestial, there is one glaring omission: human beings have almost no place in God’s response. God does not address Job’s situation or Job’s questions about justice. God does not even acknowledge Job’s suffering.
Does all of this mean that we are no more important to the other things that the Creator had made? Can we simply be destroyed like the beasts of the wild, the creatures of the sea, the mountains and the waters without a thought or concern to God? Can the randomness of destruction that may happen to those things and seemingly happened to Job also be part of our lives as well without God being concerned or interceding on our behalf? Surely not!
What God’s Whirlwind does show is how God, the powerful and wondrous, created the universe and all of things in it. The stars and the mountains and the oceans and the beasts of the ground, the birds of the air and the creatures of the water were all created by him and he has control and dominion over them.
This thought however isn’t finished in Job, all those things that God created, he gave to mankind to enjoy and to have dominion over, in order to woo us to be in relationship with him, our Creator and Father. God may have taken a bet from Satan about Job, but let us not forget, He bet on Job!
Our Daily Walk tells us that we cannot be surprised if we discover similar mysteries in God’s dealings with ourselves. Like with Job, He does not answer our questions by telling us His secret reasons. His thoughts and ways are as much higher than ours, as the heavens are higher than the earth, and we could not more understand His reasons than tiny children can understand the mysteries of human life.
But behind all mystery, the Father’s heart is beating, and a Father’s voice is pleading, that we should trust Him. Little children, you cannot understand, but you are infinitely dear to me; I have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now; what I do know you cannot know now but you will know in the fullness of time. Trust me our Father says, and “let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.”
And then suddenly and forcefully, Job was finally able to see himself as part of the fullness of God’s plan and his story a little more clearly. Job became, not just an abandoned man suffering but one of the beautiful and awesome creations of God and at the full control, grace and mercy of the Creator. Job suddenly was able finally to look up from the pile of ashes on which he sat, to look through the pain that consumed him and to see that God was right there with him, and God had been there all along.
Hear the Good News my Friends……………….
“The Lord answers us in our whirlwinds.”
Whirlwinds are forces to be reckoned with. We have certainly seen over the past few weeks with the hurricanes that have ravaged so much of the country that whirlwinds must receive our attention when they arrive. They will deliver a message, an awesome message!
Wilber Kroll tells us that “the whirlwind that Job encountered was more than a product of nature. It was a divine messenger from the Lord. God used one of nature’s most awesome expressions of power to confront Job with his own frailty and weakness.”
The Whirlwind brought Job face to face with his lack of understanding of God. After he experienced the intensity of this whirling windstorm, he was brought to a fresh realization that God was far greater than he could comprehend. With his ignorance revealed, as we will see next week, Job will confess, “I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know” (Job 42:3).
In the midst of our distress, it is common to find fault with God. We think, surely God must have made a mistake for this to be happening to me. But such thinking is foolishness. With our limited understanding of what is truly happening both on earth and in heaven, we are arrogant to think that we are in a position to judge God’s actions.
God is not required to give you answers, but He is committed to bring you comfort. Avail yourself of what God offers, His presence in the midst of tribulation, and leave the rest up to someone far wiser than yourself. Answers don’t always comfort, but God’s response always will. God will respond to you in the midst your Whirlwind! Amen.