Job

 Chapter  27  

"Job continues speaking to Bildad's address [1-6]."

"Zophar's third address to Job [7-23]."  

Job  27:1    "Moreover Job continued his parable, and said,"

Job paused for a moment, and Bildad did not answer, so Job continued to speak his parable or riddle, meaning that there is something hidden in this that goes much deeper.  It is warning us to look a little closer at the things of the universe, and urging us to study God's Word, if you are one of God's Elect that desire will be there.

Job  27:2   "As God liveth, Whou hath taken away my judgment; and The almighty, Who hath vexed my soul;"

Job is telling us that he loves Father; However, Job is still mixed up as to what is of the Father and what is from the devil.  We must guard against attributing the thing of God to the devil, and the things of the devil to our heavenly Father.  Satan that got permission from God to do all these things to Job, and plant all those boils on Job's body.  Satan killed Job's family, and took Job's wealth from him.  Satan is the one that "vexed" Job, yet Job is putting the blame for his being vexed on the Almighty God. 

Even though the Scriptures say these things, we must be intelligent enough to know that God expects the elect in the final day of this earth age to dig a little deeper.  This warning to us today, that we should not be caught up in the words being tossed around. 

Job   27:3   "All the while my breath is in me, and the spirit of God is in nostrils;"

Job  27:4   "My lips shall not speak wickedness, nor my tongue utter deceit."

As long as there is breath in my body, I will not speak wickedness of the Spirit of God.

Job  27:5   "God forbid that I should justify you: till I die I will not remove mine integrity from me."

God forbid that you are right, but I am innocent of all those things that you are accusing me of.  Job could not get these three friends to realize that just because of his lost wealth, and the boils covered his body, these things were not caused by any sin that he had committed.  They still considered Job guilty of sin because of visual things.

Job  27:6   "My righteousness I hold fast, and will not let it go: my heart shall not reproach me so long as I live."

Job is saying, I lived in righteousness from my birth, the day I could take responsibility until now.  I always tried to please God so there could be no reproach on me as long as I live.  Yet with this heart-felt message, these three friend's still will not listen to a thing that Job has said in his defense. 

Friend, when you start taking your advise from any man that does not have the wisdom of God's Word, this is the same type of advise that you will receive even in our generation.  Though they may be well meaning in their mind that they are correct, if what they have to say does not correspond with what is written in the Word of God, it is nothing but words, empty words with no meaning.  This world is full of instability, and the only thing that is rock solid in truth is God's Word.  In the manuscripts it also points out that when Job was saying this, he is going out of control and very frustrated. 

There is a break, where Job stops speaking and Zophar starts his third address to Job.  Bildad's accusations of Job so disturbed Job that the more he talked, the more Job was unable to continue speaking.     

Job  27:7   "Let mine enemy be as the wicked, and he that riseth up against me as the unrighteous."

Zophar is speaking out here to defend all the things that he has said against Job.  Zophar is telling Job right to his face that he is wicked, and what right have you to speak against me in your unrighteousness?     

Job  27:8   "For what is the hope of the hypocrite, though he hath gained, when God taketh away his soul?"

What hope is there of the hypocrite when God takes away his soul in the end? 

Job  27:9   "Will God hear his cry when trouble cometh upon him?"

Zophar is telling Job, look at you in your condition, do you think God is going to answer you when you continue to say that you are righteous? 

Job  27:10   "Will he delight himself in the Almighty? will he always call upon God?"

Again Zophar asks; "Are you going to continue to pretend that you are a delight to the Almighty, and call upon God?"  Remember that all three of these men were good friends before these troubles came Job's way.  People can be cruel at times, even our closest of friends, when the ideas of Satan creep in their minds and true understanding is missing.  These friends were not concerned of Job's sins but the sores and other things that had befallen Job.  They were assuming the worst of their old friend Job, and thus are making all these accusations.  That is the trouble with  mankind, for they assume the worst in a person when the trouble comes.  Then all that comes out of their mouth is words, endless words that just are not factual. 

Job  27:11   "I will teach you by the hand of God: that which is with the Almighty will I not conceal."

Job is inserting these two verses to respond to Zophar's accusation of him.  If you ever want to learn anything, the "hand of God" [God's Word] is where you start.  Job is saying that he will always bring forth anything that God reveals to him. 

Job  27:12   "Behold, all ye yourselves have seen it; why then are ye thus altogether vain?"

Job is remind all three of these men that they have witness how righteous of a man that Job was, so why are you speaking and accusing me of all these empty things.

Job  27:13   "This is the portion of a wicked man with God, and the heritage of oppressors, which they shall receive of the Almighty."

Zophar is going to continue with his third address to Job.  When we turn back to Job 20:29, we see that these words are being repeated from Zophar's prior address.  It is the words of Zophar, and in the Hebrew text it is beyond doubt.  Job is going to tell Job how you can tell the wicked man before God, it is the sign of the wicked man.   

Job  27:14   "If his children be multiplied, it is for the sword: and his offspring shall not be satisfied with bread."

"Man will be blessed with many children, and they will not be around to multiply."  Job's had many good children and they had all been killed.  Zophar is using this as a sign of something that had already happened, and it is not backed up by a prophet of God.  It is easy for Zophar to say these things after they had already come to pass and assume that what you are saying is truth.  However you can see how such a statement can hurt Job.  Job loved his children and even made sacrifices continually for each of his kids.  They are now all dead, and this joker is sitting there and rubbing their deaths in Job's mental wounds. 

Job  27:15   "Those that remain of him shall be buried in death: and his widows shall not weep."

If you ever need a friend to comfort you, I hope you do not draw one like this.  Zophar is now bringing up the loss of Job's wife, and using that remembrance to verify these empty words that he is spouting off to Job.   

Job  27:16   "Though he heap up silver as the dust, and prepare raiment as the clay;"

"Clay" is used here because of the condition of Job's raiment.  Job was a very rich man with much silver, as well as all the things that could be gotten in his fleshly life.  He was the richest man in the entire area, for God had greatly blessed him.  Now Zophar is using the loss of all these things that Satan had taken from him, to again accuse Job of unrighteous acts and wickedness in his life.  When in fact it was just the opposite, Job was a righteous man. 

Job  27:17   "He may prepare it, but the just shall put it on, and the innocent shall divide the silver."

Zophar is telling Job that God is not going to let you get away with any of your wickedness.  You may build your houses and wear your fine cloths, but in the end the innocent and poor shall divide the wealth.    

Job  27:18   "He buildeth his house as a moth, and as a booth that the keeper maketh."

This "booth that the keeper maketh" is a temporary structure where the keeper of the vineyard puts for the watchman that is suppose to protect the vineyard.  Both this booth of the watchman, and the house of the moth are very unstable and not built to last.

Job  27:19   "The rich man shall lie down, but he shall not be gathered: he openeth his eyes, and he is not."

This "rich" man spoken of here, is a man that is rich with ill-gotten gains.  God expects His people to have the ability to be well provided for.  There is nothing wrong with honest money, for the blessings of God are to be enjoyed in this lifetime.  So what Zophar is saying here is that one that is full of ill-gotten gains and rich, one day he wakes up and it is all gone.   

Job  27:20   "Terrors take hold on him as waters, a tempest stealeth him away in the night."

"Terrors" are disasters that come into his life like waters flowing wildly, and they will carry him away and out of control.  

Job  27:21   "The east wind carrieth him away, and he departeth: and as a storm hurleth him out of his place."

The "east wind" was the strong wind that comes off the desert and destroyed everything in it's path.  When the east wind is blowing it stirs the sand and in time you are lost.  You lose orientation of your surroundings.  In God's Word we must be very careful, if we are not familiar with the surroundings that are written with God's Word. How are you going to understand directions that are laid out in God's Word unless you keep focused the subject directed to our generation.  Don't let a tempest, or false spirit drag you off course. 

Job  27:22   "For God shall cast upon him, and not spare: he would fain flee out of his hand."

When you get away from the known path, there is nothing stable that you can count on for direction.  Zophar is telling Job that when you drifted too far from God, God will just cast you off and let you go. 

God's way is the true way, and in Christ we have the path for our lives.  If you allow your mind to drift off by strange spirits you will end up in the Antichrist's camp before it is all over.  Though you think that you are serving God, because of the east wind of strange spirits, you lose your orientation as to what is of God and what is of Satan.  These doctrines of strange spirits are being accepted more and more today.  This old world is being so twisted around that good is becoming bad, right is becoming wrong and those things of God are being called "of the devil".  We are being told to love the things that God hates, and accept and love the wicked and perverted that God has instructed us to flee from.  This is exactly what Zophar is doing in his attributing the things that Satan is doing to Job, to God.  He is making righteous Job out to be a wicked person.   

Job  27:23   "Men shall clap their hands at him, and shall hiss him out of his place."

So Zophar has used the things that can been see by outward appearance to form his accusations.  The things that can be seen plainly, can and many times are not what they seem to be.  This is gossip and story telling, for you take something that is know, something that is fact, and you build a falsehood around it that is nothing but fiction.  It is done in the press every day, and common in the gossip circles at the corner church house.  Because of what you assume to have happened, by what you are privileged to see with your eyes and understand with your mind, you build your lies around that story to give credence to what ever you want to make up.  You use partial facts, to build a complete lie.  The legal system, the government, and especially the press do this as common practice today.  This is the very nature of election polls. 

Job sits here with boils covering his entire body, so bad that these three can't even look upon him.  They know of Job's great wealth, and the kind of man he and his family were.  They knew his wife, and they were entertained in his home probably many times, and now it is all gone.  The riches, the land taken by the lenders, all of it is gone, and Job is sitting here with nothing, and now these three so-called friends are building their falsehoods around something that is real, and fact.  It all sounds good and truth, but in fact the entire premise is nothing but a lie. 

Just because these things are stated and assumed to be true, those looking on will clap their hand at those things that are stated, and hiss at the one that the stories are told about.  Mankind today finds joy in taking a man down, and the dismantling of his household and wealth.  Can you see the lesson in this for our generation and these times?  Job knew that he was innocent of all those things that are being said of him, however he simply doesn't have all the facts.  Job was not in heaven before the throne of God, when God granted Satan the right to test Job.  Satan did all these wicked and evil things, yet they were all assumed to be by God for something that happened, when in fact those things never happened. 

So now he is telling Job what true wealth is, he is saying that if you want to be happy in their world, you must be wealthy.  You must be very wealthy, however you must be wealthy with the right commodity.  However Job knows that true wealth is not gold nor silver, or anything that will pass as legal tender.  That is not real wealth, Job is letting these men know that his real wealth is not gone, and that is what the twenty eighty chapter is all about.